We Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus

by Brenda Novak

  She waited, hoping he’d say more. If only he’d mention love…promise that he’d be faithful, that he’d be a good father to her children. But she was wishing for the same elusive moonbeam Rochelle had coveted. Cole didn’t want a family, especially a ready-made family. He’d made no secret of that.

  Still, the vulnerability that showed in his face at that moment was almost enough to break Jaclyn’s resolve. She ached to hold him and whisper that she loved him and knew, if she didn’t leave right away, she’d do exactly that.

  Marshalling strength she didn’t know she possessed, she murmured a quick thanks and left.

  COLE STOOD facing Rick’s desk and sighed. He’d handled what he could over the past seven weeks, for the most part working nights and weekends. But there simply wasn’t enough time in the day to do it all. He was falling behind, and it was starting to become a real problem. The bank was waiting for the financial statements. The payroll company had said they wouldn’t cut any checks next week unless they received the income tax deduction forms signed by the construction crew, and Cole had a stack of outstanding bills that needed to be paid—the lumber and concrete companies had both called already. And there was more, lots more. Only, Cole wasn’t sure he could handle everything Rick did. His brother had been there from the beginning and had carved out his own niche. Until Rick left, Cole hadn’t realized how much he depended on his brother or how lost he’d be without him. There were some things Rick had done that Cole didn’t even know how to do—the accounting was one of them.

  He’d have to hire that out, too, he decided. He had to get things moving again. They were selling and building houses like mad. He couldn’t let the infrastructure of his business collapse.

  He glanced at Jaclyn’s desk, which was neatly organized, then at Margaret’s, which sat next to Jaclyn’s and wasn’t so neatly organized, and wondered how to restructure the company. Rick wasn’t coming back. It was time Cole faced the truth and made the appropriate changes. Too many employees were depending on him for their living. So, should he train Jaclyn to do Rick’s job? Could he tolerate having her so close, indefinitely?

  He wasn’t sure. The way she looked, the way she talked and smiled and dressed drove him nuts. He wanted free access to her. He wanted to take her out to dinner and dancing, buy her things, tell her how gorgeous she was and what she did to him every time he saw her, and make love to her at night. He wanted…

  What did he want? Sometimes he wanted to make her his own, completely, wholeheartedly, and forever. But that sounded a lot like marriage, which led to the risk of repeating what had happened with Rochelle.

  It’s just another weak moment, he thought. But he didn’t plan on being weak for long. He was going to get over her.

  His resolve firmly in place, Cole took Rick’s chair and started digging through the stack of papers closest to him, hoping to clear some things away, but the telephone interrupted him before he could get much of a start.

  “Hello.” He held the receiver to his ear with one shoulder so he could still use both hands.

  “Hello? Is this Perrini Homes?”

  “Yes, it is. Cole Perrini speaking.”

  “Ah, Mr. Perrini. I’m glad I caught you. I actually thought your office would be closed by now and was planning to leave a message for—” a pause “—Margaret Huntley.”

  “I’ll be happy to have her call you. Are you in the market for a home?”

  “No, actually I’m calling about Jaclyn Wentworth. This is Ronald Greenhaven with Guthrie Real Estate. I just wanted to verify a few items she has listed on her employment application.”

  Cole dropped the papers in his hand and gripped the phone more tightly. “Her what?”

  “Her employment application. She stopped by a few days ago to apply for a job. She doesn’t have much experience, but I met her when she came in, and she seems sharp and professional. Would you say she’s a reliable worker?”

  Cole didn’t know what to say. Why was Jaclyn applying for other jobs already? He’d assumed she’d tell him, that he’d have the chance to shift her responsibilities and retain her. So this could only be a result of…

  Leaning his elbows on the desk, he pinched the bridge of his nose. “She doesn’t have her real-estate license yet. She can’t sell houses,” he said, his words more direct than he’d meant them to sound.

  Greenhaven paused. “Yes, but she indicated that she’d be willing to come on as a receptionist until then.”

  “Starting when?”

  “Right away.”

  “I’m afraid that’s impossible.”

  “It is?”

  “Yes. She already works for me.”

  Cole slammed down the phone, angrier than he’d been in a long time. Dammit, he’d gotten too close to Jaclyn a week ago, and she was running. To a point, he could understand that. He hadn’t exactly made a commitment to her. But he wasn’t the one who’d shown up in her bedroom in the middle of the night. Even though he might have coaxed her, he wasn’t the one who’d crawled naked into bed. And he’d respected her wishes and left her completely alone since then. Why was she doing this?

  Picking up the telephone, he dialed her number, but when he heard her voice, he hung up. What he had to say was better said in person, after the kids went to bed.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  WHEN THE PHONE rang again, Jaclyn thought it might be another crank call. She almost let the answering machine take it, but grabbed it at the last second.

  “This is who?” she asked, surprised when someone spoke and the voice on the other end didn’t belong to Terry or one of the kids’ friends.

  “Rick Perrini.”

  Cole’s brother? Jaclyn hadn’t heard from him since he’d quit Perrini Homes almost two months ago. But she was worried enough about Cole and all the things that weren’t getting done at the office to be glad to hear his voice.

  “Rick, how are you?”

  “Fine. And you?”

  Jaclyn thought of Cole and wanted to say miserable, but returned the customary answer. “Fine.”

  “Great. Listen, I’m calling because I have a few things I’d like to discuss with you. Is there any chance I could stop by tonight?”

  Jaclyn looked at the Real Estate Principles textbook open in front of her. She’d finally finished dinner and had the kids at the table around her—Alyssa coloring, and Mackenzie and Alex doing their homework. She needed to get some studying done and spend some time reading to the kids, but she wasn’t about to miss the chance to find out what Rick wanted. “What time?”

  “Whenever’s convenient.”

  “Is nine too late?”

  “No, that’ll work.”

  Jaclyn gave him directions to her house, then hung up, wondering what on earth Rick Perrini wanted with her.

  JACLYN HAD ONLY ONE LIGHT burning, when Rick pulled up to her house. He parked parallel to the curb, letting his truck idle, and wondered if it wouldn’t be smarter for him to simply turn around and go home. He didn’t need to involve himself in Cole’s life again. The more he knew, the more responsible he’d feel. And his brother was going to be fine. Cole had always been able to fend for himself, to land on his feet. It was Rick who’d let the problems at home get the best of him when they were teenagers. So what did he think he could do for Cole now?

  Probably nothing.

  Only, he couldn’t forget that late-night phone call. Did you catch the game? What the hell did that have to do with anything?

  Shoving the gearshift into Park, Rick cut the engine and got out. The night was cool and smelled of autumn. He liked this time of year. It reminded him of the days when he was young and his mother was healthy. She used to make beef stew on chilly nights like this, when the leaves were turning and starting to fall….

  Rick closed his eyes and breathed deeply. He could almost smell the stew bubbling on the stove, hear his father’s boots on the front stoop as he came home for dinner.

  But that seemed like eons ago, another lifeti
me.

  The porch light snapped on, telling Rick that Jaclyn had heard him pull up. He shrugged into his sweatshirt and ambled to the porch, and she opened the door before he could knock.

  “Hi, there,” she said, smiling and moving back so he could enter.

  “Hi.” He stepped inside. The light he’d seen from the street was in the kitchen, over a table strewn with one large textbook, paper and pencils, a few scribbled crayon drawings and two children’s backpacks. Evidently the kids were in bed; the house was quiet. “Is that a real-estate book? You studying for your license?” he asked.

  She pushed up the sleeves on her sweater. “Yeah.”

  “How’s it going?”

  “Not too bad. Toughest part is getting enough time to read. Would you like a cup of coffee or something?”

  Rick agreed to the coffee and followed her into the kitchen. She took a mug out of the cupboard while he claimed a seat at the table.

  “Where do you work now?” Jaclyn asked.

  “I’m still looking,” he said, because he didn’t want to tell her that he wasn’t working, that he was living off his investments and going to school full time. Why he didn’t want anyone to know, he couldn’t really say. He supposed it was fear of failure. In high school he’d skipped more days than he’d attended, hadn’t read a single assignment, hadn’t learned a thing. So college was definitely an uphill battle. He was older than everyone else, which made him a misfit from the start, and he didn’t have a good base to work from in any subject except math, which he’d taught himself. On top of that, he learned from tinkering, doing. Textbooks were boring and tedious for him. So he could easily fail in the end.

  “What kind of work are you looking for?” she asked.

  “I’m not sure yet.”

  “I know someone who’d be happy to hire you back,” she said with a smile. “Cream?”

  “No, thanks.”

  She handed him his coffee. “The sugar’s there on the table.”

  “What makes you think Cole would hire me back?” he asked, setting the coffee aside to let it cool.

  “He won’t let anyone have your desk, for starters. He frowns if anyone even sits there to use the phone.”

  Rick smiled, thinking of Cole’s scowl. He knew from long experience that it was a fierce one. When they were kids, Rick used to do anything he could to provoke his older brother. Why? Simply because he’d been so angry, always angry. And Cole was the only one who’d fight back.

  “Are you thinking about returning to Perrini Homes?” she asked, sitting across from him.

  “No, I have other plans. Chad just said…well, I wanted to see how you thought things were going at the office.”

  “We’re on schedule as far as the building goes. And Margaret—she’s the real-estate agent Cole hired shortly after you left—is doing a great job of selling houses. But I don’t know how to do your job, so the paperwork’s not getting done.”

  “How can you tell?”

  “It’s not hard. One look at your desk is enough. Besides, the bank and others are starting to scream.”

  “What does Cole say he’s going to do?”

  “He doesn’t say. You’re a sore subject, I think. Anyway, he’s putting out fires as they occur, but he doesn’t seem to have a long-range plan.”

  “That doesn’t sound like my resourceful brother.”

  “You’ve never left him before.”

  “He can hire someone to do what I did. He’s just being stubborn.”

  “I think it’s more than that,” she said. “He misses you. He cares about you.”

  Rick knew his laugh did little to hide his disbelief. “He’s not that sentimental. Anyway, he cares about Chad and Brian and Andrew. He can live without me. I wasn’t trying to leave him high and dry when I quit. I just have other things to do.”

  She didn’t ask him what, but he knew she had to be thinking it. He’d just told her he didn’t even have a job. “I gotta go,” he said, standing. “But why don’t I give you my number? If a problem crops up that you don’t know how to handle, give me a holler. I’ll do what I can.”

  “Why don’t you just call Cole and tell him you’ll help him out if he needs it?” she asked.

  “It’s complicated,” he said.

  With a frown, she jotted his cell phone number on an erasable board attached to her fridge. As she was putting his empty cup in the sink, the doorbell rang. The way she glanced up at the clock told Rick she wasn’t expecting anyone else. And when she opened the door, they were both surprised.

  “COLE!” JACLYN SAID, her eyes widening.

  Cole jammed his hands in the pockets of his jeans and tried not to glower, but it wasn’t easy. He was feeling many different emotions, none of them pleasant. For starters, he wanted to know what the hell Rick was doing at Jackie’s house. She was Cole’s employee, Cole’s friend from high school, Cole’s girlfriend, for crying out loud.

  Well, maybe she wasn’t exactly his girlfriend, but he certainly had some claim on her after last Friday, didn’t he? If not, he should. And though he’d wanted to see his brother again, badly, this wasn’t exactly the place he’d hoped to find Rick. “I hope I’m not interrupting anything,” he said coldly.

  Rick stiffened, and his movements became jerky. “I was just leaving. Thanks, Jaclyn.”

  “No problem,” she replied, but she wouldn’t quite meet Cole’s eyes, and he wanted to know why. Was it more of the awkwardness that had gone on between them the past week or…something else?

  Cole watched Jackie’s face as Rick skirted past him, hoping for a clue as to the depth and meaning of her and his brother’s relationship, but her expression gave nothing away.

  “Thanks for stopping by,” she told Rick.

  Rick didn’t respond. He didn’t even look back. He was halfway across the lawn already and seemed eager to be gone.

  “There’s nothing going on between me and Rick,” Jaclyn announced as soon as the taillights of Rick’s truck had disappeared down the road. “This is the first time I’ve seen him since he left Perrini Homes.”

  “What did he want?” Cole asked.

  “To find out about you. He’s worried about how you’re managing without him. He’s willing to help out if you need it.”

  “Why hasn’t he called to tell me that?”

  “I don’t know. He said it was complicated.”

  Cole released a long sigh. His jealousy had just made it more complicated. He should have been smarter than to be so obvious. But he hadn’t exactly been levelheaded of late. He was doing a lot of things out of character—like mooning over a woman who didn’t want him.

  “He’s right,” he said.

  She tucked a long strand of hair behind her ear. “What brings you here?”

  “I want to talk.”

  She hesitated. “I’ll be at the office in the morning.”

  “Oh, really? I wasn’t sure,” he said. “I thought you might take the morning to submit a few more résumés. Or maybe you’ve already hired on somewhere else. Were you planning to give me any notice? Or were you going to surprise me and simply walk out one day, like Rick?”

  Her gaze lowered to the carpet, then lifted to his face again, but the troubled look in her eyes did little to soften his heart. He was angry—angry that he wanted something he couldn’t have, angry that he couldn’t solve everything by simply taking her in his arms, angry that he’d let his crush on her return after making such a clean getaway from Feld. Wouldn’t he ever learn that anything connected to that dusty town was poison to him?

  “Come in,” she said.

  He edged past her, keeping as much distance between them as possible.

  “Sit down.”

  He sat at one end of the couch, while she sat at the other. Wearing a pair of faded blue jeans and a zip-up sweater, and sitting cross-legged facing him, she certainly didn’t look like a mother of three. She looked like she had in high school, except for the frown.

  “I was going t
o give you some notice,” she said. “I just hadn’t decided how or when. It’s not like my plans are set.”

  “Is it because you’re tired of cooking and cleaning for me? You know I’ve never expected that.” He’d certainly enjoyed it, but he hadn’t expected it.

  “No, I like that sort of thing—at least, I like doing it for you. Things between us are just getting too—” she gave him a faint smile “—complicated.”

  “I seem to inspire that,” he said wryly.

  Her smile disappeared. “I have three kids, Cole.”

  “I know.”

  “And I…” Her voice faded, and she swallowed hard before continuing. “I could love you.”

  That took Cole by surprise. He’d definitely been getting conflicting signals—her warm willingness in bed that night, seeing her clutch his sweatshirt to her face a few days ago, catching the look in her eyes when she thought he wasn’t watching. But the message that had come through most clearly was her desire to push him away.

  “You have a funny way of showing it,” he said.

  “What would you rather I do?”

  He thought about that for a minute but couldn’t come up with a definitive answer, at least, not one he thought she’d find appealing. He wanted to establish a casual relationship with her similar to the one he’d known with Laura. But there were already too many emotions involved for “casual,” and it frightened him that his and Jaclyn’s experience could follow the same course as his and Rochelle’s. If it got so out of balance, someone was bound to get seriously hurt, and he had no way to guarantee that it would be him. What if it were Jaclyn? Jaclyn, who’d already known enough hurt? Jaclyn, who had three children depending on her emotional stability?

  “I don’t know, but if you care about someone, you don’t generally shut them out of your life,” he said.

  “If you care for someone, you don’t generally sleep around on them, either, but Terry did that to me. Does that mean he didn’t love me?”