Linda Lael - Holiday In Stone Creek

“Excuse me for a second, will you?” Olivia asked after filling mugs for herself and Tanner and giving him his. She slipped into the bedroom, closed the door, put down her coffee cup and quickly switched out the chore coat and her sweats for her best pair of jeans and the blue sweater Ashley had knitted for her as a Christmas gift. She even went so far as to splash her face with water in the tiny bathroom, give her teeth a quick brushing and run a comb through her hair.

When she returned to the kitchen, Tanner was sitting in a chair at the table, looking as if he belonged there, and Ginger stood with her head resting on his thigh while he stroked her back.

Something sparked in Tanner’s weary eyes when he looked up—maybe amusement, maybe appreciation. Maybe something more complicated.

Olivia felt a wicked little thrill course through her system.

“Thanksgiving,” she said without planning to, almost sighing out the word.

“You don’t sound all that thankful,” Tanner observed.

“Oh, I am,” Olivia insisted, taking a sip from her mug.

“Me, too,” Tanner said. “Mostly.”

She bit her lower lip, stole a glance at the clock above the sink. It was early—two hours before she needed to check in at the clinic. So much for excusing herself to go to work.

“Mostly?” she echoed, keeping her distance.

“There are things I’d change about my life,” Tanner told her. “If I could.”

She drew nearer then, interested in spite of herself, and sat down, though she kept the width of the table between them. “What would you do differently?”

He sighed, and a bleak expression darkened his eyes. “I’d have kept the business smaller, for one thing,” he said. The briefest flicker of pain contorted his face. “Not gone international. How about you?”

“I’d have spent more time with my grandfather,” she replied after giving the question some thought. “I guess I figured he was going to be around forever.”

“That was his coat you were wearing before.”

“How did you guess that?”

“My grandmother had one just like it. I think they must have sold those at every farm supply store in America, back in the day.”

Olivia relaxed a little. “How’s Butterpie?”

Tanner sighed, met Olivia’s gaze. Held it. “She’s not eating,” he said.

“I was afraid of that,” Olivia murmured, distracted.

“I thought my grandmother was going to live forever, too,” Tanner told her.

It took Olivia a moment to catch up. “She’s gone, then?”

Tanner nodded. “Died on her seventy-eighth birthday, hoeing the vegetable garden. Just the way she’d have wanted to go—quick, and doing something she loved to do. Your grandfather?”

“Heart attack,” Olivia said, running her palms along the thighs of her jeans. Why were they suddenly moist?

Tanner was silent for what seemed like a long time, though it was an easy silence. Then he finished his coffee and stood. “Guess I’d better not keep you,” he said, crossing the room to set his cup in the sink.

Ginger’s liquid eyes followed him adoringly.

“I’d like to look in on Butterpie on my way into town, if that’s okay with you?” Olivia said.

One side of Tanner’s fine mouth slanted slightly upward. “Would it stop you if it wasn’t okay with me?”

She grinned. “Nope.”

He chuckled at that. “I’ve got some things to do in town,” he said. “Gotta pick up some wine for Thanksgiving dinner. So if I don’t see you in my barn, we’ll meet up at Brad and Meg’s place later on.”

Of course her brother and sister-in-law would have invited Tanner to join them for Thanksgiving dinner. He was a friend, and he lived alone. Still, Olivia felt blindsided. Holidays were hard enough without stirring virtual strangers into the mix. Especially attractive ones.

“See you then,” she said, hoping her smile didn’t look forced.

He nodded and left, closing the kitchen door quietly behind him. Olivia immediately went to the window to watch him mount Shiloh and ride off.

When he was out of sight, and only then, Olivia turned from the window and zeroed in on Ginger.

“What were you thinking, running off like that? You’re not a young dog, you know.”

“I just got a little carried away, that’s all,” Ginger said without lifting her muzzle off her forelegs. Her eyes looked soulful. “Are you wearing that getup to Thanksgiving dinner?”

Olivia looked down at her jeans and sweater. “What’s wrong with my outfit?” she asked.

“Touchy, touchy. I was just asking a simple question.”

“These jeans are almost new, and Ashley made the sweater. I look perfectly fine.”

“Whatever you say.”

“Well, what do you think I should wear, O fashionista dog?”

“The sweater’s fine,” Ginger observed. “But I’d switch out the jeans for a skirt. You do have a skirt, don’t you?”

“Yes, I have a skirt. I also have rounds to make before dinner, so I’m changing into my work clothes right now.”

Ginger sighed an it’s-no-use kind of sigh. “Paris Hilton you ain’t,” she said, and drifted off to sleep.

Olivia returned to her bedroom, put on her normal grubbies, suitable for barns and pastures, then located her tan faux-suede skirt, rolled it up like a towel and stuffed it into a gym bag. Knee boots and the blue sweater went in next, along with the one pair of panty hose she owned. They had runs in them, but the skirt was long and the boots were high, so it wouldn’t matter.

When she got back to the kitchen, Ginger was stretching herself.

“You’re coming with me today, aren’t you?” Olivia asked.

Ginger eyed the gym bag and sighed again. “As far as next door, anyway,” she answered. “I think Butterpie could use some company.”

“What about Thanksgiving?”

“Bring me a plate,” Ginger replied.

Oddly disappointed that Ginger didn’t want to spend the holiday with her, Olivia went outside to fire up the Suburban and scrape off the windshield. After she’d lowered the ramp in the back of the rig, she went back to the house for Ginger.

“You’re all right, aren’t you?” Olivia asked as Ginger walked slowly up the ramp.

“I’m not used to running through snow up to my chest,” the dog told her. “That’s all.”

Still troubled, Olivia stowed the ramp and shut the doors on the Suburban. Ginger curled up on Rodney’s blanket and closed her eyes.

When they arrived at Tanner’s place, his truck was parked in the driveway, but he didn’t come out of the house, and Olivia didn’t knock on the front door. She repeated the ramp routine, and then she and Ginger headed into the barn.

Shiloh was back in his stall, brushed down and munching on hay.

Olivia paused to greet him, then opened the door to Butterpie’s stall so she and Ginger could go in.

Butterpie stood with her head hanging low, but perked up slightly when she saw the dog.

“You’ve got to eat,” Olivia told the pony.

Butterpie tossed her head from side to side, as though in refusal.

Ginger settled herself in a corner of the roomy stall, on a pile of fresh wood shavings, and gave another big sigh. “Just go make your rounds,” she said to Olivia. “I’ll get her to take a few bites after you’re gone.”

Olivia felt bereft at the prospect of leaving Ginger and the pony. She found an old pan, filled it with water at the spigot outside, returned to set it down on the stall floor. “This is weird,” she said to Ginger. “What’s Tanner going to think if he finds you in Butterpie’s stall?”

“That you’re crazy,” Ginger answered. “No real change in his opinion.”

“Very funny,” Olivia said, not laughing. Or even smiling. “You’re sure you’ll be all right? I could come back and pick you up before I head for Stone Creek Ranch.”