Their Unexpected Christmas Gift (The Stone Gap Inn Book 3)

by Shirley Jump

  Chapter Seven

  Ellie was crying.

  That was the first thing Vivian noticed the next morning. She was usually gone before Ellie woke up, and when Vivian rolled over to check the clock in her room, she realized it had been unplugged. Sunlight was just beginning to peek through the windows. Crap. That meant she was late for work. She still had the rest of those case studies to review and the research report to read. The worker she was representing had given her a number to work with—the amount that he felt he needed from the settlement to get his life back on track. But until she had all her ducks in a row, though, there wouldn’t be much for ammunition in getting the manufacturer to agree to the number of zeros on the offer. It was a critical day. Heck, every day was critical.

  Vivian sprung out of bed, tugged on her robe and hurried downstairs to grab her phone. In the nursery upstairs, Ellie kept on crying, the sound echoing through the silent house. Where the hell was Nick?

  She headed for the counter, where her phone usually sat, attached to the charger at night. The space was empty, save for a sheet of paper.

  Remember the whole “why don’t you take a day off” idea? I called your office and said you were sick today. Al said he’ll handle everything with the lawsuit, so don’t worry about a thing. I loaded the car seat in your car and went to work. Bottle for Ellie is in the fridge. Take the day off. You need it. And Ellie needs to get to know her aunt.

  Nick

  Clearly, he’d been serious about her taking the day off. That’s what she got for leaving their conversation unfinished last night. All the fears, worries, inadequacies that their talk at dinner had unearthed were the kind of thing Vivian did her level best to avoid, and here was Nick Jackson, determined to make her face it all in broad daylight. Damn that man.

  For the hundredth time, she questioned Sammie’s thoughts in leaving Ellie here with Vivian, the least motherly person on the planet. She was so far out of her comfort zone with the baby, she might as well be in another stratosphere. Why couldn’t Nick understand that?

  Vivian stared at the sheet of paper, then spun toward the hall where she’d dumped her laptop bag last night. Upstairs, Ellie’s cries had become full-on feed-me-and-change-me-this-instant wails. “Hang on, El,” Vivian called up the stairs. “Let me just—”

  Her bag wasn’t there. Instead, another note, tacked to the wall.

  I knew you’d try to work one way or the other. Laptop and phone are at the inn. Breakfast is at eight. Come join us.

  Nick

  Vivian was going to kill Nick when she saw him. He’d forced her into taking the day off, even though she’d told him she didn’t have the time. Couldn’t afford to take her eyes off the case. Now she was going to have to skip work, for at least another hour, until she could get to the inn and get her laptop and phone back.

  Meanwhile, Ellie’s cries had reached decibels normally reserved for rock concerts. Vivian stood there, trying to figure out which she should do first. Change her? Feed her? Both?

  Maybe feed her while she changed her? Was that even possible?

  Either way, it sounded like a good plan, and one that would hopefully ease the wailing coming from upstairs. She hurried back into the kitchen, pulled out the bottle that was filled and waiting in the fridge, and found a third note attached to the plastic.

  Warm this in the pan of water on the stove. Remember, you want it to be body temperature. Shake the bottle after you warm the formula, to make sure it’s all evenly warm, and test the temperature by shaking a few drops on your wrist. And yes, change Ellie while you’re waiting for the bottle. Diapers are next to the crib. You can do it, Viv. Babies aren’t as complicated as lawsuits, believe me.

  There’s a French omelet waiting for you at the inn. With bacon. And blueberry muffins.

  Nick

  What was this man, a mind reader? And damned if the omelet, bacon and muffins didn’t sound amazing. Her stomach growled, and if she’d been three months old, she might have cried and demanded the breakfast be brought to her.

  A whisper of confidence trickled into Vivian. Maybe this wasn’t all that hard. Maybe she could change Ellie and feed her, and get the two of them in the car and over to the inn for breakfast. It was, after all, the only way to get that deliciousness in her stomach and herself on her way to work. Babies aren’t as complicated as lawsuits.

  Vivian sure hoped Nick was right and that his belief in her wasn’t misguided. She did as he instructed, setting the bottle in the pan of water that she started to heat before heading back upstairs and into Ellie’s room. “Hey, sweetie. It’s your Auntie Viv. Let’s get your diaper changed, okay?”

  Ellie stopped crying long enough to give Vivian a dubious stare. That was a good start, she hoped. Vivian grabbed a diaper and the box of wipes from the small table beside the crib, then reached for her niece. Ellie squirmed a little, but mostly looked curious and bewildered by the change in her morning routine.

  “We’ve got this, right? We can handle it.” The words had a lot more confidence in them than she felt. That whisper from before disappeared the minute she held her niece, still at arm’s length, as if Ellie might explode at any second. She didn’t have that easy casualness with Ellie that Nick had. Not ever...or maybe just not yet?

  Since when have you accepted failure? she asked herself. She’d survived the nightmares of foster care, graduated near the top of her class in high school, then put herself through college followed by law school and risen to the top at Veritas Law in record time.

  “Nick’s right,” she said to Ellie. “If I can argue with a multimillion-dollar company in court, I should be able to handle changing a three-month-old’s diaper. It’s not rocket science, right?”

  Except the last time she’d attempted this, she had failed miserably. Nick made it look so simple. Maybe she was overthinking it.

  She laid Ellie on the twin bed, then unsnapped the bottom of her niece’s lilac-printed pajamas. Ellie’s legs kicked and moved, and it took a couple tries to find and unfasten all the snaps, but a moment later, Vivian had the pajamas off and the wet diaper removed. A quick swipe with a couple of wipes and a clean bottom awaited a new diaper. “Success. Whoo! Wait, El. Don’t pee on me, okay? I have to get the new one on. Just give me a second. I’ve done this a couple times before—okay, really badly—but I can do it right this time.”

  She tried to think back to how she’d seen Nick do it, because he was definitely more adept at the diaper thing than Vivian had been—a diapering job which ultimately had to be fixed by Nick, because her bad taping job had fallen apart later. To his credit, Nick hadn’t laughed at Vivian’s lame diapering. Rather, he’d given her a few tips in that patient, calm way of his.

  Center the diaper under Ellie’s bottom, he’d said as he redid Ellie’s diaper. Make sure the front and back are evenly aligned. Set the tape across that top band, and fasten it tight enough so there’s no gap in the legs.

  “Okay. We’ve got this.” She said it more to herself than to Ellie. Before Vivian could keep puzzling over it anymore, she slipped the diaper under her niece, flipped out the tape on the left and then on the right, then pulled the sides tight as she pressed the tape down and over the marching monkeys on the front. The diaper miraculously stayed in place. She checked the left leg, then the right leg, and there didn’t seem to be any gaps. “Wait. Did I actually do this?”

  Ellie wiggled her legs, squirming against Vivian’s hand of caution on her niece’s chest. The diaper stayed put.

  “Well, what do you know. Maybe I can handle this after all.” She redid the snaps on the pajamas—changing Ellie into clothes seemed a little much for her first solo day—then picked the baby up and settled her against one hip. Ellie moved a millimeter closer than the last time Vivian had held her. A start, at least. “Let’s try a bottle. Okay? Sound good?”

  Ellie started to cry again, which Vivian took f
or I don’t care, I’m hungry, and together, they headed downstairs and into the kitchen. For the first time in a long time, Vivian felt a tiny bit of optimism that maybe, just maybe, she could be the aunt Ellie deserved.

  * * *

  Mavis propped her fists on her hips and stood beside Nick while he mixed plump dark blueberries into fresh muffin batter. There were only a couple guests staying at the inn, both of whom had asked for a late breakfast, which gave Nick a little more time to prep a buffet in the dining room. Muffins first, then some bacon, waffles and eggs.

  “Where is that baby, and why haven’t you met with your father yet?” Mavis said.

  Nick chuckled. “Well, good morning to you, too, Mavis.”

  “I know you’re just avoiding the conversation your grandma asked you for, Mr. Nick Jackson. But it’s got to be had. If there’s one thing you should have learned from losing that sweet Ida Mae, it’s that life is as short as an unlucky cat’s tail.”

  He spooned the glistening batter into a paper-lined muffin tin, careful not to mash the fresh blueberries. “An unlucky cat? I don’t think I’ve heard that phrase before.”

  Mavis ignored his attempts to shift the direction of the conversation. She handed him the jar of raw sugar, and watched while he sprinkled the muffin tops, then put the pan in the hot stove. In the oven, the sugar would harden, creating a sweet, crunchy topping. “I know you have your reasons why you don’t talk to your father—”

  “He chose to stop talking to me. And when I told him about Ida Mae’s request, he said to just mail the box.” Nick started some bacon sizzling in a cast iron pan.

  “—but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t reach out again and keep trying. Your grandmother, God rest her soul, was the kind of woman who forgave everyone, and just wanted her family to be happy and peaceful.”

  “Family” had never been a word he’d associated with his parents. It was as if Nick’s childhood had happened on two different planets—the Mausoleum and Grandma’s. Maybe it was because his father was an only child, or maybe it was part of his father’s disdain for the small town where he grew up, but the elder Jackson had differentiated himself from his parents and his past as much as possible.

  Nick cracked a couple eggs into a big bowl, added some buttermilk, then whisked in the dry ingredients for waffle batter. Once that was done, he set it aside and went back to the bacon. “That’s never going to happen.”

  “Why do you have to be the thunderstorm on the picnic? You never know what’s possible until you try, Nick.” She put the empty mixing bowl from the muffins in the sink and ran some hot water over it. “Now, where’s my temporary grandbaby?”

  “Hopefully on her way over here.” He was pretty sure Vivian was going to kill him when she saw him. But he stood by his actions. Even though he’d only known her a short while, he knew she would have found a way to work if he hadn’t absconded with her laptop and cell phone. And as long as she put her work first, last and always, she was never going to truly bond with Ellie.

  As if conjured up by the conversation, the front door to the inn opened and Vivian strode in, one hand carrying the baby carrier part of the car seat, the other holding Mac and Savannah’s borrowed diaper bag. Instead of the severe suits she usually wore, Vivian was clad in a pair of butter-soft worn jeans, and a T-shirt with an image of one shark watching another trying to eat a plump lawyer under the words You’re Gonna Need a Bigger Plate.

  Her hair was out of its usual professional chignon, and loose around her shoulders. Her face was bare of makeup, which only highlighted her wide blue eyes and dark lashes.

  Mavis nudged him. “Don’t burn the bacon, Romeo.”

  He jerked his attention back to the stove. Reminded himself to play it cool. This whole thing was temporary, a deal for the holidays. She was a lawyer who clearly put her career ahead of everything else. If anything said Big Mistake, those two things did.

  “Your evil plan worked,” Vivian said to him. “I managed to successfully change Ellie, and feed her. She’s even quiet right now. And dare I say it...happy.”

  He grinned. “I wouldn’t call it an evil plan. But I’m glad you had a good morning with her.”

  “There’s my little munchkin!” Mavis crossed the room, tugged Ellie out of her baby carrier and held her tight, covering Ellie’s cheeks with kisses. “Oh, how I miss these baby days. I hope my daughter has at least two more little ones. There’s nothing more fun than being a grandma, even a temporary one.” She nuzzled Ellie’s chest, and the baby’s hand curled around Mavis’s thumb. “Let’s go visit Della, shall we? She’s probably bored silly, paying bills in the office. Let’s bring her some sunshine.”

  After they left the room, Vivian stowed the baby carrier in a kitchen chair, then leaned against the counter beside the stove. She let out a long breath. “Okay, I’m here. Now, where are my phone and laptop?”

  “If I tell you, are you going to use them?”

  “Of course I am. I have a job to do.”

  “Then I’m not going to tell you.” He flipped the bacon strips. They sizzled and spattered in the hot pan. “Besides, you haven’t even had breakfast. It’s never good to work on an empty stomach.”

  “Come on, Nick, don’t be childish. Let me do my job.”

  He avoided looking at her, and kept tending the bacon. In the other room, he could hear Mavis and Della exclaiming over Ellie’s tiny feet and hands. “When was the last time you took a day off?” he asked Vivian.

  She blew a lock of hair out of her face. “Two years ago. No, three.”

  “And did you actually take a vacation?”

  She toed at the tile floor. “I had the flu.”

  “But you take off weekends and holidays, right?” He said the last with sarcasm. He already knew that answer, because he knew Vivian’s type. He’d lived in that house, had watched that life. Even had a taste of it himself when he went to work with Carson. That job had been a constant, mind-numbing, soul-crushing hamster wheel that never stopped rolling. Just when you met one deadline, six more popped up in its place. It left almost no room for a personal life or anything outside of the office.

  “What does that matter?” Vivian said. “I’m single, and I live alone. What is there for me to rush home to? I don’t have a cat or a goldfish or so much as a potted plant. No one cares if I work a hundred hours a week.”

  “I care.”

  “Why? You hardly know me.”

  He stepped away from the bacon and shifted closer to her. Without makeup, he could see the dusting of freckles across her nose. Adorable. He softened, ignoring the ache to touch her. “Because I have seen where that path gets you. My parents are very good attorneys. Very busy and very wealthy. And very, very miserable.”

  “That doesn’t mean I’ll be the same.”

  He cocked his head and studied her. The defiant tilt of her jaw, the steely resolve in her eyes. “How happy are you, Vivian?”

  She turned away and poured a cup of coffee for herself, adding a generous serving of cream. “I’m happy enough.”

  “And what kind of life is that?”

  Instead of answering, she walked away, clutching the mug in both hands as if she was cold. She paused by the small window on the back door. Beyond the glass lay a long expanse of lawn, green grass rolling down to Stone Gap Lake, a similar view to the one from his grandmother’s house a couple miles away.

  Nick pulled the muffins out of the oven and set them on a waiting rack to cool. He turned off the bacon, lifting the crispy strips out of the grease and onto a thick stack of paper towels. He ladled waffle batter into the hot waffle iron, and worked his way through preparing two before Vivian spoke again.

  “I don’t think I know what it’s like to be happy,” she said softly. “Because just when I would think I was, or that I had found a place where I could bloom, it was all ripped away from me. I guess I’ve learned
to never count on anything or anyone other than myself. I can control me. How much I work, how much money I make, how many people I let into my world. But I’m not sure that equates to happiness.”

  “If you ask me, that’s kind of sad. Understandable, given your childhood, but still sad.” He set the pile of hot waffles aside and covered them to keep them warm. Then he put the omelet pan over the heat and added some butter. While that melted, he whisked three eggs with a little water and salt until the mixture was frothy and light.

  “It’s my life, Nick. I don’t know any other way to be.”

  “Then why don’t you take today, and the opportunity Sammie dropped into your life, and see where it gets you?”

  “It’s not that easy.” She watched out the window a little while longer, then sighed and crossed to the stove, watching him cook.

  Every muscle in his body was attuned to her presence. To the soft swell of her breasts under the T-shirt and the way the jeans hugged her hips and legs. Her perfume wafted between them, and tempted him to move closer.

  The butter foamed in the pan, and Nick poured in the eggs. He gripped the pan handle with one hand while he stirred with a silicone spatula with the other, moving the pan and the eggs at the same time. The cooked eggs moved to the center and the uncooked part rushed to the open edges. Over and over he repeated that step until the eggs were almost completely cooked. Then he shut off the heat, smoothed the top of the eggs and folded the omelet into thirds. He added a tiny pat of butter under the omelet, then tipped the pan toward one of the blue-and-white stoneware plates. The omelet slipped easily from the pan and onto the plate, looking like a pale yellow pillow of eggs. The whole process took maybe two minutes.

  “Wow. That’s almost a work of art.”

  “Well, taste it and see if it lives up to its appearance.” He added two slices of bacon and a warm blueberry muffin to the plate, then handed it to Vivian. “Do you want a waffle too?”