She knew it was true, but she also knew that he was still feeling raw. Twelve years had passed since he’d left Rust Creek Falls, but coming home now, for the first time, it was understandable that all of the memories—good and bad—would come back to him in a flood.
“And I know I promised to stay in town for Danny and Annie’s wedding, but I have reservations about being here Christmas morning,” he confided.
“Why’s that?”
“Because Bella and Hudson are still newlyweds and I’m sure they’d prefer to spend their first Christmas together alone.”
“And I’m sure that, after twelve years, there’s nothing your sister wants more than to celebrate the holidays with her family—her whole family,” Eva pointed out to him.
“Except that the whole family won’t be together,” he pointed out.
Eva knew that Hudson’s investigator hadn’t yet managed to track down Bailey or Liza, but she suspected that he wasn’t referring to a sibling reunion, but the loss of his parents.
“Tell me how you spend your Christmas morning,” he suggested, as if to distract from his own thoughts and memories.
“With my parents and sisters and their husbands and kids. We gather around the tree early—because the kids don’t let us sleep past six—and we drink hot cider or Irish coffee, nibble on fresh fruit and sticky buns and open presents.”
“Your sisters come home every Christmas?”
“Every Christmas,” she confirmed. “Calla and Patrick will celebrate with his family in Thunder Canyon on Christmas Eve before they come here. Delphine’s in-laws retired to Arizona a couple years back, so they usually head south on the twenty-sixth.”
“Do you have a big meal later?”
She nodded. “A huge roast turkey with all of the trimmings.”
“And pie for dessert?” he guessed.
“Pie for dessert,” she confirmed.
“Apple?”
She chuckled. “Apple and lemon and pumpkin.”
“I thought pumpkin pie was a Thanksgiving tradition.”
“Not exclusively,” she said. “And I thought apple was your favorite.”
“It is,” he acknowledged. “But I’ve recently discovered that I have more of a sweet tooth than I ever knew.”
But he declined the offer of dessert when the waitress came around to clear away their empty plates, expressing a desire to save room for popcorn at the movie.
The high school was only a couple blocks from the Ace—a pleasant walk in the warmer months but an inadvisable one in December, so after settling their bill, they drove over. Tickets were sold at a table set up in the main foyer and only cash payment was accepted. Eva knew to ensure that she had small bills whenever she attended because it wasn’t unusual for the cash box to be short on change.
Tonight Luke paid for their admission, then led the way to the concession area and joined the end of the line.
“Popcorn?” he offered.
“I couldn’t even finish the fries that came with my burger,” she reminded him.
“I’m guessing that’s a no?”
“That’s a no,” she confirmed.
“Soda?”
“No, thanks.”
Eva shook her head as he came away with a large bag of popcorn and a cola in hand. “You can’t honestly still be hungry.”
“It has nothing to do with hunger and everything to do with enhancing the movie-watching experience,” he told her.
“I’ll take your word for it,” she said dubiously.
There was a pretty good crowd gathered tonight. Of course, there weren’t a lot of entertainment options in town, and the high school gym was a favorite weekend destination for those who didn’t want to hang with the sometimes rowdy crowd at the Ace.
Eva and Luke found seats near the back of the gymnasium, leaving the rows closer to the front for families with children. There weren’t any previews or commercials—the only warning that the movie was about to start, apart from the lights being switched off, was Mr. Hendricks—the caretaker—standing at the front of the room and shouting out a reminder for everyone to turn off their cell phones.
Elf was one of Eva’s favorite Christmas movies, but about halfway through, she realized that she hadn’t been paying attention to the feature. But how was she supposed to concentrate on the screen when the man beside her was so distracting? Especially when, every time Luke leaned close to say something to her, his breath tickled her ear and sent shivers down her spine. And despite her insistence that she didn’t want any popcorn, he kept jiggling the bag in front of her, silently encouraging her to share. She finally succumbed to temptation—at least with respect to the popcorn. But it was the man she really wanted.
When the credits finally began to roll, she was grateful that she no longer had to pretend to be watching the movie but also disappointed that her time with Luke was coming to an end.
Maybe he was disappointed, too, because after helping with her coat, he said, “How does hot chocolate and a jelly doughnut sound?”
“The sound would be my stomach exploding,” she told him.
“Just hot chocolate?” he suggested as an alternative.
“If you want hot chocolate, we can go for hot chocolate,” she agreed.
“I’m not sure that I really want hot chocolate,” he admitted. “But I am sure that I don’t want to take you home yet.”
“Oh,” she said as happy butterflies swooped and twirled in her belly.
“I guess that wasn’t very subtle, was it?”
“I prefer honesty to subtlety,” she told him.
“Then it would be okay to admit that, every time I look at you, you take my breath away?”
“Well...that’s a distinct improvement over ‘you look fine,’” she noted.
He winced. “You must have realized by now that males have a tendency to fumble when they’re in the company of a female they want to impress.”
“Careful,” she warned, “or I might start to think you’re flirting with me.”
“I shouldn’t be,” he admitted. “But I can’t seem to help myself.”
Her lips curved as he pushed open the door for her to exit, her smile widening even more when she stepped outside. “Look—it’s snowing.”
And it was—the sky was filled with great big fluffy flakes that seemed to dance rather than fall in the dark night.
“Christmas snow,” she said softly, reverently.
“What’s Christmas snow?”
She threw her arms out to her sides, tipped her face up to the sky and turned in a slow circle. “This,” she told him.
He held out a hand, watched a fat flake land on the palm of his leather glove and slowly melt away. “It looks like regular snow to me.”
Eva shook her head. “Christmas snow is magic.”
“Magic, huh?”
She nodded.
“And is this magic snow capable of creating some kind of enchantment?” he wondered aloud.
“Of course,” she agreed.
“Is that why I suddenly find myself wanting to kiss you despite promising that it wouldn’t happen again?”
“It might be the snow...or it might be that you’re wildly attracted to me,” she said.
Though her tone projected confidence, he could see the uncertainty in her eyes. But Luke, looking at her now—her cheeks pink from the cold, her eyes sparkling, her lips tipped up at the corners—wasn’t uncertain at all.
“You might be right,” he acknowledged.
She took a step toward him. “About the snow—or the attraction?”
His gaze lingered on the temptingly sweet curve of her mouth. “Either way, didn’t we agree that any kind of romantic involvement would be a bad idea?”
“
Who said anything about a romantic involvement?” she challenged. “Sometimes a kiss is just a kiss.”
“Sometimes it is,” he agreed just before his lips brushed against hers.
With a soft sigh, Eva’s eyelids fluttered and her lips yielded. Luke’s mouth was warm and firm and masterful, causing ribbons of desire to unfurl in her belly and spread slowly through her veins. His hands slid up her back, then down again. Even through the bulky coat she wore, she felt the heat of his touch, and she wanted more.
She lifted her arms to his shoulders, slid her hands into the silky ends of his hair and held on while the world spun around her. She felt the gentle brush of snowflakes on her face, but not even the biting wind could chill the heat in her veins.
His tongue skimmed across the seam of her lips, and they parted willingly, eagerly, so that he could deepen the kiss. She didn’t know how long they stood there, in the shadows of the trees, under the falling snow. She lost complete track of time, all sense of purpose. There was only Luke and this moment. Nothing else mattered.
“I don’t think that kiss was just a kiss,” he said when he finally eased his mouth from hers and had given them each a moment to catch their breath.
But his arms stayed around her, holding her close, and she wondered if he could hear the pounding of her heart, or even feel it against his chest.
“What was it?” she asked, wanting to know what he was thinking and feeling, desperate for some hint that she wasn’t the only one who was starting to fall.
“It felt to me like the start of something bigger,” he admitted, but he didn’t sound happy about it.
“And you don’t want to start anything,” she remembered.
“It wouldn’t be fair to start something that I’m not going to be in town long enough to finish.”
She knew that she should be grateful he’d put on the brakes, but it was difficult to be grateful when her body was still aching for more. And why was he so certain that anything they started had to finish? Was it really so impossible to believe that he might fall in love and want to build a life with her? But of course she didn’t ask any of those questions.
“What about that hot chocolate?” she said instead. “Do you still want that?”
“If you’re not in any hurry to get home,” he said.
“Is my carriage going to turn into a pumpkin?”
He smiled. “It’s not even close to midnight.”
“Then I think I’ve got time.”
* * *
Eva wasn’t surprised to find that her mom was still up when Luke dropped her off. She was surprised that her dad wasn’t in his recliner beside her, flipping through the channels on TV and grumbling that there was nothing worth watching while his wife knitted tiny hats and booties and baby blankets for the Tree of Hope at Crawford’s.
She settled on the opposite end of the sofa from her mother, tucking her feet under her skirt. “Where’s Dad?”
Marion’s needles clicked in a familiar rhythm. “In bed.”
“Is everything okay?” Eva asked, immediately worried, because when someone you loved had battled cancer—even successfully—the worry never quite went away.
“Everything’s fine,” her mother hastened to reassure her. “But we had an early morning and a busy day, and we drew straws to determine who could go to bed and who should wait up until you got home.”
“You don’t usually wait up for me,” she noted.
“No,” her mother agreed. “But I wanted to know how your evening was.”
“Good,” she said cautiously.
“Luke seems like a nice man. He’s certainly a handsome one.”
“He is,” she agreed.
“Has he said how long he’s planning to stay in Rust Creek Falls?”
“At least until his brother’s Christmas Eve wedding,” Eva said.
“And then he’s going back to Wyoming?”
“That seems to be the plan,” she acknowledged.
“You know why I’m asking, don’t you?” her mother asked.
“You want to know if you need to set another place at the table for dinner on Christmas?”
Marion sighed as she tugged on the yarn. “I’m worried about you.”
“There’s no reason for you to worry,” Eva told her.
“You’re falling in love with him.”
“Maybe,” she admitted.
Her mother continued to knit. After another minute she said, “And when he leaves, he’s going to break your heart.”
“Maybe,” she said again.
She understood her mother’s concerns; she knew they were valid. She did have a habit of giving her heart too quickly—and having it broken easily and frequently.
“Or maybe he’ll fall in love with me, too, and decide to stay in Rust Creek Falls,” she suggested as an alternative.
“Maybe he will,” her mother acknowledged, though the doubtful tone warned Eva that she didn’t believe it was a real possibility. “Has he told you why he and his brothers left town?”
She picked a piece of fluff off the arm of the sofa. “Not really.”
“Maybe you should ask him,” Marion suggested.
“I figure if he wanted me to know, he would tell me.”
“But don’t you want to know?”
Of course, she did. Especially if his reasons for leaving twelve years ago were unchanged, because then it was likely that he would be leaving again. But watching him with his family, she’d seen the longing in his eyes, and she knew that he wanted to stay, even if he wasn’t ready to admit it to himself.
“It’s not really any of my business,” she finally said in response to her mother’s question.
“It is if you’re thinking of a future with this man.”
“Right now, I’m just enjoying being with him.”
Her mother set her knitting aside and reached over to rest a hand on Eva’s knee. “You deserve to fall in love with a man who will love you as much as you love him,” she said. “I’m just not sure that Luke Stockton is that man.”
“You’ve got some pretty strong opinions about a man you just met tonight,” she noted.
“You’re right. But I’m less concerned about misjudging him than I am about him hurting you.”
“Do you remember what you said to me before I went away to college?” Eva asked.
“Probably some brilliant words of wisdom that you’re going to toss back in my face now,” her mother guessed.
“You said that I shouldn’t ever let fear of what might happen prevent me from following my heart.”
Marion sighed. “It seemed like good advice at the time.”
“It was,” Eva agreed. “And it’s the advice I’m going to follow now, too.”
Chapter Ten
Bella had encouraged Luke to come and go as he pleased, reminding him that he had a key and the alarm code and didn’t need to worry about what anyone else was doing. It had taken him a few days before he felt comfortable enough to do so, but until he pulled into the driveway and discovered the house illuminated by hundreds—no, thousands—of Christmas lights, he didn’t realize that this was the first time he’d been out after dark.
He kicked off his boots and hung his coat in the closet, then headed toward the stairs and his guest room on the second level. As he approached the family room, he heard the murmur of voices from within. Obviously his sister and brother-in-law were still up—a realization that tempted him to tiptoe past the doorway because he knew that if Bella knew he’d been out with Eva, his sister would commence round two of her interrogation.
On the other hand, maybe he should solicit her opinion because he obviously didn’t have a clue about what he was doing—telling Eva in one breath that he didn’t want to get involved and then ki
ssing her breathless in the next.
Eva had claimed that the snow was magic, but he suspected it was the woman herself who had cast some kind of spell on him. He’d been attracted to his share of women and had been fortunate that his feelings were usually reciprocated, but he couldn’t ever remember being so captivated so quickly by anyone else.
“Luke—is that you?” Bella’s voice called out.
“It’s me,” he confirmed, stepping through the doorway and into the room to find his sister snuggled in her husband’s arms, her back to his front.
Flames crackled in the fireplace, and a bottle of wine was open on the table, two half-full glasses beside it. There were more holiday decorations in here, including an enormous tree that stretched floor to ceiling and was wrapped in lights, garland and decorated with baubles and balls.
“There are glasses in the hutch,” Hudson said, nodding his head toward the dining room. “If you want a glass of wine.”
Luke shook his head. “I’m not sure that would mix well with the hot chocolate I just had.”
“You’ve been hanging out at Daisy’s again,” Bella guessed.
“Not hanging out,” he denied. “But we did go there after the movie.”
“We?” she prompted, a speculative gleam in her eyes.
“Me and Eva,” he admitted.
“You’ve been spending a lot of time with her lately,” his sister noted.
“Which is nobody’s business but your own,” Hudson said, surprising Luke with the unexpected defense.
“Is it wrong to want to know about the woman my brother’s dating?” she challenged.
“We’re not dating,” Luke told her. “We’ve just been...hanging out.”
“Is that all it is?”
He wanted to answer yes—firmly and definitively—but the taste of Eva still lingered on his lips; want for her still pulsed in his blood.
“Eva knows that I’m not in any position to get involved right now,” he pointed out to his sister, and reminded himself.
“Why not?” she pressed, the expression on her face matching the disappointment in her tone.
“Because my life is in Wyoming,” he reminded her.
“It doesn’t have to be. You could come home, Luke, to be near your family again.”
The Maverick's Midnight Proposal Page 11