The Christmas Baby Bonus

by Yvonne Lindsay

  She got up from her chair, walked over to where she’d left her trusty tablet on the countertop and made a notation.

  “I’ll get on it when I get back. If I ever get out of here, that is.”

  Piers surprised himself by laughing at her hangdog expression and bleak tone.

  “It’s no laughing matter,” she stressed.

  “Hey, we’re hardly suffering, are we? We’re warm and dry. We have food and my wine cellar at our disposal—”

  “And we’re running out of diapers, or hadn’t you noticed? I took the liberty of checking Meredith’s linen supply. If we can’t get out of here by late tomorrow, we’re going to have to start using cloth napkins. It’s going to create a lot of laundry.”

  “We’ll manage,” he said grimly, irked by her not so subtle reminder that he really didn’t have the first idea of what was needed to care for Casey.

  But he had her and she very obviously did.

  Again he wondered where she’d gotten her knowledge from. Her CV had said she was from Michigan but she’d attended college in California and had worked in and around Santa Monica since graduation. She had no family that he knew of, and had never worked in child care. All the dots had connected. There were no significant gaps in between her education and work histories. So where had she learned so much about babies?

  Six

  The following evening, Piers was playing with the baby on a blanket on the floor when he took a call on his cell phone. It was a contractor with very good news. The road up the mountain would be cleared in the morning and a crew would remove the fallen tree. Piers had taken a walk to look at it a couple of days ago, while Casey had slept back at the house under Faye’s supervision. Seeing her SUV crunched up against the solid tree trunk had made him sick to his stomach. The outcome could have been so very different for her and the thought of losing her sent a spear of dread right through him.

  “Good news,” he said as Faye came through to the main room with a basket of laundry tucked under one arm.

  The sheer domesticity of the picture she made brought a smile to his face.

  “Oh? What is it? By the way, here’s your laundry,” she said, dumping the contents of the basket on the sofa. “You do know how to fold it, don’t you?”

  The domestic picture blurred a little.

  “How hard can it be, right?” Piers said, reaching for one of his Christmas sweaters and holding it up.

  Was it his imagination or had the thing shrunk? Santa looked a lot shorter than he’d been before. He wouldn’t put it past Faye to have shrunk it deliberately, but then he’d been the one to put the load into the dryer.

  “What news?” Faye prompted, tapping her foot impatiently.

  “The road will be cleared tomorrow morning.”

  “Oh, thank goodness.”

  The relief in her voice was palpable. Piers fought back the pang of disappointment. He’d known all along she couldn’t wait to leave and realistically he knew they couldn’t stay snowbound together forever, even if the idea was tempting. Baby logistics alone meant they had to venture out into the real world.

  He dropped the sweater back onto the pile of clothing.

  “We should celebrate tonight.”

  “Celebrate?” She frowned slightly then nodded. “I could celebrate but I’ll be more inclined to do so when my plane takes off and heads toward the West Coast.”

  “Skeptic.”

  “Realist.”

  He smiled at her and felt a surge of elation when she reluctantly smiled in return.

  “Well, I plan to celebrate,” he said firmly. “Champagne, I think, after Casey is down, and dancing.”

  “I hope you have fun. I’m going to pack,” Faye said, turning and heading for the stairs.

  “Oh, come on,” Piers coaxed. “Let yourself relax for once, Faye. It won’t hurt. I promise.”

  “I know how to relax,” she answered with a scowl.

  Casey squealed from his position on the blanket.

  “Even Casey thinks you need to lighten up.”

  “Casey is focused on the stockings you’ve got hanging over the fireplace,” she pointed out drily.

  “Yeah, about those. I know it’s only a day’s notice but I think we should cancel the Christmas Eve party—in fact, cancel the whole house party. I don’t think a lodge full of guests will be a good environment for the little guy here and, to be honest, I think I’d rather just keep things low-key this year.”

  * * *

  Faye looked at him in surprise. He’d been adamant that, despite the fact that the last time he’d been here with his friends it had been the last time Quin had partied with them all, he wanted to keep with his usual tradition.

  “Are you certain?” she asked.

  “Yeah. Somehow it doesn’t feel right. I know it’s short notice and people will be annoyed but, to be honest, if they can’t understand that my change in circumstances makes me want to change my routine then I don’t really want to be around them.”

  “Okay, I’ll get right on it.”

  “Thank you, Faye. I know I don’t say it often enough, but I couldn’t function properly without you.”

  “Oh, I’m sure you’d do just fine.”

  “No,” he answered seriously. “I don’t think I would. You’re important to me, Faye. More than you realize.”

  The flip response she’d been about to deliver froze on the tip of her tongue. The expression in Piers’s eyes was serious, his brows drawn lightly together. Her heart gave a little flip. Important to him. What did he mean by that? She’d sensed a shift in their relationship in the time they’d been stranded but she’d put it down to the bizarreness of their situation. That pesky flicker of desire shimmered low in her body and she felt her skin tighten, her breathing become a little short, her mouth dry. She swallowed and forced her gaze away from his face.

  What could she say? The atmosphere between them stretched out like a fog rich with innuendo. If he took a step toward her now, what would she do? Would she take a step back or would she hold her ground and let him come to her? And kiss her again, perhaps?

  The flicker burned a little brighter and her nipples grew taut and achy. This was crazy, she thought with an edge of panic. He’d just been thanking her for her dedication to her job. That was all she had to offer him. And yet there was heat in his dark brown gaze. This wasn’t just a boss expressing his gratitude to his employee; there was so much more subtext to what he’d uttered with such feeling.

  Faye fought to find some words that would bring things back to her kind of normal. One where you didn’t suddenly feel an overwhelming desire to run your fingers along the waistband of your boss’s sweater and lift it up to see if the skin of his ridged abdomen was like heated silk. Her fingers curled into tight fists at her sides.

  As if he could sense the strain in the air, Casey had fallen silent. Faye forced herself to look away from Piers and her gaze fell on the baby.

  “Oh, look,” she cried. “He’s found his thumb.”

  It took Piers a moment or two to move but when he did a smile spread across his face.

  “Hey, clever guy. I guess that means no more pacifier?”

  “I guess. It may help him to self-settle better at night.”

  “I’m all for that.”

  “But it can lead to other issues. You can always throw a pacifier away but it’s not so easy when a kid gets attached to sucking their thumb.”

  “Hey, I’m prepared not to overthink it at this stage.”

  She watched as Piers settled back down on the floor beside the baby and started talking to him as if he was the cleverest kid in the world. This time when her heart strings pulled, it was a different kind of feeling. One that made her realize all that she’d forsaken in her life with her choice not to
have a family. Faye made herself turn away and take the basket back to the laundry room. She couldn’t stay here another second and allow herself to—

  She cut off that train of thought but a persistent voice at the back of her mind asked, Allow yourself to what? To fall in love with them? That would be stupid. Stupid and self-destructive.

  Faye made herself scarce during Casey’s bath time and final feeding, leaving Piers to settle him for the night. Now that she knew she’d be leaving at some stage tomorrow, she didn’t trust herself not to indulge in little Casey’s nearness just that bit too much. It would be all too easy to nuzzle that dark fuzz of hair on his head, to pepper his chubby little cheeks with kisses, to coax just one more smile from him before bedtime, to feel the weight of his solid little body lying so trustingly in her arms. Just thinking about it made her ache to hold him, but she held firm on her decision to keep a safe distance between them. Piers was perfectly capable of seeing to Casey’s immediate needs right now. The baby didn’t need her any more than she wanted to be needed.

  But you do want to be needed, came that insidious inner voice again. The voice that, no matter how resolute she determined to be, continued to wear at her psyche. It had been easy enough for her to keep away from situations where interaction with babies was inevitable, but in this enforced, close atmosphere here at the lodge, all her hard-fought-for internal barricades had begun to crumble.

  She needed some distance. Right now.

  Faye turned on her heel and left the room, checking the laundry to ensure she hadn’t left anything behind before taking the back stairs up to the next floor. She closed the door behind her when she reached her bedroom, leaned against it and let out the pent-up sigh she’d been holding.

  Tomorrow, she told herself. She’d have her life back tomorrow. Just a few more hours. She could do this. How hard could it be to continue to resist one exceptionally adorable baby and a man who made her breath hitch and her heart hammer a rapid beat in her chest? For now, though, she had work to do and she had a whole lot of people to contact on Piers’s behalf to cancel the house party.

  When that task was done, she decided to get the ball rolling with the private investigation firm Piers used on occasion to collate data on a prospective property development. They were discreet and detailed. Everything you needed an investigator to be.

  She explained the situation with Casey and what little information they had about his mother, and asked if they could look into things. After hitting Send on the email, she lay back on her bed and wondered if she could simply hide out there for the rest of the night. But a knock at her bedroom door drew her up on her feet again.

  Piers leaned against the doorjamb with a sardonic smile on his face.

  “It’s safe to come out now,” he said. “Casey’s down for the night.”

  “I wasn’t hiding from Casey.”

  “Oh, you were hiding from me, then?”

  “No, of course not. I was working,” she protested, earning another devastating smile from her boss.

  She detailed what she’d done and he nodded with approval.

  “Thanks for taking care of all that. I’d have gotten onto the investigators myself, but I got busy with Casey.”

  “That’s why you have me, remember.”

  The words tripped glibly off her tongue but her job truly meant the world to her. She actively enjoyed the sense of order she could restore when things went awry and, for her, the skill she’d developed for anticipating Piers’s needs—whether professionally or personally—was something to take pride in. Doing her job well was important to her. Basically, when it came down to it, it was all she had.

  Sure, she had a handful of friends, but they were more acquaintances really. She tended to keep people at arm’s length because it was so much easier that way. She’d even lost touch with Brenda, her best friend from high school. Brenda had tried so hard to be there for Faye after the crash, but no one could truly understand what she’d been through, or how she’d felt, and eventually Brenda, too, had drifted out of her sphere. Now they occasionally exchanged birthday cards, but it was the sum total of their contact with one another.

  “Yes, that’s why I have you,” he answered with a note of solemnity in his voice she couldn’t quite understand. He held out a hand. “Come on downstairs. The fire’s going, the music’s playing and I have a very special bottle of champagne on ice.”

  “Champagne?” she asked, reluctantly giving him her hand and allowing him to tug her along the hallway.

  “Yeah, we’re celebrating, remember?”

  “Ah, yes. Freedom.”

  “Is that all it is to you? A chance to run away?”

  Was it?

  “I had other plans, too, you know,” she said defensively.

  So what if those plans included allowing herself to go into deep mourning for her family the way she did every year. It was how she coped—how she kept herself together for the balance of the year. It was the only time of year she ever allowed herself to look through the old family albums that ended abruptly thirteen years ago. It hurt—oh, how it hurt—but they were snapshots of happier times and that one night was all she’d allow herself—it was all she deserved.

  They reached the bottom of the stairs and Faye noticed he’d put lighted candles around the main room and turned the Christmas tree lights off. Piers spun her to face him, his expression serious.

  “I’m really sorry you ended up stuck here. I mean it. I should have realized you’d have plans of your own. It’s just that you’re always there at the end of the phone or in the office working right next to me. I guess I’m guilty of taking you for granted.”

  “It’s okay. I love my work, Piers. I wouldn’t change it for the world.”

  “But there’s more to life than work, right?”

  She smiled in response and watched as he reached down and pulled a bottle of French champagne from the ice bucket that stood sweating on a place mat on the coffee table.

  “The good stuff tonight, hmm?” she commented as he deftly popped the cork.

  “Only the best. We’ve earned it, don’t you think? Besides, we’re celebrating the road being cleared.”

  Faye accepted a crystal flute filled with the golden, bubbling liquid. “It’s not clear yet,” she reminded him.

  “Always so pedantic,” he teased. “Then let’s just say we’re celebrating the prospect of the road being cleared, and of Casey not needing to use my good linen as diapers.”

  “To both of those things.” Faye smiled and clinked her glass to his.

  She cocked her head and listened to the music playing softly in the background.

  “What? No Christmas carols?” she said over the rim of her glass.

  “I know you don’t like them. I thought tonight I’d cut you some slack,” he said with a wink.

  “Thank you, I appreciate it.”

  She sipped her champagne, enjoying the sensation of the bubbles dancing on her tongue before she swallowed. The sparkling wine was so much better than anything she allowed herself to indulge in at home. Piers turned to put another log on the fire and she found herself swaying gently to the music as she watched him. When he straightened from the fireplace, she realized she’d already drunk half her glass and it was already beginning to mess with her head. She was such a lightweight when it came to drinking, which was part of the reason she so rarely indulged.

  “Enjoying that?” he asked. Without waiting for her answer, he reached for the bottle and topped off her glass.

  “I am,” she answered simply.

  “Good, you deserve nothing but the best. Take a seat, I’ll be right back.”

  He was as good as his word, returning from the kitchen a moment later with plate laden with cheese and crackers.

  “Sorry there’s not much of a selection,” he said
with a wink. “I haven’t had a chance to get out to the grocery store.”

  Faye laughed out loud. “As if you ever go to the grocery store yourself.”

  “True.” He nodded. “I’ve led an exceptionally privileged life, haven’t I?”

  But he’d known loneliness and loss, too, despite all that privilege. And, while he hid it well, she knew that he missed his brother more than words could ever say.

  “On the other hand, you also provide employment to hundreds of people, with benefits, so I guess you can be forgiven for not ever doing your own shopping.”

  Faye put her glass down and helped herself to some cheese and crackers. It was probably better to put some food in her stomach before she had any more champagne. She had a fast metabolism and the light lunch she’d prepared hours ago had most certainly been burned up by now. A delicious aroma slowly began to filter through from the kitchen.

  “Have you been cooking?” she asked.

  “Just a little thing Casey and I threw together.” He chuckled at her surprised expression. “No, to be honest, it’s one of Meredith’s stews that I found in the freezer. I thought we could eat here, in front of the fire. It’s kind of nice to just chill out for a bit, don’t you think?”

  Faye nodded. It wasn’t often that she chilled out completely. Maybe it was the champagne, or maybe the knowledge that she’d be leaving soon, but she felt deeply relaxed this evening. The plate with cheese and crackers seemed to empty itself rather quickly, she thought as she reached for her glass again. Or maybe she’d just been hungrier than she’d realized. When she apologized to Piers for having more than her share, he was magnanimous.

  “Don’t worry. You have no idea how many of them I had to sample before I got the combination of relish and cheese right on the crackers,” he assured her.