“I’m going to go change and tell Lou and Livvie that we’re having dinner here,” she announced.
She hurried away, leaving him alone with Faith—or as alone as they could be in a vast holiday-themed lodge still filled with about twenty other people.
“It really was a wonderful show,” he said.
“I can’t take any of the credit.”
He had to smile, remembering how busy she had been before and during the show. The previous year had been the same. She claimed she wanted nothing to do with the holiday show, then pitched in and did whatever was necessary to pull it off.
His smile slid away when he realized she was gazing at his mouth again.
Yeah. He decided he didn’t much care what people would think if he kissed her again right now.
She swallowed and looked away. “I need to, um, probably take Sparkle back to the barn for the night.”
Besides the musical number with Addie and her friends, the other highlight of the show had been when Celeste, under duress, read from her famous story “Sparkle and the Magic Snowball” to the captivated audience while the real Sparkle stood next to her, looking for all the world as if he were reading the story over her shoulder.
“I’ll help,” he offered.
Both of them knew she didn’t need his help but after a moment, she shrugged and headed toward the front door and the enclosure where Sparkle hung out when he made appearances at the lodge.
Faith paused long enough to grab her coat off the rack by the door and toss his to him, then the two of them walked outside into the night.
The reindeer wandered over to greet them like old friends, the bells on his harness jingling merrily.
“Hey, Sparkle. How are you, pal?”
The reindeer lipped at his outstretched hand, making Chase wish he’d brought along an apple or something.
“I really don’t need your help,” Faith said. “He’s so easygoing this is a one-person job—if that. I could probably tell him to go to bed and he would wander over to the barn, flip the latch and head straight for his stall. He might even turn off the lights on his way.”
He had to smile at the whimsical image. “I’m here. Let’s do this so we can eat, too.”
With a sigh, she reached to unlatch the gate. Before she could, Ella Baker came out of the lodge, bundled against the cold and carrying an armload of sheet music.
“You’re not staying for dinner?” Faith asked after they exchanged greetings.
“I can’t. My dad is having a rough time right now so I need to take off. But thank you again for asking me to do this. I had so much fun. If you do it again next year and I’m still in town, I would love to help out.”
“That’s terrific!” Faith exclaimed. “I’ll let Hope know. I can guarantee she’ll be thrilled to hear this. Thank you!”
“I’m so sorry your sister couldn’t be here to see it,” Ella said. “I hope the live video worked so she could watch it at home.”
Hope was still taking it easy, Chase knew, though she’d had no other problems since that frightening day the week before.
“She saw it,” Faith assured her. “I talked to her right afterward and she absolutely loved it, just like everyone else did.”
“Oh, I’m so glad.” Ella smiled, then turned to him. “Chase, it’s really good to see you again. I didn’t have the chance to tell you this the other night but I had such a great time dancing with you. I’d love to do it again sometime.”
It was clearly an invitation and for a moment, he didn’t know what to say. Any other single guy in Pine Gulch would probably think he’d just won the lottery. Ella was lovely and seemed very nice. A relationship with her would probably be easy and uncomplicated—unlike certain other women he could mention.
The only trouble was, that particular woman in question had him so wrapped up in knots, he couldn’t untangle even a tiny thread of interest in Ella.
“I’m afraid opportunities to dance are few and far between around here,” he said, in what he hoped was a polite but clear message.
“You two could always go to the Renegade,” Faith suggested blithely. “They have a live band with dancing just about every Saturday night.”
For a moment, he could only stare at her. Seriously? She was pimping him out to take another woman dancing?
“That would be fun,” Ella said, obviously taking Faith’s suggestion as encouragement. “Maybe we could go after the holidays.”
Chase didn’t want to hurt her but he was not about to take her up on the invitation to go out dancing while he was standing in front of the woman he loved.
Even if it had been Faith’s suggestion in the first place.
“I don’t know,” he said, in what he hoped was a noncommittal but clear voice. “I have my daughter a couple weekends a month and it’s tough for me to get away.”
Understanding flashed in her eyes along with a shadow of pained rejection. He hated that he had planted it there—and hated more that Faith had put him in the position in the first place.
“No problem,” she said, some of the animation leaving her features. “Let me know if you have a free night. I’ve got to run. Good night. And Merry Christmas in advance.”
She gave a smile that was only a degree or two shy of genuine and headed out into the parking lot toward her car.
He wasn’t sure how, exactly, but Chase managed to hold on to the slippery, fraying ends of his temper as they led the reindeer the short distance across the snowy landscape to The Christmas Ranch barn.
It coiled through him as they worked together to take off Sparkle’s harness and bells, gave him a good brushing, then made sure he had food and water.
He should just let it go, he told himself after they stepped out of the stall and closed the gate.
The evening had been wonderful and he didn’t want to ruin it by fighting with her.
He almost had himself convinced of that but somehow as he looked at her, his anger slipped free and the words rolled out anyway.
“Why the hell would you do that?”
Chapter Thirteen
Faith stared at him, stunned by the anger that seemed to seethe around them like storm-tossed sea waves.
“Do...what?”
“You know. You just tried to set me up with Ella Baker again.”
Her face flamed even as she shivered at his hard tone. Oh. That.
“All I did was mention that the Renegade has dancing on Saturday nights. I only thought it would be fun for the two of you.”
His jaw worked as he continued to stare down at her. “Is that right?”
“Ella is really great,” she said. She might as well double down on her own stupidity. “I’ve seen her with the kids this week and she’s amazing—so patient and kind and talented. You heard her sing. Any single guy would have to be crazy not to want to go out with her.”
“Really, Faith. Really?” The words came at her like a whip snapping through the cold air.
He was furious, she realized. More angry than she had ever seen him. She could see it in every rigid line of his body, from his flexed jaw to his clenched fists.
“After everything that’s happened between us these last few weeks, you seriously want to stand there and pretend you think I might have the slightest interest in someone else?”
She let out a breath, ashamed of herself for dragging an innocent—and very nice—woman into this. She didn’t even know why she had. The words had just sort of come out. She certainly didn’t want Chase dating Ella Baker but maybe on some level she was still hanging on to the hope that they could somehow return to the easy friendship of a few weeks ago and forget the rest of this.
“I can’t help it if I want you to be happy,” she said, her voice low. “You’re my dearest friend.”
“Okay,” she whispered. She shouldn’t be relieved about that but she couldn’t seem to help it.
He gazed down at her, features hard and implacable. “There is only one woman I want in my life and it’s you, Faith. You have to know that. I’m in love with you. It’s you. It has always been you.”
She caught her breath at his words as joy burst through her like someone had switched on a thousand Christmas trees. She wanted to savor it, to simply close her eyes and soak it in.
I love you, too. So, so much.
The words crowded in her throat, jostling with each other to get out.
Over the last few weeks, she had come to accept that unalterable truth. She was in love with him and had been for a long time.
Perhaps some little part of her had loved him since that day he drove her into town when she was a frightened girl of fifteen.
What might have happened between them if his father hadn’t been dying, if Travis hadn’t come back to the Star N and she hadn’t been overwhelmed by the sweet, kind safety he offered, the anchor she had so desperately needed?
She didn’t know. She only knew that Chase had always been so very important in her world—more than she could ever have imagined after Travis died so suddenly.
The reminder slammed into her and she reached out for the rough planks of Sparkle’s enclosure for support.
Travis.
The images of that awful moment when she had found him lying under his overturned ATV—covered in blood, so terribly still—seemed to flash through her mind in a grim, horrible slide show. She hadn’t been able to save him, no matter how desperately she had tried as she begged him not to leave her like her father, her mother.
She had barely survived losing Travis. How could she find the strength to let herself be vulnerable to that sort of raw, all-consuming, soul-destroying pain again?
She couldn’t. She had been a coward so many years ago as a helpless girl caught up in events beyond her control and she was still a coward.
Faith opened her mouth to speak but the words wouldn’t come.
The silence dragged between them. She was afraid to meet his gaze but when she forced herself to do it, she found his eyes murky with sadness and what she thought might be disappointment.
“You don’t have to say anything.” All the anger seemed to have seeped out of him, leaving his features as bleak as the snow-covered mountains above the tree line. “I get it.”
How could he, when she didn’t understand? She had the chance for indescribable happiness here with the man she loved. Why couldn’t she just take that step, find enough strength inside herself to try again?
“It doesn’t matter how much time I give you. You’ve made up your mind not to let yourself see me as anything more than your dearest friend and nothing I do can change that.”
She wanted to tell him that wasn’t true. She saw him for exactly what he was. The strong, decent, wonderful man she loved with all her heart.
Fear held both her heart and her words in a tight, icy grip. “Chase, I—” she managed, but he shook his head.
“Don’t,” he said. “I pushed you too hard. I thought you might be ready to move forward but I can see now I only complicated things between us and wasted both of our time. It was a mistake and I’m sorry.”
“I’m the one who’s sorry,” she said softly, but he had turned around and headed for the door and she wasn’t sure he heard her.
The moment he left, she pressed a hand to her chest and the sharp, cold ache there, as if someone had pierced her skin with an icicle.
She wanted so badly to go after him but told herself maybe it was better this way.
Wasn’t it better to lose a friendship than to risk having her heart cut out of her body?
* * *
Chase didn’t know how he made it through the next few days.
The hardest thing had been walking back inside the Saint Nicholas Lodge and trying to pretend everything was fine, with his emotions a raw, tangled mess.
He was pretty sure he fooled nobody. Celeste and Mary seemed especially watchful and alert as he and Addie dined with the family. As for Faith, she had come in about fifteen minutes after he did with her eyes red and her features subdued. She sat on the exact opposite side of the room from him and picked at her food, her features tight and set.
He was aware of a small, selfish hope that perhaps she was suffering a tiny portion of the vast pain that seemed to have taken over every thought.
She had left early, ostensibly with the excuse of taking some of the leftovers to Rafe and Hope, though he was fairly certain it was another effort to avoid him.
He did his best to put his pain on the back burner, focusing instead on making his remaining few hours with his daughter until after the New Year memorable for her.
Their premature Christmas Eve went off without a hitch. When they returned home, she changed into her pajamas and they played games and watched a favorite holiday movie, then she opened the one early present he allowed her—a carved ornament he had made from a pretty aspen burl on a downed tree he found in the mountains. In the morning she opened the rest of her presents from him and he fixed her breakfast, then she helped him take care of a few chores.
Too soon, her mother showed up after visiting her parents at the care center where Cindy’s mother was still recovering from her stroke.
Chase tried to put on a smile for Cindy, sorry all over again for the mess he had made of his marriage.
He had tried so hard to love her. Those early days had been happy, getting ready for the baby and then their early days with Addie, but their shared love of their daughter hadn’t provided strong enough glue to keep them together.
It hadn’t been Cindy’s fault that his heart hadn’t been completely free. Despite his best efforts, she somehow had sensed it all along and he regretted that now.
He understood why disappointment and hurt turned her bitter and cold toward him and he resolved to do his best to be kinder.
Addie had decided to leave some of the gifts he had given her at the ranch so she could enjoy them during her time with him there, but she still had several she wanted to take home. After he loaded them into her mom’s SUV, he hugged his daughter and kissed the top of her head. “Have a fun cruise, Addie-bug, and at Disney World. I want to hear every detail when you get back.”
“Okay,” she said, her arms tight around his neck. “You won’t be by yourself on Christmas, will you, Dad? You’ll go open presents at the Star N with Louisa and Barrett, right?”
His heart seemed to give a sharp little spasm. That’s what he had done for several years, even before Travis died, but that was looking unlikely this year.
“I’m not sure,” he lied. “I’ll be fine, whatever I do. Merry Christmas, kiddo.”
As they drove away, he caught sight of the lights of the Star N and The Christmas Ranch below the Brannon Ridge.
How was he going to make it through the remainder of his life without her—and without Lou and Barrett and the rest of her family he loved so much?
He didn’t have the first idea.
* * *
“Why isn’t Chase coming for dinner tonight?” Louisa asked as she and Barrett decorated Christmas cookie angels on the kitchen island.
“Yeah. He always comes over on Christmas Eve,” Barrett said.
“And on Christmas morning when we open presents,” Louisa added.
Faith had no idea how to answer her children. It made her chest ache
all over again, just thinking about it.
That morning she had gathered her nerve and called to invite him for dinner and to make arrangements for transferring Louisa’s Christmas present from Brannon Ridge to the Star N. She had been so anxious about talking to him again after four days of deafening silence, but the call went straight to voice mail.
He was avoiding her.
That was fairly obvious, especially when he texted just moments later declining her invitation but telling her that he already had a plan to take care of the other matter and she didn’t need to worry about it.
The terse note after days of no contact hurt more than she could have imagined, even though she knew it was her own fault. She wanted so much to jump in her truck and drive to his ranch, to tell him she was sorry for all the pain she had put them both through.
“I guess he must have made other plans this year,” she said now in answer to her daughter.
Mary made a harrumphing sort of noise from her side of the island but said nothing else in front of the children, much to Faith’s relief.
Though her aunt didn’t know what had transpired between Faith and Chase, Mary knew something had. She blamed Faith for it and had made no secret that she wasn’t happy about it.
“Addie texted me a while ago. She’s worried he’ll be all by himself for the holidays,” Louisa said. Her daughter made it sound like that was the worst possible fate anyone could endure and the guilty knot under Faith’s rib cage seemed to expand.
Her children loved Chase—and vice versa. She hated being the cause of a rift between them.
“We should take him some of our cookies,” Barrett suggested.
“That’s a great idea,” Mary said, with a pointed look at her. “Faith, why don’t you take him some cookies? You could be there and back before everybody shows up for dinner.”
He didn’t want cookies from her. He didn’t want anything—except the one thing she wasn’t sure she had the strength to give.
“Maybe we can all take them over later,” she said.
The three looked as if they wanted to argue but she made an impromptu excuse, desperate to escape the guilt and uncertainty. “I need to go. I’ve got a few things I need to do out in the barn before tonight.”
The Holiday Gift Page 15