A Weaver Christmas Gift

by ALLISON LEIGH,

  She cursed her mushy knees and stiffened them, raising one eyebrow. “Never realized your sniffer was so finely tuned. But while you were obviously withering away during the, oh, forty-five minutes or so it took me to get here, I hope you managed to remember to save me some of your grandmother’s cheesecake. That is what drew me here, after all.”

  His lips twitched and he cupped her elbow. His hands were bare. No concession to the cold temperature for him. And she could have sworn she could feel the heat of his touch through her wool coat.

  She dismissed the silly notion. She was supposed to be a grown woman, not a teenager prone to such flights of fancy.

  “Sure it wasn’t my charming company?”

  She gave him a look and his twitching lips stretched into a grin. His hold on her elbow tightened a little as he started walking. But instead of heading in the direction of the buffet tables, he steered her closer to the picnic tables crowded with his various family members. “Come say hello first.”

  Of course, she’d met all of them at one time or another. Was quite friendly with many of them. They frequented Colbys, and she’d served on a few volunteer committees more than once with several of his cousins. And until she’d hired Merilee and changed her own night off to Thursday to accommodate the other woman’s schedule, Jane had taken weekly yoga classes with even more of them. But she still felt a jolt of nerves almost as if she were meeting them for the first time.

  It was ridiculous. Annoying. Downright embarrassing, actually. “I saw most of them a few hours ago when your father won the tournament,” she reminded him.

  “Yup. And you feel as stiff as a poker all of a sudden. Why is that?” His grin turned goading. “You’re not nervous for some reason, are you?”

  She tsked dismissively but because he was right, she moved forward even more quickly, taking the initiative herself as she aimed for his parents first, pinning a bright smile on her face as she plowed into the fray, greeting them as if her presence among the Clays were a perfectly ordinary thing.

  But Daniel’s mother, Maggie, ruined the whole thing by hopping to her feet and giving Jane an enthusiastic hug. “We’re so glad you’re joining us,” she said as she squeezed. She was slender, about Jane’s height, and her pale blond hair was nearly hidden by the cheerful red knit cap she wore. “I wasn’t sure Casey would ever let the two of you out into the light.”

  Jane’s face went hot and she stammered for a reply.

  Maggie just laughed and squeezed her again playfully. “Don’t be embarrassed, honey. We’re just delighted you’re here.” Keeping her arm around Jane’s shoulder, she pulled her along the tables, stopping every other step to share some comment with these people who were so familiar to Jane yet weren’t.

  She felt herself breaking out into a sweat beneath her coat from all of the attention she was getting. And Casey was no help at all. He’d stopped next to his dad, ostensibly to admire the tournament trophy. She figured he was really only saving himself from all this kindly meant torment and sent him a look that said so.

  He just grinned and left her to his mother’s clutches.

  It was his grandfather Mr. Clay who finally offered some relief. Squire and his wife were sitting in fancy-looking folding lawn chairs rather than on the picnic-table benches, which seemed to be the only concession to their ages they were making. When Maggie presented Jane, he rose to his feet and snatched the paper plate that she’d pretty much mangled. He held it up to study.

  “Good grief, child, you’re not going to be able to hold any food on that, much less a piece of my wife’s cheesecake.” His eyes were pale blue and they glinted with sharp humor as he tossed the ruined plate aside and commandeered her elbow from his daughter-in-law. Clutching a walking stick in his other hand, he ambled with her toward the buffet tables. “Getting damn cold out here,” he groused as they walked. “Don’t s’pose you smuggled over some hooch from Colbys, did ya?”

  She chuckled. Despite the walking stick, the gray-haired man stood almost as straight and tall as his sons and grandsons. And she knew from experience that he had a soft spot for a good Scotch whiskey. “Sorry.” She tried not thinking about his first wife’s violin still sitting in her truck. “Alcohol’s not permitted in the park, even on a cold winter’s night.”

  He grunted. “Seems the town council’s getting mighty uptight these days ’bout that and every other little thing.” He pounded the ground with the bottom of his walking stick once for emphasis. “Half the adults here have prob’ly got a flask hidden in their pocket, spikin’ their hot cocoa, which is what any smart person would do on a cold night like tonight. Got a good mind to get myself elected and whip those tight-asses into shape.”

  She grinned. Squire Clay was one of the backbones of Weaver. “Have you ever served on the council before?”

  “Hell no,” he said. “But I got a tad more time on my hands the older I get. Still think I could show them a thing or two.”

  “I can’t think of anyone better,” she assured him. The old man didn’t mince words, play games or suffer fools. “You decide to run in the next election, I’ll be the first one to offer a campaign contribution.”

  His laugh was almost silent, decidedly wicked and eerily like that of a particular grandson of his.

  They’d reached the buffet table, where he handed her a fresh paper plate as if it were his wife’s best china. “Now go fill it up, girl,” he ordered. “Figure you need the fuel to keep up with Casey. That boy usually looks like he’s moving slower ’n a snail when he’s really running circles round us all.”

  “Stop bad-mouthing me, old man.” Casey stopped next to them and dumped a ladle of overcooked green beans on her plate. “You’re only doing it so you look better in Janie’s eyes.” His voice was tart but his fondness still rang through. “He’s a flirt, sport, so stay on your toes.”

  Squire cackled. “Seems to me, you could’ve done a better job of flirtin’ with this little filly. She wouldn’t have needed to waste her time on Arlo if you hadn’t been falling down on the job. His daddy was a milquetoast, and so’s he.” Squire slanted her a look. “No offense, honey. Arlo’s a decent-enough fella, I s’pose, but I always figured you needed someone with more spirit.”

  “Decent,” Casey snorted.

  “I’m sure you never gave that any thought at all,” Jane interrupted drily as she sidled out from between the two of them. “I’m hungry, so I’m going to leave you both to your debate.” Before they could stop her, she hustled to the next table over. She grabbed a fried chicken leg and a slab of meat loaf, added a roll and a packet of butter and topped things off with a steaming cup of black coffee.

  Pretending to ignore Casey, who’d quickly fallen in line behind her, she sipped the coffee and studied the turnout as if she were looking for an open seat, when the truth of the matter was that she felt too shy to head back to his family’s tables on her own.

  She spotted Sam, who was wearing her uniform under her coat, keeping an eye on the cluster of kids romping around the pavilion. There was no sign of Hayley and her grandmother, though Jane wasn’t particularly surprised. When Hayley had brought Jane’s change of clothes the morning before, she’d said her grandmother was reluctant to attend the outdoor celebration.

  “Stop pretending you’re not here with me,” Casey said behind her, and nudged her toward his family’s tables. “Everyone already knows otherwise.”

  “This just feels strange,” she admitted.

  “Being together? Out in the open?” His expression was deliberately wry. “I’m not the world’s best catch, but you’re damn hard on a man’s ego, sport.”

  She made a face. Because he was the best catch. He always had been and she just hadn’t wanted to admit it. “You were perfectly fine hiding in the shadows,” she reminded him.

  “You’d think, wouldn’t you?”

  So
mething in his tone gave her pause, but he was continuing forward and she either needed to keep up with him or get left behind.

  She quickened her step.

  They squeezed in between Angeline on one side and J.D. on the other. And before Jane could lift her plastic fork to her mouth, Casey warned his two sisters to behave.

  “We always behave,” J.D. said defensively, but her expression was positively unholy.

  “I don’t know what you mean,” Angeline added, equally innocent.

  “God save me from older sisters,” Casey muttered.

  Jane couldn’t stop the laughter from escaping. “I am an older sister, too,” she reminded.

  Casey grinned and his gaze dropped to her lips. “Thankfully, not mine,” he drawled.

  Her mouth went dry and she barely managed not to squirm on the picnic bench.

  J.D. waved her hand in the air comically. “Good grief. Anyone else feel that heat wave?”

  “I did,” Angeline said from the other side. “If that keeps up, the snow Uncle Matt predicted is going to melt into rain.”

  “Don’t you both have rug rats you should be keeping an eye on? Would seem more important than reminding me what pains in the butt you were growing up.”

  J.D. laughed merrily and bumped her shoulder companionably against Jane’s. “He must really like you,” she said, not entirely under her breath. “I think we’re actually getting under his skin. And that hasn’t happened since he was fourteen and had a crush on Jenny Lee Sanders. Remember the way he mooned around over her, Angel?”

  Casey sighed loudly and looked across the table to his sisters’ husbands. “Guys, where’s the help?”

  “You’re on your own, man,” Brody said. He nodded toward Angeline. “She’s the one I’ve gotta live with.”

  Angeline stood and rounded the end of the table. Her thick dark hair streamed down the back of her coat and her dark eyes sparkled with lively humor. “Gotta live with?”

  Brody hooked his arm around her waist and pulled her off her feet onto his lap. “Gotta live with,” he repeated, and gave her a smacking kiss.

  “Get a room,” J.D. suggested on a laugh.

  Jane bit the inside of her lip, catching Casey’s gaze on her face. Beneath the table, she set her hand on his thigh. “Thanks.”

  He shrugged as if he didn’t know what she meant, when it was plain to her that he did. “They’re a crazy bunch,” he said. “But I guess that’s nothing you didn’t already know.”

  Maybe. But this was the first time she’d been part of the “bunch” from the inside.

  Then a noise from the pavilion drew their attention to Pam Rasmussen, who’d commandeered one of the band’s microphones to thank everyone for coming and announce that the official tree lighting was about to commence. The drummer did a long drumroll and the entire crowd seemed to hold its breath in anticipation as they waited for the trees to light.

  And waited.

  And waited.

  “Oh, for pity’s sake,” Pam finally said, sounding exasperated. “Somebody plug in the extension cord, will you?”

  Laughter scattered around the park. Then suddenly the trees jumped to life, each one illuminated with hundreds of tiny white lights. The band started playing “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town” amid the applause and cheers that broke out. It didn’t matter that the teenage boy singing lead had a voice that tended to crack every now and then, or that some of the trees hadn’t lit at all.

  It was still magical.

  Looking around her, Jane saw the awestruck expression on young Early’s face, echoed by a half-dozen others, and had to swallow the sudden knot in her throat.

  “You’re not looking at the trees,” Casey said close to her ear, and she shivered a little.

  “Look at Early,” she whispered in return. “Have you ever seen a sweeter look on a child’s face?”

  Casey was silent for a moment. Then he exhaled, long and low. “There’s something you need to know.”

  Still caught in the same web as Early and everyone else, she turned her head. Casey’s face was only inches from hers and she lost the ability to breathe. “Hmm?”

  He slowly nudged a lock of her hair behind her ear. Touched her chin with his fingertips, then shook his head a little. “Why are you here with me, Janie?” His low voice was barely audible.

  He was straddling the picnic bench beside her; where her shoulder touched his chest, it felt wide and solid beneath his leather jacket. Her feet were cold inside her boots and her butt was almost numb from the wooden bench. But she felt surrounded by his warmth as the rest of the crowd seemed to disappear.

  Her heart beat so loudly it was nearly all she could hear. And she couldn’t keep the truth to herself anymore. “Because I’m in love with you,” she whispered faintly.

  He sighed again and slid his hand behind her hair, holding her head close to his. But his lips didn’t touch hers. They grazed her cheek. “I’m sterile, Jane,” he said so softly next to her ear that she wasn’t sure she heard him right.

  But when she went to pull back to look at his face, his hand turned to iron, not letting her move a centimeter. “I can’t make a baby with you.”

  Her nose prickled and her eyes stung. “Casey—”

  “Ever,” he added. “It’s not something that can be fixed or changed or treated. You want a baby and I’m not man enough for the job.”

  Then he let her go, pushed off the picnic bench and walked away.

  It felt like an eternity that she sat there, frozen with shock.

  But on the podium, the band was still claiming Santa Claus was on his way, the white lights on the dozens of trees were still twinkling and nobody around them—not even Casey’s sisters—were paying them the least bit of attention.

  He’d dropped a bomb on her world before walking away, and nobody had noticed.

  She climbed off the picnic bench and hurried after him, not catching up to him until he was already out of the park and halfway down the block. And then she managed to overtake him only because she was running outright and he’d slowed, looking back at the sound of her boot heels.

  “That’s it,” she called out breathlessly. They were alone on the street. The band was still audible but muted by distance. “You make your...your announcement and walk away?”

  He turned, propping his hands on his lean hips. “Sorry if I didn’t feel like hanging around to celebrate.” His voice was tight.

  She stopped a few feet away from him and sucked in a breath that was painful because the air was so darned cold. Obviously she needed to start running with Hayley and Sam, because she had a stitch in her side. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I just did.”

  She exhaled. Took another step closer. “Casey—”

  “It’s not something I talk about,” he said flatly. “With anyone.”

  “How do you know? That you’re—”

  “Shooting blanks?” His lips twisted. “I did a semester of college in Sweden and came down with the mumps while I was there. Turned out the vaccination I’d had as a kid wasn’t real effective.”

  “You were engaged in college.”

  “Caitlyn. When I got back to the U.S. and told her, she dumped me flat.” He shoved his hands in the side pockets of his jacket. “She wanted kids.”

  “If she’d really loved you, it wouldn’t have mattered.”

  His hooded gaze drilled into her. “She was a self-centered twit who got into MIT on her daddy’s money and her mama’s family name. Marrying her would have been a disaster.”

  “But you loved her.”

  “I was twenty-one,” he said. “And she was pretty as hell.”

  “And all these years later, you’re still letting her rejection make you believe you’re not man enough?” Her voice ros
e and she lifted her arms. “And you obviously must think I’m like her!”

  He made an impatient sound. “I never said you were like her. You’re not self-centered. You’re not a twit. You’re an intelligent, grown woman who knows what she wants. And what you want is what I can’t provide!”

  “What I want is you!” Her voice rang out, seeming to echo against the brick buildings on both sides of the street. He just stared at her with a grim, stoic look that made her want to launch herself at him. She hauled in another cold breath. “If I were the one with fertility issues, would you walk away because of it?”

  “That’s different.”

  She snorted. “How?”

  “You’re not a man.”

  “Thank God for that,” she snapped. “Because one of us has to be able to think above her belt. Five minutes ago, I told you I was in love with you. Did that not register at all? Or does it just not matter? Am I really only your sex buddy after all?”

  He yanked his hands from his pockets and took a step toward her. “Dammit, Jane, I’m trying to do what’s right. You told me you wanted a baby. You wanted to get pregnant.”

  “Yes, I did. And I do. But not at your expense!” Her heart was in her throat but she stepped up to him until the toes of her boots nearly bumped his. “Tell me you don’t have feelings for me,” she demanded. “Tell me right now, to my face, that sex is all there is, and I’ll do exactly what you seem to want.” Her chest was so tight she felt dizzy. “I’ll walk away. I’ll sell Colbys. I’ll go to Montana and bounce my sister’s baby on my knee and start all over again where there’s no chance of you and me bumping into each other every time we walk down Main.”

  “You’re not gonna sell Colbys,” he said.

  “Try. Me,” she said through her teeth, and knew down to her bones that the words weren’t an empty threat. Weaver had become her home. But it would mean nothing in the end without him.

  “And you’re not leaving Weaver.”

  She stared him down.