The Best Christmas Ever (9 page)

Sarah laughed and applied the lipstick. “Oh, that’s perfect!”

Mickie looked around and grinned. “I like it. But Daddy will tell me I shouldn’t wear makeup.”

“I bet he doesn’t mind this.” In actuality, Sarah
couldn’t see Mickie’s powder, and it looked as though she’d licked her lips.

Mickie grinned. “I can’t wait to show Daddy when he gets home.”

When he gets home? Oh, dear! Sarah glanced at her watch. She’d been up here an hour and a half.

Mickie sniffed. “What’s that?”

Sarah smelled it at the same time. “The cake!”

She’d completely forgotten about the cake. “It’s burning!”

Sarah turned to run downstairs. As if sensing her anxiety, the fire alarms chose that moment to go off. Shrieks filled the air as the smoke began to drift up the stairs. “Mickie, run outside! I’ll go check and make sure nothing is really on fire.”

She took off down the hall, Mickie’s hand in hers. She had really messed things up this time. Justin was due home any minute and his house was likely on fire. Justin would surely dismiss her this time.

J
ustin had just reached for his briefcase, when he heard the smoke alarms. He jerked his head toward the house and his heart exploded in his chest. Forgetting the briefcase, he took off across the garage and burst in through the kitchen door, right into swirling smoke.

He immediately realized it was coming from the oven. “Sarah!” he called, dashing over and jerking the stove door open, only to fall back coughing as black smoke came pouring out.

After grabbing the oven mittens, he reached in and pulled out a pan. He heard the swinging door that led to the kitchen slam against the wall; heard a gasp and realized Sarah had arrived. “Where’s Mickie?” he demanded, dropping the black thing in the round cake pan into the sink.

“She’s outside. I told her to wait out there until I knew what was going on.”

The blaring alarm was so strident he could hardly
hear her. She was squinting, holding her hands over her ears, coughing each time she tried to take a breath, tears streaming down her face.

He turned on the water, and a loud hissing issued from the lump.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“What?” he asked, then shook his head and pushed past her. He grabbed a kitchen chair, dragged it over beside the wall and stood on it. Once he’d pulled the smoke alarm off the wall, he jerked out the battery.

The cessation of noise was so absolute the silence was almost as painful as the earlier din. Justin returned to the sink and simply stared at her, still gripping the hot pads in his hands.

She couldn’t tell by his face if he was mad or not. “I was making a cake.”

“You burned it.” He said it simply, no inflection in his voice to hint at how angry he might be.

“I can explain,” she began.

He turned from her and shut off the water. Staring at the hard black lump in the pan, he finally said, “That was a cake?”

“Chocolate coconut,” she confirmed.

He pushed open the window over the sink. The garage door was still open and the fan overhead was running.

“Do you want to hear my explanation now?”

“Daddy’s home!” Mickie came running into the house through the garage door.

Before she could say a word, Justin turned to greet his daughter—and froze. “Mickie?” His voice rose on the last syllable.

Mickie threw herself at her daddy’s legs. “Don’t I look beautiful?” she said, and gave him a hug.

He frowned at Sarah. “Yes, sweetheart, you look absolutely fabulous. You’re my special little darling. Now, what are you doing in the house when the fire alarm is going off?”

“You’re home and the alarm stopped.” Mickie smiled up innocently at her daddy. “I wanted to see if Aunt Sarah had messed up the cake again.”

“Thanks a lot, kiddo,” Sarah muttered.

“It looks that way,” Justin added.

Mickie sighed. “I guess after pizza I can have peanut butter and jelly for dessert.”

Justin chuckled. “Sounds fine. You wanna run out back and play on the swing? I’d like to talk to your aunt Sarah while we clean this up. Besides, it’s still sorta smelly in here, isn’t it?” He wrinkled his nose as if smelling something really disgusting.

Mickie giggled. “You’re silly, Daddy.”

She skipped out the door and Sarah watched as she unlatched the gate and went into the backyard.

When she was gone, Justin turned back to Sarah. His smile was gone and his eyes were serious. “Care to explain what happened?”

She grimaced. “I did offer.”

He tossed down the hot mitts and motioned her into the living room. After divesting himself of his suit jacket, he tossed it over the back of the couch and sank down. “Go on.”

“Mickie decided that she wants to be a beautician.”

“And?” he questioned when she hesitated.

“Well, I was making a cake—”

“I gathered that,” he remarked dryly.

“And,” she said, shooting him a dark look, “well, I didn’t realize that Mickie might take it into her head to start practicing her salon skills immediately.”

She settled on a chair, the adrenaline rush leaving her suddenly shaky. “I straightened it up as best I could, but that meant a lot of cutting. I’m sorry if it doesn’t look good. I’m really sorry about the cake, too. I just got so involved with her…” She trailed off and shrugged.

“At least my house is still standing,” he replied.

Sarah sighed and stood. “I have to clean the bathroom upstairs, then I guess I’ll retire to my room for the night. I’m really sorry about all the trouble.”

Justin sat up, alarm in his eyes as his gaze connected with hers. “Retire? Have you forgotten your promise to go out with me tonight?”

Sarah paused, but she kept her gaze steady as she replied, “After the mess I’ve made and the mess I’ll have to leave the house in if I attend, you still want me to go?”

He shrugged, then leaned back in the chair looking nonchalant, as if she hadn’t just caused a major disaster. “Accidents happen. And the housework will be here in the morning. Besides, Mickie is excited about the pizza. She doesn’t need the cake tonight.”

Sarah couldn’t believe he still wanted her to go out with him. She smiled with relief. “Give me a few minutes to get ready.”

Justin watched her rush up the stairs and chuckled over her sudden energy. His heart was still beating a staccato over the fire alarm. All he could picture when he’d heard the blaring noise was Mickie and Sarah burning in the house before he could get to them. It
had shaken him and awoken him to just how he felt about Sarah. In the past few weeks she’d become a part of his life, for better and worse.

Despite her forgetting to pick up Mickie and the other minor mishaps, things were working out well. At least, they had been until that fire alarm today. Talk about an eye-opening experience. He realized how much he’d come to enjoy having Sarah around. She was wonderful, fun, not at all the way she had been when he’d known her before Amy’s death. She was also tender and caring, as Mickie’s haircut attested.

Justin had been uncomfortable about taking Mickie to a salon for a haircut. Amy had always talked about letting Mickie’s hair grow until she was old enough to decide for herself how she wanted it styled. She had insisted the child would want curly hair when she was older. Evidently, he hadn’t realized Mickie had wanted to experience what her other friends had—a simple haircut. Or maybe she’d just wanted it to be short like Sarah’s. Who knows? But one thing was certain—when Mickie had messed up her hair, Sarah had taken time with her to fix it in a very pretty style and had somehow made Mickie feel beautiful all at once.

She was good for Mickie. And Mickie was falling under her spell. Several nights he’d heard Sarah reading to Mickie before he got up there to tuck Mickie in. And they’d shared secret smiles occasionally—girl smiles, he called them.

And here he was taking Sarah out on a date tonight.

How had his feelings become involved? He had promised himself not to fall for a woman who couldn’t love him back. He had insisted his odd feelings for Sarah were crazy and nothing could come of it. But
now he discovered he already cared deeply for Sarah. He wasn’t sure if it was love or not, but knew it could easily develop into that. His feelings today were a dead giveaway. When he’d heard the alarm, his first thought after Mickie was what would he do without Sarah?

He sighed.
Is it possible, Father, that she could actually come to love me one day? Could she forget it was her sister I married and her sister I made so unhappy that she ended up dying on a rainy highway? After all, she did come to apologize for trying to take Mickie away and says she shares the blame for the problems with Amy.

Could she eventually come to love him?

There was only one way to find out. Things were going in a much different direction than he’d planned. So he would let things develop, ask Sarah out when he could, let her get to know him and spend time getting to know her. If it was God’s will that she be his soul mate for the rest of his life, God would work things out between them.
I put it in your hands, Heavenly Father.

He glanced at his watch and realized he needed to change if he was going to be downstairs and presentable when Christine got here with her granddaughter and he and Sarah were going to make it to the dinner engagement on time.

Hurrying up the stairs, he wondered just what their dinner was going to be like.

“Your meeting is at Jon Bilovi’s?” Sarah asked, staring in surprise at the really nice restaurant. “I’d
have worn something else if I’d known we were coming here.”

Justin smiled, his gaze taking in her outfit. “Oh, no, Sarah. How could you say that? You’re a knockout in that.”

Sarah’s hand went to the soft bun on her head—a nervous gesture to cover Justin’s comment. What had he meant by that? Did he really like it? Was he just flirting with her? No, he wouldn’t flirt. Of course not. It was just what a man said to a woman, though the look in his eyes made her nervous. He didn’t find her attractive, did he?

He came around and opened her door. “Relax, sweetheart. Not meaning to hurt you,” he said, shutting the door behind her and slipping his hand to the small of her back, “but you were engaged not too long ago. Surely you know how to take a compliment.”

“Of course I do,” she muttered. But André had never looked at her quite the way Justin had. That was what bothered her. Justin hadn’t looked at her like
that
before, either. What was going on here?

“Who are we meeting?” she asked as they walked into the darkened restaurant and Justin escorted her to one of the back rooms.

“Phillip, my assistant, and his fiancée, Julie. He’s tall, blond and has a megawatt smile. You’ll like him. He’s easy to get along with—as long as he’s not involved in a business deal. And one of the lawyers we’ve just taken on to help with different things that need doing will be there. He’ll also act as an adviser about certain laws in this state. His name is Drydan Watson and his wife, Barbara, should be with him.”

Sarah stiffened, but Justin didn’t notice, as he had
removed his hand from her back and was stretching it out toward the very man who had caused Sarah’s reaction.

Drydan Watson, her ex-boss and father of her ex-fiancé, sat at the table in the private dining room they’d just entered.

Sarah felt nauseous, thought about running away, then firmed her spine.
Father, please help me get through this,
she prayed. Pasting a smile on her face, she continued forward.

She noted the welcoming smiles on Phillip’s and Julie’s faces. Not so Drydan or his wife, Barbara, who turned her head to study a picture.

“And this is Sarah Connelly,” Justin was saying as he pulled out the chair directly across from Drydan, “my sister-in-law.”

Julie smiled and Phillip stood and shook her hand. Turning her smile upon Drydan, she said, “We’ve met,” and seated herself.

An odd look flashed in Justin’s eyes, then was gone as he took his seat at the head of the table.

“So, Drydan,” Justin said, leaning forward and picking up his menu, “tell me what you think of the latest merger prospect of East Texas Software.”

Drydan launched into his opinion and Sarah relaxed. As long as Justin kept him speaking, she could handle the situation. Barbara refused to look at her and Julie was making small talk.

Feeling a gaze on her, she glanced up to find Drydan staring right at her as Phillip snagged Justin’s attention. She was shocked at the anger in his eyes.

Sarah realized Drydan was doing his best to make her uncomfortable.

And he was succeeding. Should she get up and leave? But that would hurt Justin. Perhaps just a short trip to the bathroom. But then Drydan might think her a coward.

With a sigh of resignation, she realized she would just have to put up with him. She didn’t want to be here, though. After all, he was the one who had always thought her beneath his family. He and Barbara, that is, she added as she saw the way Barbara had drawn Julie’s attention away from her.

The food came shortly, with conversation flowing easily around her. Justin had engaged her a few times in conversation, but after her monosyllabic answers, he stopped trying. She did make an effort to smile at him and reassure him she wasn’t angry. She could feel the tension coming off him in waves. What could she say to Justin in front of these people?

She choked down every bite of food into a stomach that felt as though it was tied up in knots, and barely finished a third of her meal.

When Justin pushed back his chair, she knew she couldn’t say polite goodbyes to these people. Her pain was too fresh. Besides, if she uttered one word to Drydan, she was certain he would reply something to embarrass her. He hadn’t stopped shooting her looks all night.

“Excuse me, Justin,” she said as he pulled her chair out. “I’ll meet you out front.”

Again he gave her that odd, piercing stare, then he nodded.

She escaped to the bathroom. As soon as the door was closed, she let her shoulders drop. André’s parents. What had they thought of her being there with
Justin tonight? Why would Justin associate with someone like them?

Of course, Drydan was a pretty good lawyer; he even went to church. But he certainly didn’t practice what was preached. She’d always thought him a little intimidating. His wife was condescending while acting helpful. But André hadn’t been like them. At least, she’d thought that. It was awful to find out she and Drydan were both working for the same man.

A shudder rippled through her.

At least she wouldn’t have to see much of him, unless Justin invited him over for dinner.

After washing her hands, she quickly dried them, checked her hair and lipstick, then finally headed out the door. Justin would be waiting, and surely Drydan and his wife would be gone by now.

Drydan stood by the phones, talking into one, but the minute he saw her, he hung up.

“It sure didn’t take you long, did it?”

Sarah braced herself. “I’m sorry you’re bitter about my breakup with your son, but I have nothing to say, Mr. Watson,” she said, trying to get around him. His large frame blocked her exit.

“I told André I had you pegged from the beginning. Jumping from one man to another, just as I said—another fortune hunter.”