'Tis the Season for Love: A Charity Box Set

by Maggie Dallen

  “No. No. I, uh, wanted to let you know that it posted and is getting a lot of views. You’d said you wanted to show it to your family, and you can now, because it’s up.” He scrubbed his free hand down his side of his pant leg to wipe the moisture away, then switched the phone to the other hand and wiped the moisture off that one too. If only he could swipe away all the extra words running out of his mouth.

  “Thanks. I’ll be sure to send them the link.”

  “Great. That’s really great.” He pressed his lips shut before he said the word great again.

  “Yep. It’s great.”

  Was she teasing him? It kind of sounded like it. He hoped so.

  “Is there anything else?”

  “Yeah.” He cleared his throat. “I, uh, I’d like to offer you a job.”

  “A job?”

  “As my assistant. See, my friend Jeb thinks that the reason the video did so well is because you were in it.”

  There was a blank space where his jumbled announcement hung in the air. Finally, she said, “I don’t understand.”

  “Well, you’re really pretty and you did a great job of including the crowd and stuff.”

  “You think I’m pretty?” she asked in the same tone he’d used to ask if she thought he was cute.

  Holy Rudolph! She was teasing him. He leaned back in the chair and grinned. “You have to know you’re gorgeous.”

  “Oh, so it’s gorgeous now?”

  “Always.”

  “Well, in that case …” She laughed off the rest of her sentence, leaving him wondering what she was going to say.

  His chest practically bulged with a sense of accomplishment for having brought out the melodious, bell-like sound. “So you’ll do it?”

  She sighed. “I appreciate the offer, but I’m not in a good place right now. I don’t think it’s a good time for me to commit to … you.” She paused as if holding her breath.

  Was holding her breath a good sign or a bad sign? She could be worried that she’d hurt his feelings. His shoulders caved in, and his chest deflated. He hated pity. Some girls were too nice to tell him he was a magic geek, and while they thought he was nice, they didn’t want to be tied up with him. “I understand. I hope you have a Merry Christmas.”

  “Merry Christmas to you as well,” she said quietly.

  Was that regret laced in her voice, or just wishful thinking on his part? He might never know, and he hung up the phone feeling heavy and rejected. So much for working with an assistant. He stared down at the cards in front of him, the queen of hearts smiling like the Mona Lisa. “She said no,” he told her. Feeling ridiculous, he typed the same words in a text to Jeb.

  Jeb replied with a Sorry, bro. Know any other beautiful women?

  Breck snorted. I wish. A generic beauty wouldn’t do, though. Harmony had something special, a light that drew in viewers—and him—for more.

  Join the club.

  Something will come up. He hadn’t told Jeb that this was his last shot at making a living with magic. He hadn’t told anyone. It was his burden to carry and his motivation.

  At least his parents would be happy if he quit. They never quite understood his fascination with cards and tricks, though they tried to be supportive in their way. More often than not, they asked him to put the cards away at the dinner table, though they’d smile woodenly through one of his if he asked. It was a hard way to grow up. If it hadn’t been for his grandpa, he might have quit magic before he even gave it a chance.

  He’d turned twenty-five this year, and being a quarter of a century old did things to his brain. It made him think about where he was in life, evaluate his decisions. He took a good, hard look at where he wanted to be by the time twenty-five more years passed by, and a wife and family were definitely on his priority list.

  A fear that obtaining his magical dreams would mean giving up the family he craved motivated him to practice his card tricks for the next street show, despite the stab of disappointment that Harmony wouldn’t be a part of it.

  Darn it all, he’d hoped she’d say yes. He really, really hoped she’d want to see him again, because as much as he’d tried to convince himself that he wanted an assistant, what he was after was another chance to look into those big blue eyes.

  Chapter 4

  Harmony

  Harmony slowly lowered the phone from her ear, feeling as if she’d lost her stash of chocolate Santas.

  “Who was that?” asked her cubicle mate, Jenny.

  Nothing was sacred in their three-by-five space. Harmony had heard all about Jenny’s breakup with Timothy last month—over Timothy’s obsession with Transformers collectibles, of all things. Jenny couldn’t handle the amount of money he spent on the toys. Tom bristled over her disrespect for his investment strategies. They’d finally decided that separating was the only way they could solve their differences. It was all very grown-up and methodical for a breakup right before Christmas.

  What Harmony would have given for a methodical divorce.

  She pushed the thought away. This very morning, she’d promised herself not to think about Sam. Each day was a new beginning, a chance to root his influence out of her life and regain the woman she’d been before he’d bulldozed through her heart.

  And … she pushed that thought away too. Positive thinking was half the battle. She wasn’t sure what the other half was, but she figured she’d get to it when she mastered the thinking part. “That was the street magician I told you about.”

  Jenny swiveled around in her seat. “You didn’t tell me about a street magician.”

  “I could have sworn it came up.” Harmony tapped her chin. She’d certainly thought about Breck enough to believe she’d spoken of him. Maybe she didn’t think of him quite as much as she tried not to think about Sam, but he was definitely on her top two list.

  “Spill,” Jenny demanded in that wonderful way only true friends can.

  Harmony explained about stumbling into the show and being called out of the crowd to help. Jenny insisted they look up the video—that very minute!

  Harmony typed in the channel name, and soon she was watching herself smile and blush. Good heavens, Breck was even cuter the second time around. His broad shoulders filled the frame, and his gray eyes sparkled like falling snowflakes during a romantic sunset. She found herself leaning on the arm of her chair to keep her balance.

  “Girl! He is so cute.” Jenny kicked off and made her chair spin.

  “I know.” Harmony stared at the screen, the rest of the workroom fading into the background. “He has this geek-a-licious thing going for him.”

  “Yeah, and he fills out that sweater better than a store mannequin.”

  Harmony’s cheeks flushed with heat. “I h-hadn’t noticed.”

  “Yeah, right, you didn’t notice.” Jenny shoved her. “What you need to cure your Sam blues is a big dose of magic.” She made humming noises and wiggled her fingers to accentuate her statement.

  Harmony shook her head. “What I need is a trip home for the holidays, my mom’s hot chocolate, and a visit from Santa on Christmas Eve.”

  “If you say so.” Jenny didn’t sound at all convinced. Perhaps that was because Harmony wasn’t all that sure of her plan either. Breck had given her a much-needed boost to her self-confidence in a way she’d never gotten from a gift under the tree.

  “Harmony?” Ms. Kepworth leaned over the side of the cubicle. “The boss wants to see you in her office.”

  Harmony barely held back her scowl. It wasn’t Ms. Kepworth’s fault that the boss was a wackadoo. Her office perpetually smelled of natural oils. That wasn’t the weird part, but it added to the overall picture. What was really strange about Ambia couldn’t be described in one word. The huge sequined infinity scarves with goulashes and belts covered in fringe helped paint a picture of Ambia’s need to stand apart from the crowd. If only her clothes were the strangest part about her. When she’d hired Harmony, who was desperate for a job, she’d told her that although her au
ra was decidedly blah tan with black dots, she had hopes because there were flashes of pink in there. Which meant that she could possibly be a red one day if she worked to root out her spiritual trolls. Harmony had assured her that she would do her best to rid herself of all trolls, and she was given the job.

  As she crossed the office, she prepared herself—and her aura—to be scrutinized. She knocked lightly on the open door and peeked inside to find an empty room.

  “Over here.” Ambia’s hand waved from behind her giant oak desk. “Join me.”

  Harmony went around and found Ambia sitting cross-legged with her back straight and her eyes closed. Her shoes were tucked under the desk, and her bare feet were stark white with cold. Several precious stones circled her like a rainbow arch.

  “Join me, Harmony.”

  “O-kay.” Harmony sat on the floor with her back against the wall and her knees pulled against her chest, making sure she didn’t knock a stone out of place.

  Ambia opened one green eye. “Before we start, I’d like to do some deep breathing. We’ll breathe in for the count of four and out for the count of six. Begin.” Her nostrils flared open and she loudly sucked in air.

  Harmony followed her lead. Honestly, if she didn’t need the job, she’d be out the door. But it was Christmas, and she was broke, and rent was due at the beginning of the year.

  She breathed out with Ambia. In. Out. In. Out. In. Out.

  Ambia’s eyes drifted open as if they’d been relaxed to the point that it was difficult to lift them. Harmony had no such feeling.

  “There.” Ambia twisted, picking up a sheaf of papers from behind her. “I can’t help but feel—” She glanced at the top page. “—a large emotional black hole hovering over your cubicle.”

  “I’m sorry?” Emotional black hole—what?

  “Don’t apologize. We all struggle, and the holidays can be difficult for many people.” Ambia flipped the page.

  Was that a script? Harmony lifted her chin in an attempt to read the scrawled handwriting.

  Ambia tipped the page, blocking her view. “As such, I believe our overall productivity and customer service will improve with the removal of this black hole.”

  “Are you firing me?”

  Ambia’s head popped up, her eyes wide with curiosity. “Why would you think that?”

  “You just said you wanted the black hole gone and that I was the cause of it.”

  “Oh.” She placed her hand on Harmony’s knee. “I should have explained. I don’t believe the black hole is your creation—only that it has attached to you.”

  What the …? Ambia personified an invisible force hovering over the workroom. This woman was either way more connected with the universe than Harmony could hope to be, or she was cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs.

  “Should we ask it to leave, then?” Harmony offered.

  Matching worry lines appeared on the inside of each eyebrow. “I’m afraid it’s not that simple.”

  “Nothing ever is,” Harmony lamented. She was three-quarters sarcastic and one-quarter true to life.

  “Exactly! In this case, you’re going to have to be proactive about moving the black hole off your aura.”

  Aaaand we’re back to my aura? “How does one go about doing that?” Harmony wasn’t opposed to spending time on an extra project—no matter how far in left field it landed her—as long as her paycheck reflected the additional time spent.

  “You need to have fun.” Ambia leaned back with a satisfied quirk to her lips.

  “Fun. Really?”

  “Yes. When was the last time you had fun?”

  “Two days ago.” She answered so fast that there was no question of her honesty. Breck’s magic show had been entertaining and taken her out of her haze.

  “And what were you doing?”

  Ambia was going to love this. “I was an assistant for a street magician.” Harmony dropped her knees to the sides and crossed her ankles, settling in.

  “Then you have to do it again.” Ambia clapped her hands excitedly. “You need to get your happy back.”

  Harmony blinked in surprise. “I’ve been thinking the same thing. How weird is that?”

  “It’s not weird. It’s the universe bringing together the elements that will set you on the path you were meant to follow.”

  “I had a plan, and it blew up.” Harmony rested her hands on her knees.

  “Because that was your plan. Our lives are not our own—there are things we must accomplish, people we must love, and events we are to witness. If you step off the path, then heartache follows.”

  Harmony squeezed her eyes shut. Was that what she’d done? Her parents had warned her away from Sam. Heck, Jenny hadn’t liked to double-date with him, though she’d never said why. A dozen other small signs popped into her head that she should have left Sam in her traveling dust and moved on long before he proposed.

  If that was the case, then maybe she had been led to Breck. She hadn’t even been watching where she was going that day; she’d just followed the man in the black boots. She thought back to the video and couldn’t remember seeing him in it. Weird. “The magician offered me a part-time gig,” she said absently, still trying to remember where the man in the boots had disappeared to.

  Ambia nodded sagely. “Of course he did. Because this is what you were meant to do.”

  Okay, the whole conversation was making too much sense—especially coming from Ambia. “I need to think about this.”

  “No.” Ambia covered Harmony’s hands with her own. “Listen to your heart. What does it want to do?”

  Harmony paused, searching her feelings. “It wants to laugh again, to trust, to believe in something.”

  Ambia lifted her hands, a look of triumph on her face. “There! You’ve communicated with your true self and received an answer.”

  “I did?” She couldn’t remember having come to an actual conclusion.

  Ambia stood and pulled Harmony to her feet. “You’ll call the magician and tell him yes.”

  “I will?” The words settled into her heart like whipped cream on hot chocolate, warm and melty with goodness. “I will.”

  “Wonderful. I feel very good about our performance review.”

  So that’s what this was. Harmony bit back her snicker. Even as she mentally recoiled at the idea that anything that had happened in the last fifteen minutes was professional, she had to admit she felt better, clearer, and grounded. “Thanks, Ambia.”

  Ambia pressed her palms together and bowed slightly.

  Harmony left her standing in her doorway in that pose. She made her way to the break room and hit redial on her phone, needing to make this commitment now, while courage filled her veins. The sense of calm and understanding that came from Ambia’s confidence that this was the right path still flooded her system, and she didn’t want to chicken out.

  “Hello?” Breck’s voice was so deep, it turned her insides to Christmas pudding.

  “Breck, hey. This is Harmony.”

  “Hi.”

  She paused for a moment, her mind bringing up his handsome face and picturing a smile. Perhaps she’d even heard it in his greeting. Hurrying forward now, she said, “Listen, I’d like to change my mind—about helping you. I mean, I’d like to help you—with your show. If you still want me to.”

  “That would be awesome.”

  A smile tugged at her lips. His easy acceptance and obvious excitement could be a sign that she really was stepping onto the path she was meant to follow. “What did you have in mind?”

  “Well, I have a couple of ideas, but I need a day to work them out. Can we meet somewhere on Thursday?”

  Harmony’s neck relaxed. She hadn’t realized how worried she’d been that he’d say no—or that he’d ask about the “place” she’d been in only thirty minutes before that had her turning down his offer. He didn’t ask the uncomfortable question, and she didn’t volunteer the strange answer including colorful rocks. Which made her feel safe, like maybe Breck wasn’
t out to score a date with her. “That would be great.”

  They set up a time and place, and she hung up the phone. The peaceful feeling was still there, but the butterflies in her stomach didn’t listen. They were all aflutter. Meeting at a coffee shop felt an awful lot like a first date—the kind people do when they meet online. If everything goes well, then they agree to dinner.

  It’s just business, she told herself. I’m getting my happy back.

  “What’s with that smile?” asked Jenny as she breezed in from a late lunch.

  Harmony clapped her hands together. “I’m going to do the magic shows.”

  “I knew the hot magician would change your mind.” Jenny shook her hips.

  “It wasn’t that,” Harmony protested.

  “Then what was it?”

  The last twenty minutes ran through Harmony’s head on fast forward. There was no way she could explain how much sense Ambia made without sounding like a cuckoo bird. “Never mind.” She turned to go.

  “Tell the hottie hello from me. I’m his new biggest fan.”

  Harmony rolled her eyes as she left the cubicle. So Breck was hot—er, cute. So what? She could work with a handsome man and not develop a crush on him. It was totally possible. She’d just have to keep her guard up and maintain a professional distance. She could do this.

  But do you want to? asked her inner voice, just to be a pain. Harmony didn’t dare answer that question, because she wasn’t sure she was ready for the answer.

  Chapter 5

  December 5

  Breck

  The small coffee shop wasn’t anything special as far as a meeting place, and Breck couldn’t shake the feeling that he should have tried harder, should have picked a spot that would impress Harmony. The brown paper napkins slumped pathetically over the edge of the dispenser, and there was a ring on the chipped tabletop.

  He pulled out his phone, ready to change their meeting spot. His mind was blank. Where did a guy take a woman like Harmony? Stop it. He mentally chastised himself. This isn’t a date.