“Yeah, you did,” Mario said. “And I ain’t messin’ with you this time. You got this other chick Kristina pregnant.”
Duke shook his head. “It’s not my baby. I know that, Kristina knows that and more importantly, Macy knows that.”
“Now, see, that’s where you’re wrong. My kids are involved in this. How do you think it looks for Gia or MJ? Do you think they would understand something like this?”
In the past days, he had time to think; Duke screwed things up. He thought that, as long as Macy knew the truth, everything would be okay. But Kristina not correcting the public misconception on who the father of her baby was had damaged everything Duke had built with Macy, Gia and MJ. “I am going to fix this.”
Mario said, “I kind of took care of it for you.”
Not knowing what Mario would do, Duke felt dread wash over him. “What did you do?”
“Excuse me, Duke,” Serena said, poking her head in the doorway. Duke’s feeling of impending doom went away, because if Serena was around, that had to mean that Macy was nearby, as well. Macy had pawned Serena off on him all week long. Every time he called Winter Paradise to ask a question or verify a charge, Serena tried giving the phone to Macy, but he could hear Macy turn the call down. It was sad that just hearing Macy’s voice had cheered him up a bit.
“Santa will be flying in soon. Are you ready?”
“Santa?” Duke asked with a raised eyebrow. “Flying in?”
“Yes, didn’t you look at your itinerary?” Serena grinned.
He shook his head. “No.”
“Oh dang, maybe I left it back at the office. Macy thought it would be good for the kids who are here to see you publicly apologize to Santa for your mistake in a press conference.”
Beside him, Mario chuckled.
Duke had to laugh, too. He remembered that he promised Macy that he would re-create the North Pole for MJ if need be to prove to him that Santa was real. Now the scenery in his front yard made sense. It really had turned into a winter wonderland, and to make matters better, the weather had cooled down to a nice thirty degrees. The people in his front yard admiring Macy’s handiwork were all dressed in sweaters and earmuffs. Macy had set up a carriage ride for those who had to park farther down the street, and even they were covered up in blankets and hand muffs.
When he got home yesterday evening, he’d found one side of his front lawn fenced in with snow and what looked like a landing strip in the center of the snow. He thought about Lawrence being a pilot and realized that he’d played a part in tonight’s events. Damn, he was an ass for jumping to conclusions. Why didn’t she just explain that to him? He had to find Macy.
“Serena, where is she?”
Looking innocent, Serena shrugged her shoulders. “Who?”
“Macy.”
“Mom’s at the office.” Gia offered up the whereabouts of her mother’s location as she waltzed into the room. MJ followed his sister. They paused briefly and glanced at each other before running into Duke’s arms. God, he’d missed them.
“Why isn’t she here?”
“I think she’s still working. She wants to send that money she would have won in the Christmas decorating contest to her charity, so she’s trying to figure out the books.”
“But I already donated the money.”
Serena snapped her fingers and pointed at him. “I knew you did it!”
He felt like such a jerk last Sunday that he’d gone down as soon as possible and written a check to the charity. Even though he’d done it anonymously, the newspaper had written up a comment in the paper yesterday and said the organization was still blessed. If Macy had seen it, she would have known that the charity still received its money, but she wouldn’t have known he’d done it. “That was a secret.”
“Like you bribing Andy and Spencer with football tickets?”
Duke’s mouth made an O.
“Don’t worry. Macy hasn’t figured either out yet.”
Thankful for that, Duke nodded. “So where is she?”
“Well, I don’t think she’s coming tonight, Duke.”
“What?”