“Well, we are supposed to host the party every couple of years and I wasn’t feeling up to it before. I’m excited to host it this year. You’ll see. It’s going to be amazing. We will still go visit Grandma and Grandpa and we can invite them to our party too.”
“That party sounds like a lot of work, Dad. Why not just let Aunt Ashley do it, or Uncle Robert?” Jackson chimed in.
“No!” I said much louder than I intended to. “We are throwing the party at our house. I am going to make this the best damn Christmas we have had in the last ten years. Now order your pizza!”
Both kids looked down and avoided eye contact with me while we waited for the pizza to come. I’d raised my voice and basically threatened them with a Christmas party. Not exactly the father of the year moment I was hoping for. Being a single father was much harder than it had been before. The kids were getting old enough that they had their own opinions about everything.
When they were younger I remembered thinking how easy life would be when they both could drive. I imagined this blissful world where they never argued and we all got along perfectly. I thought about how nice it would be to not have to worry about them so much. Unfortunately, that wasn’t at all what teenage life was like. I worried about the kids more now than I ever did when they were younger.
The closer they got to being adults the more I worried if I had done a good enough job raising them. I worried about what sort of things they would tell their psychologists when they talked about their childhood. Oh, the things I worried about. Basically, there was a constant stream of thoughts in regard to my parenting and I couldn’t get away from them.
When our pizza came we ate it in silence for a little bit. Not because I was angry, we just didn’t have anything to say at that moment. Both of the kids wanted to go to friend’s houses for the weekend and that meant I could get caught up on my work, but it also meant that they would be busy, and I’d be alone.
Spending night after night alone wasn’t fun at all. I was constantly thinking about the kids and wondering what they were doing. This idea that they were both going to grow up and be independent adults and leave me to fend for myself wasn’t sitting well with me at all. Ashley’s comment about me growing old and being alone didn’t help at all either. I didn’t want to be a grumpy old man who was all alone, that wasn’t the life I envisioned for myself and I knew that Rose wouldn’t have wanted that for me either.
“Dad, so can I stay at my friend's house?” Jenna got the nerve to ask again and added her signature smile to the request.
“Yes, that’s fine. And Jackson you can too. How about we finish dinner and then go grab your things at home and I’ll drop you both off?”
“Thank you, Dad,” Jackson and Jenna said in unison.
“Maybe on Sunday we can go visit Grandma and Grandpa for dinner still?” Jenna asked.
“I’ve got to make a quick phone call,” I darted to the back of the restaurant so I could hear myself as I called the party planner. I’d totally forgotten to call and see if she could meet up on Saturday instead of Sunday.
“You’ve reached the voicemail for Nicole with Superior Designs. If you leave me a message I’ll get back to you as soon as possible,” her soft and sexy voice said.
I felt her voice rumble through my body. She had a beautiful mixture of smooth and sensual tones. I was caught a little off guard when the beep from her voicemail triggered me to leave my message. I almost just hung up the phone but managed to leave a somewhat coherent message for her.
“Hi. Yes, this is Thomas Hanover. You are scheduled to come to my house on Sunday but I need to change our meeting to Saturday at nine o’clock in the morning. Hopefully, that works for you. I’ll be expecting you then. Thanks for taking the job.”
Moving my meeting with the party planner to Saturday gave me all day Sunday with the kids. Plus, it would be a lot more comfortable for us to discuss the party without the kids running in and out of the room asking me questions or trying to get my attention. Then there was the fact that this woman was absolutely stunning, and I couldn’t help but think she might find me attractive as well. Perhaps this whole party planning could turn into a mutually beneficial adult fun relationship. It had been a long time since I had a play date with a beautiful woman.
Relationships in the traditional sense were too much for me with the kids and my memories of the past. But I was still a red-blooded man and a fun night or two with this sexy party planner was definitely okay with me. Hearing her voice had stirred all sorts of desires that I wasn’t prepared for at all.
Chapter 4
Niki
“Another round,” I yelled to our waitress as she walked pass Alana and me.
“I can’t believe this guy already paid you fifty thousand dollars,” Alana said sipping her cocktail. “I’m so happy for you.”
“I’m sorry I’m not coming on the cruise, but I’m so happy too,” I yelled over the club music.
“Screw the cruise,” Alana yelled.
“Yeah, screw the cruise.”
We were having the time of our lives dancing and drinking the night away. For the first time that I could remember I wasn’t worried about how much the drinks cost or if we would find some good looking guys to pay for them. Instead, Alana and I were just hanging out and having fun together.
The old saying that money couldn’t buy you happiness wasn’t true, I was feeling really happy at the moment. After receiving the down payment for this job I wrote checks for all my bills that month. I put money into savings. I bought the accounting software program I’d been dying to own for my business. Even after all of that I still had tons of money left. It was an amazing feeling and I was so excited about this project.
“So did you win the lottery or something?” The waitress asked when she brought our drinks back to us.
“No, she landed a huge client. Thomas Hanover with Hanover Industries,” Alana bragged for me.
“Oh, good luck,” the waitress grimaced at Mr. Hanover’s name. “I heard he fired a dozen people at one time all because they were looking at him weird.”
“What? That’s ridiculous,” I laughed.
“I’m sure it’s exaggerated. You know how stories get, but I knew a girl who worked there before and she said he was one of the meanest people she had ever met. Which is a shame since he’s so handsome.”
“Maybe that was a long time ago or something? His assistant said he liked his job,” I said but definitely feeling more nervous about the project than I had felt before.
I could see that Alana was already searching the internet for information on my new client. Before signing the contract I’d looked him up too and nothing seemed too out of the ordinary. There were a lot of business articles about his company and how it was doing but I didn’t delve deep enough to find anything too scary.
He was a good looking man and he was single with teenage children. It was sort of sexy though. I mean a single father who was trying to throw a Christmas party for his kids, I was excited about the job.
“You two girls look like you could use some company,” a greased up guy said as he joined us at our table.
“Actually, we are fine,” I replied.
“Let me buy you girls a drink and then you can come back to my place and show me a good time tonight,” the man continued on.
“We are enjoying our night alone. Thank you though,” I replied.
Alana rolled her eyes at me. She wasn’t going to be as nice to this guy and I knew it. Being rude or mean wasn’t my style. I always tried to work things out and see the good in the situation. Clearly, this man thought we were beautiful and he got up the nerve to throw out this wild idea which I’m sure he hoped we would say yes to. I didn’t fault him for trying for his fantasy.
“Leave, now, before I punch you in the throat,” Alana said getting into the man’s face.
“I like this one better anyway,” he said grabbing hold of my arm. “How about you and I go home together?”
> He didn’t know what hit him. Alana did indeed throat punch the man and he was on the ground before he knew what happened. We grabbed our drinks and ran off to another corner of the club while the man fumbled to stand back up and figure out what was going on.
“Alana, you’re terrible. We could have just walked away,” I laughed.
“What fun would that have been?”
We stayed out until four o’clock in the morning and I wasn’t even tired. The adrenaline of everything had me energized and excited to take on this new project. But as our Uber pulled in front of the apartment I noticed I’d missed a call and someone had left me a voicemail.
“Shit,” I whispered as I listened to Mr. Hanover. “He wants me to come up to his house today. Like at nine o’clock. I can’t get it together by then.”
“Pull up the rental car app and make sure you can change your reservation to today,” Alana said calmly like she wasn’t drunk at all.
I did as she asked while we stumbled up to the apartment. I was drunk. I wasn’t a little tipsy, I had been drinking for nearly eight hours straight and hadn’t slept in a whole day. There was no way I could show up at his house and pull this meeting off.
“Coffee, I need coffee,” I stammered into the kitchen. “Or should I sleep for a few hours first? I don’t know what to do.”
“You are going to sleep until six. Two hours might not seem like a lot but it will help. Then you’re going to take a cold shower, drink lots of coffee, and put some makeup on to cover those bags under your eyes. You’re going to get your rental car and drive out to his house. You are being paid a fortune for this. There’s no complaining when you’re making this sort of money,” Alana said and practically pushed me into my bed.
I did exactly as planned. With a dozen alarms set, I was able to get a little bit of sleep. I took a quick and freezing cold shower and felt amazing afterward. With a quick style of my hair and some makeup, I looked put together and felt like I’d be able to hold my own, as long as the meeting didn’t last too long.
I filled a large travel mug with coffee before heading out to get my rental car. Alana was right, I was getting paid too much money not to show up when this guy wanted me to. I could do this, I had this in the bag. I was a professional party planner and a little late night partying wasn’t going to stop me from meeting my new client.
Driving out to his house wasn’t as bad as I’d imagined it to be. Living in the city made me think that anything outside of the city took hours and hours to get to, but after the short one-hour drive I was pulling up to his home.
The front gate was clearly labeled so I was confident I’d arrived at the correct address. I pulled up to the intercom and pressed the call button and then waited. His assistant had warned me that it would take some time for Mr. Hanover to answer the call, so I tried to be patient.
After about a minute, I pressed the buzzer again. Then I waited two more minutes before pressing it another time. Certainly, he was expecting me; he was the one who changed to time to Saturday.
The driveway was so long and covered with so many trees that I couldn’t even see the house. I buzzed again and walked closer to the gate to see if I could see any signs that this guy was home at all.
I checked the address again and then prepared to call him and let Mr. Hanover know that I was there. But just as I pulled up his contact information I saw a man jogging down the driveway. He wasn’t wearing a shirt and had on some workout shorts and tennis shoes. Even halfway down the driveway I could see the definition in his abs and forced myself to look away before I got too distracted by his body.
“I’m sorry, the buzzer isn’t working,” he yelled as he jogged up. “I was out in the gym and the damn thing wouldn’t release to let you in.”
“Hello,” I said very clearly looking at his naked chest.
“Hi, I’m Thomas. Thank you for coming out. If you could just punch in the numbers two, eight, four, six and the pound sign, the gate will open for you.”
“Okay.” I punched the numbers in as he requested and then went back toward my car so I could drive in. “Do you want to ride with me?’ I asked.
“Sure, yeah, that’s good.”
“Hi, I’m Nicole Normandy,” I reached my hand out to introduce myself officially.
“Yes, I know,” he replied only giving me a quick handshake and then getting into my vehicle.
It was odd that he didn’t try to flirt with me. Not that I thought all that much of myself but most men tried to make some sort of joke or and least did a flirty little smile. It caught me off guard that he was so indifferent. Probably for the best since I needed to make a good impression on this client and didn’t need any of that sexual tension mixing things up.
“Well, at least you got your workout in,” I joked while we drove down the extremely long driveway. “How long is this anyway?”
“It’s a mile long.”
“You ran all the way from your house to the gate that quickly? That’s impressive.”
“Not really,” he said dryly and then sat quietly while I finished driving us back to the house.
The house wasn’t exactly a house. It was a full-blown mansion, that was the only way to describe it. There was a large middle house with two wings and four garage doors and I assumed just as many vehicles inside. The house was two stories tall but also looked as if there was a finished basement in it as well.
“This is an impressive home. I’m excited to talk to you about the party.”
“Yes, I’m glad you had the time to take on the project,” Thomas said as he walked up to the front door and left me to gather my things. “I need to hop in the shower quickly. Make yourself at home in the living room here,” he pointed to a large room off to the right.
“Okay, thank you.”
He was already halfway up the stairs by the time I closed the front door behind me. My stomach rumbled from the coffee I’d downed on the trip there and I quickly looked around for a bathroom. With a home this large surely there had to be a few bathrooms on each floor.
I hurried past the grand staircase and ended up in the kitchen, or at least part of the kitchen. Quickly I walked around and found a bathroom to use. It was about the size of my whole apartment and there wasn’t even a shower or bathtub in it.
My stomach turned, and I felt nauseous as I tried to calm myself. The combination of alcohol, not sleeping, large amounts of coffee and a road trip was not sitting well at all. My hands shook, and I splashed water on my face in an attempt to steady myself, but then realized I’d just destroyed my makeup and now had mascara dripping down my cheeks.
With a little work, I was able to clean myself up and finally emerged from the bathroom. My hands were still unsteady and I did my best to take some deep breaths and calm myself. I just had to get through this meeting and then I could get in my car and go sleep in some parking lot. An hour, tops, that’s all I needed to make it through.
I wandered around the kitchen in awe of how large it was. The refrigerator looked like something that was in a restaurant, not a home. The center island was so large that I could have fit my queen mattress on top of it. The house was beautiful but way too big to be practical. I had to wonder why anyone would choose to live in such an extravagant home, but I figured that was what people with this kind of money did.
Fifteen minutes went by and I found myself aimlessly walked around the main floor and into a library. Most of the other rooms looked lived in, but the library seemed like it was preserved from the past. The artwork was old, the furniture not as modern as the rest of the home, and even the curtains looked like they had been there since the home was built.
In the corner were a sitting chair and a large group of pictures. They were of a woman and her children. I assumed it was the twins with their mother. I hadn’t heard anything about the wife of the family and for some reason, I thought I’d seen that Thomas was single. Perhaps he had gone through a divorce and this was the only area of the house where he kept his ex�
�s pictures for the kids to look at.
“I told you to wait in the living room,” Thomas yelled from the entryway to the room.
“I’m sorry,” I said quickly and set down the picture of the beautiful woman and her children. “Is this their mother?”
“Let me get this straight right now,” he said motioning for me to leave the room. “If I give you an order it is your job to follow it. I asked you to wait in this room.”
He slammed the library door closed behind him and then followed me into the living room across the hall. He was clearly upset that I’d disobeyed him and I had my first glimpse of what it was going to be like to work for this man.
“I apologize,” I said, knowing that it wasn’t the time to ask questions.
“Just do as I ask of you. I don’t want any more snooping around here. The library is off limits. No outsiders are allowed in there.”
I was an outsider. That was very clear to me at that moment. This wasn’t going to be one of those jobs where I felt like I was part of the family and wanted to come back and hang out with them when the party was over. This was a business dealing. I was his employee and I was going to deliver exactly what he asked of me.
The problem I always had with clients like Thomas was that they couldn’t see beyond their own vision. The benefit of hiring someone like me was that I could help make their ideas into something even more amazing, but that only worked if they were willing to give me a little freedom to surprise them. So far, I didn’t think I would be getting that sort of freedom while working for this man.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Hanover. It won’t happen again,” I said with a giant smile on my face. “Would you like to tell me a little more about your party and what you’re looking for?”
The smile was key in situations like this. I couldn’t show that he was rattling me. I had to keep my cool and put him at ease. Being upbeat and showing my fun personality sometimes helped to soften up clients like this one.
Mine on Christmas Page 4