Leaving Blue Bayou

by JoAnn Ross

  Holly glanced back over her shoulder.

  “Thanks,” he said, with a heartfelt appreciation that didn’t surprise her as much as it might have only a day earlier.

  That he loved his daughter was more than a little obvious. Although she wasn’t about to envy Emma for having the father she herself had always dreamed of, Holly nevertheless found herself warming to him. And not in the sexual way she’d experienced last night. But something deeper. And, oddly, more unsettling.

  “I’ve never gone tree hunting before,” she said. “I’m looking forward to the experience.”

  The oddest thing was, the words that were meant to reassure both father and daughter were absolutely true.

  Across the room, Emma was licking lemon filling from a small thumb, oblivious to the look Gabe was sweeping over her.

  “You look good enough to eat,” he said.

  She refrained, just barely, from running her hand down the front of the cream pajamas covered with deep red cherries. “If you’re hungry enough to eat flannel, there’s a bear claw in that bag with your name on it.”

  His deep rumbling laugh followed Holly up the stairs and into the shower, staying with her while she quickly blow-dried her hair and tried to cover up the purple and blue pouch of swollen skin around her eye.

  And his laugh was still there, warming her blood in a not unpleasant way after she’d dressed.

  There had to be some kind of mind-altering Kool-Aid in the water, Holly decided as she headed back down the stairs to willingly go on a Christmas tree hunt.

  Twelve

  Emma was bundled up like a snow princess in her Hello Kitty pink hooded jacket lined with white faux fur, matching pink snowpants and boots, and fuzzy pink mittens, when Holly came downstairs. The expectation on her face was so bright Holly felt she needed to put on her sunglasses.

  “Emma,” Gabe said, not taking his eyes from Holly, “why don’t you go check on Dog. Ms. Berry and I will lock up and be out in a minute.”

  “Okay.” She obediently went outside.

  “Now that she got her way, she’ll be sweet as a sugar plum for at least the next ten minutes,” Gabe said. His wry grin creased his cheeks in a way that made Holly want to lick those dimples.

  “She’s darling.” To keep her hands out of trouble, Holly turned her back and slipped her arms into the scarlet ski jacket she’d hung on the wall hook last night. “And you’re good with her.”

  “It’s taken some adjustment on both our parts,” he surprised her by admitting. “But we’re getting there.”

  His fingers brushed the back of her neck as he lifted her hair from beneath the collar. Like everything else about the man, the casual touch proved unnervingly seductive.

  “I don’t mean to pry, but did your wife die?”

  Emma’s mother would have been young, but having written a serial killer who targeted soccer moms in her fifth book, Holly knew that youth wasn’t always enough to keep that old boogie man Death from claiming another victim.

  “No.” His tone was curt, but in the short span of time it took for her to turn back around, his face had set in a not unfriendly, but unreadable mask.

  “Sorry,” she said as she plucked her knitted hat from the rack. “As I said, I didn’t mean to pry. Besides, it’s none of my business—”

  “I’m beginning to think it just might be.” He seemed nearly as surprised to hear himself say that as she was to hear it. “But, the thing is, it’s not a pretty story. Not all that unusual, either, unfortunately. But definitely not something I want to talk about when I’m headed out on a beautiful winter day with an even more beautiful woman.”

  “Oh, that’s good.” She drew in a short breath. “Do you practice those lines? Or do they come naturally?”

  “I don’t know, since, having grown up with three older sisters who never let me get a word in edgewise, I’ve never exactly been the talkative type.” He tilted his head and studied her, the same way he had last night. Slowly. Silently. Intimately. “Come here.”

  Holly could no more have resisted that husky invitation than she could have sprouted gossamer wings and flown to the moon.

  “I thought about doing this all night,” he said as he enveloped her in his arms. She felt her body melting. Degree by enervating degree. “About holding you again.” He brushed his lips against her temple. “Tasting you again.” His mouth skimmed down her cheek. Nuzzled her neck. “You smell like sugar cookies this morning.”

  “It’s the vanilla in my lotion.” She tilted her head, giving his lips access to that little hollow in her throat where her pulse was beating so hard and fast she wouldn’t have been surprised if he could hear it. “I have a friend who runs a day spa. She creates personalized scents.”

  “I’m sure she does a dynamite business. But I have the feeling you don’t need any extra embellishment.” His tongue slid silkily up her throat, from that wild bloodbeat to brush the line of her jaw before encircling her lips. “Though I have to admit, sugar cookies are one of my favorite things.”

  “I dreamed of this,” she said, as her hands stroked his shoulders.

  They were wide and strong and capable of carrying heavy burdens. Just like the small-town sheriff in the story she’d stayed up all night writing. There was no point in denying that Gabriel had been her inspiration for that gentle, but tough, defender of women and children.

  “Of you. And me. Together.”

  It had been after she’d pictured the sheriff shooting the psycho husband dead. Oh, she hadn’t gotten to that scene yet, but she could see it as clearly as if it was running on her HDTV. She’d had it in her head when she’d fallen into bed, thinking of the abusive bad guy’s scarlet blood staining the pristine moonlight snow.

  Once again, justice had prevailed. As it always did in a Holly Berry mystery.

  But her muses, and her unconscious mind, had a different ending. As she’d discovered when she’d dreamed of the hero making slow, amazing love to the heroine, in front of a fire blazing in a stone hearth, while the little girl slept the safe, protected sleep of innocents in her pink canopied bed upstairs.

  She could feel his lips quirk against hers. “Was it a good dream?”

  Holly tilted her head back. “What do you think?”

  “I think”—his lips plucked at hers, punctuating his words as he made her blood sing—“that there’s no way you and I couldn’t be spectacular together.”

  And then, as if to prove his point, his mouth swept down and took hers. Hard and fast, the sudden punch of heat literally rocking her back on her heels, warming all the cold, empty places inside her.

  It was the strangest thing, she thought, as the amazing kiss went on and on and on. His mouth was still on hers, but somehow she could feel it in every cell of her body. Shooting out her fingertips, her toes, curling in her stomach, making her nipples tingle and that hot, needy place between her thighs ache.

  “If we were alone,” he groaned into her mouth, one large hand holding her intimately against his lower belly, where he was rock hard and swollen, “we’d finish this.”

  “Yes.”

  Somehow, as he’d dragged her into the heat, both arms and one leg had wrapped around him. Reality had receded as he’d made love to her with only his wickedly clever lips, teeth, and tongue. At this moment, Holly would have said yes, yes, yes! to anything, everything, Gabriel had in mind.

  As he’d done last night, he backed away. His hands on her shoulders, his eyes on her face, which, she feared, was not only bruised, but flushed the crimson color of her jacket.

  “Unfortunately, right now, we have a tree to hunt down.” He bent down and kissed her nose. Then her lips again, the brief flare of heat ending too soon. “So, hopefully you’ll be issuing me a snow check.”

  “I think you mean a rain check.” Although she’d never been the type of woman to go to bed with a man she’d just met, Holly was definitely issuing one to this man.

  “Maybe that’s what you call them in Seattle.�
� He grinned, took away the leather gloves she was about to put on, and replaced them with a pair of insulated blue gloves covered with white snowflakes.

  “My sister Rachel is a serious skier,” he explained. “She was on the Olympic team that went to Japan in ’98 and her closets look like an REI warehouse. Since your own gloves didn’t look that warm, I stopped by her house this morning before coming over here.”

  “That’s very thoughtful.” They might not go with her coat, but they definitely looked warmer.

  “We do our best to keep our guests comfortable here at the Ho Ho Ho Inn. And, getting back to my plan of nibbling every fragrant inch of your sugar-cookie-sweet body, here in Santa’s Village, it’s a snow check.” He picked up the conversational thread. “We’re a little different from the rest of the planet.”

  As she walked out into the bite of an icy winter’s morning and saw the huge sleigh pulled by—count them!—eight reindeer, there was no way Holly was about to argue that claim.

  “Blitzen, I presume?” she asked with an arched brow.

  “Back left, right in front of the sleigh,” Gabe said without a touch of irony in his tone.

  She narrowed her eyes at the brown, antlered reindeer who’d caused her accident. In turn, he returned a blank, brown-eyed stare.

  “So, what happened to Rudolph?” Holly asked.

  “He’s make-believe,” Emma volunteered from the backseat of the huge red, gold, and black sleigh. Dog sat beside her, long tongue gathering in snowflakes that continued to fall like feathers from a patchy blue and gray sky. “From the song. ‘Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.’ ”

  “Of course. I’d forgotten that.”

  “I can sing it for you.” Without hesitation, she began to do exactly that.

  “There’s still time to change your mind,” Gabe murmured.

  “No.” Between the coffee and the mind-blinding kiss, she was already too awake to go back to sleep anyway. “Besides, I’m looking forward to seeing an actual Christmas tree farm.”

  The weirdest thing was, it was true.

  Five minutes later, Holly was snuggled beneath a pile of blankets next to Gabe, who was actually driving the sleigh.

  “You’re very good at this,” she said. Even Blitzen seemed to be obeying the light flick of the reins.

  “I’ve had a lot of practice. Sam Fraiser, that’d be—”

  “The village’s very own Santa Claus,” Holly said.

  Although she couldn’t quite keep the wry tone from her voice, there was no way she was going to question the reality of the man the little girl singing in the backseat had gotten in a fistfight over.

  “Yeah. That’s him. Well, he’s been loaning the rig out to the inn for a long time. It sorta adds to the appeal, and bringing the tree back on that rack at the back of the sleigh is more colorful than strapping it to the roof of the Expedition. Also, back when I was in high school, I picked up some extra Christmas bucks driving tourists around during the holidays.”

  Picturing the teenage boy he must have been, Holly had no problem at all imagining long lines of high school girls waiting for rides.

  “How does this tree hunting thing you’ve got going work during really bad weather?” she asked.

  “I don’t know, since this is my first winter running the place and we haven’t had any so far this season. This storm might have closed the roads because of the snowpack and ice, but it’s still nowhere near the blizzards the place can get. I suppose, if the weather got really nasty, most guests would prefer to stay inside by the fire and let me bring their trees to them.”

  That was probably the case, Holly thought. But as the harness bells jingled merrily, the metal runners crunched against the snow, and Emma segued into “Frosty the Snowman,” she decided they’d be missing something special.

  “Oh, they really do look just like Christmas trees,” she said on a little appreciative intake of breath as they approached the acres of fir and spruce trees lined up like little blue-green conical soldiers.

  “That’s the point,” Gabe said. “And I don’t want to burst any bubbles, especially since you’re not a real fan of the holiday in the first place, but although they’re trained to grow into a more pyramid shape than, say, pine trees, they still need to be trimmed and shaped at least once a year.”

  “They’re still lovely.” Again, she meant it. “The only thing missing are lights, glass balls, and angels for the tops.”

  He bent his head toward her, lowering his voice for her ears only. “The angel’s sitting right here.”

  “Flatterer,” she said. When she turned her head, their lips brushed.

  “It’s not flattery if it’s true.”

  He pulled up on the reins, clucked lightly, and the reindeer came to a stop next to a big gray barn. A huge fresh wreath made up of spruce boughs hung above the closed double wooden doors of the barn, and trees, wearing red bows fashioned from outdoor velvet ribbon, flanked either side. A hand-painted sign offered sleigh rides, cocoa, hot apple cider, free disposal bags, and the loan of saws and axes for the do-it-yourselfers.

  “We closed down this past weekend because the previous owner always gave his employees the last week of December and all of January off to spend with their families,” Gabe said. “But if anyone in town wants a tree, they know they’re free to come cut one.”

  “Doesn’t that invite tree theft?”

  “I suppose it could, though there’s not as much profit in second- or third-growth trees,” he said as Dog jumped down from the backseat and set off across the field, snow flying, chasing after a squirrel.

  “Poor guy never catches them,” Gabe said with another of what she was beginning to think of as his trademark grins, “but that never stops him from trying.”

  “Maybe the fun is in the chase,” she suggested.

  “There is that.”

  Taking Holly’s word that she could certainly climb out of a simple sleigh herself, he lifted Emma down.

  “How can anyone ever decide?” Holly asked.

  She had a vague memory of going to a neighborhood lot with her father, and him carrying a tree back to their apartment, but there couldn’t have been more than twenty or thirty to choose among. Here the forest of conifers seemed to stretch on for miles.

  “You have to look and look and look,” Emma informed her. “But all Daddy’s trees are the best. You can’t pick a bad one. Do you know Nordstrom?”

  “Of course.” Part of the appeal of Seattle, when she’d been looking for a new place to live, had been the fabulous downtown flagship store.

  “Well, one of Daddy’s trees is on the front of their catalog this year.”

  “I’m impressed.”

  Gabe shrugged broad shoulders. “We’re local. It only made sense.”

  Holly knew men, both in L.A. and Seattle, who’d be broadcasting such a coup through a bullhorn.

  “Good try,” she said. “But I’m still impressed.”

  As perfect as every tree appeared to Holly, Emma seemed determined to find the “most bestest” tree. This one was too skinny. Another too tall. A third’s branches were too close together. A fourth’s were too far apart.

  “How about this one?” Holly asked finally, after the search had stretched on for an hour.

  Emma’s lips drew together into a thoughtful line as she looked a long, long way upward.

  Holly, who was holding her breath, realized that Gabe, standing next to her, was doing the same thing.

  Emma let out a long, happy breath of her own.

  “It’s perfect,” she pronounced. “Better even than the one that lady from Nordstrom picked.”

  Not bothering to hide his relief, Gabe took the hatchet and saw he’d retrieved from the barn, and, after making sure Emma and Holly were standing out of the way, lay down on the ground and began to saw.

  Less than three minutes later, the tree toppled to the snow. While he was wrapping the snowy branches in netting, Emma gathered up a handful of snow and, giggling, s
tuffed it down the back of Gabe’s jacket. Which had him, in turn, expertly packing a snowball that he then threw at his daughter.

  “Holly!” the little girl shouted as she ran a zigzag retreat through the trees. “You have to help! It’s girls against boys.”

  Holly had never, in her memory, taken part in a snowball fight. But as Gabe chased after his daughter, Holly chased after him, throwing herself at his legs, causing him to crash to the ground, with her sprawled on top of him.

  “Damn, you’re pretty good. For a city girl.” Wrapping his arms around her, he rolled over, so she was lying beneath him. “But guess what, sweetheart, you and half-pint over there just happen to be outmanned.”

  Laughing, and a little out of breath, Holly shoved against him. “Let me up, you big bully.”

  “In a minute.” His body was warm against hers, his eyes hot. Holly wouldn’t have been surprised if all the snow on the mountain melted from the way he was looking at her. “Your nose is red.”

  “So’s yours.” Reaching out, she grabbed a handful of snow and washed his face with it.

  “You realize, of course,” he said, using his superior strength to press her deeper into the snowdrift, “that you’re daring to take on a United States Marine.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” she responded breathlessly, as she wrestled beneath him. “The few.” She scissored her legs around his. “The proud.” Using the instructions the Seattle cops had taught her during that class, she managed to flip their positions so she was now lying on top of him. “The oversexed.”

  “Got that right.” When he cupped her butt with his gloved hands and pressed her against him, she realized that he’d allowed her to overpower him. “As I intend to prove to you tonight.”

  Before she could respond, Emma had returned and was standing over them. “The girls won,” she decided.

  “They always do,” Gabe agreed. “At least in this family.”

  “Why don’t you kiss Holly?” Emma suggested. “To show you surrendered.”

  “From the mouths of babes,” he murmured. “I hereby surrender to the superior super power of females.” Lifting his head, he brushed his lips against hers. While still cold, they managed to send a burst of heat through her veins.