Merry Ever After

Holly

“That’s mine!”

“Really? Because I don’t see your name on it, and it’s in my hands.”

I pointed to the cart next to me. “I was making room for it.”

Ugh.

Figures.

Turning back, I got my first good look at the guy.

Dark hair, tanned skin in December when the rest of us look pasty, a chiseled jaw, and bright eyes that were annoyingly blue.

Gorgeous.

Of course.

And a jerk.

Aren’t they all?

He peeked around me, and his brows shot up. “Is that all for one kid?”

“That’s none of your business.”

“Trust me. Your kid isn’t going to miss this one toy with all that.” He started to turn away and I just…no. No. No. No! Five hours of shopping on Christmas Eve was enough to make the sanest of people snap, and I wasn’t one of those to begin with. I lost it.

“Give me that!” I attempted to yank the box from the guy’s hands, but he had too good of a grip on it. “I have been searching for that damn robot for weeks. You aren’t going to just walk away with it when I had it first. Give it to me!” When he didn’t relent, I started to scream—like a lunatic. “Security! Security! Someone help!”

The guy took a few steps back and held up his hands. “Did you forget to take your meds this morning, Ma’am?”

My eyes widened. “Ma’am? Did you just call me Ma’am!”

Security came running over. “What’s going on here?”

I pointed to the guy. “He stole my toy, and now he just called me Ma’am. I’m thirty-one!”

The guard’s brows pulled together. “You purchased that toy?”

“Well, no. I couldn’t. Because he took it from me.”

“So, he didn’t steal the toy…”

“Well, he stole it out from under me! Tell him to give it back!”

“Ma’am…can you please keep your voice down.”

Oh. My. God. “Can you stop calling me Ma’am, too!”

The guard put his hand on his walkie-talkie, which was holstered to his hip. “Ma’am.” He shook his head. “I mean, Miss. You need to calm down, or I’m going to call the police.”

“I will. As soon as you make him give that box to me.”

The guard looked at the thief. “Sir, did you take that box from this woman?”

He shook his head. “It was sitting on the shelf, and I walked over and picked it up. She wasn’t even touching it.”

“Is it the only one or something?”

I answered. “It’s the only one in the state of New York. I’ve been searching for it for a month.”

The security guard pointed at the man. “I was speaking to him. What’s your name, sir?”

“Bryce.”

“Pfft.” I rolled my eyes. “Bryce. Figures.”

Bryce’s brows dipped together. “What’s wrong with my name?”

I waved my hand around at him. “It just goes with the whole package.”

“The whole…package…”

“Yes, you know…handsome with a fancy name. You probably come from money, too. It’s what gives you that sense of entitlement you so obviously have.”

He looked at me incredulously. “You know, I appreciate women like you.”

My hands went to my hips. “Oh really?”

Bryce shrugged. “Yeah, normally I meet a pretty woman, and she doesn’t show me how nuts she is until after she knows where I live. It’s nice of you to wear your insanity around your neck like a Christmas wreath. So all of us handsome, rich, fancy-named guys can keep our distance.”

I scowled at him.

The poor security guard’s head was bouncing back and forth between us like he was watching a ping-pong game. He took a deep breath and sighed.