Her heart filled with emotion at his words. She had waited a long time to find a man who was kind and caring in a way that Richie had never been, who was steadfast and sure and saw something special in her. Maybe Tom was that man. She was investing something of herself in that hope as she offered herself to him tonight, and she had an idea that Tom understood and appreciated that fact.
They sank against the pillows, and Beth gave in to the sensations evoked by his hard palms against her skin, caressing her breasts, sliding downward across the strip of lace on her belly. He dipped his head down to her throat, his breath fluttering gently there, and feathered a trail of gentle kisses to her breasts. He cupped them reverently in his palms, kissed each one in turn, murmured her name.
She hadn’t expected such tenderness. She had expected passion and strength and, perhaps, haste. Usually, in her experience, all of which had taken place long ago, making love with someone for the first time was awkward. It was different with this man, who was instinctively aware of her, of her breathing, of every slight movement of her body. He took his time, as if he understood that the act would be sweeter if they didn’t rush. It was good to be totally in sync while making love; she felt that she could give herself over to it entirely and be lost in the experience. Lost, but somehow happily found.
The teddy fell away, and now nothing kept them apart. He made sure they were protected, and it was his eyes that held her then as much as his arms. She could sense the person inside him, the man that she had grown to care about since the day they’d first met. He had made her feel fresh and new again, unsullied by her unhappy childhood and subsequent divorce. It was as if none of that had ever happened. Not thinking about that, not really, she was living totally in the moment as she rose to him and cradled him between her thighs. Held him there, felt his heat and his urgency. It was incredibly erotic when he started to move, slowly, faster, sweeping her along on a rush of heat and intensity and longing.
Across the room, the candle flame flickered and rose, and inside them the heat swirled until it burst behind Beth’s closed eyelids into a hundred candles, a thousand. Without warning, Tom exploded inside her, his gasp close to her ear, and she hung on to him as if she never wanted to let him go.
Was that true? That she never wanted to let go? The possibility ricocheted around inside her brain, colliding with her prior determination not to let anyone—any man—into her life.
She found it difficult to come to grips with what was happening to her. She’d entered into this sexual experience expecting it to be an extension of friendship. Yet now, as she slid one leg across Tom’s and rested her head on his shoulder as if that was the natural place for it to be, troubling emotions threatened to overwhelm her.
Tom stroked her hair, kissed her temple. “Sweet Beth,” he said. “I meant it when I said I was crazy about you.”
She melted at the earnestness of his expression. “I—I’m glad,” she said, not wanting to go any further than that. She felt so helpless when it came to talking about this.
He sighed and curled his body around hers, falling asleep almost instantly. Beth lay awake pondering. Making room in her life for Tom wouldn’t be as easy as making room in her bed. It would be infinitely more complicated.
And, perhaps, more rewarding.
Chapter Ten
“Merry Christmas,” Tom said, and Beth opened her eyes to find him standing at the foot of her bed, holding a tray. On his head he wore a red Santa Claus cap, the one with the marabou trim that had come with her new teddy, and on the rest of him he wore—a white terry-cloth towel?
Remembering last night, Beth pushed herself to a sitting position and clutched at the sheet. Her teddy had somehow ended up on top of the lamp shade. His clothes were in a neat pile on a chair, and his boots were lined up beside the door.
“Merry Christmas to you, too,” she said, wrinkling her nose at the wonderfully intermingled fragrances of country ham and freshly brewed coffee.
He set the tray beside her on the bed, swooped down, and planted a kiss on her cheek. “I had an idea that you might enjoy a real Breakfast with Santa,” he said.
She smiled at him, finding the Santa cap and beard stubble combination oddly endearing.
“You should have awakened me,” she said. “I’d have cooked breakfast.”
“I didn’t have the heart to disturb you. Instead, I ducked into your shower, and afterward, I explored the refrigerator.”
“The hat looks good,” she told him.
“It would probably be more becoming to you. Want to wear it?”
“No, thanks, and would you mind handing me that robe on the back of the bathroom door?”
Tom tossed it to her. “What about breakfast in bed?”
She stood up and wrapped the robe around her. “I want to wash my face, that’s all.” She kissed him before going into the bathroom and closing the door.
For a moment, she stared at her reflection. Her face was devoid of makeup, her hair a tangled mess. No wonder, when you considered their impassioned lovemaking of the night before.
“Woman, you’re going to kill me,” Tom had moaned after the third time, or was it the fourth?
Now, as she struggled to tug a brush through her hair, she almost blushed at the way she had seduced him last night. Not that he had minded. In fact, her preparations had fascinated him, and he’d expressed delight that she was such a willing bed partner.
“You always seemed so cool and calm,” he’d said in amazement. “How could I have guessed that you’re a wild and crazy woman underneath? And on top, and every stuff?”
She’d laughed at that. “I’m not sure I was so uninhibited before you came along. Ever,” she’d told him.
When, after a shower and subduing her hair into some semblance of order, she emerged from the bathroom, Tom was propped up on pillows in her bed, the Santa hat tilted rakishly to one side, the tray on a pillow between his side of the bed and hers. She slid under the sheets.
“You’re amazing,” she said. “I wasn’t expecting breakfast in bed.”
“What exactly,” he said, waggling his eyebrows at her, “did you expect? More of what we did last night?”
She felt her cheeks heat.
“Admit it,” he said. “You’ve figured out that I’m insatiable.”
“Now that you mention it,” she replied as primly as she could under the circumstances, “the possibility has crossed my mind.”
“And what about you? You’re no shrinking violet yourself.”
“Couldn’t we simply eat breakfast? And not dissect last night?”
“I’m only expressing appreciation for the woman you are.”
“I’m not that woman, really.”
“Last night liberated you,” Tom said. “Right?”
Beth stirred her coffee, sipped and found it too hot. She replaced the cup in its saucer and regarded him. The only answer that occurred to her was that she would revert to Mitchell’s mom once her son came home.
“We don’t have to talk about it now,” Tom said. “Let’s enjoy Christmas, okay?”
She took heart from the warm light in his eyes. “Good idea.”
“You’d better eat your eggs before they get cold.”
The eggs were delicious, and so was everything else. Because he had cooked, Beth insisted on cleaning up, and after that, Tom said he would go to his house to get the goose, which was thawing in his refrigerator.
“I’ll be back later,” he said, kissing her at the door.
She stood in her warm fleece bathrobe, collar upturned against the chill, and waved as he drove away.
Afterward she hummed as she made the bed, straightened the house, vacuumed the living room. She was hoping Mitchell would call.
When the phone rang, however, it was Chloe.
“You’re invited to eat Christmas dinner with my family,” she told Beth hurriedly. “I’ve been meaning to mention it.”
“Thanks, Chlo, but I have other plans.” Beth knew C
hloe would automatically think that she was spending the afternoon with Leanne and her brood, as she had last year.
“You sound mighty cheerful.”
This would have been the time to mention to Chloe that she’d spent last night with Tom Collyer, but Beth was reluctant.
“It’s Christmas,” she said airily, “the season to be jolly, and all that.”
“Fa-la-la-la-la,” Chloe agreed. “I need to put the finishing touches on the salad I’m making for our family dinner. Merry Christmas, Beth, and we’ll get together soon.”
After they hung up, Beth wandered into the living room. The Christmas tree that Tom had brought dominated the living room, even with her new armoire against one wall. Maybe she could start a tradition of planting an Afghan pine every year. Mitchell would like that, and perhaps Tom would, as well.
She was caught up short by this thought. She had no cause to believe that Tom would be part of her life next Christmas, and she probably wouldn’t have the heart to buy and decorate a tree just for herself.
As she lit the fire in the fireplace, the phone rang again. She hurried to answer it.
“Merry Christmas, Mom!” cried Mitchell.
She carried the phone to the armchair, poked at the newly lit fire to make sure it was burning and sat down. “Hi, honey. Merry Christmas to you, too.” The familiar lump was rising in her throat again, and for a moment, the lights on the Christmas tree blurred.
“Mom, you’ll never guess what I got for Christmas!”
She blinked to clear the mist from her eyes. “No, I can’t. You’ll have to tell me.”
“Should I keep you in suspense?”
She smiled. “Please tell.”
“Santa brought me an electric scooter of my very own!” Mitchell said with glee. “It was under the tree this morning when I got up!”
“An—an electric scooter?” she repeated. She was stunned. Surely Richie didn’t believe that Mitchell was old enough to ride one.
“Yeah. It’s bright red. I love it, Mommy. Later, Daddy’s going to show me how to make it go.”
“Oh, dear. Maybe you’d better let me talk to your dad.” An electric scooter? For Mitchell, who was only five and still had to be cautioned not to run into the street when they were at the park? She’d give Richie a piece of her mind. She’d—
“Okay, Mommy, I’ll get him.” She heard footsteps running, then Mitchell calling, “Dad? Da-ad! Mom wants to talk to you.”
She waited impatiently, drumming her fingers on the table beside the chair.
“Beth?”
“Yes,” she said tightly. “Are you out of your mind, Richie?”
A pause. “Merry Christmas to you, too, Beth,” he said with more than a hint of irony.
“Never mind that. How on earth could you think that our son is ready to ride an electric scooter? He hasn’t even tried the kind you push with one foot yet. He’s barely ready for a bike with training wheels.”
“All the kids around here have them.”
“Five-year-olds?”
“I didn’t ask them for their birth certificates. Starla agreed that it would be a good gift, and Mitchell loves it.”
“Richie, don’t you worry that he might have an accident? Hurt himself?”
“Sure, that’s always a possibility, but a boy is a boy. Mitchell’s not some namby-pamby wuss. He’ll fall down and get scraped up like all kids do, and there’s not much we can do about it. He’ll be six in January and is big for his age. I don’t understand the problem.”
Beth shook her head to clear it. “Buying him a scooter wasn’t smart, Richie.”
Richie let out an exasperated sigh. “It’s Christmas morning, Beth. Couldn’t we call a truce?”
“I—I’m upset,” she admitted.
When Richie spoke again, he sounded calmer. “I bought him a helmet. I’ll make sure he understands safety rules. He can ride up and down the driveway and nowhere else. You’re making too much of this, Beth.”
She was silent, unwilling to back off. Mitchell wasn’t ready for an electric scooter. She knew it.
“Do you want to speak to my folks?” Richie asked. “They’re right here.”
“Of course,” she said. She loved his parents, and in a different scenario, the one she’d married into in the first place, she would have been with them every year at this time.
Corinne came on the line first, and she described the awe on Mitchell’s face when he first spotted the presents under the tree, related some of his clever remarks as he opened various gifts and ended by telling Beth how much she missed her.
“We’ll see you in a few weeks,” Beth promised her.
Then Allen took over, his voice gruff but energetic, asking her how she was bearing up during the holiday season and finally wishing her a merry Christmas.
“Thanks, Allen,” Beth told him warmly.
Her ex-father-in-law handed the phone to Mitchell, but her son was in too much of a hurry to talk for long. “I’m helping Grandpa put together a swing for Ava,” he said with an air of self-importance. “I’m supposed to hand him the bolts.”
“Okay, you’d better get back to work,” she told him, and then they hung up.
Beth sat for a pensive moment, picturing the scene at Richie’s house. She imagined the commotion and excitement, with tantalizing smells wafting from the kitchen and the two children playing with their new toys. But somehow, she couldn’t visualize it as well as she had on other Christmases. Maybe that was because she was looking forward to something else now. She had a life that Richie and Starla, Corinne and Allen, and most of all Mitchell, knew nothing about.
It struck her that no one at Richie’s house had indicated any interest in her plans for the day. Not even Mitchell. And if they had, she wouldn’t have wanted to tell them about Tom.
For now, he was a secret that she hugged to herself.
TOM ARRIVED about an hour later, red cheeked and hearty, carrying the defrosted goose in a brown paper bag. He’d also brought a bottle of chardonnay.
Beth tossed together the stuffing while Tom scouted up the proper pans and racks from her kitchen shelves, and after they’d consigned the bird to the oven, Beth dusted off her grandmother’s heirloom bone china and set the table. From the garage, she brought scraps of spruce and fir left over from the decorations she’d made for the pancake breakfast and arranged them down the middle of the lace tablecloth, placing some of the candles from last night among them. The evergreens’ fragrance scented the house and mingled with the aroma of the roasting goose.
When she stood back to admire the effect of the candles on the table, Tom came up behind her and wrapped his arms around her. “Is that all we have to do? For a while, at least?”
She leaned her head against his chest and closed her eyes. “There might be something else we could be doing,” she said, beginning to feel the stirrings of desire. Dimly, she wondered how she could have felt no sexual energy for years, and now that she was around Tom have it to spare.
He ran his hands up under her sweater and caressed her breasts. She turned to him, overwhelmed by her feelings. He pushed her sweater up, traced her nipples with his thumbs, unhooked her bra.
It felt right to be kissing him longingly and lingeringly, to slide her hands through the front buttons of his shirt. Her seeking lips never left his as her fingers fumbled with his belt and he unfastened her jeans.
She shivered, not with cold, because it was warm in her house, but with anticipation. Tom felt her trembling and released her lips, his words stirring the hair beside her ear.
“Do we have to make love standing up, or is there somewhere else we can go?”
She didn’t want to take the time to lead him to her bedroom, to which he knew the way already. Urgency overwhelmed her.
“Here,” she whispered, “right here.”
She pulled him down beside her on the big couch, pushed some of the faded pillows into a rest for their heads, shimmied out of her jeans. Soon he was kissing he
r abdomen, moving higher, trailing kisses toward her breasts.
He was as hungry for her as she was for him, and they reveled in their reexploration of each other’s bodies in broad daylight, with the sunlight casting shadows through the shutters at the window. Afterward, Tom cradled her close, his fingers lazily stroking her back. They dozed for a while, woke up, kissed some more, and then Beth slipped on Tom’s shirt to go to the kitchen to check on the goose. Tom, dressed only in his jeans and with the top button undone, followed her and watched as she started the rice cooking. Then they kissed again.
“First course, kisses. Second course, salad. Third course, kisses,” Beth teased him before she went to get dressed.
After dinner, when he backed her against the refrigerator and kissed her again, she asked him why he kept doing it, even as she ran her hands up the musculature of his back and tangled her fingers in his mussed hair.
He countered with humor in his eyes. “There’s nothing else I’d rather be doing,” he said, but he sobered quickly. “You’re absolutely radiant, Beth, and this is the happiest Christmas I can remember.”
“Me, too,” she told him, wondering how this could be so. Before, the Christmases when she was married had been the benchmark against which she compared all subsequent ones. She was willing to admit that she and Richie had had problems from the beginning, but Mitchell had made up for those. Mitchell had been the centerpoint of their relationship from the day he was born, so was it any surprise that their son was what had made Christmas so wonderful?
Now this godsend of a man had come along and brightened Christmas for her, made it meaningful again. Instead of feeling lonely, she was truly blessed. How could she ever thank him?
“I can think of a way,” he said, and she laughed and let him lead her to the bedroom.
“I wish this day could go on forever,” she murmured wistfully, later when they cuddled in her bed together, the comforter keeping away the chill.
“I do, too,” he said. “You’re one hell of a Christmas present, Beth McCormick.”
“Better than a leg lamp?” she asked mischievously.
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