by Debbie Mason
“No!” Jill ordered in her cop voice when Mr. Gorski bent his knee, his walker listing to the right on the concrete. She winced when several white heads turned her way. She was here, at her boss Sheriff Gage McBride’s directive, to learn a kinder, gentler approach. Jill would have protested the assignment at Mountainview Retirement Home, but she wanted her boss’s recommendation, and his job. Rumor had it Gage was joining his brothers at McBride Security and wouldn’t be running for another term.
She gave Mr. Gorski a kindly smile and wrapped her hands around his thin arms to keep him upright. He grimaced. Shit. Brittle bones. She loosened her hold and said in a sweet voice, one she heard her sister-in-law Grace use, “We don’t want to break anything, do we?”
Her smile faltered. Was that a shimmer of tears behind his dark glasses? Wonderful, just freaking wonderful. She didn’t have to worry about his bones; she’d broken his heart. “I’m flattered, Mr. Gorski. I really am. You’re a great catch. Really, really great.”
The words had barely left her mouth when a determined glint replaced the tears. He leaned toward her. “You are bootiful. I make you happy.”
Relax. You’ve got this. She’d distracted him easily enough the last two times. Once by pretending she didn’t hear him and continuing her self-defense class. The second time she’d been saved by vision testing. It had been a slight blow to her ego to learn Mr. Gorski was legally blind.
She needed to put a stop to this before he hurt himself. Or scarred her for life, she thought, when he stuck out his tongue to wet his dry lips. Letting go of his arms, she stepped back and blurted, “I have a boyfriend.”
One by one the residents of the retirement home stopped searching the manicured grounds for the weapon Jill had hidden for the murder mystery game. They turned their heads, craning their necks in her direction.
Mrs. Sharp looked up from digging in a bed of yellow tulips beneath the gurgling fountain. A naked cherub, or maybe it was supposed to be an elf, spurted water from his mouth. Whatever it was, the statue seemed a weird choice for a nursing home, but what did she know? And the elf had provided her with the perfect hiding spot for the knife. “Who is he, dear? Do we know him?”
Jill drew her gaze from the well-endowed statue. Mrs. Sharp was, well, sharp…and relentless. She had to give her something. The best way not to get caught in a lie was stick close to the truth. And while Jill might not have a boyfriend, she’d been fantasizing about the man she wanted for a long time. Too long, actually. He was the reason for her practically nonexistent love life. No one compared to Sawyer Anderson. “No, he, ah, lives in Denver.”
He didn’t now, but he had while he played for the Colorado Flurries, a professional hockey team. Sometimes she wished he would have stayed in Denver instead of moving home. It was hard to avoid him in their small hometown. Especially since he was her brother’s best friend. And it wasn’t like she could leave. She’d had her grandmother to take care of and, when she died, her sister-in-law and nephew.
Mrs. Lynn, of the tight salt-and-pepper curls and freakishly pale eyes, drove her motorized scooter closer. “What’s he look like? Is he handsome?”
“Yes, tell us,” several of the other women urged, awaiting her answer with breathless anticipation.
Anxious, Jill imagined, to relive their youth through her and her make-believe love affair with a man who didn’t know she exists. No, that wasn’t entirely true. He knew she existed. Sawyer had been a part of her life since the day Jill and her brother Jack moved to the small mountain town of Christmas, Colorado. The problem was he still saw her as Jack’s kid sister, not as a woman.
It would be easier if she saw him as the tall, skinny boy he’d once been and not the man he’d become. “He’s beautiful. But not pretty-boy beautiful, more like Viking warrior or Norse God beautiful. Rugged. He broke his nose, and it’s a little crooked, but it suits him. Just like the dimple that shows up on his left cheek when he smiles. He has a great smile,” she told her attentive audience. She didn’t want to disappoint them. And sadly, for her and her heart, it was true.
“Dark hair or light? What about his eyes?” Mrs. Lynn and Mrs. Sharp uttered their questions in rapid-fire succession.
A smile playing on her lips, Jill stuffed her hands in the front pockets of her khaki shorts and rocked on the heels of her combat boots. This was kind of fun, talking about Sawyer as if he was hers. “Straight hair, dark blond. Always messy and it comes to about here.” She pointed mid-neck. “It lightens to a caramel color in the summer. His eyes are dark, same as his eyebrows and scruff.”
“I like scruff. Manly. He is manly, isn’t he, not metrosexual?” Mrs. Lynn asked.
“Metrosexual is passé, Edith,” Mrs. Sharp said to Mrs. Lynn. “It’s lumbersexual. I read it in Cosmo.”
Jill hoped she stopped there. She didn’t want to hear what else she’d read in Cosmo. She’d interrupted a heated debate over vibrators the day before last.
“I’m manly, strong,” Mr. Gorski said, glaring in the direction of the women while flexing his arms. And that started a who’s-got-the-biggest-biceps competition between the men.
“Oh, stop it, you old coots. We want to hear more about Jill’s boyfriend. Go on, dear,” Mrs. Lynn said.
Mr. Gorski muttered something in Polish and headed for the glass doors.
“Be right back,” Jill told the older woman, sprinting ahead of Mr. Gorski. She held the door open. She hoped she wasn’t making a mistake, but she felt bad for the old guy and said, “You’ve got great muscles for a man your age, Mr. Gorski.”
“Ninety-five is not old.”
Not only determined, but a good attitude. She admired that. “Ouch.” Dammit, he’d pinched her. Mr. Gorski gave her a toothless grin. She sighed and rubbed her butt cheek. He had strong fingers, too.
“How tall is he? I hope he’s not short,” Mrs. Sharp said when Jill returned to her place on the patio. “Short men have a chip on their shoulder.” The older woman made a face. “My Barry was five four.”
“He’s tall. Six three,” Jill said, warming to the subject. “In great shape. His arms…” She trailed off when Mrs. Lynn looked beyond her. The other women seemed to have lost interest too, fluffing their hair and fanning themselves. Must be the heat. It was warm today. She probably should have kept them indoors. All she needed was for one of them to drop dead…
Mrs. Lynn smiled and said, “Sawyer.”
Jill’s jaw dropped. Mrs. Lynn of the freakishly pale eyes told her she saw dead people. Jill hadn’t believed the older woman. Now she wasn’t so sure. Maybe Mrs. Lynn was psychic. It’s fine, Jill reassured herself, totally fine. Sawyer wasn’t an uncommon name. She’d just…
“How’s it going, Mrs. Lynn? Shortstop?” said a deep voice from behind her.
Jill froze. Her heart stuttered to a stop in her chest. Slowly the muscle came back to life, flooding her face with heat. And other parts; parts that should not be heating. It was that whiskey-smooth voice of his. But this was not the time for lust; it was the time for panic. Panic that he’d overheard her and knew she was talking about him. She’d never live it down. She couldn’t face him. Maybe if she ignored him he’d go away. He was used to her ignoring him, sniping at him. Her defense mechanism. The one that saved her from prostrating herself at his feet and declaring her undying love.
Thankfully, she didn’t appear to be the only member of the Sawyer fan club. And while she surreptitiously fanned herself with her sweatshirt, he greeted the rest of the home’s residents.
“Doing good, Mr. Applebee. You?” He laughed at something Mr. Applebee said. Jill’s brain hadn’t completely recovered so she didn’t make out much of the conversation. Sawyer’s close proximity wasn’t helping. She could feel him behind her, smell his clean outdoor scent. And dammit, he had a sexy laugh. “You’re on. Flurries’ll take them four games straight.”
Right. Playoff hockey. He’d come to watch the game with his old hockey coach. He visited him on a weekly basis. And that was t
he thing about Sawyer Anderson: not only was he beautiful on the outside, he was beautiful on the inside, too.
Jill had just about got it together enough to face him when she noticed the speculative gleam in Mrs. Sharp’s eyes. Her gaze moving from Sawyer to Jill, from Jill to Sawyer. Dammit. Old sharp-eyes had figured it out. Jill had to distract her. She clapped her hands. “Okay, people, what is the problem? You’ve had an hour to find the murder weapon. If you worked for me, I’d fire your ass…butts. Come on, get it together and find the knife.”
She heard a choking sound behind her and turned. “What?”
Sawyer’s eyes crinkled with amusement. “Looks like your sensitivity training’s going real well, Shortstop.”
“Bite me.” She hated him calling her by her childhood nickname. The one Sawyer and her brother had christened her with. She wasn’t short. She was five eight. Why couldn’t he call her Legs? She had great legs. They were her favorite and best body part—long and lean with well-defined calf muscles. Or Hot Cop? Not that she was beautiful; she wasn’t. The only way she stopped traffic was by turning on her siren. But since women pretty much thought all male cops were hot, men must think women cops were, too.
He smiled that slow, easy smile of his. The one that made her toes curl every single time. “So, how many more weeks do you have to put in before Gage lets you off for good behavior?”
“Four.” Her assignment officially ended tomorrow. But something was going on in the retirement home, and she wasn’t leaving until she knew the residents were safe. She’d noticed suspicious bruising on a couple of them. Cash and jewelry had gone missing, too.
Sawyer glanced at the older men and women as they wandered off to hunt for the knife. He rubbed his hand over his chiseled jaw and manly stubble. “Why exactly do you have them looking for a knife?”
She shrugged. “Murder mystery game. It keeps them active. Makes them use their brains.” And like her self-defense classes, hopefully keeps them safe. “You’re getting warmer, Mrs. Sharp. Real warm,” Jill called out encouragement, relaxing a bit now that the older woman was focused on the hunt. Jill noticed Mr. Appleby looking up at the Aspen trees that bordered a steep hill on the edge of the property. “Mr. Appleby, buddy, you’re not even close. Get back here.”
“Maybe if you weren’t talking about your boyfriend for the last ten minutes, we would have found the murder weapon by now,” Mr. Appleby shouted at her.
Danger. Danger. Jill turned to Sawyer and faked a smile. “Better get going or you’ll miss the National Anthem. I know how much you like to sing along.”
He crossed his arms over his broad chest, the movement putting his biceps on sigh-inducing display. Show-off. He raised an eyebrow. “What boyfriend is he talking about?”
“Don’t listen to him. He’s losing it.” She gave him a light shove. “Nice seeing you. Say hi to coach for me.”
“Her lumbersexual. He sounds wonderful, doesn’t he, Alice?” Mrs. Lynn looked to Mrs. Sharp for confirmation, then turned to Sawyer and said loud enough for the entire town of Christmas to hear, “We’re so happy she has a beau. We thought she was a lesbian, you know.”
Jill briefly closed her eyes. Now what was she supposed to do? Maybe she should put in for a transfer. She opened her eyes and stared straight ahead, refusing to look at Sawyer. No doubt the interrogation would begin once he stopped silently laughing his ass off.
Movement near the statue drew her attention to Mr. Appleby. The older man stuck his hand in the elf’s mouth and triumphantly pulled out the plastic knife. There is a God. Jill pumped her fist. “Way to go, Mr. Appleby! Time to celebrate the man of the hour, folks.”
Sawyer leaned into her, his warm, spearmint-scented breath caressing her cheek. “You’re not getting off the hook that easily, Shortstop,” he said, then gently tugged on her two-inch stub of a ponytail before walking away.
She glanced over her shoulder, following his loose-limbed stride. He pulled his cell phone from the back pocket of his jeans. “Hey, Jack, heard something interesting. Jill has a boyfriend. Yeah, I was thinking the same…” She didn’t hear anything else as the doors closed behind him. But she didn’t have to to know what the next few days would bring. Sawyer and her brother wouldn’t let up until they knew every last detail. Every last detail about her fake boyfriend. She needed a real one. Fast.
She glanced at the tall, wiry man standing in the fountain with his black toupee sliding down over his eyes, the knife still raised over his head. He hadn’t groped her or pinched her butt, and he was ambulatory. “Hey, Mr. Appleby, how old are you?”
Also by Debbie Mason
The Trouble with Christmas
Christmas in July
It Happened at Christmas
Wedding Bells in Christmas
Snowbound at Christmas
Acclaim for
The Christmas, Colorado Series
Wedding Bells in Christmas
“Romance readers will absolutely love this story of matchmaking and passion rekindled. Wedding Bells in Christmas is the very definition of a well-fought-for HEA.”
—RT Book Reviews
“I loved this book. For me, it was the perfect example of small-town contemporary done right. It’s definitely going on my Top Ten Books of 2015 list.”
—SimplyAngelaRenee.blogspot.com
“I completely enjoyed visiting Christmas again. This novel is full of rich, full-flavored characters with a story line that never lets up and keeps you turning page after page to discover what happens next. I would definitely recommend this story to anyone who wants an intense, involved story that brings in the entire town for the celebration of two people falling in love.”
—KeeperBookshelf.com
It Happened at Christmas
“Debbie Mason gives the reader an excellent love story that can be read all year long…You must pick up It Happened at Christmas.”
—NightOwlRomance.com
“A passionate, liberal environmental activist and a straight-arrow conservative lawyer looking to the senate set the sparks flying in this nonstop, beautifully crafted adventure that skillfully unwraps a multilayered plot, adds an abundance of colorful characters and a familiar setting, and proves in no uncertain terms that opposites do attract.”
—Library Journal
Christmas in July
“A heartwarming, feel-good story. I have not read anything written by Debbie Mason before, but now I have to read more of her books because I enjoyed Christmas in July so much.”
—HarlequinJunkie.com
“Debbie Mason’s books are the type of books that leave you with a warm and fuzzy feeling…Christmas in July is a great read.”
—FreshFiction.com
“4 Stars! A quintessential romance with everything readers love: familiar and likable characters, clever dialogue, and a juicy plot.”
—RT Book Reviews
The Trouble with Christmas
“A fun and festive tale, flush with small-town warmth and tongue-in-cheek charm. The main characters are well worth rooting for, their conflicts solid and riveting.”
—USA Today’s Happy Ever After blog
“4 Stars! This is a wonderful story to read this holiday season, and the romance is timeless…This is one of those novels readers will enjoy each and every page of and tell friends about.”
—RT Book Reviews
“The lovers are sympathetic and well drawn…Mason will please fans of zippy small-town stories.”
—Publishers Weekly
“I’m very impressed by [Mason’s] character development, sense of humor, and plotting…Ms. Mason wraps this book up as if it were a very prettily wrapped package. Why not open the pages and have a Christmas present early?”
—LongandShortReviews.com
“Debbie Mason has created a humorous, heartwarming tale that tugged at my heartstrings while tickling my funny bone…a community that I enjoyed visiting and hope to visit again.”
—TheRomanceDish.com
Fall in Love with Forever Romance
PLAY TO WIN
by Tiffany Snow
In the third book of bestselling author Tiffany Snow’s Risky Business series, it’s finally time for Sage to decide between two brothers-in-arms: Parker, the clean-cut, filthy-rich business magnate…or Ryker, the tough-as-nails undercover detective.
NECESSARY RISK
by Tara Wyatt
The first book in a hot new action-packed series from debut author Tara Wyatt, which will appeal to fans of Suzanne Brockmann, Pamela Clare, and Julie Ann Walker.
KISS ME IN CHRISTMAS
by Debbie Mason
Back in little Christmas, Colorado, Hollywood star Chloe O’Connor is still remembered as a shy, awkward schoolgirl. And there’s no one she dreads (and secretly wants) to see more than her high school crush. While Easton McBride enjoys the flirtation with this new bold and beautiful Chloe, he can’t help but wonder whether a kiss could have the power to bring back the small-town girl he first fell in love with.
SEE YOU AT SUNSET
by V.K. Sykes
The newest novel from USA Today bestselling author V.K. Sykes! Deputy Sheriff Micah Lancaster has wanted Holly Tyler for as long as he can remember. Now she’s back in Seashell Bay, and the attraction still flickers between them, a promise of something more. Their desire is stronger than any undertow…and once it pulls them under, it won’t let go.