Free In Love Before Christmas by Capri Montgomery Page B

a small business suit, and was now considered to be a miserable old man. Yes, they all knew the story for it was told everywhere around town as another testament to the curse of St. Mary’s church. The people around town called it the St. Mary’s Curse. For some reason people still didn’t seem to learn to just keep their mouth shut while in there and to this day there were still those who made promises they had no plans to keep.
     
    “So help me.”
     
    “How?”
     
    “Do something! I can’t marry that jerk. I mean it is bad enough he’s our boss.”
     
    “True,” he grumbled. “Speaking of bosses, he wants you up covering the photo shoot. I was supposed to tell you that the moment you came in. They’re up on the top floor.”
     
    “Why? I can write the article based on the photos from the shoot. What’s the point of being there? It’s just a dress that nobody in their right mind is going to want to wear.”
     
    Matt shrugged. “Hey, maybe you’ll fall in love.” He chuckled and she slapped his shoulder.
     
    “I’ve known you since we were twelve, Matt.”
     
    “I know. And actually part of that is why you and Derek stopped being friends.”
     
    “No, we stopped being friends because he treated you like crap and I realized he was a jerk. I was so angry with him when he and his friends took your clothes and locked you out of the school gym naked.”
     
    “You gave me your coat.”
     
    “It was pink,” she laughed. “But it’s better than being naked right?”
     
    “I was mortified. I didn’t want to go back to school, but when I came back I found out nobody was talking about me.”
     
    “I know.”
     
    “They were all talking about Derek and his friends because you got them back for me.”
     
    “Yeah, boys were not supposed to wear pink, but I found the photos his mom had taken when they dressed up as Little Bo Peep and the sheep that one Halloween and I plastered it all over the school.”
     
    He laughed hard. “Okay, I’ll see what I can do, but in love in three weeks is going to be hard, Lani.”
     
    “Just help me make it happen. I can’t marry him.”
     
    “Okay; okay, just get upstairs and get to work before boss man comes down here to my office. I don’t want to see him either.”
     
    She moaned. “I wish he hadn’t bought the magazine. I miss the old owner.”
     
    “Me too…boy do I ever second that sentiment.”
     
    “Okay, I’ll come back after,” she pointed upstairs and he nodded. He had his work cut out for him. How on earth was he supposed to make her fall in love before Christmas?
     

 
    Chapter Two
     

     
    L ani took the stairs instead of the elevator, as she always did. She was a woman who liked to keep her body healthy. She didn’t always have time for a run in the park, but she did manage to work it in at least three times a week before work, sometimes after, sometimes only twice a week on her days off. She did what she could when she could and she relied on the rest of the normal daily activities to make up for the cardio she couldn’t get in that week. Walking to work, taking the stairs, eating relatively healthy—it was all part of her grand plan to keep her body in mint condition. There was no way she could do her job if she couldn’t keep up with the hectic pace, and getting sick was so not an option—something she should have thought of before she left the house with wet hair. At least her hair was starting to dry—a little. She wasn’t still leaving a trail of water droplets to follow.
     
    “You,” the photographer shouted. “You’ll do.”
     
    She had no idea what he was talking about, but she knew her name wasn’t “you,” and it would be nice if he had known that. “Pardon me?” Lani gripped her notebook a little tighter.
     
    “The model didn’t show. There was something about a car accident; not that I care. I need a model.”
     
    “Oh no; I’m the writer,” she stated. He didn’t seem to be