by Marina Adair
“But the bird’s nest,” Holly said, her body shaking with excitement.
Last week they had discovered a hummingbird nest in the tree adjacent to the kitchen window. They hadn’t seen any hummingbirds, but Holly still checked every morning.
“It will still be there when I’m done with your hair. The stiller you are, the faster I can go.” Holly froze while Regan twisted the last rubber band in place.
When standing still became too much, she lifted her little arms and wrapped them around Regan’s neck.
Regan crushed her daughter tight, breathing her in and sending up a silent thank you to her Mrs. Clauses. All of the uncertainty that had been churning since the night of the Christmas party had taken its toll.
You just have to make it through today, she thought. Because today was the last day of Regan’s old life, the last day of her old dreams. Tomorrow was another day with new direction. And it would be worth it, she reminded herself, holding Holly even closer. The chance to raise her daughter in St. Helena would be worth every sacrifice: the long hours, toothpaste-stained sinks, and soap-scummed showers.
Holly wiggled out of reach, and without another word dashed down the hallway, her pigtails bouncing with each step.
Regan looked around at the cottage, with its two bedrooms, hardwood floors, and even the avocado-green tile, and swallowed hard. They were moving into a one-bedroom apartment with white walls, gray carpet, and venetian blinds. It would smell of carpet cleaner, paint, and bleach.
Not the end of the world. She could make this work. Would make this work.
“Two minutes, young lady. Then we need to pack up your books,” she called.
Regan opened her underwear drawer and started tossing lace and satin—and a depressing amount of cotton—into a box. Not willing to admit that she was in serious need of some new lingerie, she stuffed the practical panties at the bottom of the box and draped the sexy and slinky ones over the top. She’d just folded the flaps over when the doorbell sounded.
Hoisting the box in her arms, she grabbed the tape and made her way to the front door. ChiChi had said she would come by to help keep an eye on Holly so Regan could take the first load to the new place. The thought of how wonderful her three Mrs. Clauses had been over the past two days made her perk up as she opened the door.
Her smile vanished and something entirely inappropriate began to burn low in her belly.
Even in faded jeans and a worn Stanford T-shirt, Gabe looked expensive and full of himself—and good enough to strip down and lick. His dark hair, still damp from a shower, was rumpled like he’d just run his fingers through it, and based on the shadow of stubble, he hadn’t even bothered to shave.
Gabe DeLuca was a perfect specimen of the male sex. And suddenly, the only thing she could think about was sex. With him. And that incredible package Jordan talked about. Which she was currently gawking at.
Gabe cleared his throat and Regan jerked her eyes up, away from his prize-winning package to his face that was crinkled into a knowing grin.
“Morning, Vixen,” he said in that low, you-know-you-want-me voice.
She scowled by way of greeting. His eyes dipped to the floor and Regan squeaked. Somehow in the process of mentally stripping him down, she had dropped the box and now her entryway looked like Victoria’s Secret after a two-for-one blowout.
“Let me help with that,” Gabe offered.
“I got it.”
They both bent down at the same time, Regan scrambling to shove handfuls of panties back into the box, Gabe pulling them back out one by one to inspect them.
Satisfied that she had gotten every last scrap, Regan yanked the yellow demibra out of Gabe’s long, lean fingers, dropped it in the box, slammed the flaps shut, smacked away his hands, and taped it securely. She stood, ready to give him an earful. Her day was stressful enough without having to deal with him.
Only, when she looked up she was speechless. Between Gabe’s two pointer fingers, the elastic stretched tight, hung a pair of red panties with a big green bow and “Merry Christmas, Love, Santa” across the crotch.
His lips twitched. “I didn’t know we were exchanging gifts. I think you have to be wearing it for the full effect, though.”
Ignoring the way her toes curled into the rug, she snatched the panties and shoved them in her back pocket. “Do you have a reason for being here? Other than to bother me?”
“I was supposed to come bearing fruitcake, care of ChiChi. But—” Gabe picked up a pastry box off the porch bench. Oh, God, he brought doughnuts? She loved doughnuts. “I stopped by Pricilla’s and picked up these instead.”
“Why?” She tried to feign disinterest but found herself sniffing the air for hints of maple.
“Because ChiChi’s fruitcake has been known to cause copious amounts of vomiting, and I didn’t want you to accuse me of digestive assault with a deadly fruitcake.”
Regan refused to smile. Even though, when Gabe wasn’t getting her fired or kicking her out of parties, he was charming. And she could smell the faintest hint of maple. Oh, boy, she was a goner.
“No, I mean, why are you here?”
“I heard you were moving and—”
“Oh.” Of course. Her heart sank.
Disappointed and mad at herself for feeling disappointed, Regan grabbed her purse off of the table by the door, riffled through it, and extracted an envelope with his name on it. Forcing herself to look him in the eye, she explained, “I don’t have it all. But I hope this will be enough for now. I’ll send you a payment every week until it’s paid off.”
Gabe just stared at the envelope. When he didn’t make a move to take it, Regan leaned around him and stuck it in his butt pocket, making sure not to notice how firm his ass was, or how yummy he smelled, or how her heart picked up when his eyes lit with humor. Nor did she succumb to lust and give him a firm little pat on that incredibly pat-able butt.
“Look, Regan. I didn’t come here to—”
Gabe’s words were cut short by what sounded like a small herd of elephants stampeding down the hardwood floor. The thundering drew to a close, only to be replaced by a shrill squeal that was nothing short of pure, uncontained joy.
“Mommy, he brought us doughnuts!”
Gabe looked at the tiny bundle of excitement jumping up and down, and froze. His face went slack and his eyes widened with shock.
He didn’t know?
Holly’s hands alternating between clapping and pointing at the pink box in his possession only made his discomfort more obvious. Regan closed her eyes. This was not what she needed today.
Wrapping an arm around her daughter’s shoulders, she pulled Holly into the shelter of her body and pinned Gabe with a glare, hard and determined. Neither spoke, but the message was clear: Mess with my kid and I will fuck you up.
“Mommy,” Holly whispered, eyeing the Dirty Jar. “You should introduce me. It’s only polite.”
Regan nodded. “Holly, this is Mr. DeLuca. Gabe, my daughter, Holly.”
She knew the moment he figured out who Holly’s father was. It didn’t take much. Holly was the perfect combination of her and Richard. At least physically.
“Nice to meet you,” Holly said, sticking out a hand that had a brown smudge that looked suspiciously like peanut butter.
Regan sent a questioning glance at the undeniable evidence of pre-breakfast nibbling. Holly swayed nervously and quickly wiped the evidence off on her jean-clad legs before reoffering her hand. “Can I have a doughnut? It’s polite to share.”
Gabe’s mouth opened and shut, his chest rising and falling faster than seemed healthy. With a single nod, he offered Holly the entire box of pastries. Sucker.
Regan almost felt sorry for him. Okay, she didn’t feel sorry at all. It felt nice to see Mr. Laid Back squirm.
Holly peeked under the lid and clutched the treasured pink box to her chest. Eyes squinted, face scrunched in concentration, she tilted her head and studied Gabe—tall, dark, and undoubtedly feeling g
uilty as hell. Regan almost snorted.
After long deliberation, Holly eyed the Dirty Jar and frowned. “He didn’t shake my hand, but he brought the ones with the pink sprinkles on top.”
Regan smiled at her daughter’s dilemma. The law was the law. But doughnuts were doughnuts. She also admired her daughter’s ability to gracefully break the tension in the room. The moment Holly opened her mouth, Gabe’s horrified expression faded and a charmed smile hovered on his lips. He squatted down and extended his hand.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Holly. I seem to have left my manners at home.” Holly easily accepted his excuse and hand, pumping it like a politician.
“He’s sorry ’bout the bad manners, Mommy.” Holly looked back and forth between the two adults. “Does he have to put a quarter in the Dirty Jar?”
At that Gabe raised a brow. “Dirty Jar?”
“Yup, whenever Mommy or I do something dirty or impolite we have to put a quarter in the Dirty Jar.”
“Ah,” he stood, pinning Regan with a look. “So, if your mom were to, say, call someone a bad name or throw a melon at someone’s head she’d have to—”
“Pay fifty cents,” Holly said proudly. “We collected enough quarters to go to the movies and buy popcorn when we got stuck in traffic moving here.”
“I’ll bet,” Gabe said, hands in belt loops, rocking back on his heels.
“Holly, why don’t you take those in the kitchen and put one on a napkin,” Regan instructed.
Holly flew down the hallway, the box teetering dangerously in her greedy little palms.
“Do you need to go help her?”
“No.” What she needed was for him to leave.
Gabe watched Holly disappear, then took stock of the Dirty Jar. His right eyebrow twitched, and the look he gave her was 100 percent Dirty Jar–worthy.
“Since I ran into you, I’ve practically paid for two years at Stanford for her.” Regan laughed, but quickly realized that she was the only one laughing. Gabe looked pained and a bit constipated.
“Is she Richar—”
“She’s mine.” Richard may have donated the sperm, but that’s where his influence ended.
“She’s beautiful,” Gabe said. “Like her mom.” A heated gaze swept down her body and made its way back to lock with hers. His assessment wasn’t filled with disgust but an appreciation so primal Regan looked at the floor and toed at the corner of the entry rug.
How was it possible to be turned on by the one person who had caused her so much pain?
“Why are you here?”
“I came to see if you needed help loading up.”
“Of course you did.” Too bad for him she was only moving two miles away. “Well, thanks, but no thanks.”
She went to slam the door—in his face—when he shoved his foot in the doorjamb.
“Wait, that came out wrong. ChiChi mentioned that you got a place over by the school.” So he knew. She frowned, mentally kicking herself for wondering how he felt about it. “I figured I have a truck that would make moving your things easier than trying to fit it all in your car. Plus, an extra set of arms always helps.”
Regan remained silent, her eyes trained on his face, unconvinced. If she looked down at that extra set of arms, she’d give in. Because he had really nice arms. A nice chest too. And his lips—
“Also, I wanted to apologize for my behavior last weekend.”
Regan found herself smiling, pleasantly stunned that the most irritating, high-handed man she knew was actually apologizing. To her.
Still, she wanted him to sweat it out.
“And the other day downtown.” Gabe cleared his throat and ran a hand through his already messy hair. “Actually, I wanted to apologize for just about everything I’ve ever said or done since the moment we met.”
Regan blinked. Twice, actually, and considered what to say.
She had rehearsed this moment a thousand times. Yet standing there, while he sincerely made his apologies, her scathing reply somehow stuck in her throat. Her anger faded and all she could think about was how his heartfelt contrition made her warm in places she didn’t want to acknowledge.
“Did ChiChi make you say that?”
“No. I’ve been trying to say it for a couple of days now, but every time I get around you I end up making everything worse.”
She knew exactly how he felt.
“That’s the last of it,” Gabe called out, biting back a disgusted grunt and dropping a box on the carpet next to the patio door.
Patio didn’t even begin to describe the six-foot concrete square that sat behind Regan’s apartment. Rolling his shoulders, he scanned the interior of her new home. This time he did grunt. No matter how she decided to dress it, the four sterile walls, two single-paned windows, and industrial sludge–colored carpet wouldn’t amount to much more than a crappy apartment. Nowhere near the home that a little girl deserved come Christmas morning. Hell, he didn’t even think there would be room for a tree once they brought Regan’s furniture over.
Gabe made his way to the bedroom and leaned against the door frame, his body suddenly heavy. Holly was curled up in a sleeping bag on the floor. Her eyes fluttered shut and snapped back open, fighting naptime while Regan read from a book with a kitten on the cover.
Closing his eyes, Gabe listened to her hushed voice, which to him sounded sleep-roughened and husky, and it made him want to crawl into bed too. But only if it included Regan, naked and eight uninterrupted, kid-free hours.
She came to the end of the book, leaned over, and pressed a kiss to Holly’s forehead, her jeans riding low and her shirt high as she bent over, exposing a tiny mark on her right hip that Gabe would have never guessed existed. Vixen had a tattoo. A little green bundle of leaves.
The distance made it impossible to determine for sure, but he was pretty confident that under those business suits and polished professionalism, she was sporting a holly leaf tattoo. He wondered what other secrets she had hidden and knew it would take a whole lot more than one night to discover each and every one of them. And he was up for the task.
When she’d answered the door earlier, face flushed from packing, hair pulled back into a messy ponytail, elbow deep in lingerie, all he could think about was what kind of panties she was wearing. And if they too had a big bow that he could slowly untie to get to her present. And who, if anyone, currently had their name on that particular box.
She, on the other hand, had looked like she wanted to punch someone. He’d bet good money that that someone was him. He considered puffing out his chest and offering her a free swing or two, on the house, to help her burn off some of that pent-up anger. Then he came up with a bunch of other ways to blow off steam and was about to tell her each and every one in great detail when Holly came bounding down the hall.
At that moment, Gabe realized that the only help he should be offering was to make the Martin ladies’ lives easier, not further complicating it. Which was why when he finished helping unload, Gabe was going to wish them well in their new life, somehow explain to his family that Regan wasn’t a threat, and do his best to stay away.
“Sleep tight, angel,” Regan said.
“But I’m not sleepy,” Holly protested, her lids halfway closed.
“Well, how ’bout I come back and check on you in twenty minutes, and if you’re still awake, then no nap. Deal?”
“Twenty minutes!”
“That’s my final offer.”
Holly’s eyes narrowed and her arms crossed as she considered her mom’s compromise. With a nod she conceded, but her frown said that she was not happy about it.
Holly spotted Gabe in the doorway and her face lit up. “Mr. DeLuca. You gonna be here when I wake up?”
“I should be.” He turned to address Regan, who looked so damn sweet holding her daughter that he forgot what he was going to say. She quirked a brow. He smiled back.
“I was going to call my brother, Marc. See if he’d meet me at the cottage and help me load up t
he rest of your stuff. That way Holly can sleep, and you don’t have to worry about the clouds opening up again.”
They had been lucky. That morning there was a lull in the normal December showers in the Valley, making the move much easier than expected so far. By the looks of the dark clouds coming in over the mountains, though, their luck was quickly running out and they were in for a pretty bad downpour.
Regan’s face went red. “There’s nothing else left. We’ve moved it all.”
Gabe looked at the bedroom, which, much like the front room, held only a few boxes and three suitcases. “But the furniture—”
“It came with the cottage. None of it was ours. But we’re looking forward to camping out in our bedroom,” she said with overdone excitement, tickling Holly in the ribs.
“Mommy says we’re gonna camp on the floor, but we can’t have a fire ’cuz it’s against the law and dangerous.” Holly folded her hands under her cheek, snuggling deeper into her pillow.
He looked at Regan. “Are you serious? You can’t live in a sleeping bag.” He regretted his tone the moment little Holly’s face fell. He looked at Regan, expecting her to laugh it off because there was no way that they could live here. Not like this.
Regan didn’t laugh. She didn’t even smile. Instead her face hardened, and she gave him the same look she’d given him earlier when he’d first met Holly.
“Could you please wait for me in the front room?” Regan said, clearly dismissing him.
He went. But this conversation was not over. Mama bear claws out or not, there was no way those two were going to sleep here with nothing but a few clothes, a box of books, and a ratty old sleeping bag.
Regan leaned down for one last peanut butter-and-honey-flavored kiss. “Tonight, it’s just you, me, and the great outdoors.”
“Can we make s’mores?”
Regan thought of the microwave, mentally added graham crackers, marshmallows, and chocolate to her grocery list, and nodded. “And hot dogs?”
Holly nodded excitedly. Closing the blinds, Regan headed for the front room, soft breathing already emanating from the sleeping bag.
