His First Christmas: The Lonely Billionaire - A Heart-Warming Romance Novel (13 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

At 7:45 AM, Anna woke up with a huge grin on her face.
It’s Christmas!

In the next second she remembered with a sigh:
Gotta send the contract.
Every second I wait, the deal becomes compromised…

Right on time, Cathy burst into her room. “Wake up, snoozle!” she bellowed, jumping onto the bed.

“Oof!” Anna cried. “You’re cutting off the circulation to my leg! I was already up!” she protested.

“Well, now you’re super up,” Cathy winked, getting up from the bed.
Probably to go and wake up everyone else via a heart attack.

Anna shook her head, rolling out of bed. Cathy turned abruptly in the doorway and said, “By the way—Merry Christmas, Anna.”

“Merry Christmas, you doof,” Anna grinned, going over and giving her a hug.

It turned out that Cathy needn’t shock everyone awake, because they were already up.

“Anna! Cathy! Merry Christmas!” her parents cried.

Anna went around the room, hugging her parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles.

“Merry Christmas,” she said to them all, a huge grin on her face.

The family headed instinctively towards the kitchen. Everyone knew the drill: blueberry pancakes.

“Wow, Mom, you got all the ingredients out already?” Anna noted.

“I got a little excited,” her mom explained, sheepishly.

Usually, Anna, Cathy, and their mom would start off Christmas day by making said pancakes while everyone else chatted at the dinner table and Bayou hunted around for fallen batter.

Sure, it’s a little gender segregated…but we are the best at making them by far,
she thought with a smile. Everyone usually helped out in some capacity for the huge dinner later in the day, but the Lionel women operated their pancake-making like a well-oiled machine.

“Here’s a fresh stack,” Anna said, handing it to Cathy, who took it over to the idle chatterers.

As Anna flipped another pancake like a pro, she told her mom, “You know, I actually made Jason these pancakes, while we were in the cabin.”

Her mom raised an eyebrow. “And…?”

“He loved them, obviously,” Anna said, laughing.

“I hope this doesn’t mean that you gave him my recipe?” she asked. Anna knew what the question really meant,
You better not have given him the recipe, little lady.

“Of course not,” Anna said, amused.

Her mom nodded, then turned to Anna, looking serious. “Anna, I know everyone was giving you flack about you and your boss…but tell me, are you two romantically involved?”

Anna took a moment to respond, feigning extra attention to the current pancake at hand. They weren’t officially involved. She definitely felt involved in her head, and she guessed Jason felt the same, but that was pure speculation.

The simple answer was, “No.”

Her mom gave her a knowing look
.

“Alright, alright” Anna caved. “I drunkenly kissed him once.” She looked away, then looked back. “And…I really like him. Okay? That’s it.” She said defensively, before adding in a whisper, “Don’t tell Cathy.”

Her mother seemed satisfied that Anna had nothing more to add. “Anna…just be careful, okay, sweetheart? You don’t want to throw away the career you’ve worked so hard to build, just for a guy, you know?”

Anna sighed. “Yeah, I know, Mom…”

All the talk about her career sent Anna into a fresh worry-spiral about the contract.
Damnit, why can’t I put work aside and just enjoy Christmas?! I spend my time working wanting to see my family, and now that I’m with my family, I’m thinking about that contract. Time to stop this madness. I’ll just…drive over to the office and take care of it. I’ll leave after dinner, and be back in time for late-stage board gaming.

It wasn’t ideal, but Anna knew she wouldn’t stop worrying otherwise. She thought about how long it would be before she would be able to drive over there.
Well, after this, we have presents. Then visiting neighbors’ houses, then cooking together… and finally, eating dinner. It’s gonna be at least a few hours before I can go.
Anna finally accepted that she would just have to sit tight for a bit.

After dishing out all the pancake goodness, Anna, Cathy and their mom finally had a bite to eat themselves. At the table there was whipped cream, chocolate sauce, caramel sauce, and bowls of sliced bananas, strawberries, and mini marshmallows. Anna did not skimp.

Funnily enough, Anna didn’t see the tree until gift time. She felt kind of sad that she hadn’t been there to decorate it, but that quickly evaporated as she admired how beautiful it was.
In any case…I still got to decorate a tree,
she thought, recalling her and Jason’s tree of found objects.

Objectively, the Lionels’ was a pretty standard tree, but it was made extraordinary with nostalgia. It was wrapped with a sparkly teal garland that Anna had found abandoned at school, as a child, saving her parents a couple of bucks. She paced around the tree, taking in the individual ornaments. There were the standard baubles, odd random ones like a boot ornament with the caption
“Don’t let life stomp ya down”
, mini candy canes, and ornaments that she and Cathy had made as kids. Anna spotted a ceramic heart she had made in the third grade.
“Love you always”,
it read on the back. She was glad it had survived the fire.

After the family had exchanged gifts, next on the Christmas agenda came visiting neighbors. Anna glanced at the clock. 1:08 PM. She counted in her head,
I have…about six more neighbors’ houses to visit before dinner.
She sighed.
Hoo boy.
She loved visiting the community members the family had grown close to after the fire—but the contract was really gnawing at her.

“Hi, girly,” Leone said, as she answered the door. “Have a fitful sleep since I saw ya last?”

Anna nodded.
Just a little.

“Well, come in, come in, have some pie,” Leone urged. Leone’s husband patted Anna and Cathy on the back. “Welcome, welcome.”

Anna hugged both of the Geller kids. “Benny, you just keep on getting taller and taller,” she said, raising her eyebrows. “Of course, I’m sure everyone says that.”

Benny rolled his eyes and smiled. “Yeah, pretty much.”

“And Jessie, you keep on getting prettier and prettier,” Anna grinned.

“Thanks,” Jessie said, bashfully.

They exchanged gifts, and ate yet more food. The Lionels made their way around the neighborhood, stopping at the Yates’, Friedmans’, Chow-Ryerson’s, Hendersons', and finally, the Jeffries’.

By the time Anna got back to her house it was already five.
Alright, almost there…
she thought.

“Okay…Time to cook!” her mother announced.
Hopefully by the time we’re done cooking, I’ll have digested the mountains of food I’ve already eaten.

They all herded into the cramped kitchen. The dinner preparations were always decidedly less smooth than the pancake operation—literally a “too many cooks” situation—but each person had their role. Anna’s parents were in charge of meat, her grandma and Cathy were in charge of dessert, Anna and her Auntie Lynn were in charge of vegetables, and Uncle Robbie was an assigned everyman who flitted to wherever he was needed.

In reality, it was Anna’s mother who filled the everyman role—in addition to her other duties. She paced around the kitchen, chopping, adding seasoning to this dish and that, all while checking the status of various meats in the oven.

“Think fast!” her Uncle Robbie warned, tossing Anna a potato. She caught it and passed it to her aunt, who started peeling. After she was done peeling the potatoes, Anna would mash them.

Anna was having a grand time participating in the cook-fest with her family, but she couldn’t help being reminded of her and Jason’s grand feast, and its sad, confused, ending.

There and then, she made a decision.
I’m not going to take the pragmatic route this time. I’m not going to carry on pretending I don’t have feelings for Jason just so things stay convenient. I’m going to tell him the truth.

All of a sudden, Anna felt as if a weight had been lifted. She took this as a sign that she was making the right, albeit scary, decision.

“Okay,” Anna’s mother said, a little out of breath as she surveyed the kitchen. “It looks like everything’s done!” she announced.

The rest of the party cheered and quickly started setting the table.

Once they were all seated, the standard rules of peaceful dinner conversation applied: no politics, no religion.

“Oh, Cathy, I ran into your high school boyfriend in the supermarket a couple of days ago,” their aunt said.

“Oh, my God,” Cathy groaned. “I’m so glad I’m not the one who ran into him.”

“Why? No interest in a holiday fling for old times’ sake?” their aunt teased.

Cathy rolled her eyes. “Gotta let the past stay in the past, dude. I mean, I hear he’s stayed in Westmount since high school grad. I mean, who does that?”

Cathy backtracked when she noticed the raised eyebrows coming from her family members. “Uh, I mean…this town is great, if you’re older. But while you’re younger I think it’s better to explore a little bit,” she said diplomatically.

“Good save,” their father chuckled.

Anna was shoveling yet more roasted vegetables onto her plate when Cathy said, “To be honest, I’m kind of tired of dating. Grandma’s right—everyone is allergic to commitment nowadays, and it’s really hard to click properly with someone. Even the ones you do click with don’t pan out.” She turned to her aunt and uncle sitting opposite. “I mean, how did you guys know that you were right for each other?”

Anna’s aunt and uncle glanced at each other.

“Well…” her aunt started, “When I first met him, I thought he was an asshole,” she said.

“I
was
an asshole,” Uncle Robbie grinned.

“Maybe you still are,” her aunt teased. They nudged each other playfully before her aunt continued. “Yeah, so back then we worked at the diner, and he was my coworker. Robbie was so
bossy.”
She paused to take a bite of brisket. “One day, I worked up the nerve to tell him to cool it…”

“And he realized the error of his ways and you guys got together?” Anna asked, intrigued.

“No, actually, I told her she was out of line,” Uncle Robbie said.

“Oh…”

“For a while, we tried to ignore each other. But obviously, that wasn’t possible when we had to work together…so we came to an uneasy truce,” her aunt said.

“And, eventually, I guess, we warmed up to each other. The rest is history,” he shrugged.

Cathy looked unimpressed. “Gee, that’s really heartwarming and all… but it doesn’t really answer my question.”

Anna’s mom jumped in. “I would look at it like this, Cathy. At the beginning, where you are right now, you give anyone you have a spark with a chance, right?”

Cathy nodded.

Anna thought,
easier said than done for a neurotic like me
.

“Alright. Then once you pass the infatuation stage…The rose-colored glasses are off, and you and your partner start to see each other’s flaws. Because you’re human,” she said, taking a sip of her wine. “Then you have doubts—”