Just for Christmas Night

by Lisa Marie Perry

  Jules came around, yanking the heavy bag to the side and hurling the newspaper to the concrete floor. “Anyone at Club Indiscretion that night could’ve gone with Martha.”

  “I was the one standing in front of her when the kid made contact. I was there, I had a car and I could protect them both.”

  “You’re not that guy, Joaquin. The hero, the man to count on. You ain’t built that way.” Jules released the bag and it swayed slowly on the hook. “You’re the reigning champ—the machine.”

  “The machine wouldn’t save an innocent kid from getting done up on Lagoon Rock Road? The machine wouldn’t protect his woman?”

  “She can’t be yours,” Jules said wearily. “She’s nobody’s woman. If I believed what some folks say, I’d think she was everybody’s woman.”

  Joaquin stepped around the bag, ready to defend, ready to damage. “When you talk about Martha like that, you’re no longer my trainer, no longer my uncle.”

  Jules said darkly, “Your fight’s not against me. It’s not even against Brazda. It’s against you.” He bent to sweep up the front page of the newspaper. “You claim Martha now, but after MGM Grand, you can’t give her anything. You’re the champ because this life beats all else. My sons went for the marriage thing, but they’re not champions. C’mon, man, you tried to have that life with India, and it almost screwed your name beyond repair.

  “Martha’s got her heels dug deep in Las Vegas with her family and the football team, and now she’s got a runaway under her roof. You can’t have the strings—not even a beautiful one like her.”

  Can’t have. Restrictions, catches, limitations—he resisted them. A future that didn’t intersect with Martha’s looked hazy, vacant.

  I don’t want to lose her. Or the man I am when I’m with her.

  “I’ll defeat Brazda,” he said, severing the confrontation. “But I’m not the machine.”

  “Then what the hell are you?”

  “A man.”

  Chapter 13

  In the days that followed since Martha had opened her home to Avery, the praise and criticism and questions ratcheted her annoyance to unimaginable heights.

  The media wanted a piece of her any way they could get it—through family, friends, the Slayers, Faith House volunteers and even celebrities she’d been photographed with at various social functions.

  They wanted the story, the salability of a Las Vegas party-girl washing her reputation clean by rescuing a system kid from skid row. Critics congratulated her “brilliance” while touting theories that it was no more than a damage control tactic to boost the Slayers’ team image in light of new allegations of corporate corruption and misconduct.

  Approaching the NFC championship matchup, the game that could usher the team to the Super Bowl, the Slayers needed hype and support.

  Sports media outlets incessantly juxtaposed what was at stake for Las Vegas’s pro football team and champion boxer. Potentially, both could claim victory within a week of each other.

  The nation watched her, and wanted her to talk. Did she feel a sense of power to be at the core of Las Vegas’s professional sports? Could she describe her relationship with Joaquin Ryder? Would she return the child she rescued to Clark County after the NFC championship game and after Joaquin’s fight?

  No, no and no. No, she didn’t feel “power” in her designated role on the Slayers’ publicity team, or as someone who’d never watched an entire Joaquin Ryder fight. No, she couldn’t describe how or why she and Joaquin had let themselves become so complicatedly entwined with each other knowing it’d all unravel after his MGM Grand main-card event.

  No, she would not return Avery to circumstances the girl feared, as though she was the publicity stunt cynics suggested.

  Avery wasn’t a story—she was a child so loving and loyal to her foster mother that she’d never asked for help.

  Watching the girl sit in a treatment cubicle and list what her foster mother’s son had done—frightening her, tampering with her bedroom door, throwing out her clothes—had sickened Martha to the point that she’d rushed to a restroom.

  Then she had seen to it that Avery could make a choice. That Avery had chosen her was as surprising as the fact that despite how pissed she’d been at Faith House, the kid had trusted Martha enough to call her for help.

  Giving Avery a safe harbor was the right action. No matter how dead-set her family was to prove she was wrong. Even Danica, who’d worked legal wizardry at the hospital, experienced a mini-freak-out when Martha announced plans to become Avery’s caretaker.

  Primed to tell off the next person who tried to control her life, she braced herself when Joaquin arrived at her gates. She’d been expecting her friend Leigh for dinner—and moral support for her first Big Parenting Moment.

  Avery’s health teacher had informed Martha that during the girl’s absence from school the class had studied the human reproductive system. Martha imagined a classroom full of cringing and joking teens, but the teacher had implored her to do the responsible thing.

  Since she’d never explained sex to anyone, she had made good use of UNLV’s library and LVCCLD and loaded her Audi with books on the subject. At the last minute, she’d decided it couldn’t hurt to incorporate the sex-talk method her mother had used when Martha was a kid: using dolls as visual aids.

  Agitated that Joaquin would choose now to swing by, when she had a BPM to tackle, she opened the door and said, “I decided I’m not a fan of the pop-in.”

  “The what?”

  “Pop-in. Visits with no heads-up.”

  Joaquin gave her a steady look. “Martha, a foster kid’s in your place. The county needs to check up on things. You’re going to be getting good and familiar with the ‘pop-in’ as long as she’s here.”

  Good point, damn you. “Well, that should ease up once I complete my training hours. I’m checking everything off my list. Fingerprinting, background check, home inspection—”

  “You’re committed,” he said with enough sincerity to scrape away some of her preloaded grumpiness.

  “I am. I was the minute I agreed to bring Avery here.”

  “I came here to ask if you’re sure this is right for you.”

  “Please don’t you try to talk me out of this. Everyone else I know has already tried and failed. I’m giving her the chance that Jules gave you when he took you in.” She reached for his hand, and automatically their fingers laced. “C’mon in. I’ve been cleaning and sprucing things up. Avery tells me the house looks like a Pottery Barn catalogue. I’m thinking that’s a serious compliment.”

  In the living room, Joaquin paused, dropping her hand. “A Christmas tree? You put up a Christmas tree after Christmas?”

  “A winter tree.” She explained what Avery had told her about Christmastime at her foster mother’s place. Martha had bought the frosted artificial pine not to attempt to give the girl the holiday, but to offer the spirit of the season.

  It had remained bare until yesterday when Avery had written the word kindness on a piece of paper, threaded a ribbon through it and hung it on a branch. Without comment, Martha had followed Avery’s example, adding forgiveness to the tree.

  Neither had added one today.

  “Did someone make hot wings?” Joaquin asked, sniffing the air. “Wait…you cooked?”

  “I did. Why do you sound turned off?”

  “I’ve heard awful stuff about your cooking—” his laughter was low, teasing “—from you.”

  “Recipes, patience and the chef-in-training who lives here now are making a difference.” Martha sighed when his large, strong hand found hers again. “Sharing my life with this child and Rabbit, it feels right. But I miss us.”

  It’d been too long since he’d kissed her, since he’d inspired her to consider something outside the fairy tale her life had suddenly deviated from anyway.

  Husband, baby, puppy. She had a bunny, a teenage foster daughter and a lover who’d be swaggering out of her life in a couple of weeks.


  Edging close, he repeated her words. “I miss us. There wasn’t supposed to be an ‘us.’ But we couldn’t beat this.”

  Send him off when no one could put that kind of need in his voice but her? Let him leave Las Vegas without telling him she loved him? How the hell would she do it?

  “We were about to have dinner in the backyard, once my friend Leigh gets here,” she said. “Say hi to Avery? She’s been wanting to thank you for helping me rescue her. If she’s superskittish, don’t take offense. What she’s been through…”

  When she led him into the kitchen and Avery, who was still managing a sprained wrist, rushed him, Martha’s choices were to leap off to the side or be smashed in the middle of a hug.

  She leaped.

  “Thank you,” Avery said, squeezing Joaquin tight. “You care about people. On TV, they never say that.”

  Joaquin met Martha’s gaze, laid a fist on his chest. A goner, just as she’d been when she’d traipsed into Faith House with takeout pizza from Soixante Neuf.

  “I think he’s hoping for a free meal,” Martha told Avery. “Should he stay?”

  Nodding, Avery pointed to the cooktop. “I’m making the sauce, from a recipe my foster mom—uh, Renata—taught me.” She showed him a page in her worn photo album.

  “Solid recipe,” he commented. “Worcestershire—I respect that. Ever consider adding molasses? If you’re not too worried about spiciness, you could make a decent zesty honey-molasses sauce.”

  Avery stared. “You can cook? Cook well?”

  “I hold my own.” With a grin for Martha that made her heart flip and flop, he asked Avery if he could check out the rest of her recipe collection.

  And for the first time since Martha had met her, Avery beamed.

  When Leigh arrived on her Harley, clad in black leather, Martha met her in the foyer with, “Dolls?”

  Leigh feigned a smug smirk. “Def.” She held up a Barbie and Ken, new in pink boxes.

  “Great, now put them away. BPM has been postponed till after dinner. We have another guest.”

  “BP what?”

  “BPM. Big Parenting Moment.”

  “Who belongs to the Escalade?”

  “Joaquin Ryder.”

  “Why is America’s sexiest boxer in your house?”

  “He’s a family friend and he wanted to see how Avery’s holding up.” That was part of the truth, anyway.

  Excited, Leigh let out a tiny fangirl squeal, stuck the dolls behind throw pillows and proceeded to nab Joaquin’s autograph for her boyfriend.

  Over dinner in the custom-built-for-kickass-entertaining backyard, all had been calm and the conversation light until somehow they swung onto the topic of boxing legends.

  Perhaps it wasn’t entirely coincidental that Martha lost her appetite as she thought about the physical risks Joaquin would court in the ring with Czech Republic champion Eliáš Brazda and reminded herself that fight night would end her relationship with Joaquin. When nausea threatened, she excused herself to a bathroom until she could pep-talk herself to a more upbeat mood.

  When she reemerged, she found Leigh and Avery facing Joaquin on the terrace, mimicking a boxing stance.

  “Are you teaching them how to fight?”

  Joaquin broke his stance to adjust Leigh’s fist. “A few basic moves, a couple of pointers in awareness and confidence. It’ll help them defend themselves.”

  “What about running?” She’d always run, could always count on her legs to take her away. They had before. “Escalating a situation with violence isn’t the way.”

  “What if you can’t run, Martha?”

  Leigh tapped Avery’s shoulder. “Dessert’s in the kitchen, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Then we should be in there.” Giving Martha a raised-brow look that begged, “What’s wrong with you?” Leigh ushered the girl inside.

  “Avery escaped.” She leaned against a stone column, resting under the wash of golden light from a sconce. “She ran. I ran.”

  “When?” Joaquin was in front of her, his expression grave yet pleading. “What happened?”

  “New York.” The words fell on a sigh. “Freshman year of college. I was at a bar with some friends. We flirted for drinks, but we weren’t there to hook up. It wasn’t the mission.” She reached out to trace a button on his shirt. Concentrating on that button, she let herself speak again. “A man kept sending me drinks, but I got bored, and since my friends weren’t ready to take off, I split. He followed me outside, tried to charm and guilt and threaten me into having sex with him.”

  Martha gripped the button. “All I could think was, ‘No, he’s not my choice. This isn’t my choice.’ When he hit me across the face, the violence terrified me. I ran. I got away.”

  “Name? Did you get the name?”

  “So you can hunt him down?” She shook her head.

  “I didn’t get his name. The women I was with convinced me to shut up about it. They didn’t want the university or our families to know we’d snuck into a bar. People would say the slut got what she asked for.”

  “You didn’t ask to be followed and hit.”

  “It was a while before that really sank in. I promised myself that no one would take away my choices. When I came home for Christmas, I chose you. I wanted you.”

  Only her attempt at seducing him had splintered like crystal.

  “Tabloids label me out-of-control, but I’m out of everyone else’s control—not mine. Because I make my own choices. Sometimes they’re not the best, sometimes they are.” She shrugged, felt herself smile thoughtfully. “But they’re my choices.”

  “Did you ever tell Marshall or Tem—”

  “No.”

  “Martha—”

  “It’s a choice, to not know what they’d say. To not know if they’d blame me.” She rocked forward, gearing up to walk away, but his arms opened and she found herself walking into his embrace instead.

  “I don’t blame you,” he said.

  “I know.” I’m not simple to understand and you’re not afraid to try. It’s a reason I love you.

  “Gotta get back to the gym, but think about this. Fight or flight is a choice. Fighting’s violent, but it’s another way to protect yourself. If your friend and Avery want to see it that way, it’s their choice.”

  As much as she craved to resist it, it was another good point. He seemed to have an endless supply of those.

  After he left, Martha turned away from the door to see Avery behind her holding up the doll boxes.

  “If these are for me, you should know that no one in my grade plays with these unless they’d like to be laughed at.”

  “Martha, problem. I can’t find Barbie and Ken,” Leigh called out before she stopped in the foyer. “Oh. Cancel that SOS.”

  “Please tell me y’all don’t play with dolls.”

  Hell’s bells. Martha took the female and handed Leigh the male, and they opened the boxes. “Okay, here’s the thing, Avery. Your health teacher let me know you missed the sex ed lesson. I thought I’d, um, give you notes. The dolls are props.”

  “Props?”

  “It’s how I learned.”

  Avery scratched her head. She was sporting a wrap while her sprain healed, but Band-Aids no longer covered her cuticles. “I already know about sex. And—” she took the doll from Leigh and yanked down his swim trunks “—Ken has no penis.”

  Leigh dashed off toward the living room in a haze of black leather, but her cackling belly laugh could probably be heard next door.

  “Can I go now? There’s a new competition show on the Food Network. And can I bring Rabbit’s cage into my room?”

  Martha waved the Barbie in surrender. In the living room, she sat beside her friend. “Big Parenting Moment was not a success.”

  “Oh, I’m thinking you’ll get another chance soon.” Leigh picked up her purse, cocked her head to listen for the pitter-patter of a teenager’s feet. “During the emergency doll mission, I, um, got somethin
g for you.”

  Then she yanked out a box and plopped it on Martha’s lap.

  A pregnancy test.

  “Don’t take this the wrong way,” Leigh said hastily, pushing her dark hair behind her ears. “Cranky. Nauseous. Light-headed. You’ve been all of those things the past couple of weeks. Did you miss the end of your sentence?”

  “No—wait—” Oh, God. “I’m late, but I figured it had to do with external stuff. My MBA program, Rabbit, Avery, the team.”

  “Take the test.”

  Holing up in her private bathroom while Leigh raided the closet—what was the point of friends having the same shoe size if they didn’t share sexy footwear?—Martha followed the test instructions and held off panicking…

  Until a positive result popped up on the test stick.

  “Leigh!” Her friend rushed into the bathroom, glanced at the stick. “I can’t breathe.”

  “Yes, you can, Martha.”

  “I cannot be pregnant. I—I have a foster kid and a rabbit and a house. I’m already doing the grown-up thing.”

  “Calm yourself.”

  “But how can I be pregnant?”

  “I’m guessing your mom’s idea of sex ed with dolls wasn’t very effective.”

  Her parents had asked her to keep away from scandals. Only, she hadn’t. She’d slept with Joaquin Ryder and was now pregnant. And when the public found out…

  When her family found out…

  When Joaquin found out…

  “This stays here,” she said. “How I handle this is my choice.”

  “But the father—”

  “Won’t be a part of this. He can’t be. He’s…”

  “The man who left this house about an hour ago, isn’t he?”

  Martha closed her eyes, nodding. She wanted to deny it, but it felt unforgivably wrong to start her baby’s life on a paternity lie.

  Her baby.

  Just a few weeks of secrecy until Joaquin left Las Vegas. It was all the time she needed to adapt to yet another change and cope with the reality that the fairy tale wasn’t meant for her. Her reality was unconventional and full of surprises.