Christmas on Main Street

by JoAnn Ross

  “It’s so magical out here,” she said on a long, happy sigh. “Enough that I’m not going to get mad at our families for tricking us.”

  “What about Archer? How are you going to explain spending Christmas out here alone with me?”

  “I don’t have to explain anything to anyone. And, although it really isn’t any of your business, Brad and I are no longer seeing each other.”

  “Are we sorry about that?”

  She folded her arms and shot him a look over her shoulder. “No more sorry than we are about Marcia Wayburn being out of the picture. And, for the record, I wasn’t jealous about you proposing to her. Just disappointed you displayed such poor judgment.”

  “Yeah. Sure. The same way I was going to warn you about Archer.”

  She’d gone back to looking out at the swirling flakes that were coming down faster and harder by the minute. But that drew her attention again.

  “Why on earth would you have wanted to warn me about Brad? He’s totally harmless.”

  “That was my point. It never would’ve worked because that guy never could have satisfied you.”

  “Oh, really?” The frost in her voice was chillier than the temperature outside the paned glass doors. “And what would you know about what satisfies me?”

  He nodded at that. “Your point.”

  One he was planning to rectify. But deciding that his grandmother was right about not pushing, Cole decided to take things slowly. Let the situation play out.

  He still wasn’t exactly sure what he was feeling toward her. The one thing he did know was that their families could manipulate things until doomsday, but he was damn well going to make his own choices.

  And for now, for this stolen time away from war and family and the over-the-top holiday celebrations that his hometown loved to indulge in, he chose Kelli Carpenter.

  “The tub’s probably filled,” he said. “Why don’t you take your bath while I start dinner?”

  “You don’t have to cook for me.”

  “I’m not. Along with all the liquor, the freezer’s stocked with meals.”

  “I didn’t realize your family had elves,” she said dryly.

  “Neither did I. But someone’s definitely been busy. We could probably survive until spring before we’d have to stoop to squirrel stew.

  “There’s also a small roasting turkey and all the fixings in the fridge. But I guess we’re expected to cook it ourselves. I suppose that’s to encourage us to put aside our differences and work together.”

  She shook her head, but her lips quirked. “It might be humiliating to be set up by our parents at our age, if they weren’t so obvious. And I’ll have to give them an A for effort. But I’m not some puppet they can make dance to their matchmaking scheme.”

  “That makes two of us.”

  “So. We’ll eat their food and drink their wine and catch up on each other’s lives. Enjoy ourselves like the old friends we used to be.”

  “And if there are strings to be pulled, we’ll be the ones pulling them.”

  She rewarded him with a dazzling smile that sent something beneath his heart tumbling. “Exactly. Now, I’d better get to that tub before we flood the place.”

  13

  Cole sipped thoughtfully on a dark ale as he heated up a pot of gumbo. Having grown up in a culture where the men did much of the cooking, he had no problem cooking the rice himself. He knew his mother would’ve thrown herself off the Shelter Bay Bridge before ever stooping to instant.

  He’d put on a CD, and in the background Billie Holiday was singing the blues.

  Kelli had changed in the past year. She’d toughened up. And while his grandmother was right about her having always had a mind of her own, she’d acquired more of what his grandfather Bernard would’ve called good old-fashioned spunk.

  And it looked damn good on her.

  And speaking of good . . .

  “Did you mean that?” she asked as she walked into the kitchen, engulfed in a plush, pastel pink robe that had him thinking of sugarplums again. Beneath the robe he could see a bit of blue pajamas printed with polar bears. Apparently, her winter-theme wardrobe extended beyond the sweaters.

  The outfit shouldn’t have been sexy. And it might not have been, had it not been for the way she’d piled her hair into a messy topknot that just begged to have the pins pulled out of it so it’d tumble down. Even more distracting were the beads of water gleaming on the rosy skin revealed by the robe’s neckline. She was wearing striped pink, blue, and white socks.

  “Mean what? About having to resort to squirrel stew? Because if you’re worried about starving, I can assure you that Marines are taught all sorts of cool survival techniques.” He turned the heat on the water, getting ready for the rice. “I even know how to build a snow cave.” He shot her a look. “And how to share body warmth to stay alive.”

  More color flooded into her cheeks. “I was referring to what you said about staying warm together.”

  Then he noticed that the glass she was holding was nearly empty. He took the wine bottle and topped it off. “I’m a guy. We’re always serious about sex.” He put the bottle back on the counter. “For now, why don’t we just try this?”

  He framed her face in his hands and, taking advantage of the fact that her hands were occupied holding that wineglass, he lowered his head, pausing just a breath away from actual contact.

  Her eyes darkened, and he heard the little intake of breath. He waited, giving her time to say something. Or move away.

  But she didn’t. She just stood there, fingers tightening around the glass, deep blue eyes offering him a silent invitation no man with blood still stirring in his veins would have been able to turn down.

  As he touched his mouth to hers and she slid easily, naturally into the kiss, Cole wondered why the hell he’d waited all these years. She tasted warm and feminine. Of wine and temptation. And in that moment, his entire world shifted and he knew that he would never be the same.

  All the time, she’d been right there. Hiding in plain sight.

  Because he wanted to make sure she understood that this thing between them wasn’t some convenient sex in a snowed-in-cabin scenario, although it took every ounce of his self-control, Cole kept his hands on her face.

  “That,” he murmured, as he leaned back, enjoying the delicious mingling of desire and confusion in her eyes, “was worth waiting for.”

  “I don’t understand.” She pressed her fingertips to her lips as he poured the rice into the water, which had begun to boil during the kiss. The water wasn’t the only thing that had heated up. “What happened to being friends?”

  “Wasn’t that friendly enough for you?” he asked easily as she gulped down her wine. Drawn to the silk of her skin, he returned to skim the back of his hand down her cheek. “We can try it again, if you want.”

  “No.” She backed up. “I need to think.”

  “Fine. You can sit here and think while I finish heating up dinner. Then we can watch a movie, if you’d like.” He knew her weakness for Christmas movies. And suddenly, although it was the last thing he’d been expecting when he’d taken his grandfather and father up on their suggestion to come out here to the cabin, he was in the mood to celebrate the holiday with Kelli. “I found a DVD of It’s a Wonderful Life.”

  “Oh.” She sighed happily. “I love that movie.”

  “I know.” She’d always been a romantic. Which had him determined to do this right. “Then, afterward, I’ll walk you to your door, like a true officer and a gentleman. And maybe you’ll let me kiss you good night.”

  “I suppose that sounds all right.”

  What it sounded like was a start, Cole decided.

  14

  Dinner was delicious, as Kelli would have expected. There’d been a reason that Bon Temps had been one of the most popular restaurants on Oregon’s mid coast. Maureen Douchett was a genius when it came to elevating humble Cajun comfort food to something close to sublime.

  And
speaking of sublime . . .

  The movie, which she’d seen more times than she could count, was as romantic as ever. Oodles more so with Cole sitting next to her. She sighed when Jimmy Stewart promised to rope the moon for Donna Reed.

  “A bit impractical,” Cole, who was sitting next to her on the couch, his arm around her shoulder, said.

  “It’s a metaphor.”

  “I get that.” He pressed his lips against her hair—it had, with some help from Cole, come tumbling down sometime between when George’s brother, Harry, had fallen through that ice and when George and Mary started dancing, after George finally saw Mary for the amazing woman she was. “But I guess, with women, it’s the thought that counts.”

  “Exactly.” She smiled up at him. “And maybe not as impossible as giving a woman Hawaii in a cupcake.”

  He didn’t answer. At least not in words. But the slow, savoring way he pressed his lips to hers for their second kiss spoke volumes.

  “Of course, it goes downhill from here,” he said, as he left her trembling and returned to eating popcorn.

  “For a time,” she allowed, wondering if Cole would feel cheated, like George Bailey initially had, if he returned to Shelter Bay for good. “But it all works out in the end.”

  “And good old Clarence gets his wings.” He held out a piece of buttered popcorn.

  She thought about pointing out that she was perfectly capable of feeding herself. But although it was merely corn from a package, popped in a microwave with a bit of melted butter poured over it, she found the gesture, and the rich taste, which her own air-popped unbuttered corn could never equal, unreasonably seductive.

  “You like happy endings,” he said while holding out another piece for her.

  “Of course.” She closed her teeth around the fat white kernel. “Doesn’t everyone?”

  He continued to feed her bites as George and Mary sang “Buffalo Gals.”

  “I always knew you were a romantic.”

  “Perhaps the world needs more romantics.”

  “Roger that,” he agreed. He sniffed at her tumbled hair. “God, you smell fantastic.”

  Then, before she could respond, he kissed her again, and as his tongue swirled up to taste the drops of melted butter on her lips, Kelli decided that she’d never be able to eat popcorn again without thinking of this night.

  The rest of the movie went by in a blur as they shared popcorn and kisses and he drew her so close, nestling her under his arm, she could have sworn, by the time Zuzu announced that the bell on the tree ringing meant an angel had just gotten his wings, Kelli was on the verge of melting herself.

  “Well,” he said, clicking the TV off. “All’s well that ends well.” As she put her hand in the one he held out to her, her heart did a slow, dizzying spin of anticipation.

  After all these years of waiting, the night she’d dreamed of had finally arrived. Refusing to worry about whether the closeness they were experiencing would last beyond this stolen time together and what things would be like when they returned to town, as they walked to the master bedroom, hand in hand, Kelli decided she was going to stop worrying about the future and live in the moment.

  She’d reached out to open the door when he tugged her back and turned her around.

  “Put your arms around my neck.”

  More than a little dazed by the roughness of his deep voice and the storm swirling in his dark eyes, Kelli could more easily fly to the moon on gossamer wings than refuse him.

  “Better,” he said with a satisfied quirk of the lips.

  He put his hands on her hips and moved closer, pressing her against the heavy wooden door. As their bodies touched, center to center, he brushed his mouth against hers. Touching, then retreating, touching again and ratcheting up the desire until she was practically clinging to him for support.

  Kelli was not naive. Nor innocent. She’d been kissed before. She’d made love before. But never had every atom in her body been so focused on the havoc being done to her mouth. His tongue traced a line across the seam of her lips, encouraging them to open for him.

  Which, seeming to have taken on a mind of their own, they did.

  He nipped at her bottom lip, pulling it into his mouth, drawing a ragged moan from deep in her throat.

  “Nice.” He murmured the words against her lips before slipping his tongue inside, in an impossibly slow possession that blurred her vision.

  Heat was building in her core, spiraling outward, fingers of flame reaching through her blood, touching her all the way outward to the tips of her fingers and toes. And all the time his gaze stayed locked on hers, watching, measuring, discovering all her secrets. Learning her every weakness.

  She couldn’t speak. Couldn’t think. Her mind had gone blank and she’d lost control of her senses.

  And then, impossibly—although, with his body against hers, there was no hiding his arousal—he . . . backed away?

  “Cole . . .” The words wouldn’t, couldn’t come.

  Terrific. Now she’d gone mute as well as blind.

  But not so blind she couldn’t see his slow smile.

  “Say good night, Kels.”

  Surely he wasn’t going to leave her? Not like this?

  She was dazed, confused, but although he’d left her in a puddle of need, he’d not claimed her pride. She tried to regain some self-control.

  She would not whimper. Nor beg.

  Summoning up her inner warrior goddess, she lifted her chin even as her legs felt like water. “Good night, Cole.”

  “Good night.” His eyes softened and gentled as he skimmed a fingertip over those lips he’d so expertly ravaged. “Sleep tight.” He opened the heavy door. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

  “Morning,” she repeated. Then somehow, on unsteady legs, she made her way into the room and shut the door behind her. Leaning against it, she sank bonelessly to the floor, where she bent her legs, wrapped her arms around them, and lowered her head to her knees as she listened to Cole whistling “Buffalo Gals” as he strolled the few feet to his own bedroom.

  • • •

  It was much, much later, after finally falling asleep following hours of frustrated tossing and turning, that Kelli woke to an odd, unrecognizable sound coming from outside the cabin. Without turning on the light, she climbed out of bed, padded to the French doors, and pulled aside an edge of the curtain.

  There, bathed in the spreading glow of a full moon, stood Cole. Despite what had to be freezing temperatures, he’d stripped down to a brown thermal underwear shirt and was wielding a huge red-handled ax, lifting it over his head, then bringing it down again and again as he split log after log, sending pieces of wood scattering in the snow all around him.

  The shirt fit tightly enough that it took no imagination at all to envision tan flesh stretching over sinew and muscle, rippling as he attacked the wood.

  Which was, hands down, the sexiest thing Kelli had ever seen.

  She could have stood there forever. But, not wanting to get caught watching him, she forced herself away from the window and back to the too-lonely bed.

  15

  After pulling Kelli’s car out of the ditch and towing it back to the cabin, Cole was on his second pot of coffee and was frying bacon when Kelli came out of the bedroom the next morning looking deliciously warm and tousled.

  “I’m sorry I overslept.”

  “It’s a vacation,” he said. “You’re supposed to sleep.” Which didn’t explain the lavender circles appearing like bruises beneath her eyes.

  She glanced out the window. “You’ve already rescued my car?”

  He shrugged. “I was up, so I figured I might as well. Want some coffee?”

  “I’d love some.”

  “Great. I was just making breakfast.”

  “I don’t usually eat breakfast.”

  “You should. It’s the most important meal of the day.”

  “So I’ve heard, but—”

  “Besides, you’ll need your ene
rgy.”

  “Oh? For what?”

  “We’re going snowshoeing.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Well, we could just wade through thigh-deep snow. But I figured it’d be easier to bring the tree back if we’re on snowshoes.”

  “We’re cutting down a tree?”

  “I suppose I could call Brian to deliver one from your family farm. But it is, after all, their busy season, so it only makes sense that we should forage for ourselves.”

  “It’s snowing.”

  “Which makes it more romantic,” he countered. “Trust me, Kels. You’ll love it.”

  If he’d been alone, as planned, there was no way he would’ve gone traipsing out into the woods to cut down a Christmas tree. But the idea of decorating it together, while carols played on the CD player and flames crackled merrily in the fireplace—and God knows he had enough firewood piled up to last into next year—was proving vastly appealing.

  He put the bacon in the oven to keep warm and moved on to the hash browns.

  “I suppose I might as well get some exercise,” she muttered as she crossed the room into the kitchen area. “If I don’t want to weigh as much as a moose by New Year’s.”

  “I think you look terrific,” he said as he handed her a mug of steaming-hot coffee. He couldn’t wait to get her out of those clothes and taste every bit of lush, fragrant flesh.

  Patience, he reminded himself. Keep your eye on the mission.

  Easier said than done when she smelled like a spring meadow and looked good enough to eat.

  “Flatterer,” she complained without heat.

  “It’s not flattery if it’s true.” Because he couldn’t be this close to her without touching her, because raging sexual need had forced its way even into his nightly insomnia and tangled in his mind, he fisted his hand in her hair, holding her as he swooped down and took her mouth in a hot, hard, hungry kiss that instead of easing the ache, resulted only in a more powerful slap of lust.