Free Mistletoe & Bastards by Lindy Dale Page A

the hall, flinging the door open
so fast it hit the wall with an almighty crash and left a mark.
    “Yes, I’m
fucking Melanie Samson. Whatever it is, just bloody give it to me
and—”
    I stopped short
of screaming like a banshee. Johnny was standing in front of me
holding an enormous box of my favourite Lindt chocolates and a
magnum of Veuve Cliquot. Probably the easiest way to a girl’s
heart. But not mine. Not today anyway.
    “Go away.”
    I made an
attempt to shut the door on him but he pre-empted me and stuck his
foot in the doorway and elbowed it open. Clearly, his rugby skills
were useful for something other than rugby.
    Without
speaking, Johnny pushed the gifts into my arms and strode past me
down the hall and into the living room. I couldn’t think of
anything else to do so I followed along behind him . The magnum was
chilled ready for drinking. It wasn’t exactly comforting pressed
against my skin so I put the gifts on the kitchen bench.
    “I asked you to
go away, Johnny. Please.” Seeing him again so soon was making all
sorts of emotions I thought I’d drowned in chardonnay resurface.
Either that or the massive hangover I had had suddenly become more
massive at the sight of him.
    Johnny didn’t
move. “Sure, I’ll leave and never come back. I’ll go back to
chatting up girls and taking the piss out of you every time you say
one of those foulmouthed things that seem to come out of your mouth
the way the rest of us use normal words. But I’m not leaving until
you tell me what happened. Considering that I’ve just spent over
five hundred dollars on ‘sorry’ gifts when I have no idea what I
did, it’s the least you can do.”
    I was floored.
If there hadn’t been a sofa between us, I would have leapt at him
and whacked him squarely on that gorgeous nose of his. Had he no
clue that I’d seen him with that girl? And even if he hadn’t,
didn’t he feel the least bit guilty for going off with her only
hours after he’d told me he was a changed man? Yet there he was,
his piercing blue eyes staring me down, and a look on his face that
told me he wasn’t intending on leaving until I explained myself.
Well, he had a bit of explaining to do, too.
    “I saw you with
that girl,” I managed, at last. “I saw you kiss her cheek. It
wasn’t even twenty four fucking hours since you were with me and
you were trying to get into her pants!” And then the ranting
started. It spewed from my mouth like an explosion and I couldn’t
stem the tide. My mouth had gone into autopilot as if some force
outside myself was controlling me. I ranted and raved at him,
screaming at him about how I’d given him my trust, something I’d
never done before, about how hard it had been for me. I told him he
couldn’t buy my trust with gifts — even if one of them was my all
time favourite champers. At first, he looked puzzled, bemused even,
but then it was like some magical light of recognition went on and
he began to smirk. God, if he didn’t wipe that smirk from his face
I seriously was going to deck him.
    “Are you
finished?” he asked after a couple of minutes.
    “Well. Yes. I
suppose.”
    “Can I
explain?”
    Oh, this was
going to be good.
    I nodded, not
trusting that voice inside my head to keep the sarcasm at bay.
    “The girl you
saw me with was my sister, Jemima. I thought, seeing as how you
were so freaked out by the big family Christmas thing that you
might like to meet her one on one. She’s been dying to meet
you.”
    I didn’t know
whether to be flabbergasted by the fact Johnny had spoken about me
to his family or that the girl I’d assumed was some random chick
he’d met at the bar was actually a member of his family. He hadn’t
lied.
    Great. Talk
about want to find a hole and jump in it.
    “You told your
sister about me?”
    “I told my
whole family. They must think I’m tapped in the head, I talk about
you so much.”
    Oh, this was
getting weird now. He was making it sound like we’d been a