“I can give you a ride back to the ranch and find somebody later to take your car home. Face it, Elise, you’re in no shape to drive.”
She couldn’t go back to Clifton’s Pride yet. Just the thought of walking inside the ranch house in her condition made her queasy.
She didn’t need to see that same wary look in everyone’s eyes she’d been dealing with since before Thanksgiving, as if she were somebody who had been given some kind of terminal diagnosis or something. Her mother hugged her at the oddest moments and Grant and his wife, Stephanie, went out of their way to include her in conversations.
She especially didn’t want to show up tipsy when Erin was there in all her perfection, the daughter they should have had.
“I don’t want to go home yet,” she whispered, grimly aware the words sounded even more pathetic spoken aloud.
“No?”
“Not yet. I’ll only be in the way. My…my mother and Grant have…well…guests for dinner.”
He gave her another of those long, considering looks and she could feel herself flush, certain he could guess what—or rather whom—she meant.
“Want to go back inside?”
She shook her head. “I don’t think I need to see the inside of The Hitching Post for a while.”
Or ever again.
“Fair enough. Do you want to go grab a bite to eat somewhere? I’m sure we can find somewhere still open.”
“Not really.”
He gave a half laugh. “Well, I’m running out of options. You’ll freeze to death if you sit out here in the parking lot for another hour or two until your head clears.”
“I know.”
After another pause, he sighed. “My place is just a block or two away. If you want to, I can get cleaned up and fix you something to eat and we can hang there until you think the coast is clear back at Clifton’s Pride.”
She hated that he had to come to her rescue, just like when they were kids. She had been a clumsy kid and it seemed like every time she fell, he had been right there to help her back up, brush off the dirt, gather her books, whatever she needed.
From the time he had fought two schoolyard bullies bigger than he was—and won—he had been stepping in to protect her from the world.
She was twenty-six years old. Surely it was high time she found the gumption to fight her own battles. Still, the idea of somebody else taking care of her for a few minutes sounded heavenly.
“Don’t you ever get tired of rescuing me?” she asked.
Instead of answering, he laughed and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. His hand was warm in the cold December air and she wanted to lean into him, close her eyes and stay there forever.
“Come on. Let’s get you out of the snow.”
Chapter Three
Though Matt only lived a few blocks from The Hitching Post, Elise dozed off beside him in his pickup truck before he reached his house—a small, run-down cottage on Cedar Street he had purchased a few months back to rehab in his spare time away from his work at Cates Construction.
Before the first snow a few months earlier, he’d rushed to put new shingles on and managed a new coat of white paint and green shutters. From the outside, the place looked fresh and tidy.
Inside was an entirely different story.
He thought about driving around for a while to let her sleep off the alcohol in her system, but he had a feeling she probably needed food more than sleep. Back in the day when he used to enjoy the wild weekend here or there, that’s what always helped him most.
He pulled into his driveway and put his truck in gear, though he left his engine running to keep the heater blowing. He shifted his gaze to her and shook his head.
Elise Clifton.
She was still as sweet and pretty as she had always been, blonde and petite, with delicate features, a slim little nose and her cupid’s bow of a mouth.
She always looked a year or two younger than the rest of their grade. Now she probably considered that a good thing, but when they were kids, he knew she had hated being mistaken for a younger kid.
Maybe that was why she always stirred up all his protective instincts. She was right, it seemed like he was always coming to her rescue. He hadn’t minded. Not one damn bit. He only had brothers—a twin and two older ones—and didn’t know much about dealing with girls back when he was a kid. But his father had taught them all that a guy was supposed to watch out for those who were smaller than him.
Elise certainly fit the bill—then, and now. She looked small and fragile with her blond hair fanned out on the pickup’s upholstery and her bottom lip snagged between her teeth.
Elise had always seemed a little more in need of rescuing than others. Even before the terrible events when she was thirteen, something about her seemed to stir up all his protective impulses.
Her long lashes fluttered now as she blinked her eyes open. For a brief instant, she smiled at him, her eyes the soft, breathtaking blue of the Montana sky on an early summer morning. As he gazed at her, he felt as if he’d just taken a hit to the gut from a three-hundred-pound linebacker.
He drew in a breath, trying to shake off the unexpected sensation. This was Elise, he reminded himself. Little Elise Clifton, whose junior-rodeo, barrel-racing belt buckle had nearly been bigger than she was.
Except she wasn’t little. She hadn’t been in a long, long time. Though still petite, he couldn’t help but notice she was soft and curvy in all the right places.
“Feeling better?” he spoke mostly to distract himself.
Her brow furrowed a little, as if she were trying to figure that out herself. After a moment, she nodded a little shyly, a trace of color on her cheeks. “Actually, I think I am. At least there’s only one of you.”
“Until Marlon shows up,” he joked about his identical twin, and was rewarded with her sweet-sounding laugh.
“I hope he’s with Haley right now, tucking her in and bringing her tissues and chicken soup. She and I were supposed to have a girls’ night out to see the band at The Hitching Post together tonight but she bailed on me at the last minute.”
She sat up and stretched a little and he tried not to notice how her sweater beneath her unbuttoned coat hugged those soft curves. “Since I was already there and…well, didn’t really want to go home yet, I decided to stay and listen to the band.”
Ah. That explained why she’d been sitting by herself at the bar. He had spied her the moment he walked in and had been keeping an eye on the cowboy she’d been sitting beside. At first, he thought maybe they’d been on a date. The little spark of inappropriate jealousy had come out of nowhere, taking him completely by surprise.
When she walked down the hall toward the ladies’ room, he had watched the cowboy follow her. When neither of them emerged after a moment, he’d gone looking for her. And just in time.
“Poor Haley,” he said now. “Being sick bites anytime, but especially at Christmas. Still, I’m sure Marlon loves the chance to baby her. He’s crazy about her.”
“He’d better be,” she said darkly. He hid a smile at the belligerent tone he’d noticed her adopting earlier. He didn’t know how much she’d had to drink. With her small frame, it probably wasn’t much, but he definitely recognized the signs of somebody on the tipsy side.
“Let’s get you inside and find you something to eat.”
“I’m really not hungry.”
“Humor me, okay?”
After a moment, she shrugged and reached for the passenger-side door handle. He climbed out of the truck and hurried around the front of the pickup. His work truck was high off the ground so he reached inside and grabbed her hand to help her to the ground.
Her fingers felt small and cool inside his and when her high-heeled boots hit the ground, she wobbled a little. He reached out to steady her and found he was strangely reluctant to release her.
He held her, gazing into those blue eyes far longer than he should have while the fat snowflakes drifted down to settle in her hair
and cling to her cheeks.
He hadn’t seen her much over the years since she and her mother moved away from Thunder Canyon. Last time was probably over the summer when she’d come for a visit and he had ended up pulling over to help her change a flat tire.
Every time he saw her, he was struck again how lovely she was.
He had missed her, he suddenly realized. More than he ever could have imagined.
She shivered suddenly and the delicate motion jolted him back to his senses. “Let’s get you inside.”
“Thanks,” she murmured.
He gripped her arm so she didn’t slip on the skiff of snow covering his sidewalk as he led the way up the porch. He twisted the key in the lock and was greeted by one well-mannered bark that made him smile.
As soon as he opened the door, a brown shape snuffled excitedly and headed toward them. Elise took a quick, instinctive step backward on the porch, wobbling a little again on her dressy boots.
He reached for her arm again, feeling the heat of her beneath the red wool coat she wore. “Sorry about that. I should have warned you. Tootsie, sit.”
His chocolate Labrador immediately planted her haunches on the polished wood floor of the entry, her tail wagging like crazy.
Elise reached down to pet her head. “Tootsie?”
He winced. “When she was a puppy, she looked like a big, fat Tootsie Roll. My mom named her.”
Tootsie waited patiently until he gave her the signal to come ahead, then she hurried to his side and nudged his leg for a little love.
“She’s beautiful, Matt.”
“The sweetest dog I’ve ever had, aren’t you, baby?”
She snuffled in response and he obediently scratched her favorite spot, right behind her left ear.
He loved having a dog to keep him company. When the weather wasn’t so cold, she rode with him to construction sites. After the cold weather set in, his favorite evenings were spent at home watching a basketball game with her curled up at his feet.
Used to be Marlon would join them but these days his twin had better ways to spend his time.
Matt supposed it was only natural that lately Tootsie’s company didn’t seem quite enough anymore, especially since it seemed like everybody he knew was pairing up.
“How long have you lived here?” Elise asked.
He shifted his attention from the dog to his house and winced again at its sorry shape. The place was a work in progress. He had stripped years worth of ugly wall-paper layers, down to the lath and plaster. He’d finished mudding the walls a few weeks earlier but had been so busy rushing his crew to finish Connor McFarlane’s grand lodge in time for Christmas, he hadn’t had time to paint.
At least the kitchen and bathroom were relatively presentable. He had started with the kitchen, actually, installing hand-peeled cabinets, custom tile floors and gleaming new appliances.
He had also taken out the wall of a tiny bedroom to expand the bathroom into one big space and he was particularly satisfied with the triple heads in the tile shower and the deep soaking tub.
But he couldn’t exactly entertain his unexpected guest in his bathroom. Maybe he should have spent a little more time working on the more public areas of the house.
“I’ve got lots of plans but I have to fit the work around the jobs I’m doing with my dad,” he said.
She nodded. “That’s right. I heard you were working for Cates Construction these days. Do you like it?”
He was never sure how to answer that question. Most of the time, he was only too aware of the subtext behind the question. You really dropped out of law school to work construction? Couldn’t hack it, huh?
That hadn’t been the truth at all. His grades had been fine after his first year of law school. Better than fine. Great, actually. He’d been in the top ten percent of his class and had fully intended going back for his second year—until he realized after he came home to Montana for the summer that he was much happier out at a work site with his dad, covered in the satisfying sweat of putting in a hard day’s labor, than he’d ever been in a classroom.
“I do like it. There’s always a new challenge and it’s great to watch something go from blueprints to completion, like the McFarlane Lodge.”
“Haley told me about that. It sounds huge.”
“It is. More than 10,000 square feet. It’s been a fun project but a little time consuming. That’s why I only have bits and pieces of time to work on this place. This is the third house in town I’ve rehabbed on my own.”
She cast her gaze around the room. “Um, it looks good.”
He smiled at her obvious lie. “No, it doesn’t. Everything’s a mess out here. As soon as we wrap up the McFarlane Lodge, I’ll have more time for the finish work here. But come on back to the kitchen and see what I’ve done there. I’d love a woman’s perspective.”
Surprise flashed in her eyes. “Mine?”
“You see any other women around?”
“Not right this very moment,” she muttered. “I’m sure that’s not typical for you.”
He shouldn’t be irritated by her words but he was. Yeah, he’d been wild in his younger days. Not as wild as Marlon, maybe, but he’d had his moments. How long and hard did a man have to work to shake off a wild reputation?
“Come on back,” he said again and led the way through the compact cottage to the kitchen.
When she saw the room, the shocked admiration on her features more than made up for the dig about his reputation.
She did a full three-sixty, taking in the slim jeweled pendant lights over the work island, the stainless-steel, professional stove, the long row of paned windows over the dining area.
“Wow! You really did all this by yourself?”
“You sound surprised. Should I be insulted by that?”
She made a face. “I guess I just never realized you were such a…what’s the word? I can’t think. Artisan, I guess.”
“Nothing so grand as that,” he protested. “I’m just a construction worker.”
She slicked a hand over the marble countertop and he was suddenly entranced by the sight of her long, slim fingers sliding along his work.
He cleared his throat. “How does pasta sound? I’ve got some lemon tarragon sauce in the fridge I can heat up while I throw a pot of water on to boil.”
“You cook, too? I guess with a kitchen like this, you must.”
“Not much,” he was forced to admit. “The kitchen’s for whoever eventually buys the place. I’ve got a few specialties and know enough so I don’t starve. That’s about it. My mom sent over the pasta sauce. She thinks I live on fast food and TV dinners.”
“I don’t want you to go to any work.”
“How much effort does it take to boil a pot of water on the stove and push a few buttons on the microwave? Have a seat. If you’d rather go in and watch something on TV, the family room isn’t in too bad of shape, as long as you don’t mind a few exposed wires.”
“I’ll stay here. Could I have a drink of water?”
“I can make coffee. That would clear your head faster.”
“Water is okay for now.”
He pulled a tumbler out of the cabinet by the sink and dispensed ice and cold, filtered water from the refrigerator. When he handed it to her, she took a seat at one of the stools around the work island. Tootsie, always happy for someone new to love, settled beside her and Elise smiled a little and reached down to pet her before the dog curled up on the kitchen floor.
“Maybe you ought to put something on that black eye, don’t you think?”
How had he managed to block out the throbbing from both his eye and his cheek where Halloran had gotten off a cheap shot? She was a powerful distraction, apparently. “Right. Let me get the fight washed off me first and then I’ll fix you something to eat.”
“Do you need help?”
He thought of those fingers, cool and light on his skin, and felt his body stir with interest. This was Elise, he reminded himself. Not som
e bar babe looking for a good time.
“I think I can handle it,” he finally answered. He wasn’t sure he trusted himself around her right now. “Hang tight. I’ll be back in a minute.”
It took him about ten to wash away the blood, most of it belonging to the idiot who had mauled her, and to change his shirt. When he returned to the kitchen, some of the tension had eased from her features. She was leafing through a design book he’d left on the kitchen desk and she looked sweet and relaxed and comfortable.
As if she belonged there.
She looked up and he watched her gaze slide to the bandage he’d applied just under his colorful eye.
“Does it hurt?”
“I’ve had worse, believe me.”
That didn’t seem to ease her concern. “You could have been really hurt. He might have damaged your vision.”
“He didn’t. I’m fine.”
She closed the book, her fine-boned features tight and unhappy. “I’m really sorry about…everything. I feel so stupid.”
“Why? You didn’t do anything wrong except maybe pass the time of day with a cowboy who’d had a few too many.”
“I can’t really blame him for getting the wrong idea,” she admitted. “I might have…acted more interested in him than I really was. If you want the truth, I was using him to hide from you.”
He raised his eyebrows. “Why would you need to hide from me?”
She suddenly looked as if she wished she’d never said anything. “I was embarrassed about being there by myself. It’s not something I usually do.”
“I’m glad you were there,” he said as he headed to the refrigerator for the sauce. “Except for your little episode with the jerk, it’s great to see you. So are you back in Thunder Canyon to stay?”
She sighed and sounded so forlorn that Tootsie must have sensed it. She nuzzled her leg. “I don’t know. Every thing’s in…limbo. My mother wanted to come home for the holidays and begged me to come with her so I took a temporary leave from my job until the new year. After that, I don’t know what I’ll do.”
A Thunder Canyon Christmas Page 3