Good Elf Gone Wrong: A Holiday Romantic Comedy

“No. No no no no.”

I looked out of the upstairs bathroom window. I was quickly trying to shave my legs so that I could wear the dress I had planned on for tonight.

My mom’s holiday party was in full swing.

“Gracie!” my mom shouted up the stairs. “Gracie, I need you to make sure the spinach turnovers aren’t burning.”

“Coming, Mom,” I yelled as I desperately washed off the shaving cream.

Okay, so there were a couple stripes of dark hair I had missed, but I wasn’t Kelly. I didn’t have nothing to do all day except pamper myself, dream up ways to cheat, and destroy historic dresses.

“This was supposed to be a hallucination you made up,” I muttered to myself as I raced downstairs.

“Gracie, the spinach puffs.”

I ignored my mother and ran to the front door, catching Hudson as he was heading up the walkway, motorcycle helmet swinging in one hand, long shadow cast by the streetlight darkening freshly fallen snow. Hudson’s dark hair was trimmed short at the neck and fell in longer locks over his forehead.

“You,” I hissed, “cannot be here.”

Hudson dipped his head down. In the Christmas lights that decorated my parents’ huge Victorian house, his eyes seemed almost luminous.

I shivered.

You made a deal with the devil.

Then the devil needed to remove himself.

Large hands encircled my waist, making me squeak.

“You didn’t call me.”

“I did not call you because I’m not ready for you to be here,” I said through gritted teeth.

My second cousin and her new husband gawked at me and Hudson as they walked past us to the front door.

“You need to leave now.”

Hudson tipped my chin up, the stiff leather of the motorcycle glove rough on my chin.

“Where’s the girl who was going to give me a hand job in a crowded bus? I don’t want weak soldiers.”

I glanced back at the house.

Through the large front-room windows, I could see everyone congratulating Kelly and James, gushing about the wedding, hinting at babies to come next Christmas.

Hudson narrowed his eyes.

“Shock and awe.”

I nodded and straightened.

“I can’t hear you,” he said, voice softly mocking.

“Shock and awe.”

“Good girl.”

“Just give me a minute,” I mumbled.

He let me hurry past him into the warm house.

“The spinach puffs are burning,” my mom said when she saw me.

I am taking charge of my life.

“Sorry,” I said. “A … uh … friend of mine stopped by unexpectedly.”

“Was it Muriel?” my mother asked as I raced to the kitchen, feeling flighty and nervous about what I was about to do. There was no going back once I let Hudson inside.

I scooped the steaming pastries onto a platter decorated with scenes from the Grinch.

“No,” I squeaked as I headed back to the living room. “It’s a male friend.”

“A male friend? What male?” my mother demanded.

“Holy St. Nick, Santa came early!” I heard my cousin Violet drunkenly whoop to shrieks of delight of my other cousins.

I raced into the foyer in time to see Hudson push his way into the house.

In his motorcycle gear, heavy boots, and black scarf that half obscured his mouth and nose, he clashed with the cheery Christmas décor—the garland winding up the stair banister, the vintage hand-carved Santa’s reindeer, and the dancing Santa statue that greeted people on one side of the door with a Christmas tune.

My family, attracted to the drama, crowded around the doorways that led to the foyer. Hudson slowly unwound the scarf around his neck.

I cleared my throat. “There is someone I’d like for you all to meet.”

Backbone. Show a backbone.

I straightened up, still clutching the heavy platter.

“Family, this is Hudson. I invited him to stop by the Christmas party tonight.”

“Ooh la la!”

Several of my cousins were snapping photos of him and me.

“Thank you for coming, Hudson. Would you like a spinach puff?” I shoved the tray at him.

Those pale eyes flicked down to the platter then back up to my face.

“No.” There was a scowl stamped on his mouth.

“I’ll take one,” my drunk uncles slurred, crowding around for a snack.

My family was on the shorter side, and Hudson towered over them as they crowded around him. Collar on his leather motorcycle jacket popped up, he surveyed the decorated room.

He only gave one-word answers or grunts when my family tried to talk to him. He didn’t smile or act friendly or even offer his hand for a handshake like a normal man would do when he was meeting his girlfriend’s family for the first time. Somehow his body language had shifted, making him give off even more of a fuck-you vibe.

“Um, so … is that, like, your boyfriend?” Piper asked me.

“I don’t do relationships,” Hudson said, slamming the motorcycle helmet down on an antique side table. “I just hook up with her on the regular.”

I clutched the platter of slightly too-brown spinach puffs.

Hudson flicked the nose of a Rudolph clock that was hanging on the wall.

“Disgustingly cute house. Got anything to drink?”

“Sure. I’ll make you a drink.” Ducking my head down, I hurried over to the wet bar, thinking that I’d made a terrible mistake.

Hudson followed me.

“Do you want an elftini or a candy-cane mojito?”

“I don’t want any of your Christmas shit,” he said loudly. “Just give me a scotch.”

“Oh. Okay,” I said, feeling frazzled.

The dark-brown liquor sloshed in the glass as I handed it to Hudson.

He downed it in one go and handed it back to me.

You wanted an asshole, I reminded myself.

Still.

My parents pushed their way through the crowd of my extended family, confusion and concern on their faces.

My inner neglected teenage self was thrilled to finally be the center of their attention.

“Gracie didn’t tell us she was bringing a boyfriend,” my dad said, blinking rapidly behind his glasses.

“He’s a man friend,” Granny Murray crowed from where she was emptying scotch into a mug that read Let Me Make Your Nose Glow Bright.

“I’m Rob, Gracie’s father.” My dad stuck out his hand. “Nice to meet you.”

Hudson ignored his hand and focused on my mom.

“Guess Gracie gets her great tits from you.”

My mother made an indignant noise while Granny Murray cackled.

“Those are fake, sonny. Gracie gets those milk duds from me.” The elderly woman reached for her blouse buttons.

“Gran, please leave your shirt on,” I said loudly.

I saw the briefest crack in Hudson’s façade, and alarm peeked through.

He squashed it.

“Gracie, can we talk to you privately?” my parents said in hushed tones.

Though my original plan was to waft Hudson under Kelly’s nose like a pan of fresh peppermint bark brownies, it turned out there was an added bonus for having him as my fake boyfriend. I was now the belle of the ball. Well, Christmas party.

I followed my parents into the kitchen.

“Grace O’Brien, what has gotten into you?” my mother declared. “I don’t want you dating someone like Hudson.”

“You don’t want me dating anyone at all,” I said snidely before I could stop the words.

My parents had forbidden me from dating until I was eighteen, not that guys were that interested in me. I liked to sit in my room and read or sew and listen to audio books. I had had exactly two boyfriends before James, and Kelly had slept with both of them. Before the cheating, they had been fairly bland, vanilla guys, picked because I knew my parents would approve of them and, I had thought, Kelly wouldn’t be attracted to them.

“This Hudson is all wrong for you,” my father insisted.

My mom nodded. “He rides a motorcycle, and he isn’t wearing a button-down shirt to a holiday party.”

“Does he even have a job?” my father demanded.

“He works odd labor jobs. He used to be in the military,” I added.

“An officer?”

“I don’t believe he went to college.”

“You don’t know anything about this man.” My father shook his head.

“What will the neighbors say?” my mother wailed.

“They’ll probably think Hudson is Kelly’s boyfriend,” Granny Murray said loudly, coming into the kitchen. “Need some ice for this scotch.”

“Mom, this is a crisis,” Bethany said to her mother.

“Why, because my granddaughter finally has a piece of ass worth writing home about?” Granny Murray demanded.

“I know you’re still upset about losing James,” my mom began, pressing her hands together.

“You mean James cheating on me?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Gracie, watch your tone with your mother,” my father begged.

“Rebound relationships are beneath you,” my mother scolded. “You need to try harder for a boyfriend. A real boyfriend.”

“Maybe I’ll just steal James back,” I snapped.

“Gracie, don’t say that. I didn’t raise a home-wrecker.”

Oh, the irony!

I pulled a tray of mini quiches out of the oven.

“I need to refresh the appetizers,” I said, heading back out into the dining room, just in time to see James and Hudson sizing each other up.

James, in his Christmas sweater vest that I had made him, was puffed up to his full height, which was no match for Hudson’s six-five.

James was blustering. “We all care about Gracie very much …”

Liar.

“We just need to know what kind of man she’s dating. So I’m not going to ask you again. Tell us about yourself.”

Hudson’s wintery gaze slid over my family.

For once, a family party was dead quiet as people waited to hear what Hudson had to say for himself.

“All you need to know about me is that Gracie doesn’t have any complaints … if you know what I mean.”

“Then I guess you can leave.” James put his hands on his waist.

Hudson stared up at the ceiling, then his eyes flicked to mine. His posture was insolent. Bored.

“What the hell were you on when you thought it was a good idea to waste your time with him?” James turned to chastise me.

“Probably could say the same about you,” Hudson drawled.

All the stress, the needling comments from Hudson in the bus, were worth it just to see my ex-fiancé’s face fall and his smug expression melt like a gingerbread house in front of the fire.

Hudson unzipped the heavy leather motorcycle jacket.

Kelly’s attention was glued to Hudson. Her eyes, framed by oversized fake lashes, followed his hands as he slowly pulled the zipper down, down.

Kelly’s tongue darted out to lick her lips.

Hudson mimicked the gesture.

James noticed it, too, and his eyes widened in alarm.

“At least tell us where you’re from,” James barked at Hudson.

Hudson didn’t look at him, his gaze still locked on Kelly, who made a big show of adjusting her top and sticking her chest out.

“I’m from Maplewood Falls, but the Gulch side. I went to Nixon High.”

“The bad high school,” Kelly said it like it was the name of an exclusive club.

“Then you’re really not good enough for Gracie.” James was bombastic.

Hudson tipped his head back and rolled his shoulders.

“Gracie thinks I’m good enough to come all over her face.”

What the—

The color drained from my father’s cheeks.

“Gracie?”

His elderly mother gave me a scandalized look. “Robert, I thought you raised your daughters better than this.”

My cousins were snickering. One of them was streaming the whole dumpster fire to the family group chat for those like Dakota who hadn’t been able to get off of work in time for the party.

My face burned.

Hudson gave me a feral look. His teeth were sharp. He was going for the kill.

It was then I realized I had made a grievous error in hiring Hudson Wynter to be my fake boyfriend.

He had, in fact, been correct.

I couldn’t handle it.

“Your daughter’s a little porn star,” Hudson said, deep voice carrying around the packed room.

I felt my throat constricting.

Stop, I mouthed.

“James, you must have been doing nothing but missionary with Gracie,” Hudson said in that same insolent, bored tone. “When I first had her on her knees in the back of my truck, she would barely let me eat her out. But I need a little more excitement when I’m fucking some girl.” His eyes locked with Kelly’s. My sister was practically panting.

“I showed her some porn flicks, told her to act like that, you know, really make it interesting. I slapped her pussy when she put on a good performance. That got her in the Christmas spirit.” He smirked. “I took her hard, doggy style in the back of my truck. And you should see her suck my cock. She’s a greedy little slut.” He turned those snow demon eyes on my ex.

“I broke her out of the bad habits you put in her, James.”

My cousins were whispering to each other behind their hands, and my aunts were looking at me in horror.

The room was too hot, too stuffy. There were too many people.

I cannot do this.

I dumped the tray onto a nearby table and raced outside, gasping in the cold winter, air the tears freezing on my face.

“That was humiliating,” I sobbed to myself, digging my fists in my eyes, trying to force the tears to stop.

I was never going to be able to show my face again. This was so much worse than when everyone saw James cheating on me. What had I done? It really was a deal with the devil.

The side door opened then slammed. Heavy boots crunched in the snow.

“Gracie.”

“I hate you. Go away.”

Hudson stepped around to face me, crowding my personal space.

I stepped back, but his large hand settled on my waist, trapping me against him.

“Don’t pull away from me.” His voice was laced with warning. “Your family is watching.”

I sniffled.

He dipped his head forward to whisper in my ear.

“You promised you could handle this.”

“I lied,” I sobbed. “This is terrible.”

“Wrong. It’s going perfectly,” he crooned.

“You’re awful, and you said dirty things. You were mean to me; you humiliated me. Why is Kelly going to want a man who treats people like shit? You’re not just an asshole, you’re a dick.”

“Are you kidding me?” He tilted my head up to look at him. “All women want a man who treats them like shit.”

“No, they don’t,” I protested.

“You’re dripping wet thinking about me holding you down, fucking you raw, and calling you a slut.” His tone was almost clinical.

I was glad of the dark so he couldn’t see the heat in my face.

“After that little performance, all your sister is going to be able to think about is me coming on her face,” he said in the dark. “Trust me. I understand how people work.”

He wiped the tears off my cheeks, the leather of the gloves rough.

“That’s not how I work,” I warbled out.

His eyes narrowed.

“This is war, Sugarplum. We die like men.”

He released me then stalked back into the house.

I followed, feeling stunned.

My family, who had been watching the whole thing from the windows, pretended like they were just getting more hors d’oeuvres and asking my mother for the spinach puff recipe.

Hudson stomped through the house and grabbed the motorcycle helmet.

“Not staying for dinner?” Granny Murray asked him, waggling her eyebrows.

“I have to go to work.”

“Let me guess. You’re a custodian,” James sneered.

Hudson narrowed his gaze. “Someone has to clean up the trash.”

My fake boyfriend tucked the helmet under his arm, shifted his weight, and tilted his head up at Kelly.

“You might want to level up, James,” he said, “or she might pull a Gracie and go find herself a real man.”

James gave me a dirty look.

Hudson zipped up his jacket and headed to the door. Before he left, he bent down to whisper in my ear, “Man the fuck up.”

The front door slammed, making me jump.

“Where,” Kelly drawled to me, “did you ever find Hudson?”

“Nowhere,” I said, eyes downcast as I grabbed an empty tray.

I hurried past my family to hide in my safe space, the kitchen, and plot how to remove Hudson from my life completely.

Because otherwise? I wasn’t going to survive this Christmas.