Hayley Gardner - A Baby In His Stocking

“I hope your playmate has gone home,” she said, setting her purse on a side table.

“You’re sounding more like your mother every day,” Mack said, grinning up at her.

“That’s good, right?” Leaning over, she kissed him on the forehead, then lowered herself into her father’s black leather easy chair. “But compliments and evading the subject will get you nowhere.”

“Oh, we can get to Jared in a minute.” Waving his hand in dismissal, Mack swiveled in his chair to face her. “First, the most important thing—how did it turn out with old Santa?”

She sighed deeply, which said it all.

“You think it was the Grinch again, too, huh?” Mack asked.

Nodding, she kicked off her loafers and buried her stockinged toes in the golden rug. “It had to be. We found a container of some of that gag-gift sneezing powder we sell, and the nearest I can figure out, it was sprinkled on Mr. Whitney’s Santa beard. As soon as he stopped sneezing, he said it was obvious someone had a warped sense of humor at Denton’s, and he wasn’t spending another minute waiting around for the next joke, ’cause they weren’t funny.”

The corners of Mack’s mouth curled slightly upward. “I always said that old geezer didn’t have a sense of humor.”

“Dad!” she scolded, but she was smiling, too. “Just remember, I don’t want you to get stressed out over this.” With faked optimism, she added, “We’ll find another Santa, and we’ll get that Grinch.”

“Dam tootin’.” Her father’s grin seemed awfully smug and self-assured to Shea. “I’ve got it all under control.”

“You do?” Her eyes narrowed as he rolled his chair back to his desk, picked up his pen and resumed writing in his check ledger. “How is that possible—for you to have found a solution already?”

Her father turned just enough to grin at her again. The twinkling in his eyes seemed magical, with an extra sparkle that came from goodness only knew where. She hadn’t seen him looking this happy in weeks. But instead of being comforted, the twinkle, along with his almost Cheshire-cat look, made her feel wary.

And then she knew. She actually knew. She wasn’t her father’s daughter for nothing. Her mouth fell open. “You couldn’t. You wouldn’t.”

“Of course I would.” Mack returned to his checkbook. “I’m sure Jared will help us find the Grinch.”

Nerves began jumping in protest all through her body. Pushing herself out of the chair, Shea walked the length of the room and back again, shaking her head in disbelief. To have to face Jared for the next week or so as the divorce crept up on them like her own personal Ghost of Christmas Future—no thanks. She couldn’t do it. She wouldn’t.

“Jared won’t stay here,” she told her father’s back in a soft tone. Jared wouldn’t want to face her every day until the divorce went through, either. “Has he actually said yes?”

“Well, to be honest,” Mack said, still scribbling, “I haven’t asked him yet. I told him to get something to eat since I had to pay some bills first before I talked to him. He’s due here shortly.” Pausing, Mack glanced up at her, then gave her an amused stare. “From the way you’re looking at me, you want either to change my mind or wring my neck. Have at it.”

“Dad,” she said, her voice serious, “this is not a joke. This is my life. You are not going to ask him to stay in Quiet Brook. I don’t want him here.”

“You might not, but the store needs him,” Mack said. “He’s a private detective, remember? When he finds the Grinch, all our problems will be solved.”

Shea closed her eyes. Of course she remembered. Jared had quit the force when her father had found out that Jared’s dream was to open his own detective agency and had lent him the money. He’d already paid back the loan shortly before Christmas last year, and that had been one of the times she’d actually seen him celebrate something. He’d been so happy.

She sighed. It was time to put her foot down where her father was concerned. “You aren’t harboring some hopes that he and I will mend our differences, are you?”

“Even if it is Christmas,” Mack replied, then paused to lick the flap of an envelope, “heaven forbid I should waste my time wishing for that kind of miracle.”

She knew what he meant Feeling very tired, she sank back into the easy chair.

“Really, Shea, who better to find this troublemaker and give us back our storybook Christmas than Quiet Brook’s former hero?”

He was referring to the time when Jared had caught their store’s thief. Even so... “Jared and storybook Christmas do not belong in the same sentence. He finds Christmas painful.”

Mack frowned. “He told you that?”

“Let’s just say he made it clear that he wasn’t interested in Christmas trees or Christmas Eve dinners.” Or traditions or life in a small town.

“Maybe if he had all the fun of a Christmas in Quiet Brook, he would be,” Mack said almost gently, then rose to carry his mail out of the room.

Shea doubted that. Jared had already told her he just didn’t see the purpose of going through it all because Christmas was for kids—which he never wanted to have.

But now he would have to face that, willing or not, his child was on the way. She stared, unseeing, at the doorway. How on earth was she going to break it to him? And what would he do? Run?

“A candy cane for your thoughts,” her father said, startling her. Taking the sweet, she twirled it around in her fingers but didn’t tell him what she’d been thinking in return. She couldn’t tell Mack about the baby until she told Jared. Because Mack would ask if she had. Boy, would he ask. If she procrastinated, her father might even think it was his personal responsibility to tell Jared himself. He was that kind of man.

She couldn’t let that happen. No matter how things were between her and Jared, the news that he was going to be a father after all had to come from her, face-to-face. She supposed she would have to tell him while he was here now, however she dearly wanted to tell Mack he was going to be a grandfather as a Christmas present, and Christmas was less than two weeks away.

“So, Shea, I can count on you working with Jared to find the Grinch?”

Working with Jared? Wasn’t it bad enough the man was going to be in the same town? She gazed at her father, then down at the rug to hide her confusion. Could she be around the cool, indifferent man Jared had become for days, knowing that he didn’t care enough about her to try to change for the sake of love?

It hurt too much, and she didn’t want that hurt intermingling with her joy about the baby. She drew in a long breath. “I don’t want him here, Dad.”

“Hmm,” Mack said, his weathered forehead wrinkling. “Well, sweetheart, I’m going to have to overrule you here. You might manage the store, but I still own it. If you don’t cooperate with me, I’ll just lay you off for the whole time Jared’s here. Then you won’t have to deal with him.”

“So you’re saying if I cooperate, I have to be around Jared, and if I don’t cooperate, I lose my job?” Her mouth pursed as she was caught between amusement and just a little bit of exasperation at how easily he had boxed her in. “I hate you when you act like a boss.” Only half-teasing, she added, “And like an interfering old—”

“Keep it up,” Mack warned, “and I’ll lay you off indefinitely.”

Under her breath, she groaned. She couldn’t lose this job. She was all set to give her child the perfect life she’d had growing up in Quiet Brook—-except for the father part of it, she guessed. But more important than that, she couldn’t let her father fire her because he would take her place. If he resumed the full workload she was now handling, he might end up like her grandfather had—clutching his chest, collapsing and dying before her eyes, and there’d been nothing she could do to help him. She couldn’t let that happen.