Who’s Your Daddy (Secret santa daddy, season four)

Chapter 1

Terrence

“I have sexy news and weird news.” Sitting down across from Leander, I ignored his sigh. “Which do you want first?”

Cocking his head, he frowned. “Isn’t it supposed to be good news and bad news?”

“Yes, but that didn’t work in this situation, so I fixed it.” Sometimes words just needed to be more flexible.

Leander’s sigh came back. “What did you do?”

“Um, nothing out of the ordinary.” He always expected the worst when I started a story. He was definitely a glass half empty kind of guy.

Or glass half-filled with poison kind of guy since he watched so many true crime shows.

“That doesn’t narrow it down.” Frowning, he crossed his arms over his chest and looked a bit like some of my teachers in high school. “Confess and explain.”

He was so dramatic…and unfortunately not as hot as my teachers had been.

“Well, I told the tall one I could climb him like a monkey. I told the short one that he’d be a good body pillow. He’s just the right size and he wasn’t offended. I like short guys. They have a better center of gravity and can really pound you.” Leander looked like I’d offended someone, but the short guy had just grinned and strutted around the rest of the day.

What else?

I was forgetting something…I knew I should’ve taken notes.

“Oh, and I told the one who looks bored that I knew how to cheer him up. Honestly, that wasn’t meant to be as dirty as it came out.” Shrugging, I didn’t let it bother me. “But it came out, so I have to count it too.”

He was just so distracting.

“Oh, and I should probably add in the young one because he giggles every time I walk into a room. So I’ve done something.” I wasn’t sure what I’d done, though.

Leander rolled his eyes. “That doesn’t explain nearly as much as you think it does.”

“Really?” Hmm. “It doesn’t?”

What had I left out?

Oh.

“Okay, maybe I left out the important part. It’s just been a long week.” They started so early and I didn’t have the common sense to go to bed at a decent time. “I have a Secret Santa. It’s one of my contractors. But I don’t know which one.”

Leander’s donkey brays had me rolling my eyes. “Stop laughing.”

“I’m not going to agree to that.” Barely catching his breath, he closed his eyes and shook his head. “Only you could end up in a situation this ridiculous.”

Ugh, he didn’t even know the full story yet.

“It’s worse. I don’t know which one it is and I was under the assumption they’re all straight.” It was very confusing. “They all have ex-girlfriends.”

I knew that because they gossiped and teased each other a lot.

A lot.

So I knew there were a variety of exes running around the area and some were crazier than others. The tall one liked spicy crazy. The short one liked shy girls that made him crazy. The giggler hadn’t dated nearly enough but he was still young. Oh, and my bored guy liked girls who were good with math and had too much common sense.

I wasn’t sure how that was bad but his tone and the rest of the guys’ laughter said it was tragic…and hilarious.

“They might be bi or they might be fucking with you.” Leander wasn’t as helpful as he thought if those were his only options.

“I really hope it’s not the fucking with me one. I need my kitchen remodel done at some point and I’d hate to keep going to the trouble of baking cookies for assholes.” My whole kitchen was in my laundry room, so it was a pain in the ass. “I like baking and I like watching them moan as they eat chocolate chip cookies. They pouted over raisins. They’re very dramatic.”

Leander barked out a laugh. “Takes one to know one.”

“I’m going to ignore that.” True or not, it was still rude. “You must’ve had a long day.”

“You do that and see if it helps figure out your Secret Santa.” Shaking his head, Leander looked like he was finally starting to take my problem seriously. “Are you sure you actually have a Secret Santa and didn’t just find someone’s to-do list?”

No.

“It was a Build-A-Bear with tools and a little contractor’s hat and the note was signed by my Secret Santa.” I was positive.

“Okay, well, that’s hard to misunderstand then.” He raised one eyebrow and looked at me skeptically. “But if anyone could, it’d be you.”

I wasn’t going to dignify that with an answer.

“And they all pretended not to know what it was when I found it on my dining room table when I came down for breakfast this morning.” That had been suspicious. “No one breaks into your house to be a Secret Santa. Even that guy who was arrested for stalking said I was too annoying to make it enjoyable.”

Some people were really dramatic and hard to please.

“Alright, I have to admit that really does sound like a Secret Santa gift and it seems like it’s from one of your contractors.” Leander looked like that was painful. “But if it turns out to be a very confused burglar, I’m going to remind you of this conversation.”

“Fine.” Sometimes weird shit just happened. It wasn’t my fault. “What do I do?”

“You can play it off like a game if you don’t like any of them or you can hope that it’s the one you like.” Cocking his head, Leander looked confused. “Which one do you want it to be? Tree guy? The giggler? Body pillow dude? The bored cutie? Why don’t any of these men have real names?”

Oh, he asked hard questions.

“It’s probably my need for therapy talking but I have a thing for the bored one.” I’d admit to being unhealthy in a variety of ways, but at least I was up-front about it. “I want to make him smile. One laugh from him might make me orgasm.”

Scowling was the wrong response, but Leander was hard to please too. “If that’s a turn-on, we need to get you laid more often.”

“Agreed.” But that was another problem completely. “I don’t think I see him as a challenge. I considered that, but I just like his stern bored look and want to either do wonderfully dirty things with him or curl up in his lap and have him read me a book.”

So it wasn’t as unhealthy as it could’ve been.

“Oh, and I don’t want to change him. I just want him to smile at me once in a while. It’ll mean I’m special.” So maybe it was slightly unhealthy.

Still, compared to how my past relationships had gone, it wasn’t bad.

“So you don’t want to fuck tall guy? What about the short thruster?” Leander must’ve been getting distracted because he started keeping track of them on his fingers. “I’m going to say the giggler is too young or too much like you.”

“He’s really happy, but you’re right. He might need a Dom or something.” They were all lovely in their own way, though. “Well, most of them are like dessert and I’d have fun with them. I just think the bored one is a dinner I’d eat slowly. And no sugar rush, so it’s healthier.”

The rush wasn’t bad but the crash that came after was terrible.

Leander huffed. “When did you eat dinner?”

“Weren’t you planning on feeding me?” Hadn’t he said that was what we were doing? “We were starting at the bar and then going to get food, right?”

“For fuck’s sake.” The way he rolled his eyes said that wasn’t what he’d said. “Fine. But next time you tell me that you can multitask while we talk, I’m going to hang up on you.”

Oh.

“Deal.” He’d never remember that, so I wasn’t worried. “You can feed me something unhealthy because they made me eat a salad at lunch and I’m starving.”

I didn’t care how much stuff they put on it—if the base was lettuce and there was a ton of vegetables, it was a salad and that meant I was going to die if I wasn’t fed real food soon.

“Do I want to know why your contractors are feeding you?” Leander seemed to think that was weird, but I wasn’t sure why.

“Um, they’re in charge of the project. They made that very clear. I give them a framework and guidelines for what I can deal with and what I can’t. Like this terrible cabinet color that they really liked but was damned near pink. I called a full stop on that nonsense and we found a good compromise. But I couldn’t find enough logic to do the same thing on salad.”

Salad was a fun side dish, not a main dish, but I couldn’t even get the giggler to agree with me.

Leander’s head cocked again. “Do you have safewords and limits for your contractors?”

Maybe.

“They’re not safewords unless spankings or sexy times are involved.” Wasn’t that right? “They’re just guidelines.”

“No, they’re safewords and limits.” Sighing, Leander looked up at the ceiling. “Why does he do this to me?”

If God answered, I wasn’t going to let him drink anymore.

Nothing.

We were safe.

“Customers can get overly opinionated on stupid shit that changes the budget but not the outcome. They’re more focused on the quality and how I’ll love the project in the long run. That means there are rules.” Leander was a pain in the ass and started shaking his head before I’d even finished. “I want a nice kitchen that won’t burn down if I look at it funny.”

Old homes were nice but they were insanely dangerous…even my insurance company had agreed with me.

Making toast and running the microwave at the same time shouldn’t have almost gotten me killed.

“For fuck’s sake, Terry. Those are limits and rules for a BDSM relationship. Not a reno contract.” I must’ve looked skeptical because he groaned and rubbed his face. “God. You make me crazy. Those are BDSM negotiations. A regular contractor would just make you pay more for being a pain in the ass. I bet you even say red if you have to stop something.”

Thankfully I could tell him no.

“Of course not. Everyone knows that’s the BDSM word.” I’d even gotten behind a dirty old lady in the grocery store the other day who been giggling into her phone and telling some kind of naughty story about a book she’d read. “I say stencil because frowning guy hates them and won’t do them in any projects because he’s not a bored little old lady with a fucking passion for goddamned flowers .”

I was pretty sure he had a traumatic story that would explain his strong emotions on the subject, but I didn’t want to trigger him, so I hadn’t asked for details.

No matter what Leander said, I did have some common sense.

“Safewords can be anything.” He said it so seriously I almost believed him. “That’s still a safeword.”

He just had to be right, so I shrugged. “We’re not going to worry about that.”

“I’m right, asshole.” Crossing his arms over his chest, he nearly pouted. “I’m right. It’s a safeword.”

“I understand that to you it’s a safeword.” Arguing with crazy people was never productive in the long run. “Thank you for letting me know your thoughts on the subject.”

It worked on the preacher guy who liked to lecture people outside the farmer’s market, but Leander rolled his eyes and sighed. “You’re an asshole.”

And he was dramatic.

“If we could stay on the subject, please?” I needed to be helped and fed, not lectured about ridiculous things. “I still don’t know what I’m supposed to do or which one wants to do things with me.”

We had to narrow that down before I accidentally hurt someone’s feelings.

If I was going to be an asshole, I wanted it to be deliberate, and making my little giggler upset would be terrible.

Now, frowning guy…he made me wonder if I could get him to frown harder and tell me I’d been naughty.

I wasn’t sure how practical that fantasy was, though.

“Did the note give you any clues?” Leander stopped huffing and sighing and sat back in the booth, actually using his brain instead of his drama. “Any cute pictures or doodles on it? Any clues in the card itself? What about things the bear was wearing?”

How had it taken this long for him to finally be helpful?

“Those are very good questions, thank you.” And he rolled his eyes again. Some people just liked being ridiculous. “No pictures that he would’ve made. It was a standard, fairly blank card. You know, that’s kind of telling, though.”

“Why?” Reaching out, Leander took a sip of his beer. “Is one of them artistic?”

“The younger one. He’d definitely have made little pictures on it or done something like that.” At the very least he’d have put a smiley face on it.

He liked emojis and it was impossible to forget their conversation on that.

Some people were just too serious when it came to texting.

“Okay, so one down. What else?” Frowning, Leander looked a bit like he was a cranky detective in an old whodunit show. “There have to be other clues.”

He needed to watch more of the good kind of reality TV.

“Now that I think about it, Short Guy would be a bit more obvious if it was him. He’s got no poker face.” He’d thought the situation was funny, but he hadn’t looked guilty or overly turned on about the situation. “The body pillow comment got more of a reaction than my Build-A-Bear.”

Nodding slowly, Leander took my answer seriously. “Okay, that’s not as strong as the artistic information but we’ll move him lower down the list.”

I could see his logic, so I didn’t try to convince him he was wrong.

“Do you think a Daddy would be tall or frowning?” I wasn’t sure. “The only ones I’ve met have been either online or annoying, so I don’t have much to compare my Secret Santa to.”

Leander’s brain seemed to stop working because he stared at me with a confused, blank face for so long I reached over and waved my hand in front of him to restart his brain.

It worked.

Swatting at my hand, he sat straighter. “Stop that.”

No.

“Why are you being ridiculous?” Again.

He sighed, shaking his head and looking back up at the ceiling. “Really? This is the person you said should be my best friend?”

Had God told him to push me into the mud that day?

That was rude and it was no wonder I wasn’t more religiously inclined.

“Okay. I can do this.” Seemingly talking to himself that time, Leander took a deep breath and centered himself. “Why do you think your Secret Santa is a Daddy?”

Had he not been paying attention?

“Well, first of all, he bought me an expensive bear.” Duh. Regular guys would’ve rolled their eyes and bought something for five bucks at Walgreens. “And second, he signed the card Your Secret Santa Daddy .”

He really needed to pay more attention in life.

I was starting to think the food mix-up hadn’t been my fault…he was definitely going to pay to make up for making me doubt myself.

Dinner was on Leander.