A Fairytale Christmas (10 page)

A
S PROMISED
,
the trees arrived, and the kids had a blast bickering over which tree would be “theirs.” Gill watched the chaos, feeling pretty darn good about her problem-solving skills. The kids were happy. Peter McNabb would be happy.

And Oliver was happy. She looked over at how he was smiling at the kids and felt a surge of satisfaction.

He must have felt her stare, for he suddenly turned his smile in her direction. Gill’s insides tumbled. She’d never noticed before, but his eyes had green-gold flecks in them. And dimples. He had dimples. Made her wonder what else she missed.

Picking up one of the leftover mini-trees, she headed in his direction.

“That a peace offering?” he asked, seeing what she carried.

“Santa had room for one more. Looks like it might be the runt of the litter, though.”

“It’s not such a bad little tree.”

Her insides jumbled a wee bit more. Maybe he wasn’t such an ogre after all.

Turning to the craziness on the other side of the room, she said, “Looks like the kids liked my idea.” She couldn’t help
the smug smile tugging the corners of her mouth. “Not to mention my tree.”

“Yeah, about that… I, um…” With his free hand, he rubbed the back of his neck. From his sheepish expression, and the way he suddenly averted his eyes, Gill suspected admitting a mistake wasn’t something he did much of. “I might have overreacted a bit.”

Gill couldn’t help herself. “A bit?”

“Maybe more than a bit. I saw the tree and the decorations and I… Well, it’s complicated.”

“I understand.”

“You do?”

Gill nodded. “Took me a few minutes—or blocks, as the case may be—but, yeah, I do. You were looking out for the kids. You didn’t want them to get the wrong idea. And maybe…”

She brushed her hand over the bottom branch of Oliver’s tree, studying the needles that stuck to her palm. Admitting she was wrong wasn’t something
she
did well, either. “Maybe I got a bit carried away, too.”

“A bit?”

“Point taken. Though you’ve got to admit the tree
is
pretty amazing.”

“Breathtaking,” Oliver replied, catching her gaze.

All of sudden the air in the center grew close, and for a moment it was as if he meant her, not the tree. A heat rose up inside her, starting somewhere low and feminine, and moving through her limbs and chest until she was warm and melty all over.

Oliver turned his attention back to the kids, and the sensation vanished as quickly as it appeared. “So,” he said clearing his throat, “magical Teaberry trees, huh?”

She’d surprised herself with the tale. Normally she wasn’t
the gather-round-for a-story type, but for some reason the words had seemed to pour out easily today. “What can I say? I’m from the South. We’re full of rural legends. I grew up on that one. My sister Gwen believes it wholeheartedly.” Too wholeheartedly, maybe, she added, thinking about the note in her pocket.

“But you don’t.”

A statement rather than a question. Gill appreciated the understanding. “I believe what I told the kids—people make their own magic. You want something in this life, you have to make it happen.”

She realized Oliver was looking at her again, with an odd glint in his eye. “Is that experience talking?”

“You bet.”

“Hmmm.” In his response, Gill found a kind of kinship, a bond they’d missed during their other meetings. “Yet here you are surrounded by Teaberry trees and talking magic. Funny how home has a way of pulling people back.”

“A onetime occurrence, I assure you.” Perhaps it was the way Oliver said it, but hearing the word
home
brought on a restlessness she couldn’t identify. As if something was eating away at the periphery of her life’s plan. She’d felt the same feeling earlier in the day, when setting up the tree. “I made up my mind a long time ago to get as far away from Towering Pines as possible. If Gwen wasn’t there, I’d never go back.”

“Onward and upward, huh?” There was an edge to his voice she couldn’t identify.

“Something like that.”

Carlos, Becky and a few other kids were rooting around the greenery still on the floor, picking up the scraps of bunting the decorators had left behind. Gill watched, marveling at their enthusiasm. Did kids always find fun in everything?

“You didn’t let the decorators do the windows and the other
decorations,” she noted to Oliver. “Is that because you don’t want to?”

“No, I told them I’d do the decorating myself. After our little…” he cleared his throat “…discussion, I got the impression they weren’t keen on sticking around with a guy who had a stick up his…” He looked away, but not before Gill caught the color flooding his cheeks.

She felt her own cheeks growing warm, too. “I probably overstepped a little there. Though you have to admit you have had a bit of a—”

“Stick?”

“I was going to say chip.”

Their eyes met, and in spite of themselves they both grinned. “Think we can start over?” Gill asked. “Call a truce?”

Oliver looked at the kids, who were still laughing and scrounging among the pine boughs. “We could try.”

With that, he slipped his fingers around hers to seal the deal. Their hands, Gill couldn’t but notice, fit together perfectly. The melty sensation began anew.

“What’s this?” Carlos hollered.

He ran up holding a sprig of green and white berries he’d dug from amid the branches. The stem had a red bow tied to it. The minute she saw what he had in his hand, Gill felt her cheeks grow red again.
Gwen, I’m going to kill you….

“Can you eat the berries?”

Oliver was the first of them to recover, releasing Gill’s hand and snatching the twig from the boy. “You do and you’ll get sick. This is mistletoe.”

“If you don’t eat it, what
do
you do?”

“You hang it,” Gill explained. “Then, if you’re standing under it with a girl at Christmas time, you’re supposed to kiss her.”

“And she can’t slap you?”

“No,” Oliver chuckled. “She can’t.”

“Sweet! Where you gonna hang it?” Carlos asked. You could see from the glint in his eye he was already making plans to drag some unsuspecting girl or girls underneath.

“We’ll see, Carlos. Maria’s passing out art supplies. You better go get yours.” He waited until the boy had sprinted back to the crowd before holding the sprig up for review. “Mistletoe? Let me guess. Your sister believes in its magical powers, too. Or is this your doing?”

Her cheeks hotter than Hades, Gill shook her head. And not because when Oliver held it up she thought about getting stuck beneath the branch with him. “She must have slipped it into the order as her way of creating more Christmas magic.”

“Well, from the sounds of things Carlos is thinking of making his own.”

“Are you going to hang it up?”

Oliver shrugged. “I don’t know,” he replied, catching her eye. “What do you think?”

Again came the melting sensation. What was wrong with her? Ever since she’d returned to the center she’d been having completely uncharacteristic reactions. Since when did she get all weak-kneed around a male colleague? Men didn’t fit into her eighty-hour work week—at least not in traditional, dating members of the opposite sex terms. So why was she reacting like a teenage girl every time Oliver so much as looked in her direction this afternoon?

Figuring the best solution would be distance, she snatched a bough from the ground. “What I think is that I should get this garland hung before the kids trample everything.”

For the next few hours she immersed herself in hanging greenery and draping bunting. Her conscience nagged that she should be back at the office tending to other clients. Except, she argued with herself, she was already dressed for manual
labor, so it made sense to do all the decorating in one day rather than make a second trip. Besides, the enchanted forest was her vision. She didn’t want to trust the decorations to someone else.

At least that was the argument she made to herself. It was about doing this party right.

It had nothing to do with the man painting the supply room nearby.

She was tacking up the last piece of garland around the community room door when the alarm on her cell rang, indicating it was time for her Pilates class. It couldn’t be six o’clock already, could it?

Sure enough, checking the screen, she saw she’d shot the entire day.

“Time has a way of getting away from you at this place, doesn’t it?” Oliver remarked, wiping his hands on a cloth in the doorway. Flecks of white decorated his hat brim and the shoulders of his flannel shirt. His face was flushed, no doubt from working in a small space. Manual labor looked good on him, thought Gill. Really good.

So much for distance curing her fixation.

“Happens to me all the time,” he continued. “Some days I wonder if I wouldn’t be better off setting up a cot in my office.”

“Some days I wonder why you haven’t,” Maria remarked, shrugging into her coat. “I’ve got to go home and remind my teenagers what I look like. The decorations look amazing, Gill. For what it’s worth, I told Grinchy here there was nothing wrong with your original tree.”

Red crept into Oliver’s cheeks. “I’ve already apologized for my behavior.”

“Well, it wouldn’t hurt for you to apologize again,” she
called over her shoulder. “You could use the practice.” With that, the front door shut, leaving Gill and Oliver.

Alone.

O
LIVER
immediately ducked his head, rubbing the back of his neck. “She, uh, doesn’t cut me a lot of slack.”

“She certainly speaks her mind,” Gill replied.

“That she does.”

They stood in awkward silence, with each smiling at the other like mute statues. Something between them had shifted since this morning’s shouting match. Sure, Oliver had apologized, but there was more. Gill felt as if she was seeing him in a different light. He was in his element. That was it. She’d spent the afternoon watching him interact with the kids. No wonder he seemed so appealing.

The kids weren’t here now, though. And the atmosphere still felt charged between them.

“I should head back downtown,” she said, aware that she’d made the same comment three hours earlier.

“Back to the grind?”

“I think I’ve already blown the day. I’ll probably go home and catch up on some e-mails from there.” She headed toward the piano where she’d draped her coat and portfolio. The mistletoe lay next to her belongings. With a chuckle, she held it up. “Decided against Carlos’ plan after all?”

“No, I’m going to hang the branch; I just thought I’d wait until Carlos and the girls were gone to keep the kissing to a
minimum. Something tells me I’m going to have to keep an eye on him.”

“Boys will be boys.” She twirled Gwen’s surprise between her fingers, mentally shaking her head at her sister’s romanticism.

“Although nothing says I can’t make carrying out his plans a little more difficult.” Near the stage there was a display board, filled with notices and announcements. Oliver crossed the room and removed a pushpin from one of the flyers.

“Come here,” he said.

Gill obeyed, joining him under the main entrance. Wordlessly, he slipped the mistletoe branch from her hand and, using the pin, suspended the ribbon from the top of the frame.

“There,” he said with a satisfied voice. “Now I can watch the action from all angles.”

“Smart,” Gill remarked, her eyes on the tiny green branch. “If Operation Mistletoe gets out of hand—”

“I can nip it in the bud.”

They lowered their gazes at the same time, coming eye to eye.

The air stilled. Or maybe just Gill’s breathing. Either way, she was suddenly overwhelmed by how silent and close the room felt. Oliver’s gaze lowered to her mouth and then moved back. The flannel of his shirt brushed against the edge of her jacket. Had they always been standing so close?

Neither moved. There was paint in Oliver’s hair, Gill noticed. And on his face. Freckle-size white spots splattered across the bridge of his nose. She had the sudden urge to wipe them away with her hand. Then comb her fingers through his light brown hair…

Suddenly Oliver was speaking, “Let me lock up and I’ll
walk you to your car. You shouldn’t be walking the streets alone in the dark.”

“That’s all right.” In the back of her mind she wanted to note that he’d let Maria walk alone, but couldn’t. “I’ll call a cab.”

“A taxi will take forever at rush hour—if it bothers to come to this neighborhood at all. Why don’t I drive you?”

“I—I—” With him standing so near, her brain had trouble working right. Of course she could step back, but, as twice before, her feet simply wouldn’t move. “I don’t want to put you out,” she finally managed to say.

“Consider the ride my second apology.”

If she hadn’t been standing a hair’s width from the man she’d have told him no, a ride wasn’t necessary. But he
was
standing that close, and the idea of trading that proximity for a ride in a cold, dark cab all of a sudden seemed quite foolish. “If you don’t mind…”

He smiled. “I’ll get my jacket and keys.”

“Meanwhile, while I’m spending all this effort selling the magazine on an article, the client decides she needs to ‘liven up’ her image, and so when the photographer arrives at her office she’s wearing a leather suit and lace bustier.”

“Wait—I thought you said the client was in her early sixties?”

“I did.”

“Whoa!”

“Whoa, indeed,” Gill replied. “Worse yet, the article was highlighting her conservative family values.”

Oliver coughed. “Nice. After that, Peter McNabb must be a piece of cake.”

“Believe me, he is.”

She watched as Oliver topped off her green tea. What was
she doing? This was supposed to be a simple ride home. How had she ended up in a hole-in-the-wall Chinese restaurant in an area of Chinatown she’d never known existed?

It had all started when they’d got into Oliver’s truck. The last time she’d been in a pickup truck was in high school, when Bill Travers had driven her to homecoming. As she’d slid into the passenger seat of Oliver’s vehicle she’d been struck by how small and dark the space was. She didn’t remember Billy’s truck feeling so…so…intimate. She’d been in the middle of buckling her seat belt, and hoping the cold would kill the weird sensation, when her stomach had chosen that moment to growl. Loudly.

Oliver had heard, and asked when she’d last eaten.

“Breakfast,” she’d confessed. After that, she’d been too preoccupied for food.

“Me, too,” Oliver had replied as he’d started the engine. “I meant to go out and grab a bite, but I kept getting distracted.”

By her and her trees.

Gill had assumed the exchange marked the end of the conversation, but then her stomach had continued to rumble. About a block into the drive, during which her stomach had growled at least three or four times, Oliver had turned and looked at her. “You like Chinese?”

Gill had nodded. Chinese was her favorite.

“There’s a place not far from here that serves a mean Kung Pao Chicken. How about we grab some?”

Common sense had told her to say no. Her phone was full of e-mails waiting for her answer. Plus she should call Gwen, to let her know how the kids had loved the tree.

But she’d been sitting in Oliver’s dimly lit truck, still in close enough proximity that the mistletoe’s spell hadn’t worn off, and she’d said yes instead. It would be like a meeting,
she’d rationalized. They could talk about the party and what she envisioned for publicity.

Now, an hour later, they were sitting in the back of a half-filled restaurant, having talked about everything
but
Peter McNabb’s party until now, and Gill was wondering once again how and when things between them had shifted so dramatically.

She sipped her tea, noticing Oliver was studying her mouth again. Her mind flashed to that moment under the mistletoe. The spell continued to linger in the air between them, making every action seem slow-eyed and deliberate. Gwen, if she were here, would be having a field-day with the knowledge.

Gill tried to think of the last time she’d found a man so attractive. The answer failed her. Then again, who had time for dating when building a career? Going solo was the tradeoff you made for success. Besides, she wasn’t interested in dating.

Not that this was a date anyway. Even if the restaurant’s dim lighting and soft music
were
made for romance.

“Hey, where’d you go?” Oliver called to her from the other side of the table. “You faded off there for a moment,” he said.

“Sorry. I was thinking about work.” The answer was half-true, anyway. “I’m going to have a lot of work to make up tomorrow.”

“That your hint that you want to leave?”

“No, not yet.” What was she doing? He’d given her the perfect out, and she was dragging her feet. “I’m enjoying myself.”

“Me, too,” he replied, spearing a piece of broccoli as he spoke. “Nice change of pace, eating Chinese food that’s not from a carton.”

“Tell me about it. The take-out guy in my neighborhood knows me by name.”

“I hear that’s a hazard of being a workaholic.”

“Says the man who stayed up late repairing drywall,” she remarked, accepting the plate of pork fried rice he was handing her.

“Point taken,” he replied. “Though in my case I kind of have to. The center’s budget doesn’t exactly allow for delegating. Or hiring a repairman, for that matter.” He took a bite of chicken, chewing it thoughtfully. “What’s your excuse?”

“Love of hard work. I like my job. I like making things happen.”

“Do you? Make things happen?”

She returned his grin. “All the time.”

Before either of them could continue the waitress arrived with the bill and customary fortune cookies. Oliver reached into his back pocket for his wallet. “Let me,” she said. “We’ll call it a business expense.”

He regarded her with a tilt of his head. “Is that what this was? Business?”

“Everything’s business in my life,” she replied.

The answer earned her a strangely shadowed look that she couldn’t decipher. Surely he wasn’t disappointed by her response? Did he think this dinner was something more? Or was that wishful thinking on her part?

No, not wishful thinking. She wasn’t looking for more in her life than what she already had, thank you very much.

Cutting off her circular thoughts, she proffered the plate of cookies instead. “Go ahead—you choose first. You have to share what fortune you get, though.”

“Very well.” He broke the cookie open, revealing the thin white strip. “‘What you’ve been looking for will soon be yours.’ Hope that means I’m getting a new van.”

“Or a plumbing credit,” Gill said.

“Now,
that
would be a good fortune,” he replied, popping half the cookie in his mouth. When Gill didn’t crack hers open, he gestured with his head. “Your turn. Unless you’re afraid the magic tree will get jealous?”

“Very funny. I think the tree will understand.” Sending him a quick smirk, she broke open her cookie. “Aw,” she said, frowning, “it’s the same one. That’s no fun.”

“The restaurant must be at the bottom of the box or something. Either that or we’re looking for the same thing.”

“Well, in a way we are, aren’t we?” Gill offered.

“Really?”

She met his eyes across the table. How on earth could one set of eyes have so many different hues? she asked herself, her breath catching. In the restaurant lighting, the gold and green combined to create a new shade of amber. She swore they flickered, too, like a candle.

“Isn’t it obvious? We both want a successful party.”

“Right. The party.”

“Of course. If it’s a hit, we both get what we want.”

“I hope you’re right.”

Sitting back in his seat, he’d lowered his gaze. No longer able to see their color, Gill got a strange feeling the dancing amber in his eyes had disappeared. She didn’t know why, but the idea bothered her.

Shaking off the notion, she raised her half-finished teacup. “Why don’t we seal our good fortune with a toast? To a successful event.”

“And—” he tapped his cup to hers “—to getting what we’re looking for.”