The Snow Leopard's Christmas Surprise

by Emilia Hartley

  The invitation in her hands was lined with glimmering, silver candy cane illustrations. Every year, Reggie Baxter threw a massive Christmas party out of his own home. He made an array of Christmas sweets to serve, all surrounding a decadent fountain of dark chocolate.

  Ellie had wanted to go for years, but always found herself sitting at home with Casper instead. She figured, each year, that she made the right decision while curled up with her son. The next morning, she would find her social media feed flooded with photos of exuberant faces and statuses about over stuffed bellies.

  It was okay, she reminded herself. Nights spent with her small family would more than make up for what she missed out on outside these walls. Also, she thought as she turned back to her work, she did have a wedding to attend a few days before Christmas, just around the corner really. It would be a small time out of the house that she would very much appreciate.

  “Why do you work out of your kitchen?” Nolan asked.

  When she looked up, she found his eyes grazing over the utensils and ingredients spread out over her countertop. To him, it must look like a mess. Honestly, it kind of was, but it was Ellie’s mess. It was what her heart begged her to do. She loved the process, the reliability of it, the magic of it.

  She sucked in a deep breath. “Honestly, I couldn’t afford to leave the house. Casper goes through sitters faster than he went through diapers. At least, if I’m home and a sitter leaves, I can try to juggle both jobs.”

  Nolan’s brows knitted together. “That doesn’t sound very productive. The guy at the candy shop in town mentioned you by name. He seemed like he wouldn’t have minded having you on his team. Would you work for him if you had a reliable sitter?”

  Ellie shook her head. She had dreams of her own. All she had to do was wait and keep saving her money. At least, that’s what Ellie had been telling herself for the past four years. She’d stubbornly held onto her new dream, crafted while Casper was still wildly kicking in her womb.

  “No, I don’t want to work for Reggie. He’s a nice guy and all, but that isn’t what I want.”

  Nolan opened his mouth, but shut it when Ellie’s mother breezed into the kitchen. Grace plucked the invitation from Ellie’s hands and began going on about her plans for the night. Ellie glared at her mother, but threw herself back into her work. The best she could do was ignore her mother for the next few hours while she built the structure of the cake.

  Chapter Six

  “You’re going with us to Mr. Baxter’s Christmas party tonight,” Grace announced hours later, after Ellie thought her mother had forgotten about it. Ellie balked, but her mother went on. “Don’t argue with me. This is an opportunity you shouldn’t pass up, for a number of reasons.”

  Ellie shook her head. She couldn’t leave Casper home alone. Her mother had to know that. Her parents could go, taking her place. She was okay with that. At least, that’s what Ellie told herself.

  “Oh, no,” Ellie said as she shook her head. “I just don’t have the time. Besides, who else would watch Casper?”

  “I can watch him,” Nolan offered, taking the wind out of Ellie’s sails. Her shoulders slumped, and she turned to Nolan.

  He sat on the floor beside Casper, looking up at her with steel in his eyes. They both knew she was going to try to fight his offer. If Ellie had her way, Casper would never be left alone with him. She couldn’t fight back the fear that when she returned, the house might be empty. She hadn’t been able to find Nolan the first time he’d left. If he took Casper with him, both would be lost to the world.

  Fear struck her through the heart, a sharp pain that made her knees quake. She would fight, would search the world over for her child, but how long would it take? How old would Casper be by the time she got him back?

  Nolan pushed up from the floor to stand across from her. He took her hand in his, fingers warm and calloused. Ellie wanted to pull away, but for some reason she lingered in his touch. Her body betrayed her around Nolan and it was terrifying. He was a threat to her family, but her body seemed to have other ideas.

  “Casper and I will go start a snowball fight in the back yard. We won’t even leave the property. When the clock strikes nine, he’ll be tucked in his own bed. I promise.”

  Her stomach churned. What was the right decision? Go to a party and spend the night worrying? Or, stay home and avoid the situation altogether?

  The choice was taken out of her hands when her mother grabbed her by the elbow, declared it a deal, and dragged her from the room. When Ellie’s bedroom door shut behind her, she spun on her mother, an argument ready to rise from her.

  Grace held up her hands. “No. I won’t let you fight me on this. Nolan and Casper are completely fine on their own for one night. You need to attend this party if you’re ever going to get a real job.”

  “A real job?” Ellie snapped. Where had this come from?

  Grace moved towards Ellie’s closet. “You and I both know that running your business from your own kitchen isn’t going to work long term. Casper is always going to be a wild and reckless child and it’s clear that it interferes with your business.”

  “Okay, but what does that have to do with any of this? I can’t work outside of the house if I don’t have a sitter. It isn’t like you and Dad are going to move back up to New York.”

  Grace plucked a dress from the closet, a spaghetti strap wrap dress with a tulip petal skirt that she’d never worn. Honestly, she’d been terrified of the dress. Ellie shook her head. It was distracting her from the argument.

  “Mom, what is going on in your mind?”

  Grace turned to face her. “If you talk to Reginald Baxter tonight, you might find some space for your business in his commercial kitchen. Isn’t that better than working out of your own kitchen?”

  “Reggie has been offering to take me on for years now. What he wants is for me to work for him. What I want is to run my own business. The two are very different. Besides, I still don’t have anyone to watch Casper.”

  “You have Nolan.”

  “Like hell will I leave my child with him on a regular basis.”

  Her mother shook her head. “Nolan is the boy’s biological father. You can’t keep hiding the boy from him. The more you pull away, the more likely your fear will come true. You can’t keep torturing the man like that.”

  Ellie almost said a word her mother would have cringed at. Instead, she swallowed it down, the unspoken tasting foul on the way down. Her mother sounded a bit old-fashioned, but she may have a point. If Ellie kept fighting every step of the way, she could push them all into the nightmare she was waiting for.

  “Fine,” she said, teeth grinding together. “But, I am not talking to Reggie about a job. That’s the last thing I want.”

  Grace cocked her head to the side, pity clear in her eyes. “At some point, you’re going to have to accept the fact that you won’t be able to afford the down payment on your own place. Not when you have a mortgage to pay for and Casper’s college savings to build.”

  “I hate you sometimes,” Ellie told her mother as her heart broke. Hearing the truth destroyed her. As it was, Ellie hadn’t made a deposit into Casper’s college savings for months. Paying for the roof over their heads had been more important, more imminent.

  When she had looked down at the little, pink pregnancy test and saw a positive result, she knew her dream of becoming a rock star pastry artist had been blown out of the water. Since then, she’d dreamed of opening her own café, where she could sell whatever pastry tickled her fancy that day. But, each day, the dream seemed further and further away.

  Ellie’s personal dreams were squashed to nothing more than pretty ideas, so far out of reach that she could barely see them. If she had one Christmas wish, as selfish as it was, it’d be to take one step toward her dream. Just one.

  “Put on the dress, dear. We don’t want to be late for the Christmas party.”

  Ellie rolled her shoulders back. She was being selfish. Her dreams didn’
t matter anymore, the only thing she should want being happiness for Casper. That meant, perhaps, finding the right balance with Nolan.

  Grace left the room so Ellie could slip into the evergreen colored dress. The light fabric floated over her skin and slipped to reveal a bit of lace from her brassiere. She would be adjusting the neckline all night, but she didn’t change out of it. Another argument with her mother was not what she wanted on this night.

  She slipped a silver chain over her head, a tiny Herkimer diamond nestled between her breasts, and a pair of Herkimer diamonds glinting on her ears. They weren’t real diamonds, not by a long stretch, having been named rather sarcastically after the part of New York where quartz crystals were surprisingly abundant. But, they’d been a Christmas present from her parents last year and it only seemed fitting.

  Ellie glanced to the mirror above her dresser and found that she was pleased with her reflection. She threaded her fingers through her messy waves and fluffed them around her shoulders, not bothering to put her hair up like she normally would. The crystals glimmered at her ears and above her breasts. She spared a moment to swipe a think line of black liner over her eyes, ending in pointed cat-eyes.

  In front of the closet, Ellie noticed a pair of shoes her mother must have pulled from the mess. A pair of silver pumps waited for her to slip her feet inside. Ellie didn’t know if she could stand several hours on her feet in those, but something made her want to put them on anyway.

  She wanted to see Nolan’s face when she stepped out dressed like this. She wanted him to see what he’d turned his back on when he left. It was a selfish thought and it was looking like she was full of selfish thoughts this night.

  ***

  Nolan tossed a ball back and forth with Casper while Ellie and her mother argued in the room down the hall. Casper’s eyes followed the ball, bright and full of life. Even when the ball hit the ground and bounced away, Casper bounded after it with enthusiasm that made him smile. Watching Casper run after the ball, the quiet allowed him to hear the conversation down the hall.

  Grace slipped out of the room, her head held high triumphantly. Her eyes met his and she gave him an exaggerated wink. He had the feeling that Grace was playing the both of them. She had plans for her daughter that neither of them wanted to be involved in. He could tell her that he wasn’t here to ignite some imaginary flame with her daughter, but the woman wouldn’t have listened.

  Casper raced back with the ball and cocked his arm back to throw it as hard as he could. Panic struck Nolan as the ball zoomed through the air. He shot up from the ground and had to use his cat reflexes to catch it before it broke the window. It might have been a rubber ball, but Casper didn’t know how strong he was. It would have shattered the window and soared into the neighbor’s lawn.

  Having time alone with his son was going to help both of them. Surrounded by the human family, Ellie forbade him from telling them their secret, he’d been unable to explain to Casper what they were. The boy had no idea what was about to happen to him. Nolan knew it had to be soon. The energy riding Casper’s child form was overabundant, in preparation for the first change.

  He was considering how to tell Casper when the boy’s mother stepped into the living room. Nolan’s breath caught in his throat and his heart raced inside his chest. Ellie stood, perched on glimmering heels that shaped her calves and raised her already enticing rear. The fabric of her dress glided over her skin like water, there but barely touching. It dipped low between her breasts. She’d accented the dip with a tiny, glittering piece of jewelry.

  His mouth began to water. The urge to crawl, on hands and knees, toward her was overwhelming. He wanted to run his hands up her bare calves and feel the muscle beneath them. He wanted to feel the soft cushion of her rear and see her heated gaze as she looked down at him.

  Nolan’s jaw clenched. Ellie was beautiful, but he reminded himself that wasn’t why he’d returned. Not because he needed a woman in his life. And, as enticing as Ellie was, lying with her would only complicate things further. He knew it would make a mess out of the relationship he was trying to build with his son.

  “How long do you think you’ll be gone?” Nolan asked, trying his best not to look in Ellie’s direction.

  When she spoke, there was disappointment in her voice, and he thought it had little to do with what she said. “A couple hours. Not long.”

  Nolan fought the urge to shoot up from the floor and rush to her side. He wanted to take her in his arms, twirl her around and see the hem of her skirt flutter while she laughed. In fact, he wanted it so bad, his mouth dried until he pushed himself off the floor and approached her. His hand reached out for her, hovering in the air with no real purpose, until he touched a stray curl and tucked it behind her ear.

  Beneath his gaze, Ellie’s face warmed and she looked away.

  Did she feel the way he did? Was there an abominable magnetic pull inside her that drew her toward him, too? Or, was she as cold as she presented herself? It was unfair, he thought, that his kind should live their lives alone.

  “Take your time at the party,” Nolan said, shoving back the surge of desire that swamped him. “And, try to wear a coat. That doesn’t look very warm.”

  Ellie laughed, the sound rich and warm, completely unlike the woman he’d been faced with the past few days. It made him want to pull her into him, but he held back. She smiled up at him with a smirk on the corner of her mouth.

  “No, I thought I’d go out and catch my death in the cold. I like to be dramatic like that.”

  “You don’t have to tell me twice,” he muttered.

  She wasted no time, her hand darting out to smack him in the chest. Before he knew it, his hand trapped hers against his chest. The room grew silent, everyone holding their breath.

  “I mean it. Casper needs you in his life. Be careful tonight.”

  Her lips flapped, as if she couldn’t find her voice. Finally, Ellie nodded. Unable to meet his eyes, she turned away from him. He let her hand go, even though he didn’t want to. It took Nolan a long moment to realize that he didn’t want her going out at all. He wanted her curled up on the couch while he and Casper played.

  It was a selfish thought, to consider them a family in that happy kind of way. But, that was all it was, a thought. At the end of the day, Ellie was just a human woman who gave him his child. And, Nolan was just a vagabond turned father.

  But, the animal inside of him purred with delight at the sight of Ellie, a reaction he’d never experienced before. Nolan couldn’t make sense of the war between his body and his mind and it was troublesome.

  Chapter Seven

  “What are you so afraid of,” Grace asked over her flute of champagne.

  Nolan was baby-sitting alone for the first time and it made Ellie nervous. The night was a blur of twinkling lights with the jaggedness of anxiety around the edges that not even champagne could take away.

  “I quite like the man,” Grace said to her daughter. “Nolan has been a great father figure for Casper so far. And, didn’t he get a job in town? The man seems to be prepared to stay long term and, let me tell you, I didn’t peg him for the kind to settle down when he first arrived. He had the word vagabond written all over him when he first arrived.”

  Ellie snorted.

  “But, like I said, I don’t see that anymore. Nolan wants what is best for Casper and it’s clear, at least to me, that he wants more than what you’re giving him.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?”

  Her mother stifled a sigh. Grace must have known the ups and downs of parenting, the fear and anxiety that never really left. It meant she had more patience for her daughter’s woes than someone else might have. “I’m saying that Nolan might want to put a ring on it, if you understand what I’m saying.”

  “Oh, hell no.” Ellie backed up as if the prospect were in front of her.

  “Why not?” Her mother asked, head cocked to the side.

  “Because I don’t know him! I know nothin
g about this man who appeared on my doorstep after four years.”

  Grace nodded, taking in her daughter’s words. Her eyes scanned the Christmas party as she organized her argument. When she spoke, her voice was soft and even. “Let me put it this way: Has Nolan ever hit you? Has he ever said a mean thing to you? Has he ever hurt your son? I know it might be a bit early to judge what kind of man he is, but so far we’ve seen nothing but goodness from him.”

  “Wait until you guys leave,” Ellie argued. “I might see a new side of him yet.”

  She didn’t tell her mother that Nolan was a shifter. Her mother would have looked at her as if she’d grown two heads. The last thing Ellie needed was her parents fighting her for custody with the argument that Ellie was mentally unstable. The idea terrified her, so she kept the secret shoved down. It would never see the light of day.

  “Mom, please don’t try playing match-maker for me. Okay? My life is my own and if I don’t love the father of my son, then so be it. But, I want love if I’m going to settle down. Love for me and love for my son.”

  “And you don’t think Nolan could offer you that?”

  Ellie opened her mouth to argue, but found the words had died in her throat. The way he’d looked at her, the way he’d held her hand and asked her to take care of herself, had all warmed her in a way she hadn’t expected. Ellie knew, logically, it was because Casper would be devastated without her, but she couldn’t help but wonder if there’d been more in the look he’d given her.

  He had, already, kissed her once since he’d come back. Ellie wondered if that’d been a ploy to win her over the way he once had, but it hadn’t felt like it. Instead, the touch of lips on lips had reignited the memories of that night from four years ago and made her burn from the inside out, even if she hadn’t wanted to admit it.

  “So,” Grace interrupted her daughter’s thoughts with a smug smile. “What do you think you’ll get Nolan for Christmas?”