Unwrapped

Unwrapped

His to unwrap. His to keep.

Derrick Fox only wants one gift
beneath his Christmas tree--his best friend, Mia. When her latest moron
walks out on her, Derrick finally sees his chance to break through the wall of
friendship and claim Mia for his own. Forever. But when she propositions him
instead, it leaves him reeling.

Insecure, image challenged and
dumped--again--twenty-five-year-old Mia Patterson is sick to death of being a
virgin. With her knight in shining armor nowhere to be found, naturally she
turns to her BFF, the insanely sexy Derrick Fox, to help her out. The
problem? Derrick wants far more than the body she's ready to give. He wants her
heart.

As the most magical time of year
approaches, Derrick and Mia struggle to create some Christmas magic of their
own--the sort that happens once in a lifetime, when two hearts finally come
together in trust. And love.
Unwrapped
.

DEDICATION

To
all the friends out there who took a chance on love and won

The
pearly treasures of the sea,

The
lights that spatter heaven above,

More
precious than these wonders are

My
heart of hearts filled with your love.

~Heinrich
Heine

TABLE of CONTENTS

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter
Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter
Seven

Chapter
Eight

Chapter Nine

COMPLETE
BOOK LIST

EXCERPT
~ Pearls of Pleasure, by Chantilly White

Acknowledgements

About the
Author

Unwrapped

By
Chantilly White

CHAPTER
ONE

Sunday, September 24
^th

The echo of angry words and slammed doors still vibrated
through the sunny, beach-front condo on invisible waves of sound. Hurt drifted
like a haze on the air. Derrick Fox could almost see the slide of it thickening
Mia's voice, coating her tongue and aching in her throat with every
chocolate-covered cherry she swallowed.

"And then he said," Mia continued, breath
hitching, "'You're not the woman I thought you were.' And he walked
out."

Sniffling, she licked melted chocolate off her delicate
fingers one by one. She pulled another cherry out of the half-empty box and
stared at it, twirling it by the stem before popping it in her mouth.

Despite the occasion, the sight of Mia's full, soft lips
wrapping around the cherry stem shot a sensual laser beam straight to Derrick's
groin, surprising him with its intensity and tightening everything in a painful
vise. From the back of his neck, zinging down his spine to the tips of his
curling toes, the sexual tremors had him twitching in his seat.

Throttle it back, man. Now's not the time.

With his best friend, Mia Patterson, it never was the time.

Damn it.

Flicking his gaze between Mia and Allison Kelly—the
third in their best-friends-since-college band of misfits—Derrick
shifted, trying to get comfortable. The three of them scrunched together on
Mia's plush lipstick-red couch in the front room of her tiny condo in Newport Beach.
California sunshine poured through the picture windows and highlighted a
spectacular vista of burnt-sugar sand and blue-green ocean, exactly the same
shimmery shade as Mia's eyes. The water stretched away from the crowded beach
outside her front door, but none of them paid any attention to the breathtaking
view.

Allison sat on Mia's other side, rubbing Mia's knee in
comforting circles and making Derrick crave the feel of Mia's skin just there.
He wanted his fingers gliding along her smooth, sleek legs. With time to
explore. Time to savor.

Clearing his throat, Derrick hoped neither woman noticed his
tension. His body hummed like a teenager's, all out-of-control hormones and
zero finesse. The knowledge that Mia was finally free again had flipped a switch
in his head, but he was a grown man. He needed to reassert some mastery over
himself. He needed to focus. And plan.

What would they do if he leaped to his feet and announced he
was in love with Mia right there in the middle of her family room, just hours
after she got dumped by her last boyfriend?

Yeah, it probably wouldn't go over too well.

But after eight years of friendship, this was it—the
last time some other guy was going to get in his way, the last time a suave,
posturing jackass was going to hurt Mia. She'd been hurt enough, and whether
she realized it or not, he loved her. He was ready to prove it.

"Everyone said I'd feel better when I lost the
weight." Mia swiped at the mascara running down her face, smearing it into
mini-Rorschach-style blotches, before selecting another cherry. "But I
don't. Everything hurts. I was happier when I was fat."

"You were never fat, Mia." Derrick controlled the
surge of fury with effort, a muscle going in his jaw. If he could get his hands
on Barry-fucking-Anderson right now. . . Goddamned metro-sexual sleazebag.

"Never." Allison pulled Mia's head to her
shoulder, stroking Mia's long brown hair. It shone in a waving mass down her
back, the same glossy shade as the candy Mia stuffed defiantly in her mouth.

Allison, a true redhead with pale skin lightly freckled from
the sun, exchanged a glance with Derrick. The look in her big blue eyes
mirrored his urge to commit acts of violence against the creep who'd done this
to their best friend.

Newly svelte and newly single—again—Mia leaned
against Allison wearing an ancient peach-colored t-shirt three sizes too large
and enormous ratty grey sweatpants, her bare feet tucked beneath her legs. The
sweats cinched at the waist by an unraveling drawstring, cut off at the knees and
used to belong to Derrick.

Damned if he'd ever looked as good in them as Mia did,
though.

He pretended exasperation every time she snagged another
piece of his clothing—an activity she'd made a regular habit of since
their freshman year at UC Irvine—but secretly he liked seeing her in his
castoffs. There was something unspeakably intimate about her wrapping herself
up in a shirt he'd worn.

Now, four years out of college, she'd managed to sneak at
least half his wardrobe into her own closet.

Derrick kept his attention on the conversation, but his
fingers itched to run through Mia's silky hair. Her dark strands tangled with
Allison's rioting bronze curls, a chocolate and caramel river glinting in the
sunlight beaming through the windows. Mia's lightly tanned skin sported bright
red splotches brought on by the crying jag.

Beautiful as Mia was, she'd never been a pretty-princess
kind of crier. If he got the chance, he'd make Barry pay for every splotch.

"You're beautiful and funny and sexy," Allison was
saying, her tone firm. "Any guy would be lucky to have you."

"Then why didn't he want me?" Mia's whimper
effectively killed the sensual vibes running beneath Derrick's skin and
resurrected the anger.

"Because Barry's a dick." Derrick snapped the
words like bones breaking under a heavy fist. And he wanted to hit something.
Or someone. Barry.

He'd kill Barry.

"He's an idiot," said Allison.

Mia buried her face in her hands. "I practically threw
myself at him."

"He's an idiot and a dick, and he doesn't deserve
you." Derrick made his voice particularly harsh to emphasize his point,
while Mia's tears scored trails of acid across his heart. He cracked his
knuckles.

He'd enjoy killing Barry.

"Exactly," Allison agreed. "Any guy who'd
break up with a woman because her bra and panties didn't match is a total waste
of oxygen."

Derrick snorted with disgust. No, Barry hadn't deserved Mia,
and she'd never been fat. She'd been soft and sweet and rounded in all the
right places. But once Barry entered her life, she'd stopped seeing her lushly
gorgeous curves for the scorching-hot handfuls they were, only that she hadn't
fit into the size-four jeans Barry convinced her she was supposed to wear.

"It wasn't only that," Mia said, still somehow
defending the bastard. "He just wanted me to look a certain way when
we—"

"He's a prick," Allison interrupted. "A
horse's ass in Armani suits and Italian shoes is still a horse's ass."

"I disappointed him," Mia said, and Derrick's
fists clenched.

"Bullshit," he said sharply.

Barry had led her on, made her all kinds of promises, only
to dump her when she failed to live up to the man's impossible ideal.

"I thought, when he made it past the three months. .
." Mia broke off with a hiccup.

Mia and her Three Month Rule.

Christ.

Twelve guys in eight years—not that he was
counting—plus innumerable losers who hadn't even made it past a second
date. None of them had stuck it out, except Barry. So what happened when she
finally found a man who'd go the distance? He told her 'no thanks' at the
finish line. What an imbecile.

Thank God.

"Did you love him?" Allison asked, and Derrick's
entire body went still. Mia didn't believe in that kind of love. She claimed.

"I—" Mia paused, her brow crinkled like the
tissue in her hand. He held his breath. "No, of course not,
but—"

He breathed again, a small sigh of relief. He didn't want
her believing in 'Big L' love. Not until he convinced her otherwise, and then
only with him. Not a cretin like Barry.

How a woman as smart as Mia had failed to recognize Barry's
superiority complex was a mystery to Derrick. She wasn't one to be star-struck
over a guy's credentials, even if said cretin was one of the leading plastic
surgeons in Orange County. She wasn't swayed by money, status symbols or a
top-tier social life.

But Mia had a heart the size of Jupiter, easily influenced
by good deeds. She'd met Barry while chairing a benefit for victims of violent
crimes, one of her many projects. The man's activism drew her to him like a
kitten to a bowl of spiked cream. She'd lapped up his spiel and fallen for his
shtick, milk-drunk on his image as the generous do-gooder.

Barry performed pro-bono reconstructive surgery for people
scarred by violence, a fact he played up big time in his marketing efforts. He
reveled in the attention it garnered him in the press and in the dramatic
increase in his profits from his paying clientele—all those rich,
desperate women, eager to fix their every perceived imperfection and convinced
such an altruistic surgeon was the answer to their prayers. Supporting his pity-patients,
as he called them, had turned his practice into a goldmine and had given him
entrée into the upper echelons of society, a feat he hadn't been able to
achieve on his own.

Not to mention the write-offs at tax time, a detail he'd
gleefully shared with Derrick in an unguarded moment. Mia had believed Barry
cared for the victims out of the goodness of his heart.