A gun.
As the security guys cuff him and call for police backup, some of the dads have phones high in the air, taping everything. Not a single mom or dad has covered their child, pulled them behind a post or a piece of furniture, or walked away. Fortunately, the kids just stayed in line, good little do-bees who haven’t had every Santa fantasy crushed.
Something falls out of the photographer’s pocket as he’s half dragged off. A giant pile of money. Then another.
“Hey! We paid extra for the good pictures!” a parent calls out. “You can’t take the photographer away!” The mall cops step in and try to calm the crowd while I run to Declan.
“You speak Russian?” I gasp as Declan walks toward me with a swagger. Either that, or he’s staggering.
“My nose is fine, thank you,” he says, irritated. “And yes, I speak it. Have since high school.” He glares at me. Mom and Amy run up, Mom holding out a tissue. He takes it and presses it against his nose as he tips his head up, eyes locked on me. “I go through that and all you can ask me is…”
“What the hell was that?” I snap. “You speak Russian to some angry photographer and next thing I know you turn into Jason Bourne!”
“You figured it out,” he deadpans.
People are golf clapping. “Go, Santa! America! America!”
“What does America even have to do with—” Amy starts to ask, but Mom cuts her off.
“All those children! Santa can’t be ruined for them!” Mom clucks, grabbing the Santa jacket and working to help Declan back in it. There isn’t much blood on the beard, and Mom dabs at it, frantic. “We need to get you back in that chair.”
“Mom’s just worried we won’t get a picture with you guys,” Amy says drolly.
“Picture?” Declan asks in a ragged voice. The mall cops come over and I walk away to answer questions. The long line makes this all tough, with a million questions that need to be addressed. Declan casts a long look my way. I can’t tell if he’s more upset about his injured nose or being left alone to converse with my mother.
I dispense with the mall security by begging for an hour to clear the line, which seems to have tripled. Declan’s peeling himself off Mom and Amy is texting. He settles in Santa’s chair to thunderous applause and I realize: we have no photographer.
Great.
As if on cue, Marsha walks past carrying some shopping bags. She comes over behind the Santa chair and reaches for her clipboard.
“I’ll take over. As long as I get to sit on Santa’s lap for an extra long time,” she says with a wink. I have no leverage here, so I just nod. Noddy the Elf.
“Hot Santa,” Amy says as I walk past him to join her, shaking her phone at me. “Word’s getting out. Look at all those women in line.”
I peer into the crowd. “They don’t have any kids with them.”
“So?”
“Shouldn’t you bring a kid to see Santa?”
“I think they just want to sit in Santa’s lap and visit the North Pole, if you know what I mean,” Amy says, snickering.
“She means they want to sit on Declan’s penis,” Mom translates.
Chapter Five
“Thanks, Mom,” I cough, “for the explanation.”
“Just being helpful! Oh, look—there’s Agnes!” Mom runs off toward the end of the increasingly long line. Agnes is a ninety-something regular in Mom’s yoga classes.
Declan is warm and gracious with each child who comes through, and if I weren’t completely gobsmacked by how helping Greg out has turned my boyfriend into a Special Ops CIA dude who speaks Russian, I would pay more attention to my ovaries. They appear to be clapping, cheering, fanning themselves and putting on makeup for a special occasion with Santa, because damn if Declan isn’t amazing with the kids.
Charming and fatherly and sweet, yet ruthlessly efficient. The perfect blend of high-powered executive and Chevy-commercial dad.
He’s made to be a father.
A giggly woman sans child asks if she can sit in Santa’s lap and he says, “I’m taking all the little kids first, and then we’ll work our way through the big kids,” adding a wink.
I look through the line. There are about ten kids sprinkled in among the forty or so folks queued up. I walk out and pull the kids and grateful parents forward.
“Hot Santa is kind of a dick,” the rejected woman mumbles, walking away.
My mother hands her a candy cane and a yoga business card. “Merry Christmas!” The woman just glares and mutters to the other women in line. The single women in line thin out, about half leaving.
“Once you’re done with the kids, can senior citizens be next? This bladder isn’t as young as it used to be,” shouts a familiar voice.
“Ho ho ho,” Declan shouts, then mumbles to me, “I’ve been peed on enough. Don’t need to add Agnes to it. Do whatever she wants.”
“What is Agnes doing here?” I ask Mom, who turns out to be remarkably helpful, handing out candy canes and directing people to the pay station. Amy wanders off to huff the Lush bath products.
“I canceled yoga today when I learned you were coming here, and when they asked why there was a huge stampede of people who figured they might catch a glimpse of Declan. No one ever dreamed they’d get to sit in his lap!”
“Neither did he.”
Her eyes take in my costume. “You’re a little bigger than me, but not much. You get to keep that costume? Can I borrow it?”
Declan waves me over and I walk away without a single word, because I know why she wants to borrow it, and while costumes can be cleaned, brains can’t. Once that image is imprinted in my mind—of Mom and Dad playing Santa and the Naughty Elf—I might as well get an official Red Ryder Carbine Action 200-shot range model air rifle—