Harlequin Superromance November 2014 - Box Set 2 of 2: Christmas at the CoveNavy ChristmasUntil She Met Daniel

by Rachel Brimble

  “Great,” she answered. “In a couple of minutes I’ll take a break and wander around to see if I can help with anything. We’ve had a great turnout.”

  Pausing, she meowed and gave candy bars to another collection of kids, then stood and brushed the dust off her knees.

  * * *

  DANIEL SWALLOWED AND glanced away. Mandy didn’t appear to be aware of how provocative she looked. The turtleneck clung faithfully to every one of her generous curves, sloping down to her trim waist. And the tights left little to the imagination, the attached tail only calling attention to her nicely rounded rear end.

  Yet apart from the discomfort his arousal was causing, Daniel found himself enjoying the evening. In the city he’d felt uncomfortable about taking Samantha trick-or-treating and had always sought out a similar event. This one seemed better, perhaps because the community atmosphere was so strong. People knew each other and were trading jokes, making teasing comments about costumes or decorations reappearing from prior years.

  He and Samantha worked their way through one row of cars and then his daughter spotted the fire truck, with kids climbing over it.

  “Can I go, too?” she asked.

  At his nod, she shoved her bag of candy into his hands and ran to the line where the kids were waiting their turn.

  “Kind of makes you wish you were a kid again, doesn’t it?” Mandy said, coming up beside him.

  “Definitely,” he agreed.

  “I have a feeling they’d let the city manager climb up on a truck anytime he wants.”

  “Let me guess...and bring the Senior Center director along as his guest?”

  “Too late. When we had the fire drill, they let several of us satisfy those impulses. It’s really something to see an eighty-seven-year-old man with his face as excited as a kindergartner.”

  “I’ll bet.” Daniel found himself oddly disappointed he hadn’t been there to see it. He had to admit that Willow’s Eve had its appealing aspects. In fact, it was hard not to appreciate the town, especially when seen through Mandy’s eyes—she loved the place wholeheartedly. And while he still couldn’t see spending more than a year in such a remote community, he could enjoy it while he was there.

  As Samantha got to the head of the line, Daniel juggled her bag of candy so he could take pictures. His daughter’s face was alive with enthusiasm as she explored the huge red-and-silver machine.

  “Notice the plaque?” Mandy asked as he lowered the camera.

  “Excuse me?”

  She pointed at a small silver plate on the side of the fire truck, proclaiming it a gift to Willow’s Eve from Fannie Snow.

  “I have to admit this woman is beginning to interest me,” he said. “Where did her money come from?”

  “That’s a deep, dark, murky secret. She left Willow’s Eve penniless when she was a teenager and came back in her forties, loaded. She never revealed where she got her wealth.”

  “That could lead to interesting speculations.”

  “No kidding. Everyone says she was still drop-dead beautiful when she returned, and that the only person she snubbed was Oscar Bertram.”

  “It all sounds—” He stopped as Samantha came running around the end of the fire truck.

  “Did you see me?” she demanded.

  “Sure did,” Daniel answered.

  “And he got pictures, too,” Mandy told her. “I’ll see you later. I have to go paint faces.” She headed toward the face-painting booth.

  Daniel handed the treat bag back to his daughter and hoped she wouldn’t want her face painted next. Fortunately, she ran over to join a group of friends.

  * * *

  A FEW DAYS after Halloween, Mandy leaned back in her office chair and stretched. She needed a minute of transition between the activities of the day and her upcoming meeting with Daniel. Reviewing the calendar of volunteers, she found that Jim Sandler wasn’t signed up in the near future to help with one of the senior lunches. She made a mental note that if he did volunteer, she’d need two experienced cooks backing him up. Not that it was likely to be a problem. After being responsible for getting the fire department out, she doubted Jim would ever volunteer for kitchen duty again.

  Her gaze fell on the stack of papers about the water issue. Jiminy. The whole thing was an enormous pain in the neck...in addition to a few other places.

  Still, she’d found her discussions with Daniel interesting. And stimulating. He might be a stick-in-the-mud, but he was smart and talented. She didn’t know if he was talented enough to find a way out of this mess with the water, but it was clear he knew what he was doing when it came to city government. The word from folks in other departments was that he was easy to get along with and the changes he’d suggested had actually made their work easier.

  Willow’s Eve was small, but it needed good management. Unfortunately, Daniel was temporary. The city council had hoped he would stay, but from everything Daniel had said, the town appeared to be just a stop on the road to something bigger.

  It annoyed Mandy.

  When she’d been hired, she’d told them up front that she didn’t expect to hang around for long. But Daniel had implied in his interview that he would consider staying longer than the term of his initial contract. Susan had told her how happy the council was about it.

  She checked her watch, then grabbed her notebook and headed into Daniel’s office. He was on the phone, and motioned her to sit. He continued listening to the speaker, making notes and saying “uh-huh” occasionally. Finally, he said, “That’s something we will pay attention to as we go along, Chris. Thanks for calling. ’Bye.”

  Daniel’s face appeared...well, the only word for it was harassed.

  “I know it might not be obvious right now, but Chris Randall is a nice guy,” she ventured.

  “Perhaps.” His voice was doubtful. “I suppose you’ll say his wife is also a very nice person.”

  “Of course.”

  “They ran into each other in my office last week,” he told her grimly. “The next thing I knew, they were arguing fast and furious about everything. I swear, if it had been raining, they would have disagreed about the size of the raindrops.”

  Mandy’s gut clenched. There was nothing she could do for her friends. And the old feeling washed over her, the sense of responsibility, as if there ought to be something she should do to make things better.

  “Hey, what’s wrong?” Daniel asked. “You almost look desperate.”

  “Oh.” She waved a hand. “You already know I’m the original fussbudget who thinks she ought to be able to fix everything. Even when babies cry, I feel bad, as if it’s my fault, or it’s my job to make it better.”

  “Don’t tell me you’ve got some sort of guilt complex.”

  “Not exactly.” Mandy heaved a sigh. “My great-grandfather ran out on his family when my grandfather was twelve. He quit school to support his mother, and has never seemed to get over his father’s desertion. He’s very grim and serious. In fact, I think he once tried to add ‘Thou shalt have no fun’ to the Ten Commandments.”

  A fast smile crossed Daniel’s mouth. “I take it he passed his serious attitude down?”

  “You bet. He brought up my dad to be super-duper responsible, so you could say it’s an overdeveloped instinct in the family. My brain knows the reasons, but there’s this tiny little voice from somewhere that I have to tell ‘shut up’ to once in a while.”

  Daniel’s face seemed puzzled, but he appeared to dismiss whatever he was thinking.

  “So, do you have new questions from the seniors?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she exclaimed. “And now I’m getting calls from other people in town.”

  “I kind of expected that.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me? I could have ducked.”

  “I do
ubt it. You’d have to jump over that barrel of responsibility you lug around, and that sounds like too big of a leap...even for a sleek black cat with a long tail.”

  The reference to her Halloween costume made her self-conscious, but she pushed it away.

  “Very funny. Anyway, the environmentalists in town are getting more upset than ever. Chris is stirring the pot, and some of the seniors were already touchy on the subject. Not all of them, but the issue is more out in the open than it used to be.”

  “So what questions are they coming up with?”

  “They don’t have enough information for more than generalities right now, but I was looking at that old report, the one where it recommended the best place for a second reservoir.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Have you thought about having a university class or something out to survey the site again and do another impact study?”

  “What difference would that make?”

  “If the town puts a bunch of money into moving in that direction, and then they find out there’s some rare species of fish or insect or flower or whatever, then the game is up. I mean, you’ll get environmentalists from all over the country chaining themselves to boulders.”

  He was staring at her as if he thought she was nuts. “Hey,” she protested, “I’m not saying I’d chain myself to a boulder.”

  “That’s a relief.”

  “Unless it looked like fun,” she added with a grin.

  He closed his eyes and she was reasonably sure he was counting to ten.

  “Six, four, nine, two, five,” she droned.

  Opening his eyes, he glared. “Did anyone ever threaten to spank you?”

  “Nah, my parents felt guilt trips were much more effective.”

  “I see. What a scenic way to travel.”

  “Absolutely, but the luggage is a downer. You have to take all the mistakes you ever made right along with you.”

  It was a surprising conversation. Daniel was smart and dangerous for her peace of mind. Plus, he was acting less like a stick-in-the-mud these days. He also loved his daughter, something Mandy hadn’t actually wanted to know. The last thing she needed was to see his better qualities.

  * * *

  ORIGINALLY DANIEL HAD wondered if Mandy was too flighty to be any benefit in the water debate, but now he was seeing that she was more capable than she had first appeared. Her occasionally runaway conversations revealed wide interests and a variety of experiences. And she’d obviously mastered numerous skills.

  Mandy was also proving to be very smart, and she’d brought up a good point about the environmental study. Nowadays, impact studies were done whether someone wanted them or not. But if Willow’s Eve waited until a study was forced on it, the city might invest time and money into something that could get canceled, or delayed by more protests.

  He reached for his coffeepot and found there was only a small amount left.

  “There’s still some in my pot,” Mandy offered.

  “Won’t you need it?”

  “Not a chance. I’ve drunk so much today, my toenails are floating.”

  Grabbing his mug, he walked down the hallway to her office. That was another thing she did well. He knew how to brew a decent pot, but it wasn’t as good as Mandy’s. She’d explained she had worked at one of those fancy coffeehouses for a few months, learning their trade secrets.

  No doubt her wanderlust had contributed to her variety of skills and interests. It appeared that she moved from place to place, whenever the wind blew. Furniture restoration, computer programming, tour boat operator, plumber’s assistant, farmwork, souvenir shops, coffeehouses and who knew what else. He couldn’t imagine living that way, but she’d been doing it for years.

  Back in his office, he set his mug down and saw Mandy had opened her sketch pad and was busily working. She seemed unable to sit and do nothing.

  “Mice on roller skates?” he questioned, looking at the picture she was polishing.

  “From an old ‘died and went to heaven’ joke. I thought I’d put it on the bulletin board—the seniors will love it.”

  Daniel shook his head. “Joke? It’s not ringing a bell.”

  “I don’t know how old it actually is, but it made the rounds in several places where I lived, and I think someone put it on the internet. It’s about a group of mice who died and went to heaven. Saint Peter welcomed them and said they’d been nice little mice, then asked what reward would they like. Remember?”

  “No. Why would anyone reward mice?”

  Her eyes rolled. “Cripes, Daniel, it’s a joke.”

  “Now who doesn’t have a sense of humor? I was just pulling your leg.”

  Reluctantly, she grinned. “Okay. Were you yanking my chain about knowing the joke, or about why mice should get a heavenly reward?”

  “I can’t remember the joke, so it must be that.”

  “Well, the mice said they’d had to run everywhere all the time, so they’d like roller skates to get around heaven. So Saint Peter gave them tiny roller skates and they happily set off to explore. Stop me if you’ve heard this.”

  Daniel shook his head, so she continued.

  “A while later, a barn cat arrived at the pearly gates and was asked what kind of reward she’d like to have. She explained she’d never had a soft place to sleep, so she was given a soft pillow as a bed. A while later Saint Peter went to check on the cat and asked how she was doing. She said heaven was terrific, the cushion was soft, and she just loved those meals-on-wheels they kept sending over.”

  Daniel burst out laughing. Somehow he’d recovered his sense of humor, and it felt damned good.

  Mandy laughed, too, maybe in response to his humor, but it was incredibly...erotic. Her sketch pad slipped to the floor as he leaned over for a kiss. A second later, she was up against him, laughter still rumbling, pushing her breasts against his chest.

  That also felt good. Better than good. His hand found its way beneath her T-shirt to the soft skin underneath. Unfastening her bra took even less time.

  “Wait a minute,” she gasped, stepping back and pulling the shirt over her head. The bra came with it and she started to snuggle back against him.

  “Wait your own minute,” he said hoarsely, holding her off and viewing the sight he’d imagined any number of times. Full breasts, with pink tips begging to be touched. He reached out and stroked the one on the right. It was already hard, but he teased her with his fingers, loving the way her breathing quickened as he moved his hand against her skin.

  Slowly, he tugged her close and pulled her mouth into his, still filling his palms with her firm flesh.

  Jerking, he realized that Mandy’s own fingers had been busy, unbuttoning his shirt and pushing it aside. The feel of her against his bare chest almost sent him reeling.

  He hurried to the office door, locking it, and turned again toward Mandy, enjoying the sight of her bare breasts. It had been years since he’d made love outside of a bed, but he found his instincts hadn’t lost their edge as he unzipped her jeans and tugged them down. She’d already kicked off her shoes, so the jeans quickly went sailing across the room, Mandy’s silky briefs followed.

  With a saucy grin, she pushed him against the desk and rose up on tiptoes to rub against the hard bulge between his legs.

  Hell, where was a couch when he needed one? There wasn’t even a carpet on the polished floor.

  Mandy had moved again, and was unfastening his belt, tugging the zipper open. Before discarding his Levi’s, he found his wallet and the square package he kept there.

  He nearly went insane as Mandy watched him unrolling the condom over himself, a Mona Lisa smile on her lips.

  “What’s it to be?” she murmured when he was done. “The office chair? A stand-up routine. Or...”

  Reaching ou
t, he swung her around, lifting her to sit on the desk, and pulling her legs around him. He entered her and grasped her hips, beginning a smooth, hard rhythm. Mandy hung on to his shoulders, yet arched backward until he could see the way his thrusts shivered up her body, swaying her breasts like the waves of the ocean. Daniel held off, needing release, but determined to get her there before he lost control. She hit a minute later and he let go, pleasure exploding inside him.

  With a long breath, her body stilled and she pulled herself upward to press against him again. When he tried to move backward, she tightened her legs to keep him buried in her softness. It was so good that if he’d had another condom in his wallet, he might have started all over again. How many years had it been since he’d felt that urge?

  Yet sanity was also returning.

  “How about a doubleheader?” she murmured.

  “Sorry, I don’t have any more protection with me,” he said hoarsely.

  “Damn. It would have been nice.”

  Nice? It would have been mind-blowing.

  Carefully, he eased out of her, his ego in danger of getting overinflated when he saw her disappointment.

  Silently they dressed. Daniel made sure the condom and its wrapping were safe in his pocket. No custodian was going to have the chance to speculate on what activities had taken place behind closed doors.

  Mandy sat down in her chair and raised an eyebrow at him. “So,” she said, “what do you think about getting a bunch of college students to study the site?”

  Another Mona Lisa smile curved her lips as she spoke, and he had to close his eyes.

  “It’s a good idea,” he agreed. “I’ll make some calls tomorrow.”

  He could hardly believe he’d lost control.

  “What’s the matter,” Mandy taunted, “regrets already?”

  “This isn’t funny.” He stopped and ran his fingers through his hair, trying not to remember her doing the same. “Damn it, this is City Hall, Mandy.”

  “So the location is the problem, not the quality of the activity?”

  He knew she was goading him and tried to calm the hard rush of his pulse. The whole thing had been a mistake, pure and simple, but he couldn’t blame anyone but himself. He’d initiated the kiss, and it had led to the rest.