Must Love Mistletoe

by Christie Ridgway

  As the door swung shut behind him, the scent inside the store rushed into his lungs, triggering an instant, intense olfactory memory. It was so damn real he could watch it play out on the blank screen of his missing eye. His hand still squeezing the doorknob, he closed his working one so he could see it even better.

  Nineteen. Christmas vacation. Gram had baked oatmeal-raisin cookies to welcome him back, and he’d taken a plateful with him when he’d gone to meet Bailey at The Perfect Christmas.

  The bells had jingled then too, and he’d breathed in the store’s spicy scent, the cookies in his hands adding a second layer of sweetness. And then more sweetness as Bailey flew into his arms—he hadn’t seen her since Labor Day. She’d looked like a celebration in a tiny red skirt, tight green sweater, black boots that hit just below her knees.

  They’d kissed, Finn gripping that plate between them so that he wouldn’t hold her as hard as he wanted to. So hard that she’d melt into his bones.

  At closing time they’d shooed everyone else out, then locked the doors and dimmed the lights. She’d tugged him to the farthest corner of the farthest room and they’d made a place for themselves beneath a tree twinkling with multicolored lights. White fake fur circled its base, and she’d lain back on it like a child, gleeful in the snow.

  “Come here,” she’d whispered, smiling, but he’d resisted, his blood pumping so hard and hot in his veins that he’d only trusted himself to look at all her angelic prettiness.

  “Come here,” she’d insisted, a wayward angel now, who drew one heel toward the other knee, shifting the hem of her little red skirt higher on her bare, opening thighs.

  Weakened by the sight, he’d leaned over, propping himself on one elbow to feed her a fragrant cookie.

  Crumbs had dusted her green sweater and he’d made a big show of brushing them away, drawing the side of his hand back and forth against her hardening nipples. The nape of his neck had burned and his cock had been ready for more long before he let his tattooed knuckles sneak under her sweater to stroke her bare midriff.

  The skin there goose-bumped beneath his fingertips and he’d stared, fascinated by the matching ones that rushed down her inner thighs. Desperate, he’d sucked in air that was sweet, so sweet, a dizzying combination of the smell of the store, the cookie on Bailey’s breath, her perfume.

  Pushing her sweater toward her breasts, he’d kissed her navel, close enough now to inhale a creamier scent that he wanted to think was proof that she desired him too. As usual, her face surrendered nothing. With her lashes brushing her cheeks, he couldn’t see the expression in her eyes. Her baby-doll mouth was plump, but pursed. Silent.

  So he could only hope, wish, then finally believe once he touched her thighs, tracing those goose bumps in reverse, and curled his forefinger beneath the elastic of her panties.

  As he touched the wetness waiting for him, he didn’t think she breathed.

  It paralyzed him.

  “What do you want, Finn?” she’d asked, her eyes shut tight.

  Everything. Every day.

  He wanted her joy in seeing him. To her, he wasn’t the screw-up son, the delinquent teenager, the failure one arrest away from jail.

  He wanted her mind. The brains that made her number three in her high school class. The intelligence that could write a paper on The Sun Also Rises that not only he could understand, but that also made him want to read the book.

  Finn, the fuck-up, wanting to read.

  As much—more, hell, he’d only been nineteen, for God’s sake—he’d wanted her body. Every lithe line, every feminine curve, every small moan that he could manage to wring from her. He wanted to rub his face against her belly, the small of her back, the hills of her pretty ass.

  “Finn?”

  She’d faint if he told her the truth—that he wanted to dip a cookie in that sweet, delicious cream between her thighs and then gobble it down.

  “Finn?”

  Her voice had lost its breathiness. It sounded surprised.

  Or annoyed.

  His eye popped open.

  And there she was. Not sweet or tremulous or laid out for him like a Christmas banquet. Instead she looked harried, her elf hat askew, her eyes fatigued. As if she’d spent the day searching for the last Go-Go Toaster train in Southern California. A passel of kids were gathered around her, the littlest ones with her work apron clutched in their fists. A gooey-looking, child-sized candy cane was stuck in the ends of her hair.

  He didn’t mean to laugh. But it was funny—the joke on him—that he’d been dreaming of the seventeen-year-old princess who ruled his body and then been rudely awakened by this grown-up, hassled-looking woman who gazed at him like he was a frog instead of a god.

  Then the joke really was on him, because she glanced down at the kiddie squad. “Hey, everybody, remember how I couldn’t promise we’d have Santa to read you stories tomorrow? Because Santa was probably planning on riding the uh, big surf?”

  Disgruntled nods all around.

  “I was wrong. I’m certain our AWOL Santa will be here!”

  The motley crew cheered. Bailey grinned at their enthusiasm.

  Then she looked over at him. Her forefinger aimed at his chest.

  U

  Her hand curved into a circle.

  O

  Her thumb jutted backward, her lips formed the word.

  Me.

  Too late, Finn remembered he hadn’t wanted to know what exactly she meant by that.

  * * *

  Bailey Sullivan’s Vintage Christmas

  Facts & Fun Calendar

  December 8

  In medieval England, people attended church at Christmas wearing Halloween-type masks and costumes. They’d sing rowdy songs and even roll dice on the altar.

  * * *

  Chapter 8

  “You’re supposed to be nice to Santa,” Finn hissed, the words twitching the silvery beard and mustache strapped to his head beneath the plush red-and-white hat.

  “Only if Santa has something in his bag I want,” Bailey retorted in a hushed voice, shoving a storybook into his hand. She looked down at the dozen or so little ones who were cross-legged on the floor in the front room of The Perfect Christmas for story hour. Their moms were either hovering at the edge of their semicircle or—better yet—edging away to look over merchandise and check price tags. “Now stop yapping and get ready to read.”

  “I only asked for a glass of water.”

  “No time,” she said, for his ears only. “The kiddies are here and we said we’d start at eleven on the dot. This is a business, Finn, and I don’t have time to hold your hand.”

  She wished back the comment the minute she said it. It was all business at The Perfect Christmas, no matter that she’d dragged her old flame—a man whose hand she used to love to hold and also a man whom she’d had to admit to herself she was once again out-of-control attracted to—into playing Santa. But that had been a business decision too!

  He’d been standing there yesterday afternoon, just as she’d finished an exhaustive hour doing the Pied Piper thing for a passel of sugar-buzzed, Christmas-crazed, two-legged little rats. The idea of having to read Christmas stories to a similar group the next day had made her want to run, screaming, for the Hollywood Hills.

  With the surf up and her sales dude Byron heading beachside, she’d desperately needed a Santa more than she needed distance from Finn. Plus, he owed her, and he seemed to accept that fact.

  Now if only his piratical take on St. Nick wouldn’t scare the kiddies or do any lasting psychological damage. It looked as if Sesame Street and those weird Wiggles (the store stocked both their Christmas CDs) had actually taught the kids to accept differences, however. Only one munchkin at Finn’s feet had made note of his patch—and then only to ask if he’d been poked in the eye by an antler. Finn had murmured something under his breath about a Red Ryder BB gun, and one of the younger mothers laughed. She was still there, cozying up to the kiddie circle.

&
nbsp; Bailey checked the clock. “Go,” she said.

  He glanced up at her.

  A sharp pang pierced her, somewhere between her stomach and her throat. A bullet had wounded Finn, she thought, and not for the first time. It had taken one of his eyes.

  He could have died.

  Somehow she was suddenly holding his hand after all.

  Frowning, he squeezed her fingers. “Bailey…”

  She whipped her hand away. Business! “The book,” she said. “Start reading.”

  With a little shrug, he turned away from her and opened the storybook in his hands.

  With a lot of relief, she moved away from him and toward the cash register on the other side of the room. For several minutes her hands occupied themselves with organizing the pen cup and tidying the checks in the drawer even as her ears took in Finn’s low voice. She stole a look at him. It was kind of cute, really, to see the baddest boy she knew dressed up like the nicest man in the world, telling children a story.

  Made you think about him as a dad some day—

  No. It did not make Bailey think of him as a dad. No damn way. God, the sentimental glop The Perfect Christmas sold by way of merchandise and atmosphere was trying to wear off on her.

  Turning her back on the storytime tableau, she thought about her real office, where people dressed in suits the colors of stone and dirt and ash. Her real work, where the kind of business conducted was just right for a hard-hearted, hard-headed realist like herself.

  A place where people bled money, not red.

  She found her gaze on Finn again, and she wrenched it away as the front door opened. Through it came the general—no, Captain Reed, the president of the chamber of commerce. With him was a woman with the battleship bustline and helmet hair of her elementary school principal. Bailey narrowed her eyes. It was her elementary school principal.

  Both newcomers paused to watch Santa and his little buddies for several minutes, then made their way over to Bailey at the register.

  The captain beamed. “I knew you would take care of things,” he said. Then he gestured to his buxom companion. “Do you remember Peggy Mohn?”

  “Of course I do.” She nodded. “Principal Mohn.”

  The older woman shot out her hand and squeezed Bailey’s fingers like she used to squeeze the upper arms of little kids who couldn’t stand still in the lunch line. “Bailey. Good to see you back home. I’ve left education and I’m now in medical equipment sales.”

  Education was better off for the defection, Bailey thought, but she pitied the bedpans.

  “Peggy’s also the VP of the chamber,” the captain added. “She’s an idea person, I’ll tell you. It was she who coordinated all these Christmas events among the local businesses.”

  “Oh…nice.” Though thanks to the old battle-ax Bailey was within spitting distance of the first male she’d ever shared spit with—and whom she wanted to share spit with again.

  “It’s been a great success,” Peggy put in. “Though I had a few bad moments when I heard The Perfect Christmas wouldn’t stand by its obligations.”

  Her disapproving tone set Bailey’s neck hairs on fire. Not only had the old biddy tried to squelch every childish joy at Crown Elementary—she’d had the swings removed and there’d been a no-running rule on the playground—but Bailey didn’t like her intimations about shirking responsibility. While she might assert that her mother would have to wake up soon and smell the single-woman java, it wasn’t up to Peggy Mohn to stand in judgment. The older woman didn’t understand the hell her mother had gone through during her divorce from Bailey’s father. She did. The memory of the misery and the tears could still scratch like fingernails against the chalkboard of her mind.

  Bailey’s voice sounded stiff. “Look…”

  “But now you’ve taken over,” Peggy went on. Even she was beaming now. “I remember your attendance awards, citizenship medals, the recess and lunch peacekeeper program you started in sixth grade.”

  “Pretty easy to keep the peace when there were rules against play,” she murmured under her breath.

  “So I know we can count on you,” Peggy finished.

  Bailey felt a cold chill put out that still-burning fire on the back of her neck. “Count on me for what, exactly?”

  “The Valentine’s Weekend celebrations we have in mind.” The older woman was ticking them off on her fingers. “The coordinated events we’re planning for St. Patrick’s Day, Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day, Thanksgiving.”

  “I’m not…I won’t…” Bailey fumbled for words, as she felt heavy chains draping over her, cold links twisting around her waist, her wrists, locking her to the store, to Coronado, to—

  “Bailey, I’m having some trouble here.”

  Finn, it was Finn, plucking at the patent leather belt around his waist. She realized that storytime was over. The children had joined their mothers and were crowded around the display of books she’d conveniently set up behind the Santa chair.

  “Let me help you with that,” she offered, coming around the register. “Excuse me,” she told the chamber of commerce people, “but I have to get back to work.”

  They both were smiling again. “That’s just what I like to hear,” Peggy said.

  Bailey ignored her and dragged Finn in the direction of the stock room in the back, signaling Brontë toward the front register. “Don’t take the costume off while you’re in sight of the kids,” she scolded Santa in a fierce whisper, half because Peggy pissed her off and half because even a pirate—especially a pirate—should realize he was playing a role here.

  With the door shut to screen them from the rest of the store, while he removed his hat and luxurious facial hair, she went after his belt. The mechanism was stiff and stubborn, and she grunted in exasperation.

  Finn’s voice sounded amused. “Never in a million years did I think I’d have you working so hard to open my pants again.”

  “It’s your jacket, as if you didn’t know.” In any case, her face prickled with embarrassed heat. She gave the belt’s leather tongue an impatient yank, which sent him stumbling back. A tall stack of boxes tumbled.

  “Damn. Now look what you’ve done.” She pushed him aside to reright the packages.

  “You’re so very welcome,” Finn said, sarcasm dripping from the polite words, as he stripped off the Santa suit so that he stood once again in a white T-shirt and seen-better-days jeans. “I was glad to extend my services.”

  She flushed. “This is new stock that I haven’t put out yet. I don’t want any of it damaged.”

  He picked up one of the boxes, stacked it, stacked another. “You’re getting this stuff from all over the country. And lots of the addresses are handwritten.”

  Bailey bit her bottom lip, then cast a glance at the closed door. “Here’s the thing. Due to the upheaval caused by my folks’ separation, there’s a bit of a…a hole in the stock. So I’ve bought a few things—okay, more than a few things—off eBay and some other sites. Older pieces. I’m going to turn the smallest room upstairs into something called Grandma’s Attic.” She believed the idea was brilliant herself, but she wasn’t sure what anyone else would think.

  So it was good to talk about it out loud. To talk about it with Finn, for some odd reason. “To be honest, I hope to make a killing on vintage decorations.”

  Finn placed the last carton on top of the stack. “Markup?”

  She could hardly hide her smile. Then she gave up trying. “In a tourist setting like this? With vacation dollars burning holes in their Bermuda pockets? Grandiose.”

  Finn laughed. “Now there’s the creative little business wonk I know. Remember that lemonade stand you ran one summer? Way before Starbucks opened its doors, you were the first fast-food service person I knew to keep a tip jar by the cash box.” For some reason she couldn’t imagine, he linked his arms around her waist. It was a friendly gesture, she supposed, wondering if that was how he saw her now.

  She stared at the pulse beating in
his throat and realized hers was pounding much, much faster. It wasn’t exactly “friendly” feelings on this side of the aisle, damn it.

  His voice lowered. His head did too. “You know what, GND?”

  She could smell him again. That scent that wasn’t Irish Spring, but that was Secret Service Finn. Man Finn. Still sexy Finn. “What?”

  “I have a sneaking suspicion you’re happy in this place.”

  Bailey couldn’t deny it fast enough. “It’s just business.”

  His long fingers caressed the small of her back, and a little shiver ran up her spine. She remembered his lips on hers in the T-bird. His teeth scraping against the skin of her shoulder. The wet suction of his mouth on her nipple. God, that had been so good.

  He smiled as if he was reading her mind. “The Perfect Christmas is a business you just happen to love.”

  The words paralyzed her. “You’re wrong. None of this is what I want,” she said, her voice hoarse.

  He ran a soothing hand along her back. “Bailey—”

  Jolting back, she jerked free of his touch. “None of it.”

  His arms fell to his side. His expression hardened. “That’s right. It’s only business. All business. That’s why you rushed home when you heard the store was in trouble. That’s why you coerced me into playing Santa. I’m sure you’ll say that’s why I had your tongue in my mouth and why I had my mouth on your breasts the other night too.”

  Digging her nails into her palms, she turned away from him. What was she supposed to say? “Do you have a better reason?”

  “No.” He laughed again, without amusement. “Fuck no. I wouldn’t be that stupid, now that I’m a college-educated man and all.”

  She didn’t know how to respond to that either. So she stuck to practicalities. “We’ll have to sneak you out the back door so none of the kids see you. I think they’d recognize the eye patch and we don’t want to blow your Santa cover.”