“Is she now?”
“Indeed. Went on a sabbatical this year to do her artsy-craftsy stuff, and we’ve yet to recover.” He looked more than a little pained. “But we’ll get her back. I’m sure she’ll do what’s right.”
Isaiah roused in Will’s arms, and she watched as her adept date whispered to the baby and popped his dangling pacifier back into his mouth. “An accountant.” Will sliced her a look. “I had no idea Cordelia wore so many hats.”
“You’ll have to bring this fellow here to our Christmas party,” Mr. Fillmore said. “It’s going to be memorable.”
“Will probably can’t make it.” Cordelia didn’t think the yearly event of watered down punch, gas station gag gifts, and Mr. Fillmore’s forced Christmas carol sing-along necessarily qualified as memorable.
“I wouldn’t miss it, babe.”
She glared at the interfering charmer. “We better get Isaiah back home. Good to see you, Mr. Fillmore.”
“You as well, Cordelia. We’ll talk soon.”
She shoved her hands inside her pockets as her boss walked away. “I’ll take Isaiah so you can have a break.”
Will patted the baby’s back. “He fell back to sleep. But he and I were wondering about this accounting job. I thought you were a staging decorator.”
Nothing like explaining your life choices to someone you’d known mere days. “I am. The car’s to the left.”
“I know where the car is, and you seem to have two jobs. This is intel I need, don’t you think?”
“No, I don’t think you need to know every single detail of my life just to stage a fake two-week relationship.”
“I’m fake offended.”
Two minutes ago she wanted to kiss the man. Now she’d rather he walk into a field of firs and never return. “I’ve worked for Mr. Fillmore since my junior year in college. I took a year off when I won an entrepreneurial grant to take Daring Displays to the next level. Will, if we don’t go right now, Isaiah’s going to start crying for a bottle.”
He lowered his head toward the slumbering baby. “There’s a story here, Isaiah. Later, we’ll crack open a bottle of Similac and you can tell me all about it.”
“Don’t be so dramatic. Not everything’s a sensational scoop.”
They drove home, and for once Cordelia barely saw the festive lights through town. She didn’t sing harmony to the Christmas music on the radio. And she didn’t make a mental note to buy bread, milk, and diapers when the local meteorologist broke in and forecasted possible snow and ice for next week. With her mind on a man who almost kissed her and a boss who dangled a well-paying job, Cordelia robotically plucked a sleeping Isaiah from his car seat when they arrived and walked herself to the door. It wasn’t till she fumbled in her purse for her house keys that she realized Will had followed.
“Let me help.” He reached for her purse. “May I?”
She released an uneven breath and gave a nod.
“Here we go.” Will retrieved her keys in no time and unlocked the door.
“Good night.” She stepped inside.
“Cordelia?”
She dropped the diaper bag to the floor and turned around. “Yes?”
“I had a good time tonight.” He sounded reluctantly surprised.
“I did too.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow?”
She could almost see the gray flecks in those blue eyes. “Bright and early.”
Will stepped off the porch. “One more thing.”
Cordelia’s hand stilled on the doorknob. “Yes?”
“Is a tux okay for your company Christmas party?”
She shut the door. Flicked off the porch light.
Put the baby to bed.
Then sat down with a gallon of cookie dough ice cream
And one extra large spoon.
Chapter 8
Gray skies and a leaning tower of boxes greeted Will when he opened his front door the next morning.
He was pretty sure there was a woman under there somewhere. “Are you here to help decorate or move in?”
Cordelia peeked around the stack as she shoved some of the boxes into his arms. “This is just one load. I barely had a peephole in my car to see to get here"
“I’m betting you thought it was worth the danger.” He followed her outside, the wind cutting through his t-shirt and jeans, his uniform for most writing days.
Five trips later, his living room looked like a UPS warehouse.
“And you're going to get this done by this evening?" He didn't bother hiding the doubt in his voice. "My parents will be here at six."
"Then I guess you’d better let me get to work," Cordelia said.
"Where’s Isaiah?" Will felt an unexpected stab of disappointment that she hadn't brought the baby. Not that it would've made any sense. He couldn't write a book and play with the baby at the same time. But he could’ve tried.
“The baby’s at daycare.” Cordelia peeled off her red coat, revealing a gingerbread sweatshirt, glittery skinny jeans, and giant snowflakes dangling from her ears. “He got tired of me making him decorate all the low branches."
"Is there anything you need? Besides a call to the fashion police?”
Ignoring that, she turned a half circle assessing the room, and giving him a better chance to study her. Her forehead scrunched in concentration, Cordelia wore little makeup, but he didn’t think she needed it. In the news business, he was used to seeing women with mortician layers of makeup for the cameras, but he liked the face he was looking at so much better. Her hair was gathered high in a ponytail that seemed to bob and sway with an energy equal to its owner. Will wasn't sure, but he thought he saw a glimpse of some red glitter sprinkled about in her bangs, as if she had taken a walk through Santa’s workshop before arriving.
This line of thought was going nowhere productive. Will needed to get his mind off his elfin fake girlfriend and focus on something else. Something besides her chewing on her lip as she measured his mantel. Or the way she smiled as she unwrapped an ornament in her hands, as if it held a secret only she knew. Then there was her method of—
Will shook his head and dislodged any more Cordelia thoughts. They were a brief diversion. And that was it.
Curious, he dug through a stack of boxes, found a star tree topper, and set it down on the coffee table. Next he rummaged through a bag and found a spool of tinsel big enough to wrap around the neighborhood.
"I thought you said the decorating was going to be all my job.” Cordelia watched him over her shoulder as she began to wind greenery around his banister. “Remember, you told me to leave you alone so you could write your book in peace."
Will dropped a felt puppy ornament. “Of course. Yeah, I still mean it.” He dusted off his jeans as he stood. “I'll be upstairs working, and I don't want to be bothered with any of this." The sight of his decorator’s knowing smile followed him all the way up the wooden stairs where he sat back down at his computer and returned to his chapter ten.
He was just typing literature’s most powerful opening sentence when the sound of Bing Crosby crooning drifted to his office.
Great.
Not only was he struggling for words today, but now he had to listen to Christmas carols? Hadn’t he mentioned no excessive Christmas music in their deal? He’d certainly meant to.
Will’s eyes returned to the laptop screen, and he proceeded to stare at it for the next hour. And if he tapped his foot along to the stupid music from downstairs, it was just a nervous tick. He added one more sentence to the chapter, then deleted it with aching regret. Everything he wrote was crap. He’d been in Sugar Creek three months to write, and he’d barely gained any ground. Will had written articles. He’d crafted copy for his news reports. Words were his thing. So why was this book like stabbing himself with an ice pick and writing with the blood?
Every time he sat down, his fingers poised over the keys, the sounds of the children laughing in the Durnama school came back to him, swirling in his conscious
ness, only to be followed by the horrific noises of the bomb and all that followed. There had been few survivors that day, and he didn’t know why he’d been one. Some days the guilt was too much, the memories still too fresh, and the burn scars beneath his clothes, not nearly enough punishment to match the pain he carried in his heart. He saw the faces of the children when he closed his eyes at night; and when he woke up in the morning, the loss was almost too much to bear.
And yet his family wondered why he hadn’t jumped back to work and wasn’t quite up to weekly Sunday dinners. He hadn’t told them all he’d seen and heard. All he’d endured during his imprisonment. No one else should have to live with those memories.
His holiday deejay downstairs switched to an up-tempo Mariah Carey ditty, and Will could hear Cordelia sing along. His lips curved in a smile when she tried to hit the high notes, and he imagined her down there stringing garlands and dancing around the Christmas tree. He picked up the pencil beside his laptop and let the eraser fall into percussion beats of the song.
A memory flitted across his mind, and he held it long enough to scribble it onto a notebook. Resistant to return to the harsh clack-clack of the keyboard, Will moved his hand across the page, making sweeping circles and strokes of letters that somehow formed words and sentences, and eventually paragraphs.
Forty-five minutes and eight pages of notes later, Will had more written than he’d managed in two weeks. He leaned back in his chair while the words to “Jingle Bell Rock” played a little too loudly. Somebody needed to tell that girl to turn down the music. A man couldn’t work under these annoyingly festive conditions.
Making his way downstairs with an empty coffee cup, Will paused on the fifth step and watched his staging genius do her thing. Cordelia had wrapped her ponytail in a chaotic bun. She’d taken off her shoes and shimmied to the song belting from her phone as she wove a plaid ribbon around his tree. There was a cocoon of happiness around her, and it was all he could do to not go down there and beg her to let him in it.
This was a woman in her element. Garland made of greenery, pinecones, and antique sleigh bells coiled around his banister. Coordinating sprigs arched over his doorway, while a few burlap pillows reclined on his couch. The painting of children splashing in Beaver Lake that had hung over his mantel had been replaced with a quirky paint-by-number of people ice skating on a frozen pond. The painting was amateur at best, but somehow, wearing its proud white frame, it worked.
Cordelia stooped over a box and dug through tissue paper until she gently lifted a tray of tree decorations. Threading a gold ball with a hook, she reached up on tiptoe and aimed for a branch above her head.
Will eased down the stairs and joined her in the living room. “I can help you with that.”
She made no effort to move as he came behind her, picked the dangling ball from her fingers, and held it high. “Right here?”
Cordelia turned her head and watched him. Her eyes briefly dipped to his mouth before jolting back to the tree. “To the left."
He wondered what was going through that mind of hers. "How about now?"
Cordelia shook her head and her hair rustled against his shirt. Will took one more step toward her, so close he could smell the vanilla notes of her perfume. See the graceful curve of her neck.
His arm brushed against her cheek as he settled the hook onto a branch then checked for her approval.
She turned in his arms, her toffee eyes holding his. “It’s perfect.”
Sometimes Will wondered if the bomb had rattled his common sense. He knew he should move. But he stepped even closer and reached out, his fingers threading her tendril of hair that had escaped. He let it slide across his hand, felt the texture against his skin before gently tucking it behind Cordelia’s ear. Will had the wild feeling that if he put his mouth to hers, she just might reciprocate. Would her lips be as soft as they looked? Would Cordelia throw her whole heart into kissing him, just as she threw everything she had into Christmas? A speck of glitter on his cheek caught his eye, and he brushed it away as her eyes held his.
Somewhere a phone trilled loudly. The music stopped.
And the moment shattered like a fallen ornament.
Cordelia angled past him and reached for her phone. “I need to take this call.” She stepped onto the porch and let the much-needed cold air rush inside to take her place.
Will rubbed his tired eyes and thought about banging his head against the trunk of the tree. He was in town to finish his book, and his alliance with Cordelia was simply to get his family off his back. To show them he was living, breathing, and functionally doing life.
He didn't have time for a holiday fling, and he sure didn’t need to get involved with the poster child for holiday harassment.
So when Will stepped outside with his coat, he told himself it was just to make sure Cordelia was warm. Any man with manners would do the same. As she leaned against his porch post, he settled his jacket across her shoulders.
“Are you sure, Ananya?” she said, holding the phone tight to her ear. “But where does someone even get drugs in prison?” Her eyes closed and she nodded her head. “You know I’m a foster-only home. Adoption isn’t an option for me right now. Yes, I’ll keep it in mind. Thanks for the update.” With a push of a button, the call was over, but Cordelia didn’t move.
“It’s kind of cold out here,” Will said after a minute passed. His gaze roamed to the gray sky where clouds threatened to snow. He hadn’t seen the white stuff in years. “Cordelia?” Without a care for any of their rules, he took her frigid hand in his. “Is everything okay?”
She stared blankly at their hands. “Isaiah’s mom screwed up again. She hasn’t even been sentenced yet.”
The wind rattled the trees lining the street. “What does that mean?”
“The odds of her getting out of prison aren’t good. And that means,”—She released a shaky exhale— “Isaiah and his siblings could soon be up for adoption.”
Chapter 9
“Do you want to talk about it?”
Cordelia sat on a barstool in Will’s kitchen that night as he asked a question she’d already ignored a dozen times. “No.”
“Have you thought about the possibility of adopting Isaiah?”
Her foster son was now in the capable hands of her neighbor for a few hours, which was probably for the best. Cordelia needed a little break to think, and the baby didn’t need to be out in the cold two nights in a row. “I said I didn’t want to get into it. Can I stress about one thing at a time? And why are you cooking your family dinner? Wouldn’t it be easier to eat downtown?”
He tossed some garlic in a pan. “Because cooking was one of my things. I figure one meal from me will add some serious points to the tally my mom’s keeping.”
“What tally?”
“Donna Sinclair’s ‘Is he mentally stable or not’ score card.”
“They don’t think you’re crazy, Will.”
“Maybe not, but they view any signs of a different me as cautionary.” He added some butter. “So I want to put that to rest once and for all.”
“How many times have you cooked since you’ve been home?”
Will dug in the drawers until he found a large knife. “Twice.”
Interesting. “So you cook, you hang out with your family, you celebrate the holidays, you—”
“Send them all back to Charleston and finish my book in peace.”
And how long was Will staying in Sugar Creek? Did Cordelia even want to know? She’d spent the rest of the day decorating like a madwoman, working at turbo speeds with Will’s all too frequent help. Maybe it had just been her overactive imagination, but she’d found him in her space quite a bit. His arm brushing against hers. Both of them reaching for an ornament at just the same time. His body close to hers as they inspected the final results.
Will checked the time on the stove clock. “Are you ready to be mobbed by my parents?”
Nerves fluttered like pine needles in her stomach.
She pushed the thoughts of Isaiah away because tonight she was on stage for the performance of her ridiculous lifetime. Cordelia would have to convincingly pretend to be his girlfriend, and she still felt so unprepared. She knew little about Will. What she’d learned of his family had mostly come from an extensive internet search, and that only yielded information that intimidated her—like their massive wealth and accomplishments. The Sinclair family had hotels and resorts all over the world. And not the discount rate, free breakfast sort of accommodations.
Besides his successful career as a journalist, Will had quite the resume of philanthropic and charity work. The school that had been bombed had been his third one to open in Afghanistan. His brother Alex was now a big time congressman, and with his wife Lucy ran a handful of residence homes for kids who had aged out of the foster care system. Lucy traveled the country helping other organizations follow their model. And Will’s sister Finley? Not only was she enviably gorgeous, the prodigy had graduated from a fancy music college and immediately gotten a job as a film score composer.
And then there was Cordelia. Who was she? An accountant. Who liked to decorate and blow up the holidays. She had a degree from a state college; she had a car that needed a hand crank to run, and her last philanthropic effort had been to drop a dollar in the jar at the gas station to go towards Billy Jo Jenkins’ new liver.
“Cordelia.” Will waved a spatula. “Hey, come back to me.”
“I’m listening.” She took a drink of her iced tea.
“I just said Elf was a terrible movie, and you didn’t even flinch.”
“I must’ve been deafened by your blasphemy.”
He sliced into a loaf of French bread. “You’re not nervous are you?"
There was no use in pretending otherwise. “What if we screw this up?
“Just have fun with it. We’re not trying to convince them we’re marriage material.”
“You make it sound so easy.”
“Maybe you complicate things.”
“Says the man who can’t communicate to his parents that he needs more time to decompress, so he hired a total stranger to pose as his girlfriend.”
His Mistletoe Miracle Page 5
