Helen Lacey - Marriage Under the Mistletoe

He should have expected it. Love hadn’t figured in his life since. Lust...well, that was different. Since Belinda had walked out he’d dated half a dozen different women. He’d slept with a few of them but had no inclination to pursue anything serious. Because serious wasn’t for him. Not while he was a firefighter.

Scott inhaled a deep breath and got a whiff of perfume. Something sweet...vanilla. He smiled when his brain registered how much he liked it. The woman beside him was extremely attractive; although she was so uptight he could feel the vibrations coming off her skin. But he liked the way she looked. He’d always been a sucker for long, dark, sexy hair. She had a nice mouth and big green eyes beneath slanting, provocative eyebrows. The type of woman he’d notice. Lush, he thought. And touchable in a way that could make a man’s palms itch.

Maybe I should talk to her and break the ice a bit? Talking with women had never been a problem. He liked women. They usually liked him. But she didn’t seem interested in conversation, so Scott kept his eyes closed and concentrated on the soft music beating between them.

Sleep...yeah...I can do that.

* * *

Evie had a headache. Probably from the tightly clenched jaw she couldn’t relax. Acutely conscious of the sleeping man beside her, she gripped the wheel and looked directly ahead. An hour and a half into the journey and she felt the need to stop for a fix of caffeine. She pulled into a truck stop twenty minutes later and maneuvered the pickup into a vacant space outside the diner. Her passenger didn’t stir as she turned off the engine and unclipped her belt. She looked him over and experienced a strange dip low in her belly. Really low.

Okay...so my body’s not quite the museum I thought it was.

Evie wasn’t sure how this sudden attraction made her feel. She wasn’t sure she wanted to feel anything. She wasn’t sure she even knew how anymore. Oh, she knew how to love her son, and her parents and her siblings and her nieces and nephews. And she was a good, loyal friend.

But a man? A flesh-and-blood man like the one in front of her—that was a different kind of feeling altogether. Memories of those kinds of feelings swam around in her head, like ghosts of a life once lived, a life that belonged to someone else.

The life of a woman who’d had a husband, a lover, a soul mate. When Gordon was alive she’d had those things. They’d laughed and loved. She felt passion and heat and sweat.

But Evie wasn’t that woman anymore.

She took a breath, grabbed her purse and got out as quietly as she could. The restaurant wasn’t busy and she quickly ordered coffee to go and a couple of prepackaged sandwiches. Evie hung around the counter until the order came, then stopped to collect sugar and plastic spoons from a small table near the door. She was just about to pocket some of both when she heard a voice behind her.

“How’s the coffee here?”

She turned. Scott was close. Really close. His chest seemed like a solid wall in front of her. “I’m not sure.” She held up a small cardboard carrier containing two foam cups. “It’s hot at least.”

“That’s a good start.”

Evie’s skin prickled. “I wasn’t sure how you liked it.”

He smiled. “Black, two sugars and milk.”

A funny guy. Great. She passed him four sachets of sugar. “Knock yourself out.”

“Shall we sit?” he asked.

Evie handed over the coffee. “Sure.”

She grabbed the food and followed him to one of the melamine tables and contained her surprise when he pulled out a chair for her. “How much do I owe you?” he asked once seated.

Evie shook her head and flouted the way her heart pounded beneath her ribs like a freight train. “My treat.”

He smiled again and she got another look at the dimple. “Thanks.” He took the lid off his coffee and poured in some sugar. “Callie tells me you’re in the wedding party?” he asked, resting both elbows on the table.

She nodded and pushed a sandwich toward him. “And you’re giving the bride away?”

“Yeah.” He looked at her over the rim of his cup. “So, what else do you do besides run a B and B?”

Evie carefully sipped her coffee. “I paint.”

“Houses?”

“Pictures,” she replied. “Portraits, landscapes...that sort of thing.”

“Talented and beautiful,” he said smoothly.

Color rose up her collarbone and she felt like shaking her head to refute the compliment. Evie knew she wasn’t beautiful. She had even enough features and was attractive at best. Her sister Grace, on the other hand, was a classic beauty. And Mary-Jayne, the youngest of the three sisters, had always been considered the pretty one. Evie was just...Evie.

“And I teach art classes at my studio. What about you?” she asked, ignoring the compliment. “What do you do?”

“Besides what I’m doing now?” he replied, then shrugged. “The usual, I suppose.”

“The usual?” she echoed.

He put down his cup and leaned back in the chair. “I work.”

Evie took a breath. Talk. Say something. I talk to people every day. I’m good at talking. “And when do you play?”

It wasn’t exactly what she’d planned to say. Because it sounded outright flirtatious. And she never flirted. Without warning, the sexy-as-sin Scott Jones had somehow tapped in to the female part of her she’d kept under wraps for a decade.

“I mean,” she said quickly, covering her escalating embarrassment. “Do you like sports and stuff?”

“I like sports.” He smiled. “Do you?”

“I like to watch sports,” she admitted. “Even the macho sweaty kind like football.”

“But you don’t play?”

She shrugged, suddenly feeling like a couch potato. “I run.”

“Me, too.”

With that body he did more than run—Evie would bet her boots on it.

“Shall we get going?” she asked, changing the subject. Before he had a chance to reply she grabbed her coffee and food and made her way outside. The late-afternoon sun was settling toward dusk and they still had another three hours driving ahead. It would be well after dark by the time they arrived into Crystal Point.

She hopped into the driver’s seat, started the engine and waited until they were both buckled up before heading off. They had a few minutes of silence before he spoke.

“Lacrosse.”

Evie slanted a sideways look. “What?”

“You’d probably like it,” he said. “It can be macho and sweaty.”

“I thought it was badminton on steroids?”

He laughed, and the sound thrilled her down to her toes. “Ouch. You don’t miss a man’s ego with that aim.”

A smile curled the edges of her mouth. “I’m guessing you play?”

“Yes. I still think you’d like it.”

“The next time I’m in L.A. I’ll be sure to catch a game.”

“Have you ever been?”

“Once,” she replied. “Years ago. Gordon and I did the whole tourist thing just after we were married.”

“Gordon? That was your husband?”

“Yes, he was.” Her voice automatically softened. “He’s dead.”

“Callie told me that,” he said soberly. “You must miss him.”

“Yes.”

“Were you happy?”

She shot a glance sideways for a moment. It was a highly personal question from a stranger. A stranger who would soon be family. Part of the Preston clan. Except, she hadn’t been Evie Preston for a long time. She was Evie Dunn, mother of one—mother-hen, her father often called her. The girl most likely to fade into the background and do whatever needed to be done. The sensible daughter.

“We were very happy,” she said quietly.

“And does your son look like his father?”

“No,” she replied. “Trevor looks like me.”