Beneath the Christmas Stars

by Tracey Alvarez

  He dipped his head and aligned their mouths, Karen’s breath misting softly on his skin. She didn’t jerk away, perhaps caught in the same gravitational pull as he. Their lips touched; hers were chilled silk, brushing tentatively against his. A soft, sharp inhale sounded as she stilled beneath his touch. Then her fingers curled around the neckline of his shirt and tightened, holding him in place.

  Not that he was going anywhere. If you like a girl well enough to kiss her, don’t do a half-arsed job of it. About the only advice from his big brother he’d ever agreed with.

  Another breath, and he couldn’t resist any longer. He took her mouth, teasing a sigh from her as their lips moved in perfect synchronization. One kiss led to the next. At first slow and unsure, exploring the other’s rhythm, then deepening into an unexpected heat. She tasted as sweet as he’d hoped. Sweeter, in fact. And it was a taste that could easily turn into an addiction.

  Art’s heart went from a slow cruise to warp speed. The shock of his reaction to her, and the sudden piercing wolf whistle from the direction of the lake, caused him to break off the kiss.

  Karen’s big green eyes met his, and for a moment their connection held steady in the midst of sounds of applause. He scrambled for an explanation to define what he was scared was undefinable. Something he couldn’t logically label and catalog.

  She lurched to her feet, and the chill of the late afternoon breeze prickled his skin as their towels fell to the ground.

  “Well, well, well.” Jeff smirked as he strolled onto the grass with his board.

  His sister grinned like the proverbial cat that got the canary and dropped her board next to his. She dipped into her tote bag and pulled out a thermos and four plastic mugs. “Guess you two won’t need the hot chocolate I brought to warm up?”

  He didn’t catch Karen’s muttered reply while he continued to gather up his things. “Not for me,” he said.

  More rattled than he realized, he couldn’t meet Karen’s eyes. He stooped and picked up his board and then hoisted hers, too. “I’ve got to head back and get ready for work tonight.”

  Before anyone could accuse him of kissing and running—which he totally was—he headed back to the safety and logic and formulas that explained the universe. Stars, he knew. A woman who had somehow turned him inside out with just one kiss was beyond his comprehension.

  Chapter 4

  December 24

  Just before dawn was Karen’s favorite time of day.

  Usually. This morning, not so much.

  Bare toes curling on the chilly wooden floor, she got dressed in double time in thick leggings, a long-sleeved merino top, and a fleecy sweatshirt jacket. The now-completed knitted hat sat on top of her dressing table, along with her knitting needles and spare yarn that she carried everywhere with her. Some women wouldn’t leave the house without their makeup bag; Karen wouldn’t leave the house without her craft bag.

  Guess what she’d been doing at one in the morning when she couldn’t sleep?

  But not even the soothing monotony of one row knit, one row purl could keep her mind from dwelling on That Kiss. Capital T, capital K.

  She crinkled her nose at the bedroom mirror and the purple-blue bags that had appeared under her eyes after a restless night. She needed to do something to distract herself, and yoga was just too contemplative to clear her head of everything Art. A run was just the thing.

  Easing out of her room into the hallway she came face-to-face with the man himself, also dressed in running shoes, black workout pants, and a black hooded jacket.

  “I didn’t know anyone else was up and about.” He ran a palm over his bed-rumpled hair. “Jeff’s not a morning person.”

  “Neither’s Moira. She’s allergic to light in her room before seven thirty and heaven help anyone who disturbs the sleeping bear.” She could have kicked herself. Why had she said that? She could’ve pretended she was on her way to wake Moira up to accompany her on a run.

  “Sounds like Jeff. The first week I moved in he threw a golf club at me for waking him up. There’s a dent in the wall by his bedroom door.”

  “He’s got killer aim.”

  “Yeah.”

  His gaze slid down to her feet. “Want some company on your run?”

  She could hardly say no and be a rude houseguest, so she found her chirpiest morning smile and plastered it across her mouth. “Sure. Misery loves company, right?”

  He chuckled and made an after you gesture toward the front door. “Running makes you miserable?”

  “Only for the first two miles.”

  She gave him as wide a berth as she could, which wasn’t a great deal considering the narrowness of the hallway, and led the way, her nose twitching like a rabbit’s as the fresh scent of his cologne curled around her. Oh, Lord, the smell of him invited a woman to gobble him up for an early breakfast. She found herself holding her breath as they stepped out into the cool predawn light.

  Art stood beside her on the deck, hands on hips, studying the horizon as she was. He flicked a glance at his watch. “Twenty to six,” he announced. “If we get a move on, we can be at the Church of the Good Shepherd to watch the sunrise.”

  “That was my plan,” she said. “I figured not many tourists would be up at this ungodly hour.”

  He grinned. “Only tourists would get up this early. Sensible locals sleep in. But come on—we can walk to the lakeside and do some stretches before we run.”

  They left the house at a brisk pace, the small town’s streets deserted and only a couple of cars passing them on the short walk to the lake. As they took a shortcut through the small shopping center, Karen stumbled on an uneven paver. Art was immediately there, cupping her elbow and preventing her from face-planting onto the concrete. After he’d steadied her, his hand somehow found its way into hers.

  Nerve endings tingling like crazy, she kept her gaze on the sidewalk, trying to convince her racing pulse that she was far too cool and sophisticated to get butterflies because some random cute guy held her hand.

  Her butterflies disagreed, suggesting Art wasn’t random, that he wasn’t just some cute guy. Obviously Moira must’ve added something extra to the eggnog she’d made last night. And speaking of Moira, something was up, because her best friend hadn’t teased her about Art at all. At all. Completely out of character for Meddling Moira, as she sometimes referred to her—in her head, anyway.

  They cut across the church parking lot large enough to accommodate the daily arrival of tourist buses. The iconic stone church, which had stood on this picturesque spot since the mid-1930s, seemed to glow as the sky changed from gray to a gold-dusted, hazy pink.

  “Come around to the back,” he said, guiding her down the side of the church to the jumble of rocks and small boulders on which the lake waters hissed ashore in lazy waves.

  The lake itself was a turquoise jewel. It spread before them with reflected hues of the pink, orange, and gold clouds, like some sorcerer’s great mirror stretching to the backdrop of sun-kissed mountains.

  “Oh,” she whispered as he led her to a flat outcropping of rock overlooking the lake. She leaned against his arm as they stared at the ball of fire cresting the mountains. “It’s magical.”

  He released her hand, slid his palm to her waist, and tucked her into his side. It felt so right to be with him, witnessing the simple miracle of a sunrise, and she let her head rest on his shoulder, her arm snaking around his waist.

  “It’s molecules and small particles in the atmosphere that change the direction of light rays, making them scatter and—”

  Before them was the wonder of nature and he was trying to make it cold and clinically scientific? She stiffened and he gave a wry chuckle, tightening his grip on her. “And it’s pretty magical, just the same. Especially on Christmas Eve.”

  “Nice save.”

  Nicer if he actually believed it. Could a scientist even believe in magic? Or were they bound by their profession to always seek reason and statistics, with no room for mys
tery and boundless possibilities?

  The very fact she’d kissed him—when she’d never kissed a man she’d just met before—was proof of magic. Her topsy-turvy stomach from being this close to him and the galloping of her heart in wanting to kiss him again were magic. The kind that only came around once in a blue moon, something this astronomer should know something about.

  But maybe he didn’t feel the same way. Maybe he kissed a lot of women after he’d half drowned them in the lake.

  She turned with the intention of discussing their make-out session on the beach like the calm, rational adults that they were, only to find that Art wasn’t looking at the view—he was looking at her. And, oh my, the way he was looking at her…magic.

  Her fingers knotted around the draw cord of his hoodie and she tugged, drawing his head down while she rose up to her toes, leaning into him. He slid his arm around her, holding her close, making her breath—white vapor in the still air—hitch in her throat. A thousand questions spun around her brain, but none she could vocalize because one dominated them all.

  Will I ever be the same if I kiss him again?

  She pressed her mouth to his, which felt both strange and familiar all at the same time. A small part of her wanted to keep her eyes open to see if he was having the same bone-melting experience as she was, but his lips felt so good she couldn’t. Her eyelids fluttered shut and she forgot about the rosy sky above, the soft hiss of tiny waves rippling over the lake’s rocky edge, and the chill numbing her fingertips. There was nothing but the heat of Art’s mouth, his lips coaxing, and teasing, and driving hunger into every part of her body.

  She twined her arms around him, and he cupped her jaw in his big hand. Not even the touch of his fingers on her skin could break the spell. He had cast a spell on her, because Karen Wallace didn’t do PDAs if she could help it, and this was the second time in less than twenty-four hours.

  With jellified legs, she finally dragged her mouth from Art’s. For a moment they just smiled at each other, and then he kissed her again—a sweet, finishing up dessert of a kiss.

  “We have an audience,” he said quietly, tipping his head to the side to see past her shoulder.

  Karen followed his line of sight to where two wild rabbits sat on their haunches watching them, their little bunny noses twitching. She grinned and turned back. “That boy bunny doesn’t like you,” she said.

  “Why is that?” He draped a loose strand of her hair that had escaped her ponytail behind her ear.

  “That kiss set the bar way high, and that rabbit has work cut out for him to impress his lady friend.”

  He wriggled his eyebrows suggestively. “I impressed you with my magical kissing prowess, then?”

  “Eh. It was more of a parlor trick than magic.”

  She managed to keep a straight face as she picked her way across the rocks to the grassy bank leading up to the church. She gripped the post of the fence that surrounded the church and began to stretch out her calf muscles.

  “Parlor trick?” Art moved to the next fence post and balanced on one leg, easing into a stork stretch. “I can see I’ll have to up my game. Challenge accepted.”

  * * *

  Art wasn’t particularly good at the domestic skills of cooking and baking, which was why having a chef roommate was a bonus. He made a mean macaroni and cheese, and he could throw a chicken into the oven with a few vegetables to roast same as any other culinary half-wit. But making a pavlova for their Christmas dinner with Karen wasn’t an opportunity he intended to turn down.

  Jeff had gone in to work a lunch shift, taking Moira with him so he could show her some fancy-pants new dish he’d added to the menu. It was Karen’s suggestion that they surprise Moira by helping out with tomorrow’s dessert, since she and Jeff had organized the rest of the meal.

  With only eggs, sugar, cornstarch, vanilla extract, and white vinegar as ingredients, how hard could this classic Kiwi dessert be?

  “Right,” he said, geared up for battle with his borrowed apron and can-do attitude. “What do we do first?”

  Karen, beside him at the kitchen counter, checked the recipe she’d found on her phone. “We have to separate the egg whites and egg yolks.”

  He slid her sideways glance. She’d showered and changed after their run, and looked crazy cute in another screen-printed llama T-shirt and cut-off jeans. Her shampoo or body wash, which smelled like apricots or some other juicy summer fruit, had driven him mad as they’d wandered down to the village for lunch. They’d brought sandwiches and a thermos of hot tea, finding a picturesque spot to sit overlooking the lake while they ate. It was simultaneously frustrating trying to keep his hands off her and enjoyable because they shared a love of scary movies and rugby, and found plenty to talk about.

  He gently hip checked her. “You’re not a pav-baking virgin, too, are you?”

  “Oh, ha ha. You’re such a comedian.” She crinkled her nose at him. “Confession time: yeah, I am.”

  “Stellar,” he said. “With my brains and your beauty we’ll figure it out.”

  She hip checked him back, bumping him half a step sideways. “That is so sexist, I can’t even.”

  He laughed, having known he’d get a rise out of her. He showed her his palms. “Okay, okay. With your brains and my beauty, we’ll figure it out.”

  “That’s better.” She passed him the tray of eggs. “Now, let’s crack some eggs before I crack the whip.”

  “Feisty. I like it.”

  He liked her, too. More than what was a safe level to like someone who he probably wouldn’t see again after the holidays.

  The thought sobered him, and he concentrated on watching the video clip of egg separating that Karen showed him on her phone. After a few failed attempts, they unanimously agreed Karen was better at the fiddly job of keeping whites and yolks separate. They poured the egg whites into the mixer bowl and set the machine going. With little else to do than stare at the slimy egg whites becoming opaque, Art leaned a hip against the counter.

  “How did you get into llama and alpaca wrangling?”

  “You make it sound like I work in a rodeo.”

  “I don’t know much about the animals,” he admitted.

  Karen checked on the egg whites, the corner of her mouth dimpling. “Probably about as much as I know about—what is it you do again? Astrology?”

  He snorted out a laugh. She was something else, this girl. “Touché, smart arse. It’s astronomy.”

  Her giggle shimmered through him, sending delicious ripples of awareness down his spine. When she finished chuckling, she passed him the bowl of superfine sugar. “Add this a little at a time.”

  He dumped about a quarter of the sugar into the bowl, where it was whisked into the fluffy white mixture.

  “What do you know about llamas and alpacas?” she asked.

  “They look like humpless camels. They come from South America where people make ponchos out of their fleece. And they spit when they’re cranky. That’s about it. Oh—and pretty much everything I know about them comes from watching The Emperor’s New Groove with my nephews over and over.” He grinned. “Love that talking llama.”

  “Please.” Karen rolled her eyes prettily. “They’re so much more than a cartoon caricature.”

  Art tossed in another pile of sugar. “Convince me. Start from the beginning.”

  “Really? You want to know about my work?”

  He wanted to know everything there was to know about her. “It’s not just your work, though, is it?” That much he could tell by the way her face softened when she talked about the animals. “It’s your thing. The thing you were made to do.”

  She slanted him a glance, as if suspicious that he was only telling her what he thought she wanted to hear.

  “I mean it.” His heart leapfrogged around his ribs. “I want to get to know you. Really.”

  The smile that rose on her face was brighter than this morning’s sunrise, and it affected him just as deeply.

  “
Okay. You asked for it.”

  He emptied the bowl of sugar and let the mixer do its thing.

  “When I was about twelve, I was horse crazy and desperately wanted to work in a stable. I’d given up on pestering Mum and Dad for a pony in the backyard when I was younger, and moved on from being satisfied with weekly riding lessons. Unfortunately, a lot of other girls the same age with better connections than me wanted the same thing. Dad knew a guy who knew a guy that bred llamas and alpacas and lived on a lifestyle block not far from us. He took me out to their section one Saturday afternoon to meet Sally and Steve Chambers. Sally and Steve were so sweet to me, letting me hand-feed their herd and patting a couple of babies.”

  She shrugged, her mouth twisting as she continued. “I could tell from the expression on Dad’s face that he believed I would think this even better than horses, and in the excitement with which he told me that Sally and Steve had agreed that I could come every weekend to help for some extra pocket money. I didn’t have the heart to disappoint him.”

  “An inauspicious start, then?”

  “I thought they were nice enough animals, but they weren’t horses.” She wrinkled her nose. “And like you, I’d heard they spat. Which, as a twelve-year-old, grossed me out.”

  “But they obviously grew on you?”

  “Their adorableness wore me down. I’d been to the Chamberses’ for about two months when one of the females gave birth. Sally and Steve let me name her.”

  “What did you call her?”

  “Beyoncé.” She added the remaining ingredients to the mixer.

  “Interesting choice,” he said diplomatically, struggling to keep a straight face.

  “It went with all the names of the other animals.” Karen switched off the mixer and wiggled her fingers at him to pass over the prepared baking tray. He did, and moved to stand next to her, examining the meringue mixture.

  “Now we pile it onto the baking paper in a mound about the size of a dinner plate.”

  He handed her a spatula. “You go, girl,” he said in a truly terrible diva voice.