Callie's Christmas Wish

by Merline Lovelace

  Joe’s fists tightened on the bottles. No, dammit! He didn’t want someone like Callie. He wanted her.

  Looking back, he knew now that he hadn’t wanted Nattat this badly. Yeah, he’d lusted for her. Broken every rule in the book for her. Even killed for her. But she’d never stirred this gut-deep need to cherish and protect and...and...

  Hell! No point trying to analyze whatever it was Callie stirred in him. Enough to just roll with it. Which he did, at least until she straightened and came inside.

  “It’s colder than it looks out there,” she announced with a little shiver.

  He hefted the Pellegrino. “Want something that’ll raise more heat than water?”

  “No, that’s good. Besides, after all that wine we had with our pizza, I need to have a clear head.”

  “For?”

  She gave the ends of the robe’s belt a little tug. “I enjoyed today, Joe. This whole weekend. But we need to talk.”

  Chapter Seven

  We need to talk.

  Exactly what every man wanted to hear from his woman. Hiding a grimace, Joe arched a brow. “Long talk or short?”

  “That depends on you.”

  His euphoric mood of just a few seconds ago went down in flames. Just your basic crash and burn, he thought sardonically as he gestured to the sitting room.

  “Might as well get comfortable.”

  She curled into one end of the curved-back sofa and tucked her feet under her. Joe took the middle cushion. Not close enough to crowd her, but within reaching distance. Just in case he had to resort to emergency measures. Passing her one of the bottles, he braced for the worst while she unscrewed the cap and took a long swallow.

  “I debated whether to have this discussion, Joe. I enjoyed this afternoon so much. This whole weekend. Especially the past few hours,” she added with smile.

  The smile didn’t hack it. “Cut to the chase, Callie. What’s this about?”

  Unperturbed by the gruff demand, she nodded. “All right. You told me you’re not into flowery phrases or stringing together lots of adjectives, so let’s keep it simple. If you had to describe what you feel for me in just two or three words, what would they be? And please don’t say ‘a calm port in a storm.’”

  Christ! Where’d that come from? He’d thought...been sure...she’d understood it was a compliment. Digging deep, he settled on some lines of Scripture his gran had drilled into him as a kid, accompanied more often than not by the smack of her palm alongside his head.

  “Three words? How about ‘faith, hope and love. But,’” he added gruffly, “‘the greatest of these is love.’”

  Her eyes widened in surprise. Payback, he thought with a stab of fierce satisfaction, for the crash and burn.

  “Isn’t that from the Bible?”

  “First Corinthians, chapter thirteen.”

  “I didn’t know... That is...” She floundered for another moment. “Are you a regular churchgoer?”

  “Not according to my grandmother.”

  “You have a grandmother?” she echoed faintly.

  “Most people do,” he drawled.

  “You’ve never mentioned her. Or your parents. Are they still alive?”

  “Never knew my father. Mom died when I was six. Gran took over then.”

  “Is she still alive?”

  “Alive and kicking. She lives only a few blocks from me in Houston.”

  It’d taken some persuasion to get the feisty octogenarian to leave the home she’d raised him in. Joe had made sure she was comfortable there, that house had every modern convenience known to man. But three years ago arthritis all but crippled her and Joe finally convinced her to move to Houston. She was in a wheelchair now and quoting Bible scriptures to the attendants at a luxurious assisted-living center.

  “How often do you...?” She stopped, drew a breath. “Never mind. We’ll get to that later.”

  He waited, letting her circle back to whatever had spurred this need for this little talk.

  “Why ‘faith, hope and love’?” she finally questioned.

  Resigned, Joe dug a little deeper. “Faith, because once you give your loyalty, it stays given. Dawn and Kate are living proof of that.”

  “I guess,” she murmured, not quite convinced.

  “Hope, because...” He held that deep purple gaze. “For the first time in longer than I can remember, the future holds promise.”

  Her doubt melted, her voice softened. “And love? Are you in love with me, Joe?”

  What the hell? Did she think he went around proposing to every female who looked at him sideways?

  “You’re the first...the only...woman I’ve asked to marry me.”

  “So that’s a yes?”

  “Didn’t I just say that?”

  “Not exactly. Say the words. I’d like to hear them.”

  He opened his mouth, but her too-innocent expression knocked the simple phrase back down his throat. The little witch! She was jacking him. Playing him like a trout on the end of a six-pound line.

  “I love you. And now...” Thunking his Pellegrino down on the coffee table, he plucked hers out of her hand and leaned in. “Your turn. What do you feel for me? Three words. Spit ’em out.”

  She didn’t blink, didn’t hesitate. “I love you. I didn’t realize how much until this moment.”

  “Right. Okay. Good.”

  * * *

  Callie knew better than to smile, but it took some doing. He sounded every bit as flustered as she had a few moments ago. Taking pity on his obvious confusion, she laid a hand on his forearm.

  “Will it help if I tell you that you’re the first man...the only man...whose ring I’ve worn?”

  “It helps,” he said, recovering. “It also makes me wonder where this ‘we need to talk’ sh...stuff came from.”

  She acknowledged the barb with a nod and took a moment to gather her thoughts. Her religious education had been sporadic at best. One parent was a lapsed Catholic, the other agnostic. They’d both pretty much left her to find her own way. But she’d attended enough weddings to have more than a passing familiarity with the love verse Joe had just quoted.

  “Isn’t there something in that First Corinthians chapter about love not insisting on having its own way?”

  “Verse five. Why? What’s your point?”

  “Remember what you said this afternoon? When I told you I don’t like being on an electronic leash?”

  “Hell, Callie. Is that what this is all about? The phone-tracking app?”

  “The app’s part of it. Mostly it’s about establishing and respecting the boundaries I mentioned.”

  She chewed on the inside of her cheek, needing to get this right. Whatever future they might build together depended on the next few moments.

  “You told me you couldn’t turn your instincts off and on, Joe. I don’t want you to turn them off. Not completely. Some primitive corner of my psyche thrills to the idea of a strong, protective mate.”

  He managed to look both vindicated and baffled. “I repeat, what’s your point?”

  “The point,” she said patiently, “is that I want to be a full partner in this relationship, not some pampered pet. I want you to explain up front about any security issues or actions that involve me. Or us. Or you, for that matter.”

  “The process isn’t always that deliberate. There are times...too many times...when I have to go with my gut.”

  “I get that. I do. And I’d be a fool to tell you to ignore those gut instincts. It’s the other times. The ordinary you-and-me times. I need to know you won’t just assume you know best for me.”

  She reached for his hand. Hers was still damp and chilled from the Pellegrino bottle, his warm and sinewy. The contrast wasn’t lost on her.

&
nbsp; They were so different, she and Joe. They came from disparate backgrounds, apparently. Had followed widely divergent career paths. And they were certainly at the opposite ends of the spectrum when it came to bruising, bare-knuckle experiences.

  And yet in many ways they were very much alike. Both self-contained. Both confident of their own abilities. Both, she thought with a warm halo around her heart, seemingly in this for the long haul.

  “Promise you won’t make unilateral decisions, except in extraordinary circumstances.”

  He grabbed at the out. “Extraordinary circumstances. Okay, I can live with that.”

  “I mean it, Joe. Starting here, starting now, we’re equal partners in this adventure. Deal?”

  He thought about it for a second or two, then raised her hand and dropped a kiss on the back of it. The gesture was so courtly and un-Joe-like that she almost melted into a puddle right there on the hotel’s thousand-dollar-plus sofa.

  “Deal.”

  He released her fingers and reached for the belt of her robe instead. It loosened with a single tug. With a satisfied grunt, he curved his palm over her thigh.

  “As your full and equal partner, I vote we adjourn to the bed.”

  “The bed we just left a few moments ago?”

  “Yeah.” He slid his hand higher. “That one.”

  * * *

  A cold, gray drizzle obscured the bay the next morning, but Callie held Joe to his promise to take her to Pompeii before they drove up to Rome. Fortified by the hotel’s sumptuous Sunday brunch, they checked out and hit the road.

  The nasty weather actually did them a favor by whittling the hordes of tourists down to the hardiest few. Bundled against the chill in her long duster and the paisley scarf looped twice around her neck, European-style, Callie shoved her left hand in her pocket. Joe held onto her right and kept it tucked in the pocket of his leather jacket.

  She appreciated his steadying grip as they navigated the cobbled streets. Drifting fingers of fog made the time-worn stones slick and treacherous. They also blanketed the ancient ruin in eerie silence, almost as if the terror of that day in 79 AD had never happened. Yet every excavated dwelling, every scrap of tiled floor or line of decapitated marble columns rising out of the mist gave grim evidence of Vesuvius’s destructive power.

  “Hard to believe all this lay buried for more than a thousand years,” she murmured.

  Even harder to believe the hot ash and molten lava had spewed out of the volcano with such speed that Pompeii’s citizens had no time or place to run. They had died where they cowered. Or in the case of a noticeably pregnant woman, where she lay. Callie bit her lip as she studied the plaster cast made from the hardened hollow where the woman’s body had once been entombed in layers of ash. She’d tried to shield her head with one arm. The other cradled her stomach and unborn babe.

  The tragic figure had Callie blinking back tears. She couldn’t help thinking of Kate and her emerging baby bump. She hated to miss her friend’s exciting time of discovery and impending birth. Hated missing Christmas with Dawn and her new family, too. Her choice, she reminded herself. Her choice. But she made a silent promise to call her friends as soon as she got settled in her new apartment.

  That led to a reminder of the job waiting in Rome and the center sheltering desperate female refugees. She stared at the cast of the long-dead woman, thinking that all these years later, death and destruction still rained down from the skies. Man-made now, more often than not, and every bit as devastating. So many tried to escape it. So many needed help.

  “I’ve seen enough,” she told Joe. “Let’s go.”

  * * *

  The dank, heavy mist continued to roll in from the coast as they drove north. Traffic moved at a slow crawl for most of the way. When they finally crested one of Rome’s seven fabled hills, angry black clouds had piled up over the city and added to the fast-descending darkness.

  The deluge hit moments later. As if navigating the capital’s labyrinthine center wasn’t enough of a challenge, the torrential downpour turned to slush, then fat, wet snowflakes that gave the SUV’s oversize wipers a run for their money. With grim thanks for GPS, Joe followed the system’s precise directions to the flat he’d checked out before picking Callie up at the airport three days ago. The parking gods must have been smiling. He squeezed into a space just a few yards from the entrance, unloaded their carryalls and caught Callie’s arm for a quick dash through the snow.

  The flat wasn’t much. One bedroom, one combination kitchen, eating area and living room, with a tiny bath tucked in a corner. But it was on the third floor of a recently renovated building with solid security and located only a few blocks from the women’s center where she’d be working. Still, he’d had Emilio, his contact here in Rome, install a fingerprint-activated electronic keypad on her door and new bolts on the windows...which, under the terms of their recently negotiated agreement, he felt obligated to tell her about.

  “Was that really necessary?” she asked, eyeing the polished brass hardware that gleamed bright and new against an old but very solid door.

  “Probably not. Here, press your palm against the scanner. Fingers flat. Now roll them a little. Right to left. Good.”

  Feeling a little like a felon being fingerprinted by Rome’s polizia, she submitted to what she hoped was the last of Joe’s electronic gadgets.

  “The super has an override code,” he said as the door clicked open. “Just in case.”

  Callie didn’t move. “Do you have the code, too?”

  “Yeah, I do.” He turned and gave her a cool look. “You have a problem with that?”

  “Not if you call or text me before you use it.”

  “Damn.” His mouth twisted. “There goes my plan to surprise you when you come home and find me wearing nothing but a smile and big red bow.”

  It was so deadpan—and so unexpected—that Callie blinked before choking out a laugh. “Trust me. If I walk in and find you in a big red bow, I’ll be extremely surprised.”

  “Too late. You ruined it. I’ll think up something else.” He nudged the door with his carryall. “You want in or not?”

  * * *

  Once inside, Joe flicked on the lights and waited while Callie explored her new home.

  It was perfect, she thought in delight. Absolutely perfect. The warm yellow walls dispelled the winter gloom, and the furnishings were an eclectic mix of modern and shabby chic. The kitchen consisted of a two-burner stove with a single-rack oven, a small fridge and cloth-covered cupboards. The eating area held only a narrow drop-leaf table and two chairs that could be turned around to augment seating in the living area. That room’s solitary window faced the street and the buildings directly opposite. Roll-down shutters would block the streetlights and traffic noise.

  Entranced, she opened a door to the bathroom. A stool, a sink and a shower surrounded by a circular curtain suspended from the ceiling, all squeezed into what she guessed might once have been a closet.

  The bedroom just beyond contained only a double bed, a nightstand and a hand-painted wardrobe. But to Callie’s great joy, it also boasted a glass-paned door that opened onto a minuscule balcony that seemed to hang suspended in midair. Snow-dusted buildings stair-stepped down the steep hill below. And in the distance a floodlit dome was just visible through the curtain of snow.

  “Is that St. Peter’s?” she gasped.

  “Looks like.”

  Thrilled, she twisted the knob and stepped outside for a better look. Skirting a dime-size café table with a single chair, she gripped the wrought-iron railing with gloved hands. Rome had enchanted her during her brief visit with Dawn and Kate a few months ago. Awestruck by the snowy scene spread out before her, she fell completely, irrevocably in love.

  More in love, she amended as Joe edged past the rickety little table to join her. Ov
erwhelmed, she turned and framed his face with her gloved hands. The light spilling through the glass-paned door illuminated one side of his face. The scar was lost in shadow. Where it belonged, she thought fiercely. His past had made him the man he was now, but the future belonged to her. To both of them.

  “Thank you,” she breathed. “For Naples. For Pompeii. For being here with me. This whole day’s been perfect.”

  “You’re welcome. It’ll be even more perfect,” he added with a hopeful waggle of his brows, “if Emilio stocked your kitchen with something quick and easy to fix.”

  From the sublime to the practical. Laughing, Callie came back to earth.

  And now that he’d mentioned it, she was ravenous, too. After that ginormous brunch at the hotel in Naples, she’d vowed to cut out all carbs for the next week. Touring Pompeii and the long, slow drive back to Rome sent that vow down the tubes.

  “Let’s take a look.”

  They shed their coats and crowded into the tiny kitchen. Emilio had indeed stocked the fridge and tiny pantry. Callie inventoried paper-wrapped Parma ham, a thick wedge of Asiago cheese, garlic cloves, onions, Roma tomatoes, potatoes, eggs, coffee, creamer, some canned soup, a bottle of Tuscan red and, of course, several variations of pasta.

  “How about an omelet?” she suggested. “That’s quick and easy.”

  “I hit the omelet bar at breakfast.”

  “Soup?”

  “Tell you what. I spotted a trattoria on the corner. Why don’t I just go down and get two takeout orders of veal scaloppine?”

  “Oh, God, that sounds wonderful. But I hate for you to go back out in the snow.”

  “Not a problem.” He snagged his jacket off the chair where he’d draped it. “I’ll be right back. You open the wine and get settled.”

  Before she accomplished either of those tasks, Callie had a far more important one to attend to. It was just past six Rome time. A little after noon in DC. Digging her phone out of her purse, she dropped onto the edge of the bed and hit Kate’s speed-dial number.