Christmas sucks.
When Emily Shepherd's boss boyfriend cheats on her with her best friend, she loses everything in one night-love, friendships, job, and home. In a weird fit of desperation (or some deep-rooted need to punish herself even more) she m...
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She spent the morning in the library, applying for jobs online. Not that there were a lot of jobs to apply for. Two weeks before Christmas was about the worst time to be looking for a job. Most of the retail stores would be cutting staff in a few weeks, in fact. Many companies sent an automated response to her queries—the HR department would be out of office until January 4. Another reason to hate Christmas. But she went ahead and applied for every opening she found, including a couple of jobs with a temp agency.
That actually might work out best, anyway. A short-term position would give her a paycheck while she looked for something that suited her skillset. And she definitely needed a paycheck soon. She needed a way of sustaining herself, because if she failed here, her only other option was Colorado and Mom and Dad.
And besides, she didn't want to leave here. She didn't want to leave... Leo. Which was crazy because she'd only known him a week. But she was crazy, right? She was seeing ghosts.
With nothing much to do besides go home to where those ghosts were, she decided to walk around the downtown area. The Christmas Village was a little quieter on a weekday afternoon. There were only a few mothers with small children at the reindeer stables. Santa was apparently on break until later.
She tried not to give much attention to the holiday decorations on every lamppost, but it was difficult. Everywhere she looked there was some reminder to be jolly. Strangely, those well-wishes didn't anger her as much as they did even a few days ago. Now, it was kind of quaint, homey. And even though Christmas would be a bust for her this year, she didn't feel as much pain as she did before.
She stopped in front of Diana's, an expensive dress shop that she'd never even been inside. Some of the girls in high school had gotten prom dresses from there. And her mom got a dress there once, for her cousin's wedding.
Today, there was an aluminum Christmas tree in the window, with red satin baubles. Two mannequins stood on either side of it. On the right, a faceless woman's form in a long, emerald satin halter dress held a brightly wrapped present in front of her. And on the left, reaching toward the tree with a bauble wired to her hand, was a mannequin in the most beautiful red dress she'd ever seen.
It was a tea-length, deep red party dress, with a draped neck and a low back held in place by crisscrossed sparking, delicate chains. Even without a face, the mannequin seemed very happy to be wearing it.
"You would look great in that." A familiar voice behind her startled her out of her reverie.
She smiled as Leo came to stand next to her. "Green is not my color."
He was not fooled. He just smiled and pointed to the red one. "You should get it."
She blushed at his obvious flirtation. "I could never afford a dress like that."
He shrugged. "Ask Santa."
She scoffed. "If I asked Santa for anything, it wouldn't be a stupid, sexy dress."
