Christmas in July

by Debbie Mason

  “I’ll do my best, sir.”

  Flames shot up from the barbeque, and Dr. McBride moved to his son’s side to offer his advice. While they good-naturedly argued, Sawyer said to Jack, “I hear you got your memory back.”

  “Yeah, I did.”

  “Glad to hear it. It was hard on Grace when she found out you didn’t remember her and little Jack.”

  “Wasn’t exactly easy on me, either. But it wasn’t like I lost it on purpose.”

  “Yeah, guess so.” Sawyer leaned against the rail and took a swig of his beer. Jack followed the direction of his gaze. Sawyer watched Grace through the window. “Gage’s dad is right, you know. She’s had a tough time.”

  “I’m aware of that, Sawyer. And I’m going to take care of her.”

  “Make sure you do.”

  Jack’s fingers tightened around the neck of the bottle. Sawyer seemed to be confused as to whose wife she was. Just as Jack was about to set him straight, Sawyer said, “I had an interesting conversation with Brandi last night.”

  Don’t react, Flaherty. “Is that right?”

  “Yeah, she’s got this idea in her head that the woman you rescued has a thing for you. I checked her out. Gorgeous, stacked, and brunette. Exactly the type you used to go for, flyboy.”

  “Used to being the operative phrase.” Dickhead. “I’m married.”

  “Yeah, but you didn’t remember you were. At least that’s what you said.”

  “You got something you want to say, say it.”

  Sawyer straightened and got into Jack’s space. “You hurt Grace, and I’ll tear you apart.”

  Jack pushed him. “Back off, Anderson.”

  “Okay, you two, knock it off,” Gage said, flattening a palm on each of their chests. “You’re not in high school anymore. Jack, you were always good in the kitchen, go help my wife. And Sawyer, I think it’s time you and I had ourselves a chat.”

  * * *

  “Umm, Jack, don’t you want to sit with everyone else?” Grace asked, gesturing to where Gage and his dad were setting up a bunch of lawn chairs. Ten minutes ago, they’d piled into their vehicles to make it in time for the fireworks display at the park. Jack had laid their blanket behind a cluster of evergreens.

  From the expectant look on his wife’s face, no wasn’t going to cut it. Didn’t stop him from trying, though. “No one can see us here. We can make out.” And he wouldn’t have to listen to Nell and Madison talk about the bakery ad nauseam.

  Grace looked torn. He stretched out on the blanket and gave a suggestive waggle of his eyebrows. She laughed. Jack was about to give himself a self-congratulatory pat on the back, when Nell McBride called out, “You two aren’t going to be able to see the fireworks from there. We saved you a spot over here.” She pointed to a patch of grass in front of her chair.

  Grace wrinkled her nose. “She’s right, and little Jack will put up a fuss if he can’t see them.”

  “I doubt he’d notice. He’s too busy being a dog.” Jack got up and reached for the blanket. He really hated that leash. But at least his son was no longer clamoring for Sawyer’s attention like he had throughout dinner.

  Grace looked over to where little Jack crawled on the ground with Lily holding on to the leash. She went to laugh, caught Jack’s expression, and grimaced. Picking up the other end of the blanket, she met him halfway and joined her hands with his. She kissed the underside of his jaw. “Rain check?”

  Jack folded the blanket around her, bringing her tight against him. Then he dipped his head and captured her mouth, kissing her like he’d wanted to all night. The best thing about the dinner at Gage’s had been having her at his side.

  “Woof. No kiss my mama. Woof.” Jesus, the kid was a bloodhound. Every time Jack went to touch or kiss his mother, he sniffed them out. Jack groaned against his wife’s smiling lips.

  As he moved his leg out of biting proximity, Grace crouched beside little Jack, who panted at her feet. She patted his head. “Are you having fun with Lily?”

  “Woof.” He nodded and licked Grace’s hand.

  Jack opened his mouth to give his opinion about their son pretending to be a dog, when Lily intervened, “Can little Jack have a sleepover tonight?”

  “Oh, I don’t know, honey,” Grace began at the same time Jack said, “That’s a great idea.”

  Maybe he should’ve curbed his enthusiasm, he thought as he met his wife’s narrow-eyed stare.

  His son’s “Me stay Lily” thankfully drew her attention off Jack.

  “We’ll see. Let’s go talk to your mom,” Grace said to Lily, setting little Jack on his feet. She headed off in Madison’s direction with the kids. When Jack didn’t follow right away, she glanced over her shoulder. “Aren’t you coming?”

  “Yeah,” he said on a defeated sigh, bracing for more not-so-subtle arm twisting from the Sugar Plum Bakery’s defense team. As they maneuvered through the crowd to reach their dinner companions, several people stopped to talk to Jack. He was saying so long to his sixth-grade teacher, who told Jack she’d always thought he’d end up in jail—gotta love small towns—when a lanky guy with overlong reddish-brown hair and wire-framed glasses shuffled closer.

  “Hi.” The twentysomething kid cleared his throat and stuck out his hand. “I’m Stu Thomas. You, uh, probably heard of me.”

  “Can’t say that I have. Nice to meet you, Stu.” He noticed the boot and rifle tattoo on the kid’s left bicep beneath the pack of Marlboros tucked under the sleeve of his grungy white T-shirt. “You serve in Afghanistan?”

  “No, sir, Iraq.” The kid shot a nervous glance over his shoulder. “I, um, just wanted to tell you how much I admire you. And to, uh, apologize. I… I’m the guy who trashed your apartment.” He finished on a rush.

  News to him, and unwelcome news at that. Jack crossed his arms, eyes narrowed at the kid. “You wanna explain to me why you did that?” He shifted his gaze to Grace when she came up behind Stu. She touched the guy’s shoulder. The kid practically jumped out of his skin, whipping around to face her.

  “Grace.” Stu’s Adam’s apple bobbed as he struggled to regain his composure.

  Jack pulled Grace to his side. The kid was wired.

  Grace gave him a confused look, then returned her attention to Stu. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. How are you doing? I’ve been worried about you.”

  What the hell? Angling his head to look at her, Jack raised a brow. “Stu here tells me he trashed our apartment.”

  Grace gently squeezed Jack’s forearm. “He hasn’t had an easy time since he got back.”

  The kid’s face flushed, and he shoved his hands in his jeans pockets. “I’m going to pay you back, Grace. Honest. As soon as I get a job, I’ll pay you back.”

  She searched his face. “What happened?”

  “It’s not an excuse, but everything came down on me at once. I kind of lost it.”

  “What did Lisa do now?” she asked, explaining to Jack that Lisa was Stu’s ex.

  Stu’s mouth flattened. “I got behind on my child support. She won’t let me see the kids until I’m caught up. I had a job lined up, but it fell through.”

  The guy looked too young to have kids of his own.

  Grace studied Stu for a couple of unwavering seconds, then said, “I need help with deliveries. The job’s yours if you want it. I can’t pay you much, but—”

  Stu looked like he didn’t believe her. Jack had a hard time believing her himself. “Really?” the kid asked. “After what I did, you’d do that for me?”

  “Yes, you can start tomorrow.”

  “You won’t regret it, Grace. And I’ll pay you back, just like I said.”

  She smiled and patted his arm. “We’ll talk tomorrow. I’ll see you at nine.”

  “I won’t let you down. Thanks, Grace.” He shook her hand, then Jack’s. “It was an honor to meet you, sir.”

  “Keep your nose clean, got it?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I know what you’re
thinking,” Grace said as they walked away. “But he’s going through a tough time and doesn’t have anyone to turn to.”

  “He got a raw deal,” Jack agreed after Grace had filled him in on Stu’s story. “And I get why you feel sorry for him and want to help, princess, but there’s something off about the guy. I want you to be careful around him.”

  “You sound like Jill. But you out of anyone should understand what he’s going through, Jack. He needs to catch a break, that’s all.”

  “We’ll see.”

  Grace released a heavy sigh as Jill strode toward them. “What did he want?” his sister asked, eyes focused on Stu’s retreating back.

  “To apologize.” Grace cut in before Jack could respond.

  Jill snorted. “I don’t trust the guy. I’m going to keep an eye on him,” she said and started after him.

  Jack hooked an arm around his wife’s neck. “She’s going to find out, you know,” he said into her ear, gently nipping the lobe.

  “Not tonight she won’t, and I’ll be ready for her tomorrow.” She made a face. “Maybe you could keep her busy for the next few days?”

  “I’ll see what I can do. It’ll cost you, though.” As he settled them on the blanket, he whispered in her ear what he’d expect in return.

  She grinned and opened her mouth to respond, but little Jack plunked himself down on her lap before she could.

  “Grace, you should’ve set up a booth and sold your chocolate cupcakes with the caramel centers. You would’ve cleaned up. Have you tasted her chocolate caramel cupcakes, Jack?” Nell asked.

  Oh Jesus, here she goes again. He’d hoped she’d given up the ghost. No such luck. Madison leaned forward in her lawn chair. “Nell’s right, they’re incredible. Even better, they don’t just taste delicious, there’s a hundred-percent markup on those babies.”

  He shot Grace an are-they-for-real look. She gave him an apologetic shrug before turning to the two women. A silent exchange ensued, complete with eye and hand signals.

  Jack didn’t care that the bakery appeared to be running in the black. A solid balance sheet wasn’t going to change his mind about keeping the place. All he’d heard growing up was how much his grandmother hated her life. How Libby and his grandfather hadn’t had one because of the bakery. It’d been a legacy passed on from his grandfather’s mother. More like a noose around her neck, his grandmother used to say.

  Grace had always been a neat freak and a bit of a perfectionist, but nowhere near what she was now. He blamed the bakery for that. Stress exacerbated the problem, and there was nothing, as his grandmother proved, more stressful than running a bakery. Sure, his being missing hadn’t helped. But in his gut he knew where the true fault lay, and nothing could convince him otherwise. Now he just had to convince his wife. She’d already ended up in the hospital once because of the bakery, he wasn’t about to let it happen again.

  The whir of a rocket stopped his thoughts cold. A steel band tightened around his chest as a flash exploded in the night sky, lighting up the mountains in the distance. The acrid smell of burning rubber filled his nostrils. Grace cast him a sharp glance, then moved, with their son in her arms, between Jack’s legs. He wrapped his arms around the two of them, burying his face in Grace’s hair to breathe in her sweet scent. It’s just fireworks, you idiot. You’re home now.

  Maybe not home exactly, not yet. But he was here with his wife and son and that’s all that mattered.

  Chapter Eleven

  When Grace woke up to bacon and eggs and her favorite blend of coffee laid out on a breakfast tray complete with wildflowers in a bud vase, she thought she had the sweetest, most amazingly considerate husband in the world. At the moment, she was revisiting that opinion.

  Jack raised himself up from where he’d been lying beside her on the bed and moved the cup of coffee from the tray to the bedside table. “Get used to it, princess. I’m going to fatten you up. You’ve got at least twenty pounds to go. And if I have to force-feed you to get you there, I will.” He brushed his lips over hers. “Don’t pout.”

  “I’m not pouting. This is my I’m-an-adult-and-can-look-after-myself face.”

  His firm lips curved as he lifted the tray from where it straddled her legs and stood up. “It’s a pout.”

  If she was pouting, it was because he thought she needed to gain twenty pounds. “I’ve put on five since you’ve come home.”

  “Good, only fifteen more to go. Ah, ah, no, you don’t,” he said when she went to get out of bed. “You need your rest. Grab a couple more hours.”

  Now he was being ridiculous and annoying. “I have to go to work. I promise, I won’t be long.” And she wouldn’t be. Jack had planned a picnic for the three of them in the meadow this afternoon. Which admittedly put him back in the sweet and thoughtful category.

  He set the tray on the dresser and turned, giving her a narrow-eyed look. She wondered if he knew how mouthwateringly sexy he was standing there in only a pair of low-riding navy sweatpants, all that sleek bronzed muscle on display. “I shouldn’t be more than an hour.”

  “We had a deal, remember? No more working twenty-four-seven.”

  Her brilliant plan of enlisting Nell and Madison to help change Jack’s mind about the bakery had totally backfired. Jack had realized what they were up to—they weren’t very subtle—and found them more irritating than persuasive, or so he’d told her last night on the walk back from the fireworks. At least Grace now knew exactly what she was up against. If they kept the bakery, Jack was worried she’d end up an overworked, stressed-out, miserable person. Thanks a lot, Libby, she thought a little testily.

  So there she had it. She was the only person who could change his mind. Grace drew her gaze back to his laser-blue eyes and smiled brightly. “I just have to get Stu settled and check on Desiree. She’s been with me a couple of months and still can’t get the fondant to the right consistency… What?”

  He sat beside her on the bed, giving her a look that seemed to say, I love you, but sometimes you drive me nuts. “Princess, you’ve got some serious control issues, and you’re going to have to get a handle on them if we’re going to make this work. Nothing’s perfect, not even your fondant.”

  “My fondant is so perfect. And if I work with… You think I’m controlling?”

  Rubbing his thumb over her knuckles, he nodded. “And a perfectionist.”

  “Oh, I see. So not only am I scrawny and exhausted-looking, I’m also a controlling perfectionist. It’s a wonder you married me.”

  “Hey, don’t be like that. I’m trying to be honest here. Part of why you’re underweight and exhausted, Grace, is because you’re a perfectionist. You don’t let—”

  “You forgot controlling.”

  “Look,” he took her hand, “I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.”

  “You didn’t.”

  “Yeah, I did. But, princess, I’m worried about you. And so is Dr. McBride.”

  “Jack, I love Dr. McBride, but—”

  “Should I be jealous?”

  “Ha-ha. You know as well as I do that Gage’s dad is a worrywart.”

  “He’s not the only one who’s worried about you. And I’m not going to have people saying I don’t know how to look after my own wife.”

  That was the thing about Jack: for the most part he didn’t care what people thought or said about him. But when it came to the citizens of Christmas, well, they were his Achilles’ heel. She squeezed his hand. “I’m fine. Honest. And if it’ll make you happy, I’ll eat more and hire more help. Okay?”

  “All right.” He kissed her forehead and stood up. “Why don’t you sleep awhile longer? I’ll go pick up little Jack.”

  “I still can’t believe we didn’t get a call from Madison in the middle of the night,” she said, ignoring his question and leaning over the edge of the bed to pick her nightie off the floor. Meeting his heated gaze, she smiled and said, “Stop looking at me like that and go get our son.”

  “I like looking at
you.”

  “I thought I was too skinny for your tastes.”

  He made a frustrated noise in his throat. “Did it sound like I didn’t love every inch of your body when I was kissing my way up it earlier?”

  “I guess not,” she said as she pulled the white nightie over her head, her face flushing at the memory.

  “You don’t seem too sure about that. Maybe I should remind you.”

  “Go.” She pointed to the door with a smile. “I’ll make the sandwiches for our picnic.”

  “You’re supposed to take it easy today, remember? I’ll give Holly and Hailey a call, get them to make up some sandwiches for us, and stop by the diner on my way home with little Jack. Chicken club still your favorite?”

  She nodded. “Don’t get anything for little Jack, though. I’ll make his lunch.”

  “Stubborn woman.” He headed for the door.

  “I should only need half an hour to get Stu and Desiree organized. But if I’m not here when…” He turned and raised a brow. She sighed. “Less than an hour, Jack. I promise.”

  “I won’t have the bakery sucking the life out of you like it did Libby.”

  “Your grandmother hated the bakery. It’s not the same thing.”

  “We’ll see.”

  “Yes, you will.” She swung her legs over the side of the bed and stood up, determined to get the focus off her and the bakery. “You know, all we’ve done is talk about me. We haven’t talked about you and what you’re going to do once you retire. It’s something we need to discuss.”

  * * *

  “We don’t need to talk about it now,” Jack said. It was a discussion he’d put off for as long as he could. They had enough to deal with, and he had no doubt his wife had her heart set on staying in town. If he decided to remain in the military, it wouldn’t be fair to move Grace and little Jack. But if he didn’t, could he really picture himself living in Christmas full-time? Hell no was his immediate reaction. “I don’t have to make a decision for a while yet.”