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“Nope.” He shook his Santafied head. “Any it is.”
She sighed. How bad could owing him be? They’d both agreed falling into bed together had been a mistake, the result of a particularly bad night in the E.R. where three people had died due to trauma received in a multicar accident. Although they’d done everything medically possible, the internal injuries had been too extensive. An elderly man had suffered a heart attack and hit another car head-on. He’d died instantly, but a two-year-old girl and her mother had been alive, barely, when paramedics had rushed them into the emergency room. The mother had died within minutes, the child soon thereafter. Abby’s heart had felt ripped out by shift change. Surprisingly, Dirk had been just as devastated. It had been the only time she’d seen his E.R. physician armor crack.
They’d ended up at her house, clinging to each other for comfort. That’s all that morning had been. Comfort sex between two normal, healthy adults who found each other attractive.
Not that comfort sex with Dirk had been a bad thing. She supposed sex with any man of his probable experience would be fabulous. Definitely, Dirk had been fabulous. Practice made perfect, right?
Which meant there was no way his any thing, any time, any place would have anything to do with a repeat performance. He might have been well on his way to the perfect lover, but she’d been sorely lacking in practice.
As in a couple of not-so-perfect boyfriends.
So why had she asked Dirk in when he’d dropped her by her house when he’d caught her crying in the elevator and insisted on driving her home? How had him walking her to her front door ended with him carrying her to her bedroom, stripping her naked, and initiating her to the joys shared between a man and a woman that up to that point she’d only believed happened in romance novels?
“Abs?” He pulled her back to the present.
She blinked again, hoping more fervently than every kid on Christmas Eve that he couldn’t read her thoughts.
He pushed the gold-rimmed glasses back against the straight slant of his nose. “Do we have a deal?”
She may as well agree. It wasn’t as if Dirk would ever really need anything from her. He was gorgeous, and despite his grumblings about having to play the role of Santa, Dirk was good-hearted, an honorable man and an excellent doctor. The physical chemistry between them kept her from being a hundred percent comfortable in his presence—how could she be comfortable when she looked at him and remembered how delicious his kisses tasted, how his naked body felt gliding against hers?
Just thinking about him made her feel a little giddy. There was always a little extra bounce to her step on the nights her shift overlapped his emergency room duties.
“Fine.” She met his gaze and wondered what he was up to. The man was brilliant. He was also the only Santa she had. She needed him. “For the kids. I owe you.”
“Good,” he said, standing. “Let’s get this over with.”
Dirk’s smile scared her. Which felt wrong. How could a smiling Santa be intimidating? Yet, as his gloved hand clasped hers, her nervous system lit up like a twinkling Christmas tree.
Chapter Two
FROM the moment his precious two-year-old daughter and his wife had been killed in a car accident on their way to an early-morning Christmas bargain sale, Dirk Kelley had hated Christmas.
He’d avoided anything to do with the holiday year after year. To the point that his family had held a well-intended but unnecessary intervention at last year’s not-so-joyous festivities.
After their unwelcome confrontation, telling him he needed to deal with Sandra and Shelby’s deaths, they’d continued to hound him, to try to set him up on dates, to beg him to live life. By early summer, he’d known he had to move away from Oak Park, where his family resided, before the next holiday season. Much to their disappointment, he’d accepted the job in Philadelphia, knowing he was far enough away to avoid holiday get-togethers and their piteous look, but not so far away that he couldn’t make it home if there was an emergency. He loved them, just couldn’t deal with the pity in their eyes, their interference in what was left of his life.
They were wrong. He hadn’t needed the intervention. What he’d needed was for his wife and daughter to be alive, but that was impossible. He’d accepted that inevitability years ago, accepted that he had to move on with his life, and he had. But that didn’t mean he’d ever want to be involved with another woman or would welcome the month of December and all the holiday hoopla that arrived with it.
If he could fast-forward December, he’d gladly do so. The lights, the smells, the sales, the noises, everything about the month ripped open his never-healing chest wound.
Abby’s initial shocked expression must have mirrored his own when he’d agreed to be her Santa.
Mortification and panic had struggled for top seat. Yet he hadn’t been able to take back his ill-fated yes. Not when the wariness she’d eyed him with since the morning after they’d met had finally disappeared, replaced with surprise and soft hazel-eyed gratitude. That look had done something to his insides. Something strange and foreign and despite knowing how difficult today was going to be, he hadn’t retracted his agreement.
Not when doing so would disappoint Abby.
Thank God the deed was behind him and he could put Christmas nonsense behind him, where it belonged.
Thankfully de-Santafied, he wandered around Abby’s living room. The room had been taken hostage by Christmas Past since the last time he’d been here, two months ago. He’d swear he’d stepped into a nostalgic Christmas movie scene from a couple of decades ago.
An ancient wreath hung over Abby’s fireplace, a slightly thinning silver garland was draped over a doorway with faded red ribbons marking each corner. A small Christmas village complete with fake glittery snow and dozens of tiny trees and villagers was set up on a white cloth-covered table, clearly set up in a place of honor beside the tree. The nine main pieces of the village looked old, expensive.
Her live Christmas tree towered almost to the ceiling, a ceramic-faced angel’s tinsel halo mere inches from it. What a crazy tradition. Trees indoors. The entire room smelt like the pine tree—like Christmas. Smells he didn’t like. Smells that haunted him and took him to hellish places he didn’t want to go.
There had been a Christmas tree in the waiting room of the emergency department the morning Sandra and Shelby had died. Amazing how the smell could take him back to sitting in that room, a broken man, a doctor who hadn’t been able to do a damned thing to save his baby girl and her mother.
He walked over to the fireplace, eyeing the giant painted toy soldiers to each side, picking up a slightly worn wooden nutcracker. He shook his head, waiting for the nausea to hit him, waiting for the cold sweat to cover his skin, the grief to bring him to his knees.
Christmas did that to him. Sure, he’d learned to bury his pain beneath what most labeled as cynicism, but that didn’t mean in private moments the past didn’t sneak up to take a stab through his armor, to chip away another piece of what was left of him.
And yet, for the first time since Sandra and Shelby’s deaths, he’d agreed to do something that fed into the whole commercialism of Christmas. All because pretty little nurse Abby Arnold had asked him. She’d lit up so brilliantly someone could stick a halo on her head and place her on top of a tree.
He’d definitely found a piece of heaven on earth in her arms. Had found solace he hadn’t expected in the heat of her kisses.
Solace? After the first sweep of his mouth over her lush lips, he hadn’t been seeking comfort but acting on the attraction he’d instantly felt for the pretty brunette nurse. He’d been on fire. With lust. With need. With the desire to be inside her curvy body.
He hadn’t been remembering or forgetting. He’d been in the moment. With Abby.
He’d wanted her the second he’d laid eyes on her, but never had he experienced such all-consuming sex as that morning. So all-consuming he’d known they couldn’t repeat it. Quite easily he could see himself getting obsessed with having her body wrapped around him, getting serious when he had no intention of ever having another serious relationship. Just look at how often he thought of Abby and they’d only had the one morning where they’d made love, twice, and collapsed into exhausted sleep.
Letting out a slow, controlled breath, Dirk placed the nutcracker back on her mantel. Any time, any place, any thing. Why had he teased her into making such an outlandish promise? Better yet, why had he asked for what he had?
He turned, planning to go and find Abby, to tell her he’d changed his mind and needed to go.
A fat tabby cat in a wicker basket at the end of the sofa caught his eye. They’d been formally introduced when the cat had jumped onto the bed, waking both Dirk and Abby in the middle of the afternoon that mid-October day. The cat had been observing his perusal of the room but other than watch him with boredom the cat never moved except to close its eyes.
Realizing another smell, one that was making his stomach grumble, was taking precedence over the pine and was coming through an open doorway, he followed his nose.
When he stepped into the kitchen, he stopped still at the sight that met him, wondering if he’d had one too many kids call him Santa. Because he certainly had the feeling that he’d stepped into an old Christmas movie again.
Singing to the soft Christmas music playing on the mounted under-the-counter player, Abby had on an apron that had Mr. and Mrs. Claus kissing under a sprig of mistletoe on the front. She’d pulled her thick hair back with a red ribbon and had kicked off her shoes for a pair of worn, fuzzy Rudolph slippers.
Stirring a mixture in a glass bowl, a whimsical smile played on her lips as she swayed to the beat of “Rocking Around the Christmas Tree.” She looked happy. Like she belonged in this house with its hand-me-down decorations and cozy holiday atmosphere.
Not that he found any of this cozy.
Only there was something about Abby that made him feel warmth where only coldness had resided for so long. There was also something about her that made him want to hold mistletoe over her head and kiss her.
He’d need a thatched hut with a mistletoe roof over her head to justify all the places he wanted to kiss Abby Arnold.
He wanted to do more than kiss her. Lots more. Like take some of that fudge and smear it across her…
Her gaze lifting from the glass bowl she held, she smiled, knocking the breath from his lungs with her beauty and sincerity. “I can’t believe you wanted homemade fudge as your any time, any place, any thing.”
Her smile said he’d pleased her with his ravings about the goodies she’d brought to the break room at the hospital and how he wanted another bite.
He wanted another bite all right.
Her dimples dug a little deeper into her lovely face. “Some men are so easy.”
Smiling at him like that, she made him feel easy. Like he was cookie dough in her hands, waiting for her to mold him into whatever shape she wanted. So why was he still there? Why hadn’t he told her he was leaving as he’d come in here to do?
Why was he smiling back at her? Why was he eyeing the pan of chocolate-chip cookies she’d taken out of the oven and feeling a pang of hunger in his belly? A pang that didn’t begin to compare to the one below his belt caused by eyeing Abby.
“If they’ve tasted your homemade goodies, I understand why. Especially the peanut-butter fudge.”
“Thank you.” Her eyes sparkled like the silver tinsel draping her tree. “It was my mother’s recipe.”
“Was?”
A flicker of pain crossed her face. “She died.”
“I’m sorry.” He was. Death was never easy. If anyone knew that, he did. In spades. No, death wasn’t easy. Not even when you were a highly trained doctor who’d been dealing with life and death on a daily basis for years.
Just look at how stupidly he’d behaved that first night he and Abby had worked together. Even now, his reaction to the motor vehicle accident victims bothered him, but he understood why, understood that when he’d been battling to save the mother and daughter, he’d been trying to save his wife, trying to save Shelby.
Only to fail.
But he’d held up fine, wearing the mask he’d perfected in those months following their deaths. Pretending he was okay when inside all he’d felt was cold.
Until he’d run into Abby.
He’d been on his way out of the hospital, had caught the elevator just as the door had started closing, and been startled to see a red-eyed Abby eyeing him in surprise.
After shift change, she’d obviously slipped into the bathroom and had a good cry, was still fighting tears. She’d looked vulnerable, needy, way too distraught to be getting behind the wheel of a car.
Way too distraught for him to let her.
He’d insisted on driving her home.
Which was all fine and dandy.
Walking her to the door, going inside, staying, was where he’d messed up.
He didn’t date hospital employees, wouldn’t date hospital employees.
He hadn’t really dated Abby. He’d just not been able to stand the sadness in her eyes, to stand the thought of her driving upset and possibly something happening to her. They’d ended up naked, in her bed, making love until they’d both collapsed in each other’s arms and slept the day away.
He shouldn’t have done that.
Shouldn’t have agreed to be her Santa.
Shouldn’t be here now.
So why was he pulling up a chair, willingly staying somewhere Christmas tunes played, instead of beating a path to the door?
Was her imagination running wild or was Dirk looking at her like he’d rather take a bite out of her instead of the peanut-butter fudge?
Abby turned away from his intense blue eyes and took a deep breath. Needing to do something with her hands, she twisted on the faucet and filled the sink with sudsy water to wash the dishes she’d used to make the cookies and two batches of fudge—one chocolate, one peanut butter.
“This is really great.”
There was no doubting the sincerity in his voice. She’d swear she heard him moan a moment ago.
Without turning toward him, Abby began stacking the dishes into the hot water to let them soak a few minutes.
“My mother had tons of great recipes, but…” But most of them had been lost in the fire. Only her mother’s Christmas recipes packed away in the crates in the basement had survived. The items stored in the basement had been the only items that had survived, period. Almost every box had contained precious Christmas items. “I always bring several big platters full of goodies to the hospital every Christmas.”
“Like the fudge you brought the other day?”
“That, and more.” She grabbed a dish towel, turned toward him and leaned against the sink. “I like to bake. I like how the house smells when I have cookies in the oven and candies going on the stovetop and…”
Realizing she was probably boring him, heat flushed her face. She wiped her hands more with the dish towel, wondering if the moisture was from the dishwater or from nervous clamminess. Dirk made her edgy.
“Sorry.” She smiled wryly. “Christmas is my favorite holiday and I get carried away at times.”
“Obviously.”
Despite the amusement in his eyes, something about the way he said the word struck her as wrong. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
His grin stayed in place but, still, there was something off kilter, something a bit too brittle about him. “Just that it looks like Bing Crosby should be showing up any moment to start singing about a white Christmas.”
“What would be so bad about that? He was a great singer. What’s wrong with you anyway? All day you’ve acted like you really don’t like Christmas.”
He shrugged. “I don’t.”
“Say it isn’t so!” Astounded, flabbergasted, shocked, her mouth dropped open and her palm flattened against her chest, dish towel and all.
“Why?” He shrugged, looking so serious it made Abby want to loosen her apron strings. “It’s the truth. I’m surprised you buy into such a commercialized holiday.”
“The business world commercializes every holiday but that doesn’t lessen what the day is about.”
“Which is?”
“Are you kidding me?” She eyed him, wondering if he was teasing her. When he’d first told her he didn’t like Christmas, she’d thought he was just trying to get out of playing Santa. Could anyone really not like Christmas? Why wouldn’t they? “Christmas is about everything good in life. It’s a time when families come together and give of themselves to each other. A time when the world slows down and gives a helping hand to someone in need. It’s—”
“It’s a time when people run up credit-card debt they can’t pay. It’s a time of the highest rate of depression cases treated, the highest rate of suicide, the highest rate of—”
“How can you be such a cynic about Christmas?” Abby tossed the dish towel onto the countertop and frowned. How could someone not love Christmas? Not love the bright colors in the stores, the sounds of Christmas over the radio, the decorations along the streets? Abby even loved walking past the Salvation Army bellringers. Dropping money into their collection pails always made her feel warm and fuzzy inside.
Giving of oneself was the greatest joy of the holidays. Sure, it would be nice to have someone give to her, to share the moments with, but she’d already decided once today that she’d had enough self-pity.
“I’m not a cynic,” he denied, but the more he talked, the more convinced she became that he was.
“I’m a realist,” he clarified. “For most, Christmas is a major stressor with trying to come up with the perfect gift, trying to figure out how they’re going to pay for that gift, and how they’re going to fight the crowds to make sure they get their hands on that perfect gift.”
“You’re so negative,” she pointed out, wondering what had given him such a slanted view of her favorite time of the year. “I see Christmas as at time when you get to search out that special gift to bring a smile to someone’s face. A gift meant just for them from you that signifies who they are and how much you appreciate having them in your life.”
