Jesse's Christmas (4 page)

Maybe he would just go up and make sure his mom was okay for the night. Maybe beg some dessert. Then he could possibly get to see Jesse up closer.

Hmmm. Jesse-from-the-city-with-the-camera was a very interesting addition to the town at this time of year. Very interesting.

* * * * *

Jesse was one yawn away from sleep. A dinner of lamb cutlets in the small hotel dining room had been accompanied by a frankly awesome potato/cream combo. Added to that had been more than a few glasses of a wicked dry white wine. Sated and sleepy, he was now leaning back on the wide comfy sofa in front of the open fire and feeling relaxed. He hadn’t expected food that good in a small hotel on a mountain.

Diana came into the lounge area with a tray and placed it on the table in front of him. There was coffee and cake, and she hovered for a second.

“Is it okay if I sit here for a while?”

Jesse blinked up at her. “Of course,” he said immediately.

She yawned behind her hand. “Sorry,” she apologized. “Early starts here, and by eight I want to be in bed.”

Jesse couldn’t remember the last time he was really tired and had craved his bed, aside from last night. If anything he deliberately stayed up late and lay in the next morning just because he could. He helped himself to coffee and wriggled back into the corner of the sofa, pulling his legs up under him. Diana was obviously waiting for him to say something. When had his social skills taken such a nosedive?

She seemed to see his discomfort and immediately launched into a question session about why he was there.

How she managed it he didn’t know, but by the third cup of coffee, he was spilling nearly his whole life story, minus two things—the big gay love affair that had disintegrated and destroyed him and the fact he had no money. Those were things best left alone. What he did tell her was the full brief of why he was in a town labeled as the Best Christmas Small Town for 2009 (with a population under 1200).

“People love Christmas,” he explained when she asked why someone would pay for photos on a website like he had described.

“People? You make it sound like you’re not one of those who enjoy Christmas,” she commented perceptively.

“Christmas was always a big thing in my family,” he began. He almost veered into the entire “Jonah, the bastard who broke his heart at Christmas” story. But he didn’t. Instead, he summed up his opinion as succinctly as he could. “But I’m not a kid anymore, and I can take it or leave it,” he replied with a shrug. She didn’t question what he said, so he didn’t need to focus on giving reasons. He hated justifying himself on the matter of the yuletide. Not everyone had to like the season.
Jeez.
It wasn’t mandatory to enjoy freaking Christmas.

A rush of cold air around his ears made him realize a door had opened to the outside, and he looked up, startled when the guy from this morning, Diana’s son, Gabriel blue-eyes McClurey, stood in the lounge with them

“Wanted to check the snow and was hoping I could beg some coffee and cake,” he said by way of explanation before taking position on the opposite end of the sofa. He was wearing a jacket over a sweater that he didn’t take off even with the fire, but Jesse at least got a better look at tall, dark, and sinfully handsome.

“Help yourself,” Diana said. To Jesse, she said, “This is my son, Gabriel.”

“We met this morning,” Jesse said.

“Oh yes, I forgot,” Diana said. From her expression, she hadn’t forgotten at all but was playing the innocence card.

“I was moving his snow,” Gabriel commented. He smiled as he said it and stared directly at Jesse. If anything, Jesse didn’t know where to look. He couldn’t stare into the sapphire eyes for fear of never being able to look away, so instead he focused in on Gabriel’s lips that quirked in a smile. His lips were only slightly less incendiary than his freaking eyes.

“Sorry,” Jesse apologized, “I’m not a morning person.”

“It’s fine, I wasn’t offended. Did you try the shed shot I mentioned?”

Jesse sat upright a little. Now, his photography he could talk about at length with anyone. “I did, and thank you. I went inside and looked back out and the shot was lovely. All crisp frosty windows and the smooth white behind. There was even a spider’s web that was silvery with frost. I call it Waiting.”

Gabriel tilted his head. “Waiting for what?”

Jesse didn’t get asked the whys of his photos very often. People just took the title and ran with it, probably most of the time pretending they actually got what the photo meant. As such it felt odd for him to have to consider an answer.

“The wood,” he began. “All piled up ready to be lit in the open fire and the reason for the open fire beyond. It’s been waiting since you chopped it.”

Jesse assumed Gabriel chopped wood and pushed aside the sudden image he had in his head of Gabriel in a plaid shirt open to the waist chopping wood in the forest behind the hotel.

“That is a very cool idea,” Gabriel finally said.

“I just need to find a photo for tomorrow and the next day and every day up until Christmas Day.” He felt the abrupt weight of responsibility on his shoulders, and the warmth of the wine and the fire and looking into Gabriel’s eyes all fell to the usual panic that curled inside him.

His cell vibrated in his pocket, and he thanked the heavens that someone outside of this room needed him. He pulled out the cell and didn’t even look at who was calling. It could be a wrong number for all he cared as long as it meant he could leave and get back to his room.

 “Hello?” he asked.

“Jesse, hey, it’s Em.”

“Em, hold on.” To Diana and Gabriel he simply said, “Sorry, I have to take this. My agent. Diana, thank you for a wonderful dinner. I’ll see you in the morning.” Then he nodded at Gabriel. “Night,” he added.

“Night, Jesse.”

Just the man’s low, rumbling voice was enough to have Jesse squirming inside. With a quick smile, he left the room and took the stairs two at a time until he reached the safety of his room with the door shut and locked behind him.

Chapter 4

“Did you get anything on film yet?” Emma asked as soon as Jesse came back on the phone.

“Post One.” Thank God he had that much to say to his agent.

“Just one!” No question there; she sounded horrified. Jeez, he hadn’t expected that. What did she want from him? Blood?

“I’ve been here a day. There may be more from the files when I look closer. Fuck, it’s a start,” Jesse said, defending himself.

Emma laughed low in her throat, more of a chuckle than a full-out laugh. “I’m joking. It’s good to see you working on this.”

“Yeah, it’s going well so far. Snow is easy.” He paused. As a photographer, and a skilled one at that, he wasn’t lying about that. Snow
was
easy, but Gabriel’s intervention had made it easier. With the combination of the shed, the light, and the snow, he had the perfect centerpiece for the start of the story. But…snow would form only the beginning of it all. He had the whole of freaking Christmas to capture.

“What about the other twenty-four days?” she asked.

“I have some ideas.” Even though he left the topic open, Emma didn’t press for details. Still, there were sufficient ideas for the website. Not earth-shattering, prize-winning ideas, but enough that he was happy to share, and there would be no one else he could share with.

“I’m thinking the kids at the local school and the nativity stuff. Maybe get a pose of them for a dress rehearsal or something? And there’s the tree trimming and some candle making thing they do here.” He tossed that in, suddenly remembering a detailed flyer he’d seen on the table in the hallway.

“Sounds good.” Emma had this quiet way of encouraging him that made Jesse want to do better.

“Yeah, well, I’m working on it.”

“What you doing now?”

“So tired.”

“It’s nine pm,” She sounded amazed.

He defended himself immediately. “I was up early.”
Getting photos of virgin snow and cute tight asses and staring into blue eyes.

“Night,” she said quietly. “Sleep well.”

Jesse climbed into bed and lay for the longest time in the dark under the quilts. He was torn between feelings of horniness and a desperate need to sleep. In the end he couldn’t gather the energy to get himself off and sleep won.

When he woke he felt more rested than he had for a long time, and he crossed to the window, wondering if he would see Gabriel down below shoveling any new snow. He couldn’t see him, but the banks to either side of the path were a little taller and it was obvious snow had fallen overnight.

He went downstairs and ate breakfast, then soaked in the bath way past the time he should have gotten out, topping up with the hot water as often as he could justify. His skin became wrinkled, but he had spent time thinking about himself and where he was going with this project.

So he didn’t like Christmas anymore or snow or indeed anything vaguely seasonal in December. That shouldn’t matter. He needed to man up and find the photos they needed even if each one didn’t exactly hold one hundred percent of his heart. At least he would have made an effort that was frankly way better than many other photographers. The place to start would be the school. Visitors to the blog loved photos of kids and small towns.

Getting a number from Mrs McClurey for the local school had been easy, and making an appointment to see the principal later that day was trouble-free. Unfortunately, walking down the hill to the small school had proved to be a bit more problematic. The clouds dumped more snow, and while not strong enough to be classified as a blizzard, it had been sufficient for dampness to sneak into his boots and under his hood. Jesse had been so bitterly icy cold he wanted back in his bath.

When he finally made it to Eden Vale Elementary, he saw it was as small as it had appeared from his vantage point at the hotel. A simple, modern-looking, two-story brick building, it stood squat and secure in a white-blanketed yard. To kill time, he stopped and took a couple of shots of playground equipment covered with drifts of snow. They were a bit repetitive of other photos he had seen, but the tracings of frost that encircled the metal poles were stunning against their bright red. Stamping the snow from his feet, he entered the school and waited in the office. Finally, at two, an assistant showed him in to see the principal.

The principal, Austin Francis, was a man in his fifties with a full gray beard and an expression filled with smiles. They discussed, amongst other things, the weather, small towns, coffee, chocolate, Mariah Carey, and the legalities of photographing children.

“You’ll need to think about parental release forms,” Jesse pointed out in between bouts of Mr Francis talking with “teachery” enthusiasm about which child would pose with whom and in what Christmas-themed costume they’d be wearing for their school play, which was about aliens and toys. Apparently.

“We can have something in place for after the weekend. Will it be enough time?”

“More than. I can book you in for next Wednesday.” Book the school in? Jeez, the way he’d just said that made it sound like he, Jesse Connor, was actually busy.

“The town is used to publicity ever since the Best Christmas Town award. I don’t foresee any problems with the parents. It’s not the first time the kids have been involved in some kind of Christmas marketing or another.”

After exchanging brief goodbyes, Jesse was back out in the cold. He trudged back up the hill, sliding back one step for every two he took forward. He heard the school bell behind him signal the end of the day and had the gut feeling the kids would be all hyper-happy for the extra snowfall and would be overtaking him on the hill.

The Jeep stopping next to him scared the ever-living daylights out of him, and he stumbled to a stop. The window wound down, and Jesse, for the third time, was face to face with Gabriel McClurey and his azure-sky-meets-the-calm-sea eyes.

“You want to get in?” Gabriel asked. Jesse hesitated only because he was busy cataloguing the new skin revealed to him because Gabriel wasn’t wearing a coat. Glimpses of a tanned throat and the suggestion of broad shoulders in a stretched cable-knit sweater was a sight for sore eyes.

“Huh?” he finally managed. He was actually kind of proud of himself for making even a single coherent sound.

“I’ll get you there,” Gabriel said. His mouth moved in all sorts of interesting ways, and Jesse was more concerned with watching the movement of his lips than listening to the actual words.

“There?”

“Up the hill. Get in,” Gabriel said patiently. He gestured with his thumb out of the window. “Snow tires on. I’ll take you to the hotel.”

“Oh, thank you.” He didn’t want to come across looking any more of an idiot than he already had, and with a smile of thanks, he opened the door. He took a step to get in the car, slid on the snowy curbside, and promptly fell on his ass on the cold, hard, and wet ground. Winded, he was at first unable to move. He could do nothing except listen to the sounds of Gabriel opening his car door to investigate.

“Hey, Jesse,” Gabriel said, “you okay?”

Jesse looked up into Gabriel’s eyes, but he didn’t see concern. What he could see caused him to feel instantly embarrassed. Seemed to him Gabriel was holding back laughter. And jeez, damn his photographer eyes, but the laughter twitching at Gabriel’s eyes would make one hell of gorgeous photo. Pushing aside a visceral need to capture the restrained mirth in Gabriel and mustering as much dignity as he could, Jesse scrambled to stand. He refused Gabriel’s help, using the open car door to help instead.

“I’m fine,” he said, caught between being angry at the contained laughter and wanting to laugh himself. Even he could admit that seeing someone fall on his ass in the snow was kind of funny. Pushing his way past an insistent nagging pain in his left butt cheek, he clambered into the car. Gabriel shut the door for him, and suddenly the laughter bubbled from Gabriel’s mouth. Jesse huffed and then strapped himself in. They didn’t talk on the way up the hill. Jesse didn’t want to call it sulking, but it probably was more than a little bit of sulk and one hell of a load of pure embarrassment. Thankfully the journey wasn’t long, and Gabriel was concentrating on the road and on controlling the car. Within minutes, they were at the top of the hill and parked outside the hotel.