by Lisa Jackson
Cal looked around a room that had once held nothing but bad, ugly memories and a certain sense of loss. He’d known over the past year they’d worked on eradicating all that bad, but now he knew for certain the ghosts of an ugly past were gone.
They were starting a new Barton future. A really good one.
Cal cleared his throat and held up a glass. “How about a toast?”
“From you?” Sarah and Lindsay asked in unison.
“Yes, from me,” Cal replied with a scowl. “The first and possibly last one I’ll ever give, so have some respect.”
“He’s so cute when he’s grumpy,” Lindsay said, probably to irritate him further.
“He’s not half as grumpy now as he used to be,” Sarah returned. “Thanks to you.”
Cal sighed heavily. It was his great lot in life that his future wife would be far too good of friends with his sister. But Sarah would have the kind of sister she deserved, and he couldn’t ask for more.
“To family,” he said, hoping he wouldn’t always be moved to this kind of sentimentality on Christmas. “To love. And to as many Merry Christmases as we can shove into a lifetime.”
Which earned him enthusiastic “hear, hears” from the small group, and an even more enthusiastic kiss from his future wife.
Wife. Lindsay Tyler was finally, finally going to be his wife, and he had no doubt he would make every moment of that dream finally coming true count.
Also available from national bestselling author Nicole Helm. . . .
A NICE DAY FOR A COWBOY WEDDING
“Sharp, funny, and sinfully sexy—Nicole Helm is my favorite new author!”
—Maisey Yates, New York Times bestselling author
Nestled in the Rocky Mountains, rugged Gracely, Colorado, is famous for big-sky beauty and small-town community. It’s a perfect place to take a deep breath, start again—and even plunge into the kind of love that lasts a lifetime . . .
As the oldest of three brothers, Shane Tyler takes his responsibility to the family ranch seriously—and it’s clear to him that the younger man who wants to marry his widowed mother is only looking for a meal ticket. He’s determined to stop the nuptials whatever it takes, but the shy wedding planner his mom hired is harder to intimidate than he expected.
When Cora Preston worked up the nerve to leave her abusive ex and move with her young son to Gracely, it was a huge step. Accepting the position as wedding planner at brand-new Mile High Weddings took even more courage. But Cora’s biggest challenge is turning out to be the bride’s handsome—and stubborn—oldest son, Shane, and the way the strong-willed cowboy makes her feel.
Can the heat crackling between them warm two hearts suspicious of love?
Praise for Nicole Helm’s Mile High Romance series:
“A classic small-town contemporary with extra angst, perfect for fans of Susan Mallery and Jill Shalvis.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“A deeply moving contemporary.... The protagonists are refreshingly willing to be up front about their feelings and listen to each other, and readers will want to revisit their story often.”
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
A BABY FOR CHRISTMAS
LISA JACKSON
Prologue
December 1995
Boston, Massachusetts
I’ll have a blue Christmas without you . . .
“Oh, no, I won’t!” Angrily, Annie McFarlane snapped off the radio. She wasn’t about to let the sad lyrics of that particular song echo through her heart. It was the Christmas season, for heaven’s sake. A time for merriment and joy, not the dull loneliness that caused her to ache inside.
She unwound a string of Christmas lights and plugged it into the socket. Instantly the dreary living room of her condominium was awash with twinkling bright color. Red, blue, yellow, and green reflected on the carpet and bare walls, giving a hint of warmth to a room littered with half-filled boxes and crates, evidence of the move across country she was planning. Pictures, mementos of her life as a married woman, clothes, knick-knacks, everything she owned was half-packed in the boxes strewn haphazardly through the condo.
Her throat tightened and she fought back another attack of hot, painful tears. “Don’t do this,” she reprimanded herself sharply. “He’s not worth it. He never was.”
So what if David had left her for another woman? So what if this was the first Christmas she would spend alone in her entire life? So what if she was truly and finally divorced, a situation she’d never wanted?
Women went through it all the time. So did men. It wasn’t the end of the world.
But it felt like it. The weight on her shoulders and pain deep in her heart wouldn’t listen to the mental tongue-lashings she constantly gave herself. “Get over it,” she said aloud and was surprised that her words nearly reverberated in the half-empty rooms. Her dog, a mutt who looked like he had his share of German shepherd hidden somewhere in his genes, thumped his tail against the floor as he lay, head on paws, under the kitchen table.
“It’s all right, Riley,” she said, her words sounding as hollow as she felt.
Sleet slashed against the windows, the old Seth Thomas clock still mounted over the fireplace ticked off the seconds of her life, and the gas flames in the grate hissed steadily against ceramic logs that would never burn. Outside, the city of Boston was alive with the festivities of the holiday season. Brilliant lights winked and dazzled on garland-clad porches while bare-branched trees were ablaze in neighboring yards. Wreaths and pine-scented swags adorned doors and electric candles burned in most of the windows. Children in those other houses were too excited to sleep. Parents, frazzled but happy, sipped mulled wine, planned family dinners, and worried that their hastily bought, last-minute presents wouldn’t bring a gleam of gladness to their recipients’ eyes.
And here she was, stringing a single strand of lights over a potted tree she’d bought at the local grocery store, knowing that tomorrow she would eat alone, put in some hours down at the local women’s shelter, and come home to pack the rest of her things. She only wished that she’d been able to move before the holidays, but her timing—or, more precisely, David’s timing—hadn’t allowed for Christmas.
Three months ago she’d called her real estate agent about selling the condo, watched through her tears as David had carried his half of their possessions out the door, smiled bravely when he’d casually mentioned that Caroline, his girlfriend, was pregnant, and then had fallen apart completely as she’d reluctantly signed the divorce papers.
Annie had never felt more alone in her life. Her mother and stepfather were spending the holidays cruising up and down the west coast of Mexico; her sister Nola, forever the free spirit, was again missing in action, probably with a new-found lover. Annie remembered Nola’s last choice, a tall, strapping blond man by the name of Liam O’Shaughnessy, whom Nola professed to adore for all of two or three weeks. Since O’Shaughnessy, there had been others, Annie supposed, but none she’d heard of.
Then there was Annie’s brother, Joel, and his wife. They were spending Christmas at home in Atlanta with their three kids. Though invited to visit them, Annie hadn’t wanted to fly down south with her case of the blues and spoil everyone’s Christmas so she’d decided to stick it out here, alone in the home that she and David had shared, until she moved to Oregon after the first of the year.
Thank God the condo had sold quickly. She couldn’t imagine spending much more time here in this lonely tomb, which was little more than a shrine to a marriage that had failed.
She fished in a box of handmade ornaments she’d sewed and glued together only last year and placed a tiny sleigh on an already-drooping bough. As she finished looping a length of strung cranberries and popcorn around the little evergreen, she had to smile. The forlorn little tree looked almost festive.
There would be life, a more satisfying life, after David. She’d see to it personally. At least she still had Riley, who was company if nothing else.
/> With a glimmer of hope as inspiration, she walked to the kitchen, scrounged in a drawer for a corkscrew, and realized that, as she’d given the good one to David, she was forced to use the all-in-one tool they’d bought years before for a camping trip. The screwdriver-can opener-bottle opener was more inclined to slice the user’s hand than open a can or bottle, but it was the best implement she could come up with at the moment.
She managed to open a bottle of chardonnay without drawing any blood, then found one of the wine goblets from the crystal she’d picked out seven years ago when she’d planned her wedding to David. She’d been twenty-three at the time, graduated from college as a business major and had met David McFarlane, a witty, good-looking law student, only to fall hopelessly in love with him. She’d never thought it would end. Not even during the horrid anguish and pain of her first miscarriage. The second loss—during the fifth month—had been no better, but the third, and final, when the doctor had advised her to think seriously of adoption, had been the straw that had broken the over-burdened back of their union. David was the last son of his particular branch of the McFarlane family tree and as such was expected, as well as personally determined, to spawn his own child, with or without Annie.
It was then, during the talks of surrogate mothers and fertility clinics, that the marriage had really started to crumble. Enter Caroline Gentry: young, nubile, willing, and, apparently, if David were to be believed, able to carry a baby to term.
“What a mess,” Annie said to herself as she carried her bottle and goblet into the living room. On the hearth, she tucked her legs beneath the hem of her oversized sweater and watched the reflection of the colored lights play in her wine. “Next year will be better.” She held up her glass in a mock toast and her dog, as if he understood her, snorted in disdain. “I’m not kidding, Riley. Next year, the good Lord willin’ and the creek don’t rise, things will be much, much better.” Riley yawned and stretched, as if tired of her pep talks to herself. She took a long swallow and closed her eyes.
No matter what happened, she’d get over this pain, forget about David and his infidelity, and find a new life.
And a new man, an inner voice prompted.
“Never,” she whispered. She’d never let a man get close enough to her again to wound her so deeply. “I’ll make it on my own, damn it, or die trying.”
CHAPTER 1
December 1996
Oh, the weather outside is frightful . . .
“Damn.” Liam snapped off the radio and scowling, settled against the passenger window of the battle-scarred Ford.
“Not in the spirit of the season?” Jake Cranston snorted as he stared through the windshield of his car. “I guess jail will do that to you.”
Liam didn’t respond, just clamped his jaw tight. He’d been through hell and back in the past few weeks; he didn’t need to be reminded of it. Not even from a friend. Tonight Jake was more than a friend; he’d turned out to be Liam’s goddamned guardian angel.
Liam glared out the window to the dark night beyond. Ahead of them, red taillights blurred through the thick raindrops that the wipers couldn’t slap away fast enough. On the other side of the median, headlights flashed as cars screamed in the opposite direction. Christ, he was tired. He needed a good night’s sleep, a stiff drink, and a woman. Not necessarily in that order.
It seemed as if Jake had been driving for hours, speeding through this rainy section of freeway without getting anywhere, but the city lights of Seattle were beginning to glow to the north.
“Want to stop somewhere?” Jake, while negotiating a banked turn, managed to shake a cigarette from his pack of Marlboros located forever on the dusty dash of his Taurus wagon. He passed the pack to his friend and shoved the Marlboro between his teeth.
He thought about lighting up. It had been six years since his last smoke and he could use the relief. He was so damned keyed up, his mind racing miles a minute even though he was dead tired. He tossed the pack onto the dash again. “Just get me home, Cranston.”
“Why the devil would you want to go there?” Jake punched the lighter.
“Gotta start somewhere.”
“Yeah, but if I were you I’d put this whole thing behind me and start over.”
“Not yet.”
“You’re well out of it.” The lighter clicked. Jake lit up and let smoke drift from his nostrils.
“Not until my name is cleared.” Leaning back in the seat, Liam tried to forget the nightmare of the past few months and the hell he’d been through. But the days of looking over his shoulder and knowing he was being followed, watched by men he’d once trusted, still struck a deep, unyielding anger in his soul.
It had all started four months ago on a hot August night in Bellevue. In the early morning hours, there had been a break-in at the company offices where Liam worked. At first the police thought it was a typical burglary gone sour; the security guard on duty that night, old Bill Arness, had been unfortunate enough to confront the crook and had been bashed over the head, his skull crushed. Bill, a six-times grandfather with a wide girth and quick smile, had never awakened, but lingered in a coma for six weeks, then died before he was able to give the name of his attacker. His wife had never once left his side and the president of Belfry Construction, Zeke Belfry, had offered a twenty-five-thousand-dollar reward for anyone who had information that would lead to the arrest and conviction of the perpetrator. Zeke, a law-abiding, holier-than-thou Christian with whom Liam had never gotten along, was personally offended that his company had been singled out for any kind of criminal act and he wanted revenge.
Which he ultimately got.
Out of Liam O’Shaughnessy’s hide.
Within a few months the police had decided the break-in was an inside job. Records had been destroyed. An audit showed that over a hundred thousand dollars was missing, all of the money skimmed from construction jobs for which Liam had been the project manager.
The police and internal auditors had started asking questions.
It had been nearly two months from the time of all the trouble until the police had closed in on him, slowly pulling their noose around his neck tighter and tighter while he himself was working on his own investigation. It was obvious someone had set him up to take a fall, but whom?
Before he could zero in on all of the suspects, one woman had come forward, a woman who held a personal grudge, a woman who had driven the final nails in his coffin. Nola Prescott, his ex-lover, had gone to the police and somehow convinced them that Liam was involved not only with the embezzling, but the death of old Bill Arness as well.
So here he was with his only friend in the world, trying to forget the sounds that had kept him awake at night. The clang of metal against metal, the shuffle of tired feet, shouts of the guards, and clank of chains still rattled through his brain. Prison. He’d been in prison, for Christ’s sake. All because of one woman.
His teeth ground in frustration, but he forced his anger back. Don’t get mad, get even. The old words of wisdom had been his personal mantra for the past few weeks. He’d known that eventually he’d be set free, that the D.A. couldn’t possibly hold him without bail forever, that there wasn’t a strong enough case against him because he hadn’t done it.
“Okay, so what’s the story?” he finally asked. “Why was I let go all of a sudden?”
“I thought you talked to your attorney.”
“He just sketched out the details. Something about the prosecution losing their prime witness. Seems Nola chickened out. Didn’t want to perjure herself.”
Jake snorted and two jets of smoke streamed from his nostrils. “That’s about the size of it. Nola Prescott recanted the testimony in her deposition.”
Liam’s guts churned. Nola. Beautiful. Bright. Secretary to one of the engineers at the firm. Great in bed, if you liked cold, unemotional, but well-practiced sex. No commitment. Just one body seeking relief from another. Liam had quickly grown bored and felt like hell after his few times in bed with h
er. Too much vodka had been his downfall. Their affair had been brief. “Why’d she change her mind?”
“Who knows? Maybe she got religion,” Jake cracked and when Liam didn’t smile, drew hard on his cigarette. He guided the Taurus onto the off-ramp leading to Bellevue, a bedroom community located north and east of Seattle.
“I think she might be protecting someone,” Liam said, his eyes narrowing.
“Who?”
“Don’t know. Maybe someone else she was involved with.” He concentrated long and hard. “Someone at the company, probably. It would have been someone she was involved with six or seven months ago, before she left for her new job with that company in Tacoma.”
“Christ, why didn’t you tell this to the cops?”
“No proof. I’d look like I was just grasping at straws, but there’s got to be a reason she set me up.”
“You dumped her.”
“So she accuses me of murder? That’s even lower than Nola would go. She claimed to see me at the company that night. Why? She worked in another city.”
“But still lived in the area.”
“Too much of a coincidence, if you ask me.” He stared at the streaks of raindrops on the windows. “It’s just a matter of finding out who she was involved with.” He drummed his fingers on the dash and thought of the possibilities—several names came to mind.
“Anyone you want me to check?” Jake offered.
“Yeah. Kim Boniface, one of her friends, but I wouldn’t think she’d be covering for a woman. Then there’s Hank Swanson, another project manager, Peter Talbott in accounting, and Jim Scorelli, an engineer who was always making a pass at her. Other than that,”—he shook his head, mentally disregarding rumors of financial difficulties of other friends and coworkers he knew at Belfry—“I can’t think of anyone.”