Sawdust and Mistletoe

by Michelle Pennington

  Her floral scent swept over him, and his yearning to hold her—to have her near—overwhelmed him. What would it be like to know that every tomorrow would have her in it? His chest warmed at the thought, his heart beating faster. He didn’t know all the details of what that future would look like, but he knew he wanted it.

  Then he realized Ava was looking at him with a puzzled expression.

  “What?” she asked.

  He couldn’t tell her, so he lifted his paintbrush and smeared lemon-yellow paint down her nose.

  She gasped. “Hey.” Then she reached out and swiped her purple paint across his cheek.

  It was cold and wet against his skin, but he grinned at her. “Oh, it’s on now.”

  Ava scooted back, trying to get away from him, but he dipped his brush and lunged after her. She grabbed his wrists and tried to hold him back while stretching her neck to keep her face away. But with an easy twist of his wrist, he was free. He slid the brush from the top of her forehead down to the little, rounded tip of her chin.

  “Oh my gosh. You’re so juvenile” A laugh escaped her, and she shook her head.

  “Will you stop?”

  “Not a chance.”

  A buzzing noise came from Ava’s pocket. “Oh shoot. I need to answer that.”

  “I’m not stopping you.”

  He laughed at her dilemma since she was once again holding his wrists to keep him from painting her further.

  “Please? Timeout? What if it was Sharon calling about the ball.”

  Hunter nodded, knowing this was important, and sat back, holding his brush in the air in surrender. Ava dug her phone out. “It was. Cross your fingers for me.”

  She called her back and Hunter heard a faint feminine voice telling her something. He couldn’t catch the words, but the brightening expression on Ava’s face was enough to tell him it was good news. The sight of her yellow streaked face shining with excitement was beautiful, and Hunter couldn’t take his eyes off her.

  “Thanks so much, Sharon. I’ll make you proud,” Ava said before she hung up.

  “I take it you get to do the job.”

  But instead of answering, Ava lunged at him, wrapping her arms around his neck and hugging him tightly. The sudden movement caught him by surprise, and they tumbled over together, landing with Ava sprawled on top of Hunter.

  Their eyes met and held. The grin melted off of Ava’s face as she looked down at him. She dipped her head down, and for a moment Hunter thought she was going to kiss him. But then she pushed up sharply with both hands on his chest and turned away from him.

  “Well, we’d better hurry,” she said. “If we don’t finish this tonight, we might be in trouble, because starting tomorrow, we’re going to be incredibly busy.”

  “We?”

  “Yeah. You promised to help, remember? Surely you can take a paycheck from me as easily as from the temp agency.”

  “Easily, actually, since it means I can spend the day with you.”

  “Okay, but no flirting,” she said, turning her head to hide a blush.

  Hunter started painting again. “I wasn’t flirting.”

  But Ava ignored him. “Now, as long as nothing else goes wrong, it should be smooth sailing from here on out.”

  “Do you think Mrs. Garland and Marcia will give up that easily?”

  “I don’t know, but what else could they do?”

  Chapter Eighteen

  With the ball only five days away, Ava had to kick things into high gear. As promised, Hunter signed on to her crew and she kept him busy. His biggest job was to come up with a way to string lights across the ballroom without damaging the antique wood trim. He spent most of his time in her garage welding.

  Ava and Olivia kept busy making centerpieces and giant-sized sugar plums to decorate with. They covered silk flowers and holly leaves and pinecones in clear glitter until everything looked as if it was covered in sugar.

  “This looks so cool,” Olivia said as she looked over their creations.

  They were using Ava’s house as a staging center for the decorations, so every table, counter, chair and most of her floor was full of sugar plum finery.

  “I’m just glad we can move it all over to the ballroom and start putting it up tomorrow. If it was going to stay here any longer than that, I swear I’d have a panic attack.”

  Olivia smiled at her and started painting another pine cone with Modge Podge. “Whatever. I know you are dealing with the whole Christmas thing better than you were. Hunter must be working his magic on you in more ways than one.”

  Ava glanced toward the wall that separated the living room from the garage. “If you mean he’s made things more fun, then, yes.”

  Just then, Hunter came through the front door holding his shoulder. His expression was tight like he was in pain.

  “What happened?” Ava asked stepping towards him.

  “Oh, I was grinding a piece of pipe and put too much pressure on it. It slipped off the vice and one end came up and hit me.”

  “Oh no.”

  “I don’t think it’s too bad, but I feel something wet in my sleeve, so I think it might be bleeding.”

  “Let me look at it.” Concerned, Ava reached out and started pushing his open plaid shirt off his shoulders. Part way through the motion though, she looked up and met his eyes, only to realize they were blazing down at her. She blushed and stepped back.

  Hunter didn’t say a word, just shrugged his shirt off the rest of the way. He wore a thermal shirt underneath it and the long sleeves were too tight to push up and expose his injury. Red was seeping through, however.

  “Yep, you’re bleeding.”

  “Great observation,” Hunter said.

  “I’ll go get the first aid kit,” Olivia said. “Is it still under the sink in your bathroom, Ava?”

  “Yeah,” Ava answered, but she couldn’t take her eyes off Hunter. The man was taking off his shirt. In her living room.

  Ava got a good look at his work-hardened chest and six-pack and swallowed hard. He turned his shirt right-side out and dropped it on the back of a chair piled with centerpieces. As he did so, Ava watched the play of taut muscles across his back and shoulders but tried to act cool.

  “So…” Her voice came out higher pitched than usual. She cleared her throat, “So, let’s look at your arm.”

  She stepped closer and Hunter held his arm out from his body. He looked sideways down his arm at his injury while she studied it. She touched his arm, turning it to the side, and just that slight touch sent her pulse into overdrive. “You are going to have a nice bruise and you scraped off a few layers of skin.”

  Hunter met her eyes again and his jaw flexed. “It’s not too bad.”

  Ava realized there was no reason to keep holding his arm and let go. But as if her fingers had a mind of their own, they ran down his arm. Ava’s eyes shifted away from his face, embarrassed, and saw his pecs and biceps tighten reflexively. She noticed his breathing was as shallow as hers.

  “Found it,” Olivia said coming back in.

  Ava turned toward her in time to see Olivia’s eyes bug out as she took in Hunter’s bare chest.

  “Merry Christmas,” she said, her voice awed.

  Completely appalled that both of them were acting like they’d never seen well-developed muscles before, Ava grabbed the first aid kit and started rummaging around for an alcohol wipe.

  “Olivia, there’s a big bottle of hydrogen peroxide in the bathroom. Will you go pour some over his sleeve so it won’t stain?”

  Olivia grinned. “You just want to get me out of the room again.”

  Ava held out the first aid kit. “Tell you what—I’ll do that. You can bandage him up.”

  “Do I get a say?” Hunter asked.

  “No,” Ava said.

  But Olivia grabbed the shirt. “I’m going.”

  Ava sighed and ripped open the alcohol packet. “This will sting.”

  Hunter smiled. “I think I can handle it.”
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  He was right. He didn’t even flinch until Ava blew on the wound to ease the sting. “You’re killing me here,” he said.

  Ava glanced up quickly then reached for a tube of ointment. “Sorry, my mom always did that.”

  “I didn’t say I minded.”

  Fighting the urge to smile, Ava gently smoothed antibiotic ointment over his skin, then opened a large bandage that would cover the area. “That should do it.”

  “Thanks. Sorry to cause so much trouble.”

  “What trouble? I just feel bad you got hurt.”

  “It happens all the time.”

  Standing at eye-level with all his exposed skin was dangerous, so Ava turned away and started putting all her first aid supplies back in the kit. Hunter picked up his plaid shirt and shrugged into it. Ava hated how disappointed she felt, but couldn’t help but notice that even watching him buttoning his shirt was fascinating.

  Olivia came in, holding his thermal shirt. “Oh man. Do you have to put that back on?”

  Hunter grinned. “Yeah. It’s cold outside, in case you haven’t noticed. I’m going to run home and change. Is that okay?”

  Ava nodded. “Yeah. We just need to hurry. I want to get as much loaded in my van tonight as we can to save time tomorrow. How’s your project going.”

  “Good. I should be able to finish it in a couple hours after I get back.”

  “Perfect.”

  “I’ll be back soon,” Hunter said, stepping out the door.

  Ava shut the first aid kit, very aware of the silence in the room.

  “Holy crap, Ava. That man is smokin’ hot.”

  Rolling her eyes, Ava headed to the bathroom. “Do you think I didn’t notice. And you! You acted like a hormonal teenager.”

  “I felt like one. Tell me again why you two aren’t dating? Because that man looked like he wanted you to do more than fix his owie.”

  “Olivia, will you please shut up? Go glitter some pinecones.”

  ***

  The next morning, Ava pulled up at the venue with her van full of decorations. Olivia was already there, eating a breakfast sandwich in her car, and Hunter pulled up next to her with the pieces to his light-hanging contraption in the back of his truck.

  “Let’s do this,” Ava said as they met at the back of her van.

  For the next few hours, they unloaded, organized, and started decorating the ballroom. The hotel staff brought them a lift, and Hunter used it to start hanging lights. His system of thin pipes ran along the trim work near the ceiling. The cords fed through them, connecting together, and the strands stretched out across the dance floor, arching toward the center of the room.

  “It’s looking amazing,” Ava called up to him.

  “Good. Because it’s freaking hot up here. Think you could get the heat turned down?”

  “No way,” Olivia said. “It’s freaking cold down here.”

  Ava chuckled and went back to work. She and Olivia arranged the giant candy decorations they’d made into arches and vignettes around the room. They stopped only for a quick lunch, and by the end of the day, Ava was seriously considering hiring some temps to get the rest done tomorrow. Sharon was meeting them at one o’clock for a walk-through before the hotel staff would come in to place the tables and chairs. By then, they needed to have everything done but the centerpieces and finishing touches.

  Hunter got down from the lift and walked over to where Ava and Olivia waited by the door. He paused, rubbing his neck and looked around the ballroom. “Wow. It looks great already. I couldn’t tell what it looked like from up there.”

  “Your neck sore?” Ava asked.

  “Oh yeah. Want to massage it for me?”

  Ava saw Olivia’s smirk and blushed. She shook her head at Hunter. “Stop teasing me.”

  “Who’s teasing?”

  Olivia chuckled. “Well, I have a date tonight, so I’m out.”

  Ava laughed and followed Olivia out to the parking lot. Hunter walked beside her with his hands in his pockets. Ava was highly aware of how close he was with the warmth from their bodies mingling together.

  “So who has a date on a Wednesday night?”

  Hunter smiled down at her. “Olivia, apparently. But you could have one too—if you wanted.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  He nodded. “You said you’d come watch a movie with me and Molly. She’s getting very impatient that I haven’t brought you over yet.”

  She bumped his arm with her shoulder. “Well, I can’t let you break a promise to Molly.”

  “Thanks. Do you want to follow me over there?”

  “Actually, would you mind if I went back to my house first and changed into something more comfortable?”

  Hunter grinned. “No guy has ever said no to that question.”

  Ava chuckled, surprised. “Get your mind out of the gutter. If memories of your lace monster are giving you ideas, you’ll be disappointed by my yoga pants.”

  Hunter raised an eyebrow and leaned against his truck. “Firstly, she wasn’t my lace monster. Secondly, I have a feeling that seeing you in yoga pants might have the exact effect Mrs. Garland was going for.”

  Ava raised both her eyebrows. “Sweats it is, then. See you in a little while.”

  Ava got in her car and backed out. As she drove, she felt flushed from the way Hunter stood smiling at her as she drove away. She didn’t even need to turn on the heater in the car.

  When she got to her house, she kicked off her boots and skinny jeans, freshened up with deodorant and toothpaste, then pulled her hair up with a jaw clip. She felt like crashing into Krista’s couch, pulling Molly onto her lap, and vegging for the rest of the night. It was amazing how comfortable she already felt around Hunter’s family. If only the man himself didn’t set her so completely on edge.

  Feeling a bit gleeful, Ava threw on what she considered to be her least attractive couch potato clothes, an old pair of dark blue sweats and a long-sleeved t-shirt that had been thoroughly splattered with paint since it was one of her work shirts. Then with sudden inspiration, she dug through her drawer until she found the red and white striped fuzzy socks her mom had given her several years ago for Christmas.

  She put on her coat and walked outside. “Whoa.” The temperature had dropped about ten degrees just since she got home. The heater in her car was barely starting to warm up by the time she got to Josh and Krista’s house, so she was starting to actually shiver. She parked on the street and ran up to the front door.

  Hunter answered the door when she rang the doorbell. His smile did a lot to warm her up, but she brushed by him quickly to get into the house.

  “I can’t believe how cold it’s getting out there,” she said.

  Hunter looked out the little window at the top of the door. “Yeah. We might even get a little snow tonight. Finally.”

  Ava groaned. “Great. And I’m going to have to go home in that.”

  Molly ran in from the kitchen. “Ava! You’re here!”

  “Of course. I can’t wait to watch a movie with you.”

  Molly grinned and ran into the living room where she jumped on the couch, saying “Yay!” over and over again until Krista came in and told her to stop.

  Ava, who was still standing awkwardly near Hunter, went and sat on the middle cushion of the couch. She patted the cushion next to her. “Are you going to sit by me, Molly?”

  “Yes. I want my blanket.”

  Hunter picked up a blanket with rainbows and unicorns that looked well-loved and spread it over Molly’s pajama-clad legs. “You want one?” he asked.

  “A blanket?” Ava asked. “Definitely.”

  Hunter got one from a basket at the corner of the couch. It was a heavy, old-fashioned afghan. When he tossed it over her, she instantly relaxed.

  Hunter got the movie going, and Krista came in with a tray of cookies and popcorn. She handed Ava a mug of cocoa. “To help you warm up,” she said.

  “Thanks. Oh my gosh, you’re awesome.”

&n
bsp; Krista sat on the nearby love seat, and Hunter squeezed his bulky self in next to Ava, making room for his shoulders by putting his arm around her on the back of the couch.

  “Well, that’s the oldest trick in the book.”

  “I always stick with the classics,” he said, grinning at her.

  As the movie played, Molly started out singing along and laughing, but soon she got quiet and Ava noticed her little head was bobbing around.

  “I think Molly is asleep,” Ava whispered to Hunter.

  He leaned forward and looked at her, then reached across Ava to adjust Molly until she was laying across Ava’s lap.

  A few minutes later, the final credits rolled, and Krista scooped her up and carried her to bed. About this time, Josh came in the front door, covered in snow.

  “Man, it’s really coming down out there. Oh, hello, Ava.”

  “Hi,” she said, as she got up with Hunter to look out the window. Sure enough, big, fluffy flakes were falling and the front lawn was already covered.

  “I should probably get going,” she said.

  “What? No way. Look, it’s not even sticking to the road yet. Want to stay and watch National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation with me?”

  Ava paused. “I do love that movie.” More to the point, she wasn’t anxious to leave him.

  Krista and Josh were in the kitchen, so as they settled on the couch to watch the movie, it was just the two of them and the twinkling Christmas tree. Ava pulled her blanket back over her and allowed Hunter to pull her against his side. She was starting to relax when she felt Hunter messing with her hair. It tumbled down over her shoulders, and she turned in time to see Hunter tossing the clip on the table.

  “Hey.”

  “What? It was poking my arm.”

  “Brat,” she muttered. But she took the hint and snuggled into his chest. His arm settled around her, his hand curling around her waist. She loved the feelings that washed over her, sparkling, dancing, happy feelings. She loved the way she felt his chest shake with laughter beneath her cheek and the way his fingers absently combed through her hair.