Holly, Jolly, and Oh So Naughty (Festive Flames)
Holly, Jolly, and Oh So Naughty: Chapter 23

The most alarming thing about having someone pound on my door at eight in the morning wasn’t that I spilled coffee all over the counter but that I was only half-dressed because I’d planned on returning to bed and snuggling with James.

That plan goes right out the window when I open my door and a short woman shoves past me and storms into my home.

“Excuse me!” I gasp, struggling to keep my house coat wrapped around me. The door remains ajar as I follow the woman through to my lounge where she glances around and then storms into my kitchen. The moment she sees the spilled coffee, she scoffs bitterly and spins to face me.

“Well?” she demands. “Where is he, hmm?”

I am stunned. I’ve never seen this woman before in my life and she stands before me like she leaped from the pages of one of those lifestyle magazines. Her tightly curled, sandy hair peeks out from beneath a small hat covered in flowers. She wears a slim red dress and dark tights with a string of pearls nestled among ruffled fabric along her neckline. She clutches a shining black leather bag between her hands, and her makeup is immaculate, if slightly powdery. With rosy cheeks from the cold and a tight, pursed, upside-down smile, I feel like I’m about to get the scolding of a lifetime.

“I’m sorry, who the hell are you? How dare you just come storming into my house like this? I’ll ask you once to get back outside before I call the police!”

“Oh, that won’t help you, dear,” the woman scoffs. “I know he is here. You can’t hide him from me. Enough is enough, you hear? I have had it up to here with all the lying and the sneaking and the pretending. This is over, you understand me?”

“Lady, I have no idea what on earth you are talking about!”

“And this is the house you keep?” She casts her judgmental gaze over the coffee spill.

A punch of shame worms through my chest and I dart forward, grabbing paper towels as I go. Why I’m letting some stranger make me feel judged in my own home, I have no idea, but in just a few words, she makes me feel like I need to deep clean my home from roof to cellar.

“Listen, you’d better start explaining yourself or I’m calling the police.”

“Adultery should be an offense,” she snaps. “I know women like you. Can’t replace a man of your own so you go sneaking around with someone else’s, without a thought to the other woman, you harlot! You know he’s engaged, don’t you?”

I stop dead in my tracks, coffee-soaked towels in one hand, and stare at her.

“James?” I ask.

James suddenly bursts into the kitchen, his hair a wild mess. “Mom! What the fuck are you doing here?”

Mom?

“Don’t use that foul language with me,” his mother snaps. “You know exactly why I am here.”

“No,” James snaps, moving to stand between me and his mother. “I really don’t. You can’t just barge into someone’s house like this. This isn’t New York. This place isn’t one of your estates!”

“I can if I think you are in danger or I’m worried you’re not in your right mind,” his mother snaps.

I can’t believe what I’m hearing. His mother is here? What little he’s told me of her is enough to put me off her, but now she stands here, insisting that James is still engaged. My heart races so fast that I can see shadows pulsing on either side of me, and I brace myself on the counter.

“I was engaged, yes,” James says, then he turns to me. “But I broke it off right after my father died. My ex-fiancée has moved on.” He turns back to his mother. “I’ve moved on. Why can’t you accept that!”

“Because I know it’s not you, not the real you making these decisions. Neither is Bernice. You think she’s moved on with the coffee boy? Don’t be so ridiculous. James, you’re coming home with me. I’m not asking.”

“No,” James says. “I’m not.”

It’s a strange glimpse into the world James has been trying to escape, and a surge of conflicting emotions rushes through me. On one hand, I’m furious that she’s here when my daughter is just upstairs, and I am ready to throw hands if she dares move toward the stairs. On the other hand, I know James has been avoiding her, and I can’t imagine how I would feel if I lost Emma in a similar way.

But his mother is convinced he is still engaged and another shameful, dirty feeling washes over me despite James’s reassurance.

Am I the other woman?

As James and his mother argue, it quickly becomes clear that I’m not the other woman. His mother is just unable to let go of the engagement for some absurd reason.

“James, think about this seriously,” his mother says, trying to place a hand on his arm, but he moves away. “You have a family back in the city. You have responsibilities to your father’s business, to his legacy. You have people there who love and care for you, and here? Here, there is nothing.”

“That’s the life you want me to live,” James snaps. “I don’t want that life. Why won’t you listen to me?”

“You shouldn’t be here!” she screeches suddenly. “There’s nothing for you here!”

My heart stalls in my chest.

There’s nothing for you here, not with him.

Her screech jerks me back to seven years ago when I finally managed to get through to James to tell him I was pregnant, and instead, it was his mother. I hadn’t fully recognized her up until that moment, but she screeched at me the same way with similar words when I spoke to her.

I told her it was urgent and she pressed constantly until I told her the truth. That I was pregnant and James was the father. She turned cold and bitter, telling me James wanted nothing to do with me and that I had no future, no life in their family.

Then she made me an offer that still haunts me to this day, and a sudden coldness washes over my shoulders.

I want this woman out of my house and away from my daughter.

Their argument continues and the more they debate back and forth—well, it’s not really a debate. James is pretty clear in what he wants to do, but for some reason, his mother simply refuses to accept—pieces start to slot together in my mind.

Why has James never connected the dots about Emma? Does he not remember that I was pregnant? It was years ago, but if I had the impact on him that he claims, could he really forget?

And if so, why did he think Mark was Emma’s father?

The sopping, coffee-soaked paper towels ball up in my fist and the cold liquid drips through my fingertips.

Is it possible that he never knew? Did he never know I was pregnant?

The way his mother talks, I begin to doubt everything she told me back then. Her insistence that James wanted rid of me, that he couldn’t face me and was annoyed I didn’t take the hint… was that really James or was it his mother getting rid of a problem she saw?

The more I think about it, the more it makes sense and all the other moments of confusion suddenly clear up as they slot into place.

James has never once asked about my pregnancy because he didn’t know I was pregnant, did he?

I watch his mother throw her hands in the air, scolding James for letting down shareholders and dragging their name through the mud. That’s where her focus is. On her immediate family, her name and her reputation. It’s clear that nothing else matters to her.

“Get out,” I say softly, tossing the paper towels into the sink.

Neither of them reacts, unable to hear me over their argument.

“You are unbelievable!” James barks. “You constantly talk at me, never to me. You are so determined to shove me into some little box that nothing else matters, does it? You’re so insane you barged into Lily’s home. Look at yourself, Mom. What would Dad think?”

His mother’s hand flies out and she strikes James hard across the face. “Don’t you dare,” she snaps. “Don’t you dare talk about him like that. If he were still here, none of this would be happening!”

“It would still happen,” James says sadly. “It would just take me longer to realize how fucking sad I was.”

“Get out!” I repeat louder, stepping forward. I glare at his mother. “You are not welcome here. If you want to continue this discussion, then that’s fine, but you are not doing it in my kitchen, understand? You are a rude, foul woman and if you don’t get out of my home, I am calling the police!”

“Lily!” James whirls around. “There’s no need for that.”

“Yes, there fucking is,” I snap. “There’s an intruder in my home.”

“She’ll leave.” James turns back to his mother. “Please leave. I can meet you in town somewhere and we can talk more, but not here.”

“No.” James’s mother stands an inch taller and she glares at me, then she faces James with narrow eyes. “You will come with me right now, James. This nonsense ends here.”

“No.”

“Yes, you will,” she snaps. “You come home now, or you will never see a dime of the family money. I will scrub your name from everything and I will disown you!”

My heart punches up into my throat, caught between furious desperation to get this woman out of my house and shock at the ultimatum she throws down at him.

James glances at me and our eyes meet for a second, then he faces her once more.

“Disown me. I am staying right here. This is where I belong.”

He chose me.

I didn’t know what to expect. Perhaps James would try to talk his mother into continuing this elsewhere, but no, he immediately made a choice.

And he chose me.

Shit.

I think I’m falling for him all over again.