A Daddy by Christmas

by Teri Wilson

  The shocked expression on Mrs. Summers’s face gave way to one of perplexed amusement. “Find a wife? It’s as simple as that, is it?”

  “Yes.” He gave her a curt nod.

  Simple was a necessity.

  Frankly, the more Anders thought about it, the more he liked the idea of an arranged marriage. A temporary wife was exactly what he needed. He’d handle it like a basic merger. After all, those were his specialty. No messy emotions, no expectations—just a simple business transaction between two consenting adults.

  Two consenting adults who wouldn’t sleep together or have any other sort of romantic entanglement.

  Maybe I really am dead inside.

  Fine. So be it.

  Maybe Grant had hit the nail on the head when he’d made that astute accusation right before he turned on his heel and stormed out of the office five days ago. Anders hoped he had. He’d love nothing more than to remain in his current state of numbness for the rest of his godforsaken life.

  “My husband and I only knew each other for six months before we got married, and he was the love of my life.” Mrs. Summers gave Anders a watery smile. “You’re absolutely right. It doesn’t have to be complicated.”

  Anders swallowed around the rock in his throat. “I don’t have six months. I have until Christmas.”

  She gaped at him, and he took advantage of her silence to abruptly fill her in on the rest of it. Having this conversation was more humbling than he’d anticipated. “If I’m not married by the end of the calendar year, Lolly goes to the alternate guardians—Olivia’s sister and her husband. Lolly can’t go to them. They live in Kansas, and her entire life would be upended. Plus, they’ve already got five kids of their own, and while I’m sure they’re competent parents, they weren’t my brother’s first choice.”

  Nor was Anders, technically. Grant and Olivia wanted Lolly raised by Anders plus one, as if the matter of guardianship could be worded like a wedding invitation.

  Was it even legal? Possibly, according to his lawyer. But they didn’t have time to battle it out in court.

  Even if they had, Anders would have had to speculate in front of a judge and jury why his own brother would place such a condition on his role in Lolly’s life in the event she became orphaned. He would be forced to admit that the provision in the will had taken him by surprise, but he knew precisely why it was there.

  If Grant and Olivia couldn’t be there for Lolly, they wanted her to grow up in a nuclear family—a home with a mom and dad. But that wasn’t the only reason. They knew that Anders loved their daughter, but they also knew he couldn’t be trusted to get up and walk away from Wall Street at a reasonable hour every day. Work was his first love, his only love. And that wasn’t good enough for Lolly.

  Hell, even Anders knew it wasn’t.

  He would change. Had they really thought he wouldn’t? He’d turn his life inside out and upside down for that little girl.

  Yet here you sit.

  The paneled walls of his office felt as if they were closing in around him. Anders fixated on the smooth surface of his desk and breathing in and out until the feeling passed.

  When at last he looked up, the tablet was back in Mrs. Summers’s hands again and her glasses were perched on the end of her nose.

  “Tell me how I can help,” she said.

  A fleeting sense of relief passed through him. Help was precisely what he needed, and Mrs. Summers was efficient beyond measure. He could do this. He had to. “Get me the names and contact information for every woman I’ve dated in the past twelve months.”

  “Yes, sir.” She jotted something down with her stylus.

  “Better make that the past eighteen months, just to be safe.” He took a deep inhalation. It felt good to have a plan, even if said plan was a long shot. Reaching out to old girlfriends made more sense than proposing to strangers.

  “If I might make a suggestion, sir. Perhaps you should consider...” Mrs. Summers tipped her head in the direction of the office across the hall from Anders’s, which belonged to another partner in the firm—Penelope Reed.

  Anders grew still. He hadn’t realized anyone in the office knew about the arrangement he had with Penelope. So much for subtlety.

  “No.” He shook his head.

  It wasn’t completely out of the question, but Penelope was his last resort. True, they occasionally shared a bed. And true, their relationship was strings-free, as businesslike as a coupling could possibly be.

  But marrying someone within the firm was a terrible idea. They could hide the occasional one-night stand, but a marriage was another matter entirely.

  “Very well.” Mrs. Summers nodded. “It was just an idea.”

  “I’ll keep it in mind.” He shifted uncomfortably in his chair and wondered what it meant that he’d felt more comfortable proposing to a stranger than to a woman he bedded from time to time. Nothing good, that was for sure. “In the meantime, I also need to find another puppy.”

  Mrs. Summers peered at him over the top of her glasses. “Did you miss your appointment at the animal shelter this afternoon? I thought I’d programmed it into your BlackBerry.”

  “No, I was there. But the shelter made some kind of mistake. They promised the dog to someone else.” For a brief, blissful moment, Anders’s attention strayed from his messy life, and he thought about the graceful woman in the reindeer costume—her soulful eyes, holly berry lips and perfect, impertinent mouth. Somewhere in the back of his head, he could have sworn he heard jingle bells.

  “What a shame. Lolly would have loved that little dog.” His assistant pressed a hand to her heart.

  Anders had screwed up a lot of things lately. His list of mistakes was longer than the line to take pictures with Santa at Macy’s, but he had a feeling he’d done the right thing when he’d walked away from the animal shelter empty-handed. Maybe he wasn’t as big of a Scrooge as everyone thought he was.

  Dead inside.

  A headache bloomed at the back of Anders’s skull. “There are other puppies. I suspect it worked out for the best.”

  Mrs. Summers narrowed her gaze, studied him for a beat and then nodded. “Things usually do.”

  Did they?

  God, he hoped so.

  “I think I’m going to take the rest of the afternoon off, after all.” He stood, buttoned his suit jacket and shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

  This office was his sanctuary. He’d always felt more at home at his desk, glued to the market’s highs and lows, than he did at his luxury penthouse with its sweeping views of Central Park and the Natural History Museum. But today it felt different, strange... He wondered if it would ever feel like home again, and if it didn’t, where he was supposed to find peace.

  “Call the nanny and tell her I’m on the way to fetch Lolly.” Maybe he’d take her to see the tree at Rockefeller Center or for a carriage ride through the park. Something Christmassy.

  Like the Rockettes show at Radio City Music Hall?

  His jaw clenched tight.

  “Yes, Mr. Kent. And I’ll look into the puppy situation and send you a list of available dogs that might be a good fit.” Mrs. Summers looked up from her tablet. “Would you like me to try and find another Yorkie mix?”

  He heard the woman’s voice again—so confident, so cynical in her assessment of his character.

  You really don’t seem like the Yorkie type.

  What did that even mean?

  Did she picture him with something less fluffy and adorable, like a bulldog? Or a snake? More to the point, why had that assumption stuck with him and rubbed him so entirely the wrong way?

  “Anything. I’m open to suggestions,” he muttered. Then on second thought, he said, “Scratch that. I want a lapdog—something cute and affectionate, on the smaller side. A real cupcake of a dog.”

  Mrs. Summers
stifled a smile. “Of course, sir.”

  “The sweeter, the better.”

  Chapter Three

  The afternoon following Chloe’s odd encounter at the animal shelter, she tucked her new puppy into a playpen containing the candy cane–striped dog bed and a dozen or so new toys and then trudged her way through the snow-covered West Village to the Wilde School of Dance.

  It was time to face the music.

  She couldn’t keep lying to her family about her job. Just this morning, she’d thought she spotted her cousin Ryan walking through Times Square while she’d been on flyer duty. She’d ducked behind one of the area’s ubiquitous costumed characters—a minion in a Santa hat—but there was no hiding her blinking antlers.

  Luckily, the man in the slim tailored suit hadn’t been her cousin. Nor had it been her brother, Zander. To her immense relief, she also ruled out the possibility that he was the man who’d proposed to her yesterday—Anders Kent. This guy’s shoulders weren’t quite as broad, and the cut of his jaw was all wrong. His posture was far too laid-back and casual. He seemed like a regular person out for a stroll on his lunch break, whereas Anders had been brimming with intensity, much like the city itself—gritty and glamorous. So beautifully electric.

  Not that she’d been thinking about him for the duration of her two-hour shift. She quite purposefully hadn’t. But being on flyer duty was such a mindless job, and while she flashed her Rockette smile for the tourists and ground her teeth against the wind as it swept between the skyscrapers, he kept sneaking back into her consciousness. The harder she tried not to think about him, the clearer the memory of their interaction became, until it spun through her mind on constant repeat, like a favorite holiday movie. Love Actually or It’s a Wonderful Life.

  Chloe huffed out a sigh. If life was even remotely wonderful, she wouldn’t be so hung up on a meaningless encounter with a stranger. Which was precisely why she had to stop pretending everything was fine and come to terms with reality. She was no longer a professional dancer. She might never perform that loathsome toy soldier routine again, and if she didn’t humble herself and come clean with the rest of the Wildes, they were sure to find out some other way and her embarrassment would be multiplied tenfold. Emily Wilde was practically omniscient. It was a miracle Chloe’s mother hadn’t busted her already.

  Sure enough, the minute Chloe pushed through the door of the Wilde School of Dance, she could feel Emily’s eyes on her from clear across the room. Her mother was deep in conversation with a slim girl in a black leotard—one of her ballet students, no doubt—but her penetrating gaze was trained on Chloe.

  Here we go.

  Chloe smiled and attempted a flippy little wave, as if this was any ordinary day and she stopped by the studio all the time. She didn’t, of course, making this whole situation more awkward and humbling than she could bear.

  When was the last time she’d set foot inside this place? A while—even longer than she’d realized. She didn’t recognize half the faces in the recital photographs hanging on the lobby walls, and the smooth maple floors had taken quite a beating since she’d twirled across them in pointe shoes as a teenager. The sofa in the parents’ waiting area had a definite sag in its center that hadn’t been there when Chloe spent hours sprawled across it doing her homework after school.

  Was her mother still using the same blue record player and worn practice albums instead of a digital sound system? Yes, apparently. The turntable sat perched on a shelf in the corner of the main classroom, right where it had been since before Chloe was born.

  At least Emily was no longer teaching back-to-back classes all day, every day. Chloe’s sister-in-law, Allegra, had taken over the majority of the curriculum. From the looks of things, Allegra’s intermediate ballet class had just ended. She waved at Chloe from behind the classroom’s big picture window as happy ten-and eleven-year-olds in pink tights and soft ballet slippers spilled out of the studio, weaving around Chloe with girlish, balletic grace.

  Her throat grew tight as a wave of nostalgia washed over her. Everything was all so different, and yet still exactly the same as she remembered.

  She’d grown up here. In total, she’d probably spent more time between these faded blue walls than she had in the grand family brownstone on Riverside Drive. If family lore was to be believed, she’d taken her first steps in her mother’s office between boxes of tap shoes and recital costumes. Just months afterward, she’d learned to plié at the barre in the classroom with the old blue record player.

  Chloe’s first kiss had happened here, too—with a boy from the School of American Ballet Theatre during rehearsals for Romeo and Juliet. It had been a stage kiss, but her heart beat as wildly as hummingbird wings, and when the boy’s lips first touched hers, she’d forgotten about pointed toes and the blister on her heel from her new pointe shoes.

  The kiss might have been fake, but the warmth of his lips was real, as was the feeling that this school, this place that she knew so well, was etched permanently on her soul. She’d always come back here. It was her home.

  I should have come back sooner.

  She’d meant to. But somehow days turned into weeks and weeks turned into months, and then her father died. Walking in her childhood footsteps after his heart attack was just too painful, so she’d taken the easy way out and stayed away. She’d thrown herself fully into the Rockettes and, like everything in her life, the family dance school took a back seat to her career.

  And now here she was—jobless, with no close friends, superficial relationships with her family members and no love life whatsoever now that Steven had so unceremoniously dumped her after the Thanksgiving parade mishap.

  Perfect. She’d somehow become the horrible character in a Christmas movie who required divine intervention to become a decent person again. Except there wasn’t an angel in sight, was there?

  Again, Anders Kent’s chiseled features flashed in her mind. She blinked. Hard.

  “Chloe!” Allegra clicked the classroom door shut behind her and pulled Chloe into a hug. “What a wonderful surprise. What are you doing here? Isn’t this your busy season? Aren’t you performing ten times a day or something crazy like that?”

  Before she could form a response, the teen ballerina bade Emily goodbye. Chloe stepped out of the hug and held her breath as her mother approached.

  “Hello, dear. Isn’t this a lovely surprise.” Emily kissed her cheek, but the warm greeting didn’t alleviate her sense of shame.

  If anything, it made her feel worse.

  “Hi, Mom. Allegra. It’s great to see you both.” Chloe could feel her smile start to tremble.

  Don’t cry. The only thing that could make her confession more painful was if she fell apart before she could get the words out.

  “Are you okay, dear?” Emily glanced at the dainty antique watch strapped around her wrist. She’d been wearing it as long as Chloe could remember. “It’s the middle of the day. Shouldn’t you be performing in the matinee?”

  This was it. This was the moment to spill the beans and admit she was the Rockette who’d become YouTube famous for ruining the Thanksgiving Day parade.

  She took a deep breath. “No, I’m actually not performing anymore. For now, anyway.”

  “What do you mean, you’re not performing?” Emily’s face fell.

  The disappointment in her eyes was a knife to Chloe’s heart. For all Chloe’s mistakes, Emily had always been her biggest supporter. Chloe had missed months’ worth of family dinners and get-togethers, but when it came to performing, she’d never failed to make her dancer mother proud. Until now.

  “I’m on hiatus for a while.” She swallowed and shifted her gaze over Emily’s shoulder so she wouldn’t have to see her mother’s crushed expression, but then she found herself staring at a slick, glossy poster from one of her own Christmas shows.

  The poster hung in a frame surrounded by
photographs of herself in various Rockette costumes. The arrangement was practically a shrine.

  “Oh dear, you’re not injured, are you?” Emily’s hand fluttered to her heart.

  “Please don’t worry, Mom. I’m fine.” I’m just a world-class coward. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t confess to being fired, not while she was standing there, facing the Chloe wall of fame.

  Besides, her mom had just given her an excellent idea. An injury, even a small one, would buy her some time to make things right. She could start helping out at the school. She’d answer the phones, manage the dance moms—anything—and once she’d proved her devotion to her family again, she’d finally tell them everything.

  Because she was definitely telling the truth, 100 percent. She was just delaying it a tiny bit longer.

  Seriously? Just fess up already.

  “It’s only a sprain,” she heard herself say, and immediately wished the floor would open up and swallow her whole.

  Allegra gasped. “Oh, no. Please say it’s not your ankle.”

  Chloe looked down at her feet. She’d worn Uggs, because it was freezing out, but if she’d had an injured ankle, it would be wrapped. She might even be on crutches. “Um, no. It’s my calf.”

  “Your calf?” Emily lifted a brow.

  “Yes. There’s a terrible knot in it.” Could she have come up with a more ridiculous lie? There was no way her mother was buying this.

  “I see,” Emily said quietly...so quietly that Chloe had the distinct impression that her mother really did understand what was happening, but was so unable to face the truth of the situation that she couldn’t even say it out loud.

  But if Emily sensed Chloe was being less than truthful, she didn’t admit it.

  “That’s a shame, sweetheart. But whatever circumstances brought you back, I’m glad you’re here.” She smiled. “Really glad.”

  Chloe took a deep breath. “Me, too. I was actually hoping you could put me to work.”

  “Here at the studio?” Allegra said.