Christmas Kisses

by Lori Copeland

  Originally published in 1999 as Fruitcakes and Other Leftovers

  Re-read a fun Christmas story by bestselling author Lori Copeland!

  Ho Ho Ho!

  For Beth Davis, her greatest Christmas wish was to be free of her responsibilities—and it came true when she won the lottery. Now that she was rich, she could be sure that her eccentric aunt was looked after while she traveled the world and did whatever her heart desired. New York, Rome and Paris were hers to discover. Except now that Russ Foster was back in town her heart was beating a lot faster—and Beth was beginning to think he was the best Christmas present a girl could desire….

  Christmas Kisses

  Lori Copeland

  Dear Reader,

  At this festive time of year, we’d like to send you our very best wishes for the holiday season and the New Year. Between the parties and the presents, I hope you can steal away some time for yourself and enjoy some special treats from Harlequin Duets.

  In Harlequin Duets #15 we have two delightful Christmas tales; from award-winning Lori Copeland comes Fruitcakes and Other Leftovers, and from the equally talented Kimberly Raye comes Christmas, Texas Style. The true meaning of family—its responsibilities and joys—is the theme of both stories. Pour yourself a glass of eggnog, nibble on a ginger cookie and dive into these wonderful romances.

  Duets #16 celebrates the New Year with a bachelor and baby in Bringing Up Baby New Year by Vicki Lewis Thompson. Vicki’s books are always treasured by readers, and this sparkling comedy will entertain you and warm your heart. Then Tracy South mixes business with pleasure in Frisky Business, a hilarious office romance. You’ll never look at your co-workers in the same manner!

  Happy holidays. I hope you find a lot of romance novels in your Christmas stocking!

  Malle Vallik

  Senior Editor

  Fruitcakes and Other Leftovers

  “Thanks for inviting me. The party was better than winning the lottery.”

  “Oh, sure,” Beth scoffed.

  “Seriously,” Russ continued. “Money can only buy things. Family and friends are priceless.”

  Drawing her closer to him, he met her expressive gaze. Surprise, question, curiosity filled her eyes. And she had such a kissable mouth. He brushed her lips once, twice, then lingered.

  “You taste good,” he murmured. “Isn’t this better than wanting to leave?”

  “Yes,” she whispered, but there was fear in her response.

  “What are you afraid of, Beth?”

  “You.”

  He chuckled. “I’m harmless.” He was so harmless he was a disgrace to manhood.

  “No,” she said gently, and pushed him away.

  “You’re quite lethal. I have to go back.”

  He watched her walk away.

  Beth was wrong. She was the loaded weapon.

  Christmas, Texas Style

  “Ho, ho, ho. Merry Christmas, little darlin’.”

  Winnie frowned, as a tear ran down her cheek.

  “Why all the tears?” Trace asked. “A pretty little thing like you should be inside at the party, kicking up some dust and having herself a good time.”

  “I…” She bit back a sob and shook her head. “You’ve got it wrong. I’m not pretty. It’s this.” She pulled her arms inside her sweater and shimmied and wiggled for several fast, furious heartbeats before her arms slid back out, a red lace bra clutched in one hand. “See?”

  Trace saw, all right. Her breasts full and free beneath her sweater, her nipples pebbled from the cold. “Real pretty,” he said under his breath.

  “Exactly. It’s pretty. I’m not.” She thrust the bra into his face. “A Miss Vixen Redlight Special. Guaranteed to make you fuller and perkier.”

  He closed his eyes, desperately trying to keep his libido under control. “You look like you’re doing just fine on your own.”

  CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  CHAPTER 1

  “BETH DEAR! I’m off to play bingo now!” Harriet Morris stood in the doorway wearing an inflatable rubber tube around her waist

  “Aunt Harry, you’re wearing an inner tube,” Beth muttered.

  Harriet looked down. “Oh, well. I didn’t think I’d buy a belt this wide.”

  Bethany Davis was balancing precariously on the edge of a stepladder, attempting, so far in vain, to hang a plastic pumpkin. This was not one of Harry’s better days. “Why don’t you wear that nice brown leather belt I bought for your birthday instead?” Beth suggested, patiently trying to loop the pumpkin’s hanger over a hook. A cold gust of October wind whipped around the corner, making her hair stand on end.

  Aunt Harry insisted on celebrating every holiday by decorating their house and Beth was in charge of putting up the decorations, then taking them down. Right now the Morris house looked just like the residence of Herman and Lily Munster.

  Cardboard witches, black cats and grinning pumpkin faces were plastered in every window of the three-story Victorian house. The wide, wraparound porch was laden with funky bird feeders year round, and wind chimes that Beth was sure would eventually drive her right out of her mind.

  “Yes, I’ll go put on that belt you got me right now. Thank you, dear.” The screen door flapped shut, and Beth sighed. Oh what she’d give for a nice, sane existence away from the stifling small-town life in Morning Sun. If only she had a chance, in a heartbeat, she’d flee Pennsylvania and go live in a large city with expensive restaurants, theaters, museums—a place where she could enjoy life like she’d had when she’d lived for a short time in Washington D.C., instead of merely tolerating it as she did now.

  She loved Aunt Harriet, bless her heart, but her aunt was the town crazy. No one had asked Beth what family she’d wanted to be born into. If they had, she would have screamed, “Please, God, not the Morris family!” But since no one had asked, she’d been delivered in the back seat of a 1959 Ford station wagon one stormy spring morning in 1971 to Alice Morris Davis, wife of Gustave Davis.

  Gustave had taken off soon afterward.

  That had left Alice, and her sister, Harriet, to raise baby Beth. Beth would never deny the fact that they had done a fairly good job taking care of her. She had clean clothing, regular nutritional meals, and a roof over her head at night. She was taught to wash her hands before meals, and brush her teeth before she went to bed.

  The trouble had begun when her mother had gotten sick. Beth had returned to Morning Sun to look after her mother and Aunt Harry. Her mother had died two years ago. Harriet, on the other hand, enjoyed robust health. She had only one problem, but it was a colossal one.

  Aunt Harry was certifiably nuts. And her penchant for decorating was promising to drive Beth down the same road. Every holiday—including National Potato Day—they decorated. Now that was really an event to celebrate. Baked potatoes, spuds sliced, diced, hashed, mashed, or sucked through a straw for that matter, were no problem for Beth. But potatoes dangling beneath every light fixture in the house?

  Even the outrageous bird feeders hanging from the eaves had to be decorated. Beth tried to explain to Aunt Harry that changing the feeders’ appearance so often was perhaps the reason they attracted so few feathered friends. Harry patiently listened to her, but refused to accept the idea that birds were put off by flashing red and green electric lights.

  Halloween was Aunt Harry’s favorite excuse for decorating, with Christmas a close second. Beth sourly eyed the orange crepe paper covering the door, which now resembled a lopsided pumpkin with triangular eyes
and nose. The mail slot was a pursed mouth.

  Thank goodness the small town of Morning Sun was accustomed to the Morris girls’ eccentric ways.

  “A good thing, too,” Beth grumbled, stretching to hang another pumpkin. “Any other town would have had them committed.”

  Harriet was the younger of the Morris sisters and frequently caused more talk in Morning Sun than Alice ever had. Folks were generous when they said the sisters were strange.

  “Crazy,” Beth muttered.

  Anyone who insisted on lining the front walk with pink and red hearts for the entire month of February, shamrocks and leprechauns in March, red-and-white candy canes in December, miniature flags in May and July, turkeys in November, and a giant Mr. Potato Head for, well, National Potato Day, had to be more than just a little strange.

  “Nuts!” Beth conceded.

  Not that she didn’t love Aunt Harry. She did. She just wished she could escape this town, escape her crushing responsibilities…and live a normal year or two before she died.

  But she couldn’t, or wouldn’t. She was never sure which. Harriet couldn’t live alone, and no one having any dealings with the Morrises wanted anything to do with the odd situation. Men included. Especially men, Beth had discovered.

  “So, who wants marriage and a stable family life anyway?” Beth muttered, draping another brightorange crepe paper streamer from the eaves. “It would probably be so boring, I’d start decorating for holidays.” She laughed aloud at the prospect.

  She was halfway down the shaky stepladder when the pumpkin-faced door burst open.

  “They’ll be sorry,” Harriet announced to the world in general.

  Beth gathered up the unused crepe paper in both arms, relieved to see the inner tube gone. “Who’ll be sorry?”

  “That sorry lot at the bingo hall will be sorry, that’s who. I may not go back when they come begging.”

  This was news. Aunt Harry had played bingo with the regulars at the Senior Citizens’ Center for the past three years. They had banned her?

  Beth stuffed the rolls of leftover paper into a large storage bag. “Why?”

  “Because I win, that’s why!” Always overly dramatic, Aunt Harry threw both hands into the air with the attitude that the reason for her banishment was obvious. “They accused me of cheating! Can you beat that? Like you can really cheat at bingo? A bunch of sorry losers, that’s what they are.”

  Beth opened the screen and tossed the trash bag inside, following it with the dozen or so extra plastic pumpkins. Straightening, she groaned when she spotted the tall figure in gray sweats jogging toward the house. The hood of the sweatshirt obscured his features, but Beth would recognize Russ Foster anywhere. He’d been in Morning Sun a couple of weeks, and he jogged every morning, and walked every evening. His slight limp wasn’t evident now but was discernible when he walked late in the day. Rumor had it Russ was recovering from an on-the-job accident, but no one knew exactly what the mysterious job was, or what had caused his injury.

  Beth made it a point to avoid him. It was not easy, since he was staying at his brother’s house two doors down from Aunt Harry. Oh, he’d noticed her Sunday morning all right, when she had been down on her hands and knees, picking wet toilet paper off the rose bushes. Local testosterone-enraged teens papered the Morris house and their neighbors on a regular basis. It had rained late Saturday night, so the tissue had been glued to the bushes.

  She had deliberately kept her head down when Russ had slowed on Sunday, apparently curious why she had been crawling around the wet grass in her housecoat at six-thirty in the morning. She hadn’t been inclined to initiate a conversation and had quickly crept into the garage with as much dignity as possible—which hadn’t been much. It hadn’t been just the curlers in her hair, it was the sight she must have been pushing great gobs of wet toilet paper across the lawn ahead of her.

  Ten years was not long enough for Beth to forget Russ Foster had no interest in crazy old Harriet Davis’s niece.

  Harriet looked at the sky, rubbing her bare arms. “Brrr. It seems awfully cold for August. I hope the weather doesn’t stunt the tomato plants. Come inside, dear. You’ll catch the sniffles.”

  “It’s October, Aunt Harriet.”

  “Oh, darn. Tomatoes just don’t do well in the fall. Come along.”

  She followed her aunt into the parlor, then stepping casually to the side window, she watched Russ jog on down the street.

  “They don’t understand. It’s not my fault I keep winning.” Aunt Harried padded in slippered feet toward the kitchen. “I was born under a lucky star. Everyone knows that. I can’t help it if I win raffles. I pay my money, I take my chances. Spoil sports!”

  “Oh, yes,” Beth said. “You always win.” The cluttered house was proof of that. Aunt Harry solved puzzles, entered contests, sweepstakes, scratched off “lucky numbers” and won nine times out of ten.

  Her luck was uncanny, to be sure. A constant parade of UPS men carried in boxes and packets containing everything from free pens to teddy bears, microwave ovens to chiming mantel clocks and coffeemakers—lots and lots of coffeemakers. Unfortunately, Aunt Harry kept everything. She also played the lotteries—Big Four, Pennsylvania Daily, Cash Five, Wild Card, Super 6 Lotto—but had won only small prizes on those.

  Every flat surface, every shelf, every corner of the house held a prize. Whenever she entered the house, Beth was overwhelmed by a feeling of claustrophobia. Teddy bears and other stuffed animals lined the stairs. There were awards of lamps, coolers and cardboard boxes of laundry soap. You name it, Harry won it.

  Every room had at least two radios and three televisions. Even the front door knocker was first prize for a local grocery store contest. The fact that it was a Bugs Bunny face made no difference to Aunt Harry. “We can always use more Easter decorations, dear,” she had explained happily.

  Beth wearily closed her eyes. If Russ Foster thought her mother and aunt were batty ten years ago, he must undoubtedly be convinced Beth didn’t fall far from the tree since she was living here now.

  “They’ll beg me to come back. They’ll miss my lemon bars,” Aunt Harry called from the kitchen.

  “I’m sure they will.” Beth stored the excess pumpkins in the closet under the stairs.

  Except her lemon bars were raspberry.

  Returning to the living room, she began taping colorful cutouts of witches and black cats to the front windows. Her gaze focused on Russ who was jogging back, running slower now, his eyes trained on the Morris front window. Did his blue eyes still hold that boyish charm that had so captivated her the first time they’d met? From where she stood, he was as handsome as ever. If anything, he was even better looking.

  Her mind skipped back twelve years. The Fosters had moved to Morning Sun in Beth’s junior year of high school. David Foster had been her age and had been quickly elected yearbook editor at Morning Sun High, a post he’d held until graduation. Russ, on the other hand, had been a basketball standout, named to the Pennsylvania All American team and had been in his senior year.

  Even now, Beth blushed at the thought of how she had adored him. It was the mother of all crushes. Of course, half the girls in school had felt the same. The evening he had asked her to the school dance, her feet had never touched the sidewalk on the way home. For over a week, she had floated on cloud nine. Russ Foster had asked crazy old Alice Davis’s daughter to a dance. Improbable, but true, nevertheless.

  When he’d picked her up in his old Volkswagen, she couldn’t stop smiling. She’d been so happy that she’d forgotten even to be embarrassed by Aunt Harriet and her mom, who, dressed like toy soldiers, had been standing at the front door to see her off.

  Beth closed her eyes, swallowing against the sudden tightness in her throat. That evening had been pure magic. There had been envy in her friends’ eyes, but she’d hardly noticed. The only person she’d seen that night was Russ.

  A local disc jockey had played and replayed “Only You”, by The Platters. To th
is day, she couldn’t hear the song without her eyes misting. When Russ had taken her hand, drawing her out onto the dance floor, she’d felt like Cinderella. Words hadn’t been necessary. They’d danced every dance, talked softly, laughed at nothing. She could still smell his starched shirt.

  After the dance, they, along with half the school, had stopped at a local fast-food joint for a soft drink. The hangout had been crowded and it had seemed everyone stopped by their table to visit. She’d been jealous of each minute his classmates had claimed, wanting every second of Russ to herself.

  Finally, it had been late, and she’d known the magic would have to end. All the way home, she’d worried whether he’d want a good-night kiss and whether she’d let him kiss her. She smiled now at her innocence.

  The worry had been needless. When Russ had stopped in front of her home, he’d sat behind the wheel for a long moment—so long she’d started to worry. Did he expect her to get out? Just like that? No innocuous good-night peck? She’d reached for the door handle. He had gotten out and had come around to help her out. They’d walked to the door holding hands. Then, the moment she both had anticipated and feared had been there. He’d hesitated as if weighing a decision, then had squeezed her hand and had said a very proper good-night.

  The prick of disappointment still stung, and Beth blinked back tears. Strange, that after all these years, she clearly remembered running inside the house before Russ could see her hurt.

  Of course, it couldn’t have turned out any differently. The fact that he’d asked her out in the first place had been a miracle. She didn’t need a crystal ball to know why he’d never asked again.

  He’d left for college soon after graduation, then went on to a job in Washington D.C. It hurt that her most exciting night was one that was only a whim for him. A man like Russ Foster wouldn’t give crazy Alice Morris’s daughter a second thought.

  Over the years, gossip had kept her informed of Russ’s whereabouts. He’d been engaged for a brief time, but had broken off the relationship. Someone had said he worked for the CIA. Another had said the FBI. Someone even had hinted he was a mercenary working in Asia somewhere. That, she hadn’t believed. Her pride had kept her from inquiring about him.