Susan Meier - A Diamond For Christmas

“Uh-oh.”

“She couldn’t adjust the temperature and most of them burned. At one point the pan itself started burning.” He shook his head and laughed. “I’ve always been glad my dad was quick with a fire extinguisher.”

Finley began swinging their arms back and forth. Rory took another deep breath of the pine-scented air. A small shudder worked through Shannon’s heart. It was the perfect outing. Just like a mom and dad with their daughter, they walked the long thin rows, looking for the tree that would make their living room complete. And every time they’d start walking after pausing to examine a tree, Finley would swing their hands.

“What about this one?”

Rory had stopped at a towering blue spruce. Shannon studied it critically. “You don’t think it’s too tall?”

“Better too tall than too short. If it’s too tall, we can always shave a few inches from the bottom.”

She looked at it again. The needles were soft but bushy. Healthy. The branches were thick. There were no “holes,” as her father would say. No places where you could see the wall behind the tree because there was no branch filling in the space.

“I like it.”

“Then let’s tag it,” Rory said, reaching out to grab a branch and attach the tag. His arm brushed against her and Shannon jumped back. When their gazes met, she immediately regretted it.

He was so good to her, so kind and she was nothing but jumpy.

She swallowed. “I’m sorry.”

He pulled away. “You’re just nervous.”

That sounded like as good of an excuse as any. Especially since it was true. He did make her nervous. He made her shaky and antsy and all kinds of things because she liked him. Still, she didn’t need to tell him why she was nervous.

“It’s cold. It’s close to Christmas. I have lots of work to do.” She shrugged. “So, yes, I’m nervous.”

He cast a quick glance down at Finley, who was preoccupied with fitting her little pink boot into the footprint of someone who had walked down the row before them. “You’re not nervous because you like me?” He smiled endearingly. “Not even a little bit?”

His question was so unexpected that she pulled her bottom lip between her teeth, stalling, trying to figure out what to say. She didn’t want to insult or encourage him.

Finally, confused and out of her element, she said, “I’m not sure.”

He laughed. “You like me.”

Her breath stuttered into her lungs at his confidence. She was on the verge of denying it, like a third grader confronted by the cute guy in class and too afraid to admit her crush, but he didn’t give her time.

He turned and faced Finley. “Want to stay with Shannon or walk back with me so that we can get one of the tree cutters back here to help us out?”

She didn’t even hesitate. “I’ll stay with Shannon.”

He gave Shannon a wink before he turned and headed down the row. Finley said, “I like your tree.”

Shannon glanced down with a smile. “I do, too.”

“My dad picked out a good one. He’s smart.”

“Yes, he is smart,” Shannon agreed, but her throat was closing and her knees were growing weak. He hadn’t confronted her about liking him to give her a chance to argue. He’d made a statement of fact, then walked away, as if giving her time to accept it.

Accept it?

She knew she liked him. She fought her feelings for him every day. He hadn’t needed to tell her. He hadn’t needed to get it out in the open for them to deal with.

She sucked in a breath. Stupid to panic. In another day or two, he’d be done looking at her store. Then he’d leave. And the rest of their dealings would be done through lawyers. Even if they had to meet to sign an agreement, it would be at a lawyer’s office.

They wouldn’t spend enough time together for her “liking him” to mean anything. Even if he liked her back.

Which he did—

Oh, dear God. That’s why he’d said that! He was preparing her to hear him tell her that he liked her.

With a glance down the row, she saw Rory returning with the tree cutter. She moved Finley out of the way as they approached.

As if he hadn’t just dropped the bombshell that threatened to destroy the entire evening, Rory said, “You can go down and pay if you want.”

She nodded, and, holding Finley’s hand, she raced down to the cashier. She paid for the tree and directed Finley to the SUV, where Rory and the farm employee were tying her blue spruce to her vehicle’s roof.

As they got inside the vehicle and headed home, Shannon and Rory were quiet. But Finley chatted up a storm.

“So how do we get the tree in the house?”

Rory said, “We’ll park as close as we can to the porch, then I’ll hoist it on my shoulder and hope for the best.”

Finley giggled. Shannon almost laughed, too. She could picture him wobbling a bit with an entire tree on his shoulder.

“And then what do we do with it?”

He looked over at Shannon. “I’m guessing Shannon has a tree stand.”

“What’s a tree stand?”

Shannon took this one. “That’s the thing that holds up the tree. Since it doesn’t have roots anymore, it needs help standing.”

Finley nodded sagely. “Oh.” Then she grinned. “Do we get hot cocoa after that?”

“As much as you want.”

Rory peeked over at Shannon. “But not so much that she’s too wired to go to sleep tonight.”

An unexpected longing shot an arrow straight to her heart. She wanted them to stay the night. She wanted to put the tree up in the living room, make hot cocoa and decorate the tree with them. Not just Finley, but Rory, too. She’d liked his stories of happy Christmas Eves and Christmases. She liked that his mom couldn’t cook any better than she could. She liked that he didn’t mind telling stories of his past. She liked that he didn’t mind leaving her with his child, doing the heavy lifting of the tree… Who was she kidding? She also liked that he was good-looking, funny, smart—and that he liked her.

She turned to look out the window. He liked her. Her heart swelled with happiness, even as her stomach plummeted. He could like her until the cows came home, but that didn’t change the fact that they wouldn’t ever be together.

Pulling into her driveway, Rory said, “I think the easiest way to get the tree off the SUV is for me to stand on one side, while you stand on the other. You untie your side of the ropes first. I’ll do mine second. Then I’ll ease the tree off on my side.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

Finley leaned forward. “Yeah. Sounds like a plant.”

Rory laughed. “She said plan. It sounds like a plan.”

“But a tree is a plant!”

Shannon slanted him a look. “She’s got you there.”

They got out of the SUV laughing. Rory stood on the driver’s side, while Shannon stayed on the passenger’s side.

“Okay,” he called. “You untie the ropes on your end.”

As quickly as she could, Shannon undid the ropes currently holding the tree to her side of the SUV.

“Okay!”

“Okay!” Rory called back. “Now, I’ll untie mine.”

The branches of the blue spruce shimmied a bit as he dealt with the ropes. Then suddenly it shivered a little harder, then began to downright shake. Before Shannon knew what was happening, it rolled toward her, and then tumbled off the roof.

Finley screamed and raced up the porch. Shannon squealed and jumped out of the way, but the tree brushed her as it plopped into the snow.

Rory came running over. In a move that appeared as instinctive as breathing, he grabbed her and pulled her to him. “Oh, my God! Are you all right?”

Even through his jacket she could feel his heart thundering in his chest. Feel his labored, frightened breathing.