Have Gown, Need Groom

by Rita Herron

  Jake cranked his Jeep and followed, making sure to keep a safe distance through traffic, always lagging behind a car or two so Joey wouldn’t notice the tail. They wound through the central part of town, past a row of warehouses where he suspected DeLito might stop, but the man traveled on, finally pulling in at a local pub.

  Jake parked across the street and watched DeLito climb out, his shoulders hunched against the evening wind, his jaw tight. He strode into the bar as if he had a definite purpose. Jake slipped from his Jeep and followed, hiding in the crowd a few stools down so DeLito wouldn’t spot him. The stench of cigarettes and sweat surrounded him, country tunes trilling out through an old-fashioned jukebox.

  A brassy, hard-edged blonde wearing leather pants and a biker’s jacket wove between the patrons and settled in a nearby booth with DeLito. Jake couldn’t make out what they were saying, but they ordered drinks and talked in hushed voices. He nursed a beer and tried to figure out the relationship—personal or business? The woman was a distinctive change from Hannah’s sister, then again, he’d never seen the connection between Mimi and DeLito. Mimi obviously preferred to live on the edge a little more than her older sister.

  DeLito lit a cigarette, blew a puff of smoke in the air and glared at the woman, his other hand pounding the table once to emphasize his words. A few customers nearby glanced their way and DeLito seemed to realize he’d drawn attention, so he leaned toward the woman as if to shield them from curious onlookers. A heated exchange took place, then the woman slid a plain manila envelope across the scarred table. DeLito picked it up, stuffed it inside his leather jacket and hurried away. Jake tossed a few bills on the table to cover his tab and stalked outside, more certain than ever that Wiley’s right-hand man was involved in the theft ring.

  HANNAH’S EARS still burned from gossip as she drove toward her father’s car lot the next day. The nurses’ lounge had buzzed with rumors that Seth had left town because he was devastated over their canceled wedding. It was also whispered he’d run off with a nurse from obstetrics. And still others claimed he’d gone to a New Age retreat to lock himself in with a bunch of naked people and rediscover his inner soul. Something about washing and anointing each other’s bodies with ginseng oil and singing to the moon….

  Of course, the rumors were all false; she couldn’t imagine Seth doing anything so outlandish as rubbing any kind of oil over a stranger’s naked body, but the chief of staff’s look of disapproval when she’d passed him in the hall had scorched her. Maybe she’d have to move across the country to escape the gossip—although she’d probably have to leave the country since her dad’s ads ran from the east coast all the way to the west, where his latest car lot had opened.

  Christmas decorations glittered from the sidewalks, garland was draped around phone poles, and miniature trees lit with white lights were interspersed throughout the town. She steered past the newly erected Christmas-tree lot, past the old-fashioned soda shop and Cindy’s Cut & Curl until she reached her father’s car lot. She was supposed to meet Mimi and Alison here so they could go tree hunting together. With any luck, her father would go instead of sending Jake and Joey as he’d mentioned the day before.

  A laugh bubbled in her throat when she saw the car her father had fashioned as a sleigh. He’d decorated the red Cadillac with bows and garland and candy canes, and he sat on the back wearing a Santa costume, his black-booted feet dangling over into the back seat. Apparently Wiley was offering free Santa visits to the customers’ kids, along with candy and a specially designed coloring book featuring a dozen different kinds of cars. He’d strategically placed a fully enlarged picture of the cover on a huge sign hanging above the makeshift sleigh. Already a line of eager kids snaked through the used cars, while a photographer stayed on hand to capture the tender moment for a mere five dollars. A toddler sat in her father’s lap, clutching a half-eaten sucker in one hand, tugging at Wiley’s fake white beard with the other. The child was obviously determined to find out if Hannah’s father was the real Santa.

  A brief moment of insanity passed through her again as her imagination swung into overdrive—she saw a dark-haired little boy with black eyes climbing onto Santa’s lap, a little boy who resembled Jake. Her son.

  Dear heavens—she was hallucinating.

  Shaking herself from the stupor, she parked the car, then saw the real, fully grown man emerging from the building. Jake wore a denim shirt with the sleeves rolled up, revealing dark arms dusted with fine black hair. A pair of khaki slacks hugged his muscular hips and thighs. His shiny black hair gleamed in the sunlight.

  The breath whooshed from her chest, and she paused to steady herself before approaching him. The memory of his hot, wild kisses surfaced, sending a tingle of awareness up her spine. For her own peace of mind, she prayed he’d changed his mind and would bow out of the Christmas-tree hunt.

  JAKE SAW HANNAH approach and willed himself to behave. He was so close to cracking this case that he couldn’t allow himself to become emotionally entangled with the beautiful doctor. Surely he could resist temptation a little longer. Although the sight of her in that pale pink sweater hugging her soft curves and that pair of tight, well-worn jeans sheared his careful control into shreds.

  Damn. The morning had been frustrating enough without having his body cramped from unsated arousal. All morning DeLito had been hovering in his office, situated right next to Wiley’s, so Jake’s plan to explore Wiley’s files had been nixed. He’d decided to keep his promise to Wiley and go on the tree hunt, hoping to watch Mimi a little more closely.

  But he didn’t know the first thing about Christmas trees. He’d never had one before, much less gone and cut one down. Thank goodness he didn’t have to play Santa. Wiley insisted they hike into the woods and find a real tree instead of buying one from the tree lot in town. He claimed his daughters believed in tradition. Tradition to Jake meant finding whatever local bar was open and forgetting the cheery day with beer and pretzels.

  “LET’S GET that big pine!” Mimi shouted.

  “I love it,” Alison agreed. “The branches are so full.”

  “It’s too big,” Hannah argued.

  “No, it’s perfect. It’ll look great in Dad’s den. Don’t you think so, Joey?” Mimi asked.

  Joey slanted a look at the gigantic pine tree and shrugged. He’d been quiet and moody all day. Hannah wondered if he was two-timing her sister but was too big a coward to tell her.

  “Come on, let’s cut it down,” Mimi said.

  “I’ll get the saw,” Alison offered.

  Hannah eyed the height from base to top. “You’ll probably have to cut off the top to get the tree in the den.” She glanced at Jake, hoping for backup, but he’d staunchly avoided offering an opinion on any of the possibilities so far. And they’d been searching for over an hour. Every tree Hannah found, Mimi refused, saying it was too puny. Mimi always wanted the biggest, gaudiest one she could find. She was so much like their father. Jake’s steady gaze didn’t waver, as if to say he didn’t care one way or the other.

  “Please, Hannah, Dad has a ton of ornaments, too,” Alison begged. “And I know he bought a new set of lights, I think the package said there are a thousand of them.”

  Hannah imagined the den filled with the huge tree, the branches shimmering with so many lights they would nearly be blinded. But she couldn’t disappoint her sisters, so she finally agreed. “All right, but you two have to haul it in.”

  Mimi laughed with delight and handed Joey the saw. “We’ll cut this one down if you two want to go look for your own tree, Hannah. I’ve already picked out one for my apartment.”

  “You want to come with us, Alison?”

  Alison gave her a devious look. “No, I think they’ll need my help to carry this one. You two have fun.”

  Hannah bit down on her lip. She doubted it would be a good idea to be alone with Jake in the woods. Of course they were only hiking, hunting for a tree. And it was daylight. And Jake did work for her father, so she
supposed he was trustworthy.

  “All right,” she agreed, thinking they would have a simple, quick trip—completely unromantic.

  “Don’t get lost,” Mimi teased as they started to walk down the path.

  Hannah paused. “Maybe we’d better come back another day. It’ll be dark soon.”

  Jake shrugged. “We can come back tomorrow if you want, but I can find my way. All we have to do is look for the North Star.”

  “Okay, let’s go ahead while we’re here,” Hannah said, knowing every minute with Jake only presented temptation. The fading remnants of daylight filtered through the branches of the trees, creating shadows and slivers of light that danced when the breeze fluttered through the woods. Fresh air steeped with the scents of moss and wildflowers only heightened her awareness of Jake and his masculine musky smell. His stark raw power seemed magnified amidst the quiet serenity and beauty of the woods.

  “I’m considering not putting up a tree this year,” Hannah said, trying to fill the awkward silence as she traipsed behind Jake. He seemed to have a natural sixth sense for directions and had wound them through the thick of the forest with ease.

  “My mother never bothered either. The only tree we ever had was this little silver thing.” A chuckle rumbled from his chest. “Looked like a pitiful piece of aluminum foil.”

  His tone held no accusation or hint of hurt, just quiet acceptance. Hannah stopped, stunned by his words and not sure she liked being compared to his mother. She’d sensed his mother was an awful person, but was she becoming just as jaded?

  “Do you want to turn back?” Jake asked.

  A shadow fell across his face as he turned to stare at her. Somewhere in the distance she heard a bird chirp, the rustle of leaves as squirrels scampered for food.

  Hannah suddenly spotted a tall, sturdy-looking spruce jutting from the ground in the clearing. The tree stood all alone, seemingly abandoned by nature in the twilight. The North Star shone straight above it, reminding her of Jake’s comment.

  “That one,” she said, feeling uncharacteristically emotional. “I think it needs a home.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Jake parked the Jeep in front of Hannah’s, frustrated and tired. He hadn’t learned anything about Mimi and Joey from the tree-hunting adventure, except that DeLito was about as enthusiastic a tree-hunter as Jake himself. He also sensed tension between Mimi and DeLito and wondered what had caused the rift.

  “Okay, where do you want it?” he asked, juggling the scraggly tree down from his Cherokee. Slinging it over his shoulder, he followed Hannah into her house. He didn’t understand why Hannah had chosen the lopsided spruce when the woods had been filled with sturdy pines rich in needles.

  “In the den.” Hannah led the way through the entrance to the hall. The fine antiques and old-fashioned accessories were so different from his own place he found himself staring at them, studying the details. The family photos on the wall, the lace doilies that looked like they’d been handcrafted by a loving grandmother’s fingers.

  “Just sit it in the corner by the fireplace.”

  He lowered the spruce, careful not to knock the antique coffee table and the small tea set spread daintily on the gleaming wood surface.

  Within seconds, she’d located a tree stand and he settled the tree inside, frowning when he let go and the tree teetered sideways.

  Hannah laughed. “I think it’s leaning because the branches are so much fuller on the right side.”

  He tried to readjust the base, but only managed to make it worse.

  Hannah laughed harder. “I’m not sure it’s going to stand up straight. I may have to get Dad’s old belt.”

  Jake arched a brow from where he’d stooped. “What?”

  “Dad’s belt.” Hannah dug through the box and produced a strip of green plaid flannel. “Dad used to take turns letting us choose the tree. The first year Alison chose, the tree was so lopsided it would hardly stand. Then Mimi made things worse by hanging all the decorations on one side. Dad had to tie the tree trunk to the wall so it wouldn’t fall over.”

  Jake chuckled, awed by the close-knit family. He stood back, scrutinizing the problem, then dropped down and worked to right it, finally leveling the base off with the saw and aligning the trunk. Hannah rummaged through the box of decorations on the Victorian settee.

  “If you need to get going, I can finish,” Hannah said.

  Did she want him to leave?

  “No, I can stay,” Jake said, knowing Wiley would still be at the dealership and DeLito and Mimi and Alison were delivering the bigger tree to Wiley’s house.

  She unwrapped a string of tiny white lights and handed him one end. Odd, how easily they seemed to work together. His height enabled him to reach the taller branches while Hannah draped the lights along the lower ones. Finally, Jake climbed the ladder and placed a white angel on top. Hannah plugged in the lights and the angel and the room lit up with sparkling white lights reminiscent of snowflakes.

  “It is beautiful,” Hannah admitted.

  Hearing the soft admiration in her voice touched a chord inside him. He swallowed, catching the sweetness of her smile as she began lifting ornaments from the box.

  “You have a lot of decorations,” he commented, surprised that several ornaments seemed to be handmade, not expensive crystal or china or glass balls as he’d expected.

  “My dad’s a packrat. Every year he gave us an ornament for Christmas,” Hannah explained. “He kept all the decorations we made at school, too. And my Grammy Rose sends us a homemade ornament in our stocking each year. She always writes the date on the bottom.”

  Jake studied the simple reindeer made from a clothes-pin and felt, the crocheted little pig, the handpainted teddy bears and punched-tin stars. Hannah Hartwell’s tree painted a picture of loving family memories—something he’d never had.

  He shifted and stared at his hands. Her whole family was starting to get under his skin in an odd way. Not a good sign. Emotions had no place in police work. And neither did getting involved with a suspect or a relative of one.

  A twinge of panic hit him. He needed to hurry up and unearth the truth about the car ring before he found himself getting attached to the oddball bunch. If it wasn’t already too late.

  HANNAH HAD TRIED her best to keep the conversation light while they’d decorated the Christmas tree but sharing the nostalgic ornaments had somehow seemed so intimate. Occasionally she’d glimpsed a sadness in Jake’s eyes, a longing and hunger both sexual and emotional, a hunger she doubted he knew she could see. He’d revealed a lot about himself when he’d mentioned the aluminum tree, and then again when he’d become melancholy over her description of the handmade ornaments her family traded every year. He wanted his own ornament, his own tree she realized, sadly, maybe even his own family or place to belong. Only she doubted the big proud man would ever admit it.

  Maybe she was becoming psychic, she thought, finding the idea not quite as unsettling as she once might have.

  Or maybe he was her destiny—her soulmate?

  Then again, maybe Dr. McCoy was wrong, and she was wrong about Jake, and she was losing her mind.

  If she’d learned anything from her own childhood, she knew that trying to change someone to fit a mold didn’t work. Her mother wasn’t the settle-down type and they couldn’t make her stay—Jake was a drifter and would leave, too.

  He flipped off the lamp on the end table, stood back, folded his big arms and admired the tree, his mouth twisting up in a smile. White lights glittered from the tree branches like diamonds. “You did a good job, doc.”

  “Thanks for your help,” Hannah said softly.

  His gaze met hers, a reminder of the times their fingers had brushed as they’d hung the treasured ornaments, the way his voice had sounded low and husky as he’d said her name. Desire stirred along her nerve endings, rippling into a tidal wave of need as his dark gaze raked over her.

  He was going to kiss her, Hannah realized, when his g
aze fell to her lips.

  She parted them in anticipation, the heady scent of his hunger like an aphrodisiac to her heart. His hand rose to cup her chin, to trace a featherlight line over her lips, then to slide into her hair. Tilting his head sideways, he threaded his fingers in her hair, drawing her to him with a moan of desire that broke the silence humming between them.

  “You are so beautiful,” he murmured just before their mouths met. Their tongues collided, mating and dancing in a frenzy; their hands found each other, clinging and holding on as passion erupted, breaking down fragile walls of restraint. Hannah sighed in contentment when his arms embraced her, nestling into his body as if she’d been sculpted to fit against his frame. Her pulse beat wildly as he trailed hot kisses over her neck, as his hands covered her breasts, as his blatant arousal pounded against her belly.

  She dug her hands into his hair, sweeping her tongue along his face, groaning in pleasure when his mouth dipped to suck at her breasts through the soft knit of her sweater. “In the bedroom,” she whispered, urging him to follow.

  He didn’t release her, merely walked her backward, his hands and mouth everywhere on her fevered skin. Heat rose in Hannah, nearly setting her ablaze, all coherent thought lost in the moment. His hands slid beneath her sweater to cup her breasts, hers lifted the buttons loose from his shirt. They entered her darkened bedroom, still clutching one another, the air between them humming with sultry looks and touches. Hannah felt something press against her leg, something hard and cold, blocking her path to the bed. She glanced down and, through the dim moonlight streaming in the window, recognized the hope chest.