Host for the holidays a.., p.1
Host for the Holidays: A Sweet Romance (Christmas Escape),
p.1
Copyright © 2022 by Martha Keyes
Cover Design by Melody Jeffries
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
To Paris—my first international love
CONTENTS
Chapter 1
Madi
Chapter 2
Madi
Chapter 3
Madi
Chapter 4
Rémy
Chapter 5
Rémy
Chapter 6
Rémy
Chapter 7
Madi
Chapter 8
Madi
Chapter 9
Madi
Chapter 10
Rémy
Chapter 11
Madi
Chapter 12
Madi
Chapter 13
Madi
Chapter 14
Rémy
Chapter 15
Madi
Chapter 16
Madi
Chapter 17
Madi
Chapter 18
Rémy
Chapter 19
Madi
Chapter 20
Madi
Chapter 21
Rémy
Chapter 22
Madi
Chapter 23
Rémy
Chapter 24
Madi
Chapter 25
Rémy
Chapter 26
Rémy
Chapter 27
Rémy
Chapter 28
Rémy
Chapter 29
Madi
Chapter 30
Madi
Chapter 31
Rémy
Chapter 32
Rémy
Chapter 33
Madi
Chapter 34
Madi
Chapter 35
Rémy
Chapter 36
Madi
Chapter 37
Rémy
Chapter 38
Rémy
Chapter 39
Rémy
Chapter 40
Madi
Chapter 41
Rémy
Chapter 42
Madi
Chapter 43
Rémy
Chapter 44
Madi
Chapter 45
Madi
Chapter 46
Rémy
Epilogue
Read the next book in the series
Christmas Escape Series
Author Note
Other titles by Martha Keyes
Acknowledgments
About the Author
ONE
MADI
Just added to the tippity top of the List of Utterly and Completely Worthless Things: getting an “A” in every term of high school French. Je m’appelle Madi and Comment allez-vous? just aren’t cutting it as I speak with the employee at the lost luggage office in the Paris airport.
Would it have been so hard for Madame Wilson to teach us something useful like, “Hey, I’ve watched that carrousel spin around more times than a teacup at Disneyland, and my perfectly packed bag is nowhere to be seen”? Not once has this woman asked me a question that would necessitate an answer like, “I like to play soccer.” I probably should have listened to my friend Siena and downloaded one of those language learning apps for a refresher before leaving home.
Having said that, I strongly suspect this woman speaks perfectly good English, but she’s purposely trying to make it hard for me. Admittedly, making it hard for me is pretty easy at the moment. I just escaped eleven hours in a tight space with a herd of strangers, hovering miles above solid ground. Everything about that is contrary to my natural habitat.
After fifteen minutes, I walk away with an assurance that my bags will be delivered to my vacation rental when they arrive at the airport, though when that will be, I have no idea. Thankfully, the taxi driver who approaches me just outside seems a bit less inclined to hate me than the lost luggage lady. Thank heaven for that, since it’s negative seven hundred degrees outside, and my oversized cardigan and leggings have not equipped me for December in Paris.
The driver looks at the address of the Airbnb my boyfriend, Josh, booked for me and tells me in a thick French accent that it will be no problem to get me there. Grunting a bit under the weight, he chucks my carry-on into his trunk and opens the door for me to get in.
I sit down on the leather seat and take in a breath full of the gloriously heated air. It also happens to be saturated with cigarette smoke, and I try to stifle a cough. Siena warned me that the French still smoke like it’s the 1960s.
She also warned me that French men are flirtatious—sometimes aggressively so. My taxi driver does not seem to fit that second stereotype, however, unless communicating in grunts is considered “aggressive flirtation” here. Either way, I’m not complaining. In the lead-up to this trip, I heard enough jokes about Taken to last me a lifetime.
I set my backpack full of camera gear next to me, clenching my hand around the strap as I realize how fortunate it is that this didn’t get lost. Not only is it thousands of dollars of equipment, it’s my passport into the future. The hopeful future, at least.
I pull out my phone from the bag’s side pocket. It’s still super early morning back home, but I promised Siena I’d text her when I arrived.
Madi: I made it!!! I’m actually in Paris! Hope you’re sleeping cuz at least that’ll make one of us. *GIF of woman propping open her eyelids with paperclips*
I cringe thinking of how much an international phone plan is costing me for these two and a half weeks in Paris, but when I told Siena I wasn’t going to get one at all, she insisted, offering to pay for it herself.
“I can’t be cut off from my other half for three weeks,” she said. “I need to know the second you have the ring on your finger.”
Don’t be fooled. Siena’s not crazy about my boyfriend (slight understatement). But she tries to be supportive, and I try to believe her icy heart will melt once Josh proves he’s taking things to the next level with some hard evidence. Nothing is harder than diamond, right?
My mom and my brother, Jack, will embrace him with open arms at that point, too. I’m counting on it.
Okay, so Jack is more likely to embrace Josh’s face with an open fist. He really doesn’t like Josh. Protective Older Brother Syndrome and all that nonsense. But since Jack has a history of dating and discarding my friends, who then discard me, I don’t lose too much sleep over his opinion.
I glance down at my ring finger with a little hiccup of nerves—or maybe that’s just the airplane food making itself heard. All I know is that this finger has been bare as a baby’s bottom my entire life, and it finally looks like that might change. In Paris, of all places!
When he invited me to tag along on this business trip, Josh hinted pretty heavily at a perfect Paris proposal (see how amazingly alliterative that is?). I’m trying to balance my hope for that long-awaited event against the other times I’ve let my expectations get away from me, only to be disappointed. A woman’s heart has only so many cracks and crevices to cram those kinds of experiences in before all of it pops out like a package of Pillsbury biscuits (those things are terrifying).
But Josh has had a really crazy year at work, and I know from past experience that he can pull through when it counts. So even though I got to a point last month where I was ready to go our separate ways, he helped remind me of all we’ve done and experienced together over the past two years—and convinced me that there was no place better than Paris to recharge us and start fresh. Not that I needed much convincing to do Christmas in the City of Love.
I swipe to unlock my screen and go to my recent calls, tapping on Josh-wah. No, he doesn’t really spell it like that, but it’s the nickname for him I stole from Rachel on Friends. His phone rings a few times and goes to voicemail.
I’m used to it. Josh can be tricky to get a hold of—like I said, he’s a busy guy—but he always calls me back. His flight got in earlier this morning, so he’s probably sleeping. The thought makes my eyes droop a bit with jetlagged jealousy.
Or maybe he’s not sleeping. This is a work trip for him, so he flew on the company dime. Business class. I saw what that section of the plane looks like. The seats are like the Batmobiles of chairs, transforming into a luscious sleep space where you can extend your leg until your knee actually straightens. Magic.
“Hey!” I say to the machine. “It’s me! I made it! I’m in a taxi on my way to the Airbnb right now. Took a while since the airline lost my luggage. I may have to borrow some clothes from you. Anyway, thank you so much for taking care of the Airbnb for me. Honestly, I can’t wait to climb in bed and take a nap, but I’ll keep my phone ringer volume up in case you call.”
I catch my reflection in the rearview mirror, and my eyes balloon. Maybe a shower first. No wonder the woman at lost luggage kept looking at my hair. It looks like I put it in a ponytail then stuck it in a greasy tumble dryer.
I run my free hand through it to try to calm the mess a bit.
“Anyway,” I say, “call me wh
The traffic in this city is like nothing I’ve ever seen, but the movie-worthy building façades lining the busy streets offer plenty of distraction from the many near-fender benders. I’m wishing I had those paperclips from the GIF I sent Siena, because blinking is my worst enemy. You might think black, wrought-iron balconies, creamy buildings, and gray rooftops would get old after a while, but you’d be wrong. Add in the Christmas lights and the wreaths and garlands hanging up all over the city, and . . . contented sigh.
Finally, the taxi turns onto a one-way street and stops about halfway down. The driver slings his arm over the seatback to look at me. “This is it,” he says in that thick accent.
I’m not entirely sure what this is, since we’re surrounded by tall buildings, and the only doors I can see are massive, arched ones that look like the entrance to places well out of my price range.
I smile. Good thing Josh is the one paying for this place. He felt so bad the hotel he’s staying in was booked full, so he must have sprung for a ritzy rental for me. Having a kitchen works better for me, anyway. I can’t afford to be eating out every meal.
I smile at the taxi driver and open my door despite not being sure where exactly I’m supposed to go. A blast of freezing air reminds me again that it’s December, and I’m not in California anymore. Also, my real coat is in my bag that, according to the lady at the airport, is apparently in Morocco on its own vacation.
The driver steps out of the car, rolls his shoulders, lights a cigarette—priorities, people—then pops the trunk. He hefts my suitcase out and looks at me. “One hundred euros.”
TWO
MADI
My stomach plummets. “One hundred?” I figured I’d be paying a third of that, tops. Maybe I should have done more research? Or maybe I shouldn’t have made it so obvious that I’m new to this travel gig.
He nods, pulling out the cigarette in his mouth and blowing a puff of smoke straight at me. With his other hand, he keeps hold of the suitcase handle like my carry-on is full of cocaine and he’s not handing it over until I show him the dough. I want to fight him on this, but that taxi trunk looks mighty roomy, and, as much as I love Josh, he is no Liam Neeson.
I pull the credit card out of my purse, my stomach twisting in knots, and hand it over to him, wondering how close to my credit limit this will put me. Little known fact: credit card companies don’t love giving credit to people with unstable jobs. I can’t really blame them.
The driver runs the card in a handheld machine, waits, then shakes his head.
“Declined?” I squeak.
“Declined,” he says, imitating my accent in a way I find entirely unnecessary. Do I really sound like that?
“Can you try it again?” I ask.
He barely suppresses an eye roll, then swipes it again. “Declined,” he says in that same attempted American accent.
I take the card back and rifle through my purse, pulling out the precious euros I got at the bank and choosing two fifties. I hand them to him, hoping it’s not evident by my face that I’m not at all accustomed to throwing this much money around for a car ride.
He releases my hostage carry-on and, euros in hand, gets in the car with his glowing cigarette, slamming the door and zooming off faster than I can say a weak Merci.
I try to shake off the dent just put into my already tight budget. Since graduation a couple years ago, I’ve been living from paycheck to paycheck, hoping that business will pick up at some point. Turns out, majoring in photography does not guarantee you’ll become the next Annie Liebowitz. Go figure.
I’m hoping to put those days behind me, though. Josh has promised to put me in touch with the director of marketing at his company, Dan Vincent. This could be huge for my career. And by huge for my career, I mean it could actually be a career, which my current situation does not at all qualify as. This is a sort of last shot I’m giving my dream before surrendering and getting a desk job.
Product photography might not be exactly what I was hoping to do when I set out, but this is the real world. I can either starve while pursuing my passion of portrait photography, or I can do a Ross Geller-worthy pivot to a different type of photography and eat three square meals. Compromises must be made; pivots must be embraced.
Blowing air into my freezing hands, I turn to the building next to me. It has a big, blue number five over the massive set of doors. Yesterday, Josh sent me screenshots of the check-in instructions in case my internet didn’t work. He’s the one who booked the Airbnb, since I didn’t have the app or any guest review history. Checking his messages, I verify that it’s the right building, then read the instructions the host sent him. Apparently, a neighbor will be giving me the keys.
There’s a big pad of buttons next to the door, and I follow the instructions and press the bottom one. After a bit of ringing, someone answers over the microphone in French.
I wince. Anyone who thinks you need to speak the same language as someone to understand what they’re saying is full of it. The guy answering is irritated in all languages.
“Um,” I say, dusting the cobwebs off my high school French, “Bonjour. Je m’appelle—”
Beep. A loud click follows the beep. It sounds like it came from the door, but I have no idea what it means. Did he just deadbolt it to keep me from getting in?
“Hello?” I say into the microphone on the button pad. Dead silence.
I hesitate, wondering if I should press the button again, but I don’t really feel like being yelled at, even if I have no idea what’s being said—my mind is all too ready to fill in the blanks. Instead, I give the door a little push, and, miraculously, it gives way.
I step through, yanking my bag over the door ledge and pulling it along through the dark archway. My suitcase wheels make a racket, but since it’s cobblestone, the sound has a bit of charm to it. At least, that’s what I tell myself as my hand vibrates like I’m shooting a machine gun.
I emerge into a courtyard and look around. My heart soars, floating upwards like Mary Poppins with her umbrella. Cream stone walls rise above me on all sides, punctuated by white-framed, curtained windows, green potted plants, and a few festive wreaths. My hands itch to take out my camera because I’m surrounded by the essence of Paris. At least, as much as one can know the essence of Paris after a smoky taxi ride from the airport.
My mouth stretches in a gleeful grin, and all my travel troubles are immediately forgotten. I get to stay here—in this beautiful, swanky building—for almost three weeks!
“Excusez-moi.”
I whirl around and find a middle-aged man walking toward me. He starts going off in a language I’m positive is not French, because it sounds nothing like what I learned in high school. He’s definitely not telling me he likes to play soccer or asking me where the library is.
Just generally, he does not look thrilled to see me.
“Bonjour,” I say with a courageous attempt at a smile. I don’t want to brag, but my accent is pretty good. Or so Madame Wilson told me.
The man is unimpressed. “I have been waiting for you for an hour,” he replies in heavily accented English.
“Oh,” I say. “I am so sorry! The airline lost my baggage, and it took—”
He holds up a ring of keys that look a lot like the massive, rusted ones I almost bought at Hobby Lobby for my entry table. “Through there. Top floor.” He points toward a set of French doors I must have passed in the dark archway. He holds up one key. “This is for the door from the street.” He holds up the next one. “This one is for the door to the building.” And one more. “This one is for the apartment.” He hands them to me, nods, then turns.
