Santa Monica Baby (Holidays in LA #3)

2. Chapter Two

Chapter Two

December 2nd

Nellie

I had never considered myself a “romantic” person. I wasn’t a fan of cutesy couple nicknames, hand holding gave me the ick—especially on a first date—and even after a year of reading my sister’s favorite romance novels, grand gestures still made me cringe.

That being said, nothing warmed my heart quite like Frank Capra’s masterpiece, It’s a Wonderful Life.

Long before the days of twenty-dollar movie tickets and Netflix subscriptions, my sister and I had spent many Saturday nights picking out tapes—that was right, tapes—at the local video store. Whereas she always gravitated toward the latest rom-com releases and I preferred a grizzly horror flick, there was always one genre we could agree on—Christmas movies.

White Christmas, Meet Me in St. Louis, Elf —basically, anything featuring Bing Crosby and/or at least one song and dance sequence that had absolutely nothing to do with the plot. But if you asked me, none of them held a candle to It’s a Wonderful Life.

For twenty-ish Christmases, I had watched Jimmy Stewart dance himself over the edge of the school swimming pool, lasso the moon for Donna Reed, and race through the streets of Bedford Falls, shouting merry greetings to passersby. Personally, I liked to believe that there was a lost alternative ending out there somewhere—one where Mr. Potter got his ass handed to him by the rest of Bedford Falls—but even without it, the movie was damn near perfect.

Sadly, due to recent events, I had taken a wrong turn on Sunset Boulevard and had ended up in a different Jimmy Stewart movie.

Rear Window.

Stuck in my apartment with a fractured foot, I watched as the rest of my neighbors—including the sexy Santa who’d run me down—go about their lives. The only thing missing was Grace Kelly. Instead, I had Tabitha.

“Please, Tabitha,” I said, wincing at the desperation in my voice. “A small fracture isn’t going to stop me from coming into the office.”

The intimidating woman on the other end of the video call blinked back at me. Tabitha Treger could give lessons in the art of resting bitch face. Seriously, Mona Lisa had nothing on Tabitha. She was the only senior partner at the firm with experience in both intellectual property and corporate law, and even though she was one hell of a shark, something told me that if she ever gave up her career, she could make a killing as a professional poker player.

She also scared the ever-loving reindeer shit out of me.

“Honestly, Janelle. There’s no reason for you to come in.” She tucked her crisp blonde bob behind her ears. “We’ve got everything covered around here. I can have one of the interns drop off your files later today, along with anything else you might need from your desk.”

“But what about—”

“Besides, isn’t it your driving foot?”

I stared down at the heavy black Aircast weighing down my right foot. Black had never been my color.

“I can always Uber.”

“We’ll be fine. Just go ahead and focus on your current accounts.” She passed a stack of papers to somebody off screen. “Geoffrey here can handle any new leads for the next few weeks.”

Over my dead—

“Nellie Belly! How’s the foot?”

I lurched in my seat when his face popped into frame, sending a wave of pain shooting down my leg. He certainly had a knack for popping up at the most inopportune moments, and why did those always seem to coincide with me sans makeup?

I clenched my fists at my side and smiled. “Perfectly fine, thanks.”

“That was a pretty bad fall you took.”

Oh, no you don’t. That pompous, ponytailed bastard wasn’t going to get the best of me.

“Barely felt a thing.”

“Let’s see that boot, then.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Oh, come on,” he pushed. “Show me.”

“Let’s not,” Tabitha said coldly, shooing him away from her desk. “For future reference, Geoffrey, please don’t ask your coworkers to show off their feet. That’s a human resources nightmare waiting to happen.” She quickly tacked on, “Oh, and please reschedule our meeting with Brooks Bennett and his team.”

“What? No.” I’d had tomorrow’s meeting with Bennett Studios on my calendar since Halloween. “Please don’t change it on my account. I’ll get my sister to drive me if needed.”

“It’s already done. His assistant called this morning, requesting that we push it out a few more weeks. Something about a broken sauna at his house in Joshua Tree.”

My brows furrowed. “The address we have for him is in Malibu. Do you need me to change that?”

Her lips kicked up to one side.

With anybody else, I wouldn’t have thought much of the subtle smile. With Tabitha, though, she might as well have been bouncing off the ceiling with uproarious laughter.

“That’s his other house. Welcome to Hollywood, Janelle.”

“Right.” A soft knock at the door drew my attention. “I’m so sorry. There’s somebody at my door. Do you mind if I grab that?”

“Please do. Actually, why don’t you take the rest of the day off?”

Um, what?

I didn’t take days off. Ever.

Since starting with Wilson, Treger, and Faison, I had taken exactly one half-day, and that was only because my gynecologist had refused to see patients before or after normal office hours. Nonetheless, I had still made it back by eleven a.m., a smile on my face and I.U.D. in my uterus.

“Oh, that’s not necessary.”

“I think it is,” Tabitha said with the arch of her perfectly manicured brow. “You have thirteen days of paid leave that expires at the end of the year. It wouldn’t hurt to take a day or two off, especially around the holidays. And speaking of . . .”

Oh fuck, I already knew where this was going.

“How are the plans coming along for the company holiday hoopla?”

I swallowed a sigh. In my desperate need to impress the partners, I’d volunteered to organize the end-of-quarter company outing. Not a Christmas party, but rather a company-wide holiday hoopla—whatever the hell that meant. According to some of my coworkers, past years’ events had included a yachting excursion to Catalina Island, tickets to Wicked at the Pantages, and a private dinner in Cinderella’s Castle at Disneyland.

WTF put the extra in extravagance.

Nonetheless, they were a lot more invested in their staff’s well-being than either of the firms I had interned with during law school. The bar—pun intended—had officially been set.

“I’m still throwing around a few ideas.” That was a lie. I had been so focused on work lately that I had barely given the holiday shindig a second thought . . . or first one.

“Fantastic. Send me some thoughts by next week, please.” Awesome. Well, at least I would have something to work on during my sudden, extra downtime. “In the meantime, take it easy, would you?”

“I’ll do my best.”

“And Janelle?”

“Hm?”

She leaned in a little closer. “Don’t forget about your door.”

Oh, for fuck’s sake.

Taking the afternoon off might not be such a bad idea after all. I had heard about “pregnancy brain” before, but was there such a thing as “fractured foot brain?”

Tabitha ended our call, and I leapt up from my swivel chair. “Leapt” might have been a bit optimistic—hobbled was more accurate. Just the short walk from my desk to the door had me breaking out in a sweat.

I nearly missed a step when I flung open the front door, though that had less to do with my bulky boot and everything to do with the man waiting on the other side of the threshold. The one holding an oversized gift basket packed full of fluffy socks, delicious treats, and my favorite trashy magazines.

Only this time, he wasn’t dressed as Santa Claus.

“Hi.”

“Hi,” I echoed.

“Am I interrupting anything?” His eyes skirted over my bare legs. I was suddenly very aware of just how short my plaid pajama shorts were. “Er, I can come back later, or—”

“No, you’re fine. I was just working from home.” The sharp bite of winter air made me shiver. It was hard to believe that in just a few short weeks, L.A. had gone from seventy to fifty-degree temperatures. “Actually, my boss all but ordered me to take the rest of the afternoon off, so your timing is perfect.”

He snorted. “That’s probably the first time I’ve ever heard that.”

I got the feeling that he wanted to say something else, but he left it at that. It wasn’t the first time Austin had left me wanting more. The truth was, I had spent my first few months in Santa Monica shamelessly flirting with him—in the laundry room, next to the mailboxes, across the street in the community garden. And why the hell not? The man was a snack and half— thicc with two c’s—and had a beard made for riding. Plus, he really knew his way around a plot of eggplant.

At the time, I could have sworn that the interest was mutual, which was why I’d been so surprised—and frankly disappointed—when he’d turned me down. There’d been no more flirting after that. In fact, now that I thought about it, I had barely seen him around the complex for weeks.

Maybe it was for the best, though. He had clearly found somewhere else to . . . put his eggplant, and I’d thrown myself headfirst into work. Besides, I had never been the kind of girl who chased after a man, and I wasn’t about to start now.

I wanted somebody who wanted me, who was obsessed with me—in an obnoxiously adorable, can’t keep his hands off me, and wakes me up with coffee kind of way—and I refused to settle for anything less.

“Is that for me?” I asked, gesturing toward the basket in his arms.

“Oh, yeah.” He held it out to me. “Just a few things I thought might make you feel better.”

“You really didn’t have to do that.”

“I still feel awful about what happened.”

“Seriously.” I huffed. “Please stop being so nice.”

We both winced at the venom in my voice. He wasn’t the only one that was taken aback by my pent-up frustration, none of which should have been directed toward him. Well, maybe a little. I was still salty about not being able to finish that Turkey Trot.

Before he could turn tail and run, I held up my hand.

“I’m sorry,” I told him, softening my tone. “I didn’t mean to snap at you. I’ve just . . . been a little on edge the last few days, not that that’s an excuse, but still.” Understanding dawned on his face. “I just meant that you don’t need to keep apologizing. As much as I hate to admit it, Leighton was right; I wasn’t looking where I was going, so I’m just as much to blame for this.”

He nodded. “Got it.”

I could have left it at that. I could have taken the gift basket inside and cracked open a gossip rag in the tub. But that would have been too easy. Instead, I gave in to the swirl of manic thoughts racing through my head, just searching for an audience.

“Now, my boss wants me to ‘take it easy’ and work from home, but I can’t win over Bennett Studios and tear down that ponytailed bastard from my living room couch, now can I?”

“Probably not.”

“Then there’s the office holiday spectacular thing I volunteered to plan, and my mother, who won’t stop calling me about Christmas, and the worst part about all of this—”

His eyes widened. “There’s more?”

“I can’t even do the one thing that always makes me feel better when I’m stressed . . . run.”

I chanced a look at his face when I finally caught my breath. Poor guy . He had come over to check on me and deliver, by the looks of it, a well put together care package, only to be subjected to my word vomit and ire. Some neighbor I was.

My eyes roved over the basket of goodies, quickly zeroing in on a familiar package of cookies. “Did you— Are those Tim Tams?”

“Uh, yeah.”

I snatched the basket out of his hands and held it up for closer inspection.

“Those are my absolute favorites.”

“I know.” He smiled and tucked his meaty palms into his pockets. The things he could do to me with those thick fingers. I shook off the thought. Fantasizing about my neighbor filling me up with his fingers wasn’t exactly appropriate for a Monday morning. “You mentioned them a couple times before.”

“And you remembered?”

“I remember a lot of things.”

Moisture clouded my eyes. It wasn’t every day that somebody gave me a package of my favorite Australian delicacy. They weren’t easy to come by in the States. Most grocery stores didn’t carry them—believe me, I’d checked. “Where did you even find them?”

“A small international market in Silver Lake.”

“You drove across town for me?”

He shrugged. “It’s not a big deal.”

That was where he was wrong. I might have been a newly minted Los Angeleno, but even I knew that driving to the east side, from the west side, for a package of goddamn cookies was as good as a marriage proposal. West siders hardly ever left West L.A., aside from the occasional weekend brunch trip or tickets to a movie premiere.

Maybe it was time I reconsider that whole grand gesture thing.

I swallowed when he crossed his arms in front of his chest, my tongue suddenly heavy. Venice Beach could keep their bodybuilders; I would take a photographer’s arms wrapped around me any day of the week. Hugging me tight, lifting me up and down his coc—

“I’m sorry to hear you’ve been going through it,” he said, interrupting my second fantasy in the span of five minutes. “Let me know if you need anything else.”

“Thank you, Austin.”

His pupils darkened at the sound of his own name.

“My pleasure, Janelle.”

The funny thing was, I believed him. Maybe taking the afternoon off to stuff my face with Tim Tams and my pussy with my favorite dildo wasn’t such a bad idea after all.

Austin

“Which one of these Santas do you think is the hottest?”

I looked up from the lens in my hand to find Sloane, my photography assistant, laser-focused on an Asian Santa in neon-red swim trunks. “I thought you were off the dating market.”

I hadn’t met Sloane’s newest beau yet, but from what she had told me, they had made things social media official right before Thanksgiving.

“That doesn’t mean I can’t admire the merchandise.”

I nodded my head toward the subject of her attention. “Twenty bucks says he’s stuffing his shorts.”

“No way. I know a monster cock when I see one.”

“So do I,” I said around a wink.

“You’re on.”

Sloane had never been able to resist a competition of any kind, really. I had once seen my five-foot-nothing assistant turned best friend drink a three-hundred-pound biker under the table, all because she’d wanted a chance to drive his motorcycle. To every bar patron’s shock and awe, Sloane had challenged him and won the bet. They had both been too blitzed to take the ride, though, so instead she’d taken him for a different kind of ride as a consolation prize.

People constantly underestimated her, especially men, but after three years of working together side by side, there wasn’t a doubt in my mind that she could do anything she wanted to. Plus, there was a certain kind of sick satisfaction that came with watching her hand some dude twice her size his ass.

“Trade you for the 300 mm.” I held out the smaller lens. It had been good for getting close-up content on the beach, but the competition was underway now, and I needed something that would clearly capture the action through the waves.

“You got it.”

We made the lens switch just in time for me to capture a rainbow-bearded Santa in a jockstrap catch a ten-foot wave.

This was my second time photographing the Surfing Santa Monica competition, an annual contest that drew in dozens of surfers from across West Los Angeles as well as parts of Orange County. Per the contest rules, all surfers were required to don some kind of gay apparel, hence the beach packed full of Santas, elves, and reindeer of all shapes and sizes.

“You should learn to surf by next year so you can compete.”

I shot her a lock from behind the tripod, one that said, “Sure, when reindeer fly.”

“C’mon,” she said, goading me. “You’ve already got the suit. The rest is just a board and some water.”

“As easy as that?”

“You bet.”

I shook my head. “We both know I’m more of a land mammal. Remember the swan boats?”

She tilted her head back and cackled. “Boy, do I.”

Sloane moonlighted as a makeup artist in her spare time, so when she’d heard that one of her regular clients was planning to propose to her partner, she’d recommended me to document the proposal, a job which I’d happily accepted. Photographing local happenings and holiday events were my passion, but private events—weddings, proposals, corporate retreats—paid the bills. Camera equipment wasn’t cheap.

Little had I known that the proposal would take place in a swan boat on Echo Park Lake. I’d capsized halfway through and I’d had to abandon . . . swan.

I’d still gotten the shot, though. And Sloane’s client had gotten the girl.

“By the way,” I said, changing the subject. “I talked to my neighbor again.”

“The cute one you ran down?”

“That’s the one.” I had given her a bare bones account of what had happened on Thanksgiving during the Ho-Ho-Hot Dog Eating Competition we’d photographed this weekend. “I brought over an apology care package with some tea, magazines, and comfort snacks.”

“Well, that was sweet of you.” She twisted her lips. “I don’t know why you haven’t asked her out yet. It’s clear that you’re hard up for her.”

Hard was an understatement.

“We don’t really talk much.” I hesitated before reluctantly adding, “Anymore.”

“Anymore?”

I zoomed in on the next surfer, a woman old enough to be my grandmother decked out head-to-toe in full icy-blue body paint. A pair of snowflake nipple pasties completed her Jack Frost-inspired look.

Hang ten, Granny Frost.

“I’m waiting, Texas.”

I rolled my eyes. Smartass. Sloane insisted on her silly nickname for me, despite knowing that I—an Italian, bisexual boy from Cleveland—had never set foot in the Lone Star State. My parents, though, in their infinite corniness, had named my sisters and I after the cities we’d been conceived in—Charlotte, Savannah, Madison, and Austin. Talk about a fun and uncomfortable factoid to learn as a child.

“She might have . . . asked me out earlier this year.”

Intrigue colored her eyes. “And?”

“And I might have . . . turned her down.” She tilted her head to one side and blinked back at me. “Don’t look at me like that. You’ve seen her. She’s so . . .” I bit down on my bottom lip, thinking about the brilliant beauty who lived across the courtyard. “And I’m so . . .”

“Wow,” Sloane drawled. “That explains it.”

“C’mon, you know exactly what I’m saying.”

“What you’re saying is a pretty girl asked you out and you were too scared to say yes.”

Fuck yes, I was scared, and rightfully so. I was a grad school dropout turned photographer; Nellie was a lawyer, who worked hard and played harder. In the eleven-ish months since she’d moved in, I had seen her come and go—to club and bar openings, to red-carpet events, on dates with men who wore watches that cost more than my most expensive camera. Clearly, she was interested in somebody to wine and dine her, and I was more of a cocoa and cuddle kind of guy. My social battery didn’t allow for much outside of work and the occasional movie night with Sloane, and I was fine with that.

A lot of my previous partners hadn’t been, though, and I refused to be the one that dimmed Nellie’s light.

“It doesn’t matter,” I told her. “Let’s get some shots from the left.”

She didn’t let up as we made our way across the beach to get another angle. “Texas, when are you going to realize that you’re the prize? Seriously, any girl, gay, or they would be lucky to call you daddy.”

Sloane giggled when I tripped over my feet, catching myself—and my camera—before I nose-dived into the sand.

Never in my thirty-four years had I thought of myself as a “prize,” something to be won. Not when there were so many better, younger, and more successful options. Then again, growing up as the “baby brother” to the famous Amato sisters—or infamous, depending on who you asked in Cleveland—hadn’t left many opportunities to come in first, so to speak. Each one of my sisters was a powerhouse to be reckoned with, and together, they were unstoppable.

Sloane had been right about one thing, though: I was a kinky fucker. There wasn’t much I wasn’t up for in the bedroom, so long as it got my partner off, preferably more than once.

The things I wanted to do to Nellie Wheatley . . . fuck.

That didn’t mean I talked about them out loud with anybody, not even my best friend.

“Can we not talk about her anymore?”

Sloane exhaled exaggeratedly and tucked one of her long black curls behind her ear, exposing her multiple piercings. Seeing as how she had posed for me in a series of nudes last year, I knew firsthand that there were a lot more silver hoops and balls going on underneath her demure outfit. She might put off the appearance of the girl next door, but there was a lot more to Sloane than met the eye.

“Fine.” She huffed. “I’ll leave it alone.” She waited approximately zero-point-two seconds before quickly adding, “ But, can I just say one more thing?”

A loud belly laugh escaped me. We both knew her too well. Not only did she always have to have the last word, but she also never shied away from telling you exactly how she felt. It was the quality I envied most about her.

“Don’t close that door too soon, babe. I’ve seen the way you look at her, like she’s the last slice of pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving dinner.”

“I’m more of a pecan guy.”

Sloane rolled her eyes. “Then you’re dumber than I thought. All I’m saying is there’s clearly something there. She asked you out, and you brought her snacks and apologized. Sounds like a match made in millennial heaven to me.”

If snacks and a kind word or two were all it took to impress a woman these days, then heterosexual men were failing miserably.

“It sounds like you’re dating the wrong men.”

“You’re probably right,” she said, shrugging her shoulders. “I have high hopes for this new one, though.” Just then, a Grinch dressed in a candy cane striped Speedo sped past us on a unicycle, surfboard strapped to his back. “Then again, if things don’t work out, it looks like I have options.”

Deep down, I knew what Sloane was saying made sense. Not about the Grinch—I would sooner go down in a swan boat than go down on a man covered in green fur, no matter how hung he was. By all accounts, I had a lot of great things going for me—a family who loved me (even if they didn’t always understand me), a career that I loved and made a decent living at, and a rent-controlled apartment, which in West L.A., might as well have been liquid gold.

But unlike a lot of the people I had met, dated, and worked with since moving here nearly a decade ago, I didn’t trade in accomplishments. Transactional relationships were a dime a dozen in Hollywood, and while that might have worked for some people, I wasn’t one of them.

I didn’t need a sensational or extraordinary love; comfortably quiet would do. And to be fair, there was something extraordinary about that unto itself. It wasn’t every day that you found somebody you could lie with in comfortable silence for hours on end without feeling uneasy.

“Allow me to propose a toast, then,” I said. Sloane cocked her head to one side and gestured toward her empty hand.

“Um, I think we’re missing something. If you want to ditch this Santa fest for drinks, though—”

“Shut up and lift a lens, will you?”

I held my camera out in front of me, pointing the lens toward the clear blue sky. Sloane’s eyes sparkled with intrigue. To her credit, though, she didn’t question me or my sudden proclamation. Instead, she reached into my hefty equipment bag and lifted a macro lens with gusto, holding it up in front of her face.

“To taking a chance on ourselves.” She lifted a brow. “And the people lucky enough to know us, fuck us, and, maybe one day, love us.”

“Lucky bastards.”

My attention caught on something behind her. “Speaking of lucky bastards.” I pointed over her shoulder, toward the Santa currently tugging a pair of balled-up socks out of his swim trunks. “I believe you owe me twenty bucks.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake.”