Sweet Holiday Surprise (Indigo Bay Sweet Romance Series)

by Jean Oram

  Cash Campbell was hands-down the best kisser Alexa had ever laid her lips upon.

  Of course he had to be her boss. She couldn’t have it easy and be swept up by a man who came without complications.

  But soon Luke would return to Cohen’s as CEO and Cash would no longer be her boss. Because he’d be in Thailand, working for a new company.

  Alexa placed a hand against Cash’s chest, wanting to remain absorbed in the kiss rather than her thoughts. But knowing she was giving him the wrong impression about being his date, she slowly broke the kiss despite wishing it could go on forever.

  She cleared her throat and tried to steady herself, glad she was seated. She didn’t feel as though her legs could do a sufficient job of supporting her after that kiss. Because their attraction from the office? Yeah, it was pretty darn real. As real as being hit by a bullet train, and she didn’t expect to regain her footing for some time.

  “How did you two meet?” asked a woman from across the table.

  Alexa struggled to focus on the question and her surroundings. Waiters were weaving among the tables, delivering salads. Next would come chicken or fish, depending on the guest’s preference. After that would come the dance and the cake, just like at a real wedding reception.

  She wanted to grab Cash’s hand and run from the room, steal him away all for herself. But the woman was waiting for an answer, ignoring her salad. Alexa knew from her place setting that she was Mary Alice Bernfield, a guest who’d flown in on one of the chartered flights from Blueberry Springs Alexa had arranged on behalf of Luke and Emma for their friends and colleagues.

  “We work together,” Cash said, standing to reach across the table to shake hands. He introduced himself to everyone, committing names to memory in that genuine way of his that always impressed her.

  “Dating the boss?” Mary Alice asked slyly.

  “We’re…” She wasn’t sure what to say.

  “Engaged,” Lucille stated.

  The lie felt wrong and Alexa opened her mouth to set the story straight, but Cash continued with the tall tale. “She’s the only woman who’s always treated me the same whether I was rich or poor.”

  “Well, everyone has their faults,” Alexa joked uneasily. “Mine is spending all my money on horses in need of rescue. I have a ranch of them back in Montana. Yours happens to be women and fast cars. It would be hypocritical of me to judge.”

  Cash didn’t smile at her ribbing, a flash of hurt in his eyes setting her back.

  “A lot of people treated me differently after I lost everything to a tsunami in the South Pacific,” he said, his voice low.

  “Tsunami?” Mary Alice repeated, leaning forward.

  “What were you doing in the South Pacific?” Alexa asked, confused at this obviously sizable side to Cash that she’d been unaware of. All she’d heard from Luke, when he’d told her Cash was taking over and would be housesitting for him was to pay his house bills as per usual and to let him know if anything odd came through. She’d assumed he’d meant extravagant spending. But apparently there was more to the story that Luke hadn’t shared with her, even though he’d obviously shared her Anthony story with Cash.

  Cash had paused, and everyone at the table waited silently. For a moment, Alexa thought he wasn’t going to continue.

  “I took just about everything I had and invested in starting a tech company overseas. It was in a small community of about eighteen thousand. I refurbished buildings, brought in the equipment, trained a large staff. We were creating a new Silicon Valley, and just as we were about to open our doors a tsunami wiped out most of the town.”

  Alexa’s breath caught as she saw the pain in Cash’s expression. “That must have been shocking, devastating.”

  The others echoed her sentiment with quiet murmurs.

  Cash was looking down, absorbed in that old world. Finally he nodded. “It was. I thought I was going to do something really… And then…” He let out a shaky breath.

  Alexa reached for his hand. “I’m so sorry. I can’t imagine what it must have been like.”

  “A tornado hit my cousin’s hometown once, bless her heart,” Lucille said, drawing the guests’ attention to herself as she retold the tale of devastation.

  “I’m sorry you had to go through all of that,” Alexa said quietly to Cash. “We lost a herd in a flood once, but I can’t imagine what it must have been like to see people you know endure such trauma.”

  He let out a laugh. “Cows, huh?”

  “It’s not the same,” she said quickly.

  “Oh, Alexa.” He tipped his head so it was resting against hers, and smiled.

  “What?”

  “Nothing. You’re perfect.”

  The words hit her like her own internal tsunami, washing away the rest of her doubts. She angled her head, giving him a light kiss.

  A waiter topped up their water glasses and Alexa pulled back, lifting her fork to try the chicken she’d ordered. She hadn’t even noticed her untouched salad being swept away. “Did emergency aid and insurance help with rebuilding?”

  Cash shook his head. It looked as though his anger was rising to the surface like a submarine breaching too fast, cracks forming in the steel casing he’d wrapped around the emotions to keep them safely locked in.

  Alexa braced herself for an outburst, but all Cash did was let out a long heavy sigh, his shoulders drooping. “Corruption runs deep.”

  “Nothing?”

  “I sold everything I owned to put roofs over the heads of as many as I could, but in the end I had to admit defeat. I came home broke.”

  Alexa was stunned. She didn’t know what to say. It gutted her to learn that he had money problems, and that they were due to generosity and kindness and not frivolity like she’d first assumed. Cash was so much more than she’d ever given him credit for.

  She dropped her fork and threw her arms around him, squeezing him tightly. “You are the best man I’ve ever met.”

  “I’m not, Lex.” He was squeezing her back, his palm bracing her spine the best feeling in the world.

  She pulled away slightly so she could look him in the eye. “I don’t know anyone else who would do that for a community. Not even me.”

  “That’s because you would have been organizing a letter campaign, as well as contacting reporters and international officials. Maybe even making a plea to those who were lining their pockets and diverting emergency supplies,” he said with a half smile.

  “Yeah, okay. Maybe.” That did sound like something she’d do.

  She gazed at him as he brushed her bangs off her forehead. “We just have different ways of approaching problems and showing we care.”

  “Is that what it is?”

  “Show us the ring,” demanded Mary Alice, breaking into their conversation.

  “Ring?” Alexa asked, blinking at the guests.

  “Did you cry?” someone asked. “I cried like a baby when my Walter proposed.”

  “You cry at everything,” the guest beside her said.

  Cash held up Alexa’s hand, showcasing her bare finger. “See? I can’t even afford a ring for her and yet she still loves me. Broken and broke.”

  “Cash…” This was going too far. But he entwined his fingers in hers, locking their hands tightly together as though he needed to tether himself to her. As she watched him laugh with the others, trying to brush off the way he’d shared a painful moment from his past, Alexa realized that not only had she unfairly judged him, but that maybe things were much more real to him than she’d ever imagined.

  And that might even include tonight.

  Cash ate his mashed potatoes, green beans and roasted chicken with creamy white wine and garlic sauce in silence. He couldn’t quite believe he’d told everyone he was engaged to his assistant—even as a joke. And yet the idea didn’t leave him squeamish like it would have a year ago. What did that mean?

  He’d told Alexa about the South Pacific and she’d sympathized in a way that had made him fee
l less alone. It was as though he’d somehow shared the weight that had been sitting on his heart and lungs for months. But he didn’t know how to take it from here as he’d never allowed a woman he was interested in to see more than his light, playboy side.

  With Alexa they were serious when they worked, but also playful. Often interjecting a flirtatious comment or innuendo. But now that he’d shown her more…silence.

  He glanced at Alexa, who was chewing slowly, her unfocused gaze telling him she was processing things. Processing him.

  And he wasn’t sure what the printout would say when she was done. He hoped it would be good, that it wouldn’t damage or interfere with whatever it was they were building tonight. They were forging something that complemented their already strong bond, cementing their connection on a deeper level. He recognized it as trust and emotional intimacy, and he wanted it.

  Conversations had picked up around the table, Mary Alice and Lucille, realizing they weren’t going to get a tantalizing engagement story out of Alexa, were now trying to outdo each other with their own long-winded tales.

  Soon the table was cleared and speeches made, Mary Alice digging into the neckline of her floral dress to offer a tin of mints to her tablemates. Alexa took one, but Cash refused.

  A few tables were moved aside to clear the dance floor, and the band played the first song, for Luke and Emma. Cash tried not to pay too much attention as they glided across the floor in a waltz, appearing so content, making their marriage and professional partnership look downright easy.

  As the song finished, Alexa leaned closer and said, “I could really go for some honky tonk right about now.”

  Cash laughed at her heartfelt admission. Top-notch party of the year and the gal wanted honky tonk.

  “Yeah?” he murmured.

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay.”

  He excused himself from the table and placed a request with the band. He returned to where Alexa was sitting and took her hand, sweeping her onto the dance floor as the opening strains of George Jones’s “Honky Tonk Song” began. Alexa’s lips curved into a smile and her eyes glimmered with amusement.

  He sure wanted to kiss her again.

  Her hand felt solid in his, warm, real. As sure as her quick steps.

  Was this what Luke and Emma felt when they looked in each other’s eyes?

  “I may just have to keep you, Cash Campbell,” Alexa said, leaning in as they two-stepped their way across the ballroom.

  Instead of her words making him want to run, he found himself pulling her closer. He murmured against her ear, “It’s no honky tonk bar with peanut shells or sawdust on the floor, but maybe it’ll do, Miss Montana.”

  “You know the direct route to a woman’s heart, don’t you?”

  “And here I’ve been spoiling women with trinkets and charm, when all I needed was to request something downhome?”

  Her steps didn’t slow as he spun her, changing their direction. She danced as naturally as if she’d been born doing it. Like at work, they meshed, flowed.

  “Somehow I doubt this song would work on the women you like to chase,” she teased.

  Cash laughed at the image of his last date, a high-maintenance headache, reacting to this musical request. “You know, for a gal who likes things structured and organized, you deal with my chaos quite well.”

  “You’re fun,” she said, looking up at him in surprise. “I like the unpredictability.”

  “Do I remind you to enjoy life?”

  “Don’t go getting full of yourself, buster,” she said, giving his hand a warning squeeze.

  But she was smiling.

  Cash mindlessly massaged her lower back with his right hand, loving the way the fabric of her gown felt over her firm muscles. Luke and Emma danced by, smiling, eyes alight. Behind them, Logan, Luke’s security agent, and his wife, Ginger, were dancing, acting as though Logan wasn’t tailing the couple.

  “Did you request this, Alexa?” Emma asked, looking delighted.

  “Cash did. I know better than to create pinched lips.” Alexa was laughing as she angled her chin in the direction of Emma’s strict grandmother, who looked downright sour as she watched guests pour onto the dance floor.

  “Sorry,” Cash said.

  Emma waved his concerns away as she danced off into the throng with her husband.

  “They’re a good team,” Cash said. They worked together, played together and were now quite happily married. So happily that Cash couldn’t see Luke ever coming back to Cohen’s since Emma’s work kept her across the continent in the Rockies.

  Which meant what? That Cash was going to stay at Cohen’s as CEO?

  He sized up the woman in his arms. If he stayed on, then what?

  Would she still want this? Cash shook off his thoughts as his gut began to ache, and kept his feet moving. He was thinking too much. He just needed to dance, enjoy, take it all for whatever it was in this moment.

  “Cash?” Alexa had stopped moving and was smiling at him.

  “Hmm?”

  “The song ended.”

  The dance floor had emptied, the band was preparing for the next song. “So it did.”

  He followed his date off the floor, one hand guiding her, his mind caught in an avalanche of thoughts. Every single one of them about him and Alexa.

  Alexa leaned in as Cash gave her a peck on the temple before she sent him off to get her a drink, so she could have a moment to settle her nerves. Part of her wanted the night to be over so she’d know how it would end. Another part wanted to enjoy every single second of it.

  Cash’s depth surprised her. He was very real, full of compassion and commitment. How had she managed to overlook that for so long?

  Because she’d been afraid to find something real behind his flirtatiousness, something—or someone—she could truly fall for.

  She let out a shaky breath. Everything felt so real tonight.

  “I heard the news!” Emma let out a delighted laugh as she sidled up beside Alexa, hooking their arms together. Months ago she’d changed her long hair style to a pixie cut and it still took Alexa by surprise.

  “What news?”

  “Your engagement!” Emma gave her a massive hug, her surprise obvious, but overshadowed by happiness.

  “Oh, no,” Alexa said quickly. “Cash was just avoiding Lucille.”

  Emma held her by the arms, watching her for a long moment.

  “Did Olivia design this?” Alexa nervously gestured to Emma’s dress, which was everything a bride should ever want. “It’s gorgeous.”

  “You’re trying to change the subject. Why?”

  “Because…” Alexa’s fingers went to her lips as she fought to find a reasonable excuse. Cash was moving confidently through the crowd, his eyes locked on hers in a way that made her heart lift, the world fall away.

  That was the man she wanted.

  “You’re in love,” Emma stated.

  Alexa jerked in surprise. “I am not.”

  “Well, call it what you want, but I have a little holiday surprise for you.”

  Alexa reluctantly followed Emma through the guests toward a table ladened with ornaments, wishing Cash could somehow be her sweet holiday surprise without it being followed by heartbreak. On the table were Christmas tree baubles. Some were small, frosted glass balls with Luke and Emma’s initials and the date etched on them. Others were sizable plastic ones suitable for outdoors.

  “What’s all this?” Alexa had been in charge of party favors and hadn’t planned these.

  “My surprise for our guests.” Emma handed her a small gift box. “This is for you to take home.” Though the box’s clear plastic front she could see a frosted glass ornament. “And this is for the tree in the town square.” She passed her an large plastic green orb stamped with a snowflake. Alexa stared at it. Snow. Winter. The ornament was making her inexplicably homesick for Montana and everything she knew and understood.

  “Make a wish,” Emma explained, “then hang
it on the tree.”

  Alexa’s gaze lifted to the massive tree in a corner of the ballroom.

  “In the town square,” Emma clarified. “It’s a tradition. At five o’clock on Christmas Eve they’ll light it, and rumor has it all the wishes will come true.”

  Alexa nodded to show she understood, but she couldn’t keep from staring at the bright green ornament resting in her hands.

  Home.

  Wishes.

  “Make sure these get to Alexa’s accommodations tonight,” Emma instructed a staff member who was boxing up party favors. Emma took the one Alexa was holding, handing it off. She added, before gliding away with a wink, “Make sure Cash gets one, too.”

  Alexa contemplated the flood of wishes that had come to mind. The most remarkable one being that she wished for Cash. All of him.

  And especially his heart.

  Cash watched Alexa dance with some guy named J.J. What kind of name was that, and could he rest his hand a little higher on her waist, please?

  Cash paced the edge of the dance floor, chiding himself for wanting to cut in and claim Alexa. He’d never felt like that with any other girlfriends. He’d happily let someone else wander off with them, if that’s what everyone wanted.

  But Alexa…she was different. She was his. At least in his mind.

  He began storming across the dance floor, then halted suddenly.

  Wait one hot second. Had he just mentally referred to her as his girlfriend?

  The song ended and Alexa turned away from her dance partner, spotting Cash with a look of surprise.

  J.J. had his eyes narrowed at Cash, and Cash took Alexa gently by the elbow, trying not to act like a possessive Neanderthal as he said, “I was thinking maybe we could go somewhere for dessert.”

  “There’ll be cake in a few minutes,” she told him.

  “I was thinking just you and me.”

  She watched him for a split second, then smiled. “Let me grab my bag.”

  J.J. scowled as Cash led Alexa away. Moments later, with Alexa’s purse and light jacket reclaimed, they ran down the mansion steps and out into the salty ocean air like two kids playing hooky.

  “Where do you want to go?” Alexa asked breathlessly.