The Perfect Christmas

The Perfect Christmas

True love is forever, not just for Christmas…

Hollywood movie star Maggie and friend and manager Zoe need an escape from their complicated star-studded lives in LA. With its history and Christmas charm, London feels like the perfect getaway.

But can they truly leave their realities behind?

In their luxurious quarters, the girls meet Holly who is ideal at showing Maggie and Zoe the sumptuous sights and sounds of London in their most glittering light.

But behind her bright façade, Holly is hiding a secret: suffering from unrequited love, she’s looking for a Christmas miracle. Desperate to see an unattainable love story for Holly come together, will our LA starlets succeed in providing a Hollywood ending before the dawn of Christmas Day?

Packed to the brim with festive cheer, this is the only story you’ll need this Christmas…

The Perfect Christmas

Kate Forster

KATE FORSTER

lives in Melbourne, Australia with her husband, two children and two dogs, and can be found nursing a laptop, surrounded by magazines and watching trash TV or French films.

Contents

Cover

Blurb

Title Page

Author Bio

Story

Extract

Copyright

Maggie Hall pushed open the door of her home, trying to balance the shopping bags from her trip into Beverly Hills. She could hear her husband, Will, bellowing from the study, the deep voice that had made him famous, along with his handsome face, was telling someone that he needed two rooms at a hotel.

Maggie dropped the bags of Christmas presents by the decorated fir tree in the foyer. The top of the tree nearly reached the second floor of the high ceilings, its gold star at the summit, perched at a peculiar angle.

The tree had been decorated by a ‘Holiday Consultant’, hired by Will, even though she had said she wanted something smaller, more personal, for their little family.

Elliot, her stepson, came out of the kitchen and rolled his eyes at Maggie. ‘Dad’s been yelling for at least ten minutes,’ he said.

Maggie reached out and pushed some of his dark hair away from the teenager’s eyes.

‘How are you feeling today?’ she asked.

Elliot looked down and scuffed his bare feet on the marble floor. ‘Same as ever, but not too bad.’

Maggie nodded and glanced at the tree.

Of all the things she wanted for Elliot this Christmas she wouldn’t give him any broken promises. Waiting on the donor list for a new heart wasn’t for the faint-hearted, she thought, not registering her unintended pun.

Every time the phone rang, she held her breath, wondering if someone else’s tragedy would be Elliot’s miracle.

‘Who is he yelling at?’ she asked as she moved towards the door of the study.

‘Zoe,’ Elliot said and went to the bags, trying to peek into them.

‘Step away from the bags,’ she threatened playfully as Will came into the foyer.

‘Hi,’ she said politely.

They had had a huge fight before she left the house, about Elliot of course, it was always about Elliot.

Will was always trying to control his son with his health, social life, what he ate and when he slept.

She knew she didn’t have to be Doctor Phil to understand that this was his way of trying to control the illness, but it meant that Elliot was given no freedom, not even to see his friends for a weekend away, which was the topic of their argument.

‘Elliot and I are going to Mexico for Christmas,’ he said, walking past her and ignoring her greeting.

‘What? Why?’ asked Maggie. ‘I don’t want to spend Christmas in Mexico.’

‘I didn’t ask if you did,’ said Will, as he opened the refrigerator door. Their housekeeper, Dolores, stepped into the kitchen and fled at the sight of Will, not that Maggie blamed her one little bit.

‘You’re planning on spending Christmas without me?’ she asked, trying to understand.

‘I think we need some time apart,’ he said, taking a bottle of water and opening it forcefully, small drops spilling onto the floor.

‘It was just a fight, Will, we should be together.’

Will took a long sip and then put the water on the bench.

‘I want to spend some time with my son,’ he said, staring daggers at her.

Our son, she wanted to remind him. She had been Elliot’s stepmother for eight years and she was more of a mother than his own biological mother had been, abandoning him for a guru in India when Elliot was diagnosed with a rare heart disease.

Maggie felt tears well in her eyes. ‘I don’t think you mean that, I think you’re just trying to hurt me,’ she said calmly.

‘I don’t care what you think. I’m going to Mexico early, before the shoot, to spend some time with El, and he will stay with me while I shoot the film.’

‘But that’s for six weeks, he can’t be away for six weeks,’ she cried.

‘Why not? I’ve spoken to his doctors, they said he was fine to fly and I can take all his equipment with us. It’s not a backwater.’

‘But what about me? What about my Christmas?’ she said, feeling a teardrop fall, joining the spills of water on the floor.

‘I don’t give a crap about your Christmas, Maggie, you need to think about what I want and what Elliot wants for a change.’

Maggie turned to ask Elliot but he, like the housekeeper, had scurried away from Will’s firing line.

‘He doesn’t want to spend it in Mexico, having you control every single aspect of his day.’

‘I don’t care,’ said Will as he moved towards the door. ‘We’re leaving tonight.’

Maggie watched him leave the room, knowing it was useless to try and change his mind. Then she took a dishcloth from the sink and wiped up the watery mess he had left between them on the floor.

***

Pulling up at the front of a quietly stylish house, with the night lighting showing off the lush tropical plants, Maggie dialed a number from her car.

‘Zo, it’s me, let me in, I’m out the front,’ she said, trying to steady her voice.

The sound of the automatic garage door started and, as it lifted, Maggie inched her car towards the house’s sanctuary.

When she was finally inside, parked next to Zoe’s BMW, and the door was safely down behind her, she let out a long breath of relief.

The sound of tapping on the glass window made her jump.

‘God, woman, I’m already on my last nerve,’ she said as she got out of the car.

Zoe smiled, ‘You’re always on your last nerve,’ she said, ‘You’re the most impatient person I know.’

Maggie hugged her best friend and manager.

‘What’s up?’ asked Zoe as they walked inside the house.

‘I haven’t seen you in ages.’

‘I know, I know,’ sighed Maggie. ‘Things at home have been horrible. I haven’t seen you, I haven’t seen anyone.’

Zoe walked into the kitchen and turned on the coffee machine.

‘Espresso?’ she asked.

‘If I have any more adrenalin in my system, I’m going to go through the roof,’ Maggie said as she draped herself over Zoe’s sofa and put a pillow over her face. ‘I’m so goddamned angry!’

‘What’s happened?’ asked Zoe.

Maggie pulled the pillow away and sat up, ‘Will. And don’t tell me you don’t know, I heard him yelling at you today,’ she moaned.

Zoe sat on the chair opposite her friend.

‘How is Elliot?’

Maggie felt her eyes fill with tears. ‘He’s sick and he needs his mother but she’s in India, chanting in an ashram and, as Will reminded me when I walked out, I’m only his stepmother and they don’t count for shit.’

‘He can be a cruel bastard sometimes.’

‘Not having Christmas with Elliot makes me want to cry,’ Maggie sighed as Zoe reached out and rubbed her leg.

‘Elliot knows how much you love him,’ she said.

‘And that’s what makes Will’s cruelty so harsh. He knows I love Elliot like my own.’

Silence filled Zoe’s living room.

‘I wish I could have told him to organize his own stupid trip to Mexico but he’s my client, I have to do what he asks even if it hurts my friend.’

Maggie nodded and then grabbed Zoe’s hands with hers.

‘I’m sorry I’ve been such a crappy friend,’ she said. ‘I haven’t seen you in, what? Two months? It’s just been diabolical in my world. I haven’t had anything good to say, so I’ve stayed away. I don’t think we’re going to make it. I don’t think I want to be married to him anymore. Do you think I’m being weak?’

Zoe squeezed her hands in return.

‘Of all the things you are, Mags, weak isn’t one of them. You’re the bravest and most loving person I know,’ she said and Maggie knew she meant it. In a town of false promises and empty compliments, Maggie could always rely on her oldest friend to tell the truth.

‘What are you doing this Christmas?’ asked Maggie forlornly. She was now wearing the pillow as a hat and Zoe laughed as she looked at her friend.

‘I have a few parties I’ve been invited to and a couple of clients have invited me to their Christmas lunches,’ said Zoe vaguely and Maggie frowned.

‘Weren’t you going to come to ours?’

Zoe paused, ‘Honestly? I couldn’t bear the tension in your house, I mean, Will isn’t the most congenial of hosts.’

Maggie closed her eyes, ‘You wanna try living there.’

She put the pillow over her face again for a moment, before sitting up as though waking from a nightmare.

‘I have an idea.’

‘God help me,’ said Zoe.

‘No, seriously, it’s a good one,’ Maggie was now on the edge of her seat. ‘How about we go to London and escape from all this madness?’

‘Your madness,’ Zoe reminded her. ‘I have plans to drink champagne and talk business over roasted turkey with power players who are wearing paper hats.’

Maggie was now out of her seat, pacing back and forth in front of the sofa.

‘No, that’s a terrible idea. You’re always working. Even when you think you’re relaxing, you’re working. I need to get away so I can think straight about what to do with my marriage, and you need to get away and remember how not to work for a while.’

Maggie was warming to her own idea with each word.

‘Think about it. In London we can roam around all their gorgeous high streets or whatever they call them, drink ourselves to oblivion in shadowy pubs, buy lovely things for ourselves and each other, look at the Christmas lights, watch the snow fall. Be generally English and cultured and immerse ourselves in the place.’

Zoe was laughing. ‘You’ve watched The Holiday too many times.’

Maggie got up and looked out of the window into the flood-lit garden. ‘No. Well, maybe. But I just want to do something different. God knows, what I’m doing now isn’t working.’ She turned round, feeling her eyes fill with tears. ‘We are each other’s family, Zoe, we don’t have anyone else; no parents, no siblings, only us. If we don’t celebrate our friendship then we don’t deserve each other.’

Zoe nodded slowly, ‘But why England?’

Maggie shrugged, ‘I don’t know why. Maybe because it’s full of tradition and here it’s just about business. You know, last Christmas Will took a production meeting with Jeff Beerman after Christmas lunch. ’

Zoe shook her head. ‘Jeff’s Jewish, so Christmas isn’t his thing and he’s a studio head who is a workaholic, but Will should have known better.’

‘I know, right?’ Maggie was sitting down again, holding the pillow to her chest. ‘Can we go? Will you come? Please?’

‘You sound about twelve,’ said Zoe good-naturedly.

‘Then I can’t go to London alone, I will need a chaperone,’ said Maggie with a smile and Zoe shook her head.

‘Okay, little Miss Christmas, let’s go to London.’

***

Over the years of Zoe Greene pushing Maggie Hall to the heights of Hollywood, Maggie had learned that almost everyone was ambitious, that most people in LA would sell their grandmothers for a good deal and that true friendship was rarer than an actress over forty without Botox.

Maggie was brave, Zoe was smart and somehow they were the perfect balance. Zoe could hear Maggie in the next room, talking to her assistant on the phone. Maggie made a point of not using Zoe as a PA, but as a business manager.