The Spirit of Christmas. Liz Talley

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      “And I’m a woman of mine. I told you that you could stay here for a few days…a month ago. Now it’s time to find some other sucker to mooch off. And you better leave the forty bucks you took out of my purse on the table before you leave. Oh, and the extra key.”

      Simon straightened. “I didn’t take your forty bucks. I borrowed it.”

      “Well, I want my borrowed money back or I’ll walk my butt down to the police station on the corner and file charges.”

      He threw his hands up. “Whatever. I’ll write you a check.”

      Not even worth the paper it was written on, no doubt. But it was better than nothing. “Fine.”

      “Don’t know why you’re busting my ass for forty bucks when you got a two-million-dollar check squirreled away.” He gave her a little-boy smile aimed at making her feel crummy for holding out on him. “Naughty little M.P.”

      His guilt trip didn’t work.

      “You went through my jewelry box?” Mary Paige curled her hands and parked them on her hips so she wouldn’t wrap them around Simon’s scrawny neck. What had she ever seen in him? Okay, he was cute in a starving artist, funky, unconventional way, but that was where the charm ended.

      Cookie Dreadlocks’s eyes widened. “She’s got a check for a cool two mil?”

      “Looks real,” Simon said, stretching before glancing at the girl he’d more than likely bopped on Mary Paige’s grandmother’s vintage table. “Is it real?”

      Mary Paige glared at him. “Of course not. Why would I have a check for that much lying around for you to find? It was a joke gift from my uncle’s party.”

      The doorbell dinged like the bell in a boxing match.

      Sweet relief.

      “I’ll get it,” Cookie Dreadlocks chirped as she skipped to the door.

      “This isn’t your—” The door swung open to reveal Brennan Henry standing on Mary Paige’s stoop.

      “Yo, lookie,” Cookie Dreadlocks said, glancing over her shoulder at Mary Paige. “You got money in your doorway.”

      Brennan slid off his sunglasses and glanced at the brass numbers affixed to the weathered exterior boards.

      “Fake check, huh? Yeah, I know who that is.” Simon pointed toward Brennan. “Saw him at a show once.”

      Mary Paige had no clue what to do when a hot, rich guy showed up on her stoop in the middle of kicking Sir Simon the Leech and his consort from her life, so she took a good thirty seconds to think about it.

      Why now? Why here? Why her?

      No answers.

      “Oh, wow, is that your ride on the curb, dude?” Cookie Dreadlocks asked.

      “Um, yeah,” Brennan said.

      “Goddamn, that’s a good lookin’ car.” Simon checked out the ride through the slotted blinds.

      Mary Paige finally snapped out of it when she saw Simon sliding toward the door with an opportunistic gleam in his green eyes. She pushed skinny Simon against the couch and stepped in front of Cookie Dreadlocks then she squeezed out the door, shutting it behind her.

      “Mr. Henry,” she said, glad she hadn’t already changed into her usual end-of-the-day sweats and fluffy socks. “What are you doing here?”

      He stepped back, nearly falling off the postage-stamp-size stoop. “Uh, I had to come this way for an appointment and thought I’d bring over the contract and schedule Grandfather and Ellen put together. Got my hands on it right before I left the office and thought you might want to look at it before you sign since there are some negotiable areas with regard to appearances.”

      Mary Paige caught a flutter at the window and knew Simon was spying on them. She almost shushed Brennan. “Oh, okay.”

      Brennan turned as the curtain was drawn back. “Who’s that?”

      “Who’s who?”

      “That guy staring out at us. Is he your boyfriend?”

      “No,” she said, holding firm to the doorknob and pretending that Simon and the weird girl didn’t exist.

      Simon knocked on the window and waved.

      So much for pretending Simon the Mooch away. She tried to smile.

      “Well, he’s waving at us. And he’s in your place. This is your house, right?”

      “I’m actually leasing it, but, yes, I live here,” she said, turning toward her ex-boyfriend. She shot poison arrows out of her eyes at him. Not for real, of course. But if she’d had the ability, she might have used it.

      She hadn’t wanted Simon to know anything about the Henry Department Store thing.

      Yet.

      Of course, Simon would find out when he saw her in the media, but she really wanted to get him out of her life—and off her couch—before he learned she’d become the centerpiece of a multimillion-dollar campaign. Who wanted the headache of Simon and his puppy-dog eyes and sad-sack stories of someone ripping him off facing her every time she turned around? Oh, and his palm out, too.

      “So?”

      She glanced at Brennan, who seemed out of place against the sagging rail of her porch steps and the scraggly grass creeping over the cracked sidewalk. Mr. Ledbetter, the guy who owned the duplex, had had surgery and hadn’t been able to do any repairs, much less weed eating. The whole neighborhood still showed the effects of Katrina like a dry-rotted badge. So Brennan standing akimbo in his charcoal cashmere coat, dark pants and shiny shoes looked like a prince who’d stumbled upon a broken-down duplex in a questionable area of midtown to save the poor, clueless wench.

      Well, she wasn’t a wench or clueless.

      But still he looked awfully yummy for a gripe-ass.

      “He’s leaving. Now,” she said loud enough for Simon to hear. The curtains swished closed and she sighed. “He’s been staying with me for a few weeks. Uh, just as a friend, but he’s worn out his welcome today. Kind of an inopportune time, you know?”

      Brennan’s eyes widened and he shoved his sunglasses into the coat pocket. “You were kicking him out?”

      “Not that it’s really any of your business, but, yes, he’s leaving,” she said again loudly, to emphasize the point.

      One of his dark eyebrows lifted and a smile played at his lips. “You’re fired up, aren’t you?”

      “That amuses you?” she asked, pushing her hair behind her ear and trying for some inner control. She needed to get Brennan off her stoop and Cookie Dreadlocks and Simon out of her house, and then eat a Lean Cuisine dinner. In exactly that order. “Now, if you’ll hand me the contract and schedule?”

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