Christmas In Silver Bell Falls

by Samantha Chase

  “Excuse me?”

  “Your sisters,” she repeated. “You said you had three of them. Where are they at?”

  Josiah took a sip of his own beverage before answering. “They’re sort of scattered all over the place. Heather’s down in Pennsylvania, married and just had her first baby. A girl—Dawn. Her husband is a high school teacher. Then there’s Susan. She’s down in Binghamton. Also married, no kids, and both she and her husband are in medical sales.”

  “Wow! That’s kind of cool.”

  He shrugged. “They think so,” he said with a smile. “And the baby of the family is my sister Danielle. She’s the feisty one. It’s funny because she’s this tiny little thing but she can kick all of our butts.” He laughed. “Her husband is a professional football player—he’s about a foot or so taller than her—and I think he’s intimidated by her too!”

  “Now there’s an image!” Melanie said, laughing with him. “What does she do?”

  “Actually, the two of you have a little something in common; she’s a writer too.”

  “Really? What does she write?”

  “She does the life and style articles for their local newspaper. She really doesn’t need to work but she loves writing.”

  “When it’s in your blood, you know it and you find any creative outlet you can find to get it out there.”

  He studied her for a moment. “How’d you get started?”

  Melanie imitated his pose and relaxed back against the seat. “It was a case of pure luck.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I entered a writing contest while I was in college,” she said. “It was to pitch a book idea to a publisher.” She shrugged. “They loved it. I got signed to write the book and it sold relatively well so they offered me a three-book deal and I readily took it.”

  “Wow! That’s impressive!”

  She gave him a small smile. “Yeah…it sounds like it but for those first few years I still needed to have a day job. So I worked in retail and did some waitressing for a while—and found out I’m not very good at it—and after the fourth book, I was able to do it full-time.”

  “And again I say…impressive,” Josiah said. “So what are you working on now? Anything?”

  “Actually, it’s part of the reason why I’m here. I’m treating my time here as a writing retreat.” Pausing, she sighed. “For the first time in my life, I have writer’s block. My publisher and editor and agent are all at the end of their ropes with me.”

  Leaning forward, Josiah rested his elbows on the table and looked at her with concern. “What do you think is causing it?”

  She waved him off. “It’s not really important. Anyway, I think I had a bit of a breakthrough last night. It sort of came to me while I was in the tub.” She looked up and gave him a pointed look. “Before someone broke in and disturbed me.”

  “You’re never going to let that go, are you?”

  Melanie playfully shook her head. “It’s not everyday someone barges in on me while I’m taking a bath.”

  It was on the tip of his tongue to say something about how amazing it was for him, but decided to keep it to himself. “You have to admit, you’ll never forget our first meeting,” he teased with a wink.

  She burst out laughing and Josiah found he loved the sound of it. He joined her and before either could say anything else, Bev was back with their lunches.

  They ate in companionable silence and Josiah knew right then and there, he’d more than likely never forget Melanie Harper.

  ****

  “I think I’ve died and gone to heaven.”

  “I told you.”

  “No,” she said, “you made it all sound rather blasé…but this?” She held her chocolate ice cream cone out toward him. “This is decadent perfection.”

  “I said it was the best ice cream in the world. How is that blasé?”

  “There was no passion in your voice. Ice cream like this deserves a little passion.” It wasn’t until the words were out that Melanie actually heard them and she wanted to groan and perhaps die of embarrassment. Was she seriously sitting in Josiah’s truck talking about passion with him? What in the world?

  “I keep telling Nikki—she’s the owner—she better make sure her daughters know the family recipe because she can never close the shop.”

  “How many does she have?”

  “Four—Kathy, Donna, Caroline and Rhonda. So chances are good that they’ll be in business for a good long time. Her ice cream alone makes living here worthwhile.”

  “That and the fact it wasn’t like Christmastown in there.”

  He chuckled. “Geez, woman. Ease up on the Christmas hate. While you’re here, you better learn to embrace it. It’s going to be everywhere.”

  “Hate to break it to you, but Silver Bell hasn’t cornered the market on that. Everywhere you go from November first to December thirty-first is all trussed up for Christmas.”

  “So what does that mean? You don’t leave the house for two months?”

  She glared at him, but found it hard to be truly angry. “No,” she said and then took a few licks of her cone. “I just limit my outings and keep my iPod handy at all times.”

  “Anyone ever tell you you’re a Scrooge?”

  With a smile and wink, Melanie nodded. “For two months out of every year!”

  Josiah laughed out loud. “You sound very proud of that fact!”

  “You have no idea.”

  They pulled up in front of the cabin and Josiah parked but didn’t move to get out. Turning in his seat, he faced Melanie. “I had a really good time today.”

  She faced him with a smile of her own. “I did too.”

  “You sound surprised.”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know…I think I had such a negative attitude about being here that I didn’t think I’d find anything good about it.” She paused. “Then you added to it last night…”

  He rolled his eyes and groaned. “Okay, let’s make a deal right now—neither of us is allowed to bring it up anymore. We’ve talked it to death and it was all an unfortunate misunderstanding and I think it’s safe to say we can move on.”

  Melanie considered him for a minute. “I don’t know…”

  “What? What’s wrong with that?”

  She shrugged. “You sort of made out better than I did in the whole thing.”

  “How do you figure?”

  “You walked in and saw me naked! I was mortified! You came out of the whole thing unscathed!”

  “So if you walked in on me naked, would we be even?”

  Her mind instantly raced with possibilities. Normally, Melanie was the type of woman who didn’t make rash decisions and weighed all of her options. But something about Josiah Stone made her want to throw all of that away and act rashly and recklessly and not worry about the consequences. See him naked? She did last night in her dreams.

  Beside her, Josiah cleared his throat. Melanie looked at him and saw the smirk on his face and felt herself blush.

  “The fact that you didn’t immediately shut me down tells me you’re considering it,” he said silkily.

  Melanie’s eyes met his and she saw heat there and knew it mirrored her own. She was stuck here for three months and then she’d be gone. Could she possibly let go and let herself enjoy her time here and have it include the sexy sheriff?

  “At the end of three months I’m going back to North Carolina,” she blurted out.

  Josiah seemed to know exactly what she was implying. “So you’ve said.”

  “It’s true. I…I don’t normally get involved with someone when I know it’s going to be short-term.”

  He nodded. “I was offering you the chance to see me naked. I wasn’t trying to talk you into changing your life or making a commitment.”

  “Oh,” she said quietly. “I mean…okay…that’s good.” She nodded quickly and fidgeted with the door handle. “Um…we should probably get those groceries inside.” When she went to open the door, Josiah’s
hand on her arm stopped her. For a brief moment, Melanie was afraid to meet his gaze.

  “Hey,” he said softly and waited until she did finally look up at him. “I think I’m as out of my comfort zone right now as you are. I don’t…what I mean is…I don’t usually tease like this. In the past, I had a tendency to take things slowly and see where it led. But I look at you, Melanie, and I don’t want to wait and see. The clock is already ticking and if that means throwing caution to the wind and jumping in with both feet right now so we spend as much time as we can together until you leave, then I’m willing to do that.”

  Her eyes went a little wide at his words. “I wasn’t expecting you,” she said, gazing at his face in wonder.

  Josiah leaned in closer. “I wasn’t expecting you either, but now that you’re here, I’m extremely grateful.”

  A small sigh of relief at his words had Melanie relaxing a bit. “This is crazy,” she whispered. “We don’t even know each other.”

  “And yet we seem to know each other quite well. When we talk, it’s like I know what you’re going to say. You can read my mind and it’s the same for me. We can sit here and question it and try to make sense of it, but all we’re doing is cheating ourselves out of time where we could be together.”

  “We’re together right now…”

  He shook his head. “You know what I’m saying.” With a sigh, he pulled back. “Just…promise me you’ll think about it.”

  As if she’d be able to think of anything but.

  Without another word, they each climbed from the truck. Josiah helped her carry her groceries into the cabin before taking care of his own. Melanie wanted to ask if he was going to come back over when he was done, but she knew she needed some time to think about what they had just discussed. As much as she wanted to be that carefree person, she knew she’d need a little time to think.

  With the last bag in her hand, Josiah turned and faced her, stepping in close. “I’m not going to rush you or push,” he said softly. “You know where I stand on this. And if you think it’s something you’d like to…explore, I’ll be right over here waiting.” And before she knew it, he leaned in and placed a gentle kiss on her cheek before turning and walking away.

  Waiting until Josiah was in his tiny house, Melanie let out the breath she was holding. Holy heck…what was she supposed to do now? Turning, she walked into the cabin and closed the door behind her. She moved around putting food away as if in a trance.

  Three months.

  She had three months away from her normal life to be…whatever she wanted to be. Sure there was her writing and her deadline that needed to be dealt with, but it wasn’t as if she and Josiah would be spending every waking moment together. She really did enjoy his company and other than his seemingly ridiculous love of living in this tiny Christmas-themed town, she also really liked him.

  He was sexy and attractive and Melanie knew—she just knew—she would never regret the time she spent with him.

  In and out of bed.

  Whoa…getting a little ahead of yourself, aren’t you? “Actually, I don’t think I am,” she corrected herself. It had been ages since she’d been out on a date and even longer since she’d been in a relationship. And if she were being completely honest, she’d never felt as comfortable with any of her former boyfriends as she did after knowing Josiah just one day.

  How bizarre was that?

  Once all of the food was put away, Melanie walked into the guest bedroom, which she decided to use as her office and forced herself to sit down at the student desk in there with her laptop. It was time to push thoughts of Josiah aside for a little while and focus on trying to get some work done on her book.

  Within minutes, her fingers began to fly. It was the first time in months that she felt her creativity coming back to her. In her mind, her characters were starting to take form. Her editor continually begged her to put her thoughts and plots and plans down on paper, but Melanie didn’t work that way. She was more of a fly-by-the-seat-of-her-pants kind of girl—or a pantser. It worked for her.

  When she finally stopped, she stretched and looked down at the corner of the computer screen and saw that almost two hours had gone by! And what was even better, she had almost five-thousand words done. Not a bad day’s work! Taking a few minutes, she read over what she had written and couldn’t suppress a smile—her hero bore a strong resemblance to her sexy next door neighbor. She wondered what he’d think of that.

  With a chuckle, she stood and walked out to the kitchen to get herself something to drink. Thinking about the story she was creating, she knew it was too soon for her hero and heroine to kiss, but that didn’t mean she didn’t want them to.

  And what was worse, she found she wanted to know what her very own hero, Josiah, kissed like.

  It was almost five in the afternoon. She wasn’t the least bit hungry but decided she was going to invite him over for dinner. Maybe she’d be hungry later. With a renewed sense of purpose, Melanie went into the bathroom to freshen up and then walked out to the living room and grabbed her jacket. With a steadying breath, she opened the door and walked out toward Josiah’s house.

  Feeling a little self-conscious, she tentatively knocked on the door. Was she being too obvious? Should she be playing a little hard to get? As soon as Josiah opened the door she had her answer.

  No.

  She didn’t want to play hard to get.

  She didn’t want to play at all.

  Well…sort of. A small smile tugged at her lips. “Hey,” she said, her breath visible in the cold air.

  “Hey. Come on in.” Josiah stepped aside and once she was in, he closed the door. “So…what’s up?”

  Where did she even begin? Part of her simply wanted to pounce on him—to kiss him and be kissed by him—but she had a little more couth than that. “Um…I wanted to see if maybe you were free for dinner.”

  He smiled and Melanie felt her knees go weak. “Dinner, huh?”

  She nodded.

  “You didn’t mention anything about it while we were grocery shopping.”

  Okay, so he wasn’t going to make this easy for her. Fine. Two could play at this game. Stepping in close to him—very close—she met his gaze. “It wasn’t on my mind then,” she said, her voice low and just a little sultry. “After our little talk earlier, I decided that…dinner…might not be a bad idea.”

  She watched his expression turn serious as he swallowed hard and mentally high-fived herself.

  “So…uh…sure,” he said, his eyes locking on her lips. “Dinner sounds good.”

  Feeling a little wicked, she leaned in even closer until her body brushed his and then slowly moved away. “Good,” she said. “That’s good.” A breathy little sigh escaped before she took a full step back. “So I’ll see you at seven. Will that work for you?”

  A muscle ticked in Josiah’s jaw as he slowly shook his head. “No. No I don’t think it will.”

  Her eyes widened slightly. “Oh?”

  Lightning quick, Josiah reached out and grabbed her hand and gently tugged her against him. “What’s going on here, Melanie?” he asked lowly.

  She could have played dumb, but what was the point?

  “Like I said, you gave me a lot to think about earlier. And I have. I thought we’d have dinner together and…see where it led.” Her heart was hammering in her chest at her bold confession. This so wasn’t like her and yet with Josiah, it seemed natural. Scary, but natural.

  His expression was still serious as his eyes scanned her face. “What changed your mind?”

  “It wasn’t a matter of changing my mind, it was a matter of taking a step back and making sure we weren’t making a mistake.”

  He quirked a dark brow at her. “And what makes you so sure we’re not?”

  She gave a slight shrug. “I’m still not sure. But I know I want to try.” Swallowing, she moved against him. “We’re on borrowed time here and I think we’d both regret it if we wasted time pretending to think about it.�
��

  “We?”

  A low laugh was her first response. “Okay, me. I knew I’d regret it if I sat around pretending to think about it. I know it’s only been twenty-four hours but it’s all I’ve thought about. I could stand here and play the ‘I don’t really know you’ game, but you took me all around town today and everywhere we went, people knew you. Everyone talked to you. Hell, it’s like you have your own fan club around here so it’s not like I can’t trust you since obviously everyone does.”

  “I wouldn’t call them a fan club. Not exactly…”

  And just like that, the tension between them was broken. “Oh please…I was beginning to think they all had t-shirts with your picture on it. Maybe there was a parade in your honor during one of those ridiculous Christmas festivals.”

  He joined in her teasing. “It’s not a particularly huge parade…normally me just driving down Main Street waving to people.”

  “Does the high school marching band follow you?”

  “Only on Saturdays.”

  Melanie rested her head against his chest as she laughed. She could feel him laughing with her, felt his arms band around her waist as he slowly pulled her against him. When she lifted her head and looked up at his face, humor was suddenly the last thing on her mind. His name was a whisper on her lips.

  “As much as I love talking with you and laughing with you, Melanie, right now all I really want is to kiss you.”

  Her hands skimmed up his chest and up and over his shoulders. “So what are you waiting for?” And much to her surprise, Josiah didn’t move. The confusion she felt surely must have been obvious on her face.

  With his forehead gently touching hers, he sighed. “I can’t believe I’m saying this but…”

  “But…?”

  “I don’t think we should do this.”

  “Oh.” Melanie felt like she had been kicked in the gut and she wished the floor would just open up and swallow her. She was mortified. She’d never been the aggressor in a relationship and on her first time out of the gate she was shot down.