Santa's Naughty List by Mina Carter Read Free Book Online Page B

some jobs the agency took on were location and retrieval. It wasn’t unknown for them to drop into a war zone to retrieve a fairy Princess, or track a wyvern across the Antarctic.
    He glimpsed Mia through the crowd, slipping out of the door opposite onto the terrace and smiled to himself. And those skills would come in useful to track and capture a delightful armful of a Christmas elf. Because he was determined that tonight, she stopped running from him.

Chapter Two
     
    Although Mia liked Christmas and parties, and all the revelry that came with it, she wasn’t a people person. Elves had a reputation of being cutesy and sweet. There was also that children’s book thing about them sitting on toadstools. So much so, that for the first three weeks working at the PPA, she’d had to endure the toadstool jokes. But elves were just like anybody else, they had their likes and dislikes. Some, like her cousin Roger, were assholes, and some wanted to party.
    Mia though was a little bit more of a homebody. She liked the parties, liked getting dressed up and looking pretty (not cute, pretty. There was a difference), but she didn’t like crowds of people. She didn’t like being closed in. So after a while, she grabbed a drink and slipped out to the sanctuary of the terrace.
    It was a lovely terrace, on the boardroom level and wrapped around the front of the building. Access to the back was restricted, but she knew that was just because the Dragons used it as a landing pad; people wandering around when creatures the size and weight of inner city buses hit the deck was a safety risk.
    The Christmas decorations extended outside. Wreaths of holly and ivy wrapped around the balustrade, and yet more fairy lights twinkled among the leaves and berries. Picking a spot along the railing, she rested her elbows on the wood, and looked out. She loved the city at night, all the twinkling lights and the sense of peace that came when most of the population settled down to sleep. It was even better this time of year, at Christmas, when magic hung in the air.
    The door open behind her, a blast of music and the sound of voices erupting into the silence for a few moments before it swung shut. She half turned, and smiled as Darrick, an operative whose cases she often dealt with, strode towards her.
    A pixie with a shaven head and a thing about leather, he was as handsome as all hell. The kind of sharp-edged, dark and brooding look she often saw on billboards and movie posters. Darrick wasn’t a movie star though. He was one of the best bodyguards the PPA had. For all his good looks though, and his non-too subtle flirting, there was no answering flutter of excitement in her chest.
    Not like when Cole looked at her.
    Honestly girl, like a Claus will be interested in you, she told herself as Darrick came to stand beside her.
    “Little lonely out here,” he slid her a sideways glance and a hot look. “Thought I’d come and stop you getting cold.”
    She opened her mouth to answer, but didn’t get a chance. Before she could speak a rough male voice interrupted.
    “She’s a Christmas elf. We don’t get cold.”
    Both she and Darrick spun around in surprise to find Cole stood behind them. Her heart lurched, then stuttered, and she put her hand up to her hair to smooth it. Almost instantly she realized what she was doing, primping and preening in front of him, and dropped her hand like it had been burned. Shit, now she looked like an idiot.
    “Christmas elf?” Darrick’s brow puckered in surprise. “No, no, no…she said she was a winter elf.”
    Both men looked at her, and she shrugged. “Christmas elf… Winter elf, same thing.”
    It wasn’t, and a little light in Cole’s eyes said so but he didn’t correct her. She blushed again, dropping her gaze as heat shivered through her veins. He only had to look at her, and her senses went haywire.
    “Well, thank you for that nugget of information,” Darrick said waspishly, wrapping an arm around