by Ember Flint
I shrug. “We all know it’s not true, Natalie, even you.”
She immediately begins to harangue me again and I try– I really try– not to fight back, but damn, I fucking can’t. She pushes all of my buttons and a part of me likes it a little. Okay, a lot.
“Both of you stop it this instant. My Goodness! Son, you’re 30-years-old and you Natalie, dear, you’re 28. This is enough! What kind of example are you setting for your employees? You act like this is a bad remake of ‘The War of the Roses’! You’re gonna tear this company apart if you don’t stop!”
I look down at my shoes, my ego blistering under my dad’s disappointment.
Of course, he’s right. I know he is.
Why is it that she can make me regress to a five-year-old every time we argue about something?
Sean claps me on the shoulder and then turns to hug his daughter one-armed. “We didn’t make you Co-CEOs because you are our only children, we did it because you’re great at your jobs. We thought you could push past your differences and bring this company even higher and guide it into the future, but you’re doing the opposite.”
I start to talk, trying to defend myself. “She—”
Natalie talks over me. “He—”
“Enough! Both of you. We have talked about this. It’s almost too painful to put into words, but unless you find a way to get along and work together as a team, we are going to suspend you both from your capacity and get the board of directors to nominate two new temporary CEOs.”
My eyes nearly bulge out at my father’s words. “Who?” I ask.
Sean exchanges a look with my father and then he sighs. “Us,” he says.
“But Daddy, you retired…”
Sean glares at his daughter taking a step back from her. “I’m still the owner around here, and so is Neal, young lady. You might be both computer geniuses, but you don’t just have to understand the product to sell it, you also need to know how to run this place…”
“And we don’t?” I ask, indignantly.
Natalie and I might not get along, but we have done nothing but work our asses off to keep us in the green, despite the general mess we have to deal with; the good of the company is the only thing we agree upon and ultimately even if we argue for days about every little thing, we always take the right decisions for Silver & Gold Tech.
This might not be the most peaceful and serene place of work right now, but business is more than good.
“Singularly, yes. You both did good for Silver and Gold when we were two separated companies, but in tandem? In tandem, you guys are pitiful, Son.”
“And you think that sending us packing will help you with those jerks that just left? They’re going to keep on fighting no matter what,” Natalie says.
My dad shrugs. “It may very well be, or it might put the fear of God in them…”
I gulp. Fuck, no. This company is my life.
“Dad, do you really want to do this?”
My father gives me a sad smile. “Not really, Tristan.”
“And maybe we won’t have to. We’ll see about it after,” says Sean.
“After what?” Natalie and I ask, in synchro for once in our lives.
“After the week-long retreat we’re all going on for Christmas.”
Natalie and I look at each other bemused.
“Come again?” I ask.
My dad gestures for us to sit at the conference table and we both do so.
What the fuck is he talking about?
We’re going on a retreat?
“Really, Son, I think it’s pretty self-explanatory: we already had plans to spend the holidays together, remember?”
“Yeah,” I grumble.
“Like I could forget,” mumbles Natalie.
“Well, we thought we could go away somewhere, rather than simply spend Christmas together here, to help you guys build a more… sane and profitable relationship and then Deanna thought about how much our execs could benefit from it too,” my father says.
I roll my eyes. Typical of Sean’s wife. She’s a Yoga instructor and a full-blown hippie who thinks ‘communication is the key’.
“Um, Dad,” Natalie starts to say, but he interrupts her.
“Isn’t it a wonderful idea? Even Naomi thought it was just perfect…”
I sigh. Of course mom would be on board with the craziness as well.
I’m just that lucky.
“It was easy enough to turn a family vacation’s idea into a company retreat for all of the executive staff,” my dad tells me proudly. “It would help reduce their stress for one thing…”
Sean nods. “After all, it’s a paid vacation for them and their families too…”
My father goes on. “Everybody’s going to be coached to learn teamwork, productive confrontation, compromise and reciprocal trust.”
I chuckle and Natalie glowers at me, mouthing a ‘what the fuck?’.
I wave her off and turn to look at our dads.
“So basically this ‘suspension’ you just sprung on us is what? A rehearsed threat that you’re using to force us to go along with this retreat thing?” I ask.
My father gives me a lopsided smile. “Pretty much, Son.”
“And then we get there and we play besties, sing Kumbaya and deliver motivational speeches about kittens and rainbows and crap to the VPs?” Natalie scoffs.
“Something like that, sweetie,” her father tells her.
Great. Just what I need. A week in close proximity with this one, fighting with myself both not to strangle and not to fuck her.
What could ever go wrong, right?
Natalie glares at me almost as if she can read my thoughts — or part of them, anyway.
“And we have to go when?” she asks, turning to look at our dads again.
My dad pats her hand. “We’re leaving in five days, darling.”
Five days only?
Shit.
Five years wouldn’t be enough to help me prepare for this.
Sean smiles at his daughter and then at me. “We have everything planned down to the last second. S&G Tech’s execs are going to be a big happy family by the time we get back.”
Yeah, right.
We start to argue as soon as they stop talking.
They can’t do this to us.
There’s no way we’re going to survive this without killing each other.
They ditch us before we can say much in favor of remaining in San Jose for the holidays and far —far— away from each other.
“See what you have done?” Natalie says.
“What have I done? Try what have you done instead? This is totally your fault, Miss Caterwauling 2019.”
She glares at me. “Like hell, Mister Fucker of the last decade. You’re to blame and you know it,” she says and tries to punch my shoulder.
I dodge her little hand easily and grab it, bringing it to my chest as I scowl down at her, our lips so close they’re almost touching and then we push away from each other like we’re both on fire.
Oh, this is going to end up bad.
Chapter 2
NATALIE
December 20
“Do you think the entire Sherpa’s population is going to miss all the winter gear you stole from them for this trip?” Mr. Pain-In-The-Ass asks with a sexy little smirk on his full lips.
I glare at him and as soon as I see that the coast is clear and no parents are about to witness my gesture, I give him the finger and turn to look out the little window.
Holy Jingle Bells, this is so not how I pictured myself spending the holidays!
I huff to myself slinking down into my seat.
This cannot possibly be my life, dammit!
Until five days ago, when my dad and Neal dropped the ‘let’s go on a retreat bomb’ on us, I had pretty solid plans for this Christmas and none of them involved spending time on a freaking mountain where it’s gonna actually snow and
temperatures are gonna freeze over way past zero.
I’m a lover of all things Christmas, I’ve always been. I love trimming the tree, putting on lights, baking Christmas cookies — all right, eating Christmas cookies is more like it—, I love shopping for my dear ones and wrapping presents, I love watching every single ‘classic’ Christmas movie and/or cartoon from ‘ A Charlie Brown’s Christmas’ to ‘It’s A Wonderful Life’, I even like the sappy stories: there’s not a single Hallmark’s or ABC’s production that I haven’t seen a couple of hundred times, but there’s one thing I just don’t like and that is snow.
I mean who likes snow anyway aside from maybe penguins and polar bears?
It’s cold, it’s wet, it makes people sick. I mean sure, it’s pretty to look at, all glistening and white, but that’s what we have fake snow for, right?
Now, that’s my kind of snow, and you can even pour a little bit of peppermint essential oil into it and then it even smells great and Christmassy. But do I get to ‘pretend’ it’s cold, all tucked-in, warm and cozy, with the windows open and the fireplace going just for show in my kick-ass penthouse in my beloved San Jose?
Not this year, thanks to my damn Co-CEO and his big mouth.
So now here I am reluctantly sitting on the very back of S&G Tech’s private jet, waiting to reach Mount Rainier in the state of Washington where I’m gonna spend an entire week freezing my fluffy ass off at the Crystal River Resort while I hypothetically spread holiday cheer and promote healthy teamwork between the two factions that are ripping apart our company.
Now, the name sounds pretty enough, that’s true, but I’ve done my research: temperatures drop even to -4 °F during the night and I’m from freaking California for heaven’s sake!
I. hate. cold.
If I could move Christmas from December to July, I would do it in a heartbeat.
But it isn’t merely the fact that this stupid retreat is in the middle of snowy hell in nowhere-county up in the freaking mountains where even grizzly bears are probably smart enough not to venture up unless it’s spring, and it isn’t even because this messes with my program of just vegging on the sofa with a good Christmas romance book where the characters are the ones freezing their butts and I can simply ‘hu’ and ‘ha’ along from the comfort of my sofa.
It’s that I’m gonna have to play nice and act like I’m friends with Mr. Pain-In-The-Ass, the giant asshole sitting over there and currently hogging half of the plane with his stupid long legs and all his heavy cargo of jerkiness.
It’s safe to say I haven’t felt this much spite for another human being since, well, ever, I’m a pretty tranquil chick normally.
In my entire life, I’ve never had someone just rub me the wrong way as much as this stuck-up jerk has done from the very first time I met him and he opened his mouth to speak in my presence.
Half of the times we’re sharing air, I want to punch his lights out, he is that irritating and for some reason he apparently loathes me just as much, to the point we rarely if ever spend more than five minutes alone; I always have Sarah, my PA, along so she can keep me sane and, most importantly, keep me from strangling him and he, I guess, does the same with Drew, his own PA. That’s why we dragged them along, complete with their families of course, our parents are also going to be there, but they won’t be much help: we needed at least two people on our side –yes, we do have a single side when it comes to this–, two people who actually understand how much of a bad idea is to keep us too long in the same place at the same time.
I push another strawberry bubblegum in my mouth and start to pop it. Hard.
I know how much he hates it.
Stupid giant with his stupid suspenders and stupid sexy glasses and his stupid formal dress-code and that stupid baritone of his and let’s not forget him being stupidly smart and also stupidly tall.
I just can’t stand him!
To think my life used to be that much simpler seven months ago before my dad went batshit crazy and decided being a millionaire wasn’t enough.
Why fight with the competition, when you can merge, make even more money and go from a multi-million to a multi-billion-worth company, right?
It sounded good enough on paper, so I supported the idea, but back then I didn’t know about the little proviso Daddy and Mr. Silver had worked into the merger.
I even thought I was gonna finally get the chance to prove myself at the helm, since one of the stipulations Daddy and Mr. Silver made was that they were both gonna step down as CEOs and only stay on as Presidents.
I was gonna be CEO of a tech giant at only 28 and not even because I was one of the big kahunas’ daughter, no: I freaking worked my way from the bottom up and studied my ass off to get there and just when I could almost taste the glory of the promotion, I had the displeasure of meeting Mr. Silver Jr.
The view from where I stood was pretty good, I hate to admit it, but the asshole is pretty much sex on a stick: tall, muscular, handsome, a mixture between a stubbly rock-star and a super genius nerd with sexy dark-rimmed glasses.
So there I was taking all the hunky yumminess in; sure the man looked like he could do with a makeover since he had — and sadly still has— a damn near obsession with suspenders and bowties, but I could still have done worse.
He actually stirred something within me, on sight. Something I had never felt before.
And then he opened that damn mouth of his and the charm wore off pretty freaking fast.
I tried to look for a redeeming quality, I really did, but I came out empty-handed. From day one I could see working with him was going to be a veritable nightmare: he appeared to be — and subsequently confirmed it with every action and word— a brooding, arrogant, unsociable, bossy asshole with an inexplicable hate for my informal attires, an attitude the size of Antarctica and the almost innate need to contradict every single one of my ideas.
Seven months later, and I’m only discovering more stuff to dislike about him and now, now I get to spend my favorite holiday with him.
Fuck my life.
Chapter 3
TRISTAN
The humongous hall of the resort is entirely decked up in midget twinkling lights, red, silver and gold trimmings are elegantly spread all over the place, the snow outside the large floor-to-ceiling windows, both in a thick white layer over the ground and gently falling from the dark sky, is an all time favorite of mine, and adds even more to the Christmassy atmosphere surrounding us as soft classical jingles and carols from the Forties float through the air mingling with the general conversation while we all sip eggnog and munch on wintery delicacies.
By all accounts this should be the setting of a perfect holiday, but I’m in the foulest mood I’ve been in quite a while.
Normally I like the holidays, I really do, but at present my emotions are running in a complete different direction, the Grinch in his worst possible day would have nothing on me.
I’m pissed off, dammit.
This is so not the way I envisioned spending my holidays!
Sure, the resort looks amazing and my parents are here with me, but this whole thing just feels… wrong and totally fucked up.
I am at a welcome party Natalie and I supposedly threw together for our employees to celebrate our retreat in this wonderful place.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
Our moms took care of everything and accidentally on purpose forgot to mention we needed to pretend to be BFFs for the evening.
And now here I am wearing a stupid Santa hat with one arm thrown over Miss Ball-buster’s shoulder as we hold court in the middle of the room, the scene looking as fake as they come as our poor executive staff gawks at as in bedazzled confusion.
And is this enough?
Far from it.
Because not only I get to spend the entirety of this week stuck with Natalie in close quarters as we apparently partake in all kinds of activities that the moms can’t stop raving about,
someone also forgot to mention this was going to be a fucking 24/7 arrangement, since I’m gonna have to also share a chalet with her.
And is this chalet close to the main hotel or to any of the cabins our VPs, our PAs or even our parents are renting out?
Of course not.
There was a conspiracy of some kind, it seems, possibly orchestrated by my own mother if I know her enough —and I do— my father wouldn’t confirm nor deny it, he only would say that ‘someone’ mentioned how much more effective it would be to get us to ‘bond’ if we also actually lived together, aside from spending time in the same resort, doing the same activities fucking day in and fucking day out.
And could this ‘someone’ stop at that?
Nuh-uh, ‘someone’ also thought it would be even better if the cabin we were to share was ‘further up the mountain’.
So basically I’m gonna be alone with her in this super isolated place with no internet connectivity and not even a stupid television, nothing.
I’m literally gonna be sharing space. With her. For seven days and seven nights. With no interruptions and no distractions.
I’m pretty sure we’re gonna bond on one thing only: killing each other.
I can clearly see it in my head.
My brain begging me to chuck her out the closest window into the snow so she can cool her hotheaded ass a little, and my cock simply never shutting up about my need to go all caveman on her and just take her under me.
Pretty as a picture, ain’t it?
“I so hate you, this is all your fault,” the bane of my existence mutters through the forced smile frozen on her face, fixing her Santa hat over her forehead and discreetly elbowing my side.
“I hate you more, Nat, and don’t try to pin this on me, when we both know you’re the one who’s to blame,” I hiss through clenched teeth, also keeping my smile big as our parents beam at us proudly, our PAs stare on, both looking like they could use a drink, and the rest of the staff just gapes at us, wondering when was it that the feuding Montague and Capulet decided we all had to get along.