The last thing she wanted was to cause problems in someone’s marriage. She knew how that felt. “Maybe I shouldn’t be Mrs. Claus, then—”
“Me.”
Both of the women looked up.
The cowboy stood next to Libby’s desk, his face flushed. His hat was practically crushed in his big hand as he spoke. “I’ll do Mrs. Claus.”
“You mean you’ll be Mr. Claus,” Libby called out, giggling.
He looked for a moment as if he wanted the floor to swallow him up but managed to nod. His gaze remained locked on Amy, as if trying to silently communicate something to her.
What it was, she didn’t know. But she put on her best teacher smile. “Sounds like you and I are going to make quite the pair.”
* * *
* * *
Caleb carried his niece out to his truck and tried to walk calmly. Tried. His boots crunched on the snow as he cut across the grounds of the school, not bothering with the cleared sidewalks because he just wanted to get to the safety of his vehicle as soon as possible. Inside the truck, no one would see how red his face was, or how much he was sweating. They wouldn’t notice just how uncomfortable he was.
“Your hat is crushed, Uncle Caleb!” Libby called out helpfully as he opened the back door to his truck and pushed the passenger seat forward. “Why is your hat all messed up?”
“I’ll tell you later, Libster.” He settled her in her car seat and buckled her in with the ease of someone who’d done this a hundred times before. He had, too. Up until a few months ago, his older brother was a single parent, and that meant leaning on his brothers for help. Ever since Libby was born, Caleb had pitched in when needed, changing dirty diapers, doing laundry, and helping with feeding. Now that Hank was married, Caleb wasn’t needed as often and his uncle duties were mostly babysitting for the occasional date night and watching Frozen, but he didn’t mind. Libby was a good kid.
Most of the time. She was a loud kid, too. “Your hat looks so funny, Uncle Caleb! You smooshed it!”
She wasn’t going to be quiet about his damned hat, was she? He snatched it off his head and threw it in the back seat, then shut the door and jogged around to the other side of the truck. His boots slid on the icy slush, but he ignored it. He just needed to get away from the school. Needed to get away from Amy Mckinney, who was so pretty that it made his chest ache.
Actually, she was so pretty she made his entire soul ache.
She’d talked to him today. Acted like he was a total stranger even though he’d met her twice before now. Once, he’d gone to the school with Hank and had stood mutely behind his brother like a big, bearded fencepost. Another time he’d run into her in town and they’d nearly collided on the sidewalk. She’d dropped a package in surprise; he’d mumbled an apology and handed her package back to her. Their fingers had brushed.
Caleb remembered every second of that encounter. It was burned into his mind. Her hair had swung over her shoulder as she’d leaned over, and her blue eyes had gone wide. She’d been wearing a gray turtleneck dress that hugged her curves, and tall black boots. She’d laughed and taken the package from him—one she’d gotten in the mail.
He remembered everything.
And she didn’t remember he was alive. That stung, just a little, but it was to be expected. No one ever noticed Caleb.
Even so . . . she hadn’t remembered his face? He had hers memorized. It was engraved into his brain. He noticed everything about her, right down to the little mole just below her ear.
He drove back to the ranch in silence, listening to Libby chatter about her day. She’d colored pictures and was learning about animals today. “Did you know platypuses lay eggs, Uncle Caleb?” she mentioned in the middle of a constant stream of talking. “Because they do. They have duck noses and they lay eggs. Miss Mckinney says so.”
He grunted a response. Miss Mckinney. She had his phone number now. She’d given him the most curious smile when he’d volunteered to be Santa, as if she weren’t entirely certain he was sane. “You sure you want to do this?” He’d nodded mutely, because words always failed him, and then she’d taken down his phone number.
His phone.
Amy Mckinney had his phone number. That made him start sweating all over again. What if she called him to talk about the whole Santa thing and he messed up his words again? He’d wanted to grab Libby and haul her out of the room the moment he said he’d do Mrs. Claus. The other woman had tittered and looked at him like he was a creep, but Amy had just given him the most gentle expression, as if she understood how hard it was for him to talk to women.
She couldn’t know. Most people didn’t have any idea that he and his brothers had grown up in the remote reaches of Alaska and that he’d only seen women when he’d gone into town with his father. He’d never talked to them, either, because he was just a kid. Back then, he could be a quiet type and no one thought anything of it. But at twenty-seven? Living in a town like this? He was sorely missing communication skills that had never been given to him. It was easy to talk to his brothers. Fairly easy to talk to Uncle Ennis.
Impossible to talk to a woman without the words tripping over his tongue and coming out wrong.
It occurred to him that he had no idea how to be Santa if he was going to have to talk to people. Of his brothers, Caleb was the silent one. Hank was quiet, but he didn’t have problems talking to most people. Jack, the youngest, wouldn’t shut up. He talked about anything and everything—kinda like Libby. Caleb was the middle child, the peacemaker. The listener. If Amy Mckinney wanted an ear, he could give her one.
If she wanted him to talk, he was in trouble.
He pulled up to the Swinging C Ranch and unloaded Libby, who was still talking about platypuses and clutching a crayon drawing in her hand. He pulled the car seat out of the back of his truck and put it in Hank’s truck, then picked up Libby—still talking—and took her inside.
Jack was in the kitchen, grinning as he polished off the last of the Christmas cookies that Hank’s wife had sent up with them.
“So did you see her?” He wiggled his eyebrows. “The love of your life?”
Caleb felt his face get hot.
“You love Miss Mckinney?” Libby said, surprised. “Like Mommy and Daddy love?”
Oh hell. He glared at Jack, who just snorted with laughter. Jack wasn’t supposed to bring up this sort of thing in front of Libby, because she’d repeat everything. The last thing he needed was his niece blurting out his infatuation to her beautiful teacher. “No. Not her,” he said quickly. “Someone . . . else.”
“Miss Lindon?”
Caleb shot Jack another angry look. He didn’t know who Miss Lindon was, but he suspected it was another teacher. “Someone else,” he said again, setting her down. “Uncle Jack, where’s Libby’s dad?”
“He’s in the barn with Trixie. Checking her hoof out.” Jack poked Libby with a finger. “You want to watch Rudolph while we’re waiting for him to return?”
Her face lit up, and Caleb set her down, letting her race into the living room while Jack turned on the Christmas movie. Christmas. Right. He was in a heap of trouble now. Jack returned to the kitchen a few moments later and gestured at the living room, where the TV was blaring with jingling bells and Christmas music. “You didn’t take her to the salon?”
Caleb waved a hand in the air. “Hank said to bring her here. Becca’s busy. Something about a hair emergency for someone. Look, that’s not important. I’ve got a problem.”
Jack picked up the plate and ate a few of the stray sprinkles. “What, did you say something stupid to that teacher?” He grinned. “Oh damn, did you call her Tits like you did Tina?”
Caleb clenched his jaw. He was never going to live that down. “No. But I volunteered to be Santa at the Christmas Carnival at the school.”
Jack’s brow wrinkled. “What? You?”
“Yeah. Me.”
Jack stared at him, bewildered. After a moment, it finally sunk in, and he began to laugh. “Are you serious? You? You can’t even hold a conversation around that woman. What makes you think you can be Santa?”
He crossed his arms over his chest, feeling like an idiot. “I don’t know. She just . . . she said she was going to be Mrs. Claus and they needed a Santa, so I said I’d do it. I wasn’t thinking.” He didn’t tell Jack the part where he said he’d do Mrs. Claus. Jack didn’t need more ammunition for teasing Caleb. “What do I do?”
“What do you mean, what do you do?” Jack grinned hugely. “You practice your ‘ho, ho, ho.’ You wouldn’t want to disappoint the kids, would you?”
Damn it.
Maybe he could be a silent Santa.
Santa with bronchitis.
Santa that had taken a vow of silence.
A mime Santa.
Something.
He immediately wanted to cancel . . . but he didn’t have Amy’s phone number. He’d forgotten to get it, and now unless he went back up to that school and told her that he was out, he was going to be Santa. He was stuck.
CHAPTER TWO
When Amy got home that night, the ceiling in her bedroom had caved in.
It had been a long day already. The children were fine—the children were always fine—but she’d had two parent meetings after class and had discovered that Tim Howerton had left his inhaler in his cubby at school, so she’d driven out to the Howertons’ house to drop it off just in case. Then she’d gone back to school to clean up her classroom and to take down the fall decorations in preparation for the holiday decor.
Unfortunately, her holiday decor left a lot to be desired, so she’d spent some time shopping local teacher supply shops and clutching at her neckline at the prices. Lord, it was expensive to decorate a classroom. She was on an extremely limited budget, too, which meant she’d be cutting out paper snowflakes and making garlands with construction paper. Maybe some of the thrift places would have sales this weekend? Or she’d find another estate sale to hit up? She made a mental note to check the local paper and watch the local donation lists online, then packed up her laptop and headed home.
It was dark early, thanks to winter, and she slipped twice on the icy sidewalk. That’s what happened when you were from the South and didn’t know how to handle winter. She got inside all right, though, with only her backside and pride bruised, and discovered the problem with the ceiling.
Really, it was the perfect end to a perfectly awful day.
She put her laptop down on her table in the living room and stepped inside the bedroom gingerly. Water was dripping from upstairs, which was kind of odd, because she hadn’t realized she had an upstairs. She peered up at the soggy remnants of her ceiling, determined not to cry. Sure, her bed was soaked and it was ten degrees outside, and she had no ceiling, but she could handle this. She could.
She was strong. Independent.
She didn’t need to count on anyone to fix this.
Well, sort of. Amy immediately texted her landlord, Greg.
AMY: Hi there! It’s me on Madison Lane. The ceiling in the bedroom collapsed . . . ?
Impatiently, Amy watched her phone as the three dots flashed up, indicating someone was typing, and then disappeared again. No message came through right away, so she grabbed the two towels she had, made a mental note to buy more towels, and did her best to start mopping up the mess. Between the third and fourth wring-out of her towels in the bathroom, her phone buzzed with an incoming text. She raced over and picked it up.
GREG: Hey there! How’d that happen?
GREG: Been meaning to talk to you. I was thinking about Italian on Friday night and I know this great little place a few towns over. You interested?
She fought back a scream of frustration. Was he asking her out? While she was staring down a squishy mattress and a ceiling that gaped into the attic above? Amy took a deep breath (or three) and finally composed an answer that didn’t sound rude.
AMY: Hi! I’m busy Friday. My ceiling . . . ?
She snapped a picture and sent it to him. Surely now he’d do something? Come over and fix this? If nothing else, bring fresh towels so she could clean up on her own? She stared in frustration at the mess. There went her plans for just grabbing a glass of wine and relaxing for the evening. She was going to be cleaning and doing laundry all night.
GREG: It looks like the ceiling got wet and collapsed. Do you have renter’s insurance?
Renter’s insurance? That was a thing? If it was, she didn’t have it.
AMY: This is my first rental. I didn’t know I needed renter’s insurance. Can’t you come and fix this?
GREG: Oh. Well, in the future you might want renter’s insurance. I’ll call my guy and see if he can make it out there this weekend. Did you store something with water in the ceiling?
Her jaw dropped. She clamped her mouth shut, took a deep breath, and looked up at the hole again. She could see the night sky through the roof, which wasn’t a good thing. Given all the snow they’d had lately, the water had probably leaked in from the attic until it destroyed the ceiling above her bed.
Fun.
AMY: I think there’s a hole in the roof. I can see the stars. Also, you said you’d fix the leak in the kitchen. And the window in the living room.
He sent her an emoji for a thumbs-up and she knew that was the end of the conversation. When she’d moved here, she’d been told that most people in tiny Painted Barrel didn’t move much at all, so housing was at a premium. Her Realtor, Greg, had acquired a property that he was willing to rent to her, and she’d gladly taken it. It was a few blocks from the school, which meant it wouldn’t tax her ancient car too much, and the price was reasonable given her tiny teacher’s salary.
He’d told her it wasn’t posh when she moved in, and she’d said it was fine because she needed affordable, not posh. Unfortunately, she was starting to realize that “posh” was a faucet that didn’t leak and doors that shut properly and a window that didn’t have a finger-size crack that let in all kinds of cold air. She’d reported it all to her landlord like the articles online said to do.
Greg always texted back that he’d “get his guy” on it. She’d never seen the “guy” and wasn’t actually sure he existed. But what other choices did she have? With one last frustrated sigh, she put her phone back down and got back to work.
A while later, her shoulders were aching, her entire house smelled like mildew and water, but the mess in the bedroom was mostly cleaned up. She’d gathered up the waterlogged particleboard of the ceiling and had tossed it into garbage bags that now waited in the mudroom to be taken out to the garbage cans. She was tired, sweaty, and exhausted, but it was done. Oh sure, her bed needed to air out and she had no bedding and no genuine place to sleep other than a love seat, but she’d handled it.
And wasn’t this why she’d moved out to Wyoming anyhow? So she could learn how to be self-sufficient? To figure out how to handle things on her own?
All in all, she was going to chalk it up to a good life experience. Maybe not one she’d ever really wanted to have, but a good experience all the same. With that in mind, she closed the door to the bedroom and threw on her jacket to take the bags of rotted ceiling to the garbage cans.
The cans were back behind the house, and she went down the two slippery steps to get to them before she noticed the stars. The view was utterly gorgeous, the vibrant nebulas out in force and the midnight sky lit up with colors she’d never seen in the city. Each time she saw this, it took her breath away.
That was another thing she couldn’t get in Houston—stars like these.
Even though it was cold and she was tired, she threw the garbage in the cans and then sat down on the top step to watch the stars for a bit, to stare up at them in wonder and daydream.
It took a minute for her to hear the growling.
Amy clutched at the neck of her jacket, her entire body going stiff at the quiet, low growl. She looked out behind her house, but there was nothing to see. Painted Barrel’s “main” part of town was small, and beyond the main street, there wasn’t much but a scatter of houses. Her rental was on the edge of things and backed up to a large pasture, which meant there was a lot of open space.
And something was . . . growling.
She remained frozen in place, unsure what to do. She didn’t have a weapon of any kind at hand. The garbage can lid was plastic and attached to the can, so she couldn’t even use that as a shield. If she turned around and leapt into the house, would it attack her the moment she stood? Amy waited . . .
And waited.
The growling stopped. Did that mean the creature was gone? She got to her feet slowly . . . and it started again the moment her boot scuffed against the wooden step.
Okay, that was odd. It sounded like a dog, but as far as she knew, her neighbors didn’t own dogs. Heck, she’d never owned one herself. In her mind, the creature was something fierce and terrible and enormous. She had to see what it was for herself, though. Carefully, she crept up the stairs and grabbed her flashlight, then shone it out the window.
A pair of eyes shone back. It looked like . . . a collie? It wasn’t a wolf; that was for sure. The dog lurked at the edge of the fence, near the pasture, and she waited for it to leave. Instead, it just sat there. After a while, it turned around three times and lay down, and when it did, she noticed that it looked impossibly thin.
Her heart squeezed.
Her Christmas Cowboy Page 2