The Ghost of Christmas Past

By Dominique Wild

Julia Matthews is the biggest Scrooge around when it comes to love. She writes romance novels but thinks romance readers are ridiculously sappy and gullible. She's a writer with a major chip on her shoulder.

 

She's all alone in her house on Christmas Eve when she gets an uninvited visitor. He has something to show her, something she doesn't want to see. He's ready to take her on a journey of self discovery. Whether she wants to go or not.

 

There's just one hitch: her mysterious visitor shouldn't even exist. Every sexy inch of him is an impossibility. Can he work his magic and give her a happy ending?

 

Fans of Christmas stories with a happily ever after, and of the classic tale A Christmas Carol, will love this Ghost of Christmas Past.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dominique Wild
• Release date: Nov 24, 2023
• ISBN: 9798215156490

Book preview

The Ghost of Christmas Past

By

Dominique Wild

©2023 Dominique Wild

All Rights Reserved, worldwide. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in, or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without prior written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. All trademarks used herein are the property of their respective owners.

For permission requests, please contact: Dominique Wild at [e-mail].

Cover design by: James at www.GoOnWrite.com.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

Content Notes

Hi Wild Ones! I know sometimes you need to watch what you read, and it helps to have content notes or trigger warnings about the story you’re thinking about. The Ghost of Christmas Past does contain content that some readers may find difficult. Click Here if you want to know more. That will take you to a page on my website where you can see if there's anything in the story you need to avoid.

1

Nathaniel’s Ghost

Nathaniel Davies didn’t exist. Julia Matthews had made him up whole cloth from her imagination. Every perfectly tanned and sculpted inch of him (including those oh-so-important inches below the belt that Julia may have embellished a tiny bit) came directly from her fevered and active imagination. She knew, because she’d sat on her ass for four months while he poured out of her and onto the pages of her most popular romance novel.

She had the emotional scars to prove it. Every time she held a book signing she signed more of that book than all the rest put together, and every single time she got the starry-eyed dreamers who asked what man had inspired Nathaniel Davis. Surely it was her own great romance that served for inspiration?

It had not. Julia had no great romance whatsoever to pull from for her books, just good old imagination. The fact that her readers couldn’t tell the difference made her scoff — privately, of course. She’d never be so gauche as to insult them to their face. She relied on their starry-eyed gullibility to put bread on her table.

It wasn’t the implication that her love life was lacking that bothered her about the question- she had no hang ups about her love life, thank you very much. No, it was the fact that she’d answered the question a million times and yet they still kept asking it. Were they so feeble that they couldn’t do more than the most cursory internet search to answer their questions? It was in so many of her interviews that anyone with twenty minutes to spare could find one with her answering it.

She’d taken to inventing the most outrageous answers she could think of just to keep herself from dying of boredom, or throwing her pen in frustration, when yet another fan asked it.

He’s based on my long lost love that died when we were children.

There was a French spy by that name and that was his story. I just adapted it.

Between you and me, it’s based on my husband and every dirty word is real. But don’t tell anyone!

After that one she’d wink, sign her signature phrase with a flourish, remind the reader that copies of her book made for great Christmas gifts, and signal for the next reader as quickly as possible before they tried to ask more questions.

After her latest signing, a Christmas Eve extravaganza with all her Christmas-themed books, Julia’s agent had taken her out to dinner. The restaurant was the nicest Italian restaurant in Stamford, Connecticut, done up in enough festive cheer to give a nod to the Christmas holiday but not so much as to be cheesy. They were still in their nice slacks and blouses they’d worn to the extravaganza, and they fit in perfectly here. Over plates of crusty Italian bread, lasagna, and a good red wine she had asked Julia an unexpected question.

Dinner had started normal enough, with Julia sniping about the reader who had asked her to sign not one but seven copies of Nathanial’s The French Lover.

It’s like Nathaniel is a magnet for lonely women, or something, Julia said with a dismissive flick of her fork. I’ll never understand it.

Anna pinned Julia with a hard stare. She had a heart-shaped face framed with curly red hair that gave her such an innocent air. It was easy to forget that she had a backbone of steel until she did something like this. So are you lying when you write these books, or are you just that depressed with your own sex life?

Julia’s fork paused halfway to her mouth. Excuse me?

"I mean, for a bestselling author you’re remarkably condescending about your readers. Most of the writers I work with would kill for your fan base. But