Excerpt of It Happened One Christmas by Leslie Kelly

Her jaw unhinged. "You'vegot to be kidding! You seriously want to go into the biggest toy store in theuniverse today?"

"Come on, it'll be fun."

She took a step back. "It'll be insane. There will be agazillion kids in there."

"Nah. Just their frenzied parents."

"Who are worse than the kids!"

"You'll like this, I promise. Come on, Miss Cranky Ass."

She gaped.

"Look, I need to get for a present for my nephew. I know he'dlove this walking, roaring dinosaur toy I've seen commercials for. My sistertold me he's spent the last month with his arms hidden inside his shirt, wavinghis little hands and roaring at all his preschool classmates."

"Velociraptor?"

"Yup."

"Okay, at least he's gotgood taste in dinosaurs. They're my favorite, too."

"I always preferred theT-rex, myself."

"Not bad," she said with ashrug. "So I guess that means we're a couple of carnivores."

He nodded, liking thebanter, especially liking that the bad mood her ex had caused appeared to havecompletely disappeared. "I guess so. Though, I don't suspect it would take awhole pack of you to bring me to my knees." No, indeed, he suspected Lucy wouldbe quite capable of that all on her own.

He didn't elaborate,letting her figure out what he meant. When she lowered her lashes and lookedaway, he figured she had.

What could he say? He wasaffected by her, had been at first sight. The feelings had grown every minutethey'd spent together. Not that she was probably ready to hear that from a guyshe'd met a few hours ago. Nor, honestly, was he ready to say it. Knowing shewas amazing, fantastic—and that he wanted her, badly—was one thing. Admittingit this soon was another.

So he went back to saferground. "Anyway, that store's probably the only place I'm going to find thedino-toy I'm looking for today. It walks, it roars, he'll love it!"

"Preschool-ageappropriate?" she asked, sounding dubious.

"Hell, no." He grinned."But that's for his parents to deal with. I'm just the cool uncle who buys it."

Considering the presentmight be late, he wanted to make it a good one. No Internet gift card couldever satisfy a four- year-old, and since Ross was the boy's godfather, and hisonly uncle, he had to do right by him.

"So, what do you say?"

"I dunno..."

"We're talking about goinginto F.A.O. Schwarz, not Mt. Doom and the fires of Mordor."

She rolled her eyes. "Atleast there are no screaming little ones on Mt. Doom, unless you count theHobbits."

He liked that she got thereference. He wasn't a total geek but couldn't deny being a LOTR fan. "None inthere either. They're all home being extra-good, hoping Santa will notice."

"How about I wait outside?"she offered, looking horrified by the idea of going in, but also a bit saddenedby it.

Lucy was obviously seriousabout that not-liking-Christmas thing. Though, he wondered if it was theholiday she didn't like, or some sad memories that were attached to it. Given thefew things she'd said about her parents, and the happy childhood she'd hadbefore she'd lost them, he suspected that might be it.

Well, bad memories nevertruly went away, but they could certainly be smacked into the background bygood ones.

"Your call," he replied,tsking. "But remember, you don't have to shop. Don't you think you'd have funwatching the crazed parents fighting over the last Suzy Pees Herself doll, orthe My Kid Ain't Gonna Be Gay Monster Truck playset?"

Lucy laughed out loud, ashe'd hoped she would. "When you put it that way, how could I possibly refuse?"

"You can't. Anyone with anounce of schaudenfreude in their soul—which I suspect you have, at least whenit comes to Christmas and oddly-penised exes—would race me to the door."

Mischiefdanced on her face and a dimple appeared in her cheek as she offered aself-deprecating grin. She didn't deny it. That was something else he likedabout her. Most other women he knew kept up thatI'm-sweet-and-love-puppies- and-kitties-and- everyone front, at least at thebeginning of any relationship. Lucy hadn't bothered. Hell, she freely admittedshe hated Christmas, and had been fantasizing about cutting off a guy's dickwhen they'd met. Talk about not putting on some kind of nice-girl act. Was itany wonder he already liked her so much?

"Okay, Mt. Doom, here we come," she said, taking his hand.