“Let me take you to get something to eat.”
“Oh, thank you, but it's late, and I don't think I could eat anyway.”
He smiled an easy smile that did wild things to her pulse and nodded. “I guess I'll be going, then.” He turned and looked at the door, then back at her. “Can I at least walk you to your car?”
She doubted she'd get much sleep tonight. No need to go home and rattle around her empty condo. “I think I'll work on these charts before I go home.” She stacked the files in the center of her desk and sat. Blake just stood there. Looking at her. He was clearly concerned about her.
“Thank you for coming. For listening.” She gave him a weak smile.
“Sure.” He picked up a crystal paperweight and turned it over in his hand. “What are you going to do?”
Janice frowned. She'd just told him she was going to stay and work. “These charts—”
“I'm not talking about work.”
Her uncle's invitation to come to Angel Ridge. Blake's invitation to spend Christmas day with him. The promise she'd made to Eve she hadn't yet had a chance to analyze. “I need time to think, Blake. To process everything. I can't make a decision like that now.”
He moved around the desk. Janice spun in her chair to face him. She had a strong urge to retreat to the other side. She felt much safer with the barrier between them, without him standing so close she could feel his heat. For one crazy moment, she imagined him pulling her up against his chest and kissing her the way he had at his house. Only this time, it wouldn't end at his door. It would propel them to her sofa and into something neither of them was ready for.
Blake leaned back against the desk, his knee touching hers. “Come to Angel Ridge. Take the time to get to know the town and its people. Your uncle. Me. See how it feels. No pressure.”
“No pressure.” Janice laughed and rested an arm on the desk. “You have no idea.”
“Tell me.”
She looked up into his amazing blue eyes and all she wanted to do was run into the safety of his arms. She couldn't go there. Allowing herself to depend on anyone always spelled disappointment. Her parents had certainly never been there for her. Even her grandparents had left her just when she finally had the opportunity to form a real relationship with them.
Blake trailed his fingertips lightly across the top of her hand. “Tell me,” he repeated.
What the hell. “My uncle wants me to move to Angel Ridge permanently. He's ready to retire and thinks I'm the right person to take over his practice.”
“I know.”
“You—you know? How?”
“Dixie. There aren't many secrets in a small town.”
Janice nodded. She should have realized that. She might have if she hadn't been so distracted by this attraction between her and Blake.
“So what's holding you back?”
“My life is here.” She stood and walked over to the window and away from Blake. City lights winked at her instead of stars.
He followed. “You sure about that?”
She wasn't sure of anything. She felt like her life had been shaken up and poured out in a hopeless jumble on the floor.
“Like I said, I need time to think.”
“Okay. Fair enough.”
She could see him reflected in the window. He took two steps back, and headed for the door, but stopped before reaching it. Janice pivoted and watched him. He put his hands on his hips, his head dipped, and then he was facing her.
“At the risk of coming off like a complete idiot, I think there's something special between us. Call it attraction, a connection, I don't know. But I want to . . . ”
He approached her in slow measured steps. “I want to know everything about it. About you, about us together, about where this might take us.”
He grasped her arms, then slid his hands from her shoulders to her wrists and back again. Janice grabbed the front of his jacket with both hands and willed her knees to keep her upright.
“I've never felt anything like what I feel when you're near me,” he continued, his voice soft and low.
“I know,” she breathed. Janice closed her eyes and leaned into him.
He smelled like leather, warm spice, and one hundred percent male. He was the culmination of every fantasy she'd ever had.
“The kisses we shared earlier . . . ” He squeezed her shoulders and rested his forehead against hers. “I can't get it out of my mind.”
She closed her eyes. All other kisses for the rest of her life would be measured against Blake's. The way he made her feel frankly scared her senseless. She couldn't let herself feel that way for anyone.
She released his jacket and balled her fists, then forced herself to move away from his touch. “I'm not free, Blake.”
Blake raked a hand through his hair. “There's someone else?”
“No.”
“Then what is it?”
She crossed her arms. “I thought you said something about no pressure.”
He held up his hands. “Sorry.” He backed away. “It's your decision to make. I won't pressure you, but . . . I'll be hoping.”
The door closed softly behind him, and Janice was left in a state with which she was intimately familiar. Alone.
You. There's still time for you. Don't waste it. Don't wait for tomorrow. You never know what it will hold. Promise.
Eve Carlisle's words hung in the room like she'd just spoken them.
Time. Don't waste the time she had. Still time for her . . . .
Janice chewed on her thumbnail. Time for what? She had a life. A safe life. For as long as she could remember, she'd envisioned Angel Ridge as an ideal that couldn't possibly be real. She'd have to be insane to give up everything she'd worked so hard to achieve and move to a place that didn't exist.
What if it does? the voice whispered. It's your time . . . if you let tomorrow come.
Chapter 6
Insane. She was completely insane. Hearing voices. Telling her partners she would take the rest of the month off as they'd suggested. Packing her bags. Sitting in front of her uncle's house, prepared to spend the holidays in Angel Ridge.
Janice eased her sunglasses off. She couldn't fault the weather. It was a beautiful day with nothing overhead but a wide expanse of cloudless blue sky. She opened the door and grabbed her coat from the passenger seat. After shrugging into it, she walked up to the front door.
Since it was a doctor's office, she tried the doorknob, but found it locked. She looked for a lit doorbell button, but only found a raised knob with something like a key protruding from it. Janice turned the key. The contraption made a loud whirring sound that resembled the sound of a bell. Very clever.
Janice stood back and waited. No one came.
“Check the note in the window. Doc's probably gone fishin' like he usually does on Saturday,” someone said from the sidewalk below.
Janice turned. A little red-haired boy looked up at her from his bicycle. “Thank you,” she said.
“You new 'round here?”
She walked down the steps before she answered. “I'm Janice Thornton. Doctor Prescott is my uncle.”
“Ya don't say. Well, I'm Sam Houston. My daddy's the mayor.”
“I'm pleased to meet you, Sam Houston.”
The adorable boy's smile revealed he was missing his front teeth. “I could show you to the fishin' hole, if'n you's a mind to go.”
“That's very kind of you, but I think I'll wait around town until my uncle comes back.”
“Suit yerself. See ya.”
“Bye.” Janice watched as the boy continued on his way down the sidewalk.
She walked back up the steps to the porch. As Sam Houston had said, there was a note on the window by the front door, and it read, Gone fishing. Call Mable if you have an emergency.Doc Prescott.
Janice turned and squinted against the bright noonday sunshine. The light reflecting off the lake was nothing short of brilliant. Might as well have a look around town while she wa
ited.
She went to the car and retrieved her sunglasses, then strolled down the drive to the sidewalk that ran parallel to the street. Two steeples were visible a few blocks down to the right. To the left, nothing but a long row of houses with a spectacular river view below. She headed toward the steeples.
After covering only a block, she turned to find a very elderly lady approaching her from a walkway in front of what must be her house: an unusual, two-story white frame with two jutting wings that extended on either side of a trapezoid-shaped front porch. Janice squinted to make out a design in the gingerbread trim. Angel wings?
“Howdy-do there.”
The woman, who reminded her a little of Eve Carlisle, was bundled into a royal blue wool coat with a fur-trimmed collar and matching fur cap. Snowy white hair with a bluish tint peeked out from beneath the hat and a wide, curious blue-eyed gaze peered back at her. At five foot nine, Janice dwarfed the diminutive lady.
“Hello,” Janice said.
The older woman opened the gate and joined her on the sidewalk. “Well, it's a happy day to see you standin' here in front of my house, young lady.”
Janice frowned. She didn't quite know how to respond, but she said, “Thank you.”
The woman tugged at her black wool gloves. “We expected you sooner, but I suppose it's no matter. You're here now. Mmm-hmm.”
How could this stranger know she was coming when she hadn't even known herself until this morning? “I'm sorry, ma'am. Do I know you?”
“I reckon not, but I know you. You're Dotty Prescott's girl. Got to be. You're the spittin' image of her.”
“Yes, ma'am. I'm Janice Thornton. Dot—Dorothy Prescott Thornton is my mother.”
“Well, I knew that. I might be old, but I ain't senile.” She pointed toward town. “Let's get movin' before we freeze to the sidewalk.”
“Of course.” Janice couldn't hold back a smile. The woman certainly knew how to take charge of a situation. They moved out at a brisk pace. “I'm sorry, but you have me at a disadvantage. I'm afraid I don't know your name.”
“Well, I'm Miss Estelee,” she said it as if everyone knew her name.
“I'm pleased to meet you, ma'am.”
“No need to call me ‘ma'am.’ Miss Estelee will do just fine.”
Janice shortened her strides to match Miss Estelee's. She seemed in good shape for a woman of her age.
“Doc told me you'd been in town.”
“Yes, ma—um—yes, I came to see my uncle last week.”
“Mmm-hmm. He didn't say you was a comin' back. In fact, he weren't sure a t'all that you would.”
She also knew how to get right to the heart of the matter. Janice was at a loss again. “I'll be staying through the holidays.”
“You'll be stayin' longer than that, but you'll see the light soon enough.”
Janice bristled. She'd only be staying for the holidays, but saw no reason to dispute the point with this stranger. She wondered if everyone in this small town would feel the need to offer unsolicited advice.
After two more blocks, the road they were walking on ended at Main Street. Janice stopped and stared. “Oh, my . . . ”
“Beautiful, ain't it?”
It certainly was. It looked like a Currier & Ives Christmas print. Evergreen garland and wreaths decorated the old Victorian storefronts and buildings and . . . real gas-burning street lamps? In the center of an honest to goodness Town Square stood a bronze sculpture of an angel with a huge Christmas tree rising behind it.
“Take it all in, honey. This is your home.”
Janice blinked out of her reverie at the woman's words. Enough was enough. “Miss Estelee, this—”
“Come on, I'll show you around. Help you get acquainted.”
Miss Estelee took off down the street, while Janice just stared after her. Apparently her straight, honey-colored cane was for ornamental purposes only.
She turned and pinned Janice with an astute gaze. “Don't make an old lady wait. It ain't polite.”
Janice got her feet moving and caught up with the woman as she was saying, “This here's the grocery. Just let Jessie know what you need and she'll have that nice Houston boy bring it out to you.”
Janice just nodded and let the lady talk. There was hardly anyone around. With it being such a chilly day, everyone must be indoors.
She pointed. “DeFoe's Hardware is just there. There's a nice young man—Cole Craig—who does all the handy work in town. He's put in an office over by the Hardware because he's an architect now, or some such. But if you've got anything that need's fixin', he'd be the one to call.”
Janice found it odd that an architect would do odd jobs about town, but kept silent on the matter.
“Over there's the bank. The McKay's run it. They're richer than the Rockefellers and snooty as the Vanderbilts. They own the library down there, too. That nice Cole Craig I just mentioned is marryin' our librarian, Josie Allen, in a couple of weeks.”
“What a beautiful building.” The red brick structure resembled a medieval castle. Not at all what she'd expect in a small town library.
“It's one of our oldest buildings. Served as Red Cross Headquarters during the Second Great War. Sherman's Headquarters in the recent unpleasantness with the North.”
Janice frowned. “Sherman?”
“Oh, yes. He marched right through the middle of town on his way to Georgia and commandeered it. Stayed pert near three weeks. Some welcomed him. Most didn't.”
“Didn't Tennessee fight with the south in the Civil War?”
“Some did. Some didn't. Most folks were simple farmers, but around here, they was a lot of folk whose way of life was threatened by the Northern aggression. That's enough talk of discord and strife. This here's a happy day what with it bein' your homecomin' and all. No need for none of that.”
The woman's references to Janice coming home were making her very uncomfortable. “Miss Estelee, I don't want you to get the wrong impression. I'm only here for a visit.”
They stopped for a moment before circling around and proceeding down to the other side of the street. She tapped her cane. “Mmm—hmm. I hear you met our Blake Ferguson.”
Janice puzzled at that statement. The woman certainly was forward. “Yes.”
Miss Estelee stood still, resting both hands on the silver handle of her cane. “He's settled into your grandparents' house real nice. Like he belongs there.”
She was about to agree when Miss Estelee continued. “You belong there with him.”
The statement took her by surprise. The older woman took advantage of her speechless state.
“Your mama never belonged here. A fish out of water. But now you, you was meant to be a part of this town. And Blake Ferguson buyin' that house was no accident. No siree, them angels was at work in that.”
Janice found her voice then. “Angels?”
“Why sure. There's been angels a livin' up on this ridge for ages. They kinda watch over things, if you will, since we ain't too good at it ourselves.”
Janice wondered if the poor dear suffered from dementia. That would explain a lot. She'd have to discuss it with her uncle later.
Miss Estelee continued down the sidewalk and Janice followed.
“That's the First Baptist Church up there. First Presbyterian's just there, at the other end of the curve. Don't know how they're gonna fair when they get to heaven. I reckon one'll set up at one end of the streets of gold. One on the other.” Miss Estelee shook her head.
Might as well humor the old dear. “They're both beautiful churches. Which one do you attend, Miss Estelee?”
“Oh, I used to attend both. But now, most times, I just go up to the tall pines. If ya ask me, it's the closest a body can get to Heaven 'round here.
“Over here, right across from the bank, is where one of our newest businesses has opened. Girl who runs it is named Candi Heart.”
Miss Estelee had to stop. She began to cackle and tap her cane. Janice couldn't help it. She l
aughed along with her.
“O—Oh. She's a breath o' fresh air, I tell you.” She elbowed Janice. “Givin' old lady McKay a time, too. Well, just look at that sign. Why it's enough to give Harriet McKay an episode every time she walks out the front door of her bank right across the street.” Miss Estelee tapped her cane again, and laughed louder.
A big, heart-shaped, red sign above the door of the white wooden storefront read Heart's Desire. In the store window, one mannequin was dressed in a risqué red teddy with white fur trim and a Santa hat while another wore a more sedate, full-length red satin peignoir set. Cling stickers on the window read, Naughty or Nice. A platter of chocolates and an arrangement of flowers sat between the two displays.
“Interesting.”
"It sure is. We ain’t never had nobody like Candi here in town. She’s a breath of fresh air if you ask me. If you ask Mrs. McKay across the way there at the bank, she’d just as soon run Candi out of town on a rail. I say, to each her own. There’s room enough for everybody in Angel Ridge. If you live long enough you learn it’s the differences in folks that make life interestin’.” She laughed and tapped her cane, “Some make it more interestin’ than others!”
Without warning, Miss Estelee veered off the sidewalk toward the Town Square. She walked right up to the angel monument and stared up at it with a slight smile on her face. The exquisite sculpture stood on a brick pedestal and extended at least eight feet toward the blue sky. The warrior angel immortalized in bronze stood passive, his sword hilt held in both hands, its tip down. He had the most strikingly beautiful face. The most peaceful countenance.
“Somethin', ain't he?” her companion breathed.
Still looking up, Janice agreed. “He certainly is.”
“He just sorta says it all, don't he?”
Janice puzzled. “About what?”
“The town.”
Janice looked back up at the angel, giving the statement some thought. He did. Peaceful. Dignified. Surviving the test of time.
“Yes,” Janice agreed. “I see what you mean.”
A Home for Christmas Page 7
