“You sure you want to use one of your questions on that?” Deacon asked.
“You can learn a lot about someone by their song choice. It’s a valid question.”
Eyes forward, Deacon’s mouth hooked up on one side. “How about I let you guess?”
“Oh!” Kate perked up and wriggled in her seat, excited at that option. “I like that. Make a game of it. Okay.”
She adjusted her seatbelt strap, really getting comfortable as she sized up the man next to her. He had pulled his signature white hat from his head, leaving it to rest on the dashboard below. His profile was strong, much like his presence. At first glance, Deacon seemed like a what-you-see-is-what-you-get sort of man, but their limited interactions had already demonstrated otherwise. There were layers under that exterior. Kate was sure of it. And she was determined to peel them back.
“Twelve Days of Christmas?” she posited after thinking on it for over a mile’s worth of silence.
“Really?” A bellow of laughter let her know she’d struck out. “There are a whole lot more than twelve days of Christmas when you run a tree farm. More like three-hundred-sixty-five. Guess again.”
“I want to say something goofy like Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree, but that feels too obvious. Plus, you’ve got far too many trees to rock around. You’d get dizzy. And I don’t take you for much of a dancer.”
“I’ll have you know I’m a great dancer,” he defended, slapping a palm to the steering wheel as he let out a hoot of pure delight. “You’re looking at our high school’s senior class square-dancing champion in P.E.”
“Is it possible that you just volunteered information about yourself without me having to pull it from you?”
Screwing up his mouth into a pout, he snorted. “Only because that title is absolutely brag-worthy.”
“I’ll give you that,” Kate played along because it was too fun not to. “It really is.”
“One more guess.”
“And if I don’t get it?”
“Then I suppose you’ll never know.”
Kate grinned. “Then I’m going to wait until I’m really confident.”
Pulling up to their destination, Deacon angled his truck into the entrance of a dimly lit parking lot. A log structure that looked similar to the ones Kate used to make with building blocks as a child rested on the other side of the pavement. The backdrop of snow-tipped trees made the restaurant feel like a natural part of its surroundings, almost as though it had always been a piece of the landscape. Icicles clung to the building’s peaks and gutters were strung with colorful lights that flashed like beacons of holiday cheer. It was the most welcoming sight, both to her heart and to her growling stomach.
“This is the place,” Deacon noted as he tugged his keys out of the ignition. The engine hissed quietly under the hood. “I hope you’re hungry.”
“I could eat a horse,” Kate exclaimed, unhooking her lapbelt and letting it fly.
“I’ll be sure not to repeat that information to Sarge.”
Deacon hopped down from his truck and closed his door into place behind him. Before Kate could move her fingers to her own door handle, Deacon was standing at her side of the vehicle.
“Careful.” He opened the door for her, letting a blast of icy air swirl into the cab and he surprised her again when he took her hand. “The running boards tend to get slick.”
She had no desire to end up on her backside in front of this man for a second time in two short days, so she readily grasped onto his proffered hand. “Thank you. I appreciate it.”
Side by side, they huddled against the cold, their paces quickening as they scurried up the slushy stone path toward the entrance. There was a set of outdoor speakers hanging under the eaves and the up-tempo carol, We Wish You a Merry Christmas, met their ears like a formal holiday greeting. Kate’s thoughts spun back to Christmases past, to the many spent alone in her small apartment with a lukewarm take out meal and a glass of celebratory champagne for one. She’d never minded the solitude. Not entirely, at least. Due to the nature of her job, so much of her life was spent in the company of others. Of course, as a true extrovert, Kate adored that aspect of things, but she also understood Christmastime was meant for family.
Inside the restaurant was crowded, living up to Deacon’s assertion that it was indeed a local favorite. The lobby teemed with customers congregating around a massive stone fireplace that donned colorful knit stockings in festive greens and reds. Across the lobby, there was a stately tree wedged in the corner bearing ball ornaments with names of the restaurant’s employees penned in glittering gold, and cranberry garland coiled up the evergreen like train tracks twisting up a steep mountain. It was everything Kate imagined a Sierra dining establishment to be: cozy, familiar, and much to her relief, overwhelmingly warm.
They sat on a wooden bench made for four, but due to the crowd it currently held twice that amount. She couldn’t turn to look at Deacon without feeling intimately close, like they were both invading one another’s personal bubble by at least two feet. Kate flipped a menu over, busying her hands and eyes so she didn’t focus on the way her leg lined up next to Deacon’s or how their elbows touched with every slight movement or jostle. “What do you usually get?”
“Prime rib. Twice baked potato. Green beans. Slice of chocolate cake.”
“Every time?”
“Every time.”
“Where’s the adventure in that?” Kate lowered the menu to her lap and chanced a look up at Deacon right when he happened to do the same. As their gazes met, she felt their proximity as a low flutter in her stomach, like the release of a butterfly swarm. She forced a swallow that bordered on a gulp and prayed Deacon was illiterate when it came to reading body language.
“You saw those driving conditions, right?” he asked, almost rhetorically. He nodded toward the window that framed in the landscape like a wintery, nostalgic painting and cocked his head slightly. “It’s an adventure out on those roadways all season long. I don’t want an adventure when it comes to my food, too. Some things need to be consistent in life and I, for one, think food should be that way.”
“You do make a fair point. I’ll give you that.”
“Deacon, party of two!” the hostess behind the podium interrupted their conversation and it couldn’t have come at a better time. Each minute spent squeezed up against Deacon’s big body made Kate feel increasingly out of sorts. She welcomed a table’s distance between them. It was as though her thoughts had come completely unraveled and she needed some space to spool them back up and pull herself together.
“Nice to see you, Deacon.” The young hostess flashed a genial smile over her shoulder while the trio maneuvered around the tables and chairs spaced throughout the restaurant. There really wasn’t an empty table in sight as families and friends all had the same idea to gather and share an evening meal.
“Same to you, Sarah. How’s the family?”
“Everyone’s doing well. The boys are excited to come on out to the farm and cut down their tree next week. It’s all they’ve been talking about.”
“Well, we do have one or two for them to choose from,” Deacon noted with the touch of sarcasm Kate had come to expect.
As promised, the woman showed them to their table and if Kate had been flustered by their closeness on the bench in the lobby, this setup wasn’t going to alleviate that. The booth had high back, leather seat cushions, bolstered on the ends with upright, rustic logs that stretched all the way to the A-frame ceiling. This portion of the establishment was secluded and the flickering tea light candles centered on the table screamed date night. Despite the many people in the building, this particular table was meant for privacy.
“Will this do?”
“Yeah, this should be fine,” Deacon answered for them.
“Good.” The hostess deposited two menus onto the table and stepped back, hands folded. “Because it’s the only available one we’ve got. I’ll leave you both to get settled in. Tommy sh
ould be by shortly to take your order. Enjoy your dinner.”
“Thank you.” Kate unbuttoned her jacket and placed it onto the seat cushion before sliding in next to it.
Pressing his shirt to his stomach, Deacon lowered into his side, wiggling in. Kate could instantly see how tightly he wedged into the narrow booth, almost too big to fit.
“Do you want to wait until one of the other tables opens up?” Kate offered. “Might give us a little more room. I’m totally fine with waiting.”
“Nope.” He removed his hat. “I’m too hungry. This’ll work.”
“But you look uncomfortable.”
With two hands gripping the table’s ledge, Deacon slid the solid wood fixture a few inches closer toward Kate. Even still, she had ample room.
“I’m good now,” he said as he stretched out, arms splayed wide as he rested them on the back of his cushion. “We make a good pair.”
She knew he referred to his large size and her small stature, but she couldn’t keep her mind from traveling into territory it had no business entering. They weren’t a couple in that way. They were like oil and water. Cats and dogs. Total opposites in every area. That was a recipe for relationship disaster.
“What are you thinking?” he said, collecting a menu she figured he already had memorized.
“That you and I would never work.”
Deacon sputtered a cough. “I meant, what are you thinking for dinner?”
This is where Kate wished she could cut to commercial. Someone was going to need to script her conversations if she let stupid things like that fall from her lips. “Oh. Of course. Right. Dinner.”
“But I’d like to hear more about this—”
“I misunderstood you.” She threw her menu up in front of her face like a paper barricade. “The roasted chicken looks good. Salmon, too.”
“What do you mean, we would never work?”
“I saw someone with the chicken pot pie when we walked in. I haven’t had one of those in years. I don’t like peas though, and it says here they put peas in theirs. Maybe I’ll be able to pick them out. What do you think?”
When Deacon’s index finger hooked over the top of her menu and lowered it, revealing his smirking face on the other side, she wanted to crawl under the table. “Why wouldn’t we work, Kate?”
She let the menu flutter down between them. “Well, for starters, we can’t even work together in a professional capacity. Working in a relationship would be even more disastrous. Plus, you’re not really my type.”
“Your type isn’t tall, dark—”
“And handsome?”
“You said it. Not me.” Deacon shrugged so indifferently it had Kate wondering where this suddenly flirtatious version came from. This manifestation was certainly a new side of him. “So, what is your type?”
“I prefer men that don’t make me feel small.”
“I can’t help that I’m six-four. I’ve always been sorta big. Even as a baby. I hold the record for the biggest one born at our local hospital, I’ll have you know. Eleven pounds, thirteen ounces.” He crossed his feet at the ankles and accidentally kicked Kate’s shin under the table in the process. “Sorry.”
“It’s fine.” She waved him off. “But I meant that I prefer men who don’t make me feel small confidence-wise.”
That comment appeared to hit Deacon with the force of a sledgehammer. He practically looked like he might become sick as his hand went to his stomach and clutched the fabric of his flannel shirt. “Is that how I make you feel?”
“In all honesty? A little. I can’t blame it all on you, though. My boss had already taken me out at the knees with this whole assignment. I was supposed to have my cameraman with me, but at the last minute, she moved him over to another piece. My confidence was already rattled before I even got here. You just added to it.”
Deacon’s eyes found Kate’s and an apologetic gaze swept over his strong features, molding them into something that had Kate losing her breath. “I can’t say I’m not relieved that there’s not a cameraman following us around since I wasn’t even super thrilled with the idea of you filming with just your camera phone. But I had no idea I made you feel like you weren’t capable, Kate. That’s not how I feel. Quite the opposite, actually, now that I’ve seen your show. You’re more than capable.”
“Sure, but only if I have some material to work with,” she replied with a hopeless shrug as she picked her menu back up.
“Then it’s a good thing you’ve still got two more questions.”
Deacon
Tommy, the waiter Sarah had promised from earlier, ultimately arrived at the side of their table fifteen minutes later, out of breath with dark hair matted in sweat and an apron haphazardly tied around his middle. Everything about his demeanor indicated it had already been a rough night.
Yeah. I know the feeling, buddy, Deacon mused to himself.
His conversation with Kate had taken a swift and jerky turn. Not that it surprised him. Their discussions always seemed to do that. One minute things were civil—flirtatious, even—and then they were U-turning into downright uncomfortable territory. But learning he’d made her question her abilities was news Deacon never wanted to hear. He’d have to make that right.
“I’m so sorry,” the waiter apologized as he pulled a pen and paper from his back pocket and scribbled circles onto the pad to get the ink flowing. “We’re really slammed. Didn’t mean to keep you waiting. My name’s Tommy and I’ll be helping you both out tonight. Would you like to hear our specials or do you already know what you’d like to order?”
Like the opposites they’d already proven to be, Kate answered that she’d love to hear the specials at the same time Deacon said it wouldn’t be necessary, making their words jumble together like alphabet soup. That brought on a laugh from all parties, a welcome release that eased some of the tension mounting from earlier. They’d needed that.
While Tommy rattled off the dishes, Deacon found himself staring at the woman across the table. She was engaging in the way she made each person feel like the only one in the room. Even now, she hung on every word Tommy recited like he was telling her the secrets of the universe and not merely listing dinner entrees. Deacon honestly believed her interest wasn’t fake or for show. Kate was the type of woman who cared about the intricate details of a person. She wanted to know what made them tick. What filled them with passion. With hope.
Deacon liked to give people their space, mostly because he valued his own. He’d made the mistake of letting someone in once and it left him exposed in a way he still hadn’t fully recovered from.
“The half chicken,” Kate said decisively, about to hand off the menu to Tommy. She yanked it back suddenly. “Actually, no. The short ribs. Yep. Let’s go with the short ribs.”
“One order of short ribs. Good choice,” Tommy said. He jotted her order into his notebook and turned to Deacon. “And for you?”
“Prime rib. Medium rare. Twice baked potato. Green beans.”
“Great.” The waiter clicked the end of his retractable pen and shoved it behind his ear. “We’ll have those out for you in a bit. I’ll send someone over with fresh bread, too.”
Once Tommy retreated to the kitchen, Kate dragged the back of her hand across her brow with flair. “Whew! That was tough. Everything looks so delicious when you’re hungry.”
“I agree. That’s why I only go grocery shopping after I’ve had a solid meal. I once bought two cartfuls of groceries I didn’t really need because my stomach growled each time I turned down a new aisle.”
“I’ve done that, too. The worst is when they have those little old ladies with the free samples. I end up buying everything they offer! I have no self control.”
Kate laughed at herself as she reached for the bread basket that a busboy had recently left at their table just as Deacon made the same move. Their knuckles brushed. Deacon pulled back.
“You go ahead.” He nodded toward the steaming pile of buttery rolls.
Conversations swelled around them but all Deacon could zero in on was Kate and the way she chewed and savored her food like it was her last meal. She made little sounds of delight with each bite popped into her mouth. “This bread is delicious.”
“Pretty good, huh?”
“Better than the freezer meals I usually have.”
“And you haven’t even tasted the entrée yet.” Deacon waited until she took her second roll before reaching into the basket for one of his own. “You really eat frozen dinners? I didn’t realize people actually bought those.”
“It’s either that or takeout. I don’t often have a lot of time to spend in the kitchen. Don’t get me wrong because I absolutely love what I do, but it’s a real struggle to find balance.”
“I can imagine.” Deacon aimed his eyes at Kate. “Alright. I’m ready.”
“For what?” She held a bite-sized piece of bread up to her lips and gave him a funny look.
“For question number two.”
“Oh! I had almost forgotten!”
Deacon shook his head. “No, you hadn’t.”
“You’re right. I hadn’t.” She set the bread down and rubbed her hands together like she was revving up for something great. “Okay. Here it is. Question numero dos. Will you ever agree to a real interview with me? Like filmed and all? Something I can use for my show.”
“That question only requires a one-word answer. Don’t you want to ask something that will give you a little more to work with?”
“The answer to that question will give me everything to work with, Deacon,” she said with conviction. “So what will it be? Yes?” Kate produced a massive grin. “Or no?” Her mouth overturned into a frown like she was the real life version of the comedy and tragedy theater masks.
“It’s a yes.”
“No way!” He wasn’t prepared for the roll that launched out of her hand, smacking him squarely in the chest. “Oh my gosh! I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to throw that at you. You just got me a little excited.”
Christmas at Yuletide Farm: A Small-Town Christmas Romance Novel Page 5