by Geri Krotow
Serena tried to ignore her regret. “It helps if you stick to toys, Pepé.”
Last year, to her horror and the shopping mall’s Santa’s dismay, Pepé had asked for a father to come and stay “with me and my mom, like my dad did before he died.”
Phil had been gone for three Christmases by then, between being on deployment and then his death, and that was when Pepé decided to ask for him.
“It would be nice to have a dad, Mom.”
“I know, honey.” She couldn’t say more, wouldn’t. It wasn’t her priority to find Pepé a dad. That dad would have to be a man she’d be willing to spend her life with. Which meant she’d have to get to know him first. Actually go on a date.
That kiss with Jonas had opened up the room in her heart she’d sealed off since Phil died. She hadn’t worried about finding someone until she realized how much she’d been missing—all that warmth, not to mention sizzle.
The man could kiss, she’d give him that.
“Come on, honey, let’s go pick out our Christmas tree.”
Pepé clambered down from the high seat and allowed Serena to tighten his scarf and close the snaps over his jacket’s zipper. On school mornings he often wiggled out from under her hands, fighting her attention. Today was different. Today was Christmas-tree day. Santa day.
“Mom, can I go pet the reindeer?”
“Why don’t we pick out our tree first, then we can come back and spend as much time as we want in Santa’s village.”
Pepé looked first right, then left, before he sent her a big smile.
“Okay. Good idea, Mom.”
Serena laughed—until she heard someone speak not far from her.
“Need some help chopping down a tree, neighbors?” She’d know Jonas’s voice anywhere.
It should alarm her, how quickly he’d eased himself into her psyche.
“Jonas!”
“Jonas.” The trill of excitement in her belly wasn’t for him, or the surprise of him showing up on her holiday celebration with Pepé. It was because of the holiday itself. Christmas was an exciting time.
“Are you getting a tree, too?” Pepé gazed up at Jonas as if he were Thor, Pepé’s favorite mythic hero. Serena had to admit to herself that, except for his short haircut, Jonas would make an excellent Thor. He certainly kissed like a god.
Stop it.
“Why, as a matter of fact, I am, but I’m going to buy a small one. My place doesn’t need a big huge tree. Not like yours.”
At least he’d referred to the house as theirs and not Dottie’s or his family’s.
Suspicion erased Serena’s polite smile. “What brings you here today, Jonas, at this particular hour?”
“A tree, like I said.” His grin was like a blowtorch to the icicles with which she’d carefully surrounded her heart.
“We don’t happen to have a mutual acquaintance in Mrs. Claus, do we?”
She suspected Emily had “run into” Jonas at the hospital and let him know that she and Pepé were going to be here. She really needed to talk to Emily about matchmaking. Serena wasn’t ready, and certainly not for Jonas.
He overwhelmed her.
“Oh, Serena, ye of little faith. Why can’t you accept that I’m here of my own accord? That I really want to be friends? Not to mention a tree.”
Because she was a lawyer, she knew people often had deeper motives, or different ones, than they proclaimed. Because she had a child to protect from anyone who wanted to become “friends” and then leave when he’d attained his goal. Because she was living in the house he still thought was his, no matter how gracious he was being at the moment.
“Hmm.”
“Want to help us find our tree, Jonas?” Pepé asked eagerly.
“Sure. Do you need a saw?” He looked inquiringly at Serena.
“I was going to have Santa’s helpers do it for us.”
“No need. If you’ll allow me, I have a handy-dandy Christmas-tree saw right here.” He held up a grocery bag with the handle of a small tree cutter sticking out.
“How fortuitous.”
Jonas laughed. “Your mom has a wonderful vocabulary, Pepé. I’ll bet she’s the best lawyer ever.”
Pepé wasn’t listening—he’d taken off down the path that cut through the rows and rows of trees.
“Pepé!”
“Let him go. The precut trees go about halfway down the lot, and then he’ll get to where the live ones are. We won’t lose sight of him.”
Serena looked at Jonas as they walked together, their boots making the cold snow crunch in the squeaky way she loved.
“I rarely saw snow as a kid. Sometimes I feel like I’m only six years old, too.”
“Did you grow up entirely in Texas?”
“Yes.” She hesitated, then allowed the words to come. “My mother raised me on her own until she met my stepfather, another store owner in our small town. She still owns the best tortilla bakery in south Texas. It kept her and us in a good lifestyle.”
“Did you ever want to find out about your biological father?”
“I didn’t know about him until after Phil died. It was only then, when I was in a pit of depression and my mother was afraid I wouldn’t climb out of it, that she told me she’d had to raise a kid on her own, too. Me.”
They’d caught up to where the live trees grew in neat rows. Pepé was weaving around each tree in the row, taking his time to pick the right one.
“She married my stepfather when I was four. They had two daughters and twin boys of their own. Yet I never thought of my siblings as half anything. We were all a family, together.” Serena realized she hadn’t told anyone that much about her family since she’d shared her past with Dottie.
“You must have been angry when she told you about your father...my uncle Todd.”
“I was devastated. Especially when I found out he’d passed away. Thank God for Dottie—she reached out and told me I’d always have family here.”
She turned to Jonas, who stood with his gaze on Pepé.
“Why are you asking about this?”
“I’ll admit I wasn’t thrilled about your showing up, not with all the stories you hear about seniors being taken advantage of nowadays. But now I know you’re legit, and I want to know what made you both move all the way out here.”
“That’s a longer story than we have time for at the moment,” Serena said. “The quick answer is that I needed to start over and give Pepé and me a new life. Something different from what we’d known.” And away from the constant reminders of their loss.
“Mom! This one!” Pepé’s excited shouts reached them and they laughed. Jonas’s blue eyes sparkled with warmth as he looked at her and Serena felt that jolt again.
Knowing. Recognition. Soul-level attraction.
“I think he may have found a tree to saw down. Come on, let’s go help your son.” Jonas grabbed her mittened hand in his gloved one. Serena glanced at their hands together, then up at him.
He gave her a quick tug.
“Come on, Serena. Let go. Have some fun.”
What would it hurt to let go for a few hours?
She answered by grasping his fingers more tightly and walking with him toward the tree Pepé had deemed Christmas worthy.
* * *
JONAS HAD TO keep his grin either aimed at Pepé or to himself. He lay on the crunchy snow, staring up at pine-needle branches, his saw and Pepé’s wide eyes, shining with boyish excitement. Pepé got it—that they were on a quest to find the best tree for him and his mom. And he’d succeeded in achieving their target.
Jonas only had to make sure they cut the tree down without Pepé’s getting crushed or nicked. Neither would place him on Serena’s good list, which was his goal.
Her faux f
ur–trimmed snow boots were in his peripheral vision, reminding him of her feminine presence.
He was doing this to show her his more human side, per Doc Franklin’s suggestion. Doc was an ace at career survival and dealing with the slickest, highest-ranking officers. That he was single and not so lucky in love didn’t matter to Jonas.
This wasn’t about relationships or love, he reminded himself yet again; it was about getting Dottie’s house back. And convincing Serena that she and Pepé would be just as happy in a new place closer to Oak Harbor.
“That’s it, Pepé, move back a bit so you’re not in range of the wood chips and put your hand on the handle here.”
Pepé’s small hand in its red mitten fit firmly around the saw’s handle. It was going to take a little longer as Jonas didn’t want to crush the kid’s fingers, but he admired Pepé’s spunk. Nothing fazed this kid.
“Okay, let’s start sawing. Ready?”
“Ready!”
Jonas kept his focus on the saw and Pepé’s fingers. Even though he couldn’t help being aware of Serena, hovering a few feet away from them...
“This is a tough one, Jonas.” Pepé’s eyes watched the teeth of the saw and the flecks of wood that spit out as they worked together. His face was scrunched up behind his safety goggles and Jonas laughed at the adult expression on such a young face.
“What’s so funny?”
“We are, Pepé. We think it’s hard to chop this tree down, but just imagine how hard it was for the tree to grow!”
“Will Santa still be there when we’re done?”
“He’ll still be there, honey. Just get the tree down so that we can get it onto our car.” Serena’s voice broke through Jonas’s concentration and he paused in his sawing motion. He looked up to see her gaze steady on both of them as she crouched beside the tree.
“Stay behind us, Serena, or risk being pummeled by this green beast.”
“I’m fine, Jonas, don’t worry.”
It took several more minutes but finally the tree was about to fall.
“I’ll hold it from the top.” Serena’s face disappeared and Jonas felt her boots against his back as she grasped the main trunk.
“Got it!”
“Pepé, let’s slide out nice and easy. Once you’re on your feet, get behind your mom.”
Pepé did and managed to unwittingly kick a bootful of snow in Jonas’s face.
“Oomph.” He would have laughed if the cold hadn’t shocked him so much. Pepé was right; where was the Santa village? He needed some hot cider. Maybe he’d luck out and Santa would have hot coffee.
Once up and on his feet, Jonas stood behind Serena and reached into the center of the tree. Her backside fit nicely against him, and he allowed himself to inhale the warmth of hair that fell from under her snow cap.
“What are you doing?” Her whisper was supposed to chastise him, but tell that to his groin.
“I’m enjoying myself. How about you?”
Her brown eyes turned their sharp intelligence on him and Jonas wanted to kiss her, push her down into the snowy ground, reach up under her jacket...
“I’ve got the tree. You and Pepé go over there and watch it fall.”
“Oh!” Her eyes were still on his, the awareness crackling between them. She stared at his mouth, and Jonas bit the inside of his cheek to keep from moving in closer.
“I’ve got my camera!” Serena slid out from under him and he had to stare at the snow-covered tree for a second to will his erection into merely semi-uncomfortable.
“Come on, Pepé, let’s go stand where it’s safe. We’ll get a great picture of our tree falling down.”
“Hurry, Mom!” Pepé ran out in front of her and Jonas couldn’t have stopped the laugh that rumbled out of his belly if he’d wanted to. The pure joy on Pepé’s face was worth every bit of discomfort.
“Ready?” He could stand here all day when Serena was up next to him, but in the cold he became aware of the weight of the tree and the way his muscles were starting to protest from lying on the cold ground for so long.
“Hang on, I need to get this focused properly.”
“Take your time.” He really wanted to say “Snap the picture already!”
“Okay, Pepé?” He saw her bend her head toward her son. As Pepé grinned up at Serena, the similarity in their profiles struck him as endearing.
Endearing?
Had he taken a crack to his skull while under the tree?
“Okay!”
“Timber!” Jonas bellowed the word more to get his mind off his uninvited emotions than for any dramatic effect. Pepé jumped up and down as the tree tipped and took its final bow before becoming a Christmas decoration. White puffs of powdery snow flew up as the boughs hit the ground, the definite thud validating Jonas’s concern for his and Pepé’s safety while under the tree.
“Okay, let’s haul her in.” He was glad he’d worn his leather work gloves instead of his ski gloves, but the cold bit at his fingertips. A warm cup of coffee or cider was on his mind as he slid the tree onto the plastic sled he’d brought, courtesy of his brother’s overstocked garage, and pulled it up the path back to Santa’s village.
“Keep an eye on the back of our caravan here, Pepé, and make sure the tree doesn’t jump off the sled.”
“Okay!” Empowered by the order, Pepé ran behind the sled as if his entire Christmas gift pile depended upon it.
“You didn’t forget one detail for this, did you?” Serena’s brown eyes narrowed as she walked beside him, her face turned toward him.
“Why so suspicious? Can’t a guy help out?”
“It’s not the helping that bothers me. I’m very grateful that you were here. Otherwise, I would’ve asked one of the workers to get the tree for us and haul it back. This way Pepé was able to fully participate. Thank you, Jonas.”
“You’re very welcome.”
“I’m not sixteen, and there aren’t any stars in my eyes, however. It’s been my experience that men are this helpful for one of two reasons.”
“Go on.”
“In your case...you’re either feeling guilty about purchasing the land around Dottie’s house and want to ease that guilt by doing a good deed for Pepé and me. Or you want something.”
“Such as?”
“Dottie’s house. Don’t be obtuse, Jonas. Do you think I believe for one minute that you’ve given up on getting back what you feel is rightfully yours?”
He stopped in the snow. Santa’s village was another two hundred yards down the path.
“You’d suck the sugar right out of a candy cane, wouldn’t you, Serena? Is there anything wrong with a little Christmas spirit?”
“Do you blame me?”
“No, but I’m going to give you a chance to feel like I didn’t take this whole day right out of your hands. Here, use your energy for something other than trying to figure me out. I’ll meet you at the snack shed.”
He handed her the rope handles to the sled. Her mouth fell open and he saw a fleeting shot of regret before she gritted her teeth and started to pull the tree.
It was petty, but the grunt that came out of her mouth with her first few steps gave him tremendous satisfaction.
“Pepé, your mom has command of the tree. Keep an eye on the stern for me!”
“Aye-aye, Jonas!”
“Good boy.”
He turned back to Serena. “It gets easier once you have the momentum of the tree’s weight sliding on the snow with you.”
He didn’t wait to hear her retort as he jogged up ahead of them toward Santa and a warm cup of joe.
* * *
SERENA HAD SEVERAL minutes to her thoughts as she clomped through the snow. It wasn’t hard to imagine she was out on the tundra with the cold wind hitting he
r square in the face and the heavy weight of the tree making the trip to warmth feel like it was miles away.
Except that in the tundra she’d have sled dogs pulling the tree for her, wouldn’t she? She didn’t have the energy to laugh, or she would have. She absolutely deserved this. She’d been rude to Jonas after he’d made their tree search more fun and certainly less laborious for her.
Until now.
“All clear in the rear, Mom!” Pepé chortled at his rhyme and Serena smiled. He was having the time of his life.
He needed positive male attention and role models. It wasn’t his fault that his dad had died, nor was it hers. Still, she worried about a child’s ability to cope. When they’d visited Beyond the Stars two summers ago, she’d discovered that what had helped her get through her grief more than anything was learning to accept life on its own terms. But Pepé was so young and as much as he took things at face value more than she did, it was also easier for him to escape into an imaginary world.
After Phil died, Pepé had retreated so far into his private fantasy world that he didn’t speak to any adults other than Serena. Even his beloved abuela was hard-pressed to get a word out of him. Only after the counselor at the resort for Gold Star families had helped Pepé get over his new fear of jumping into the deep end of the pool had Pepé started to talk again.
That counselor, Lucas, had been male and Serena didn’t miss the significance.
As much as Pepé was a well-adjusted kid, thriving in his new environment, Serena knew he had a hole in his heart. He craved a father. How could he not? Phil had been there for him 100 percent of the time when he wasn’t deployed downrange. They’d bonded as a solid father-and-son unit. Right after Phil died Serena had a hard time separating her grief at losing her husband from the sheer torture of watching her little boy grieve for the father he’d called “Bud.” Pepé had been “little buddy.”
“That was then, this is now.” She murmured the reminder to herself; it was advice from her grief counseling sessions. She didn’t have to carry the guilt and the grief for both of them any longer.
Serena wiped a stray tear from her cheek and felt a bloom of gratitude she hadn’t experienced in a long while. Here they were, she and Pepé, hauling in the first Christmas tree they’d handled all by themselves, from picking it out to cutting it down, and now they had the decorating to look forward to.