BLURB When Pam accepts a holiday job playing Mrs. Claus at the mall, she falls in love with the sexy Santa, but a woman picks him up after work every night. Pam builds fantasies but fears Ed is married and off-limits. Can her Christmas wish possibly come true? Then one night the woman doesn’t show up at the mall, and “Santa” Ed invites her out to dinner and asks her to drive him home. Over dinner, Pam learns some surprising facts, including who the woman really is, why Ed doesn’t have a driver’s license, and how Pam fits into his plans. Might she get her Christmas wish after all?EXCERPT On December 24th, Pam awoke with a sense of foreboding, then remembered the reason: Today was her last day of working with Ed…and a shortened day at that. Toyland would be closing at five sharp, the gig over for the year. Well, she would make the best of it. She arrived even earlier than usual and was pleased to see that Ed was there early too. Reg himself let her in, instead of the assistant to whom he’d delegated the task after the first day. “It may be a mad last-minute rush,” he warned her. “Be prepared for anything.” She was prepared for anything but never seeing Ed again. She was having trouble handling that prospect.Ed himself seemed filled with a certain melancholy. “It’s over after today,” he said. “I’ve been peed on for the last time, gotten the last candy cane stuck in my whiskers…but, you know, I’m going to miss the little monsters.” He said it very fondly. “I’m going to miss you, too,” he added.“I’m going to miss you also!” Pam blurted out with more emotion than she’d meant to show. “Want to have dinner?” Ed asked. “We won’t get a dinner break today, but we get out at five. Would you allow me to take you to dinner? Dinner’s on me…but you have to do the driving.”“What about Misty?” Pam couldn’t help but ask.“Her sister is making a Christmas Eve afternoon party. I told Misty I’d find my own way home.”“You don’t have a car?”“I don’t have a license. I lost it last year.” A burning sadness sprang into his eyes and a shadow crossed his face. Pam wanted to ask how it had happened that he’d lost his license, but the sadness and the shadow persuaded her that the question would be inopportune. “If I spring for dinner, will you drive me home?”“I would drive you home even if you didn’t buy me dinner.”“But I want to buy you dinner! I don’t like the idea of never seeing you again.”“It’s bugging the hell out of me too.”There. She’d said it. In fact, they’d both said it…but where could things go from here? He was still a married man.
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