All I Want for Christmas

Chapter One

"I'll be Cloned for Christmas"

(To The Tune “I'll be Home for Christmas")

I'll be cloned for Christmas,

There'll be three of me;

One to work, and one to shop,

And one just for parties.

Christmas Eve, I'm certain,

I won't be alone;

I'll be home for Christmas,

Or else I'll send a clone!

"I'll be Home for Christmas” played on the radio on her desk, and Erin Nordman substituted the words to “I'll be Cloned for Christmas” as she sang along in her mind, her fingers flying over her computer keyboard. While everyone else was out shopping, having long Christmas lunches and partying, she was hard at work in the office, muttering un-seasonally under her breath about fairness and justice. Christmas was only three days away, work still had to be done, and someone had to do it.

On top of all the usual Human Resources work, this year she was in charge of organizing the staff Christmas party to be held tomorrow night, and her boss had assigned her the task of picking out the gifts for everyone in the department. Usually he got his administrative assistant to do it, but she was home with mono so he'd delegated that task to Erin.

Normally, she loved shopping and, with someone else's money, it was even better, but this year she didn't have time to do her own shopping, and these year-end reports still needed to get done.

The phone rang. It was the hotel calling with last-minute questions about the hors d'oeuvres being served at the party. She'd just dealt with that when another call came from someone from Marketing who'd forgotten to RSVP and wanted to know if it was too late.

She glanced at her watch and saw it was lunch time. She debated with herself what to do. If she hurried she could kill two birds with one stone by running out to get the office gifts and at the same time pick up new gifts for her family. Her stomach tightened, and she rubbed her forehead.

This year she thought she'd been so smart by ordering everyone's gifts over the Internet, but here it was December 22, and none of them had arrived yet. The only gift she had was the bottle of body spray she'd bought for her friend and coworker Kayla, and that was just because one day they'd been out shopping at lunch time and Kayla had exclaimed over how much she loved it. Her parents’ gifts, her sisters’ gifts, and their children's gifts were all lost somewhere in cyberspace.

And as usual, she'd spent way too much money so, while the gifts hadn't arrived, the credit card bill certainly had.

She leaned back and put her hands over her face for a moment. Just for a moment. If she had to go buy presents, she'd be even more broke. But perhaps after Christmas when the other stuff showed up she could return it. Sure, that's what she'd do.

"Um ... is everything okay?"

The deep, masculine voice startled her, and she almost fell backwards in her office chair. She quickly dropped her hands and stared up at Dex Mitchell, director of finance, standing in the door to her cubicle.

God, the man was insanely gorgeous. For a bean counter. No, for anyone, actually. Every time she saw him it was all she could do to keep from drooling. Ever since she'd started working at ICS Software Development, she'd had a crush on Dex Mitchell.

"Um, yes, yes,” she finally stammered, straightening up in her chair. “I just have a tiny little headache, that's all.” Yeah, tiny like sledgehammers being swung inside her skull.

"Need some painkillers?"

"I ... have some,” she replied nervously. She smiled. “Thanks, though. Really, I'm fine. I'm just about to go for lunch. Probably that'll help. Sometimes when I don't eat I get a headache, and all I've had today is a banana, and that was at seven-thirty this morning.... “She realized she was babbling like an idiot, and her voice trailed off. She stood up and grabbed her coat off the coat rack in the corner of her cubicle then pulled her purse from the bottom drawer of her desk where she stored it.

"I was just looking for someone to ask about some payroll questions,” Dex said, moving aside so she could exit her cubicle.

She carefully squeezed herself small so she wouldn't brush against him, although she wanted to.

"You seem to be the only one here."

"No kidding. Everyone else is either off today or out for lunch.” She winced at the bitterness in her tone.

"Okay. I can check back later."

"Maybe I can help you?” She stopped with her coat half on, her arms hung up in the sleeves.

His lips twitched. “You need to go for your lunch,” he reminded her.

"Yes, but I can wait ... what is it you need?"

"Go,” he directed her firmly, his beautiful lips curved into a smile.

She was about to argue more, but the look in his eyes made her change her mind and, with a nervous smile, she whirled around and scurried out of the office. She waited for the elevator and gave a big sigh. She always felt like such a goof around him.

Out on the busy downtown street, crowds pushed along the sidewalks, everyone laden with shopping bags. Gentle fluffy snowflakes floated around her, creating a very Christmassy atmosphere, but Erin had no time to enjoy it. She darted across the street on a red light, and a horn blared at her. She waved a gloved hand and pushed through the revolving doors of the department store luckily near her office building.

Inside it was a Christmas paradise. Extravagant Christmas decorations hung from the ceilings. Green, red, gold and silver balls adorned draped swags of greenery, little white lights sparkled everywhere, and lushly decorated trees stood at the foot of the escalator. Christmas music filled the air.

She could have sworn the tune was “Jingle Bells” but the words sounded like “Dashing through the mall ... On a late December day, through the stores we go, charging all the way ... Ching ... Ching ... Ching ... Bells on registers ring, making checkbooks light, oh, what fun it is to buy up everything in sight!"

She grinned as new words to the familiar song ran through her head.

She paused at the cosmetics counter, looked at beautifully wrapped gift packages of fragrances. Yes, the girls in the office would all like something like that. Actually, so would Jason, she thought with a grin. The only male in the HR department besides their boss, it was surprising how well he fit in.

But when she checked the price tags and calculated how many gifts she needed, these would all be much beyond the budget she'd been given. What about her mother? No. She sighed. Her mother had worn Chanel, and nothing but Chanel, for the past thirty years. Her sisters? Ditto.

Onward. She pushed through crowds to the escalators and waited impatiently as she rode up to the next floor. What, oh what was she going to get?

An hour later she'd wandered aimlessly through the huge store, overwhelmed with choices, none of which seemed exactly right. When she checked her watch and realized it was time to get back to work, she was still empty-handed.

Desperate, she returned to the accessories department and grabbed some fuzzy socks for her mother and sisters. They were atrocious gifts, but she had to have something to show for the hour she'd just wasted.

Gifts for the office were going to have to be booze and chocolates. Again. How unimaginative and impersonal but, if not that, it would be nothing because she was running out of time.

She sprinted back to the office to find a few people had returned from long boozy lunches and were sitting around eating a box of chocolates that had just been delivered from their photocopy repairman.

She stuffed her shopping bag and her purse back into her desk.

"Did you get the presents?” Kayla, manager of organizational development and her best friend at work, appeared in her cubicle.

"No,” Erin sighed, not looking up from her computer. “I'll go tonight.” Except tonight she had to try to find presents for her family—besides the dumb socks she'd just bought. Socks. She shook her head in disgust.

"Oh. Is there anything I can help with?"

Erin looked up at her friend, small, cute, with long red hair. She smiled. “Thanks, Kayla, but I know you're swamped, too."

Mother of three young boys, Kayla looked impossibly young for that. She nodded. “Tonight is the Christmas concert at the boys’ school. It will be hectic getting home, getting some food into them and getting there on time."

"So leave early,” Erin said. “Everyone else is."

Kayla grinned. “Great idea."

"Hey, Erin.” One of her coworkers, Cheryl, appeared in the door of her cubicle. “I have a little problem. I was supposed to take all the door prizes to the hotel tonight, but my boyfriend just got invited out to a Christmas cocktail party at his boss’ house, and I really have to go to that."

Erin sighed. “Can't you drop them off on your way? It won't take long."

Cheryl shook her head. “No. I made an emergency appointment to get my hair done, so I'm going to leave a few minutes early."

"But you took a long lunch!” Erin pushed her long hair back off her face. “And what about those reports on the training outcomes for this year? They have to be to the executive team by January second."

"I'll get them done, no problem,” Cheryl said cheerfully. “There's still all day tomorrow."

"But...” Erin gave up. “Never mind. I'll take the prizes. Where are they?"

"In the cupboard in the staff room. Thanks, Erin! You rock."

Erin grimaced and turned back to her computer where numerous emails had accumulated even in the short time she'd been gone. If she was the only one working, which it certainly seemed like, who was sending her all the emails?

Apparently the executive team was still working and still had questions about the big presentation they were doing for the Board of Directors early in the new year. She sighed but decided she needed to deal with her persistent headache before she got into replying to them.

Erin was just popping more painkillers into her mouth when she looked up into the amused eyes of Dex Mitchell. Again. “So, anyone here that can help me out now?” he asked, eyes glinting.

She almost choked on the pills and took a big gulp of water, which of course dribbled down her chin and onto her silk blouse. She wiped ineffectually at it as she felt her cheeks grow hot and no doubt red. “Jason is back from lunch,” she told Dex, swiping at her boobs. “He does the payroll. He's just around the corner.” She flashed a smile that she hoped looked helpful and confident, praying that Jason wasn't sitting there with his feet on his desk eating chocolates and wearing the plush Santa hat he'd had on earlier.

She heard Dex go around the corner and start conversing with Jason in a low voice, and she slumped back in her chair. Why, why, why did he always have to catch her at her worst?

She was scrawling her signature across some vendor invoices a few moments later when Dex returned.

She looked up at him inquiringly.

"I hear you're in charge of the party tomorrow night,” he remarked.

"Yes.” She was almost reluctant to admit it. What if the whole party bombed? It would be all her fault. No, it was not going to bomb. She'd checked and rechecked every detail with her usual thoroughness (or was it paranoia?). “Did you have a last-minute addition to the guest list?"

He shook his head, a smile touching his mouth. “No. I'll be there, but I'm coming alone. I just wondered if you'd arranged for taxi service to take people home."

"Of course!” The company provided taxi vouchers for anyone who wanted them to make sure that nobody drove home after drinking.

"Perfect. Don't want any unfortunate incidents at the holiday party."

Erin shook her head. “No, of course not."

At that moment, Erin's phone rang. She grabbed for the receiver.

"Good afternoon, Human Resources, Erin speaking, can I have you?"

There was silence at the other end of the line, and Erin closed her eyes rather than face Dex. “I mean, can I help you?” she gasped.

A laugh came over the line. “You can have me any time, honey. My wife might not like it, though. It's Carl in Research."

"Hi, Carl.” Her cheeks burned.

"Just a quick question about the party..."

She dealt with his question then hung up and looked at Dex, still standing there, looking very amused.

"So, I guess I'll see you at the party then,” he said.

She stared at him. Why was he making small talk with her? She smiled brightly. “Absolutely. I'll be there. I'm going alone, too."

Shit. Why had she said that? It sounded so lame. She turned back to her work again with flaming cheeks and bent her head.

"Hey!” Kayla whispered seconds later. “What did Dex Mitchell want? I saw him talking to you!"

Kayla was the only other person who knew Erin thought Dex Mitchell was a hottie. She looked up at her friend and grinned.

"He came to talk to Jason about some payroll stuff, and then he was asking me about the party."

"Really."

"He told me he's going alone to the party."

"He told you that? Just out of the blue?” Kayla's brows rose almost into her hair. “Hmm."

"But look at me!” Erin whispered, dipping her chin. “I was just downing Aspirin when he arrived, and he made me slop water all over myself. Then I answered the phone, and I said...” She paused, closed her eyes again in mortification. “'Can I have you?’ instead of ‘Can I help you?’”

Kayla's eyes widened, and then she collapsed against the wall of the cubicle in laughter. “Oh, my God!” she cried a moment later, wiping her eyes. “That is so funny! I can't believe you did that!"

"Har,” Erin said, a bit miffed at her friend's enjoyment of her discomfiture. She sighed. “I'm such a loser."

Kayla stood up straight and rolled her eyes. “As if,” she said dryly, trying not to smile. “You're gorgeous and smart and funny ... we all want to be you."

Erin snorted. “Well, he's never seen that side of me.” She picked up some papers and shuffled them in her hands. “Hey, you'd better get going so you make it to that concert on time."

Kayla left with a quick wave of her hand, and Erin turned back to her desk. She really needed to get one more report done before she left. She glanced at her watch. But the liquor store was miles from her home, the hotel was not even close to there, and she still had to hit the mall.

Feeling guilty, she decided to leave, too. Although why she felt guilty when the office was deserted she had no idea. Even her boss was gone.