Further, he didn’t have many Christmas decorations at his house but even so, he didn’t run around Carnal, Chantelle, Gnaw Bone and the mall finding decorations, lights, Christmas cookie jars (for the personal cookies I made us), Christmas dishtowels and bathroom hand towels (because even bathrooms needed Christmas cheer). Okay, so he set up the tree and he and Jonas did a really good job on the outside lights and they both helped decorate the tree, but the rest of the house was all me. We were going to Indiana for Christmas, leaving the next day, but that didn’t mean we didn’t need a little bit of Christmas at home on the lead up to it.

He also didn’t pack for the three of us to be away for two weeks which I’d already done, mainly because there was a lot to do between now and leaving and I didn’t want to pack in a rush but also because I was excited to go home for Christmas.

And lastly, he wasn’t helping to plan the wedding, which I’d already started doing. Sure, it was a small wedding but it was still a wedding which required planning and a lot of it.

He went after a skip and was gone for two weeks. Sure, that skip was a high bond and the payoff was mammoth, so mammoth Tate didn’t really have to work for months if he didn’t want to (and it meant I could double the flower and catering budgets for the wedding which Holly, who was doing our flowers, and Shambles, who was doing the catering, were ecstatic about). But still!

“The Christmas Beast?” I asked on a warning whisper.

“Yeah, babe, seriously, half the shit you been doin’ you don’t need to do,” Tate answered.

I felt pressure in my head indicating it was about to explode.

“I’m sorry?” I was still whispering. “Which part would you leave out? Do you want the boys in Junior Football League to have tatty jerseys? Do you think we shouldn’t have decorated and given Jonas a festive house, especially this Christmas, his first one with us and without his Mom? Do you think I should bypass the opportunity to shove my smokin’ hot, badass biker fiancé down the throats of my ex-friends in Horizon Summit? Do you think Jonas shouldn’t give his teacher a present when all the other kids are going to do it which will make her think we’re bad parents or Jonas is a shit kid? Hunh? Which part would you leave out, Tate?”

He studied me then deduced on a mutter, “I see the shit you been doin’ is shit you need to do.”

“Damn straight,” I muttered back, straightening in my seat.

“Next year, Laurie, we’re goin’ to a beach,” he told me and I twisted to him.

“We can’t go to a beach!” I screeched. “My mother would have a stroke! Christmas is about family!”

He again studied me and I was thinking that he was thinking much what I thought the night he asked me to marry him (or, more accurately, gave me a ring and told me we were getting married next April which I decided to think was the same thing). That was, there were many of my ways that had or would become clear to him. There were others that would remain a mystery.

“So, you’re sayin’, every year you’re gonna go Christmas crazy?” he asked when Jonas hit the garage carrying the shiny red and green Christmas bag with a big gold, glitter star on it, satin ribbon handles and big tufts of gold, glittered tissue paper spiking out of it.

“Yes,” I answered.

He grinned then murmured, “Good to know.” Jonas jumped into the cab, slammed the door and Tate announced, “Just had the talk with Laurie, Bub, she gets this way at Christmas. Get ready, every December we’re gonna be neck deep in Christmas until the day we die. But, good news is, next year we’ll know to brace.”

Jonas chuckled then said, “Gotcha.”

I jabbed a finger at Tate and snapped, “Scrooge One!” And then twisted in my seat and snapped, “Scrooge Two!”

Jonas burst out laughing.

Tate put the SUV in reverse and backed out of the garage. He was turned in his seat to look out the back window and his smile was wide.

I crossed my arms on my chest, looked out the front window and harrumphed.

* * * * *

I walked out of the office at Bubba’s, turned and locked the door.

I’d just finished the schedule for the next three weeks and finished payroll as well as wrote out the Christmas bonus checks that I’d talked Tate and Krys into giving the staff. They weren’t huge but anything at Christmas was welcome.

A Christmas miracle had happened and Tate had talked Krys into letting Bubba take shifts while we were away. Krys had hired Izzy, a new bartender, and he was good but she also stayed open throughout Christmas, every day just like normal, and with Tate and me both gone, and ski season upon the mountains, she needed an extra pair of hands.

Not to mention, for Tate’s peace of mind, he wanted that extra pair of hands to be the big, bad Bubba.

Bubba had got a job working for Tate’s attorney, Nina Maxwell’s husband Holden Maxwell. It was construction, the job they were doing just finished and Maxwell was giving his crew until the New Year off.

Bubba was already burning the candle at both ends, working construction during the day, sitting on his Harley at three thirty waiting to follow Krys home at night if it wasn’t snowing, that was. If it was snowing or the roads weren’t clear, Bubba sat in a pickup truck that was more beat up even than Jim-Billy’s, but he sat in it every night Krys was on. Still, taking shifts through Christmas would probably seem like a break after the schedule he was keeping.

I walked down the hall and into the bar to see Krys standing inside the bar, bent over it, head close to Jim-Billy who looked, even though it wasn’t even two in the afternoon, like he was drunk as a skunk. She was murmuring to him and Jim-Billy was staring into his beer. This was the third day in a row this had happened.

This was also surprising. Jim-Billy liked his beer and he drank a lot of it but he was no drunk.

The bar was pretty empty, too early for people to be off the slopes and looking for a different kind of fun. It was also a weekday prior to a Christmas where the bar would not close. This meant, to give them some kind of break, I scheduled lots of time off for our staff and only Tate, Krys and me were on and Tate, I suspected, was only there because I was.

I walked around the bar to where Tate was standing, his h*ps against the back bar, his eyes on Krys and Jim-Billy.

I stopped where he was, got close and put my forearms on the bar. Tate saw me, pushed away and came in close, putting his forearms on either side of mine.

“What’s that all about?” I whispered with a barely there tilt of my head toward Krys and Jim-Billy.