Nic stood beside the grill, watching as Eric cleaned the grate before adding the burgers. Addison, his wife, had just brought them two beers—a Bud Light for him and a Shiner Bock for her. While she thought she’d be better served having this conversation with Addison, she’d already gone back inside to get the patties. Eric might be more receptive to the idea, though. They’d gotten into their share of mischief in college, double dates and all. Of course, now that he was married with a baby on the way, he’d settled down quite a bit. He might not think of this offer as the possible adventure she did.

“So…I had a proposition the other day,” she started.

He glanced at her, then turned his attention back to the grill. “Something good?”

“Depends how you look at it, I suppose.”

He turned to her then. “And?”

“Some woman—a stranger—invited me to Red River for Christmas.”

He frowned. “New Mexico?”

“Yeah. For skiing and stuff.”

He took a swallow of his beer. “You don’t ski, Nicky.”

“Well, yeah, there’s that. She wants me to pretend to be her girlfriend.”

“What?” He held his hand up. “Okay, wait, start over. What?”

She laughed. “So this really cute woman comes up to me, out of the blue, and says she needs a fake date for Christmas. With her family. For ten days.”

“Are you serious? Who does that?”

“Right? No one does that.”

“So, is she a weird psycho type?”

“I don’t think so. At first, I thought it was just her attempt to ask me out.”

“And we all know you like to be the one doing the asking.”

“I know. I’m picky that way. But anyway, no, she looked perfectly normal. Attractive, in fact.”

He shook his head. “Don’t do it. She’s probably a crazy woman.” He pointed his finger at her. “I know you! You’re thinking about doing it, aren’t you?”

She smiled. “Could be kinda fun.”

“For ten days? With a family you’ve never met? With a woman you don’t know? That’s insane.” He looked up as Addison came back out. “Babe, listen to this. Nic got invited to go skiing in Red River for ten days. At Christmas.”

“How nice.” Addison patted her arm. “You don’t know how to ski, do you? That could be a problem, Nicky.”

“She was really cute, though.”

“Oh, well, that makes all the difference. Don’t ski into a tree.”

“That’s what you tell her?” Eric held his hands up. “I told her she was insane.”

Nic smiled at him. “And here I thought you’d be all in favor of it.”

He shook his head. “Why can’t you do normal dating? You meet someone, you go out, you fall in love. Why do you always have these weird dates?”