Jessica Lemmon - Christmas Seduction

Ew.

She started her march home, an unhealthy dose of anger seeping into her bloodstream. The first sip of her coffee burned her tongue, and the wind blew directly into her face, cold and bitter.

A series of beeps sounded from her pocket and Hayden’s back stiffened. That was her mother’s ringtone. It never failed to cause a cocktail of panic, fear and resentment to boil over. She ignored the second ring and then the third and, a minute later, the chime of her voice mail.

When Hayden left Seattle, it had felt like more of an escape. Her mother had been—and was still—stressed to the max, refusing to draw boundary lines around the one woman causing problems in their lives: Hayden’s alcoholic grandmother. Grandma Winnie favored drama and bottom-shelf vodka in equal measures, and Hayden’s mother, Patti, had turned codependency into an art form. Hayden’s dad, Glenn, was content to let the matriarchs rule the roost, as if he’d eschewed himself from the chaos in the only way he knew how: silence.

After years of trying to balance family drama with her own desperate need for stability, Hayden left Seattle and her family behind for the oasis of Spright Island.

By the time she was changing for her class, her coffee was cool and her mind was numb. She paused in the living room of her apartment, put her hands over her heart and took three deep breaths.

There was no sense in being angry at Grandma Winnie for being an alcoholic. It wasn’t her fault she had a disease. Similarly, she let go of worrying over her mother’s codependence and her father’s blind eye.

“Everyone is doing the best they can,” she said aloud.

But as she trotted down the stairs to the studio and unlocked the door for a few waiting guests, she found that there was one person in her life she didn’t feel as magnanimous toward.

The man who’d kissed her soundly, scrambled her senses and then showed up in town with the very woman he claimed had left him behind.

“Hi, Hayden,” greeted Jan, the first of her students through the door.

Hayden returned Jan’s smile and shoved aside her tumultuous thoughts. She owed it to her class to be present and bring good energy, not bad.

Family drama—and Tate drama—would be waiting for her when the class was over, whether she wanted it or not.

Four

The bell over her studio entrance jangled as Hayden’s evening class filed out of the building. She was behind the desk, jotting down a note for Marla, who’d been coming for individual classes but decided tonight she wanted to join the group. Since Marla hadn’t brought her credit card, Hayden had promised to email her in the morning.

Hayden stuck a reminder Post-it note onto the cover of her hardbound planner and looked up, expecting to see the last of her students leave. Instead, someone was coming in .

A certain someone who hadn’t left her mind no matter how hard she tried to stop thinking about him.

Dressed in black athletic pants and a long-sleeved black T-shirt, Tate shrugged out of the same leather jacket he’d worn the night they kissed. It’d been five days since that kiss. Two days since the coffee shop.

She still wasn’t happy with him, but it was impossible not to admire his exquisite hotness.

“Hey,” she blurted, unsure what else to say.

“Hey.” He looked over his shoulder. “I know I missed class, but I was hoping to schedule a one-on-one.”

Her mind went to the last “one-on-one” session they’d had. She hadn’t forgotten that kiss. She probably never would. It was burned onto her frontal lobe.

“Individual sessions have to be scheduled ahead of time,” she said as tartly as she could manage. The vision of him with Claire was too fresh in her mind for her to be cordial.

“Are you sure?” He tilted his head as he stepped closer to her.

“If you’re here because you feel you owe me an explanation or you need to air your regrets—”

“No. Nothing like that.”

She lifted her eyebrows, asking a silent well?

“I haven’t been in control of my life lately. Everything’s moving at warp speed, and I’m caught in the undertow. You ever feel like you’ve lost control? Once upon a time you had it in your hands, and now...” He looked down at his own fists gripping his coat as his mouth pulled down at the corners.

She knew exactly what that was like, but in reverse order. Her world had been moving at warp speed since birth, and only moving to SWC had stopped its trajectory.

She sympathized with Tate, though she was tempted to cut her losses and show him the door.

“And taking a yoga class with me would help you feel in control?” she asked anyway.

“Ah, well. Not exactly.” Palm on his neck, he studied the floor and then peeked up at her with a look of chagrin so magnetic, her heart skipped a beat. “I’m really good at turning you on. At least I think I would be. Are you still doling out kisses with every cup of tea?”

She gripped the edge of the front desk, digesting what he’d just said. He was good at turning her on. She knew that, but what was she supposed to do with it? Especially when Tate stood in front of her looking coy and cunning and yet vulnerable and was offering... Wait... Was this a booty call ?

“Sorry. That offer expired.” Not that she was above kissing him, but... “I’m not going to be your girl on the side, Tate. What would Claire say?”

“That’s over. It’s been over. What you saw at the coffee shop was her finalizing things. You know, like you do after someone dies.”

He paced to the salt lamp on her desk and stared at it for a beat. “She dropped off a box of my stuff at my house and then asked if we could grab a coffee and talk. I told her she could talk to me there, but she said she preferred neutral territory.”

“Oh.” It was a breakup. Hayden had misread that entire exchange. Still... “And you didn’t feel the need to explain yourself after I saw you at the café? You thought you’d instead come here and...” She waved a hand uselessly, unable to finish her thought, since she wasn’t 100 percent sure why he was here.

“I thought we could start with a yoga session.” He dipped his chin. “If you have any openings for, say, now.”

She tried to tell him no, but found she couldn’t. Tate Duncan didn’t have to work hard to charm her on any given day, and today he was actually trying.

“How about...” She flipped open her planner and traced her finger down the page. “Tomorrow. Noon.”

“Deal.”

“I’ll need your credit card. I require a nonrefundable down payment for the first appointment.”

“Smart.”

She hummed. She wasn’t so sure this was smart, but was too curious to turn him away.

The morning of his yoga appointment, Tate set out for Hayden’s studio. The day was dry if chilly, but he welcomed the burning cold in his lungs as he cut through a path in the woods.

He’d been out for a quick trip to Summer’s Market when he’d witnessed Hayden’s evening class letting out. He hadn’t planned on walking across the street and inside, but when he found himself in front of her, he had to have a reason for being there.

Besides the obvious.

Hayden had consumed damn near every one of his waking thoughts, which was a relief compared to his usual pastime: turning over his parentage, the truth about where he came from, or the disastrous outcome since.

He’d blamed the kiss on whiskey and a need for connection. The liquor buzz was long gone, but the imprint of her kiss remained like a brand. It was reckless to leap into the flames after he’d just escaped a fire—Claire should’ve rendered him numb. But Hayden...she was different.