by Lori Wilde
“Why do I feel like I’ve stepped into a remake of Miracle on 34th Street?”
“Because you have.” Dwight laughed. “Get down to the police station. They’ve got him in interrogation room two and they’re waiting on you.”
Fifteen minutes later, sans makeup, Alana knocked on the door of interrogation room two at the Pine Crest Police Department. The door opened and she found herself staring into a pair of sharp brown eyes.
Unnerved, her gaze slid past a rumpled, light blue button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up revealing tanned forearms, on down to long lean legs encased in black trousers and finally to a pair of new leather shoes that clearly had been tramping around a fire site.
Soot.
She could smell the smoke on his clothes. Quickly, she darted a glance back at his face, wishing she’d taken the extra five minutes to put on some mascara, lipstick and blush.
No wonder she kept having sex dreams about him. He exuded a primal male energy that tugged low in her belly.
Noah Briscoe.
She knew he’d been up all night investigating the fire, but he looked alert and wide-awake, staring at her with that intense, cynical stare of his. Even so, there was an inner calmness about him that appealed to her. She came from a boisterous, argumentative family of mostly attorneys and judges who could debate either side of any issue. Noah was a man of singular convictions. Right and wrong. Black and white. While her world was totally gray. Complex and complicated.
Was that part of the attraction? The delineated simplicity of him?
“I’m Mr. Clausen’s court-appointed counsel,” she announced.
Noah sized her up with an appreciative glance, his gaze moving from her eyes to her lips and on down her body. Everywhere his gaze roamed she heated up.
Then he took a step closer and reached out and touched her sweater over her heart.
Startled, Alana jerked back.
“Let’s not feed into his delusion,” Noah said.
It was only then that she realized she wore a Santa Claus pin on her sweater. “Oh.” She blinked. “Oh.”
Smoothly, Noah bent his head, found the pin clasp and unhooked it. His knuckles grazed just over her breast.
She stopped breathing.
He stepped back, extended his hand. She held out her palm and he dropped the Santa pin into it. His masculine potency reminded her why she’d called things off between them. With his sarcastic wit, dark outlook and drop-dead gorgeous body, he’d simply been too much for her to handle.
“I’m not delusional,” said the man handcuffed to the interrogation table. “I’m the real deal.”
For the first time, Alana noticed her client.
He was dressed in full Santa regalia. She couldn’t pinpoint his age. He was past middle-age, but not elderly. He possessed a robust figure, twinkling blue eyes, rosy cheeks and a genuine smile beneath a thick white beard. Red suit and hat with furry white collar and cuffs, black boots, white gloves. The only thing missing from the outfit was a wide black belt.
“Hello, Mr. Clausen,” she said, “My name is Alana O’Hara.”
“The spirit of Christmas.” Clausen smiled.
“Excuse me?”
“That’s about all he’ll say,” Noah supplied. “Now that you’re here, I’m hoping we’ll get somewhere.”
“What are the charges?”
Noah told her. She hadn’t heard about the woman injured in the fire. That added a whole new wrinkle to the arson case. Santa was in deep trouble.
Noah spent the next fifteen minutes questioning Christopher Clausen. For the most part, Alana told her client not to answer. On the surface, he appeared open and honest and fully willing to cooperate. The only problem was, he kept insisting he was Santa Claus.
“Mr. Clausen, do you have an explanation for how your belt got into the foyer of the Price Mansion?” Noah quizzed.
Alana rested a hand on her client’s forearm. “You don’t have to answer that.” She met Noah’s hard-edged stare and got to her feet. “It’s time to terminate this interview, Sergeant Briscoe. I need to consult with my client in private.”
A sardonic look crossed his face. His default expression. Erect that barrier. Don the tough-guy mask. She’d gotten a glimpse beyond that, however, and although she had not unearthed the full story, she sensed a bone-deep vulnerability that he never showed anyone.
His teeth flashed, white and straight. It was a cool smile with something hot simmering beneath. “Sure, whatever you need, Ms. O’Hara.”
Was it her imagination or had he put added emphasis on the word need? She thought about her sex dream, felt a flush of heat rise to her cheeks. He noticed and his smile widened, went wicked. She didn’t trust an accommodating cop. Why was he being so accommodating?
Sergeant Briscoe. Ms. O’Hara. They were being all formal, as if they hadn’t once had a sweet tussle in the back of his SUV.
He got up, walked to the door, nodded to a guard standing outside. “You can take Mr. Clausen to lockup.”
The guard entered. Removed Christopher Clausen. Left Noah and Alana alone in the interrogation room.
His hot gaze was on her again. They were both standing. He was closer to the door than she was. “Santa’s guilty as sin.”
“Love the rush to judgment. It’s so you.”
His eyes narrowed but she could have swore he was suppressing an amused smile. “We’ve got an eyewitness who saw him leave the mansion just before the fire broke out. A black belt was found in the foyer and he’s missing one from his Santa suit. Clausen was in the crowd watching the place burn.” Noah ticked off the evidence on his fingers.
“Every bit of it circumstantial.”
“Circumstantial evidence gets a bad rap. You know as well as I do that it’s enough for a conviction.”
“I know you’re hardnosed, Briscoe, but I had no idea you were closed-minded as well.”
“Your guy is a nut case.”
“He’s a bit unconventional, but that doesn’t make him crazy.”
“He thinks he’s Santa Claus.”
“I don’t think he means that literally. It’s more spirit of Christmas thing. As in, Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.”
“Cute. Considering we’re in Virginia.”
“That’s what I’m getting at. Clausen is just trying to prove a point.” Alana was talking out of her hat here. She knew it and Briscoe knew it. She had no idea whether Clausen had a psychological disorder or not, but she was his defense attorney. It was up to her to defend him.
“Which is?” Noah’s gaze drilled into hers and he crossed his arms over his chest. Another barrier along with the challenging tone.
His proximity did something curious to her nerve endings. More specifically, the nerve endings in a certain region of her body that hadn’t been touched by a man in a long time. She notched her chin up. “The spirit of Christmas resides in everyone. Even you, Scrooge.”
He laughed, loud and startling. “Let me guess, your favorite movie in the whole wide world is Miracle on 34th Street.”
Nailed it. Completely.
She wasn’t going to let him know. She held his stare. What she saw there made her forget all about Christopher Clausen and the burned-out Price Mansion.
Raw desire.
Desire that matched her own.
“What’s Clausen’s motive?” she asked, determined to ignore what she saw written on his face. “He doesn’t have a motive for burning down the Price Mansion.”
Noah shrugged. “Maybe Santa is just a plain old firebug who gets his sexual jollies from setting fires?”
Her breath was coming in shallow little puffs of air. Now she remembered the real reason she’d pulled the plug on their budding romance. Noah was too much man for her. If she ever slept with him, she knew she’d fall head over heels and that was a risk she simply could not take. She was just getting started in her career. She wasn’t ready for anything serious. A casual fling was all she wanted.
But
one thing was abundantly clear.
There was nothing casual about Noah Briscoe.
2
NOAH LEFT THE station around 10:00 a.m., headed home to snatch a quick nap. Alana’s words circled his brain. I know you’re hard-nosed, Briscoe, but I had no idea you were closed-minded as well.
Was he closed-minded?
Noah didn’t think so. The evidence against crazy Clausen was as clear-cut as the aged pastrami on the Reuben sandwiches at Mac’s Diner. Sliced, hot and ready to serve.
Not closed-minded, eh? You’re thinking Clausen is crazy when you have no solid proof of any mental disorder. Other than an enchantment with Christmas. If he locked people up for excess Christmas spirit the Pine Crest jail would be full to the ceiling and chief among his prisoners would be Alana herself.
How was it that Alana’s offhand comments could embed themselves so firmly in his head and cause a twinge of doubt? For the most part, he was a self-confident man. But she had a way of rattling his cage when he least expected it.
Noah had no sooner passed through the back entrance into the employee parking lot, surrounded by an eight-foot chain-link fence and liberally posted with security cameras, than he spied the protesters marching the sidewalk outside the locked gate. They were chanting and carrying picket signs reading: Free Santa! and Pine Crest Police Department ruins Christmas.
A van from the local TV station sat parked at the curb and the amused camera crew filmed both the protesters and Noah as he slid behind the wheel of his black SUV. He slammed the door closed, sighed and rolled his eyes. Who had leaked Clausen’s arrest to the media so quickly?
Alana?
He immediately dismissed the thought. She might be full of the Christmas spirit, but she wouldn’t pull something so underhanded.
Would she?
She was an eager young lawyer looking to prove herself. Noah’s suspicious nature kicked up. He’d learned a long time ago that it was a good idea not to trust anyone too much.
He drove from the lot, past the protesters and news media, headed home to his empty apartment. He’d promised himself he was going to buy a house. With the interest rates so low and a hefty down payment in the bank, there was really no reason not to take that next step. But he had no wife, no girlfriend, not even a pet. There was no need to rush into home ownership, but he was tired of apartment renting. Nothing permanent. Nothing that belonged to him. Strange. Until recently, those had been the positive points of renting. When had his thinking started to shift?
The air smelled of snow as he trudged up the steps. This time of year brought out the worst in him. He wished he could take a vacation, head for the Bahamas. But in all honesty, he wasn’t a beachy kind of guy. His ideal vacation involved an isolated cabin in Montana and plenty of fly-fishing. Wrong time of year for that.
Once inside, he stripped off his clothes and got into the shower, scrubbing the soot and wood smoke smell from his skin. He thought of Alana and the sleepy-eyed, just-rolled-out-of-the-sheets look she’d worn to the interrogation room.
He got hard instantly, cursed himself under his breath and dealt with it in the most efficient way possible. Afterward, he toweled himself dry and fell naked into bed, determined to dream of nothing.
Noah woke from his nap sometime later, feeling foggy and ravenous. It was five-thirty in the evening. He hadn’t intended to sleep that long. His stomach grumbled. Groggily, he stumbled to the kitchen, opened the refrigerator door and peered in.
A bottle of ketchup, another of Dijon mustard, maple syrup, Spanish olives, six-pack of beer and half a carton of milk. He opened up the milk, took a whiff. Ugh. Poured it down the sink.
The pantry was just as sparse. A tin of sardines, but no crackers. Froot Loops. Barbecue potato chips with mostly crumbs left. Cans of corn, green beans and spinach. The search of the freezer yielded a stack of TV dinners, but his microwave was on the fritz, and way in the back, he found a forgotten container of rocky road ice cream coated with ice crystals.
Sighing, he shut the freezer and went to get dressed. Not long after, he was sitting in the booth at Mac’s Diner, close to the station house. The big-screen TV mounted on the wall above the front counter was playing the evening news.
The image of a pretty reporter on the courthouse steps popped onto the screen. Microphone in hand, the reporter smiled into the camera. Around her protestors carried Free Santa! picket signs. That was still going on? Noah rolled his eyes.
“Maxie Marks here, reporting for KPCV. It’s been a lively day at City Hall as Christopher Clausen supporters turned out in droves to demand the release of Santa Claus, who stands accused of burning down the Price Mansion,” said the reporter in an über-perky voice. “This afternoon, Judge Kline granted his lawyer’s shockingly low bail request of ten thousand dollars. Clausen, who’s known around town as the Spirit of Christmas, is out on bond and free to return to his job as Santa at the Pine Crest Mall. Look, here comes Clausen’s lawyer now. Let’s see if we can get a statement.”
The reporter and her camera crew sprinted higher up the courthouse steps. Noah straightened, watched the screen for Alana. She ought to be pretty proud of herself for swinging such a low bail.
But instead of Alana, the reporter thrust her microphone into the face of Dwight Jacoby, one of the most renowned defense attorneys in the state. What was a big cheese like Jacoby doing on a small-potatoes case like this? And what had happened to Alana? She should have been giving the interview.
Just then the door to the diner flew open, bringing in a brisk gust of cold December wind and a striking redhead bundled up in a wool, houndstooth coat. Her head was down. Mumbling to herself, she stormed into the booth next to Noah, plucking off her gloves as she went. She doffed a white tam that matched her scarf and tossed it on the seat beside her. Running a hand through hair that crackled with static electricity, she finally glanced up.
Alana. Looking sexy as hell with a disgruntled scowl on her face.
Memories of the wee hours of the morning with Alana standing in his interrogation room, arguing with him every step of the way, rushed back to Noah.
“Oh, crap,” she muttered, plenty loud enough for him to hear. “It’s you.”
Noah got up, sauntered toward her. “Dining alone?”
“Yes. Go away.”
He slid into the seat across from her.
“Didn’t you hear that last part? I said go away?”
“I heard you,” he said mildly.
“You don’t follow instructions well.”
“A frequent fault of mine.”
“So I’ve noticed.”
“What’s got you in a lather?” he asked.
She wanted to talk. It was written all over her. She was just uncertain about talking to him. “Stupid,” she grumbled. “Stupid, stupid.”
“Am I interrupting a private conversation?” He tried not to grin. She looked as if she’d get mad if he grinned.
“No. Yes.” As she spoke, her words fanned the fine tendrils of red hair framing her face. “Go away.”
“You’re waffling.”
A waitress popped over to their table. “What can I get you?”
“Reuben sandwich and coffee,” Noah said, closing his menu at the same time Alana said, “He was just leaving.”
Noah shook his head at the waitress. “I’m staying.”
“Go away,” Alana said succinctly. “I’m sick of men.”
“I hear you on that one, honey,” the waitress said.
Alana turned to the waitress. “What is it with guys? They give you the grunt work and then when you’re enjoying it, they take it away from you.”
“Pigs.” The waitress tapped her chin with an index finger. “Swine. Greedy hogs.” She shifted her gaze to Noah, narrowed her eyes. “You want me to call security to get rid of him for you?”
Noah smiled at Alana. “I’ll buy your dinner if you let me stay.”
“I’ll call security,” the waitress offered again. “It’ll just take a s
econd. Say the word.”
“No, no,” Alana said. “He’s not the swine in question. At least not at the moment.”
“Okay.” The waitress twisted up her mouth, glared and pointed a finger at Noah. “I’ve got my eyes on you, buddy.”
“Duly noted.”
“Now,” the waitress said to Alana, notepad in hand. “What’ll you have?”
“Cobb salad, vinaigrette on the side, hot tea.”
“Gotcha.” She gave Noah one last glare and walked away.
“Why do I feel like I got caught in the middle of something?” he asked Alana.
“Because you brought your nosy butt over here.”
“I was just concerned.”
One skeptical eyebrow went up on her forehead. “Seriously?”
“Jacoby took the Clausen case away from you?”
She nodded. “He did.”
Noah shrugged. “Protestors and media attention. It was inevitable.”
“I was the one who negotiated the reduced bail for Clausen.” She smoothed a paper napkin over her lap. “Jacoby gets all the credit.”
“It’s politics. Not to belittle your accomplishment or anything, but you got the bail lowered because Kline is up for reelection next year. He was kowtowing to public sentiment.”
“You sound so philosophical. That’s not the hotheaded Noah Briscoe I know. In fact, that’s one of the reasons we never hooked up. You were so rigid—”
“I thought you liked that about me,” he teased.
She ignored the innuendo. “And I was always trying to get you to be more fluid, see both sides of the issue. Now we’ve flip-flopped. What’s happened?”
“Santa burned down the Price Mansion.”
The waitress returned briefly to settle a cup of hot water and a tea bag at Alana’s elbow, and a cup of coffee in front of Noah.
“Clausen didn’t do it.”
“The evidence says otherwise.”
“You promised me that you’d keep investigating.”
“What do you care now that Jacoby’s hogging your case?”
