Cathy Thacker - A Mummy for Christmas

He shrugged. “Well…?”

Holly took the oven mitt from him, reached past him, hit the off button on the control panel and took the muffin pan from the oven. “Get your shoes on, kids!” she instructed.

Travis read her mind and went to get jackets for all. “We’re going out for breakfast today!” he announced cheerfully.

FORTY-FIVE MINUTES LATER, Holly and Travis were seated at a hard plastic table, enjoying their premium coffees and apple Danish pastries, while the kids—who had downed their own breakfasts in record time—climbed on the indoor playground. “You see, for every culinary disaster there’s a silver lining,” Holly teased.

Travis exhaled in frustration, still a little embarrassed by the mistake that had brought them here. He shook his head wryly. “I really thought I had it this time.”

She reached over and gave him a friendly pat on the arm. “You almost did,” she told him with a smile.

Travis shot her a level look. “If I built buildings the way I follow recipes,” he acknowledged dryly, “I’d be in big trouble.”

Holly held up a slender hand, cutting off his self-deprecating remarks. “You’re a very capable man.” She paused and wrinkled her nose at him playfully. “You just can’t cook anything that doesn’t come out of a box or a jar or a plastic bag.”

Travis waved at the kids, who were peeking through a mesh safety barrier at them, then turned back to Holly. “You do it with aplomb. So do a lot of other single parents—men included. My friend Jack, for instance, is an excellent cook. Jack’s daughter loves his cooking, the more gourmet the better.”

Holly’s eyes sparkled as she met his gaze. She leveled him with a look of her own. “First of all, it’s not a competition, between you or me and you and Jack or anyone else, okay? You parent in your own way, just as I do, and furthermore—” a self-conscious pink crept into her cheeks “—you’re a fantastic dad.”

Looking at her determined expression, Travis could believe it. Still, he didn’t like falling short in any category, and that went double when it came to anything pertaining to his kids. “Maybe I should take some cooking lessons,” he murmured.

“You really want to do that?” Holly looked surprised.

A little irked that in some ways she knew so little about him, and what made him tick, Travis tapped the center of his chest and countered, “What? Are you worried I’ll flunk out of the class or something?”

“No. Of course not. I just didn’t think you’d have time for something like that right now, with the holidays and the Trinity River Place project. And isn’t there something else you fellows are bidding on?”

Travis nodded. “A steering committee was just formed by some of the city’s leading philanthropists. They want to build a new opera hall if the funds can be raised, and we want to be ready if the project comes to fruition.” He paused. “And speaking of business, what’s on your schedule for the next two weeks, now that you’ve finished the restaurant mural?”

“Next week I’m doing murals for three exam rooms in a new pediatrician’s office. And a nursery mural for Grady and Alexis’s new baby after that, although I’m still waiting for Alexis to okay the design. We’re supposed to meet at her office next week.”

“You sound busy, too.”

Seemingly as reluctant to break up the cozy tête-à-tête as he was, Holly glanced at her watch. “Which is why we better get a move on if we want to get both our Christmas trees up and decorated today.”

SIX HOURS LATER, THE trees were up and twinkling in both their family rooms. Dinner and dishes were over. It was breaking up the four kids that was proving to be the problem.

“I don’t want to go back to our house, Daddy,” Sophie said with a pout.

“Me, either.” Mia stamped her foot. “I want to stay here with Tucker and Tristan and Holly.”

“You all need baths and pajamas,” Holly decreed.

“Why can’t they take their baths here?” Tucker asked.

“Yeah, they’ve done it before, plenty of times,” Tristan argued.

Holly looked at Travis. He, too, seemed to be wondering if this was a battle worth fighting. Suddenly, wordlessly, they were in agreement. “Okay,” he told the four kids. “You all can have your baths here, but they’re going to be quick ones tonight.”

“And then we get to watch A Charlie Brown Christmas together like you promised!” Sophie reminded him.

They had promised, Holly recalled. Hours ago. When they’d had no idea how long it would actually take to do all they had done.

Travis lifted his hands in surrender. A promise was a promise…

“Okay.” Holly relented, too. She and Travis exchanged empathetic looks before she continued. “And then everyone is going to go to sleep in their own beds.”

“Are we going to get new Christmas pajamas this year?” Tucker asked, once all four kids were back downstairs again, getting settled on the sectional sofa.

“Yeah, ones that match!” Tristan said.

“Of course,” Holly replied. That was one wish that was easily granted.

Travis looked at her with a question in his dark eyes. “It’s a family tradition,” she explained. “The kids get new pajamas on Christmas Eve and wear them to open their presents Christmas morning.”

“Well, we want to do that, too,” Mia said.

“Yeah, and we want ours to look just like Tucker’s and Tristan’s,” Sophie added.

Holly had no earthly idea what to say to that. For one thing, boys’ and girls’ pajamas were usually quite different in color and style. And Travis’s daughters favored pink!

“Can we?” all four kids said at once. “Please…can we?”

Yet again, Holly looked at Travis. And once more, he took the lead. “Sure,” he said, turning on the TV. The video started, and all four kids fell silent.

“DO YOU EVER THINK our families are a little too integrated?” Holly asked, when the two of them had retired to the kitchen.

Travis watched her spoon fragrant decaf French roast coffee into a paper filter. Like their kids, he found himself wishing the evening would never end.

Aware that Holly had paused, waiting for an answer, he said adamantly, “No. I don’t think our lives are too enmeshed.” In fact, there were nights—long, lonely evenings like the night before, when they each did their own thing with their own kids—when he wished they were more entwined.

Holly set the coffee on to brew, then turned around. She lounged against the edge of the granite counter, her hands braced on either side of her, and searched his face. “You never wonder what will happen if one of us moves away?”

Travis moved so they were a foot apart, and his arms folded in front of him. “I’m not going anywhere.” He thought of Cliff’s sudden reappearance in her and the twins’ lives. Uncertainty made him tense. “Are you?”

Her expression said that was a ridiculous question. “Well, no…”

Travis shrugged and held his ground. “Then it isn’t an issue,” he said flatly, wondering when things had gotten so personal between the two of them.

A pulse throbbed in Holly’s throat. “It could be if you started dating someone.”

“I’m not interested in remarrying. You know that.” Or at least, Travis amended silently, he hadn’t been until he’d kissed her. That had opened up such a realm of possibilities he no longer knew what the future held. Except for one thing. The woman next door. His best friend. “Are you?” he persisted.

“No,” Holly answered, just as quickly and resolutely. Her soft lips compressed stubbornly. “I decided long ago that’s not in the cards for me, either.”

“Then what’s the problem?” Travis asked softly, wondering what suddenly had her so on edge.