Spirit (Blackwood Security, #10.5) - Elise Noble Page 0,5

your freaking house.”

“It’s the People’s House, and I came in the back way.”

Good grief.

“Okay, okay, hold on…” I consulted Professor Google. “Right, the bows and baubles are red and white. So, go with the blue tie. Red, white, and blue. And don’t forget trousers.”

While James knotted his tie and pulled on a pair of slacks, I idly clicked on Bradley’s message. Bloody hell—there was a whole colour-coded spreadsheet, and it was over a hundred lines long. Only Mack could have typed that quickly. Green, blue, red, and yellow lines covered the screen. The first request was from an eight-year-old girl. She wanted a pony.

Oh, no, no, no.

I groaned out loud as I pictured Bradley gleefully reinstating the order for miniature ponicorns. What had I done? The boy on the next line had asked to ride in the Batmobile. The comments box noted that he wanted to “kick the Penguin’s ass.”

“What’s wrong?” James asked.

“I think I might have made a terrible, terrible mistake.”

He straightened his tie and came to sit in front of me again. “I’m sure it’s redeemable, Linny.”

Linny? Yeah. Did I mention that I’d had a bit of a thing with Mr. Harrison a few years ago? Before he became the president, of course. The first time we met was at a Cinco de Mayo celebration thrown by a mutual acquaintance of his and Black’s, and after he’d had one too many shots of Patrón, he kept forgetting my name. I went from Emerson to Emma to chica linda. But even drunk, he was hot, and when he asked for my number, I saved it in his phone as Linda, probably because I’d been matching him shot for shot. Then when I became his dirty little secret, that was how it stayed. Black swore James was still in love with me, but whether he was or he wasn’t, I didn’t feel the same way. I did, however, value his friendship. And his advice.

And I also noticed that James never used the nickname in front of Black.

“Really? You think? There’s a kid on this list who’s requested a yacht.”

“An actual yacht? Or just a toy?”

“I don’t freaking know!” He’d spelled it “yot,” but I still got the message. “Bradley’s going to bankrupt me. Dammit, I hate Christmas. I’m gonna take a vacation, somewhere hot and not at all festive. Do they do Christmas in Sierra Leone?”

“I believe so.”

“Shit.”

“Let’s start from the beginning. I take it Bradley sent through a list of requests from the meeting you skipped this morning?”

“Yes, exactly.”

“Let me see it. Look on the bright side—it can’t be as bad as Diana volunteering me to play Santa Claus last year.”

That had nearly been a disaster. I mean, everyone—except Diana, it seemed—knew the unwritten rule. Presidents did not put novelty items on their heads. Not helmets, not caps, and certainly not fake beards and jaunty red fur-trimmed hats. A panicked late-night brainstorm had led to a compromise, and James dressed in jeans along with a reindeer-themed sweater and a Rudolf belt buckle. The trip to hand out gifts at the local children’s hospital had spawned a thousand crotch-shot memes as well as inspiring a new knitwear craze.

“Hey, you can pull my sleigh any time.”

“If only that were true.”

I shared my screen, and James scrolled through the spreadsheet. Fuck my life, there was more than one tab?

“What do the colours mean?” he asked.

“How the hell should I know?”

The door opened behind me. “Green means a gift, blue is an experience, yellow is a wish that we’ll have to compromise on, and the reds are unknowns.” Dan passed me her bottle of Jack Daniels, and I took a swig. “Hey, James. How’s the vital meeting on national security going?”

“I remembered to zip my fly when I got dressed, so I think we’re good.”

“What belt buckle are you wearing for your hospital visit this year?”

“A very plain, very boring one.”

“Shame. I was looking forward to more column inches on the presidential dick print.”

“Dan, stop harassing the leader of the free world,” I said.

“What? You didn’t look?”

I didn’t have to, not when I’d experienced the real thing. And impressive though James’s equipment might have been, that was in my past.

“Can we focus on the job at hand?”

Namely, drinking the entire bottle of Jack and sending myself into peaceful oblivion.

James cleared his throat. “If you look at the far column, it appears that Bradley’s assigned each task to somebody.”

“Yeah, he did,” Dan confirmed. “He tried to give all the green tasks to himself, but