Hottie for the Holidays (Three Steamy Holiday Rom Coms)

“And then what?” Emma stirs sugar into her espresso. “You go door to door and ask every man between the ages of twenty-five and fifty-five if you can inspect his backside for slingshot-inflicted bruises?”

“I’m not going to hit him in the backside. I’ll aim for his shoulders. Or his chest. I certainly don’t want to give him an excuse to take off his pants. If I never see this dude’s hairy rear again, it’ll be too soon.” I shudder. “I’m just glad he’s on an after-sunset schedule so no one coming to pick out a Christmas tree got an eyeful of that Sasquatch situation. Or anything else he’s got flopping around.”

Emma’s lips twitch, but her smile fades almost instantly, replaced by another furrow of her brow. “You aren’t going to do this all by yourself, are you? What if he gets angry and tries something?”

I snort. “He’s about as big around as you are. If he tried anything, I’d have him hogtied and waiting for the police in five minutes flat.”

“But what if he has a weapon?”

“Where would he put it?” I ask, pushing on before Emma can reply. “Seriously, he doesn’t appear to want to hurt me. He just thinks it’s hysterical to streak through a Christmas tree farm. But nobody’s laughing, and I can’t risk him coming back again next year. If word gets out that I have a Creeper Santa on the loose, Sir Lawrence the Wretched will shoplift all my business, the way he’s been trying to do since he moved his slimy English ass to town and had the balls to set up shop right next door.”

Emma laughs. “His ass is not slimy. And he’s not right next door. The Childers’ place is between you two, right?”

“He’s close enough. Too close. And his ass is slimy. And so is his snooty English face and his pasty English chest and all his other ooky British parts.”

Emma’s cheeks dimple, and her eyes go soft and sparkly.

“Don’t,” I warn before she can start in again. “I do not have a secret thing for Lawrence I-Eat-My-Own-Toenails-For-Breakfast Beverly.”

“Ew. Gross, Lucy.”

“Yes, Emma. That’s correct. It is gross to suggest I have a crush on a human-sized wart on the face of humanity. I can’t stand him. Truly. The sight of the man makes me physically ill.”

“All right, all right, whatever you say.” Emma lifts her hands into the air in surrender before smoothing them over her blond hair. “Though I’m sure he’d still loan you his motion-activated camera if you asked. It would save you the misery of sitting out in a deer blind all night in the freezing cold, and you’d get the guy on video to give to the police.”

“No way,” I say with a sniff, even as a voice in my head insists it might be okay to ask for the camera.

Lawrence did offer, after all. While at a local agricultural alliance meeting, he overheard me talking about how I wished I had a surveillance system, and without even any pressure to know what I needed it for, he offered to let me borrow his. And when I said, “No, thank you,” I had no idea Creepy Kris Cringle would still be rocking his stocking-cock around my Christmas trees nearly a month later.

But if I ask for his help, I’ll be in Lawrence’s debt. And I vowed after last New Year’s Eve never to give the-personification-of-eye-crust leverage on me again. He’s a monster person with a lump of coal where his heart should be, and I have too much pride to let my guard down again with a man like that.

Fool me once, shame on you, but fool me twice…

“I don’t need his camera,” I insist, my resolve renewed. “I just need a solid ambush plan and good aim, both of which are in my wheelhouse. Gramps got me started with a slingshot when I was six. Santa won’t know what hit him.” I push my empty coffee cup to the edge of the long bar, scoring a refill as Sophie, the owner of Barn Roasters, hustles by on her way to pull a batch of scones from the oven. “I just wanted to let you know what I was planning in case something unexpected happens.”

Emma arches a brow. “Like if Streaking Santa turns out to be a serial killer?”

“He’s not a serial killer.”

“Or a sex pervert.”

“Well, yeah, he’s probably that,” I admit, “but as I said, I’m not worried. If he tries anything, I’ll handle it. I lettered in wrestling in high school. Against the boys because they didn’t have a girls’ team.”

Emma’s dubious gaze sweeps up and down my bundled-up frame. “Oh, yeah? What class? The mosquito weight division?”

“I can bulk up.” Sitting up straighter, I roll my shoulders back, suddenly regretting wearing my sweatshirt with the baby sloth on the front.