by Sandra Brown
All she knew was that Mr. Harlan Boyd was the most annoying, aggravating, and arrogant individual she'd ever had the misfortune to meet, and he'd witnessed her most humiliating moment.
No way on earth could she live with that. It was untenable. Since he had bamboozled her family and made himself indispensable to Tyler Drilling, she could eliminate hopes of his disappearing any time soon.
Her only alternative was to get Travis back quickly. "Then we'll see who laughs last, Mr. Boyd."
* * *
Chapter 5
Single file, the Tylers paraded down the center aisle of the church for the midnight candlelight service. Attending was a Christmas Eve tradition that hadn't been broken for decades. Everyone in the family was expected to be there. This year, for obvious reasons, Chase and Marcie had been excused.
"But we have Harlan with us to take up the slack," Laurie had said happily as she slid her arms into the coat Pat had held for her.
Sage had patently ignored Harlan as the family gathered in the entry hall of the ranch house before leaving for town. He'd been away from the house all day, so she hadn't seen him since the night before.
That morning, she had visited Marcie in the hospital and taken another look at her nephew Jamie. The rest of the day she had been occupied with baking cookies and eleventh hour shopping. The prevailing Christmas spirit had lightened her dark thoughts of Travis.
Her holiday mood was squelched, however, when Harlan came loping down the stairs as they were preparing to leave for church. Failing to take the hint that she didn't want to acknowledge him, he sidled up to her as they were crossing the front porch.
"You don't mind if I go to church with y'all, do you, Miss Sage?"
"I do indeed. You're not family." She gave him a condescending once-over. He wasn't dressed up by any means, but he had on black slacks and a white shirt under a brown leather bomber jacket that looked battle-scarred. "But I suppose I should be glad that you won't disgrace us."
Grinning in the manner that made her grind her teeth, he lunged forward and opened the car door for her. Before he had a chance to get in beside her, she soundly closed it.
It was well known by the rest of the congregation that the third pew from the front was tacitly reserved for the Tylers. They had occupied it for as long as Sage could remember. Their processional down the aisle created quite a commotion. They were carrying the candles each of them had been issued at the church door, their programs, their coats, and baby Lauren and her paraphernalia.
Pat Bush stood aside and let Laurie precede him into the pew. She had taken only a few steps when she backed into the aisle again and whispered, "I'd like to sit beside Sage. You go ahead." Pat went in first and moved to the end of the pew, followed by Laurie and Sage.
Glancing over her shoulder, she was relieved to see Devon moving in behind her. Lucky came next. Then Harlan. Thank heaven she had avoided having to sit beside him.
She looked toward the front of the church and let the ambiance seep into her. The altar and choir loft were decorated with bright red poinsettias. The organist and pianist were playing a Christmas medley. The atmosphere was hushed and reverent.
"…but if she starts crying, we might need to slip out."
Sage was distracted by Devon's whispering.
"Good idea. We'll swap places with Harlan." Lucky didn't know how to whisper. His voice could be heard throughout the sanctuary. The pastor, sitting near the podium, frowned down at him, as he had been doing from the pulpit every Sunday of Lucky's life since graduating from the nursery.
Harlan stood up, Lucky scooted to the aisle seat, and Devon moved next to him, leaving a vacant space beside Sage. Harlan shuffled between the pews, trying to avoid feet and knees, and dropped into the space beside her.
Her back stiffened and she groaned audibly. Leaning toward her, he whispered, "Did I step on your toes?"
"No."
"Did I bump your knee?"
"No."
"Were you groaning because I didn't?" Her head whipped around in time to see him turn his attention to the podium and assume a righteous countenance. Steaming, Sage moved as close to her mother as she could get, so that even her clothes wouldn't be touching Harlan.
The yuletide medley ended on a crescendo. The pastor stood in the pulpit. The service always began promptly at eleven-thirty so that it could conclude at midnight.
"Hi, everybody."
Chase whispered to them from the outside aisle, leaning in over Pat's shoulder. His smile was for all of them seated along the pew.
"Oh, you got to come!" Laurie gladly exclaimed in a stage whisper.
"Marcie insisted that I not miss it on her account."
"How's Jamie?"
Chase grinned like only a new father can. "Wonderful." He cast an apologetic glance toward the pastor, who seemed to be waiting for the Tylers to get situated before starting the service. "I'll just sit up here," he whispered, and moved to take a seat in the row in front of them.
"You'll do no such thing. We can make room," Laurie said. "I want all of us to sit together. Scoot in, Pat."
They shifted again, barely making room for Chase and getting settled before the minister asked them to bow their heads for the opening prayer.
Sage's mood was hardly spiritual. She was crammed against Harlan's side. Her thigh was pressing his from hip to knee. Their shoulders battled over the forward position until Laurie nudged her and admonished her to be still. She had no choice but to relent and place her arm and shoulder behind his.
He stared forward, seemingly enraptured with the reading of the scriptures. Sage knew better. The soft lighting reflected the mirth in his blue eyes. He placed unnecessary pressure on her arm with the back of his. When he reached for the hymnal, she was sure the brush his arm gave her breast was no accident.
The thirty-minute service seemed to drag on interminably. At last the lights were turned off and ushers moved down the aisles with candles, lighting those of the people sitting on the aisles.
When Lucky's was lit, he turned to Devon and, after touching the flame of his to the wick of hers, kissed her softly. Devon, being careful of the baby, held her candle to Harlan's.
Sage held up her candle as he turned toward her. He didn't look at their touching wicks, but at her. Feigning indifference, she lifted her eyes to meet his gaze. Just as her wick ignited, something leaped inside her chest, as hot and spontaneous as the flame at the top of her candle. For a moment, she was held captive by his blue stare. Then quickly, shakily, she turned to light her mother's candle.
She refused to look at Harlan again during the candle-lighting process. She sat with head bowed, staring at the burning candle held between her perspiring, unsteady hands. She tried to convey a picture of piety. Surely everyone would think that she was at prayer and not riotous with confused emotions.
Her insides churned. Her mouth was dry one minute and profusely salivating the next. It took all the self-discipline she possessed not to look at Harlan again. She was distinctly aware of every place her body was touching his. She felt lightheaded.
She had never felt this way before, and it was frightening. Maybe she was coming down with the flu. She felt uncomfortably warm and unaccountably flustered.
Her knees were weak and would barely support her when the pastor signaled for the congregation to stand. A cappella, they sang "Silent Night," before extinguishing the candles and filing out of the church while the chimes tolled midnight.
This had always been a reviving, uplifting moment for Sage. But tonight, as she moved toward the exit, the pounding of her heart had nothing to do with the spirituality of the moment. She had a guilty notion that it was carnal in nature.
"I'll have to skip the cider and cookies tonight, Mother," Chase told Laurie when they reached the parking lot. "This is our first Christmas together. I want to spend as much of it with Marcie as possible."
"I understand," Laurie said, hugging him. "We'll miss you. Give Marcie our love."
&
nbsp; "See you tomorrow."
"Then you are coming for dinner?"
"I wouldn't miss that," he called back as he jogged toward his car.
Sage rode home with Pat and Laurie, while Harlan rode with Lucky's family. During the drive, they discussed the church service and Jamie and plans for Christmas Day, but Sage was uncharacteristically subdued.
It distressed her that Harlan Boyd had sparked such a drastic physical response in her. She had never been so sexually aware of a man in her life, not even the man she'd been planning to marry. Nor did she believe she could have been that tuned into him, to the point of being aware of each breath he took, if he hadn't been equally tuned into her.
Nonsense. It was the season. Christmas did crazy things to people's minds, made them believe in Santa Claus and such.
To be on the safe side, however, she avoided Harlan as she helped her mother set the table. Earlier they had prepared sandwiches and dips. A kettle of wassail was simmering on the stove. In deference to the occasion, they used the dining room, but Christmas Eve was always casual.
"Did you hear from Travis today?"
Sage choked on the cookie she'd been chewing when Laurie asked the unexpected question. "Uh, no, but he, uh, his family had plans for most of the day and tonight. I didn't expect to hear from him. Pat, another sandwich? You've only eaten two."
She teased the sheriff in an effort to divert attention away from herself. Only one person at the table wasn't fooled by her bluff. When she risked looking at Harlan, he winked at her.
Later, carrying a tray of dirty dishes into the kitchen, she met Harlan coming through the back door, his arms loaded with Christmas presents. She didn't even acknowledge him.
However, as he passed her, he leaned down and, placing his lips directly against her ear, whispered, "You lie real well, Miss Sage. They don't suspect a thing."
The shock of feeling his lips and breath on her ear nearly made her drop the tray. She slammed it down onto the counter. Dishes rattled. "I did not lie! I didn't expect Travis to call me today. And while I've got you alone, I want you to know that I didn't appreciate what you were doing to me in church."
"Probably not. But you liked it."
Before she could refute him, he slipped through the door.
* * *
Laurie, Devon, and Sage were in the kitchen by seven o'clock the following morning, preparing Christmas dinner. Laurie fretted over the turkey, which she was afraid would either be undercooked or overdone.
Sitting at the kitchen table, Harlan ate a light breakfast and then volunteered to carry in firewood and build a fire in the living room fireplace. Laurie blessed him with one of her special smiles. Sage pretended he was vapor.
Lucky came in, saying to Devon, "Lauren's been fed, bathed, and is down for her nap."
Sage dropped the celery stick she'd been chopping and turned away from the counter, her jaw hanging slack. "You're kidding!"
"What?" he grumbled as he poured himself a cup of coffee and opened the Dallas newspaper.
"The former stud of Milton Point, ladies' man extraordinaire, gives his baby daughter baths?"
"Yeah, and I'd better be the only man who ever bathes her."
"Why, Lucky, what a strange thing for you to say," Devon cooed, batting her eyelashes in mock surprise. He snarled at her, then buried his head in the newspaper, coming up several minutes later to exclaim, "Hey, Devon, this is your best article yet. No wonder you're syndicated statewide. Have you read it, Mother, Sage?"
They both answered that, yes, they had read her Christmas editorial about the homeless in America and that it was both insightful and poignant.
Midmorning, Pat arrived bearing gifts. Lucky took them from him to place beneath the tree in the living room.
"When can we open our presents?" Sage asked.
"After dinner."
"Aw, Mother. After dinner?"
"Yes, after dinner."
Plans changed, however, with the unexpected arrival of Chase and his family. Laurie burst into tears when he laid her first grandson in her arms. She immediately forgot the turkey and retreated to the rocking chair in the living, room with the newborn. Chase solicitously helped Marcie into an easy chair, though in Sage's opinion she seemed perfectly capable of moving under her own power.
"I hope you'll have enough room for us at the table," Marcie said, laughing. "I know you weren't counting on my being here, but when the doctor released me this morning, Chase and I decided we'd come out for a while."
"Just until she gets tired." He laid his arm across her shoulders. "Doesn't she look great?"
She did. Her red hair was falling loose and full on her shoulders. If anything, her gorgeous complexion had improved with pregnancy. Her figure was fuller, too.
"This really made my Christmas," Laurie said, nuzzling Jamie's sweet-smelling neck.
Everyone clustered around to admire the newborn. Sage suggested that since everyone was already there, they might just as well open their presents. She was indulged.
Pat played Santa Claus, removing the gifts from beneath the tree that was decorated, in Sage's opinion, as a Christmas tree should be. Among the candy canes and tinsel were ornaments that her brothers and she had made in school. Not even the most amateurish efforts had ever been destroyed, but were proudly displayed each year.
She was delighted with all her gifts, but especially with the new riding quirt from Chase and Marcie. "I know you'd never touch it to animal flesh," he said, affectionately tugging a lock of her hair, "but it looks good."
"Here's one more for you, Sage," Pat said, handing her a gift-wrapped box. "This is from…" Pat consulted the gift tag. "From Harlan."
"Harlan!" Her tone suggested that he was a descendent of Attila the Hun. Ameliorating it somewhat, she glanced at him and mumbled, "We only met night before last. You really shouldn't have."
"Oh, I wanted to."
His earnestness set her teeth on edge.
"What is it, Sage?" Laurie asked.
She unwrapped the package. "It's a book-marker."
"There's a quotation on it," he said, making certain everybody's attention was called to it.
Sage scanned the swirling calligraphy, then scowled at him.
"What does it say, Sage?" Chase wanted to know.
"Read it to us."
"It's just a quote from H. L. Mencken," she told them all, hoping that would suffice. It didn't. They all looked at her expectantly. She was in the spotlight and on the spot, which was exactly where Harlan had wanted to place her. With absolutely no inflection, she read, "'Conscience is the inner voice which warns us that someone may be looking.'"
Lucky laughed. "You should have given that to me."
"What have you done to have a guilty conscience about?" Devon asked, her eyes narrowing.
Everyone's attention moved to them. Sage, glaring at Harlan, stuffed the bookmarker back into the shallow box and stood. "I'll go check the turkey." Feeling his laughing eyes boring a hole into the center of her back, she retreated.
In spite of Harlan's presence at the table, Sage enjoyed Christmas dinner enormously. It was so good to be at home, surrounded by the people she loved. During the meal, she realized that she was more relaxed than she'd been in a long time, and it was because Travis wasn't there.
He had always annoyed her brothers, and their wisecracks had always annoyed him. Sage had been caught in the middle, trying to pacify all of them and to reassure Travis that teasing was a Tyler family tradition. Today, it was a relief not to have to pander to his supersensitivity.
As though her thoughts had conjured him up, the telephone rang just as they were clearing the table. Laurie went to answer. "Sage, it's for you. Travis."
As she left the dining room for the hall telephone, she shot Harlan a smug glance over her shoulder. Taking the receiver from her mother, she raised it to her ear and, loud enough for everyone in the adjoining room to hear, said, "Merry Christmas, darling."
"Uh, Merry Christmas." It
was obvious he was taken aback. He hadn't expected her to sound so joyful. "I just called to make sure you'd gotten home all right."
"You shouldn't have worried about me. I made it fine."
"Well, uh, that's good. I'm relieved."
He didn't ask how she had made it. Didn't he care? Wasn't he curious? For all he knew she could have hitchhiked and been picked up by a sexual deviate … which, when she considered some of the things Harlan had said and the way he had kissed her, wasn't far from what had happened.
"Marcie's baby was a boy," she told Travis. "He's been nicknamed Jamie."
"Really? That's nice."
"Wait till you see him, Travis. He's so cute."
"Sage, I… What I mean to say is that nothing's changed. The only reason I called was to see that you were safe. You weren't in a very stable frame of mind when you left. The maid found the bracelet I gave you lying on the end table in the guest bedroom."
"That's right."
"I wanted you to have it, Sage."
"Why?"
"Well, you know, I felt so rotten about having to tell you that we were off. It hit you hard. I could see that. Now that you've had time to adjust, how are you taking it? I don't want you to be too upset."
So, he wasn't calling with reconciliation in mind. He wasn't offering her apologies and an olive branch, only condolences and a gold bangle bracelet to salve his conscience.
By the tone of his voice, she realized that he never was going to come crawling back. Over the last couple of days, she had been deceiving herself into thinking that he might. This was for real. It was final. What she heard in his voice wasn't contrition and appeal, but pity.
How dare he be that conceited! Had he expected her to jump off a bridge? Or, having made it home, be prostrate in bed with cold compresses over her tear-bloated eyes? Apparently so.
Not bloody likely, she thought angrily. And she would rather have a shackle around her wrist than the bracelet he had given her as a consolation prize. She wished she had the opportunity to cram the thing down his throat.