Hating Christmas (Holiday Series) by Carol Rose

she’d said
everything was forgiven.
    He shook his head. “I tend to respond to things too
quickly sometimes. Your mom was just being financially
conservative. I can understand her response. I appreciate her money
attitude. Not all women worry about what their husbands are
spending. Your mom’s smart that way”
    Holly wasn’t sure where to go with this. “Yes….”
    “Levi was right. It’s crazy to spend a lot of money
going on another cruise right now. We can do that later. Maybe for
our anniversary or something.” Michael beamed a smile at her. “That
boy of mine makes a lot of sense sometimes.”
    “Mmm hm.” Where the hell was her mother? It didn’t
take this long to put on a dress. Holly glanced back at the
staircase. Even Levi’s presence would be a relief, at this
point.
    “I know you and your mom are close.” Michael leaned
back against the couch. “She’s used to counting on you and I get
that. But I just want you to know that I don’t intend to come
between you.”
    “Good,” Holly stuck in, “because you couldn’t.”
    “Of course not. I wouldn’t want to. I love your mom
very much and I just want to make her happy.”
    She felt like she should respond to this, but she
couldn’t find anything to say and Michael went right on as if he
didn’t need anything from her.
    “She’s a wonderful, intelligent woman. I don’t know
if she told you, but we knew each other way back in grade school.”
His smile was boyish and bashful. “I liked Leanne Milgrove back
then and your mom was going steady with a kid named Rocky. Geez,
that was years ago.”
    Holly understood the fun in meeting old friends, she
just wished her mother hadn’t felt the need to marry within a month
of reconnecting with a man she hadn’t seen since they were in grade
school.
    “Quite the looker, your mom.” Michael mused, clearly
lost in reflection. “Of course, she’s still beautiful now, but even
back then all the guys were jealous of Rocky.”
    He frowned into space. “I wonder whatever happened to
him. I think he moved away—yes! He and his family moved to
Milwaukee the summer before we all were headed to high school.”
    Her step-father seemed to shake off his nostalgia,
saying with a smile, “We all had crushes on you mom back then. She
was quite a girl. I’m a very lucky man.”
    Watching him talk about her mother left Holly feeling
a little shaken, not stirred. He seemed to genuinely appreciate her
mother. Holly wasn’t sure what to do with this impression.
    “Of course,” Michael smiled at her, “she’s lucky to
have such a good daughter, just like I’m lucky to have Levi. Not
all parents have such loving, successful children.”
    Holly wondered with a sudden shade of guilt if he’d
still have this conviction if he knew that she and Levi were doing
their best—well, she was doing her best!—to break them up. She
couldn’t vouch for Levi after his woodpile failure.
    Maybe they were both wrong…. Holly wove her fingers
together on her knee and registered the sinking feeling in her
stomach that had nothing to do with lunch being delayed. Were she
and Levi all wrong about this? No, no. Their parents’ marriage had
been sudden and impulsive—two things marriages should never be in
this day of more than half of them failing. You needed to think
about that kind of commitment carefully. Look before leaping, that
was Holly’s motto, at least when it came to marriage.
    “Here they are!” Michael hailed his new wife.
    Both he and Holly swiveled around just as Audrey came
down the stairs.
    He jumped up to give her a peck on the cheek. “Oh,
that’s a pretty dress.”
    Her mother was wearing forest green shirt dress with
tiny red Christmas balls dangling from her ears. “Thank you,
sweetheart. Oh, good,” she smiled as Levi sauntered down the steps.
“Now we’re all here and we can start dinner.”
    Chastened by the possibility that this marriage might
not be a bad thing, she followed them in for