One Mistletoe Wish

by A. C. Arthur

  She was drowning in his kiss, her hardened nipples rubbing against his broad chest.

  “It’s been a while,” she whispered and flattened her hands against his chest. “I mean, um, not since...”

  Gray touched a finger to her lips to silence her.

  “I understand,” he said softly. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  His gaze seemed a bit softer, although his eyes were still darkened by desire. His jaw was strong as she lifted shaking fingers to touch him. There were so many reasons for her to answer no and only one for her to say yes. Morgan had suspected that it had been hard for a man like Grayson Taylor to refrain from anything he wanted. His wants and needs were always met, probably without him ever having to voice them. Yet he had with her.

  “I want you,” she told him without wavering another moment. “I want you, Gray.”

  She was the one to lift up at that moment, at the same time guiding his head down so that their mouths could meet for a kiss. Their tongues dueled, moans mingled, and Gray slowly slipped inside of her. There was a rush of heat, a slight tensing, and then Morgan was falling. She matched Gray’s thrusts, her eyes closing involuntarily as she held tight to him for fear of falling off the cliff to a bottomless abyss.

  Every stroke, every whisper, every time he kissed her shoulder, her chin, her closed lids and her lips—it was all intoxicating. Morgan forgot everything and everyone. There was only Gray. Only this moment and he filled it and her with complete satisfaction.

  So complete that she didn’t want it to end.

  Yet, she knew that it would. It had to, and then where would she be?

  He held her when she trembled in his arms, her release taking her completely by surprise. It was a wave of pleasure that she couldn’t resist but wanted to hold on to for dear life. Gray fell right behind her, holding her so tightly she could barely breathe. It was a wonderful feeling, a safe and cherished feeling, which, of course, Morgan knew would end and probably too soon.

  * * *

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I’m picking you up for work. You do have to teach today, right?” Gray said the next morning when he showed up at her door.

  Morgan didn’t understand. Well, she did, but she hadn’t anticipated that he’d be there. She’d already talked to Wendy—who was apologetic about last night—this morning. Her sister was supposed to roll out of bed and bring Morgan her car to use today. When she got to work she planned to call Otis to see if he could tow her car over to Smitty’s, Temptation’s only official auto-mechanic shop. She had not expected to see Gray at all.

  “There’s no need to inconvenience your sister. I’m here and I can take you,” he insisted.

  “You were here last night,” Jack said.

  Morgan had left Jack and Lily at the kitchen table with orders to finish their cereal while she answered the door. Apparently, Jack was finished. Morgan doubted that, but here he was.

  “Yes, I was, and you were sound asleep,” Gray replied.

  “Not all the way. Your car has cold seats,” Jack continued and Morgan froze.

  She wondered if Jack remembered anything else about last night besides riding in Gray’s car. Her son hadn’t mentioned anything about Gray this morning, so the fact that he knew he’d been here was news to her. Yet another thing for her to think carefully about today.

  Gray gave a nod as he moved past Morgan and into the living room. “I have seat warmers. We can turn those on this morning. I think it’s colder today.”

  “It’s gonna snow,” Jack told him.

  Morgan closed and locked the door behind her, turning in time to see Gray and Jack walking back toward the kitchen like they were old friends. They weren’t, however. Gray was just passing through town. He would be gone as soon as he decided what to do with his buildings. Then they would never see him again. He’d made it perfectly clear that he did not like being back in Temptation. The pain, for him, was too great, and Morgan could understand that. No matter how her body wanted something totally different.

  “Mr. Gray!” she heard Lily chime just before she entered the kitchen.

  By the time she entered, she saw Lily once again in Gray’s arms. Jack, who was standing close to his leg, looked up as he asked, “Do you know how to build a snowman?”

  Gray had been touching the ends of Lily’s hair. Her daughter had wanted to have the ends of her ponytails left loose today. No twists or bows at the end, she’d instructed Morgan. Normally, Morgan didn’t like for Lily’s long and sometimes untamable hair to be worn loose while she was in school. It made for a distraction that the ABCs could not compete with. This morning, however, the conflict over just how wrong Morgan had been to have sex with a guy she hardly knew, on the couch in her living room, while her children were in the other room fast asleep, had made her a little more relaxed on the rules.

  “I haven’t seen snow in a very long time,” Gray told Jack.

  “How can you not see snow? It comes every year,” Jack insisted, his little brow furrowed in confusion.

  “We have fifteen minutes, you two. Finish your breakfast,” Morgan interjected. “Would you like a cup of coffee?” she offered Gray, since he was there.

  “Sure,” he replied, sitting Lily down in her chair.

  Jack slipped into his seat and scooped another spoon of cereal into his mouth, drops of milk dripping down his chin. Morgan looked up after taking another mug down from the cabinet to see Gray leaning in to wipe Jack’s face with one of the napkins from the center of the table.

  “How do you like it?” she asked, her voice unusually loud.

  Gray and the children looked her way.

  “Your coffee, I mean,” she clarified, feeling uncomfortable.

  The scene before her was extremely domestic and she didn’t know how to digest it. Just like in her dining room, there was just a small table in the center of the kitchen floor where, normally, only three people sat. None of those people had been a man, because there had been no male in her life since James.

  “Black,” Gray replied.

  James liked lots of cream and sugar in his coffee, just like Morgan did. Her husband hadn’t been a millionaire, either. He’d driven a Jeep and not a Porsche. He was exactly six feet tall, not an inch over. Gray was much taller and more muscular than James. She wouldn’t say Gray was stronger or more handsome, though. She just couldn’t. It would be disrespectful to James’s memory. Hell, everything she’d done and thought since meeting Grayson Taylor had been like spitting on all the love and memories she’d shared with James Hill and Morgan hated that thought.

  “I live in Miami,” Gray informed the children. “We don’t get snow to build snowmen.”

  “No snowmen?” Lily asked. “That’s sad. I want it to snow on Christmas. Just like the song Mama listens to on the radio.”

  “She listens to those songs all the time,” Jack quipped.

  “All right you two, less talking and more eating,” Morgan chided lightly as she brought Gray’s coffee to the table.

  There was nothing else for her to do but take a seat across from Gray while the children continued to eat.

  “Mr. Taylor’s going to give us a ride this morning,” she announced when there had been a few moments of silence while the children finally did what she’d told them to do. Her cell phone was sitting on the table and she picked it up to send Wendy a text to let her know.

  “Where’s your car?” Lily asked.

  “It died.” Jack shook his head. “Just like our dad. Did you know that our dad died, Mr. Taylor?”

  Morgan almost dropped the mug she’d just been bringing to her lips. Her gaze shot to Gray’s, but he only looked mildly taken aback. He probably wasn’t used to the candor of children. Morgan was, but she had to admit that she hadn’t anticipated Jack bringing up his fathe
r. The children rarely said anything about James, because they had no real memories of him, aside from the things that Morgan had told them.

  Gray had just taken a sip from his coffee and now he slowly lowered his mug to the table as he looked from Morgan to Jack.

  “My father died, too. Just over two months ago,” Gray told him.

  “Did he get shot?” Lily asked.

  “Maybe we shouldn’t be talking about this right now,” Morgan said trying to intercede.

  Gray shook his head as he looked over to her and said, “It’s fine.”

  It wasn’t, Morgan wanted to yell, but she didn’t want to argue in front of the children.

  “No. He wasn’t shot,” Gray said to Lily. “He had a heart attack.”

  “Oh,” Lily said, her eyes wide now. “Our dad was in the army.”

  “He was a soldier,” Jack offered. “He was fighting wars to help people but he got shot instead.”

  Morgan’s chest constricted at the words and her hands shook so she pulled them away from the mug completely. Her mind was whirling with guilty thoughts about James and having this man sitting here at the table with James’s children. A part of her knew how silly that was. James would never have expected her to remain a widow for the rest of her life. He would have wished for her to find happiness again, even if that happiness was in the arms of another man.

  But Gray wasn’t that man. There was no happiness to be found with him because he had no plans to stay in Temptation. Not to mention the fact that Morgan wasn’t the type of woman that landed a man like Grayson Taylor. She knew that each time she let herself recall meeting Kym Hutchins. That woman—as much as Morgan instinctively did not like her—was exactly the type that would be on Gray’s arm.

  “It’s time to go,” Morgan said as she immediately stood. “Grab your coats while I clear the table.”

  The children were glad to be finished with their breakfast and hurriedly pushed away from the table. They were on their way out of the room when Jack turned back and asked Gray, “Are you going to heat up the seats now?”

  Gray nodded. “Sure will. By the time you come outside they’ll be all warm for you.”

  Jack smiled. “Okay, I’ll hurry.”

  Now alone, Morgan struggled for the right words. She would text Wendy and cancel, then she would accept Gray’s ride to work this morning, only because he was already here and they were in danger of being late. But then she wanted him to stay away from her children.

  “You look like there’s a battle going on inside your head,” she heard him say.

  “What?” she asked and picked up the two bowls from the table, then carried them to the sink.

  “Your brow’s all wrinkled and you were rubbing the back of your neck like you were trying to push some difficult thoughts out of your mind,” he told her.

  Morgan put the bowls in the sink and tried to relax. He was right, but he didn’t need to know that. “I’d like my car to be fixed and I’m hoping that Otis can get to it today.”

  “Otis? He’s the guy at the B and B?”

  “Yes,” she answered. “He does a lot of odd jobs around town since his wife died. Before that he’d worked at the train station for thirty-five years and then retired. Granny says he used to drive Ms. Ethel crazy when he was sitting in that house all day doing nothing. Now he spends his days helping out at the B and B and wandering around town giving people rides, dropping off packages, fixing broken bikes or raking up the leaves. Anything to keep him from sitting still too long because then he’d miss Ethel too much.”

  She’d said the last quietly, her hands clenching the side of the sink.

  “Like you miss your husband?” Gray asked softly.

  Morgan turned quickly and was shocked to see that he’d gotten up from the table and now stood just a couple feet away from her.

  “I—I didn’t say anything about that. About him, I mean,” she said and then paused. Taking a deep breath, Morgan let it out slowly. “I apologize for the children bringing him up. I don’t know where that conversation came from.”

  Gray looked as if he was going to say something, then he stopped and simply waited.

  “I can’t do this,” she admitted. “I don’t know how to do this casual sleep-together thing that I’m sure you’re used to. I’m not as worldly as you or Kym and I don’t want to be. All I ever wanted was to have a family and to live right here in Temptation, just like my parents did. I never expected my husband to die so quickly and now I can only focus on my kids. I hope you don’t sell those buildings because they mean a lot to us. Your father even had plans for them. Although I’m not sure they were the best plans. Still, the town’s counting on you continuing with your father’s ideas so that we can reap the revenue and hopefully draw in more tourists. There are lots of updates we need here in Temptation. We could be such a rich and prosperous town for future generations, but if you sell, outsiders will come in and do what they want.”

  She stopped because she’d been babbling. All the things that had been rolling through her mind for many nights just came tumbling out and now her heart pounded and her hands shook.

  Gray took a step toward her. He reached out, cupping a hand at the nape of her neck. He didn’t rub the spot, but simply held his hand still there. The heat and comfort spread instantaneously and she almost leaned into him with relief.

  “I’m not trying to make you forget your husband,” he said quietly. “I don’t know what a love that deep feels like, but I have to say it’s admirable. As for the town, I don’t know what I’m going to do about that yet.”

  It was an honest answer, she figured. Honest and conflicted. Was Gray having as hard a time dealing with his dead father as she was with the strong memory of her dead husband?

  “Now, let’s get you to work,” he said, pulling his hand slowly away from her. “You don’t want to be late.”

  He’d walked out of the kitchen then, leaving Morgan alone with her thoughts. The ones that did not want to obey her declarations. She did feel guilty about James and she did want what was best for the town. But she also wanted Grayson Taylor. Damn, how she wanted him.

  Chapter 8

  “I want all of his files delivered here. No later than tomorrow, Phil,” Gray said into his cell phone. “And see if you can locate my brother Garrek.”

  After hanging up with his lawyer, Gray sat back in the chair at the coffee shop where he’d been for the last hour. The manager of the shop, a very lovely lady in her midforties named Clarice, had given him permission to use the back two tables as his makeshift office.

  “I don’t know why Jim and Darlene won’t get with the times and have Wi-Fi installed out at the farm. I swear some people are so resistant to change,” Clarice had told him as she’d brought him coffee and the whole wheat bagel he’d ordered.

  “It’s all right,” he’d told her. “I kind of like the solitude, for small stretches of time, that is.”

  Gray smiled and for the first time since he’d been in Temptation, he felt totally relaxed.

  After dropping Morgan and the children off at school he’d come straight to the coffee shop with his tablet, cell phone and a small file he’d begun to compile late last night. He’d spent hours thinking about the time he’d spent at the old house. The feelings he’d felt while walking through the rooms, the memories that continued to push further and further to the forefront of his mind. They all swirled through his head until he’d spent most of the night and early morning sitting up staring out the window to the dark outline of the mountaintop. After finally getting a couple hours’ sleep, he’d showered and headed straight to Morgan’s house. There’d been no question that he’d drive her to work that morning.

  With that done, now Gray had a lot of research he wanted to get done.

  Theodor Taylor had been up to something befo
re he’d died and Gray wanted to know what.

  The man who he and his siblings had all developed a love-hate relationship with over the years had secrets. Gray had never doubted that. One of the things his mother had always said about their father was that he had an uncanny ability to keep things to himself, whereas she was an open book. Olivia had always blamed herself for that flaw. Gray had actually found it refreshing that all he’d ever had to do was ask his mother a question to get an honest answer.

  Where his father was concerned, well, there weren’t many times Gray had even attempted to ask the man anything of substance. During his childhood there had only been a couple of visits from his father and sporadic phone calls. Theodor just sent money. That was all he’d been able to do for his family after they left Temptation. Gray considered that enough since the man’s presence never failed to upset his mother. Had he been left to make the choice about leaving town, he would have chosen to see his mother with some semblance of happiness every time. Some of his other siblings didn’t agree, but Gray couldn’t carry their burdens as well as his own.

  Morgan had told him that just about a year ago his father had been in touch with Fred Randall, the real estate agent and property manager. He was also Millie’s husband. Gray had written all these names down last night. Now he typed the agent’s name into the computer to see what he’d come up with. There wasn’t much, but the agency did have a website with Fred and his wife smiling on the front page. They stood in front of a sparkling white colonial that Gray figured was their house. He went to the contacts page on the site and wrote down the address and phone number. He would pay Fred Randall a visit today.

  “There you are,” a female voice said as she approached the table. “I’ve been looking all over for you. Those people at that so-called resort you’re staying at are rude and unprofessional. I guess I shouldn’t expect too much considering where we are.”

  Gray looked up from his tablet to see Kym. “Good morning,” he said to hopefully stop her from talking.

  She sighed in return. “It will be when I get a decent cup of coffee. I swear, one of the first things I’m going to do when I get back to the office is write a letter to Starbucks and tell them they need to open up a shop in this ho-hum town.”