A Dixie Christmas

by Sandra Hill

  “I love you, Brendie.”

  “I love you, Lance.”

  And the voice in both their heads said, “Another job done!” Or maybe it was “Ho, ho, ho!”

  (Continue reading for more information about Sandra Hill’s books and an excerpt from ’Twas the Night)

  ’Twas the Night

  More Romantic Christmas Fun!

  From Sandra Hill, Kate Holmes and Trish Jensen

  Excerpt

  Tuesday, evening, three days ’til Christmas Eve.

  “Gotcha!”

  With that single word, when her attention had wandered for all of a nanosecond, Sam cornered her in the back of the bus by sliding onto the bench seat next to her, thus trapping her against the window. What a tight squeeze it was, too, considering her bulk in the Santa suit!

  “You are so juvenile,” she said with a sniff.

  “Yep,” he agreed and adjusted his body closer to hers, something she would not have thought possible.

  With all the movement he was making, he shook some of the boxes stacked behind. There was a chorus of “Suzie Gotta Pee,” “Suzie Gotta Pee,” “Suzie Gotta Pee,” “Suzie Gotta Pee” from some of the gifts left over from the last shelter stop.

  “What the hell?” Sam exclaimed as he turned to straighten the talking boxes.

  “Samuel Merrick!” Emma Smith chided from the seat in front of them. Emma, a large, husky woman, much like Camryn Manheim, but older, and brusquer, was a retired eighth grade teacher, who had taught them all. The one thing she could not abide was bad language and she heard every bit of it with her trusty Miracle-Ear hearing aid. “Tsk, tsk, tsk!”

  Sam folded his hands in his lap and said, “Sorry, ma’am,” batting his eyelashes with exaggeration. Once Emma turned around with a huff, he ruined the good little boy effect by winking at Reba. God, that wink went through her like an erotic current. The man was lethal. And way too close.

  She doubted whether pushing him would do much good; the determined gleam in his eyes said loud and clear that no quarter would be given by this soldier, not after her having blocked all his previous moves. Plus, he had about seventy-five pounds on her. She supposed she could scream for help, but what a sight that would be . . . nine overaged Santas to the rescue . . . assuming they would come to her rescue, considering how Sam was charming the liver spots off of them all . . . darn it.

  Yep, Sam had her right where he wanted her, apparently, after a day and some odd hours of the pursuit-and-avoid game they’d been playing. Who am I kidding? It’s exactly twenty-eight hours and thirty-five minutes since The Good-bye Kiss . . . not that I’m keeping tabs. And, heavens to Betsy, why am I feeling all melty inside at the prospect of the louse’s having me where he wants me?

  “Hello,” Sam said.

  “Good-bye,” she said.

  He smiled.

  She frowned.

  He took her hand in his.

  She pulled her hand away from his.

  It was all so childish. But they weren’t children anymore, and Reba couldn’t risk the powerful wave of pain that would surely accompany any association with Sam. She didn’t want to hear his phony excuses. She didn’t want to discuss her long-standing anger toward him. She didn’t want anything to do with the testosterone-oozing hunk. Stiffening her spine, she steeled herself to resist the allure he offered, and, yes, he was alluring, even as he merely sat beside her. Seemingly innocent. Never innocent.

  He reached for her hand again, and she swatted him away, again, but harder this time. “Ouch,” he said with a grin.

  “Cut it out, Sam. Just cut it out.”

  The fury underlying her words must have struck a chord in him somewhere. He stilled. “What?”

  “Don’t touch me. Don’t talk to me. In fact, don’t even look at me. Don’t think I haven’t noticed the way you watch me all the time, just waiting for a chance to pounce.”

  “Hey, I do not pounce.” He studied her carefully as if trying to figure out some puzzle. Then, he concluded in typical Dumb Man fashion, “You are being really intense here, sweetheart. That has got to be a good sign. If you didn’t care, you wouldn’t react so strongly, right? You must not want me near you because you fear the temptation. Yep, a very good sign.”

  “Either that, or you repulse me.”

  He appeared to give that serious consideration, then decided, “No, no, no! I won’t consider that possibility.”

  “Stay away from me, Sam. I’m not one of your groupies. I’m not your . . . anything.”

  The vehemence of her response seemed to stun him, but then he immediately switched to irritation. “Groupies? Are you nuts? I have never been into the Blues’ groupie scene.”

  “I wasn’t talking about the Blue Angels. I was talking about you, Mister Egomaniac.”

  “Me? You are suffering from a huge misconception, honey. I don’t have groupies.”

  “Oh, Sam, you’ve always had groupies.”

  He threw his hands in the air. “This is a ridiculous conversation. I don’t want to talk about me. I want to talk about you. I want to talk about us.”

  “Here’s a news flash. There is no us.”

  The sadness on his face tore at her soul, but at least he had the good judgment to say nothing for a few moments. He must have sensed her growing agitation and realized that the best thing he could do was sit silently next to her and let her grow accustomed to his presence. Which she would never do. Not now. Not ever. No way. Please, God!

  When did it turn so warm in here? Betty must have jacked up the heat.

  When did Sam start wearing aftershave, or was that tangy evergreen scent just a residue of soap on his skin? Heck it was probably just the greenery that decorated each of the windows in the bus. How pathetic was she?

  When would she stop noticing every little thing about him? The intriguing laugh lines that bracketed the edges of his blue eyes and the corners of his firm mouth. Or perhaps they were sun crinkles, living in Florida as he did much of the year. Then, there was his rigid military demeanor, even when he stretched his long legs out into the aisle, or joked with the senior Santas, or, Saints forbid, gazed at her with a longing that was anything but soldierly. And, criminey, he had a body perfectly honed to suit the military and a grown woman’s humming hormones.

  She must have been more exhausted than she’d realized to have allowed Sam to slip past her watchful guard. It was only eight p.m. But she’d been up since five. In the midst of some stress over the weather conditions, they’d performed two shows today, in Sarasota Springs, New York, and Burlington, Vermont, after which they’d picked up Stan and his lady friend, Dana . . . rather, George’s friend, Dana . . . or was it both? In any case, she was on the way to the wedding, too. That, on top of JD and the Amish woman, Callie, hopping onto the bus this morning. They were becoming a regular reunion commune. Right now, JD and Callie were sitting on the front seat of the bus, with Stan and Dana on the opposite side. The two men were chatting amiably across the aisle, while the women stared pensively out the darkened windows.

  “That was not a good-bye kiss. No way was that a good-bye kiss!” Sam declared, out of the blue, jarring her out of her mental wanderings. Good Lord, the man was resuming a day-old conversation, as if it had never been interrupted.

  “I am not going to discuss this.”

  “This?”

  “Us,” she said. “It’s over . . . done with.”

  “No, it’s not, Reba. God, I hate that song. I can’t think when I hear that song. Can’t you make them stop?”

  “Huh?” Reba glanced up, realizing that her Santa crew had started caroling, as they often did, not just to practice for their homeless shelter events, but because they were, frankly, a cheerful group. It was the holiday season, for goodness sake. “What do you have against Christmas songs, Mr. Grinch?”

  He poked her playfully in the arm, but the playfulness never reached his somber eyes. “I don’t hate all Christmas songs, just that one,” he grumbled.

 
; She narrowed her eyes at him, interested, despite herself. “And why would that be? Too lower class for a hoity-toity celebrity pilot?”

  At first, it appeared as if he wouldn’t answer her, but then he disclosed something he hadn’t shared with her in all the eight years she’d known him.

  “My mother gave me up two days before Christmas when I was ten years old. Just walked into a police station, said she needed to find a home for me, plopped down a paltry little cardboard box with all my worldly belongings, and left. Just like that. In the background, that stinkin’ `Jingle Bells’ song was playing. I’ll never forget it. Me screaming like a banshee for my mother to come back, and Bing Crosby crooning away with those cheerful cornball lyrics.”

  Suddenly, a look of horror spread over his face as he realized how much he’d revealed. “Forget I said that. God above! Here I am trying to charm you into talking with me. Instead, you must think I’m downright pitiful.”

  Reba didn’t think he was pitiful, at all. In fact, she was deeply touched. “You’ve certainly come a long way since then, Sam. Your mother would be so proud of you.”

  “My mother could have cared less.”

  Reba would have liked to argue that point. After all, she held a masters degree in psychology. Here was a man with major unresolved issues . . . and not just dealing with his mother. But it was none of her business, really.

  He ran the fingertips of one hand over his forehead, an unconscious effort to smooth out the creases.

  Reba had to make a fist to keep herself from reaching out and doing the smoothing herself.

  “Tell me about The Santa Brigade . . . and Winter Haven. I never thought you’d follow in your Dad’s footsteps with a nursing home.”

  “It just happened. I was in private practice . . . working for a Bangor psychological clinic when Dad got cancer. I took a leave to come home and care for him, which meant taking over directorship of the retirement community on a temporary basis. It hasn’t been a nursing home for years, by the way. Dad was in hospice for a year before he died. By then I discovered that I liked the work, and I took over.” She shrugged. What she left out was the agony of that year, caring for a loved one through that horrendous disease.

  “It appears as if you’ve made the retirement community your own, though. Lots of modern ideas.”

  She tilted her head in question. “Oh, you mean The Santa Brigade?”

  “That and the mandatory volunteer program and physical fitness regime you instituted. Maudeen told me about them while I was showing her how to reorganize some of her files this afternoon.”

  “You’re a computer expert, too?”

  He laughed. “Not quite a computer geek. Jets are all high tech today, though, and pilots are required to have advanced computer training.”

  “You? The person who took algebra twice?”

  “Hey, I just wanted to be with you. I liked the way you tutored me.” Reba had been a year younger than Sam, thus taking the same courses the year following him. She chose to ignore the eyebrow jiggling trick that accompanied his latter statement.

  Now would be a good time to change the subject. “How about you? Do you intend to make the military a career?”

  “If you’d asked me that a year ago, I probably would have said I’m destined to be a lifer. But I’m not sure now. At the least, this is my third and last year with the Blues. It’s a policy to rotate squadron members every few years on a staggered basis, so there are always familiar faces. The Blues have never been a permanent career option. At the same time, I’m feeling burned out with the Navy these days. I’ve already served four tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, which is enough, but I have no idea what else I could do . . . in civilian life.”

  My goodness, Sam was opening up a lot today. He always used to keep his personal doubts inside, as if they signified weakness. It was probably a ploy, though she didn’t think he’d go that far. “You could do anything you wanted, Sam.”

  “I don’t know about that. I wish you could have seen me perform with the Blues, though, Reba. I’m a screw-up in lots of ways, but I’m a really good pilot. Hot damn, but I would have showed off for you.”

  “You always showed off for me, Sam. Whether it was skiing down Suicide Run, or diving off the high board.” She shouldn’t tell him, she really shouldn’t. Oh, heck! “Actually, I did see you, Sam.”

  “You did? As a Blue Angel? When?”

  “Two years ago, in Boston. You . . . the team . . . were great.”

  He took her hand in his and held tight this time. “You came to a Blue Angels show, and never contacted me? Why not?”

  “What was the point?”

  “The point? I’ll tell you the point,” he said hotly, squeezing her hand painfully. “We were friends. Good friends. Whatever else we might have been, friendship demands common courtesy. I can’t believe you were so close and didn’t even talk to me.”

  “I intended to, but there were lots of people surrounding you after the show.”

  “And you couldn’t wait? Or yell out my name to get my attention?”

  “There were girls there, Sam, and women. I wasn’t about to become one of your groupies.”

  “Groupies again?” he muttered.

  “What did you say?”

  “Nothing, babe. Nothing.”

  “And stop calling me babe and honey and sweetheart.”

  He grinned, as if—yep—he was getting to her.

  He was, but that was irrelevant.

  “Are you involved with anyone? A relationship, I mean?” Another of those disarming, out-of-the-blue questions.

  “No. Nothing steady.”

  “Good.”

  Good? What did that mean? It was not good with regard to him. Whether she had a boyfriend, or lover, shouldn’t concern him in any way.

  “And you?” she asked. Jeesh! Her brain must be splintering apart to be continuing this line of conversation.

  He shook his head.

  And she thought, “good.”

  “I’ve had lots of women—”

  “No kidding.”

  “Would you let me finish, Ms. Smart-ass? I’ve had lots of women . . . well, not lots . . . but enough.”

  She barely restrained a sarcastic remark.

  “But none of them ever lasted more than a few months. I never even lived with a woman. I certainly never loved any of them . . . not like I . . .”

  He let his words trail off, and Reba just knew that the reason was because he wasn’t sure what tense to use. Was it “not like I loved you?” Or “not like I love you?”

  Not that it mattered.

  “I told you that I wasn’t going to discuss this, and I meant it.” She stood up abruptly and yanked her hand out of his. “Golly, it’s hot in here. Move, so I can take off my blasted Santa suit.” Enough of hiding behind this disguise. If she didn’t cool down soon, she was going to have a stroke, or something. Probably a hormone meltdown.

  Sam stared at Reba for several long moments. He was about to resist her order, but then, a good soldier knew how to pick his battles.

  “Act calm. Be in control. Never show emotion,” he murmured the mantra under his breath.

  He’d made some progress with Reba tonight. Best he step back and let her assimilate everything that had been said and the emotions that still sizzled between them. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll stop . . . for now. But I’m not going away, Reba. We have things that need to be cleared up.”

  “Like what, Sam?”

  “Like why I never came back? Like why you got married? Like where we go from here?”

  Before she had a chance to make some wiseacre comment about there being a snowball’s chance in hell that they were going anywhere together, he stood up next to her, gave her a quick peck on the mouth before she had a chance to belt him a good one, then moved to the half-empty bench seat across the aisle. The window side of the seat was piled high with boxes of candy canes. All around him he heard people speaking in the deep Maine burr that was at once
familiar, and oddly soothing to him.

  Reba was already peeling off the Santa suit, as if it were on fire. He felt a little hot himself, but his body heat emanated from an entirely different source. Hey, maybe Reba’s heat was the same as his. Hmmmm. How to capitalize on that?

  “Would you like a little refreshment?” an elderly voice asked him. Actually, the offer was made by two elderly voices. One held a tray filled with paper cups of egg nog, and the other a tray of sliced fruitcake. It was the spinster twins, Maggie and Meg MacClaren. Their matching, perfectly coifed pinkish blond hairdos never seemed to lose their old-fashioned deep waves. They reminded everyone of those two elderly Baldwin sisters on The Waltons.