* * *
Briscoe Ranch Resort’s annual Christmas Ball was a sight to behold. Kelly stopped just inside the main ballroom doors and drank in the splendor of the ball’s theme, “Christmas in Paris.” She raised her camera to her eye, but couldn’t decide where to start shooting first—the intricate ice sculpture of the Eiffel Tower or the two chefs flipping crepes at a made-to-order station to her left. Or maybe the grandly made Arc de Triomphe at the front of the room, under which an ornate golden throne sat.
Paul slung his arm around Kelly’s waist. “I thought last year’s was spectacular, but Remedy Lane, the resort’s special events and wedding planner, outdid herself again this year.”
“No kidding. This is incredible.”
“They’re going to make Sadie and me do a grand entrance, but I wanted to watch the look on your face when you saw it for the first time. Think you’re going to be able to entertain yourself for the hour they have me doing a meet and greet up on the stage?”
“That throne’s for you?”
“I’ve been telling you, being Santa has its perks.” His arm tightened around her waist. “And before I tell you good-bye, check out what we’re standing under.”
Kelly lowered her camera and looked up. Mistletoe. Of course.
She turned and wrapped her arms around his big ol’ Santa belly, only for Sadie to wedge her way in between their legs. She may sulk at them getting intimate in bed, but she was all for hugs and kisses. “I should hang mistletoe all over your house, if it means I get to steal kisses from Santa whenever I want.”
“Sounds like a plan to me,” he said as he brought his lips to hers for a lingering, closed-lip kiss that still managed to curl her toes. He might look like Santa, but his kiss was pure Paul. Confident. Tender. And sexy as hell.
Then a blood-curdling kid scream cut through the air. Paul and Kelly pulled apart in time to see a red-faced kid pointing at them. “That’s not Mrs. Claus!”
The older kid standing next to him contorted his face in horror. “Santa’s a cheater!”
A handful of people gasped. Kelly’s and Paul’s gazes met. “Oops,” Kelly mouthed.
“Not quite the type of grand entrance I was expecting,” he said, squeezing her hand. “Let’s get out of here before we get in even more trouble.”
With that, he pulled her and Sadie through a door marked Employees Only. They hadn’t had time to catch their breath before Brent appeared at their side.
“I hope you didn’t see that,” Kelly said.
“What? You and Santa getting frisky again? Color me not surprised.” He added an eye roll for good measure.
“So you’re not here to fire me?” She was only half-joking, but the thought of losing this job when she needed the money so badly made her stomach turn.
“Funny you should mention it—”
Kelly flailed her arms, then grabbed onto Paul’s sleeve. “What?” No. Brent couldn’t be serious.
He gave her a pointed look. “Funny you should mention it because I’m here to do just the opposite. You’ve done an incredible job as Paul’s photographer. So much so that my bosses noticed. They asked me if I’d recommend you for a permanent position, and I told them that I did.”
She sagged into Paul. “You’re offering me a job?”
“The official offer will come from my boss next week, but I couldn’t wait until then to let you know. The resort always keeps a couple photographers on site to cover our events and press, and I think you’d be perfect.”
“Brent, that’s . . . thank you.”
It was the perfect solution to all her problems. Well, most of them, anyway. Everything except the fact that she’d lied to Paul about her job at the college.
“You don’t have to answer now, but do me a favor and seriously consider it. You’d be a great asset to Briscoe Ranch. And I know Paul would love for you to stay around, too.”
“Again, thank you. I’m honored.” Maybe Paul would never need to find out how bad off her life had gotten. She could tell him she’d quit her job at the college.
No.
If they were going to have a future of any kind, it would have to be one without lies. But maybe this job offer at Briscoe Ranch would lessen the sting of the truth.
The moment Brent walked away, Paul braced his hands on Kelly’s shoulders and turned her to face him. “I have to get going for my grand entrance, but first I have something to say. This month has been the best of my life. I don’t want it to end.”
Neither did she. And now it didn’t have to. “Paul . . .”
He held up his hands. “Hear me out. Please. I had this whole soul-bearing speech ready for later, while we were dancing, but it looks like now’s the time. Kelly, I know you have a job waiting for you and a house and a full, great life that’s five hours away, and I would never ask you to give any of that up, but I think we owe it to ourselves to see where this goes. Even if you don’t take the job that Brent offered. Even if we’ve got to try the long-distance thing for a while. This job or another job, it doesn’t matter to me as long as I have you in my life.”
“I want that, too,” was all she could think to say.
Brent popped his head back into the hall where they were standing. “Paul, it’s time. They’re about to announce you.”
“Okay, this is it. Sadie and I will see you in an hour. Then we can go up to the room and change.”
With a tug of the leash, he and Sadie were off. Probably, Kelly should have trailed behind them with her camera so she could capture every moment. But tonight, the resort had hired multiple photographers, so instead she took a moment to calm her racing thoughts, even as her heart felt like it was full to bursting.
Brent’s offer was finally something in the yes column for once this year. She was still standing in the hallway, running through all the ways the job offer would change her life for the better, when her phone sounded with an incoming call.
Her heart sank. The only people who’d called her lately were creditors. She almost didn’t want to look and ruin a perfect day.
Against her better judgment, she brought the phone out to see if she recognized the number. It was her next-door neighbor, Alice.
“Hey, Alice. Everything all right?”
“No, it is not all right.” Alice’s voice was shrill and shaky. “A bunch of men from a repo went in. All your stuff’s on the lawn.”
Kelly swayed. She set a hand on the wall for support. “What? On the lawn? Why?”
“Oh honey, it looks to me like you’re being evicted.”
Kelly rolled toward the wall and pressed her forehead against it, trying to visualize the last eviction notice she’d gotten. “The notice said I had another two weeks. I swear it did.”
“I don’t know what any notice said. All I see is your clothes and dishes out on the grass. I’m saving what I can, moving it into my garage, but you’d better get here quick.”
For once, Kelly’s mind wasn’t racing. It was dead blank. It was as if God and the universe just couldn’t cut her a break. No sooner had Brent made her a great offer, than everything she wanted was snatch away in the blink of an eye. She ended the call and looked down the hallway in the direction Paul had disappeared, her heart breaking.
No matter what happened next, she was going to have to ditch him at their big dance again. Alice was right. Kelly needed to get home in a hurry and salvage whatever belongings she had. She didn’t have money for a plane ticket, much less the hour-and-a-half taxi ride to the airport. Which meant she either had to borrow Paul’s truck or ask him to drive her, equally devastating choices. But only one of those options would keep her from having to see the look of disappointment on Paul’s face as she toppled off of the pedestal he’d put her on. Only one of the options could she accomplish right that very second instead of waiting another hour for him to finish playing Santa.
A text came through from Alice. It was a picture of Kelly’s belongings strewn over the lawn along with a caption. Starting to r
ain. Moving stuff as fast as I can into my garage.
“Oh, God.”
Seeing her prized collection of porcelain dolls from her mom piled up amid her clothes, and everything soaking wet drove a knife through her heart. She couldn’t believe she’d been forced into this impossible choice. This really was a disastrous Year of Yes, more horrible than she could have imagined. She’d never say yes again, if that’s what it took to get Paul to forgive her and give her one more chance once the dust had settled.
She walked out of the Employees Only area and pushed the ballroom doors open. After a long last look at Paul, up on the stage beaming with a jolly smile at the little girl on his lap. Then she turned and walked away.
Chapter Eleven
Kelly found Paul’s key ring where he’d left it on the desk in the room they’d rented for the night. The resort’s stationary caught her eye. She didn’t have time to write him a note, but she promised herself to call him from the road as soon as she could figure out what to say.
She grabbed the suitcase she’d packed for the night and dragged it behind her, racing down the hallway, down an elevator, through the lobby, and out to the parking lot.
She didn’t hear the sound of jingling behind her until she’d reached his truck and opened the driver’s side door. She turned in time to stagger back as Sadie leapt into the truck cab.
“No, no, no, no, no! Sadie, what are you doing here?”
Sadie wagged her tail joyfully and assumed her usual seat in the middle of the bench seat, barking her excitement that they were going on a drive.
Kelly snapped her fingers like she’d seen Paul do a thousand times. “Sadie, you have to get out. Please.”
But Sadie was immune to both the snap of her fingers and the tears that pricked Kelly’s eyes. Her phone chimed again with another text. Kelly couldn’t bear to look. There was nothing else to do but use brute force to extricate Sadie from the truck. This resolved, she climbed into the cab, wrapped her arms around Sadie, and pulled. But Sadie merely licked Kelly’s face and dug her claws into the upholstery.
Kelly wiped the tears and slobber from her mouth and cheeks, then tipped her face up toward the sky. “Okay, I give up. You’re going to make this as disastrous as possible no matter what I do, so I give up. Paul’s going to hate me for this.” To Sadie, she added, “I guess you’re coming with me.”
Sadie’s tail wagged even harder, and she gave a little whine of excitement.
As they passed through Dulcet’s Main Street, Kelly’s phone rang. “What now?”
She glanced at the readout. Paul.
Shit.
She answered on speakerphone. “Hey, Paul.”
“Do you know where Sadie is? She just took off,” he said.
“She’s with me. I’m so sorry.”
“Nothing to be sorry about. I’m glad she’s okay. I don’t know what got into her.”
Kelly swiped the corner of her eye with her palm. “I don’t know either. I got some bad news from home and I had to leave the ball. Sadie followed me. I tried to get her to go back to you, but she wouldn’t leave your truck.”
Paul was silent for a long beat. “What’s going on? What’s wrong? Where are you?”
Kelly swallowed past the lump in her throat. “Paul, I’m not . . . I’m not who you thought I was. And I just—”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means I lied to you, and I’m so sorry. I had to borrow your truck, but I’m going to return it in a few a days. And Sadie along with it. I’ll take good care of her. I promise.”
“Kelly, listen to me. Wherever you are, stop driving. Pull over and wait for me. I’m coming to you.”
If only it was that easy. “I’m already too late, Paul. I’m so sorry. I’ll be in touch soon.”
She hung up the call as she drove up the highway onramp, swallowing back the sobs that only threatened to slow her down.
* * *
Just when a man thought he’d changed, his whole world came crashing down on him. Lo and behold, he was still that naïve, moony-eyed chump he’d been running from his whole adult life, falling in love with an unobtainable girl who was destined to break his heart. Go figure.
The realization took his breath away, but he’d have the rest of his life to sort all that out. Kelly might have stolen his heart and broken it to pieces, but he’d be damned if she took his dog, too.
He let hot, centering anger flood through him, then pulled up the GPS locator app on his phone, the one that tracked Sadie’s whereabouts. The orange blip on the map showed Sadie on the highway headed southeast—right in the direction of Cranston.
He was too pissed and in too much of a rush to bother changing out of his Santa uniform. “Brent, I need to borrow your car for the rest of the night.”
“What?”
Brent would have to settle for a half-truth because Paul didn’t have the time or patience to explain. “Sadie’s gone missing. I’m tracking her with my GPS, but I need to go after her.”
“What about your truck? And Kelly?”
“Never mind about my truck. Kelly neither.”
Brent must have seen how gravely serious Paul was because he tossed him his key ring without any further protest.
Five hours in the car at night was a long time to think—and a long time for Paul’s anger to cool to a simmer. After a few hours, his stewing turned reflective.
What the hell was he doing, accepting that Kelly was running away from the possibility of them again? All this time, he’d been a chump, but one of his own making. He’d been playing the victim, waiting passively for Kelly to reject him or love him. Every time she got scared and backed off, he just watched her go and licked his wounds, treating her actions as further proof that he was unworthy.
The truth of it all hit him so hard, he had to pull to the side of the road.
Kelly wasn’t the one who’d turned him into a moony-eyed, insecure chump. He made himself that way. If he’d really evolved, as he knew he had, then he couldn’t be that victim anymore. It was time to step up and be the man he knew he could be. Yes, she ran out on their big dance for a second time, but so what? There had to be a good reason. Instead of assuming the worst about one of the people he cared most about in the world—the women he’d fallen in love with twice in his life—it was time to risk his heart in a real way. No safety nets, no playing the victim card.
With shaky hands, he picked up his phone to call her, but he saw that she’d already left a voicemail. With a muttered curse, he put the phone to his ear to listen.
It’s me again. Since I’m driving, and I had all this time to think, I figured I might as well pass the time by getting the truth out where it belongs.
In the background, Sadie barked.
Sadie says hello. I had no idea she’d followed me to your truck, and once she was in it, she wouldn’t get out, no matter what I tried.
Here’s what happened. I got a text from my neighbor tonight that I was being evicted, and all my belongings had been dumped on the lawn. I have to go rescue my dolls and my clothes before the rain destroys everything. I should have told you how hard up I am, financially, but I didn’t. I lied about my job at the college. I was fired last spring. And then Rob left me high and dry with this huge lease. And I’d already maxed out my credit cards with this stupid Year of Yes idea. I’m broke, and now I’m homeless, and I can’t imagine what you think of me right now.
Her voice quavered in a half-sob, a sound that wrapped around Paul’s ribs and squeezed them painfully tight. He closed his eyes.
I’m not who you thought I was. I’m so much less than that fantasy Kelly you’ve built me up to be. So many times I wanted to tell you, but it felt so good to have you look at me with pride and love in your eyes. I’m so sorry.
On the start of another shaky breath, the message ended abruptly.
“Damn it!” Paul shouted, smacking his hands against the steering wheel. The car couldn’t contain him. He burst out of the pass
enger seat and kicked the back wheel until some of his frustration had faded.
People honked and called out “Hey, Santa! Need a tire change?” and “Where are your reindeer?” But he didn’t pay them any mind.
Just when he’d thought he had it all figured out again, she threw him another curveball, this one made up of lies and half-truths. What if she’d been lying about the way she felt about him, too? What if the love he’d seen in her eyes wasn’t real?
It didn’t matter. Regardless of how she felt about him, the woman he loved was broke and homeless and hurting in a bad way. Thank God Sadie had jumped in the truck to keep watch over her.
Filled with a fresh urgency, Paul fired up the car and barreled down the highway, one eye on the GPS, even though he knew the way home to Cranston like he knew the back of his hand. He could only hope that she was still there by the time he arrived.
Two hours later, in the pouring rain, he pulled to the curb in front of a postage-stamp-size house a few blocks from where they’d grown up. Kelly was out in the weather, shoving clothes into trash bags as raindrops splashed against her back and hair. Several other neighbors had come to help, tossing as much as they could into the next-door neighbor’s garage to get it out of the elements.
Sadie sat on the porch, out of the rain, though she never took her eyes off Kelly, not even with Paul’s arrival. What a good dog she was.
Kelly didn’t notice him, she was so intent on her task. He dropped to his knees next to her and gathered a pile of clothes in his hand to stuff in the bag she held. She froze, staring at his hand and arm, then followed the sleeve of his Santa jacket up to his face.
The moment their eyes connected, she crumbled. He’d never seen someone so broken. His heart burst painfully into a million pieces. All he wanted to do was scoop her up and take her home, but he settled for trying to pull her into his arms. She pushed him away and stood.
If Santa Were a Cowboy Page 8