My Christmas Darling Read online

  Contents

  New Novelette Series

  New Book Series

  Current Books

  Title Page

  Preface

  Introduction

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  A Special Gift

  Literary Works Mentioned

  Authors Mentioned

  Coming Soon

  Sleepy Hollow Preview

  A Sleepy Hollow Kiss

  Wedding at Walden Pond

  Once Upon a Thanksgiving

  Dreams of Mistletoe

  Request from the Author

  About the Author

  My Christmas Darling

  A Delightfully Uplifting Holiday Romance

  Vivien Mayfair

  Praise for Vivien Mayfair

  There is likely to be no better, more uplifting, contemporary Christmas novel for the 2019 season.

  Midwest Book Review

  Vivien Mayfair delivers a wholesome and heartfelt holiday gift with her new book; a classic tale of unlikely lovers tumbling together. Laden with quaint charm, the story is cozy and quick, with clever writing, that amuses throughout.

  Self-Publishing Review

  Vivien Mayfair offers a tender, enjoyable romance filled with powerful life lessons, all blended perfectly into a book that is hard to put down. Well done, Vivien Mayfair.

  Reader’s Favorite

  My Christmas Darling deftly captures the magic of Christmas in New York City. The season transforms every street and softens every hardened denizen.

  Jack Magnus

  An enjoyable read that puts you in the mood for Christmas. It covered all things Christmas, including Scrooge and all things books, making me want to know what was going to happen next.

  Goodreads Top 43 Reviewer

  In the Mood for More Christmas?

  * * *

  Join us in celebrating the first official Christmas season in the little book town of Snowdrop Valley.

  * * *

  DREAMS OF MISTLETOE

  Coming December 15, 2019

  * * *

  New Novelette Series

  Short and Sweet Holiday Reads Novelette I

  Available Now

  Buy Here

  New Book Series

  Welcome to Snowdrop Valley

  A charming, swoony, small-town series where independent women dream about finding their forever love in a magical place where only bookish things are allowed.

  Available on all platforms wherever books are sold in small print, large print, and eBook.

  Current Books

  By Vivien Mayfair

  A Sleepy Hollow Kiss

  Wedding at Walden Pond

  Once Upon a Thanksgiving

  My Christmas Darling

  Dreams of Mistletoe

  www.VivienMayfair.com

  DISCLAIMER: Although the author and publisher have made every effort to ensure that references to real places, dates, or events in this book were correct at press time, they do not assume and hereby disclaim any liability to any party for any loss, damage, or disruption caused by errors or omissions, whether such errors or omissions result from negligence, accident, or any other cause.

  * * *

  My Christmas Darling Copyright © 2019 by Vivien Mayfair

  Excerpt from A Sleepy Hollow Kiss © 2019 by Vivien Mayfair

  * * *

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  Vivien Mayfair asserts the right to be identified as the only author of this creative work. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission, except in the case of brief, credited quotations embodied in literary articles or reviews in an honest manner.

  * * *

  Published in the United States by Bramble House Books

  https://bramblehousebooks.com

  ISBN Large print: 978-1-7332261-4-1

  ISBN Regular print: 978-1-7332261-1-0

  ISBN ebook: 978-1-7332261-0-3

  Author’s Website: https://www.vivienmayfair.com

  * * *

  Cover design by: 100Covers.com

  Editor: Kathryn Wexford

  * * *

  My Christmas Darling is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidences are either a product of the author’s imagination or, if real names or places are used, are completely fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business, establishments, periodicals, locations or events, author names or fictional characters, are either coincidence or used intentionally for fantasy and fiction-writing purposes only.

  Created with Vellum

  For Jackson

  * * *

  May you always love Christmas the way I have loved spending it with you

  A Snowdrop Valley Series Novel

  Book 1

  MY CHRISTMAS DARLING

  * * *

  A delightfully uplifting holiday romance

  * * *

  by

  * * *

  Vivien Mayfair

  Bramble House Books

  Preface

  Dear Reader,

  * * *

  Thank you for taking the time to join me in my charming Fifth Avenue holiday tale. Christmas is my absolute favorite time of year, and there’s no place I’d rather spend it than in the folds of a sweet romance.

  This Christmas we’ll enter the dreamy world of Lucy Carpenter named after two great icons – Lucille Ball and Karen Carpenter – two ladies who have special meaning to me. Enter the invention of mysterious Bibi Roquette, a.k.a Lucy’s secret pen name created in desperation to sacrifice the most notable reward: redemption, self-forgiveness, and generosity.

  The dashing and dark William Harcourt wants nothing more than to feel the love and acceptance we all crave deep down. His literary exploits enacted trying to achieve this bring him right into the love letters and arms of Lucy and Bibi, unaware they are the same person.

  Books are my life and passion. I had a sincere blast writing this story and I hope you’ll find great joy in reading it this holiday season. My hope is that when you’re done, your love of books, merry-making and the spirit of Christmas, will be that much brighter.

  I love hearing from my readers. You can search for me on Facebook and drop me a line or subscribe to my newsletter for upcoming release information and free books.

  www.VivienMayfair.com/newsletter

  Merry Christmas and happy yuletide. I hope you find your Christmas stocking full of little books to warm your heart, and chocolates to remind you just how sweet life can be.

  * * *

  Love, Vivien

  Introduction

  “Happy, happy Christmas, that can win us back to the delusions of our childish days; that can recall to the old man the pleasures of his youth; that can transport the sailor and the traveler thousands of miles away, back to his own fireside and his quiet home!"

  Charles Dickens - The Pickwick Papers

  Chapter 1

  “When life gives you lemons, trade them in for Christmas books and peppermint bark.”

  With Love, Vivien

  There it was.

  Her liberation in a manila envelope.

  Finally.

  Lucy Carpenter picked up the crisp yellow package off of her bedroom dresser in slow motion as if cradling the lost secrets of Atlantis. Her heart slammed into her ribs. “Why is it so big?”

&nbs
p; “Because you’re going to be famous.”

  “The others weren’t this big.”

  “Big packages are like cowboys wrapped in red bows which I love.”

  “Yet, your love life is a barren wasteland.”

  “I’m saving myself for Daddy Warbucks.” Her best friend Heather, aspiring actress and nimble Uma Thurman doppelgänger, stretched out like a sunbathing cheetah on Lucy’s bed. “Um, Congress is way faster.”

  Tempted to relay her surprise that her pal knew anything about Congress, Lucy gripped so tight to the envelope that her knuckles popped. “This book took me a year to write.”

  “Then open the envelope, silly!”

  “The other rejection letters were small envelopes. This is heavier than my makeup bag.”

  “A three-book contract maybe. Or, a proof?”

  Lucy picked up her oversized snowflake mug and sipped on peppermint tea. After a grueling day at the publishing house reviewing the worst manuscripts ever to insult the English language, she faced her destiny for precisely the seventy-fifth time. That’s how many rejection letters.

  Seventy-four so far; plus one.

  They were always polite. Sorry, not accepting new submissions. Our apologies, we don’t publish holiday novels. Wonderful work, but we’re full. She took each denial like a bison stampede over a sunburn.

  Some never replied at all.

  The one in her hand was different. Something regal and important waited inside that, unfortunately, wasn’t a ripped holiday hunk in a Stetson with a diamond ring and a shoddy proposal waiting.

  “I can’t, I just can’t!” Lucy groaned, setting down the mug.

  “It’s just an envelope, my goodness. What’s the worst that can happen?”

  “But, this is Walton and Cartwright,” Lucy expelled in disbelief. “It’s 2014, and they’re like the Prada of publishing now.”

  “Then maybe they’re the one.”

  “To publish my book? But, they’re a Top Five Manhattan publisher.”

  “All the bigger the royalty checks.”

  “Why would they want me of all people?”

  “You ninny, I thought you said your novel was charming and frothy and genius. If a Christmas novel can even be charming and frothy and genius. I mean, what exactly is frothy anyway?”

  “You after a hot date, bubble bath, and bottle of champagne.”

  “And Mariah Carey in the background. All I want for Christmas is...”

  Lucy glanced at a Snoopy Christmas clock as it dinged her dinner reminder. Thirty minutes to boil and prep her red and green baked tortellini. Twenty-five to cook it to a crisp-browned top. Twenty to feed her mother who was blind as a geriatric bat. Fifteen to clean up the mess and get her mom settled for bed.

  Ninety minutes.

  That’s how long she’d have to wait to find out if her mom’s life would change. Or, she could choose to open it now and choke down another rejection. Weighing the image against a cheesy bowl of pasta, she thought better of rushing it. She’d need time to keep her intestines on the inside.

  Her belly growled, and not in the tortellini-craving way.

  Despite the rejections, excitement buzzed through her limbs. It felt like Christmas Eve wondering what was inside, and that wasn’t for another three weeks. Forget the iced cookies and Clement C. Moore and embroidered Christmas quilt on her bed.

  Tonight, would be her Christmas Eve.

  “I should wait,” she decided, glancing at her friend combing her long, honey-gold hair. “Don’t you think?”

  “I can open it for you.”

  Lucy set it down and spread her fingers over the mail. Ignored at least three late notices for their cable, water, and cell phone bills. The connected irony between the envelope awaiting her future and the bills made her frown.

  This was a first.

  The rejections usually came in a slim envelope with a single piece of paper that crushed her hopes and dreams of giving her mom a better life, all in one condescendingly polite and humiliating swoop.

  “There must be a reason it’s so big?” she asked through a mouth that went dry.

  Heather bounced up to her knees. “Only one way to find out.” She reached for her wine glass filled to the brim and sipped a cranberry sangria that made her lips smack in delight. “This is the one!”

  “What if it’s not?”

  “Then it’s not.”

  “But, what if it is?”

  “Then you’ll be rich. Then your mom gets what she needs.”

  Lucy recalled her goal. “Nothing’s that easy.”

  It took a year to write the book while working two jobs. As a level-three manuscript reader, she made enough to pay the rent. Then there were groceries, medicines, health care, insurance, electricity. She cleaned apartments on the weekends for that. Sometimes it was enough; not always.

  Books though, were her life.

  Publishing – her dream.

  Two years working on a graduate degree in literature while writing her book, she schmoozed the literary channels until a noteworthy press hired her to scan for new talent. Not a bad life reading books all day.

  Except, most were garbage.

  Give a fledgling writer a computer, a pirated TV show plot and, with guts the size of Texas, all anarchy reigns on the page. Still, there was the occasional gem that made it worthwhile.

  Then evenings.

  She had her writing, her passion, her escape. It still rattled her mind knowing that she created an entire holiday novel that could make the Hallmark Channel whisk her off to a Vermont movie set on a glamorously decked-out private plane.

  “What if this is really it?” she asked.

  Heather checked her makeup in the mirror and shrugged. “I’ll be in your movie then.” Her ambition was to land the next biggest Oscar role. Her life’s work at the ripe age of twenty-seven consisted of a one-year acting program at Kingsborough Community College that was more likely to land her a leading role in a Colgate toothpaste commercial than as Brad Pitt’s next love interest. “Do you think I have laugh lines?”

  So much for Lucy’s big moment. “Not at all,” she lied.

  “I’m thinking of a nose job. What do you think?”

  Insulting her by agreeing wouldn’t help anybody. Her fluty hellion friend rescued her more than once as her mom’s caregiver. Living in the apartment next door helped make both of their lives easier.

  Lucy kicked off her heels at the window. She had barely made it home alive with hard falling snow that blanketed Manhattan with chubby fresh flakes. The city was starting to sprout Christmas decorations at every turn, which really made it feel like the North Pole.

  “We need to get to the decorating,” Lucy sighed.

  It wasn’t unusual for her to buy time opening her rejection envelopes. She’d come to expect it just like her ex-jerk’s prophecy indicated – nobody wanted her book. Why rush mortification?

  “All this waiting,” Heather again, now dotting on a rouge lip stain that likely could be seen in the dark. “What if you’ve been discovered?”

  “Or laughed at.”

  “Or chosen as the next Danielle Steele.”

  “Or served legal papers for plagiarism.”

  “Or offered a deliciously fat check. Honestly, why do you keep submitting it then?”

  Lucy stuck her aching feet in fluffy elf slippers. “You know why.”

  “Your mom’s fine, Luce. She doesn’t need anything more.”

  “She wouldn’t be in this position if it wasn’t for me. Seeing Eye dogs, blind school, braille school, anywhere-but-this-life school. I can’t afford any of it.”

  “You realize most writers don’t make it big.”

  She picked up the envelope again. “Nor do most actresses.”

  That got her a noxious frown. “Touché, jeez.”

  Pain. Sweat. Tears.

  She poured it all into her first novel. Finally, she’d be able to give her mom a better life. Make amends for her mistake that took her
mom’s eyesight, ruined her career, and pushed them down the poverty rabbit hole.

  “A new man,” announced Heather, crossing long, slender legs. “That’s what you need.”

  “I’ve no interest in being an escort.”

  “You can’t let a hunk like Mark Roland get under your skin. He’s a thorn, Luce, and it’s been months since you dumped him. He’s so totally crazy about you still, even though he’s a jerk.”

  “He’s a genius rich writer who knows his stuff.”

  “His stuff, not yours. And there’s a heap of fish in the sea.”

  The love of her life once proposed with a list of conditions. Three best-sellers on the New York Times list and he was done supporting her aspirations for a charming holiday novel that in his eyes equaled haiku written on a McDonald’s napkin. Give up the writing and he’d support her mother. Despite that, he never failed to come around now and again to try and get her back.