Holiday Temptation

by Donna Hill

  Her brows lifted as a bemused smile stretched across her lips. “That’s too bad,” Miranda murmured, trailing her fingertips up his chest. “A sex-filled free-for-all is exactly what I was hoping for.” She looked up at him. “If we’re going to be stuck together in a snowstorm on Christmas Eve, we’d better make the most of it.”

  The smoldering look in his eyes nearly singed her. Taking her by the arm, he started for the baggage claim. “Let’s get out of here.”

  Chapter Four

  Miranda tried to keep her eyes open on the drive into the mountains, but jet lag began creeping up on her the minute her butt hit the soft leather seat of Kyle’s Range Rover SUV. He’d told her that the drive usually took about forty minutes, but with the approaching storm, coupled with the fact that it was nearly Christmas Day and last-minute shoppers were on the road, it took them well over an hour.

  By the time they finally arrived at his home, it was after 9 p.m., which meant she’d officially been awake for over twenty-four hours. It took all Miranda had within her just to keep her eyes opened. Yet, despite her exhaustion, her stomach still clenched with need as she followed Kyle up the stairs that led to his front door. Her eyes honed in on the way his khaki pants stretched taut over his well-shaped ass with every step he took. She wanted to sink her fingers into that firm backside and clutch him to her the way she had back in Turkey.

  But not as badly as she wanted to sleep.

  “I don’t think I’ve ever been so tired in my life,” she said.

  Kyle looked back at her over his shoulder. “Did you get any sleep on the flight?”

  She shook her head and had to stop midstep as she yawned. “No, my brain was too preoccupied with the fact that you were on the plane with me,” she admitted.

  Kyle’s head flew back with his laugh. “Once I found you on the flight, I slept like a baby.”

  They arrived at the landing to find a box next to the front door.

  “Surprise Christmas present?” Miranda asked.

  He shook his head. “Grocery delivery. I’m happy they were able to get here before the storm. All I have in the refrigerator are bottles of the newest brew I’ve been working on and a box of baking soda.”

  Miranda reached over to pick up the box, since both his hands were filled with her bags. He’d insisted on carrying them up from the car.

  “Leave that,” Kyle said. “I’ll get it after we’re settled in.”

  Miranda didn’t argue. Her limbs were weak with exhaustion.

  However, when Kyle pushed open the sliding front door and flipped on a switch, she temporarily forgot about her fatigue. All around them dark gray window shades lifted in a slow, simultaneous roll, revealing a breathtaking display of the Colorado Rockies.

  “Oh, my,” Miranda released on an awe-filled breath.

  The structure brought the phrase “people who live in glass houses” to life. The entire floor was one big open space. Two steps led to a sunken living room, which housed an ultrasleek couch and nothing more. It faced a television with a screen that had to measure at least eighty inches. A massive freestanding fireplace, with an exposed vent pipe that stretched all the way to the top of the twenty-plus-foot ceiling, separated the living room from the dining room. The open kitchen took up the left side of the bottom floor. A frosted-glass wall stood behind it. Just beyond the wall, Miranda could make out what looked like stairs leading up to a second floor.

  “This is amazing,” she said. The words were woefully inadequate when describing this ridiculously gorgeous house, but it was the best she could come up with at the moment.

  “Thanks,” Kyle said. “I sacrificed space for the scenery. It’s only two-bedrooms, eleven hundred square-feet.”

  “You’re single. You don’t need anything bigger than this,” she said.

  He nodded. “It works.” He set her bag on the stone-laid floor, then went back outside to get the box of groceries. As he carried it into the kitchen and set it on the island, he said, “I forgot to mention that I converted the second bedroom into an office, so you’ll have to sleep in my room with me tonight.”

  Miranda burst out laughing at the fake contriteness on his face, but she had to stop midlaugh in order to yawn. It lasted so long that she started to sway.

  “Okay, okay,” Kyle said, coming around the kitchen island and catching her by the waist. “I think it’s time to get you in bed.”

  “I want to,” she said, “But I’m so tired.”

  “I meant get you in bed so that you can sleep,” Kyle said with a laugh.

  Miranda could only keep her eyes open long enough to appreciate the stark beauty of the bedroom, with its minimalist design, much like the rest of the house. She walked over to the bed in the center of the room and climbed in under the covers, not bothering to take off her clothes. She felt Kyle untying her shoes, but by the time they were off her feet, Miranda was out like a light.

  She awoke the next morning to an astonishing display of Mother Nature at her finest. Thick, downy white snow covered the branches of the blue spruce trees that surrounded the elevated house. The snow continued to fall in a steady shower, covering the deck that surrounded the second floor.

  Miranda sat up and listened for Kyle. She didn’t hear anything at first, but moments later, she heard the front door slide back into place and then the distinctive sound of footsteps coming up the stairs. He rounded the frosted-glass wall and smiled when he spotted her in his bed.

  “Good morning,” he greeted.

  “Morning,” Miranda returned with a smile.

  “I don’t have to ask if you slept well. I could have brought a ten-piece band in here last night and I doubt it would have woken you, once you fell asleep.”

  “Blame the jet lag. It sneaks up on me.”

  Kyle put an arm on either side of her, enclosing her in the bed, but Miranda turned away before he could kiss her.

  She shook her head. “I’m yucky. At least let me shower and brush my teeth first.”

  “Did you just call yourself ‘yucky’?”

  “It’s the truth. I’ve been wearing these clothes since the day before yesterday.”

  “Fine,” Kyle said, sneaking a kiss against her neck anyway. “You shower and change. I’ll get started on Christmas Eve lunch.”

  “Lunch?”

  “It’s nearly noon, Miranda.”

  Her mouth fell open.

  Kyle nodded. “Yeah, you may want to call your friend Erin. She’s been blowing up your cell phone.”

  “Shit,” Miranda said. She scooted out of the bed and grabbed the cell phone from the dresser. After assuring Erin that she hadn’t been kidnapped, she called the airline to check on the flights out of Denver. As she expected, there were none, at least not until this snowstorm blew over.

  She climbed into Kyle’s shower. Miranda could admit to feeling a pang of regret that he hadn’t joined her, but she appreciated that he wanted to make her breakfast almost as much as she would have appreciated shower sex.

  Almost.

  She dressed in the only remaining clean clothes in her suitcase, a pair of denim-colored tights and an off-white cable-knit sweater that ended at her knees. Then she walked down the stairs in bare feet to find Kyle putting away groceries. The welcoming smell of bacon hit her right in the face, and her stomach released a menacing growl.

  Kyle set two plates with bacon, fried eggs, and toast dripping with butter on the place mats that sat on the kitchen island across from the stove.

  “Look at all that lovely butter,” Miranda said. “You don’t happen to have a home gym around here somewhere, do you?”

  “Calories don’t count during the holidays,” he said as he rounded the island and pulled out one of the stools for her to sit.

  “I’ll go along with that,” she said with a laugh. “So,” she said before taking a bite of bacon, “you mentioned that you’re from Chicago. How did you end up in Denver?”

  “I followed the tech jobs,” he said. “It isn’t
Silicon Valley, but the tech industry is still pretty robust here.”

  “So you’re a tech geek, huh?”

  “A huge one,” he said with a good-natured chuckle. “If you have any apps that deal with increasing productivity on your phone, it’s more than likely that my team had a hand in it. We created over three hundred these last five years.”

  “My goodness, Kyle. That’s an amazing achievement. Your family must be so proud of you.”

  He huffed a humorless laugh. “Let’s not go there.”

  Miranda studied his profile as she bit into her toast. This wasn’t the first time he’d shied away from talk about his family, which, of course, intrigued her even more. But she was no stranger to backpedaling from talk about family, and she wouldn’t force Kyle into engaging in any conversation he didn’t want to have. Lord knows she wouldn’t be up for it if the tables were turned.

  Once they were done with breakfast, Kyle went upstairs to take a shower. Miranda used the opportunity to check out the house. She roamed around the downstairs area, learning about him. She was struck by the amount of Christmas decor peppering the space. She’d been too exhausted to take note of it last night, but Christmas was everywhere. Not in an in-your-face Rockwellian way, but with little subtle touches: a dish filled with delicate glass ornaments on the kitchen island, satin ribbon threaded through sprigs of balsam along a corner display shelf, little nutcracker soldiers standing sentry on either side of the fireplace.

  Miranda intentionally avoided the six-foot tree wedged into a corner in the dining room. Instead, she walked over to the display shelf to take a closer look at the pictures that occupied it.

  In one there was a large group of at least twenty, with two older people whom she assumed were Kyle’s parents sitting in the middle, surrounded by their brood of children and grandchildren. They were a diverse bunch. There was a blond-haired Caucasian man, with his arms around a petite woman with Kyle’s cheekbones, and a South Asian woman standing next to Kyle’s look-alike. A man and a woman, who Miranda could only guess were Kyle’s siblings based on their strikingly similar features, held small babies in their arms, while another obvious sibling had a toddler fused against his leg.

  Miranda looked up at another picture that had just the Daniels children and their parents. There were five of them total, three boys—including Kyle—and two girls.

  How lucky to come from such a large family. How lucky to still have so many of them there.

  She suddenly felt a pang of disappointment on Kyle’s behalf. As much as she appreciated being here with him, she was sorry that he was spending Christmas here instead of in Chicago with his family. If she’d had the option, there was no doubt in Miranda’s mind where she would be.

  She noticed an indentation on the frosted-glass wall and realized it was the seam to a door. She gave it a light push and discovered that it was the former spare bedroom turned office. Miranda recognized that she should have felt at least some guilt about entering his private office, but she’d spent the night in his bed. The bedroom held more sanctity than the office, didn’t it?

  Besides, she was much too impressed with his workspace to even think about feeling guilty for invading it. Compared to the little work closet she had, with contracts and magazine spreads strewn about like a tornado had torn through it, Kyle’s office was heaven. The walls in this room alternated between panels of glass and the shiny hardwood that made up the walls of his bathroom.

  She surveyed the plethora of framed documents mounted on the wall behind his sleek stainless-steel desk. She blinked several times, unsure if what she saw was real. Phi Beta Kappa Honor Society, Phi Lambda Upsilon Honor Society, a doctorate in organic chemistry.

  “Wait? What?”

  Miranda spun on her heel and marched back into the kitchen to find Kyle standing at the kitchen island. His carry-on bag lay open on the counter; the packets of different spices he’d purchased in Turkey were lined up next to it.

  He looked at her over his shoulder, a huge smile on his face. “I can’t wait to start experimenting with these,” he said as he rearranged the spices.

  “You have a Ph.D.?” Miranda asked. She knew she wasn’t mistaken when she saw the hint of unease that traveled across his face.

  “Yeah,” he answered. “In chemistry.”

  “I read that.” She shook her head. “I have way more questions than I even know what to do with right now,” she said.

  Kyle walked around the kitchen counter and reached out for her hands. Taking both in his, he led her to one of the bar stools.

  “Let me answer a few for you,” he started. “No, I wasn’t a child genius, but I did skip a couple of grades in school and earned my Ph.D. at a younger age than most people. Yes, I actually used my science degrees for a while, some years ago when I worked for the EPA. No, I don’t have any degrees in computers. That was all self-taught, but turned out to be much more lucrative. And, no, I don’t think I wasted all that time in school studying chemistry.”

  “Of course you didn’t,” Miranda said. “There’s chemistry that goes into concocting those beer recipes, right?”

  “Yes, there is,” he said. “I wish everyone could make the connection as quickly as you did.”

  “It’s a no-brainer,” Miranda said with a shrug. “However, none of that answers my question.”

  His brow arched.

  “I want to know how someone as handsome, funny, accomplished—and with killer bedroom skills, might I add—is still single? Based on that picture over there, you’re the only one among your siblings who isn’t married.”

  “That’s unfair,” Kyle said. “You’ve spent the morning snooping around my house, learning about my family, and I still don’t know anything about yours.”

  “Stop trying to dodge the question,” Miranda said. “And I’m sorry for snooping.”

  He grinned. “I don’t mind. I like that you want to know more about me.”

  “Well, answer my questions,” she said.

  “Fine.” He released a highly exaggerated sigh, kissing her on the nose before continuing. “First of all, my older sister, Tammy, is no longer married. She got rid of her jerk of an ex-husband this summer, a few weeks after that picture was taken. It should have happened long ago. He’s always been an asshole.”

  “What about you?” Miranda asked. “Have you gotten rid of a wife?”

  He shook his head. “Never been married.”

  “Have you gotten close?”

  He squinted, one side of his mouth twisting in a grimace. “About five years ago, my ex-girlfriend and I almost got to the point where we were almost talking about it.”

  “That’s a lot of ‘almost’ there.”

  “Pretty much sums up the entire relationship.”

  “So?” Miranda asked.

  He shrugged. “We recognized that we didn’t want the same things out of life. She didn’t want kids. She didn’t want to settle down at all, really. It sounds cliché, but I like the thought of the two-point-five kids and the white picket fence.”

  “A white picket fence doesn’t really go with this place,” Miranda pointed out.

  “I’d sacrifice it.” Kyle looked over his shoulder at the vast landscape behind them. “Okay, maybe I’d keep it as a weekend home,” he said. He grinned, but then his smile dimmed. “I want what my parents had. What they still have. They worked hard and were able to give their kids a good life. I didn’t realize that we had what’s considered a modest upbringing. We never wanted for anything. We were happy as kids—as an entire family.”

  Miranda figured the tidal wave of jealousy and resentment would crash into her any minute, but, surprisingly, it didn’t. She wouldn’t begrudge Kyle his carefree childhood, because she realized that she had one, too. Her childhood years were the very best years of her life.

  Until everything changed fifteen years ago.

  But before then, when she and her family piled into her mom’s old minivan and set out on their yearly family vacatio
n? Or when they’d make the drive to Pittsburgh to visit her grandma every Easter? Or on Christmas morning, when her dad would allow them to open one present before church? Nothing in the world could top the burst of joy she felt just remembering those memories.

  “I know what you mean,” Miranda said, unable to keep the wistfulness from her voice.

  It was good to recall the happy times instead of focusing on that one tragic night. Why had she put so much emphasis on that for all these years? Why had she chosen to forget the good times?

  Kyle continued to pull things out of his carry-on bag. He lifted a teardrop-shaped glass ornament, which Miranda instantly recognized as a nazar—the traditional blue amulet the Turks believed protected one from the evil eye. He headed straight for the area that she’d avoided up until this point.

  Even after all these years, she still had a visceral reaction when she spotted a Christmas tree. But if she was finally going to move on, Miranda knew she needed to face it instead of avoiding it.

  She followed Kyle to the tastefully decorated tree, which stood in the corner of the dining area.

  “Your decorations are lovely,” she said.

  “Thanks,” Kyle said, placing the amulet next to a silver-dusted pinecone. “Some people probably think it’s silly to decorate for Christmas, seeing as I live here alone, but it’s the holidays. I can’t not decorate. It’s tradition in my family.”

  Miranda nodded. It used to be a tradition in her family, too. The best tradition.

  The emotions she’d tried to suppress welled up in her throat, threatening to spill forth. She managed to maintain her control.

  Until she spotted it.

  A tiny replica of Batman’s Batmobile hung innocently from a softly flocked branch.

  The air rushed out of Miranda’s lungs. Pain crushed her chest. Her heartbeat thudded in her ears, making her dizzy.

  “Miranda?” Kyle reached for her, but she backed away, covering her mouth with both hands. “Miranda, what’s wrong?”

  She shook her head. “I’m sorry,” she murmured. “I just need . . . I need a minute.” She turned and raced up the stairs, locking herself in the bathroom.