Christie Ridgway: Must Love Mistletoe

Until eleven months ago.

He supposed they still boasted about him, but he didn’t feel the same about himself. Certainly he’d never be the same.

He adjusted the strap of his eye patch, and the sharp ache in his facial bones sank all the way to his gut.

Closing his one working eye, he sucked in a deep breath. For a second, over the coffee and the pain, he smelled Bailey again. He’d never pinpointed the name of her personal perfume, but it hadn’t changed in a decade. Light, citrusy, with a layer of some flowery note on top. Then all wrapped up in bow of sex appeal.

One sniff this morning and, damn it all to hell, he’d been going hard and horny again.

Because that delicate blond prettiness of hers was still the same too. That sleek golden hair and gymnast figure that had made him feel both macho and clumsy when he was sixteen. That now just made him feel mean because despite himself it still pulled at him.

But who could blame him for reacting to all the memories between them? Innocent kisses. Not-so-innocent kisses. Her small breasts in his palms. The first time he’d touched the wetness between her thighs and how she’d buried her face against his neck in embarrassment.

The burn of her skin when he’d tasted that delicious wetness on his tongue.

As he said, who could blame him?

But hell, it only twisted the uncontrollable tension inside of him tighter. He was the Bad Ass again, feeling all edgy and penned-up and rebellious. Like then, just a razor’s edge away from fucking up.

Oh, wait. He’d already done that eleven months ago.

But he was supposed to be getting past that. He was supposed to be icing over all the anger, the guilt, the sense of loss. During this “vacation” with Gram he was supposed to be unwinding eleven months of coiled emotions that had made him harder and meaner than ever before. And he couldn’t-wouldn’t-let the unwelcome return of Bailey Sullivan impede his objective.

Bailey Sullivan’s Vintage Christmas

Facts & Fun Calendar

December 3

Helen Keller said, “The only real blind person at Christmas time is he who has not Christmas in his heart.”

It was after midnight when Bailey left the shop and headed toward Walnut Street and the sleep she so desperately needed. At the store’s closing time, she’d been in no hurry to return to Christmas Central with its cacophony of holiday sound and emotional caterwauling of ancient memories, so she’d busied herself by restocking. The day’s stream of customers had left gaping holes on the shelves and tables and under and on the half-dozen decorated trees inside The Perfect Christmas.

The last box she’d unpacked had contained St. Nicholas figurines from Germany. Dressed in old-fashioned robes of green, red, and white, they’d been frosted with a superfine glitter that she hadn’t been able to completely wash off her hands. As she adjusted the Passat’s rearview mirror, in the streetlight she could see the stuff dusted across her nose and cheeks and clinging to the strands of hair surrounding her face. She rubbed at it with the back of her hand and tried finger-combing it out of her hair, but then gave up.

Glitter girl was going straight to bed, so what did it matter?

Except one block from 631 Walnut, she had second thoughts about sleep. As in, she didn’t think she was going to get any right away. Maybe a teensy glass of Merlot and some crispy cheese straws would pull her overactive mind off its fixation with the past. And not just the past as in ten years ago, but also the past of sixteen hours ago. All day she’d been wondering what Finn had been doing with his life. She knew he hadn’t been living with his grandmother all this time, though she didn’t know anything else. For example, what was that eye patch all about?

And why did it give her the uneasy impression that he saw her clearer than ever? When he was a teenager, she’d catch him looking at her, sometimes with amusement, sometimes with bemusement, sometimes with a kind of heat that made her heart fall to her belly and throb there, low and hard. Though she’d tried to pretend that she managed all the dark, wild power in his bad-boy body, deep inside she’d known that he only let her feel that way.

A panther who tolerated the pretty girl riding him with ribbon reins.

Now he looked like a man who didn’t have any patience for pretending.

The thought would be hard to fall asleep with.

So she turned left and headed for the grocery store a quarter mile away, gratified to see that it was open 24/7 as she’d expected. Grocery stores restocked in the off-hours too, and there was no sense not making a sale or two if they had to have employees in the store overnight anyway.

Though as she pulled into the lot, the number of cars surprised her. Late-night sales must be brisk because apparently she wasn’t the only insomniac in town. Inside, the place was bustling with stockers and shoppers. Even with Bing warbling about snow and her wine and snacks quickly in hand, Bailey continued to wander around, in no hurry to return home to where the proximity of Finn was sure to plague her.

Here, at least, she could find some peace.

“Bailey? Bailey Sullivan?” said a female voice.

She swung around to find no one behind her, then adjusted her level gaze three inches lower to latch on to the gamine face of her oldest childhood friend. The only person who had ever made her feel tall. “Trin Tran?”

They let out identical squeals and rushed into each other’s arms, bumping and tangling plastic shopping carriers in the process. Laughing, they pulled back and went about disconnecting their baskets. Inside Trin’s, Bailey glimpsed Cheerios, a box of pediatric cold medicine, and small jars of something the color of melted purple crayons.

She looked into her friend’s almond eyes. “You’re a mother?”

Trin nodded. “To Adam-sleeping-at-the-moment-but-with-a-cold-that-makes-him-cranky. He’s not quite two years old. I’ve been married for three. My husband’s Andrew Truehouse. Remember him from high school?”

“Of course I remember him from high school.” A few years older than the two of them, he’d been student body president, as well as captain of the water polo and volleyball teams. Andrew Truehouse had been nicknamed “Drew So True.” Bailey started to laugh. “Oh my God, that makes you Trin Tran True!”

The other woman scowled. “It was almost a deal-breaker, I’m telling you. But then we agreed I’d keep my maiden name and the wedding went forward. I would have sent you an invitation if you’d ever bothered to make contact during the last decade.”

Regret and guilt gave Bailey dual hefty pinches. “I’ve made my visits home infrequent and extremely brief. Running from retail, you know?”

One of Trin’s eyebrows rose. “Oh, I’m perfectly aware of who you were running from.”

“I don’t know-”

“And I just saw him on aisle three.”

Bailey swallowed, trying to calm her suddenly rocking stomach. “Who…?” Then she gave up all pretext and clutched Trin’s forearm as if they were both still sixteen. “You saw Finn in here?”

“Mmm-hmm. He’ll see you your bottle of wine and raise you a quart of whiskey.”

Bailey searched the area around her, but there wasn’t any sign of him. “Are you certain it was Finn?”

“Muscles? Eye patch? Big-boobied redhead hanging all over his wide manly chest?”

A redhead? A woman? But of course Finn had a woman. Did Bailey expect he’d mooned around for ten years, remembering some starry-eyed first love and finding nothing near as dazzling? “Well, um…”

Trin wasn’t listening to her. “C’mon,” she said, dragging Bailey around a corner. “Let’s spy on him. It’ll be like old times.”