Santa in a Stetson
Page 19
“Don’t call me that unless you mean it,” she blurted out, storming into the room and whirling to face him. She hadn’t known what to say before, but she did now. “Don’t call me your honey, or little darlin’, or anything like that unless I’m the last one of those you’re ever going to have. And you’d be a fool not to take me, Russ, because I’m the best thing that ever happened to you, and I’m sick of you not being able to see that!” She paused to gulp in a breath.
The one-room cabin was filled with the scents of Christmas dinner piled on the small table in the corner. Russ stood partly in shadow, his arms crossed over his chest. “Go on. I can tell you’re not played out yet.”
“No, I’m not! You lived through that crash, but so what? You might as well not have. It’s terrible the way you’ve denied your love to folks these past three years. You have so much love to give, and you keep it bottled up inside, never letting Steve know how much you care about him, or Claire, or...”
“Or you?” he said softly.
She swallowed hard. “Or me.”
He uncrossed his arms and stepped closer, although his face was still in shadow. “All those folks who came to visit me tonight. Was that your idea?”
She lifted her chin. “Yes, it was. You gave love to those people last night, whether you realized it or not Some of them were strangers to you. If you can do that, then the least you can do is love the people closest to you.”
“Like you?”
She met his gaze, but the light was too dim for her to read the emotion written there. “Yes, like me.”
“Did you ask them all to tell me that?”
She stared at him in shock. “T-tell you what?”
“That I’d be a damn fool if I didn’t snap you up quick as I could.”
“No!” Heat rose to her already flushed cheeks. “Of course I wouldn’t ask them to say such a thing. I just thought they’d like to thank you for being Santa Claus last night.”
“Well, they did that, and then every last one of them told me to marry you. Even the kids.”
“Oh, Russ.” She covered her face in embarrassment “I really didn’t—” She paused and took her hands away to gaze at him defiantly. “But it’s true. You should.”
His mouth twitched as if he might be holding back a smile. “And why should I?”
“You’re a smart man, Russ, and you should have figured it out by now. If you haven’t, I’m sure not going to tell you!”
He stepped more fully into the light, and there, in the depths of his eyes, was the same glow she’d seen when he’d come into the kitchen this afternoon. “Okay, I’ll take a stab at it. Maybe because I don’t want to end up alone and miserable like Hector Barnes, or maybe because I’d like to have a little girl like Amanda someday, or a little boy like Benny.”
Her heart started beating in a crazy rhythm.
“Maybe because I want to be with you when you pay Lucile and the kittens a visit, and maybe because I want that special something that Ned has with Sharon, and Fran has with Dave. Maybe because nobody’s ever done something like this for me, sent a whole army of folks to convince me I’m a good person.” He smiled. “And maybe because you’re the prettiest thing stark naked that I’ve ever seen.”
His last comment heated her blood. “Russ!”
“And maybe because I love hearin’ you say my name.” He took her gently into his arms. “And maybe because I want to keep callin’ you sweetheart, and little darlin’ and honey for the rest of my life. And because Ned said he’d kill me if I didn’t marry you, and then he’d go to jail and Sharon would be all alone.”
She drank in every word, but still it wasn’t enough. “That’s all?”
He laughed softly. “That’s a powerful lot of reasons, sweetheart” He pulled her closer so that she could feel the wild beating of his heart. “And I didn’t have sense enough to see a one of them before. But even taking all those reasons, there’s still something missing, isn’t there?”
“Yes.” Her world hung in the balance as she waited.
“Then I guess I should marry you because I love you more than life itself. Be my wife, Jo. Help me start livin’ again.”
She started to cry.
“Oh, little darlin’, don’t cry.” He kissed her cheeks, her eyes, her mouth. “Please don’t.”
“I’m...crying...because I’m...really, really happy,” she said through her tears.
“Happy tears? Like Lucile’s?”
“Y-yes.” She sniffed.
“Then I must have given you something special.”
She gazed up at him through watery eyes. “Only the best Christmas present of my life.”
“Does that mean you like the idea of gettin’ married and making love to each other for the rest of our born days?”
“I love it. It’s the right kind, the right color and it fits great. That’s why I’m crying.”
He swept her up in his arms and carried her to the bed. “Then get ready to sob your little eyes out, honey. Because all I’m gonna do for the next sixty or seventy years is give you that same present over and over and over again.”
ISBN : 978-1-4592-7120-3
SANTA IN A STETSON
Copyright © 1997 by Vicki Lewis Thompson.
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