Montana Secret Santa

by Debra Salonen

  The door opened again, and this time the right person walked in. Or, rather, trudged in.

  “Whoa. What happened to you?”

  Krista dumped her computer bag, purse, and gloves on their usual table then collapsed in the chair, not even bothering to take off her coat. “I look that bad, huh?”

  Jonah jumped to his feet. “You look like me after pulling an all-nighter in the lab. Sit. I’ll get your cocoa.”

  Normally, two or three other Santa volunteers would have been here by now. Although he and Krista rarely were alone, Jonah always felt a connection between them—as warm and sweet as the cocoa they shared. The threat of a storm must have kept the other Santas at home, which meant he could find out what had her so stressed out.

  He returned with her steaming mug of fragrant bliss. “I’d like to help, if you’ll let me.”

  Her beautiful eyes—completely devoid of makeup—blinked. “What do you mean?”

  “Oh, come on, Krista. I know we only met a week ago, but what we do here is a lot more intense than I expected. Some of these people’s stories stay on my mind all day. Is that what keeps you awake at night, because you sure as hell don’t look like a person who was out having fun till the wee hours of the morning?”

  Her sharp bark of laughter held zero amusement. “It’s not Santa business. It’s my family. The holidays are always challenging and this year is turning into a circus.”

  “How?”

  “My mom decided it was time to get the whole family together. Here,” she cried into her mug before taking a big gulp.

  “In Marietta? At your place?” From the description she’d given him, her two-bedroom condo didn’t sound large enough to host a big group.

  She shook her head. He could tell she’d been wearing her alpaca cap. He wondered if she’d walked the whole way?

  “No. Mom’s assistant has booked a vacation rental between here and Paradise. Apparently, it has five bedrooms and four baths. Thank God.”

  He sat across from her. “Then, what’s the problem?”

  She inhaled deeply. “My siblings are being their usual pain-in-the-butt selves. I was on the phone with one of my sisters until after midnight last night. She’s filming a commercial in Hawaii, and we… she… oh, hell, it was just…” She closed her eyes and let out a sigh. “One of the reasons I chose to move to Montana was so I wouldn’t get dragged into the various family dramas.” She sank against the back of her chair, legs stretched under the table, nearly touching his.

  “Did you ever see the movie Groundhog Day?” she asked.

  “With Bill Murray? It’s one of Mom’s favorites.”

  “It’s the same thing every year for me.” She shrugged off her coat and sat forward again, elbows on the table. “Mom was up for the role of Nancy Taylor, the pretty town lady Bill Murray’s character kept hitting on. Obviously, Mom didn’t get the part, but I heard about how the casting person played favorites for years, over and over and over again. Sound familiar?”

  He’d read about her very famous mother online. Her dad and siblings, too. In a way, he understood her decision to distance herself from the entertainment business, but that couldn’t have been easy. “Some hurts seem to stick in your craw, don’t they? But your mother obviously didn’t let it hold her back. She’s a producer, now, right?”

  Her eyes narrowed. Had his question crossed some line she’d heard way too many times before?

  “If you tell me you’ve been harboring a secret desire to act, I’m out of here.”

  He laughed, surprised by the flash of anger in her eyes. “Me? Act? Yeah, right. We’re here to brainstorm. You have a problem. Maybe Secret Santa can help.”

  “How? Are you going to bribe my sibs to get together for Christmas just so I can watch us implode and prove to my parents that we aren’t ever going to be a storybook family?” She shook her head, her expression so bleak it nearly broke his heart. “No, thanks. Keeping all seven pockets of dysfunction separate has worked this long. Why risk it?”

  She didn’t realize, of course, just how much Jonah loved a challenge. “I may have a skewed view of the holidays since I like spending them with my family. If it weren’t for the dogs, we’d all be in Florida.” Although, to be honest, Daniel had seemed on the fence about making the trip the last time they talked.

  “You have a different kind of family.”

  “Okay. I’ll give you that, but I still say having your family come to Marietta is pure genius.”

  Her jaw gaped. “How do you figure?”

  “Marietta is like Christmas on steroids. Look at us. Did you ever think you’d start every December morning trying to fill the wishes of perfect strangers?”

  She hesitated. “No.”

  “Well, there you go. Tell me a little about your brothers and sisters. Maybe I can think of something that will make your time together more Hallmark and less Maker’s Mark.”

  That brought a laugh and she finally seemed to relax a bit. He’d heard her tell Louise she was the youngest of five. He’d eavesdropped, plain and simple. He couldn’t help himself. He wanted to know everything about her—even though he told himself repeatedly to stop thinking about her. That nothing good could come of falling for her. That he had one foot in a jet plane set to take him home and she wasn’t going anywhere until she grew her business to the point where she could make her Marietta office one branch of Blue Sky Promotions.

  “Okay. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  He tapped two fingers to his chest in some pseudo Boy Scout salute. She rolled her eyes. “My dad’s Manny Martin. He changed our last name from Martinez to Martin to avoid getting typecast in Hispanic roles, but guess what? Didn’t work. He’s been in hundreds of movies and TV shows—always the Mexican sidekick, never the star.”

  Jonah knew the name and recognized the face when he’d done his online search. The man had like a thousand titles to his credit. He must have started working when he was a toddler.

  “For the past ten or so years, Dad’s been doing plays on- and off-Broadway. When he’s not in New York, he’s filming in Mexico with my eldest brother, Diego, who stars in, produces, and directs a super-popular telenovela.”

  “Interesting. I know what that is, but I’ve never seen one.”

  “Do you speak Spanish?”

  “Yes. French and Japanese, too. But I don’t watch TV.” He could tell by her expression his answer threw her.

  “My sister, Branna, who is eighteen months my senior, is the only one in the family who legally took back the name Martinez. Don’t ask me why. Our grandparents are dead and even though Branna supposedly means ‘hair as dark as a raven’s wing’ in Irish, she and I have exactly the same coloring.” She sighed and lowered her voice. “Frankly, I think the name change was a show of solidarity with Dad because people have always looked at Branna and me and speculated that we had a different father than the other kids.”

  “You can check for that.”

  She faked a gasp of shock. “My parents have lived on opposite coasts since I was five but never divorced. Why? The answer depends on who you ask and who’s the most pissed-off at the time. I’m not going to be the one to blow their fragile detente out of the water.”

  The rest of the Santas showed up before he could get any more information, but his mind was racing. He’d scribbled down a couple of notes while she was talking and couldn’t wait to do a little research. As far as he knew there wasn’t a law against using his Santa powers for someone in the group.

  *

  A dream maybe. Snug in her bed with the solid warmth of Jonah’s arm around her middle. Perfect—until she opened her eyes to see she was clutching the heating pad she’d applied to a muscle she’d strained while working out. She’d pushed herself for a reason—to get Jonah Andrews out of her system. Fat lot of good that did. He’d sneaked into her dreams.

  A muffled, non-dream sound made her open her eyes. Her phone, face down on her bedside table, emitted an eerie glow. A call versus a
text notification. Her heart rate spiked the moment she turned it over and saw Jonah’s face. She’d captured his unguarded happy grin the morning when he won Louise’s vote on a request Krista had found too problematic. He liked to win. So did she. But he wasn’t the kind of person who woke someone up before dawn to gloat.

  “Hello?”

  “Hi. I woke you. Sorry. I held off as long as I could. I… it’s… I need help.”

  She reached out to turn on the bedside lamp. “What’s wrong?”

  “Bindi’s sick. She’s been throwing up all night. Even water. Mom thinks it must be something she ate. Beagles are notorious for eating anything and everything. It’s possible River Jack spit out the prescription pill for his joints and she ate it. She’s fast.”

  “What can I do?”

  “I was going to take her to a twenty-four hour urgent care in Bozeman but chains are required over the pass and Dad’s set is busted. He forgot to replace them before he left. So, her vet is coming in early. I’m meeting her at the office in half an hour. If she has to pump Bindi’s stomach or put her on an IV, I might be there for hours, and I’m supposed to be at the radio station at eight.”

  She pushed a tangle of bangs off her forehead. “That’s right. I forgot. Can Louise handle it alone?”

  “She texted me that she’s not feeling well. She thought maybe she and Bindi have the same bug.”

  His attempt at humor fell flat. “You want me to do it.”

  “Em’s snowed in. It’s either you or we cancel. Your call, Krista. I know you’re reluctant to do the on-air thing, but I think you’d be great.”

  Her palms went damp. She’d avoided anything that had to do with show business her whole life. And now he wanted her—the biggest fake Santa of all—to do a podcast? Her stomach heaved and she tasted a bit of bile. “Maybe we should cancel.”

  “Okay. But it’s our last chance before that podcast guy heads to the North Pole or Sweden or wherever he’s going. I know this is outside your comfort zone, but we’re still way behind on donations. What if we get a really important wish? You can do this, Krista. You can do this with your eyes closed. And, hey, they’re not filming it, right? You can keep your eyes closed if you want.”

  She smiled then. His conviction in her ability took the edge off her stage fright. She’d never told anyone about the cause of it. The humiliation she’d felt and the teasing she’d endured from her siblings. “One day a TV crew from some talk show came to our house to do a Christmastime PR thing on Mom. Or, maybe, Dad. I don’t remember. Some studio big shot decided the kids needed to be dressed alike in red, white, and green. The older kids were being brats and one of them tricked me into saying, ‘Santa sucks.’ I had a lisp at the time and it came out: Thanta thucks.”

  “Well, that’s just plain cruel.”

  “They thought it was hysterical. Mom was pissed. Dad threatened to send all their presents back. For years, people called me the Thanta thucks girl.” She sighed. “That was my last on-air interview.”

  Jonah didn’t say anything for a minute. “Cancel. It doesn’t matter. If we need more money to finish up the wishes we’ve committed to, I’ll make up the difference. But I don’t have the podcast guy’s number. Well, I do, but it’s not handy. Can—” A puking sound in the background interrupted his request, but she knew what he was going to ask.

  “I’ll figure it out. Go. Text me when you know something. Good luck. I hope Bindi’s okay.”

  *

  Two hours later, palms sweaty and throat so tight she wasn’t sure she’d be able to answer a single question, Krista faced her worst nemesis—a microphone. This one was minuscule compared to the huge, club-like metal monster of her memory. And the man sitting opposite her in the comfortable chair of the small, airless walk-in closet he’d converted to a studio, seemed harmless. A twenty-something nerd with a greasy ponytail and garlic breath.

  “Closed the bar last night. Sorry,” he said, the moment he opened the door to his place. “Cowboys are a bit tightlipped, but I got some great stuff from the bikers at the Wolf Den.”

  “What kind of stuff? I thought your podcast was about local holiday customs.”

  He showed her where to sit and clipped the mic to the lapel of her overly businesslike wool jacket. She’d dressed as if she were going to be on camera even though she knew this was audio only.

  “I have four active podcasts. The most popular is called ‘Raw Road Confessional.’ No names. Just stories. I make each person sign a waiver that says what they’re telling me is the truth and I am not responsible for reporting anything illegal to the authorities.”

  “Do you believe them?”

  His skinny shoulders lifted and fell. “Why not?”

  She could think of a hundred reasons but she kept them to herself. “How popular is your holiday podcast?”

  “Last one hit a hundred and forty-K. That Jonah guy said he tuned into it live and thought it was great.”

  “L-l-live?” She thought she’d be able to vet a transcript before he published it—or whatever he did with a podcast.

  The kid nodded. “Yeah. Didn’t he tell you?”

  Her throat squeezed shut making speech impossible. She shook her head.

  He shrugged again. “No biggie. Put it out of your mind. Pretend you’re talking to me, which you are. It’s really no big deal. This is the Internet. Things move at warp speed. People may retain a sound bite or two but most of what you say will get lost in the ethers. Sad fact, but true.”

  She took a deep breath. “You’ll stick to the script?” She’d written one for Jonah, so she knew it pretty much by heart.

  “Sure. Unless something cool comes up. I like to go with the flow. You’ll see.”

  Her heart palpitations started the moment he motioned one, two, three, and a green light appeared on the bigger mic in front of him. “Merry, merry jingle-bellers. It’s me, SeeMikeGo.” He said the words together like a name.

  Krista pictured a children’s book she’d loved Go, Dog, Go. Strangely, the image calmed her nerves enough that she could respond to his clever mic check and introduction.

  “Let me tell you, friends. I really wish we had video on this one because Krista Martin is hot. Who else thought Santa only employed odd little elves to do his business? Well, you’re wrong. So, Krista, when you’re not pimping the man in red, what do you do?”

  “Advertising, Mike. I pimp, as you put it, for anybody with money and something to sell.”

  “Cool. What’s your favorite product?”

  She frowned and pointed to the script. “Hands down, Copper Mountain Chocolates, on Main Street in Marietta, Montana. Sage Carrigan’s cocoa is the bomb.”

  “I haven’t tried that, but I will before I leave town and head toward the North Pole. Speaking of which, I hear you have the big man’s ear with something called the Montana Secret Santa Society.” He said the last in a stage whisper. “You’re sure you’re not violating some kind of code by talking about this on-air?”

  “Thanks for your concern, Mike, but, actually, Secret Santa has been around for years. Just ask the IRS. We’re a legitimately registered nonprofit. Every single donated dollar goes to fill wishes made by an anonymous person on behalf of someone they feel deserves a gift they can’t afford—or wouldn’t feel right—giving.”

  “Can you tell my listeners what kind of wishes you’ve fulfilled in the past?”

  “Of course, but then I’d have to kill you.” She quipped. “Only kidding. I’m a new recruit, so I can only go by the list the older, more experienced volunteer Santas have provided. Are you ready? There’s a lot to cover.”

  “Give it your best shot.”

  Keep it light and bright and fun. She’d written in big red letters on the script Jonah was supposed to be reading. What an arrogant ass!

  She inhaled loudly and tried to channel her father. “Marionettes for a girl from France. Cowhide chaps to protect a cowboy’s a… pants. Candy, flowers, and canes—the real kind, not red an
d white. A ticket home when a mother’s end was in sight. Day passes to all kinds of fun—skating, skiing, and zip line runs. Books that teach, preach, or reach, in every language, including Braille. Phones with easy-to-read keys. Fixes on motors, heaters, roofs, or hearts. Yes, I said, hearts. Giving is good for the heart.”

  They talked a bit about how Secret Santa came about and why people volunteered during such a hectic season, then he asked, “Cool. What’s the best gift you’ve ever received, Krista?”

  Her brain froze. She stared at the script stupidly. “Hmm, I don’t know. I’ve never really thought about it.”

  “Seriously? Most people have at least one great memory from Christmas past. Are you telling me you don’t?”

  Her spine stiffened. “I’m telling you this isn’t about me. It’s about Secret Santa.”

  “But how can you represent a cause you don’t feel a connection to? Do you even believe in Santa Claus?”

  How many epic Santa fails had it taken before the truth her brothers had been telling her for years sank in? There is no Santa Claus, Krista. Get over it.

  “I believe we all have the potential for being a Santa for somebody—whether it’s your children, your parents, your siblings or that friend at work who is feeling a bit beat up by life.”

  “If one of your friends was nominating you to receive a Secret Santa gift, what would it be?”

  Did one of my siblings pay you to ask that?

  She tossed out the first, non-personal thing that came into her head. “Easy. A practical, inexpensive way to ship climate-specific cargo—say Copper Mountain Chocolates’ truffles—anywhere in the world.”

  The look on his face was worth the unease she felt mentioning Sage’s business a second time. Well, almost worth it. But, hey, how many people were actually listening to this cheesy program, anyway?