The Lawman's Christmas Proposal

by Barbara White Daille

  He crossed the room to sit on the king-size bed within arm’s reach of the desk chair. Immediately, she rose. She couldn’t have changed seats at supper, but she had managed to slip away from the sitting room. And she could certainly leave the suite now.

  He stretched his leg in front of him and sucked in a breath through clenched teeth. Concern froze her in place. “Are you okay?”

  “Fine.”

  “What happened, Mitch?”

  “I sat too long, and it stiffened up on me.”

  “That’s not what I meant, and you know it.” Concern gave way to frustration. “You question me like you’re a cop—”

  “I am a cop.”

  “Yes, I know. But I don’t like being treated like a suspect. And I don’t like when you want to know things about me, yet never give back anything yourself.”

  “It seems to me we’ve got a lot more history to discuss than my bum knee.”

  “You mean the fact we hadn’t forgotten each other, don’t you? We should forget those memories. We’re better off letting them stay in the past.”

  “That’s not what I’m getting at this time.”

  He rested his hand on her forearm. Despite her frustration, she couldn’t ignore the pleasurable chill his touch sent through her.

  “I think you’ve got something else on your mind. Other worries. Other memories, maybe. And we’ve already seen how they can come back to haunt us.”

  Haunt was the right word. Meeting Mitch again had instantly reignited their teenage passion. Their first love. But his injury and his claim of being married to his job in Los Angeles were both painful reminders of what she had to put behind her. She had to make it clear to him, once and for all, that she’d gotten over their past.

  “I’ve made other memories that take the place of ours.” More lies. Though she had found a new life, nothing could take the place of those memories she had created with Mitch. But she couldn’t tell him that. “I’ve had two children. I lost my husband—”

  “I know that.”

  “No, you don’t. Not all of it.”

  “That’s just my point.”

  He took her hand. Her mind warned her to pull free, but as he tugged gently, her emotions refused to listen. She sank to the bed beside him, making sure to keep space between them and still, she fought to keep from sliding closer.

  “That summer, we talked about everything, Andi. All I want is for you to talk to me now the way you did then. Tell me what happened. After that, you’ll be able to put those memories away in some neat, little box—like a Christmas present. Or like that package over there.” He gestured to the desk.

  She took another unsteady breath.

  Obviously, he did a better job than she did of tuning in to the surroundings. She hadn’t thought he had even noticed the package.

  She shook her head. “I lost my husband. He went to work one day and never came home. That’s all.” She had the right to keep her story to herself, the way he guarded his. It had to be related to his injury and why he had come home. She tugged her hand free. “You need to leave, Mitch. I respect what you and everyone in law enforcement do. But there’s no way I’ll get close to someone in such a dangerous job.”

  “We’re already close. We’re friends. Don’t think about what I do. Think of me as the boy you once knew.”

  “You’re not a boy, you’re a man—”

  “Glad you noticed.” He gave her a crooked smile.

  “—and I’m a woman—”

  “No argument there.”

  “—with responsibilities.” Why did her voice have to shake? “Lots of responsibilities,” she ended firmly.

  “And I respect you for that. But there’s no way I’m going to walk away when I think you need to talk. And I hope you’ll tell me the truth.”

  “I don’t—”

  “Yeah, you don’t lie. I’ve heard that before, a million times, from people who couldn’t make an honest confession if I dictated it to them. But never from you. And I know you want to set a good example for your kids. Then be responsible now,” he said, “and give me straight answers.”

  Sighing, she shook her head. “You won’t give up, will you?”

  “You don’t want me to, do you? Because you know talking to me might help.”

  He wrapped his arm around her shoulders, his touch gentle, almost brotherly, yet her heart pounded even as her breathing seemed to shut down.

  When she turned to look at him, he reached up to brush her hair away from her face. Their eyes met. Their gazes held. They were so close, and in an instant she was standing outside at the corral again. Just as she had then, she instinctively tilted her head, nestling her cheek against his palm.

  Did he move closer, or did she? She couldn’t have said. All she knew was they met somewhere in the middle, and when he lowered his mouth to hers, she returned his kiss as eagerly as she always had that one summer.

  No matter what she had said, they weren’t a man and a woman now, not in her mind. They were a boy and a girl again. A couple of teens in love, making out in the hayloft or beside a summer-swollen creek or inside a honeymoon cabin not far from the hotel.

  Just a couple of teens on their own...

  But not alone. Not when she could hear footsteps in the hallway.

  Backing away, she brushed at her lips with one hand and smoothed her hair with the other. They had never been discovered during any of their make-out sessions. How ironic to be caught now.

  The sound of footsteps, many footsteps, thudded on the wooden floorboards. They grew louder as what sounded like an army of people approached the suite...reached the doorway...

  And passed by.

  She let out a sigh of relief.

  “I didn’t mean for that to happen—” he began.

  “Neither did I—” Then why wasn’t she sorry? “—but we both know it can’t happen again. Mitch, you have to leave.”

  “Now?” He frowned and leaned back, using his elbows to prop himself up on the bed.

  She fought the urge to throw herself on him just as the teenage Andi would have done. Judging by the way his jeans tented in front, that could be both a very satisfying and a very stupid move. She had no time in her life for either.

  Instead, she returned to sit at the desk.

  “Things were just getting interesting,” he protested.

  She could hear the forced amusement in his voice. He was trying to laugh this off, to make less of it, probably in an attempt to leave her feeling better about this mistake...about this kiss that never should have happened.

  “Maybe things were getting interesting for you,” she said as lightly as she could manage. “But I’m not interested, thank you.” Liar. She was intrigued. Fascinated. Ready for more. But she shouldn’t be.

  She reached for the package and the scissors, hanging on to them tightly as if they would help fend off Mitch’s advances...not that he was making any at the moment.

  She risked a look over her shoulder.

  He raised a brow.

  Again she struggled, this time to swallow all the questions she could barely hold back. How could they have reached this moment of mutual temporary insanity? Worse, how could she have given in to it? And how could he sit there looking at her so coolly when she was burning up inside and out?

  “Not interested, huh? You could have fooled me.”

  If only she could have tricked herself. But that was impossible when her reactions were so easy to define. She wasn’t simply recalling a teen’s faraway memories. She was feeling here-and-now emotions without having a clue how to handle them. No, she might not be able to fool herself, but she certainly was acting like a fool.

  “Mitch. We can’t continue this conversation here. We can’t be here. We’re lucky the people who passed by weren’t headed for this suite. Please, go—before anyone else comes along.”

  Slowly, he rose to his feet. Deliberately, she knew, he adjusted his jeans. “You can feel sorry for me and my limp all you wan
t at the moment, because it won’t be my knee making me hobble out of here.”

  Feel sorry for him? No, sympathy certainly wasn’t on her long list of emotions. Clutching the scissors so tightly her fingers went numb, she watched him walk slowly across the room.

  At the doorway, he turned back. “I’m leaving for now,” he said, “but that doesn’t mean we’ve wrapped things up.”

  * * *

  “COFFEE’S UP,” DEPUTY HERNANDEZ announced.

  “Sounds good.”

  Mitch propped his leg on a desk in the outer office of Cowboy Creek’s sheriff’s department and lost himself in the memory of last night.

  Once Tina had filled him in on Andi’s possible whereabouts, he’d gone up to the suite only to talk. Even taking her hand and putting his arm around her had been meant as reassuring gestures, nothing more. His aim was to find out what was bothering her. To help her, not to come on to her like the oversexed adolescent he’d once been.

  But touching her cheek had done him in. Watching her tilt her head as if seeking more of that touch had made him lose control. Before he had known what was happening, he had gotten so carried away, he’d pushed aside thoughts of his goal. Hell, he’d forgotten he had one.

  She seemed to have that effect on him.

  He had to forget about that, too. Had to put his teenage hormones on hold if he was ever going to help her. But besides frustrating him to death, what good would that do? She would never open up to him with all of her family and the hotel guests within earshot. The way she had insisted he leave the suite—in his condition, no less—had proven that.

  “Here you go.” Paco set the foam cup on the desk beside Mitch. “Black okay with you?”

  He nodded at the coffee cup. “Black’s fine. Back home, we don’t have the luxury of making it light. Or sweet.” He grinned at Paco. “Depending on whose turn it was to stock the kitchen supply cabinet, we’re lucky to find a few packets of fake sugar wedged into a crack in the shelf.”

  “Same here,” Paco said. He took the chair behind the desk. “I guess you big-city cops aren’t so different from us, huh?”

  Mitch nodded in the spirit of solidarity. The desk phone rang, and as the deputy answered the call, he glanced around the office again.

  Not much had changed in here for years.

  Growing up, he had made plenty of visits to the office with his dad. In those days, this room had seemed so much bigger, so much more exciting than it did now. Maybe he’d outgrown it. Or more likely, he’d grown used to a different place.

  Still, the office looked familiar. Comfortable. All law enforcement offices might feel the same way. He wouldn’t know, as he’d gone straight from school to the LAPD.

  Paco hung up the phone. “Routine call. Miz Greta’s cat is on the loose again.”

  They both laughed.

  “I’ll bet you see more action in LA.”

  “Sometimes, sometimes not. We get our share of animal rescue calls.”

  “And break-ins and shootings and drug busts.” Paco sounded almost envious.

  “Yeah, those, too. There’s a lot to be said for peace and quiet, though.”

  “We get plenty of that.”

  “I’ll tell you one thing we don’t get, at least in my area. That’s cattle rustlers.”

  “Yeah, I’ll bet. We still run into them, but not too often. Your dad got a reputation for clamping down on that around here—” Paco laughed “—after he drop-kicked the last wannabe rustler in the creek.”

  “I never heard that one.” What else had he missed that a flying visit and a few-times-a-year phone call didn’t cover? “That was a while ago?”

  “Years,” Paco said firmly. “And we haven’t had a problem in that line since. Your dad’s a good man.”

  A while later, once he’d left the office and started a slow walk up Canyon Road toward home, Mitch thought of that comment again.

  Lately, he hadn’t lived up to his old man’s high standards. His former boss was telling stories to help him save face. He’d let himself down again last night by losing his ability to keep his hands off Andi.

  At the moment, he didn’t have much going for him. The one thing he had to hang on to was his determination to follow his instincts.

  If he couldn’t trust himself to do that, he wasn’t worthy of wearing a badge.

  Chapter Eight

  “Well, we’re making progress,” Jane announced.

  Andi looked up from the pile of red netting she was cutting into rectangles. “We are?”

  Tina sat at the desk in the honeymoon suite going through their wedding checklist.

  Jane knelt on the floor poring over photos she had taken of sample place settings they had designed for this first wedding. “Sure,” she said. “We’ve moved on from picking out fabric patterns to finalizing settings and party favors—now that Bridezilla has finally started making some decisions.”

  Andi rolled her eyes. “Her name’s Sandra. You’ve got to stop calling her that, Jane. When she gets here for the wedding, I’m liable to open my mouth and say the wrong thing.”

  “Not you, sweet cousin,” Jane mocked.

  “Don’t squabble, girls,” Tina said. “And look at the bright side. We’re on budget and a week ahead of schedule.”

  “Spoken like a true accountant.”

  Andi glared at Jane, then turned to Tina. “That’s true. Double kudos to you.” She hoped her smile didn’t look as strained as it felt. During the past few days, instead of progress, she had felt only pressure from every direction.

  Jed had so many hopes riding on relaunching the Hitching Post’s bridal business. This wedding had to be a success, to generate word-of-mouth referrals and bring in new reservations. It had—as Grandpa had often said lately—to go off without a hitch.

  Mitch had shown up at the hotel every day this week and without a murmur of protest had helped with anything they requested. He had repositioned tables and chairs in the banquet hall, brought down boxes of Christmas decorations from the attic and strung lights in the lobby and sitting room.

  He had also kept the conversation rolling, had kept the kids occupied once they started getting underfoot, and had even managed to keep Jed from trying to climb a ladder to hang some of the decorations.

  He had somehow done all this without once being out of her line of sight...or maybe she had just spent too much time watching him.

  Yesterday, Jane had jokingly told him he could have Sundays off, yet he had returned this morning for brunch.

  Each day he had acted as if nothing had ever happened between them, while she still dreamed of the kiss they had shared on this very bed. The kiss she wanted to repeat.

  I’m leaving for now, Mitch had said before walking out of this room that night, but that doesn’t mean we’ve wrapped things up.

  His parting words only added to her stress.

  He kept insisting she talk to him, that she had something bothering her. And she did. But their kiss and her response had only added to her list of worries.

  She even felt pressure from her own son. Maybe because of their conversation about their “badges,” Trey seemed to have latched on to Mitch. He had insisted on carrying his booster seat over to the chair on the opposite side of Mitch’s. When they had all moved to the sitting room, he trailed after the man like one of Robbie’s miniature cars on a string. And the latest new words in his vocabulary? “Mitch... Mitch... Mitch.”

  Her son’s growing attachment worried her more than anything else could.

  Beside her on the mattress, her cell phone buzzed with the special ringtone she had set for their client’s messages.

  “Now, if only Bridezilla would stop texting you every three minutes,” Jane said, “we could get everything wrapped up.”

  Andi glared. “Would you please not call her that?”

  Tina closed her laptop. “Why don’t we quit? It’s almost dinnertime.” On Sundays, the Hitching Post offered only two meals, brunch and a midafternoon Sunday d
inner. “I need to see if Abuela needs help. Cole mentioned taking all the kids into town for ice cream after dinner. I think we should go along, too.”

  “Ice cream?” Jane said. “It’s December.”

  Tina laughed. “The kids don’t care about that. And you’re not in New York, anymore, remember? It’s not nearly as cold here.”

  “True. Then count me in.”

  Andi nodded. “It is a good idea. I’ll be with you in a minute. I just need to check my phone.” She hesitated. With everything else bothering her, she didn’t need an argument with Jane on her conscience. “The text was from...the woman we will now refer to as you-know-who.”

  To her relief, Jane and Tina laughed.

  As she watched them both leave the room, she cradled the cell phone in her hands. Nothing would excuse the way she had responded to her cousin, but she had to admit she knew the cause.

  Since her encounter with Mitch in this very room, her nerves had felt as tight as a high-tension wire. At Jane’s comment, the wire had snapped. Her cousin had been right when she’d mentioned wrapping things up. Right in more ways than she knew.

  That’s what she needed to do—with Mitch. To wrap things up between them once and for all.

  She couldn’t get involved with him.

  For her children’s sake, she needed to let go and move on.

  Yet the worst of the pressure she’d felt these past few days had come from inside her.

  Seeing Mitch here provided a constant reminder that she had once loved him. That she still couldn’t resist him. And that, instead of wrapping up their relationship, she wanted to pick up from where they had left off.

  * * *

  MITCH STOOD NEAR the Big Dipper’s front counter patiently waiting his turn to pay for his ice cream cone. With Andi right in front of him, he was in no rush to move the line along.

  Earlier that morning, though he was off duty according to Jane, he had made the trip out to the Hitching Post. He didn’t want to admit it, but he was hoping for more time alone with Andi. Not for a repeat of the night he had found her upstairs in the suite, but for the chance to talk.