You see, Darcy and I were best friends by default. Our mother's were best friends, our older brother's were best friends, our dad's were best friends, even our grandparent's, God rest them, were best friends. There was no escaping Darcy or his family after our falling out, so we both learned to tolerate one another as best as we could... Which was usually by fighting or pranking one another.

Our hate for one another grew as we got older while our tolerance for one another's company lessened. Our families didn't seem to understand our mutual loathing, because they always tried to force us together so we could learn to 'get on'. They still did. Never mind that we were now both twenty-five, and any chance of mending our joke of a friendship was long gone.

Our mothers, God help them, had this silly fantasy that we would get together, fall madly in love, and give them grand-babies, but I could tell you that was never happening. There wasn't a snowball's chance in hell. You had a better chance of fusing oil and water together to form a single liquid than you did of Darcy and I being civil to each other. That was how deeply we hated one another.

We were a lost cause and as far as I was concerned that wasn't a bad thing.

"What's that look for?"

I blinked my eyes, and shook my head clear of my thoughts then I looked to my mother who retook her seat next to me on the couch. I wasn't telling her I was thinking about Darcy and our past because she would take it as a stupid sign that it meant he was my future or some bullshit like that.

I cleared my throat. "Nothing, this is just how I look when I zone out. It's me duh face."

My mother grinned and quietly sipped on her tea, and it grated on my nerves. I hated when she looked smug after pissing me off about Darcy - she knew what she did bringing him up and it bothered me deeply.

I needed to change the topic of discussion away from Darcy and to something mundane. Anything else would help, just as long as it wasn’t about him.

I blew a breath out through my nostrils and asked, "So, breakfast?"

My mother smiled to herself as she stood up and winked. "Yep, let's go get some breaky. You can tell me how you plan on getting me grandchild that doll for Christmas along the way. I can tell it's going to be interesting.”

I snorted. "Doubtful. "

"I wouldn’t speak too soon on that, lovely." My mother winked. "When you’re involved, things are always interesting."

After my mother and I went to a cafe in the village and had breakfast she dropped me off at Smyths on her way home. I got there forty minutes before closing time for the holidays. I knew I had a limited amount of time left in my mission, so I had to get to it.

My mother wished me good luck in finding a doll for Charli, and I told her that I didn't need luck. It turned out I needed more than luck - I needed a bloody leprechaun with his pot of gold to appear and accompany me into the shop because I was royally screwed.

"This can't be happening," I whispered in dismay as I scanned the doll aisle in the shop for the tenth time in twenty minutes looking for a Fire Princess doll from a popular children's film called Blaze. The film was huge, it had been months since the film came out, and all the kids were still bloody crazy about it. That was exactly why I needed this doll. I told my niece Charli that I would get this doll for her for Christmas and I already told my brother Sean, Charli's father, that I had the damn thing so I could not go home empty-handed. If I did go home empty-handed it meant I would have nothing to give her on Christmas morning. I swallowed down bile as images of my crying niece, and her disappointed Father flooded my mind.

I had to get this doll, my title as the world's coolest Auntie depended on it.

I shook my head and the unwelcomed images away.

"Why do they only have the Princess's stupid sidekick?" I muttered aloud as I pushed aside box after box of the poor boy - who was really a Prince - from the film.

I needed the red-headed Princess, not this lad.

"Excuse me." I waved to a young lad who was stacking boxes down the far end of the aisle.

He straightened up as I approached him. I smiled as he cleared his throat and said, "Can I help you with something, miss?"

I nodded my head. "Yeah, you can actually. I need the redheaded Fire Princess doll from that children's film Blaze. You know the one were the princess can make fire-"

"Sorry mate, you couldn't tell me where the dolls from that popular Fire Princess film are, could you? I need the red-haired Fire Princess one."

My mouth lost all of hint of a smile, and my stomach churned with the sight of him. My wide green eyes narrowed and my hands balled into fists. This was cruel, as if having to put up with a conversation about him earlier wasn't torture enough, now God was going to make me face him as well? All in the same day? Not cool. Not cool at all.

I narrowed my eyes to slits because he was mere feet away from me.

Darcy Hart.

My archenemy.

"Excuse me, are you blind? I'm standing right here, and I was talking to this fella before you were," I growled.

Darcy leaned to the left and looked around the lad to see who was speaking to him, and when his eyes landed on mine, they instantly narrowed.

"Neala Clarke," Darcy spat.

I inwardly rolled my eyes - he always spat out my name like it left a bad taste in his mouth.

I evilly smirked at him. "The one and only."

Darcy gave me a bored once over before he dismissed me with a glare and turned his attention back to the male worker. "As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, do you know where the dolls from the Fire Princess film are? I need the red-haired doll."

Was he serious?

"You can wait your turn for help, Darcy. I was here first!"

Darcy clicked his tongue at me. "Boo hoo, little miss perfect doesn't like waiting, what a surprise."

Excuse me?

"Hold on just a minute you rude shite, what the hell is that supposed to mean?"

The lad between Darcy and myself stepped back from standing between us. Now we had perfect views of one another. I kept the look of sincere disgust on my face as I stared at him, but my stomach fluttered even though I willed it to stop. I hated how good looking the bastard was - he always had a handsome face, but unlike our school days he wasn't a skinny boy anymore. He was filled out and all man, and from what I heard around the village, he was also now quite the slut... or ladies man, whatever.

Back in our school days, Darcy was the nerdy, lanky, pretty boy. He had a baby face that was accompanied by a killer smile, but that was all he had going for him because Darcy had always been a prick, at least to me anyway. He has been a pain in my arse the last twenty years, and I honestly could never see a day where that would ever change.

I blinked my eyes when Darcy's voice knocked me out of my trance, and got my attention.

"It means you have a stick up your arse about waiting a few minutes for something."

Oh, hell no.

"That's not bloody true and you know it, Darcy!" I snapped then flung my long brown hair over my shoulder and said, "And for your information, I don't have anything up me arse."

Darcy smiled, but it was an evil smile at best. I imagined Satan had a similar, if not identical, smile to Darcy's.