Christmasly Obedient: Small Town Holiday Romantic Comedy Romance Read online

  Christmasly Obedient

  Julia Kent

  Contents

  Christmasly Obedient

  Praise For Julia Kent's Books

  Author's Note

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Excerpt: Maliciously Obedient

  About the Author

  Other Books by Julia Kent

  Christmasly Obedient

  Tree picking in glorious, downeast Maine. Snow. Santa. Roaring fires, people you love, and a good life.

  What more could a guy want?

  Or, rather, two guys?

  Mike and Jeremy have a quiet life with Lydia, on her parents' family campground in Verily, Maine. It's a little boring, sure, but after the craziness of their old lives, what's wrong with boring?

  Besides, Jeremy and Mike find Lydia anything but.

  As Christmas looms, and an unexpected oops leaves them all in a state of uncertainty, they have to ask themselves: Is it time to let life be a little less boring?

  And what's inside that slim box Lydia's giving them both on Christmas morning?

  Christmasly Obedient is a holiday book in Julia Kent's USA Today bestselling Obedient series.

  Other books that feature Mike, Lydia and Jeremy include:

  Maliciously Obedient

  Suspiciously Obedient

  Deliciously Obedient

  It’s Always Complicated

  Read them all!

  Praise For Julia Kent's Books

  From Authors

  "Reading a Julia Kent book is like taking a vacation with your best friends. They'll make you laugh, tug on your heartstrings, and leave you wanting more." -- New York Times bestselling author Melissa Foster

  "Julia Kent is my go-to author when I want to laugh, swoon and just feel oh-so-good as I get lost in a romance! Hasty delivers on all those fronts!" ~ #1 New York Times Bestseller Lauren Blakely

  "Witty, sexy, funny and delightfully delicious--love it from beginning to end."-- USA Today bestselling author T Gephart

  From Readers

  “I just can’t imagine how you come up with this stuff, but am so glad you do!”

  “I finally had to write to you and tell you that you are simply one of the most amazing authors. Your humor is perfect. I really do bust out laughing out loud. My family thinks that I am crazy when I do it but I can count on a good read from you especially when it has been a rough day. There hasn't been a single thing that you have written that I haven’t fallen in love with the characters. They become real and some of your lines have become a part of our family language. Thank you for sharing your amazing gift.”

  “Having another fantastic evening as I just finished your latest book and now the fam can go to sleep since the laughing/screaming out loud has stopped...Stomach muscles are sore. Better than sit-ups! :-)”

  Author's Note

  In February 2013, I published my 5th book, called Maliciously Obedient. That book reached number 6 on the Barnes & Noble charts, and was the book that truly kick-started my full-time writing career. In March of 2013, the same month I became a full-time author, I was halfway through Suspiciously Obedient, the second in the Obedient series, when an idea for a new book hit me out of the blue.

  Ten thousand words later (in a single day, like a firehose aimed from my brain through my fingers to the keyboard), I had the first part of Random Acts of Crazy written (my New York Times and USA Today bestselling small town rock star “opposites attract” book, also with a permanent triad), and in late May 2013, I published that book, waiting to finish Suspiciously Obedient. I resumed writing Suspiciously Obedient, but then everything came to a screeching halt as I watched Random Acts of Crazy climb the bestseller charts.

  And stay there.

  June 2013 was a banner month in my life, and Random Acts of Crazy hit the USA Today bestseller list, later the New York Times bestseller list, and my life was forever changed.

  Thank you, dear readers.

  For the next year, I alternated writing books across three series – Obedient, Her Billionaires, and Random. Long-time readers of these series know that they intertwine, with characters from one having cameos in others.

  For instance, Dr. Alex Derjian first appears in It's Complicated, as Josie Mendham's (Her Billionaires) love interest. He is also the grandson of Ed, Madge's (Her Billionaires series) boyfriend. Madge is Lydia's (Obedient series) grandmother. Josie is Darla's (Random series) cousin/aunt.

  Do you hear the banjos playing yet?

  The crossover was intentional. In my mind, readers would want to follow characters across interwoven worlds, so I just had everyone cross over, like a big web. A puppy pile.

  A group hug.

  The last time I wrote a book about the Obedient world was in 2016, when Jeremy, Mike, and Lydia play a major role in It's Always Complicated, a sprawling epic that blends the Her Billionaires, Obedient, and Random worlds.

  This Christmas novella takes place AFTER that book, so in many ways, if you're NEW to the series, the reading order is:

  Maliciously Obedient

  Suspiciously Obedient

  Deliciously Obedient

  It's Always Complicated

  Christmasly Obedient.

  That said, if you're starting here, with Christmasly Obedient, you do not need to have read any earlier books. You simply need to know this: Mike, Jeremy, and Lydia are a permanent triad. This book is a sweet (yet hot...) glimpse into settled life on a campground in Verily, Maine between these three, where love is all about making people feel at home.

  I hope you feel that as you read.

  And the guys just happen to be billionaires.

  Hey - it’s fiction. ;)

  And thank you, wonderful readers, for giving me a home for my writing. You are always appreciated.

  All the best,

  Julia Kent

  1

  Lydia

  She could not stop crying, no matter what she did.

  And it was all her grandmother's fault.

  “Lydia!” Madge croaked over the video conference software they were using as Lydia learned to cook one of her grandmother's signature foods.

  Fried green tomatoes.

  “What?” The cabin Lydia shared with her guys, Mike and Jeremy, had a soaring ceiling in the combined kitchen-living room, with a great, long counter where Lydia could cook with abandon.

  While her brother, Caleb, was the chef in the family, and their grandmother, Madge, ran a diner in Boston that was a stalwart tradition in that corner of the city, Lydia had never mastered some of the family's cherished dishes.

  It was time.

  Her grandma was getting old, and Lydia needed the connection. The engagement. The interaction.

  But mostly, she needed to not be such a bad cook.

  “You're turning it all into goo,” Madge chided, lips pursed in a tight line, head shaking with a motion that triggered instant shame in Lydia.

  “I'm dredging! Just like you told me!” Reaching for her glass of Merlot, she took an extra long sip, using her other hand to move her long, dark braid off her shoulder and behind her, where it belonged.

  “And why are you crying?” her grandmother demanded.

  “The onions.” She sniffed, as if to prove a point.

  But really because her nose burned.

  “You didn't use my trick?”

  “The bread-in-the
-mouth trick?”

  “No! The swim goggles!”

  “You wear swim goggles when you chop onions, Grandma?”

  “Yes! Caleb showed me a Hickory Dickory Dock about it.”

  “A what?”

  “You know. That website that shows people doing short videos?”

  “You mean Tik Tok?”

  “That's what I said!” Her grandmother's big, beaming face filled her tablet screen as Lydia stared at her first attempt at a slice of fried green tomato. Madge’s hair stuck out in crazy tufts, framing a wrinkled face that looked like a shrunken apple. Wise old eyes, ever sharp, watched Lydia through the screen.

  “Grandma, the juicy tomato slice is too much. When I drag it through the breading, it just clumps.”

  “Did you do the egg dip first?”

  “I thought that was after the breading.”

  “Nope! Egg, then breading.”

  Listening carefully, Lydia tried it, using a fork to pierce the green flesh of the tomato slice, dunking it in the scrambled egg in a bowl, then dredging it, carefully plunking it on the baking tray.

  “One down, nine to go!” she announced.

  Caleb appeared on the screen with Madge. The two gave her a polite golf clap, Lydia’s younger brother looking smug, muscled forearms poking out from under a stained chef’s shirt.

  “This isn't helping!”

  “What, sis? We're applauding you.”

  “You're mocking me!”

  “Same thing in this family,” Madge joked, but while her words were sarcastic, her mannerisms were all infused with love and affection.

  “When will we see you here at the campground, Grandma?” Lydia asked as she executed the dip and dredge perfectly for the second slice, wondering why she ever thought this was hard. In a large frying pan, onions and peppers sauteed in ghee, seasoned with Turkish oregano and lime, awaited a sprinkling of crumbled feta cheese, to be served with the fried green tomato slices.

  She already made the “tiger sauce,” a blend of horseradish and sour cream.

  By the time she was done, Jeddy's Diner's signature dish would be served in her own home up here in Verily, Maine.

  And it would taste almost as good.

  She might not be the first member of her family to get it right, but she would be the first in the cabin she shared with Jeremy and Mike, which made this an achievement that deserved to be celebrated.

  With more Merlot.

  “How many glasses is that?” Caleb teased her over the video window he appeared in, now connected on his phone, which was propped up somewhere on the kitchen line at the diner. A few years ago, he joined Madge as co-owner of the old restaurant that had been a part of the Charles' family life since, well...

  Since Lydia could remember.

  “My Merlot consumption is none of your business, Caleb. Speaking of things that aren't anyone's business, how's your love life?”

  Madge cackled.

  Caleb left the call, disappearing off camera. Lydia could hear the grumble, though, for a few seconds more.

  Which meant she hit the right nerve.

  “I don't know why that boy doesn't get up the guts to just kiss that poor best friend of yours and break the ice,” Madge said as she tipped a beer to her lips and took a sip. “And get your oil ready. What're you frying those tomatoes in?”

  “Canola oil.”

  “WHAT? That's a waste of good tomatoes. Get some bacon grease.”

  “Bacon grease? Grandma, that'll clog your arteries.”

  “Then maybe the only reason I'm still alive well into my eighties is because my arterial walls have been replaced with bacon fat, Lydia. Don't you dare use any canola oil!”

  “We don't have leftover bacon grease.”

  “Where's your can under the sink?”

  “Grandma, I know you told us we should do that, but Mike was grossed out and said it's not sanitary.”

  “Not sanitary? I do it and I'm fine!”

  “You've had two heart attacks in the last five years.”

  “Those were just blips. Not my fault Ed's so good in the sack my heart gets pushed to the limits.”

  “Grandma! Gross!” That comment called for more wine.

  “Says the woman who's screwing two men at the same time? Lydia, when did you become such a prude?”

  “When you destroyed my eyes with onions and mocked me for it. I am this close,” Lydia said, holding her index finger and thumb a centimeter apart, “to joining Caleb and logging off!”

  “You can't do that until you properly fry one of these. And not in that canola oil crap!”

  With a peal of laughter, Lydia did as she was told, finding some avocado oil that barely passed Madge's muster. Lydia missed the old woman, more than she realized until now. They'd been roommates in Boston, an odd combination that had worked really, really well.

  Until Lydia met Mike, then Jeremy, and the threesome decided to relocate to the family-owned campground and help run it.

  And live in their custom-built cabin together.

  When she’d met Mike and Jeremy, Mike had been the founder and CEO of Bournham Industries, the faceless, nameless megacorporation where she’d been a corporate drone. Working her way up the ladder had sucked.

  Meeting Mike hadn’t, though the circumstances had been about as weird as could be. He was undercover for a reality television show, pretending to be a middle manager of his own company, and they’d fallen for each other.

  Nothing like accidentally making love on camera for a billion people to watch.

  Oops.

  Jeremy was Mike’s best friend, and Mike had transferred her to Iceland, a fake assignment designed to get her out from under media scrutiny. He’d also sent Jeremy to watch over her.

  Which Jeremy had.

  In bed.

  And now here they were, permanently together, blissfully happy, and Lydia spent her days helping with marketing for the campground while her two billionaires did… stuff. Mike was an outdoorsman, trading mergers and acquisitions for ocean kayaking and trail bikes.

  Jeremy puttered around the campground and helped her father and brothers with odd jobs.

  Never in a million years did she imagine she’d move back home and settle down at the family-run campground, but here she was.

  Sometimes, Lydia missed the city life.

  More than that, she missed her grandmother.

  Madge was a curmudgeon's curmudgeon, old and crusty in a way that Lydia didn't quite understand, but found very fascinating. Gruff on the outside, with a sarcastic comment always at the ready, her grandmother was also an endless source of deep love, stability, and practicality.

  Had a problem? Madge could help.

  Needed to keep busy? Madge always had a suggestion.

  Wanted to whine and complain? Find someone else.

  “How's it going?” Madge asked before taking another sip of her beer. For the first time, Lydia realized Madge held the beer bottle with a firmer grip in one hand vs. the other.

  Strength was fading in her strong-willed grandmother.

  But will alone wasn't enough to stay alive. If only.

  “I've got five frying now, and five more to go.”

  “That enough for the three of you?”

  “The three of us? I'm alone. Mike's out ice fishing – or trying to – and Jeremy's doing something with Miles and honey.”

  “I can't believe Miles taught him to make that shit wine. Who drinks mead these days?”

  Making a face, Lydia leaned in toward the camera and whispered a confession. “I think it tastes like cough syrup.”

  “Cough syrup with a heaping dose of rabbit dung,” Madge replied as Lydia flipped the five breaded tomatoes, impressed with her culinary skill. They were perfectly browned, a golden color that made her puff up with pride.

  “Look, Grandma,” she said, tilting the tablet so Madge could see.

  “Perfect!” Madge's smile made her look like a thick curtain being pulled back on both sides,
her skin so papery, deep wrinkles a testimony to time.

  And so many impish grins.

  “You have enough room in that stomach for ten pieces, plus the onions and peppers and feta?” Madge asked, the question rhetorical. They both laughed, the sound a joyful noise that made Lydia loosen up better than any wine.

  Though she took another sip of her glass anyhow.

  “Always, Grandma. Always. Now that I've got this one under my belt, you have to teach me the key lime fennel pie recipe.”

  “We added a caramelized coconut milk drizzle to that one.” Madge gave her a chef's kiss. “Caleb has all the good food DNA in the family.”

  “It all started with you.” Lydia transferred the five pieces to a folded paper towel on a plate, then began the dip and dredge of the last five slices. Madge watched her carefully, the two silent until all five circles sizzled nicely in the avocado oil.

  Madge liked compliments, but never dwelled on them, always changing the subject fast.

  “How're your lachrymal glands?” she asked.

  “My what? Sounds kinky.”

  “Only if you like having sex with your eyes.”

  “How did the conversation veer in this direction?”

  “You asked!”

  “What are lachrymal glands?”

  “They produce the tears when you cut onions. There's a chemical released in the flesh of the onion. It triggers the tears.”

  “Since when did you become a chemical engineer?”

  “Since my grandson started running the diner with me and teaching me all this food science stuff he learned in college. Not that it matters,” Madge said sagely, tilting her beer bottle up to sip the final bit. “Doesn't take a degree in chemistry to know your eyes water when you cut onions. I just freeze them before I cut them.”