The Secret of Santa

by Liz Isaacson

  Her family had been the Santa Claus in Three Rivers for four generations, and she was the first female Kris Kringle. A sense of pride filled her as she took in the baggy pants that would look spectacular once she tucked them into the oversized black boots. The pieces themselves never really inspired her, but with the wide, black belt around her waist, the fluffy beard against her face, and the twinkle in her eye that came every time she sat on Santa’s throne, Holly Ann did love playing the holiday hero that made children’s wishes come true.

  The role was important to her, because she felt like so many of her childhood prayers and wishes and dreams had not come true. Her mother hadn’t returned after walking out on her and Bethany Rose, for example, and she’d never gotten her Telly Talksalot doll. The year Bethany Rose had opened an Easy Bake Oven had been the highlight of the holidays for Holly Ann, and she loved holding children on her lap—even while they screamed—and letting them whisper their deepest wishes in her ear.

  In her time on the throne, Holly Ann had personally donated Christmas to a dozen families, sponsoring those she knew wouldn’t have anything after their children had perched on her knee and admitted all they wanted was a new pair of shoes.

  She’d made sure that tiny boy last year had gotten them. His sister had received a new dress too, and Holly Ann had bought every toy on their Santa Shops For Kids list. That program would not be getting cut this year, though Holly Ann knew she needed to pare down the list of activities in the Christmas Festival.

  She thought about the free miniature golf night, and that could probably go. Three Rivers designed a ton of events for families and kids, and the miniature golf course didn’t need to benefit from it. Families could take their children for sleigh rides in the downtown park or to write letters to Santa at the founder’s fountain.

  Holly Ann tilted her head as she settled the cheery Santa hat right above her eyebrows. Since she sported far darker features than her father, Holly Ann wore blue-colored contacts while playing Santa Claus, and getting those in and out would probably take the longest amount of time.

  She finger-combed the hair she’d glued inside the elfish hat and played with the fold of it, pulling on the white puff ball to get it to lay right.

  Finally satisfied, she picked up the belt and wrapped it around her waist. When it wouldn’t go all the way to the hole she’d used last year, lightning struck her mind. She’d started a catering company this year, and she may or may not have put on a few pounds.

  Her eyes widened in the mirror, and she quickly stripped everything off—the suit, the hat and wig, the bodysuit, and hurried into the bathroom.

  “Thirteen pounds,” she said, her voice mostly a gasp as she stared at the number on the scale. She looked up, but there was no mirror there. “You’ve gained thirteen pounds since last year. No wonder the suit doesn’t fit.”

  Horrified and disappointed, Holly Ann stepped off the scale. She’d never cared much about her weight, and perhaps her clothes had been a tad too tight recently. She liked her curves, and she liked food.

  But thirteen pounds?

  She carefully stepped back into the body suit, wondering if she could shave some padding out of it. After all, she now had more natural padding than before. The costume went over that, and she latched the belt one hole bigger.

  Santa didn’t need a waist, and the belt did help the coat sit better on her hips. She repositioned the hat and stepped into the enormous boots. She wouldn’t be able to run anywhere in these, and she reminded herself that she’d need to be sure to schedule herself time to change and get to Santa’s appointed appearance spots in plenty of time. The last thing she needed was to fall flat on her face because she was in a rush.

  No one wanted to talk to Santa when he had a black eye, and she wouldn’t be able to hide an injury the way she did her eye color.

  With only the beard left, Holly Ann faced the mirror again. This was always the trickiest part, and it could take her twenty minutes to get the facial hair positioned correctly and glued in place. “You don’t have that kind of time this year,” she told her reflection. “You have to practice until you can do it in two minutes flat.”

  Before she could begin, her doorbell rang. Snickers jumped to his feet from his nap time position on the bed, barking as he ran to the edge of the mattress.

  “Yes, you’re ferocious,” she said to him. “Come in!” she yelled, hoping her voice was loud enough for Daddy to hear.

  She reached up under the Santa cap and looped the beard around her ears. “Maybe I can glue the beard to the hat too,” she mused. Make the hair, hat, and beard all one piece. That could speed things up.

  “Holly Ann?” a man called.

  “In the bedroom,” she called back, distracted by the stupid loop that wouldn’t go up under the hair right on the left side. Yes, she definitely needed to make this a single piece. Then she could have everything arranged and correct before she even started getting dressed.

  “It’s Ace. You want me to come into the bedroom?”

  Holly Ann’s vision turned white. Her heartbeat raced. Her fingers turned numb. She dropped the beard.

  Her reflection was that of a female-faced Santa Claus, and Ace Glover absolutely could not see her like this.

  Gaining control of herself, she reached out and slapped the bedroom door closed even as footsteps came closer. “No!” she yelled a moment before the door slammed closed. “Sorry, I’ll be right out.”

  She pressed her eyes closed and held very still as if that would get Ace to leave. What in the world was he doing here?

  An alarm went off on her phone, forcing Holly Ann to turn and walk in the bulky boots to check what she needed to do. Lunch with Ace sat on the screen, and she groaned as she remembered that she’d agreed to go eat with his family up at the ranch today. They got together every Sabbath, and Holly Ann had been excited to attend today.

  She sat heavily on the edge of her bed, her phone gripped in her hands. Could she cancel now? He was already here, and she’d already talked to him. What would she even say?

  The doorbell rang again, and Holly Ann pressed her eyes closed. “Dear Lord, he’s going to have to meet my father without me.” She looked up at the ceiling. “Help him.”

  She felt bad praying when she’d skipped church, and she vowed to get up on time next week. Change and get out there, her mind screamed at her.

  She didn’t move, because she needed Daddy’s help with this Santa suit, and he was leaving town for the next week to teach at a police academy conference.

  “Do you want me to get that?” Ace asked, his voice dangerously close to the door.

  “Yes,” Holly Ann called. “It’s my dad. Will you send him back here for me? I’m not feeling very well, and I need to talk to him.”

  “Sure thing.”

  The doorbell rang again, and Holly Ann shook her head. “Jeez, Dad, give me two seconds.” She could just see him standing on the porch, the first two digits of 911 already dialed, his thumb hovering over the second one. He was jumpy and paranoid, but also the best man Holly Ann knew. He’d do anything for her and Bethany Ann, and he believed in anything and everything Holly Ann had ever wanted to do or try.

  He’d given her the funding to start Three Cakes, and she’d have him paid back in another four months, if business kept up as it currently was.

  “Holly Ann?” Her father’s knock came on the door, and then it started to open. He slipped inside, barely opening the door wide enough for him to enter. He wore a sharp look in his eyes, some of it edged with concern.

  “What is Ace Glover doing here?” he hissed as he came closer.

  “I forgot we were going to lunch with his family.” Holly Ann stood up. “So help me really fast, Daddy. Then I can go with him too.”

  “Help you really fast,” Daddy said, shaking his head. “This is not something you rush, Holly Ann.” He had a special way of making her three-syllable name into five.

  “Daddy, I have to rush it this year.”
She met her father’s eye in the mirror. “I just need help with the beard. I have to be able to get it on and in place quickly. What do you think I should do?”

  He scanned her from the cap to the big, black boots, a smile taking over his features. He beamed at her. “I love this suit.” He brushed something from her shoulder, and she let him have a moment.

  Then she said, “Help me, Daddy,” in a tone that had him squaring his shoulders and rolling them back as if he were about to enter a boxing ring for the fight of his life. “I think if you sew in the beard on one side, then all you’ll have to do is put on the cap, pull the beard up and around, and secure it on the other side.”

  “Genius,” she said. “Could I use a snap?”

  Daddy stuck his finger up into her hat above her ear. “I think a button would be better. It’ll give you some wiggle room and be easier to attach by yourself.”

  “I can’t really sew,” Holly Ann said, thinking of her younger sister. Bethany Ann could make the most complicated of Halloween outfits out of thread and fabric and feathers. The only problem was she didn’t know about this Broadbent tradition either.

  “Yes, you can,” Daddy said. “It was one of the classes you took during that decade where you were trying to find yourself.” He didn’t smile, but he didn’t intend for his words to be cruel. They sort of stung Holly Ann, but she didn’t show it.

  She couldn’t help her gypsy spirit, though she worked incredibly hard to subdue it. She did not want to be like her mother. She would not abandon her father and sister, despite her longing to see more of the world. To quell her need to constantly be doing something new, Holly Ann had tried dozens of different things, trying to find the one item that she could cling to and own.

  She’d learned to paint with oils and watercolors. She’d taken several gardening classes, and for a while there, she thought she’d open her own landscaping company. That hadn’t panned out, because Holly Ann didn’t like working in blazing hot temperatures and having mud under her nails.

  She’d worked for a theater company as an acting coach for a while, and she’d taken singing lessons. She’d taken one sewing class, but as that memory surged forward, so did the one where she hadn’t been any good at making straight lines with a needle and thread.

  “You’d do it by hand,” Daddy said. “I know your mother taught you how to sew on buttons.”

  Holly Ann said nothing, but she was already planning how she could sew in the beard. “Okay,” she finally said. “Help me mark it.”

  Together, they positioned the beard where it needed to go, making minute adjustments and ensuring it didn’t catch on the collar of her coat, where it could get pulled off easily.

  “Right here,” Daddy said, looking at her in the mirror. “It’s perfect. I’ll pin it.”

  Holly Ann resisted the urge to tell him to hurry. Every second they were in here together meant Ace was waiting out in her house somewhere. The reason she needed to provide changed with every breath, because what would he believe for why her father had come into her bedroom and not come out for fifteen minutes?

  With the beard pinned, Holly Ann said, “Okay. You go out and entertain Ace for a few minutes while I change and get this put away.”

  “Entertain Ace?”

  “Be nice to him, Daddy.” Holly Ann reached down and pushed off one boot. “I like this man.”

  Daddy grunted, the sound morphing into muttered words she didn’t catch as he left the bedroom. She didn’t have time to worry about it right now. She put the boots in the corner and stripped all the clothes off. She hung them on the special, extra-large hangers and did the same with the bodysuit.

  She removed the cap with the pinned beard last and set it on the shelf in her closet just-so. She’d have time to sew the beard tonight, after she returned from the ranch.

  Since she’d forgotten Ace was coming, she hadn’t chosen her outfit, and her mind raced with what she should wear to Sunday dinner with his entire family. At his generational ranch, where she’d only been once before.

  In the end, she chose clothes she loved and felt comfortable in, and she double-checked to make sure the closet door was closed before she left her bedroom. As she hurried down the hall, her shoes in her hands, she heard Ace say, “…that would be my mother,” and then he chuckled.

  She burst into the living room, scanning to take in the scene as quickly as possible. Ace sat on the couch, seemingly at ease in her house, one arm up on the back of the couch. Daddy perched on the piano bench facing Ace, his expression open and curious.

  “Is that right?” he asked, clearly in awe. “Well, I’ll be.”

  “You’ll be what?” Holly Ann asked, causing her father to turn toward her and Ace to leap to his feet. Their eyes met, and Holly Ann stepped toward him. “I’m so sorry, Ace. I wasn’t feeling well, and…I’m okay now.” She leaned right into him, balancing herself with one hand on his shoulder and kissed his cheek. “I just need to let Snickers out and put on my shoes and….” She glanced around, completely out of her element.

  “I’ll take Snickers,” Daddy said, bending to scoop up the little dog. “He likes me, and I need a friend today.”

  Holly Ann met her dad’s eyes, regret and guilt combining into a dangerous cocktail inside her. “Sorry, Daddy.”

  “We don’t have to go,” Ace said.

  “I want to.” Holly Ann sat down and slipped on her shoes. “Should I follow you up or are you willing to drive me all the way back down here?”

  “I’ll drive you,” he said, swallowing as he glanced at Daddy. “I saw they got your door off.”

  “They did.” Holly Ann smiled as she rose to her feet. She took his hand, claiming him in front of her father. She’d tried to wander from Ace before. She feared she’d do it again. Looking at him, this kind, hard-working, handsome cowboy, she really didn’t want to hurt him. At the same time, she couldn’t tell him about the Santa suit, and what good, kind, loving relationship was built on a secret? What relationship would work with a woman who couldn’t stick to any one thing? Whose attention skipped from thing to thing as easily as the wind changed direction?

  She swallowed down the questions and fears, thanked Daddy for taking Snickers, and nodded Ace toward the exit.

  Chapter Twelve

  Ace turned away from the gaping garage in front of him, his truck already in reverse. “When did they say the new door will be in?” He honestly hadn’t thought it would take a week to replace her garage door. At least she could drive her own car now.

  “Tomorrow” she said, and he felt her smile fill the cab.

  He looked at her, and she sure didn’t seem sick. She’d put a thin coat over the pine green sweater she’d had on, the scooping neck something that had made Ace swallow hard. The navy blue coat had enormous buttons up the front, tapered in at the waist, and flared over her hips.

  Ace could only think about kissing her. And then kissing her again while he put his hands on the belt around her waist. And then kissing her again as he slid his fingers through the silky, black ribbons of her hair.

  He swallowed and shifted in his seat. He’d kissed Holly Ann before, but it had been a while since they’d shared a really good kiss.

  “Tell me what to expect up here today,” she said.

  That got Ace talking, and the nervousness scampering through him settled into a normal knot of nerves he could deal with. He told her about the people who clashed, and the stories about Judge and Mister sounded pretty ridiculous as he told a couple.

  “Sometimes Bear and Ranger argue a little. Ward isn’t all that happy with Ranger right now either.” He glanced at her as they started down the South highway. “But we all get over things. We forgive each other, and we move on. If things get real bad, Bear and Ranger will call a family meeting.”

  “How often do you have family meetings?”

  “Every so often,” Ace said. “You were going to come to dinner after one last week. It wasn’t about anything bad, though.”

>   “But you just said he called a family meeting when things got bad.”

  “They’re for discussions,” Ace said, trying to figure out how to explain it. “So, we have twelve of us, right? I have eleven siblings or cousins, and we all work at the ranch. Everyone except the twins lives up there. Some of us—them—some people are getting married now, and they can’t live with their brother with their new wife, right?” He glanced at her, wondering if she’d heard all of that stumbling. “So we’re building new houses, and looking at some of our adjacent properties to make sure any Glover who wants to stay at Shiloh Ridge can actually do that.”

  “I see,” she said. “It makes things less complicated when there’s just two of you.”

  “That it does,” he said with a smile. “Is that you saying you don’t want a big family?” He didn’t dare look at her, in case this conversation was a bit premature.

  The weight of her gaze fell on the side of his face, but he gripped the steering wheel as if he was driving into the heart of a terrible storm.

  “I don’t know,” she said.

  “You don’t know if you want a big family?”

  “I don’t know,” she said, and her voice had turned quieter than normal.

  Ace dared to look at her then. “It’s okay if you don’t.”

  “What if I don’t want children at all?” She looked out the passenger window, and Ace didn’t like that. A new distance started to open between them, and he desperately needed to claw it back.

  “Hey, tell me what’s going on in your head,” he said.

  Holly Ann crossed her legs, which was a real feat in the jeans she’d painted onto her skin. He catalogued the movement and focused on the road again.

  “Only if you tell me something you’ve never told anyone.”

  “I have so many secrets,” he said, a frown infecting his mood. “They’re not all about me, though. Is that part of the deal?”