A Baby In His Stocking (Harlequin Treasury 1990's)

by Hayley Gardner

  “They’re hiding something,” Shea whispered to Jared as they crossed the floor to a quiet area. He took her hand. Shea was sure he did it unconsciously and tried not to imagine that it meant anything at all.

  But still...

  “Yeah, I noticed that, too,” Jared told her.

  “Question is, what do we do?”

  “Leave it to me.” His eyes caught hers and held them, and then, with a quick squeeze of her hand, he headed toward the clerk they had just finished questioning.

  Watching him talk to the employee, Shea fervently prayed for the strength to keep up her campaign to change Jared. All the signs were there that he really did want to be a part of the holiday. Take this little Molly. He’d gotten the child a tree out of the goodness of his heart, whether he wanted to acknowledge he had a heart or not. And that, of course, would be the trick—making him understand that he did.

  Standing there, listening to the Christmas carol over the music system her father had installed, she saw one clerk summon another over to where Jared and she were standing. When Jared turned, Shea was surprised to see the clerk move out from behind her booth and return with him. Grace Corwin was one of her father’s longtime employees, one whom Mack really trusted.

  “Shea, do you know an employee named Lucy Millstone?” Jared asked.

  “Lucy Millstone...” As she made one more visual sweep of the store for a little sandy-haired girl, she thought about the name and then shook her head. “It’s possible Dad might have hired someone part-time in the past couple of days, but I don’t know why he would have—not with the business having dropped off some.” And she’d been in and out of the store since Jared’s arrival, not really paying attention to faces.

  “Go ahead, Grace,” Jared prompted.

  “Well, Mrs. Burroughs,” the gray-haired woman said, wringing her hands as though she was nervous, “after your father hired Lucy, I put her to work learning the ropes. This little girl you’re looking for sounds exactly like Lucy’s daughter.” She paused. “Please don’t be mad, but with school out for the holidays, Lucy couldn’t afford a sitter. We’ve been letting her daughter stay in the store, and whenever anyone asked about her, we act like she doesn’t exist. But when Mr. Burroughs here said there might be some heads rolling if that little girl isn’t found, I got scared for my job—which I need.”

  Heads rolling? Shea quirked an eyebrow at Jared. “We definitely have to do something about your Christmas spirit.”

  He grinned unabashedly. “Look at it this way. Even Santa Claus probably has to rein in the elves sometimes, right?”

  “Hmm.” She’d have to give that one some thought. Turning back to Grace, she asked, “Are the two here now?”

  Grace shook her head. “Lucy said they had a Christmas pageant to go to this evening.” She rattled off the address of the church, which was a modest one in Shea’s part of town. “I really hope no one is going to get in trouble over this, Mrs. Burroughs. Lucy’s an older widow, and she needs this job really bad.”

  “Don’t worry.” Thanking and waving Grace on back to work, Shea said to Jared, “I strongly suggest that Santa Claus wouldn’t threaten anyone. I think he’d offer praise and encouragement to his employees.” She smiled. “And lots of bonus Christmas cookies.”

  The edges of Jared’s lips turned into a smile. “I wish the world was that good, Shea. But not everyone understands sweetness and light.”

  “Like you.” She gave him a tight smile and started toward the back of the store and her coat. He moved to her side.

  “That’s right,” he said. “Like me.”

  “I still say the kind way is the best way.”

  He didn’t answer. Shea hadn’t really expected him to. She would just keep trying, that was all. They hadn’t found the Grinch yet, so she still had some time to help Jared—for their baby’s sake.

  She could almost picture the little one to come. It would have dark hair, like her and Jared, and blink up at her with Jared’s eyes, and coo at her with tiny lips... and dang it all, it would spend lots of time in its daddy’s arms. She’d see to it.

  Rounding a corner by the magazine rack, Shea found Mr. Griswold, her neighbor, who was coming from the rear of the store, his coat still on, his hat in his hand.

  “Merry Christmas, Mr. Griswold,” she said to the older man. “Out shopping for gifts?”

  “No, no, not right now.” Griswold hesitated. “Is your father around?”

  “No, he’s at home. You didn’t notice the lights were all on when you left?”

  “Naw,” Griswold said, the word accompanied by a shake of his free hand in the air. His hat glimmered with a few new-fallen snowflakes that were still melting. At the sight of them, Shea grinned. The first snow of the year. It was a sign.

  “It’s snowing—how nice!”

  “If you like hazardous driving and pain-in-theneck shoveling, it’s nice,” Jared replied.

  “Going soft on us, Jared?” Shea asked, her eyes twinkling. “Maybe we can find you a nice sit-down job around here, something that will keep you out of the snow.”

  Jared’s eyes glinted as he caught on, and he grinned back. “Don’t even think about it.”

  “Now, now, children.” Mr. Griswold looked at them both, and it was then Shea noticed that his face seemed awash in misery. “Squabbling isn’t good. Take it from me. It just isn’t good.”

  “What’s wrong, Mr. Griswold?” Shea asked.

  “Nothing you can help with.” His jaw jutted, and he sighed. “As long as I’m here, I guess I’ll just go have some coffee. Maybe I’ll come by again tomorrow.” With a goodbye wave, he continued on his way.

  “Mr. Griswold doesn’t look very happy,” Jared said suddenly, watching the elderly man walk away. “Does he have a family?”

  “A lovely wife and a grandchild they’re raising,” Shea replied. She went over to the coat rack, found her coat and slipped it on. “Mr. Griswold and his friends like to come here to have coffee together at the snack bar while they talk or read the paper.” Her mouth twisted in a grin, and she followed him outside into the parking lot, her shoes crunching the gravel as she walked. “Also, whenever Mr. Griswold has a fight with his wife, he comes here, finds Dad and harps about women.”

  “Gee, I wonder if they want company....”

  “Very funny,” she said sweetly, stopping and swinging around to face him. She gave him a gentle poke on the chest with her finger as snowflakes dusted them both. “Do you have a new woman you need to gripe about? I know you aren’t referring to me.”

  “No new women for me, princess,” he said, grabbing her finger and holding it for a long minute, warm skin against warm skin in the frosty air. “You’re too unforgettable.”

  His words were everything she could have wished for a few months before, and now, they were just painful. Her face fell. “I know things are kind of impossible between us, but I truly want you to be happy, Jared,” she said in a low voice. “I really do.”

  Snowflakes settled in her hair like diamonds, and Jared almost lifted his hand to brush them away. Then he remembered she wasn’t his to touch.

  “Don’t worry about me, Shea. I’ll survive.” Maybe he would. Looking at her delicate features and remembering her warm smiles, he was no longer so sure he could go on without her laughter. Inside, he wanted to shut down. Outwardly, he wished he could escape. Once the divorce went through, it would all be over.

  Reaching up, she cupped his cheek and rubbed her thumb against the dark stubble of his light beard. His hand caught hers and held it, and for one precious second, he looked so intensely at her she thought he might kiss her again, which wasn’t what she wanted. Or was it? She no longer knew.

  “We can’t go backward, Shea.”

  His husky words took care of her having to come up with an answer to her own question of what she wanted, and she nodded. He was right, of course. They shouldn’t be trying to go backward; they should be building a new relationship for their child’s sake.
Even Jared could see that.

  Dropping her hand back to her side, she continued on toward the truck, frustration breaking through her pain over his not wanting a child in the first place. Frustration, pain and grief. They should have lived happily ever after. This wasn’t right. As soon as he found the Grinch, he was leaving, the divorce would go through, and...and she’d be as miserable as she’d been without him.

  She’d never find anyone like Jared, she knew. Never. Real, enduring love was not something you got over, even if that love had never been in the cards.

  “So we find Molly and her mom and get the tree back,” she said, ignoring her pain and choosing, instead, to be strong. She had a Christmas to prepare for after all, for the town, for Jared and the baby, and for the sake of tradition. “That is, if you’re still with me.”

  A dozen seconds passed as Jared stood silently by the front of the truck. Finally, to Shea’s relief, he nodded. “I’m not sure why it’s so important, but yeah—let’s go after that tree.”

  The church could have been any old church. What stopped Jared in his tracks, though, were the twinkling Christmas lights strung all along the west side of the building and around the windows and doors.

  “This place is lit up like a...” Words failed him.

  “Christmas tree?” Shea suggested. She grinned when Jared mugged a frown at her. “It’s for the kids, Jared.”

  Jared was grinning inside, actually enjoying this great Christmas-tree chase, but he knew his happiness wouldn‘t—couldn’t—last. It was just that she was starting to wear him down with her charm. But if she wore him down, then that, coupled with the constant physical attraction that he still felt and knew was never going away, was sure to lead him straight into wanting to call off the divorce. And should that happen, they would only end up right back where they’d been before, with the desires she had that he didn’t feel he could fulfill, and his own worries that he could never make her happy.

  He couldn’t let her wear him down.

  Together, they entered the church. Six kids were at the front, facing the filled pews, singing their hearts out—and one of them was Molly.

  Transfixed by the scene, Jared stood rooted there for a moment. The little ragamuffin who had popped up in the store while he’d been questioning people that afternoon now had her dusty cheeks scrubbed to a blushing pink. Atop her head she wore an angel’s silver halo, and between the halo and her cloud of tawny hair, he thought he was seeing something almost... angelic.

  Shea followed Jared’s gaze and recognized Molly from his previous description and from the visit the child had made to her office. She ventured a glance back at her husband. Her heart skipped a beat. Jared’s face had softened and she saw the hint of tears forming in his eyes.

  Then he blinked and resumed his normal guarded look. But Shea had seen enough to tell her that the man did have a heart where children were concerned. For their baby’s sake, she would have to keep on trying to thaw it out permanently.

  The singing ended, the parishioners clapped, and then everyone seemed to be standing and milling about at once, with some heading toward a side door.

  “We need to find Molly,” Jared said, taking Shea’s hand and leading her toward the front. His heart was telling him there was nothing at all special about the child, but there was. He just didn’t understand what it was.

  Molly spotted him first. Leaving the side of a petite woman in her forties, she ran to him. “You came! I knew you would come—Santa told me! He loved the tree!” She threw her arms around his legs. “Thank you so much.”

  Jared threw a “get me out of this” look at Shea. Stifling a grin, she bent down and took one of Molly’s hands in her own. “Remember me, Molly? You dropped by my office the other day at Denton’s department store. I’m Shea Burroughs.”

  Molly let go of Jared, then Shea heard his grateful sigh and hid her smile. The poor man really did seem terrified of children.

  Molly turned to her mother, who had joined them. “This is Mr. Burroughs, Mama. He gave Santa the tree.”

  “Then I second my daughter’s thanks, sir,” Lucy Millstone said softly. Although she looked happy, she seemed very tired as she smiled at Shea. “And you, too, Mrs. Burroughs. It was so nice of you to make a little girl’s wish come true.”

  “Oh, it was all Jared’s idea,” Shea told her and then smiled down at Molly, who was looking at Jared as if he was Santa Claus. “But I’m curious,” she added. “You said Santa loved the tree? He’s seen it already? How, when he doesn’t come until Christmas?”

  “He’s already been here, at the church,” Molly said solemnly, nodding her head. “He came early for us, and he saw the tree at the party. He said, ‘It’s a grand old tree.”’ She spoke Santa’s words in a low voice, as if the sentence had really come from St. Nick.

  Shea looked up at Molly’s mother, who laughed. “My daughter means the Santa who came to the church party we had about half an hour ago, right before the pageant. The children all got a present.” She lifted a tote bag to show Jared and Shea a brightly wrapped gift tucked inside. “And your tree was the star attraction.”

  “I don’t understand,” Jared said. “I thought the tree was for you and Molly in your house.”

  Lucy shook her head. “Oh, no. The tree was for Santa’s party. I’ll show you.” Taking Molly’s hand, then beckoning Shea and Jared to follow, she walked through what was left of the crowd toward a door, then down a small hall, before she finally turned right into a large community room.

  And that’s where Shea found her tree.

  It was dressed up in ornaments that only children could have made: paper chains, colored cutouts of Santa and candy canes and bells, and shiny tinfoil stars. It had no twinkling lights, it had no perfect crystal ornaments like the ones she had to put on her tree at home—but it was a glorious tree. Its stunted branches had been filled in by a big picture of Santa on his sleigh waving and grinning, and, Shea swore as her eyes filled with tears, winking at her.

  Jared’s arm slipped around her waist, and he pulled her close to him. “Still want the tree back, princess?”

  “How could I?” She brushed away the tears. “I wouldn’t touch that tree for the world. It ended up exactly where it was supposed to.” Gazing up at him, she smiled. “Even with flaws, it’s a perfect Christmas tree, isn’t it?”

  He groaned, but then shot her a big grin. “Didn’t I tell you that?”

  “Maybe I should start listening to you more,” she said, sharing a smile with him. It was certainly something to consider. With a start, she recalled something that Molly had said, which sidetracked her, and she hurried back to the door where the two were waiting.

  “Mrs. Millstone, I think you said that someone played Santa here this evening?”

  Molly tugged at the bottom of her coat to get her attention. “No, not played Santa. He is Santa Claus.”

  Reaching under Molly’s halo, Lucy gently stroked her daughter’s curls. “I tried to explain to Molly that Santa is very busy making toys right now, and the Santa we had is just a very nice helper, but she seems to really believe this is the one.” She shrugged in a parental, “you know how kids are” way.

  “I’d like to see if he could help out at the store. Would you know where I can find him?”

  A cautious expression on her face, Lucy looked down at Molly, and over her head so the child couldn’t see, she nodded toward a smaller adjacent room. “Could we talk in there a minute?”

  “If Molly would stay with Mr. Burroughs,” Shea said, smiling at the little girl.

  “Sure. I’ll tell him what Santa’s been telling me all about Christmas,” she offered.

  Jared shot her an “I’ll get you for this” look, and Shea grinned back. It would be good practice for later, she wanted to say, but she knew that might be pushing her luck.

  When the two of them were far enough away from Molly, but she and Jared were still in sight, Lucy gazed earnestly at her. “I don’t know if you’ll want
to hire the man, Mrs. Burroughs—or if you’ll even find him. I mean, our minister has a gracious, giving heart, but you might worry about the responsibility. The man truly believes he’s Santa Claus, and...” Her voice trailed off.

  “Mrs. Millstone, you don’t have to worry. Please just tell me,” Shea said.

  “He’s living at the Quiet Brook Shelter. I think he’s a transient.”

  Oh, dear, Shea thought. “Well, I guess that might be something to check out. But how does Molly know him?”

  “We’ve been living there, too, ever since a bit after her dad died and we lost the house,” Lucy admitted, blushing bright red. “Not for long, I hope, but...” Unable to continue, she shook her head. “No, I shouldn’t kid myself. It might be for a while, considering the Christmas rush will soon be over and the store won’t need as much help.”

  “We’ll see what happens then. Try not to worry.”

  Even as Shea said the words, her heart was sinking. They didn’t need the extra help now, she knew. Later...if the store failed and closed, all their employees would be scrambling for jobs. She had no idea how to help Lucy Millstone and the adorable Molly.

  She said the same to Jared when they were alone again in the truck. “I hadn’t realized that we had anyone in the store in such dire straits.”

  “Your father must have if he hired her on without needing the help. He tries to protect you too much, Shea.”

  “He always has.” She leaned her head back against the seat and closed her eyes. That was another thing she’d loved about Jared. From the start, he’d treated her like the successful, intelligent grown-up that she was. In the eyes of the town and her father, she would always be “that little Denton girl.”

  “Then Quiet Brook isn’t the perfect place you thought it was?” he asked solemnly.

  “Of course it is, Jared,” she told him. “I can say that because I’m going to find a way to get that Santa to help us, and you’re going to find the Grinch that wants to spoil Christmas around here, and then we’re going to hang our baby’s first ornament on the other tree you picked out and make this season in Quiet Brook perfect.”