“Christmas presents for all your parents.”
“But I told…I told Santa I made a card.”
“And that’s very nice. But there’s no reason you can’t give your mom and dad a present, too.”
“We’ll make ornaments,” Lyssa said.
“Make how?” Tommy demanded. “And what’s a ormer…that thing you said?”
“It’s a decoration for your Christmas tree. We’ll make them with a very special recipe I have for clay. We use flour and salt and glue and food coloring. Just like you do in school with Miss Barnett, right, Mollie?”
The girl shrugged and stabbed her stocking again.
This time, Nick didn’t blame her. The thought of having to make a stocking had been bad enough. And now, this?
Lyssa was going to great lengths to keep the kids occupied. He had a sneaking suspicion her efforts were also aimed at making sure he and she didn’t get to spend any time alone. After last night, he couldn’t blame her.
Yet even the fresh wave of guilt he felt now couldn’t keep him from wanting her.
Chapter Eleven
“This is fun, Miss Lyssa.” On the flat disc of clay in front of him, Tommy patted a second, curved piece of the clay centered beneath a pair of round blobs. “It’s a smiley face.”
“Yes, I see. Good job.”
To her relief, the clay ornaments were a hit.
She had been so surprised by Nick’s statement about taking the kids shopping, she hadn’t been able to think straight. But one look at Tommy’s face at the mention of Christmas presents told her she had to come up with something.
She had blurted her suggestion of homemade ornaments, only to realize she might not be able to follow through on making Callie’s recipe for the clay. But she didn’t back down, reasoning that every house, even one as fancy as Michael’s lodge, had a junk drawer in it somewhere. Sure enough, she had found the pot of glue in a catchall collection in his office desk.
“I can make more?” Tommy asked.
“You can make all you want,” she assured him. “We have plenty of dough.”
As she had blended the ingredients, she might have worked with a little more force than necessary. Kneading the dough helped to loosen the knotted muscles in her shoulders.
How could Nick have said something like that to the kids? They didn’t have any money for gifts. Thanks to him, they could have gone home empty-handed and feeling guilty. Worse, thanks to his mention of Christmas presents, they were reminded they wouldn’t be home for Christmas at all.
Brent and Mollie took the reminder well, but Tommy’s eyes had filled and his mouth had trembled.
Thankfully, her suggestion of making ornaments had distracted him. He had been enthusiastic about the idea. Brent had seemed mildly interested. Mollie had been the lone holdout, but she now knelt on a chair at the breakfast bar, rolling dough into long coils to make into a necklace and bracelet.
Lyssa eyed Nick, who sat at the kitchen table with a magazine spread open in front of him and a cup of tea near at hand. Obviously, he’d wanted no part of sewing a Christmas stocking and had just as little interest in making an ornament.
Well, she couldn’t fault him for that. Some people just weren’t crafty.
But she would still blame him for what he had said to the kids.
“How’s this, Miss Lyssa?” Tommy asked. He sat back and pointed to the mound of clay in front of him.
She looked at the two round balls pushed together and the two long strips dangling from the smaller ball. Before she could even take a guess at what the figure was meant to be, Brent spoke up.
“What’s that, Tommy?” Over the boy’s head, his eyes met Lyssa’s.
Grateful for the save, she smiled at him.
“A puppy,” Tommy said. “Can’t you see?”
“Brent’s on the other side of the table,” Lyssa explained. “He can’t see it as well as I can. It’s an adorable puppy, Tommy.”
“What do you think, Mr. Nick?”
Nick closed the magazine and picked up his tea mug. He came over to the breakfast bar and took the empty stool on Tommy’s other side. “Looks very good to me. I like the floppy ears.”
“Do you like my bracelet?” Mollie demanded, holding her arm out in front of her.
“I do. Blue’s my favorite color.”
“Mine, too.” She gave him a wide smile.
Lyssa swallowed a smile of her own. Judging by Mollie’s sulk all through breakfast, she had planned to hold a grudge about what had happened in the hallway last night. Evidently, thanks to Nick’s compliment, all was now forgiven. Or at least, he was forgiven. Lyssa wasn’t sure if Mollie had let her off the hook or not. The little girl hadn’t made eye contact with her once yet this morning.
Neither had Nick—except for that one quick glance at the breakfast table. The memory alone still had the power to affect her heart.
“What are you making, Brent?” he asked.
“A Christmas tree for our Christmas tree.” The teen laughed. He had made a cone-shaped base, then decorated it using a narrow coil of clay as a string of garland and tiny round bits of clay representing Christmas balls and lights.
Next to her, Tommy had pushed the puppy aside and sat copying Mollie’s movements as she rolled out another long, smooth coil of clay.
“What are you making now?” Nick asked him.
“It’s a surprise.”
“Great. Gifts are best when they come as surprises.”
“I love surprises. Don’t you, Miss Lyssa?”
“I sure do,” she agreed.
Tommy twisted the ends of the clay coil around each other, making a loop, then pushed the ends together into a rounded lump against the coil. “It’s a ring, like my mommy’s.”
“Very nice,” Nick said. “Looks like you’ve got a top of the line diamond there.”
“It’s for Miss Lyssa.”
“For me?” she asked, both surprised and pleased.
“Yes. Here. Put it on.”
Carefully, she slipped the loop of soft clay onto her ring finger. She stretched her arm out in front of her the way Mollie had done.
The giving of this gift was an example of all she believed in, and her response was both heartfelt and sincere. “It’s beautiful, Tommy. I love it. Thank you.”
“Welcome. It’s a pretend ring.”
She couldn’t miss the irony of reality clashing with a pretend ring. A simple toy made of dried clay, and yet it represented so much—the differences between her and Nick and the sad truth that they couldn’t resolve those differences. The knowledge left her blinking back tears.
She managed a smile for the little boy. “I know it’s a pretend ring, but it’s just as precious to me as a real one, and I’ll love it just the same.” She slipped the ring off again.
“You don’t want to wear it?” he asked, dismayed.
“Of course I do. But I’m going to set it on the counter for now. Once the clay dries and hardens, then I can wear the ring.”
“Oh. Okay. I’m going to make a star for my mommy now.” He reached for another lump of clay.
At the counter near the breakfast bar, she set a sheet of waxed paper into a far corner where it wouldn’t be disturbed, then rested the ring carefully on the paper.
Beside her, Nick turned on the bar stool and nodded at the ring. “Just as precious as real, huh?”
“Exactly,” she answered. “You can’t put a price on a gift that comes from the heart.”
The truth was, she sincerely believed what she had said. It was the thought of the gift that counted, and the care that went into making it. She was as happy with Tommy’s gift as she would have been to receive a real ring studded with emeralds and rubies.
At the same time, the homemade gift made her sad because every time she saw it, it would only remind her why she had lost Nick.
…
Though no one else had watched her, Nick had seen how carefully Lyssa had set aside the ring Tommy ha
d given her. She was genuinely pleased by the gift, which surprised and pleased Nick more than he could say.
He glanced up from the ring on the counter to find Lyssa standing near the sink, staring at him. “Umm…Nick,” she said, “could you give me a hand in the living room?”
He’d known that was coming. She had been annoyed at his suggestion about taking the kids shopping. He’d seen it in her face when he had first said it, and he’d read it in her body language ever since.
No matter what he suggested, she would have something to say about it. Sometimes, she made him nuts. And sometimes, he still felt crazy about her.
As he followed her out of the room, he admired the long locks of her dark hair tumbling around her shoulders and the way her sweater hugged her hips. He wanted to be wrapped just as closely around her, the way he had been upstairs last night.
And he didn’t stand a chance. In his heart, he’d also known that invitation he had given her to his room wouldn’t get the response he’d been hoping for.
In the living room, she took a seat in the armchair. As if the isolated location wasn’t enough of a barrier keeping them apart, she crossed her arms over her chest.
He could have taken the couch, but that would have been too easy for her. And not nearly as much fun for him. Instead, he pulled over the footstool and set it on the floor in front of her chair, then settled himself on the stool.
She blinked, looking for a moment as if she planned to say something. When she didn’t, he smiled and said, “What can I help you with?”
“You can start by not talking to the kids about buying gifts for their families.”
“Why?”
“Because they all seem to look up to you, and I have a sneaking suspicion Tommy believes you’re Santa Claus. So, anything you tell them, they’re going to treat as if you’d written in stone.”
“That sounds right to me, since I’m trying to give them a rock-solid foundation. To teach them about all the good things in life, about not settling, about going for the best.”
“‘Top of the line’?” she asked, arching a brow. “Like my clay ring you called a diamond, I suppose? And Tommy’s request for a bike that you wanted to turn into a Harley? And all the five-star restaurants you wanted to take me to, the out-of-season flowers you’d had flown to my house, the designer boots you said looked like they’d been made for me?”
“You’ve got it.”
“But you haven’t.”
He frowned.
“That’s not what life is all about, Nick.”
“Sure it is.” What was she saying? What was wrong with giving nice gifts to people you…wanted to give gifts to?
“It’s not life in this situation. In case you haven’t noticed, we’re talking about kids. Kids who don’t have money to buy presents—expensive or otherwise—for their parents.”
“I intend to take care of that.”
“Why? Because you’re paying it forward?”
“Something like that.” She couldn’t have anything against his doing a few good deeds, could she?
Evidently, judging by the frozen look on her face, she could.
After a moment, she shook her head. “If they accept your…your offer, they’ll feel obligated to you. You’re pushing them into an impossible position.”
“I’m not pushing them into anything. I’m giving them an opportunity to give a gift to someone they love. What’s wrong with that? And as you said, they’re kids. They don’t know a thing about obligations. All they would do is enjoy a shopping spree.”
“They’re making the ornaments to bring home with them,” she said.
“Yeah,” he agreed. “That’s another option. One that wouldn’t have occurred to me because homemade gifts aren’t something I’m into.” He rested his hand on the arm of her chair and leaned forward. He could almost feel her desire to look away and the effort it took her to hold his gaze. “This isn’t about them at all, is it? This is about you. About what I’ve been telling you about your options and your potential.”
She tightened her crossed arms a notch.
“You know,” he continued, “neither of us is wrong here about what Christmas gifts the kids should give to their parents. We’re both just coming at the situation from different angles. But compromise means being willing to take a look at both sides and meeting in the middle. If you’d keep an open mind about what I’m saying, you’d see not everyone cares as much about handmade, homespun things as you do.”
“And if you weren’t so driven, you’d see not everyone wants an expensive, store-bought gift.”
He laughed. “You don’t know my mom. Even as a kid, I knew better than to give her something like Tommy’s ring. She would never have been satisfied, let alone happy, with such a small gesture. But you were.”
“That’s because I don’t care about how much a ring costs.”
“Neither do I…more or less. Look, Lyssa, no matter what you think, I’m not all about the price tags attached to everything. In this case, I like giving gifts. Growing up, I learned you spend what you can afford—and I can afford decent presents.”
“Gifts are supposed to be a way to show you care.”
“I know that,” he said patiently. “It’s why I like to give them.”
“And the best way to show you care is to give gifts that are both meaningful and come from the heart.”
“I have no problem with that, either. But that doesn’t mean a gift from the store can’t also come from the heart. By not giving the kids options, you’re forcing your value systems on them.”
She smiled sadly. “And isn’t that exactly what you tried to do with me?”
Chapter Twelve
“Nick, could I see you for a minute?”
Here we go again. He looked up from the magazine he’d been reading.
After their conversation here in the living room, Lyssa had returned to the kitchen to help the kids clean up the counters from the craft project. When she was done, the kids had come out to join him and she had gone upstairs for a while. Quite a while.
He had begun to wonder if she planned to avoid him for the rest of their time at the lodge.
He already knew she was never going to forgive him for what she saw as all his mistakes.
But dammit, he’d only wanted to make her happy. Isn’t that what you did for someone you…someone you were dating? When it came to her job, he’d just wanted her to see her potential and to give her his support. When it came to their dates, he’d wanted to take her to nice restaurants and give her even nicer gifts. None of which she had seemed overjoyed about accepting. He’d never met a woman like her, that was for certain.
“Now would be a good time,” she prompted him.
He shot a glance across the room. Brent sat at one end of the couch with his earbuds in. Mollie sat at the other end, cutting something out of another magazine. Shrugging, he rose and followed Lyssa into the kitchen. “What did I do wrong this time?” he asked, only half-jokingly.
“Nothing.”
“Well, that’s a switch.”
“Nick, please.”
Now he heard the tension in her tone. A closer look at her showed the lines creasing her forehead and crinkling the corners of her eyes. Instantly, he sobered. “What’s wrong?”
“I didn’t want to tell you in front of Brent and Mollie, but I can’t find Tommy.”
She locked her gaze with his. He nodded slowly, reassuringly. “I hadn’t even realized he’d left the living room. But it’s a big house, Lyssa. You probably just missed him.”
“I checked everywhere. Twice. You don’t think he could have gone outside, do you?” she said, barely pausing for breath, then rushing on. “It’s snowing again, so if he has gone out, we might not be able to see his footprints. We won’t be able to—”
“Hey, hey.” He rested his hand on her shoulder. “He was rubbing his eyes and yawning out by the fire earlier. He’s probably just crawled into a quiet corner and gone to sleep. Kids
do that.” How would he know? But he’d say anything to calm Lyssa and give her a chance to recover her usual control.
Even as he finished the thought, she took a deep breath and nodded more steadily. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I guess being cooped up for so long here has me a little jumpy.”
“That’s understandable.” Or maybe having to talk to him again upset her. He couldn’t think about that now. “Did you look everywhere?”
“Yes, I told you—”
“I mean, did you only scan rooms from the doorways, or did you go inside and check closets and under the beds?”
“Well, no.” She shook her head. “I guess I’m overreacting, aren’t I?”
“You go back into the living room with the kids—”
“I don’t think we should tell them. If I am just jumping the gun—and I’m sure I am…I hope I am—”
“We won’t tell them,” he said evenly. “At least, not Mollie. No sense worrying her when Tommy will most likely turn up any minute now. You keep her occupied. Send Brent in here, tell him I want his help shoveling the back porch. Just in case, I’ll get him to do a check of the perimeter of the house while I take a good look inside.” He squeezed her shoulder lightly. “Okay?”
“Okay.”
As soon as she left the kitchen, he checked the door off to one side of the room. Locked on the kitchen side. No chance of Tommy being in the basement.
He went through the cabinets. The boy could hardly have climbed inside one while everyone had been in the room, but they had to be searched.
Nothing.
The pantry and the space behind the door were all clear.
He headed across to the back door. Despite what he had said to Lyssa about Tommy curling up for a nap and the fact he believed the boy would be inside the house, not outdoors, it would be foolish not to check to make sure he hadn’t left.
He flung open the door. A blast of cold air whooshed past him and into the kitchen.
The back porch was covered by a smooth, unbroken drift of snow. The walkway leading from the lodge was a flat sheet of crusted white. If the boy had gone outside, it hadn’t been by way of this door.
Brent could concentrate on the front of the building.
Snowbound with Mr. Wrong (Snowflake Valley) Page 11