A Christmas Spark: An Enemies to Lover's Christmas Romance (A Pride and Pranks Romance) Read online

  Cindy Steel

  A Christmas Spark

  A Pride and Pranks Holiday Romance

  Copyright © 2020 by Cindy Steel

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

  First edition

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  Contents

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Confessions

  Thank You

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Dedication

  For Lisa—who shares my love of flirty, sarcastic, and on occasion, delightfully inappropriate male characters. This book is for you.

  Prologue

  15 Years Earlier

  The Incident

  I was going to throw up.

  The Eugene, Idaho middle school loomed ahead of me on the sidewalk, feeling especially large. My brother Matt, who had been walking by my side, began to open the door for me and, just as I neared the threshold, he shut it in my face. I glanced over at him, annoyed.

  “Don’t be a butt head.”

  He laughed, his eyes crinkling as he opened the door once more, this time letting me enter. “What’s your deal today? You look like you’re going to puke.”

  I could only agree with him, and the odor assailing us upon entering the side door, in-between the practice gym and cafeteria, was not helping. By the smell of the body odor, leather, cheap cologne, and some sort of scrambled egg mixture that wafted in the air, the basketball team must have had their early morning practice, and the cafeteria must be serving breakfast. Although these smells didn’t help, it wasn’t exactly what was causing me to want to upchuck the pop tart I had pecked at for breakfast.

  We stopped at a water fountain. Matt leaned down for a drink, while my eyes went unwillingly to the poster hanging above, advertising the Sadie Hawkins Dance in one week. I swallowed hard.

  I spotted my best friend, Gina, at the end of the hall, talking to a group of our friends, and suddenly remembered my promise I had made to her. I turned to Matt. “Be sure you check your locker before you go home today.”

  He didn’t stop walking, but he eyed me suspiciously. “Why?”

  Despite the pit in my stomach, I comically avoided his gaze. “No reason. Just wanting to be sure you have everything you need before you go home…” I trailed off at the growing wariness in his eyes, because now he understood perfectly what I was telling him.

  “She gonna ask me?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  He sidled up closer to me, flung his arm around my shoulders and propelled me forward. “Liar.”

  I contemplated shrugging him off, but truth be told, I had a big day coming up, and any extra support I found in my twin brother could only help. Sometimes I was amazed we were even twins. Other than our dad’s brown eyes and my mom’s pert nose, our similarities stopped there. Matt had a lean, athletic build, dark hair, and an easy smile. I also had a lean build, but that’s where my build stopped. There was nothing athletic about my body—no shape and no definition. I just had limbs that frequently fell down, got in the way, and nearly poked eyes out. He even had the better hair, which was totally unfair. His was dark, rich and full, while mine was long, mousy brown, with zero body. I guess that just goes along with my general physical theme—mousy, with no body.

  “Who are you asking?”

  “Hmm?” I looked over at Matt.

  “Are you asking anybody? I can’t imagine Gina not forcing you to ask somebody, if she is.”

  “Nobody.” No way. Until I got a ‘yes’ reply, I would take this information to the grave.

  “Penny, tell me.”

  “Maybe nobody. I’ll see you later.” I pushed him toward some of our friends that were huddled against a locker. Usually I stayed to chat, but today, I needed to get to Gina. Matt shrugged and turned toward our friends. All of our “friends” already had dates to the dance, so now, I was forced to ask Chase. Okay, maybe ‘forced’ was pushing it, but he was the only other guy who had given me the time of day. Mind you, it was a very slight time of day.

  Chase Riley.

  Tall, dark hair… he did that thing where, when he smiled, it was a crooked, half smile out of the side of his mouth. It was like he always had some joke on the tip of his tongue. It might not be everybody’s cup of tea, but…

  It. Was. Mine.

  Once, he dropped his pencil behind his desk in class. When I reached down and handed it back to him, he gave me that crooked smile in thanks and, just like that, social studies became my favorite class. Once, our teacher Mr. Thomas walked in front of the fan, and it blew his hair partially askance on his head.

  Did any of us know it was a toupee? Nope.

  We had been taking a test that day. Most of the class had been pouring over their tests on their desks and hadn’t noticed, but Chase and I had been looking up at the same time, and we both saw it. He snickered softly at first, and then I joined in. A while later, while I was writing the essay section for the test, a small piece of paper landed on my desk. I glanced around to make sure Mr. Thomas wasn’t looking, before taking in the crudely sketched drawing of our teacher with his hair flying off his head. I snickered.

  If I were being honest, I liked our teacher and felt bad for making fun of him. However, Chase Riley had drawn me a note and passed it to me in class.

  Me.

  I stared at the note on my desk, trying to figure out my next move. I changed the face of my teacher on the paper to one of horror and passed it back to him. His shoulders chuckled with mirth before we went back to our tests. That had been it. He still talked mostly to his friends that surrounded our desks during class, but every once in a while, he would send me a look when something was funny. So far, I had made him laugh exactly two times.

  So… we were friends, right? Friends could ask friends to the dance. The pit in my stomach grew into a tree.

  “Penny!”

  By that time, I had made my way to where Gina stood next to our shared locker. Her expressive eyes looked me over as I approached. “You feeling okay?”

  “I’ve been better. Your fault.”

  She smiled as she tossed her auburn, Disney princess hair over her shoulder. “You’ll be fine. It’s not like it’s a real date or anything.” She wasn’t wrong. We were only in the 8th grade. The dance would just be held after school because nobody could drive yet. Getting a “date” probably just guaranteed us some dances.

  “Did you tell him?” My best friend was busy looking over my shoulder down the hallway, no doubt searching for my twin.

  “I didn’t tell him. I just told him to check his locker before going home.”

  “Do you th
ink he’ll say ‘yes?’”

  “Positive. Now can we stop talking about you liking my brother? I already feel like I might puke.”

  She laughed and opened her locker, rummaging through her bag of toiletries. “Just think, if he says yes, you get to talk to him!”

  I leaned against the locker next door. “The key word here is ‘if.’”

  Gina applied a thin coat of lip-gloss, checking herself out in the mirror that was pressed against the inside door. “Did you bring the candy gram?”

  “That thing burning a humongous hole in my backpack? Yeah, I brought it.” I hadn’t wanted to do any sort of grand gesture to ask him to the dance, but Gina insisted we had to do something, so we settled on a candy gram. Everyone liked candy, right? She made one for Matt, and I made one for Chase, which meant we spent all night surrounded by a pile of candy bars, coming up with lines like, ‘I love snickering with you in class,’ and ‘it would be worth a 100 Grand if you’d go with me to the dance.’

  What have I done?

  Gina was not deterred. Of course, it was easier for her; she knew Matt would say yes. Given the general amount of time I have spent actually talking to Chase, his niceness was still up for debate. I nudged Gina to the side and checked my own reflection in the mirror. No new pimples had appeared on my red, blotched cheeks since that morning, and I had no hidden boogers in my nose. I checked for food in my braces and picked out a speck of pop tart.

  “The bell’s going to ring any minute,” Gina said. “Then you go to his locker and I’ll go to Matt’s, and we’ll make the drop.”

  “Josh said he’d hang around his locker for a minute after the bell, so he can get you in,” I told her, clutching the shoulder straps on my backpack as if they were a lifeline. “Did you ask Mike to do the same for me?” Mike was Chase’s locker partner.

  “He’ll be there. He said he might be late, but he’ll be there.”

  The bell rang and we parted ways, each of us carrying our loaded backpacks to our intended lockers. Chase’s locker was down in the corner of two connecting hallways surrounding the practice gym. I peered down the hall and saw him, Pete Davis, and Jason Malcom standing next to his locker, laughing loudly at something. Pete and Jason were both in social studies with us and, while Jason was okay, Pete wasn’t my favorite person. I moved to wait in the hallway, located behind his locker, until they left. As the middle schoolers began to disperse toward their various classes, their voices became louder. I leaned against the wall running perpendicular behind them, ready to wait it out, just out of sight.

  But not out of hearing.

  “I heard Brandi Templeman was gonna ask you to the dance, Jase.” Pete’s laughter took on a higher pitch, as if he were doubled over, laughing at the thought. “But she couldn’t find a dress big enough to fit her.”

  The two boys laughed, albeit a bit stiffly.

  “Shut up, Davis.” That was Chase’s voice. Relief warmed my heart. Good, I was glad he was going to put Pete in his place for his mean comment. I had sat next to Brandi in algebra the year previous and we had bonded over our hatred for Mr. Young’s surprise pop quizzes he enjoyed torturing his class with.

  “I heard Kat Hunter wanted your number,” Chase said, laughing.

  The boys guffawed while I rolled my eyes, disappointment flooding through me. It felt a bit like watching an interview of a celebrity who played a role in my favorite movie. They were usually a letdown after falling in love with the character they played on screen.

  “You better watch out, Riley,” Pete added, through the laughter. “I hear that Penny chick from social studies is into you.”

  I stiffened at the sound of my name. My heart dropped. How could he have heard that? I hadn’t told anyone, except Gina, and she would never say anything.

  “Penny who?”

  Despite being on edge while listening to this conversation, I felt a bit hurt. How could he not know who I was? He had passed me a note! I made him laugh. Twice! Did that mean nothing?

  “You know, no boobs. No butt. Boring. Sits behind you.”

  I covered my hands over my mouth, but no sound came out. I couldn’t move. I think I even stopped breathing. My stomach clenched tight and my ears perked up, waiting for more, while at the same time wanting to make a break for it.

  “Oh yeah. Now I remember. She looks like my dog, but not as hot.”

  The boys snorted in laughter. The tardy bell rang, and from a distance I heard a locker door slam, and the voices faded away as they shuffled toward class. Our class.

  My face fell, deflated, along with my heart. I wrapped my hands around my stomach, sliding down the wall to sit with my knees bent. I sat in stunned silence for several minutes, my heart pounding, running the words he had said over and over again in my head; cementing them a permanent fixture in my brain.

  ‘’She looks like my dog, but not as hot.’

  What did that even mean? The boys had laughed like they had known what it meant. Those boys who I had sat by, passed papers to, and even smiled at when they made jokes in class. They laughed at me.

  Chase had said I looked like a dog. Uglier than a dog. Tears leaked from the corner of my eyes, the sting burning the creases as footsteps sounded down the hallway. I averted my face and discretely wiped at the tears.

  “Penny, are you sick?”

  Turning, I looked at Mrs. Norris, the school counselor, as she approached. I nodded up at her, in my dazed stupor. She had a history of wearing the brightest colors imaginable, and today’s orange was no different. Her arm jangled with bracelets as she placed her hand on my elbow and helped me to stand.

  “Let’s go to the office and we’ll call your mom.”

  A few minutes later, I sat alone in the nurse’s office, waiting for my mom to pick me up. As if the fates were all conspiring against me, across from where I sat was a full-length mirror. I squinted at myself to get a better view. My brown hair lay limp and stringy just past my shoulders. My braces pushed against my lips, making them poke out just a bit. At my count that morning, I had a total of eleven zits running across my face.

  Was it all true?

  I had never thought of myself as ugly. I always figured, if I were ugly, my family would have told me. Or at least given me that impression. Even though I compared myself to Matt’s good looks, I always figured I would catch up someday. Ugly. What did that word even mean? Why did it hurt so bad that Chase had implied it? Was it because I had been so delusional in thinking that he liked me? Not in a girlfriend way, but in a ‘friend’ kind of way. He had tossed me a secret note. Wasn’t that a friend thing to do? Yes, I was about to ask him to a dance, but that was it. I didn’t expect anything else. I thought he was cute, but I knew he was out of my league. It all just felt like a giant stab in my bulging backpack full of candy bars and cheesy rhymes. Gina and Matt would be going to the dance without me.

  I didn’t have boobs. That part was true, though I still remained hopeful. I had no curves. Pete thought I was boring.

  Chase thought his dog was hotter than me.

  It took several weeks for my fragile, middle school heart to patch back together. I had been burned. Tossed into the inferno, only to spit me back out into social studies with Chase and Pete. I no longer held interactions with them beyond the necessities. I didn’t laugh at their jokes, I no longer found them funny. Those moments were gone. But there was also a moment—albeit several days later—that begged for the ‘Pretty Woman moment.’ Gina’s mom had that movie in her secret stash that she didn’t know we knew about. One afternoon, to cheer me up, Gina snuck it away and we watched it together. There was a moment in that movie, when Julia Roberts went back into the high-end store that she was kicked out of days earlier, only to rub it in their faces that she could have bought them out. She showed them that they shouldn’t have judged her based on her looks. Then, she had her grand finale statement to the snobby shop workers, where she said, ‘big mistake. Huge.’

  Gina and I had cheered when she said tha
t. We had clapped as she spun around and walked away. Maybe that would be me and Chase some day—when I found my confidence. My moment.

  First, I had to find out—What could a person be, if not pretty?

  Chapter 1

  All four tires on my trusty Toyota Corolla spun loudly, putting up a decent fight. Eventually, they lost the battle. Amidst prayers and swears on my part, I stomped on my breaks to keep from rolling backward and careening off the mountainside. The car slid back a few inches before stopping. I held my breath, muscles tensed, as I tried to figure out my next move. The snow pelted down like a scene from Star Wars. It was also pitch-black outside. Did I mention that? Instead of leaving for the cabin at a sensible time, like three in the afternoon, I left after work. At seven at night. In the winter. During a huge snowstorm.

  ‘Okay, don’t panic,’ I told myself. ‘Stay calm, think.’

  My first inclination was to call my dad. Ten years after graduating high school and moving out of my childhood home, I still called him to fix all the broken things. I had dated plenty of other men (three other men) and nobody responded as promptly, and with such attention to detail, as my dad. He was a ’Jack of all Trades’ too. It didn’t matter what it was; the garbage disposal, the leaky sink, or the front door that refused to shut properly. Dad could fix it all. Too bad my parents were in London visiting my sister and her husband for the Christmas holiday. There was nothing he could do from that far away, except worry.

  My next thought was to call Gina. After all, she had been the one who invited me to her cabin the week before Christmas. Then I remembered, she was on a cruise with my twin brother Matt and their young family. That’s right, my twin brother married my best friend Gina, and we all graduated high school together. We were just one big, happy, All-American family. Well, except, they had a family. I did not.

  I’m getting off track.

  Knowing I would be alone, Gina offered me the use of her family’s remote cabin in the mountains of the Salmon-Challis National Forest in Idaho. Once they were back on land, they planned to meet me at the cabin on Christmas Day, to spend the holiday together. I was under a deadline for my third book, and a week by myself in a snowy, cozy, fire drawn cabin had seemed like a slice of heaven.