Sugar Creek Christmas Nook

by Jones, Jenny B.

  At five o’clock, she heard him tell his secretary goodbye.

  Emma expected him to pop his head in and give her the same courtesy.

  But Noah left without a word.

  From her office window, she watched him climb into his truck and drive away.

  It was better this way. The less contact, the easier it would be to leave at the first of the year.

  But if that was best. . . why did she feel as bleak as that wintery sky?

  Chapter Five

  That night Sylvie stood in the living room of her rental house on Harrison Avenue holding a hot pink pistol. “This house doesn’t have an electronic security system, but I got your security right here.”

  “Put that gun away. I don’t even know how to use it.” Emma rolled her two suitcases in and surveyed the house.

  “Have you forgotten everything I’ve taught you?”

  “Yes. In therapy.”

  This small Queen Anne of Sylvie’s had been completely renovated. Dark hard woods, granite in the kitchen, a marble-tiled fireplace. Old trim work still outlined the doors and windows, and some of the original light fixtures and glass doorknobs remained. The home brimmed with charm. It invited you to settle in and stay a long while. Like years.

  Emma pulled herself from her white-picket thoughts. “I still want to pay you rent.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. My next tenant isn’t due for a few months. It’s perfect. Unless you’re planning on trashing it with your wild parties.”

  “No wild parties for me.”

  “Pity,” she said. “I was hoping for an invite.”

  Sylvie slipped the gun back in her concealed holster. “Frannie and I are on neighborhood watch, so we’ll drive by at least once every single night.”

  “Most grandmothers would just bring over a casserole.”

  “You have no ideas the dangers that lurk out there.”

  “I read the Sugar Creek paper this morning. The worst thing in the police report was an escaped cow walking down Lee Town.”

  “Sometimes cows are just walking bombs. Once I was in Egypt and—”

  “Sylvie, I don’t want to know!” Emma plugged her ears and walked toward the kitchen.

  “So you were telling me how work went,” Sylvie called. “Did Noah pin you against the desk or leave you dirty voice mails?”

  “He’s not even talking to me.”

  Her grandmother joined her in the kitchen. “Shug, he just needs time. You’re a hard thing to get over.” She gave a gentle wink. “Or maybe you don’t want him over you?”

  “Of course I do. I don’t want to work with him for six weeks with him being all mean and broody.” Especially while he was his usual charming self to everyone else. Even the annoying citizens. Like his secretary.

  Sylvie leaned against the counter and leveled those sharp-shooter eyes on her granddaughter. “Does seeing him again bring back any old feelings?”

  Emma opened her mouth to fire off a quippy barb, but the words fizzled and popped. “Yes. I didn’t expect that. But he’s still . . . Noah. Even when he’s totally ignoring me he has the power to make my heart beat faster and my breath catch. I still smile at the sound of his laugh. He’s still the most handsome guy I’ve ever laid eyes on.”

  “Have you considered that maybe you still love—”

  They both jumped at the sound of a throat clearing.

  Emma turned to find Noah standing in the living room, hands stuffed in his pockets, his face the neutral mask he had worn that morning. “Hi.” His eyes locked on Emma. “I knocked a few times, but I guess you didn’t hear me.”

  “No, we didn’t,” Emma said, eyes wide. How long had he been standing there?

  “Come on in here, you cute thing, you!” With a pointed look at her granddaughter, Sylvie breezed into the living room and pulled Noah into a hug. “Don’t you look just like a Ralph Lauren ad?”

  Did he ever. Noah had changed out of his business attire into dark jeans and a sweater. With those eyes, that jaw, and that athlete’s body, he could easily have stepped out of the pages of a magazine.

  “I hear we’re going to have quite the light show.” Sylvie gave his back a maternal pat. “I’ll have to wear one of those blackout masks to bed.”

  Noah kissed Sylvie’s blushed cheek. “That’s gonna make it hard for you to sleep with one eye open.”

  “You know me too well,” she said. “My ninja senses won’t let me down. I think all the lights will only help my neighborhood watch.”

  “You mean neighborhood neurotic snooping,” Emma said.

  “I broke up some gang activity at Delphie Martin’s place just last week.”

  Noah finally smiled. “You told me it was a pack of raccoons.”

  Sylvie lifted her chin. “They are not to be underestimated either. Do you have any idea what they can do with those little thumbs? Terrorists, all of them.”

  Noah and her grandmother made small talk about folks they knew, while Emma stood in the background, about as noticeable as the small gossamer spider web hanging over the fireplace. As she watched Noah smile and laugh with Sylvie, Emma suddenly knew what she wanted for Christmas more than anything. She wanted Noah’s forgiveness. Yes, he had a right to be angry. But it had been ten years. They were both different people now. Surely he could find it in his heart to accept one of the one hundred apologies she had sent his way. Emma craved it like water in her desert.

  “I saw your rental car, Emma.”

  Noah’s voice pulled Emma from her pitiful ruminations. Was he actually speaking to her?

  “Are you moving in here?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she said. “Sylvie’s just cased the joint and declared it fit to inhabit.”

  “It’s a good neighborhood,” Sylvie said. “I’m just going to step into the kitchen and unpack some of the stuff I brought.”

  “Did your grandmother tell you who lives across the street?” Noah closed the distance between him and Emma.

  “The two-story sage green house with the wrap-around porch?”

  “Rebuilt the porch myself.”

  “You’re my neighbor?”

  “I take it Sylvie left out that part.”

  Emma looked back into the kitchen, where her grandmother hummed a little too loudly. “Speaking of terrorists.” She wondered what Noah thought about his new neighbor. Would it really be so bad for him to have to live across the street from her? “Look, I’m only going to be here a short while. You won’t have to worry about me bothering you or peeping in the windows while you’re entertaining a date.”

  Noah’s lips quirked. “Is that my cue to make the same promise?”

  Emma laughed. “Do you remember that time you climbed the trellis of my sorority to my second-story bedroom?”

  “Or what I thought was your bedroom.”

  “The cleaning lady thought it was very romantic.”

  “After she called 9-1-1.”

  Sometimes the past was so sweet, it hurt to revisit. “We had some good times.”

  He slowly nodded. “We did.”

  Emma’s breath caught as Noah watched her, saying nothing. He was so close, she could see the gold flecks in his brown eyes.

  “Noah, I wanted to tell you—”

  But his words overran hers, shoving them both away from the oncoming train of old memories. “I’m actually here on business tonight.”

  “Oh.” A definite mood breaker. “What’s up?”

  “We need to go for a little drive.”

  He didn’t sound the least bit happy about it. “Is there a body bag and some duct tape in your trunk by chance?”

  “We’re going to do a dry run of the lights tour.”

  “That was next on my evening agenda. We just dropped some stuff off here first. Sylvie and I are going.”

  “Emma!” As if on cue, Sylvie buzzed out of the kitchen like an angry bee. “I gotta bail on our little moonlit drive. Frannie just called, and she has a code ten emergency at her house.”
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  It was impossible to keep up with all of Sylvie’s lingo. “Is that a stray dog or a suspicious noise?”

  “It means she needs someone to color her roots.” She gave a loud, enthusiastic kiss on Emma’s cheek, then reached up to Noah and cupped his face in her hands. “You take care of my Emma here, okay? Don’t let her go out into the big city all by herself.”

  Before Emma could protest, Sylvie was gone.

  Leaving Emma and Noah standing alone in the living room. Again.

  “I’ll drive.” Noah jerked his chin toward the door. “My truck’s still running.”

  He wasn’t asking her to go to spend time with her. Noah didn’t trust her to do this simple task. “I’d rather check out the lights myself.”

  “I want this done right.”

  The hurt flashed on her face before she could school her features. “I’m pretty capable of driving through town and making sure everyone has their lights up.”

  “Really?” He reached for her hand and led her out the front door. “Did you happen to notice your house is on the tour?”

  “I just got to town.” Emma stopped beneath the glow of her porch light. “I need a few days to organize that. It’s not like I got on the airplane with a two-story ladder and some LEDs.”

  “The tour opens Monday night. We need everyone ready, and that includes your home.”

  Another detail Sylvie forgot to mention. “I’d rather drive alone. You can text me your Christmas light thoughts and innermost feelings.”

  “Get in the truck.”

  She slammed the door closed behind her and locked it tightly. “Pretty sure this constitutes as employee harassment. I’m going to consider suing.”

  He opened her car door and smiled. “Let me know if you need an attorney referral.”

  Chapter Six

  Holy sleigh bells, Noah smelled good.

  There was something about being confined to a truck cab that just encapsulated and intensified the scent of a man. Noah’s scent was clean, rugged, with a hint of woodsy spice.

  With barely a glance in her direction, he buckled his seatbelt, flicked on her seat warmer, and pulled onto the road. “We’ll start at the bridge, just like the tourists.”

  “Exactly what I was going to do.”

  “Mr. Dennis always has a light show, and you gotta make sure it doesn’t blind the oncoming traffic coming around that corner on Lee Town.”

  “Melissa left a stack of notes on this. I was going to check that.”

  That earned her a grunt, and Noah didn’t try to make conversation until they passed the bridge that connected Sugar Creek to Bentonville. He turned around in a driveway and faced his hometown.

  “I assume we’re waiting for nine o’clock,” Emma said. “Unless you called every one of the participants and changed the time I told them.”

  “I might’ve called a few,” Noah admitted. “But I didn’t change a thing.” He glanced at the clock on his dash, and with no one behind them, he put the truck in park and let it idle.

  Emma studied Noah’s face in the dark and wondered what the man was thinking as he stared out into the night. “So . . . how’s your mama?”

  “Fine.” He searched the sky, as if making sure all the constellations were hanging in their correct spots.

  “And your dad?”

  “He’s well.”

  It was clear his family wouldn’t be nominating him to compose the Kincaid Christmas newsletter.

  “Cassiopeia is bright tonight,” Emma said quietly.

  At that, Noah turned and met her gaze, holding it so long, Emma had to remind herself to breathe.

  “Do you remember our first date?” she asked.

  He was silent, so silent, she didn’t think he was going to answer. Then finally Noah cleared his throat, as if reluctant to verbalize the memory. “The college planetarium.”

  “You talked your friend into letting us have a picnic there. I think that was the most romantic date I’ve ever been on.”

  His laugh sounded hollow. “You’ve been all over the world.”

  And yet nothing compared to the memories she’d had with Noah. “You had some pretty good moves for a frat boy. Remember when you leaned over me to show me Ursa Major?” She unbuckled her seatbelt, pointed her finger high, and leaned into Noah, aiming her arm across his body. “It’s somewhere over there,” you said. “To the left. A little more. See it?” Emma laughed at the memory.

  “You never did see it,” he said near her ear.

  Emma turned her head, her face so near Noah’s. “I just pretended not to.” My stars, he’s gorgeous. “You weren’t the only one with some game.”

  His smile was slow, a slight tug of his lips. “I remember that date got me to first base.”

  Emma couldn’t seem to move away.

  His eyes dipped to her lips, and the words kiss me crashed through Emma like a heavy chorus. The air in the truck sparked and sizzled with the energy between them. Whatever had been there over ten years ago, something remained.

  Noah turned his head just slightly, his lips now hovering over hers—waiting, teasing, considering.

  Emma closed the small gap and feathered her mouth over his.

  Suddenly the truck lit up, as if someone had flipped a switch, and Noah immediately pulled away.

  He rubbed the back of his neck and returned his attention to the town, now illuminated like a Christmas dream. “Nine o’clock on the dot.”

  Emma’s lips still tingling, her senses humming from the kiss that barely qualified, she straightened in her seat and watched the light show.

  It really was beautiful.

  The white lights dominated, beginning first on the bridge, as if pointing the way to a magical land just beyond the creek. Nestled in the trees and rural vista, the homes sparkled and flickered with their displays.

  “That’s my home.” Noah’s voice held the kind of reverence reserved for art hanging in the Guggenheim.

  “It’s a great town.”

  “Great? You can look at that countryside right there, and great is all you see?”

  “I’m sorry.” Suddenly her seatbelt seemed a little choking. “Perhaps the two-second kiss seemed to have robbed me of adjectives.”

  “That wasn’t a kiss.”

  “Oh.” She’d just had to mention it. “Whatever you call that. A fleeting and accidental meeting of the lips.”

  “Which I believe you initiated.”

  “There was a definite lean on your part.”

  “I wasn’t leaning.” His grin deepened. “Just like when we were in college—you can’t keep your hands off me.”

  “I was—” Emma’s cheeks burned hotter than coals from a stove. “Never mind. You’re right, that was not a kiss. I’m sorry if I invaded your space while strolling down memory lane.” Tripping down memory lane. Falling flat on her humiliated face onto memory lane.

  His sigh sounded as weary as she felt. “I’m not interested in rekindling any relationship with you,” he said.

  “That makes two of us.”

  “You’re just passing through.”

  She crossed her arms over her chest. “Yep.”

  Noah jerked the truck into drive and drove them across the bridge and into town. The creek flowed beneath them, shimmering with the reflection of the town lights. Large red and white candy canes blinked from streetlights as they entered the first neighborhood. Glowing icicles hanging from rooftops, trees wrapped in lights in front yards, snow men dancing, a nativity at Pastor Joe’s, animated reindeer at Mr. and Mrs. Simpsons’, a laser show at Miles Tisdale’s. Each house was so different, yet each so achingly lovely. Not one person on the trail did anything less than a huge production. The old Victorian homes looked so regal accentuated by all the lights.

  It beat even Rockefeller Plaza.

  Sugar Creek, you have gone and turned my head.

  They passed a two-story home with gingerbread boys and girls dancing around giant gumdrops that towered all the way to t
he roof.

  “You’ve done an incredible job,” Emma said, still slightly embarrassed she had kissed Noah. What had possessed her?

  “Any success the town has this season is thanks to a team effort.”

  She’d read Melissa’s notes. She knew how much Noah had been involved, even before he’d stepped in as mayor. They drove for another half hour in silence, save for the occasional observation Noah wanted Emma to record.

  Two hours later, Noah circled back to Emma’s house and pulled into her drive.

  “The town looks incredible.” It would film beautifully for the morning show story. Her producer would love it. “Wait, what are you doing?” She watched Noah jump out of the truck and walk around to her side.

  “I’m walking you to your door. Don’t your big city men do this?”

  City men didn’t do anything the way this man did. His mama had raised him right. “Thank you.” She took his outstretched hand and stepped down onto the driveway. It was no surprise that he dropped her hand, but the twang of regret that followed left Emma unsettled. Surely it was just the season. The holidays always made her lonely.

  They stopped at her front door, and Noah held out his hand for her keys.

  She simply stood there in the frigid night air and watched him. “Are you going to be mad at me the entire time I’m in town?”

  “I hope to not be that aware of you.”

  The memory of their interrupted kiss flashed through Emma’s mind. “Let me know how that goes for you. But I’m invested in this for the duration of Melissa’s maternity leave.” Like she needed to remind him one more time that she wouldn’t bail.

  Noah stepped closer. “Hand me your keys.”

  “I’ll let myself in.” Her words came out in ghostly puffs. “I had a lovely evening. I’ll contact the homeowners you suggested first thing in the morning. Good night.”

  “There’s a storm coming, you know.”

  Pretty much one brewing right here between us. “Sylvie’s already warned me. It’s going to get cold, chance of light wintery precip, stock up on milk and bread, and change all my internet passwords.”