Annihilate Me 2: Holiday Read online

  ANNIHILATE ME 2:

  HOLIDAY

  By

  Christina Ross

  Annihilate Me 2: Holiday is a new book set in the Annihilate Me universe. It’s an extension of the series, with more than 1,000,000 books sold worldwide.

  Although this new book can be read on its own, readers will likely enjoy it more if they first read the original Annihilate Me series, followed by the Unleash Me series, the Annihilate Me 2 series, and Ignite Me, as it shares the same characters. The experience will be dramatically deepened.

  BELOW ARE THE U.S. LINKS TO ALL OF MY BOOKS.

  ANNIHILATE ME, VOL. 1

  ANNIHILATE ME, VOL. 2

  ANNIHILATE ME, VOL. 3

  ANNIHILATE ME, VOL. 4

  ANNIHILATE ME, HOLIDAY EDITION

  ANNIHILATE ME: OMNIBUS

  ANNIHILATE ME 2, VOL. 1

  ANNIHILATE ME 2, VOL. 2

  ANNIHILATE ME 2, VOL. 3

  ANNIHILATE ME 2: HOLIDAY

  ANNIHILATE ME 2: OMNIBUS

  Also by Christina Ross:

  UNLEASH ME, VOL. 1

  UNLEASH ME, VOL. 2

  UNLEASH ME, VOL. 3

  UNLEASH ME: BOXED SET

  Stand-alone novels

  CHANCE

  IGNITE ME

  For my friends and my family.

  And especially for my readers, who mean the world to me.

  Your support of my career is unfounded.

  Thank you for following all of your favorite characters into a new holiday story.

  Copyright and Legal Notice: This publication is protected under the US Copyright Act of 1976 and all other applicable international, federal, state and local laws, and all rights are reserved, including resale rights.

  Any trademarks, service marks, product names or named features are assumed to be the property of their respective owners, and are used only for reference. There is no implied endorsement if we use one of these terms. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means (including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval) without permission in writing from the author.

  First ebook edition © 2015.

  Disclaimer:

  This is a work of fiction. Any similarity to persons living or dead (unless explicitly noted) is merely coincidental. Copyright © 2015 Christina Ross. All rights reserved worldwide.

  Disclaimer

  I visited Sugarloaf mountain several times while I was earning my undergrad degree at the University of Maine before going on to earn my master’s degree in English at Columbia University in New York. So, for the purposes of this book, I’ve turned the Widowmaker Lounge into something far less chaotic than what it is in reality. In this book, it’s a calmer place—but one that, nevertheless, is full of hot, single men!

  CONTENTS

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Books by Christina Ross

  ANNIHILATE ME 2:

  HOLIDAY

  By

  Christina Ross

  CHAPTER ONE

  New York City

  December

  It was a frigid December morning and the snow was flying high in midtown when I gave my husband, Alexander Wenn, a kiss on the lips and told him that I loved him.

  “I love you, too,” Alex said when he returned my kiss. “And by the way, Jennifer—just so you know, you’ve already got that warrior look in your eyes.”

  I furrowed my brow at him as our limo pulled alongside the Wenn Enterprises Building on Fifth.

  “What ‘warrior look’?”

  “The determined one that says ‘I can move the world with the mere flick of my finger.’”

  “Well, I’m nothing short of determined this morning!”

  After all, today wasn’t going to be just another busy day at the office for me. There was another level to the day that could potentially derail it. I also needed to nail down a commitment from a certain Barbara Blackwell that was going to be trying at best, hellish at worst.

  Who knew when it came to that one?

  Our head of security, Tank, came out of Wenn and opened the limo’s door for us. I stepped out of the car first, and reached up to give him a quick peck on the cheek. “Morning, Tank,” I said.

  “Good morning, Jennifer. Alex,” Tank said with a nod.

  “Good to see you, friend,” Alex said. “Oh, and if you wouldn’t mind turning off the snow, that would be great.”

  “I’ll work on that,” Tank said.

  “Perfect. And I’ll see you at noon?” Alex said.

  “Noon for your business lunch at the Four Seasons. I’ll meet you in the lobby. Jennifer, Cutter will meet you in the lobby at noon also for your lunch date with Lisa.”

  “I can’t wait to see her,” I said. “I haven’t seen her in a week. Talking to her on the phone every day isn’t the same thing.”

  “New book and all,” he said. “She’s been working hard on it.”

  “Inexcusable. We need our girl time together. If you’d let Cutter know that I’ll see him at noon, I’d appreciate it.” And then I went in for the kill. “And by the way, you look handsome in your suit this morning, Tank. And you know what? Oh, look—it just occurred to me. I can almost see you wearing something just like that when you and Lisa finally pull it together and decide to walk down the aisle. Not that I’m pressuring either of you to make that happen before I die, of course. It’s just not in me.”

  He smiled. I shot him a solid wink, and then Alex and I crossed Fifth’s busy sidewalk and moved into the building, the lobby of which was teeming with people moving toward the bank of elevators at the other end of it. My leg muscles were sore from the night before, but I bit down on the pain and moved through it.

  “Are you sure you’re ready for this?” Alex asked.

  “I’m totally ready for this.”

  “Do you think she’ll agree to it?”

  “I have zero idea if she’ll go for it or not, but as you know, this time I’m well-armed. How can she resist agreeing to our little plan when I show her what I have up my sleeve? She can’t. She’ll melt when she sees it. When it comes to that one, what I have in store for her will be better than an orgasm. Well… maybe.”

  “I believe you had a few of those yourself last night.”

  “In fact, I did.”

  “By the way, are you OK? You seem a little stiff—it’s as if you have a limp.”

  “After what you did to me last night, I have every right to be walking with a slight limp. Hell, I should be in bed right now with my legs lifted high and wide in stirrups to give everything you pounded against the solid rest it deserves.”

  He put his hand around my waist, drew me in close to him, and spoke so that only I could hear him. “It’s not as if I instigated all of it,” he said. “I seem to remember you saying things like ‘harder,’ ‘faster,’ ‘give it to me, stud,’ and ‘woo-hoo, look at me, I’m a cowgirl’.”

  I wanted to la
ugh out loud, but because so many of our employees were around us, I needed to keep it in check. “I never said that last part.”

  “Oh, yes, you did.”

  “Oh, no, I didn’t.”

  “OK, so maybe you didn’t.”

  “But I’m pretty sure that I did call you a stud,” I said. “Because, you know, your wife kind of thinks that you’re a pretty big one.”

  With a few other employees, we stepped into one of the elevators. After exchanging greetings with them, Alex and I pressed the buttons for our respective floors and stood at the back of the car holding hands and looking up at the dial as the doors slid shut, and the elevator began its ascent.

  Since Madison Wells was to be my partner in crime today, I was getting off on the fortieth floor, where Wenn Entertainment was located and where Madison now worked as an assistant director of marketing in the music division. She’d been in this position since we’d found it for her in June, and Alex and I thought—along with Blackwell herself—that she was thriving in it.

  “Off to see Madison,” I said to Alex as the elevator dinged. “Wish me luck?”

  “Not that you’ll need it, my little warrior, but good luck.”

  Since we tried to keep it as professional as possible at work, we simply squeezed each other’s hands goodbye, and when the doors slid open, I was off to find Madison.

  * * *

  Madison’s office was down a long hallway already bustling with dozens of people, feeding the space with a strong creative vibe.

  Wenn Entertainment oversaw all of Wenn’s movie, television, and music ventures. It wasn’t often that my job took me here, but whenever it did, I could feel the electricity and excitement in my bones.

  After stopping to say hello to a number of people and checking in on their various projects, I reached Madison’s door, and knocked.

  “Come in,” she called.

  I stuck my head inside. “Hi,” I said.

  She spun around in her chair, placed her palms in front of her on her glass desk, and winked at me. “Hi, Jennifer.”

  She looked not only beautiful, but also more confident than the young woman I’d met just six months ago, when she first came to Wenn as Blackwell’s personal assistant. There likely were four other reasons for the change I saw in her now—her relationship with Alex’s cousin Brock was becoming increasingly serious, I knew for a fact that she loved her job, she now had the means to dress in ways that finally had earned her Blackwell’s approval—and then there was that little something I’d noted on Billboard’s site while having my morning coffee.

  “Congrats on scoring your first number-one single,” I said.

  “I can’t believe it,” she said. “But it was hardly just me. The entire team threw everything they had into getting that song out to radio. Lucky for us, that radio loved it.”

  “I’m sure that you had a big hand in it. Alex was thrilled when I told him. He specifically said to me, ‘Didn’t Madison work on that?’ I reminded him that you did, so he’s fully aware of it.”

  “Thanks, Jennifer. That means a great deal to me.”

  “My pleasure.” I looked around her office and then lowered my voice. “So—did you get it?”

  She stood up from her desk and flashed her eyes at me. “Oh, I so got it. Last night—right after work.”

  “Let me see it!”

  “Close the door. You never know when that one might appear. Yesterday, I was writing a press release and glanced up to find her standing in my doorway, watching me silently with folded arms. She scared the hell out of me.”

  “Part of her M.O.” I said as I closed the door.

  “Anyway, I put it over here in my closet. Wait until you see it in person.”

  And when Madison showed it to me, I knew that the plan she and I had cooked up to sway Blackwell’s decision in our favor might just work indeed.

  “You remember the plan?” I said to her before we left for Blackwell’s floor.

  “I remember it.”

  “Then let’s get this done and nail it down.”

  * * *

  “Hi, Barbara,” I said when I reached her office. For the time being, Madison hung back in the hallway and remained strategically out of sight.

  “Jennifer,” Blackwell said as her gaze swept over me. “Nice suit. Winter white and all that. Fendi is it? Don’t answer. I already know that it is. And even though you decided to become some sort of a lab rat and not consult me on it, I have to say that it looks good on you.”

  “Thank you—I guess…”

  “Believe me—take the compliment while you can. And I have to say that you still continue to surprise me. To top it all off, that suit of yours is actually part of this year’s fall/winter collection—so be still my heart. Perhaps you’re finally learning that last year’s fashion really is last year’s fashion. God knows you have enough money at your disposal to make that a priority—especially since I have to look at you.”

  “Are we through with the suit?”

  “Oh, we’re through with it,” she said. “Because just by looking at you, I can tell that you’re filling my doorway for some sort of unwanted, subversive reason that I have no intention of dealing with right now.”

  “What does that even mean?”

  She removed her narrow black glasses from her face and tossed them onto the desk in front of her. Then, she folded her arms across her chest, leaned back in her chair, and studied me with a peculiar look on her face. Barbara Blackwell was the vice president of human resources at Wenn, and despite how harsh she sometimes came off, at this point, I knew that most of it was just a façade. She was a mother figure to me.

  “Why are you here?” she asked. “And when you first said hello to me, why was that horrid, yet oh-so-familiar note back in your voice?”

  “What horrid note?”

  “The one you use whenever you want something from me. Do you have any idea that when you use it that you sound like Snow White, for God’s sake? ‘Hi, Barbara’,” she said in a sweet, lilting voice that mimicked mine. “God! Whenever I hear you sound like that, I half expect blue birds to fly out of your ass and flutter around whatever’s in that head of yours. So, what is it? Clearly, you’re up to something.”

  As long as I’d known Blackwell, I’d yet to figure out how to outwit her. It was infuriating to me. Was there nothing this woman didn’t see coming?

  “Well,” I said.

  “Just spit it out.”

  “Fine. Christmas is a week away. Alex and I were talking the other night, and we decided that we’d ask—”

  “Oh, no,” she said. “Not that again. Not ever. Not. Even. Going. To. Happen.”

  “Just hear me out?”

  “And yet suddenly I’ve gone deaf.”

  “The hell you have. We are inviting you, Daniella, and Alexa to join Alex and me, along with Brock, Madison, and Cutter, in Maine for Christmas this year. No arguments. Last year was an unmitigated success.”

  “Really, Jennifer? An unmitigated success? Do you even remember how Alexa and Daniella tore into each other during those few days?”

  “They weren’t that bad.”

  “The lies!”

  “Fine—they had their moments. Those two will always have their moments. But do I need to remind you that they certainly found a way to come together when we were stranded on that island this summer? Daniella actually cared for her sister at one point. They might not often show it, but as different as they are, they do love each other, and they do have a bond. If they could make it through what happened to us on that island, then they certainly can manage spending the holidays together in Maine with us again.”

  “They had no choice but to make it on that island. Their lives were at stake, for God’s sake. And now you’re telling me that Cutter will be there? The Cutter who remains single to this day? What in the fresh hell do you think Daniella is going to do with that?”

  “Whenever she’s tried to hit on Cutter—like when she got on bended
knee and asked him to marry her—he’s always handled her with poise and kindness.”

  “Well, I will admit to that. You know I love that boy. After what he did for all of us on that island, he’s a gift. And if Daniella would grow the hell up and get her act together, I would love to have him as a son-in-law. But that’s not going to happen, because I think that an unmedicated Daniella is forever going to be unhinged. As much as I love my daughter, I know that Cutter deserves better. And by the way, why didn’t you mention Lisa and Tank? Have you become so cold and self-involved that you decided to cut them out of the festivities?”

  “Of course they were invited—do you really think that I wouldn’t invite them?”

  “Crystals of ice embrace your heart in ways that are deeply concerning to me,” she said.

  I rolled my eyes and pressed on. “Tank is taking Lisa home to Prairie Home, Nebraska to finally meet his parents this Christmas.”

  “To where?”

  “To Prairie Home—”

  “I heard you. I just can’t believe that a mountain of a man like Tank comes from someplace called Prairie Home, Nebraska. But since a wedding has to come at some point, I suppose it’s about time that she meets them, and that they become acquainted with her zombies.”

  “There’s that,” I said. “Anyway, since we are a family—and because you are my surrogate womb—”

  “Would you please stop using that term? It’s grotesque.”

  “—Alex and I, along with Cutter, Brock, and Madison, want you, Daniella, and Alexa to pack your bags and join us for another holiday. We leave in five days. We’ll arrive on the twenty-second. We’ll settle in. We’ll celebrate. We’ll eat. We’ll ski. And we’ll even exchange gifts. And then, the day after Christmas, we’ll be on a flight home to New York so the girls can still hang out with their friends on New Year’s Eve. How bad can that be? It’s only for four days.”