Annette Blair (29 page)

“I don’t believe you.”

“Tonya follows teams and picks out players every season. Once it was me, yesterday it was a New England tight
end, today it’s Santiago the Stealer. She was trying to make Tiago jealous by bidding on me.”

“Well, I’m glad she didn’t win you. I’d like to think she wouldn’t have had quite the same date.”

Jason felt the insult like a slap. “I told you, this wasn’t part of it. The auction date ended when I climbed on the quilts.”

“Right. Sorry.” Kira’s stomach growled, a physical reminder of the real world beyond the rabbit hole. “Too bad it’s over,” she said, but she raised a victorious fistful of silk turquoise with a grin. “Can’t wear these home.”

Jason pulled her down beside him, loathe to let the day go, to let her go. He grappled her for her underwear. “I want a souvenir,” he said, “and turquoise is my favorite color.”

“What do you want with them, you kinky man?”

He kissed her nose. “I figured I’d frame them.”

“For our rabbit-hole retreat in the attic, you mean?”

“Ours? I thought that was
your
trysting place,” he said, putting a bit of distance between them.

“Mine or yours, doesn’t matter,” she said, “we can both have one.”

“Good. You scared me.”

“Don’t worry, Goddard, your commitment phobia is safe with me,” Kira said. “I’ll keep it on the altar of sanity where I keep my own. Help me fold these quilts and put them away.”

Kira didn’t seem to have any difficulty leaving their amazing day behind, unlike him, which bothered Jason.

She shoved her underwear in her pocket for the elevator ride downstairs, and he talked her into joining him in his shower, because it was bigger.

That she fell for his shoddy reasoning, or agreed despite that, meant she was up for a bit more playtime, which was good, and bad. Jason wished he could get his hands on a patch to slap on his arm, to help him kick his addiction to her. A “Kira” patch.

An hour later he was elated, sated, and drying her off, because she could barely stand. “I’m going to remember this,” he said, “every time I step into a locker room shower from now on, no matter what state or country I’m in.”

Jason’s words knocked Kira from her sensual haze. She grabbed her clothes and stepped around him. “You can leave me the hell out of your locker-room fantasies, Ice Boy.”

“Wait.” Jason followed her, buff and sated, and half of her wanted to jump him again. “Where are you going?” he asked.

“I’m going to bed,” she said. “I’m beat.”

“What’s in your bed that I don’t have in mine?”

“My squishy pillow.”

“You’re kidding.”

“There are some things commitment-phobics are allowed to become attached to,” she said. “Pillows are one of them.”

“And turquoise underwear,” Jason said. “I’m pretty attached to that. I’ll probably miss the puck every time I see a flash of turquoise in the stands.”

Kira stopped. “You know, Goddard, I get it. Enough already. You’re not staying. You’re going back to hockey. Fine. Maybe you need to remind yourself, but you don’t need to remind me.”

“Okay,” he said, backing away from her. “Geez, you got grouchy all of a sudden.”

“Yeah, right.” He’d probably screw every “ho” waiting outside the arena after he went back to hockey, but when he was in the shower, he was gonna be thinking of her? “Great. Just freaking great.”

On Sunday Kira was still in a mood to stay away from the clueless jock, so she went shopping. At a local thrift store she found a turquoise scarf and a great pair of turquoise sandals. At the Brick Marketplace she found a sale and bought a clingy knit top, a low-cut silk top, and an awesome suit, all in shades of turquoise.

Not that she wanted Jason to stay at the foundation, she just wanted him to know what he’d be leaving behind when he went back to hockey.

On Monday she wore a black suit softened by a sheer turquoise top, her turquoise bra like an enticing shadow beneath, with a flowered scarf, largely turquoise. Gram saw her as she was leaving for work and offered her a pair of exquisite butterfly earrings, with turquoise, white, yellow, and pink stones that brought the outfit’s colors together.

“Please tell me these are fake,” Kira said clipping them on her ears and checking them in Bessie’s mirror.

“Of course they are, dear,” Gram said.

Kira kissed her cheek. “You’re a terrible liar, Bessie Hazard,” she said, and Bessie laughed. But Kira was guessing that aquamarines and topaz couldn’t be too dangerous to borrow.

Jason froze when he saw her. “Glad to see you’re coming out of your cocoon, Fitz,” he said. “Great turquoise scarf.”

Shut up, Ice Boy,
she thought,
or I’ll gag you with it.

Working side by side, yet remaining emotionally and physically apart, they chose the Castleton Court ballroom for the Open Arms event, partly for its homey painted-leather wallcovering, and partly because its huge corner windows begged for a twenty-foot Christmas tree.

More than a hundred sets of potential parents had registered to attend, and calls were still coming in.

Sister Margaret dutifully explained to the boys not to expect miracles. None of them would go home with parents
this
Christmas. But Kira sensed anticipation, nevertheless.

They hung family-inspired Christmas decorations: a family watching a train beneath a Christmas tree, children in their beds with images of sugarplums, a family of carolers.

The boys set up the ballroom with chairs and a stage of risers with curtained space, behind and beside it, for props and dressing rooms. Sister Margaret held dress rehearsal there to get the boys acclimated. “I want them to see those
empty chairs,” she told Kira and Jason, “and realize that people who
want
children will be watching, to give them the courage to perform.”

“Or scare them to death,” Kira said. “The poor things.”

“Speaking of poor things,” Sister said to her, “they chose you, by popular vote, to play Mary in the Nativity scene. Will you?”

“Please,” Travis said, tugging Kira’s hand and employing the “look” he’d used when he’d asked her to adopt him.

“Please?” Zane said, his anxious gaze guileless and hopeful.

“Yeesh, talk about pressure,” Kira said. “Will I have to memorize lines?”

“Nope,” Travis said. “You just gotta act like a mother and hold a baby.” He made a rocking motion with his arms to show her. “You know, the way you hold Zane at hockey practice.”

“What is he, the director?” Jason whispered in Kira’s ear.

She elbowed him. “I’ll do it,” Kira said, ignoring Jason’s chuckled, “Pushover.”

“And you’ll be Joseph,” Travis told Jason.

Jason’s smile vanished. “Do I have a choice?” he asked. “
Kira
had a choice.”

“Nope,” Travis said. “Joseph watches over the baby like you watch over us at hockey. You’re a natural,” the kid said, stealing Jason’s favorite affirmation.

Kira knocked Jason with her shoulder. “Pushover.”

“Thank you, Sister,” Jason said. “Do you give these kids lessons in salesmanship, or what?”

“Travis comes by it naturally,” Sister said, watching him charm his friends. “He might make a success of sales someday, like cars . . . or swampland in Florida.” The nun shrugged. “I’m guessing it could go either way.”

Kira and Jason both chuckled, because they knew she was right.

“I guess we have to wear costumes,” Kira said.

“Of course,” Sister said. “Right this way.”

Jason turned toward the exit with longing, but Kira tugged on his arm and dragged him backstage.

Her costume was turquoise, of all things, and when Sister left, Kira whispered to Jason that she knew exactly what to wear beneath it.

Jason was too busy scowling to take the bait. “Yeah, well, I’m wearing a burgundy freaking dress and I don’t give a rat’s tail what I wear under it.”

“Nothing,”
Kira whispered, “would be a turn-on.”

Jason raised his head, and Kira was pretty sure that his radar was working again.

In the dining room that night, Jason ranted about his veil, “or whatever the hell they call that
thing
I have to wear on my head,” going on about his dress, his itchy beard, entertaining Kira and his grandmother through dinner.

“Stop laughing,” Jason said to Kira. “It’s not funny.
You
have to act like a virgin!”

Kira raised her chin. “Do you have reason to believe it’ll be an act?”

Gram’s face was as red as her grandson’s.

THE
day of the event arrived in a flurry of stage fright, bad temper, and negative behavior . . . and the boys weren’t much better. As far as they were concerned, the best part was that Sister had allowed the “angels” among them to choose the kind they wanted to be.

The Angel of Christmas Present was a maroon dinosaur named Larry.

Brad Davis, the bully Jason made captain of the hockey team, played Scrooge, an investment banker.

“You’re cheap, Scrooge,” Larry said. “You never give money to St. Anthony’s at Christmas!” he shouted, and fell off the stage.

Scrooge helped the beached dinosaur get up.

Larry readjusted his head, and cleared his throat. “You have money, but nobody to love, Scrooge. Wouldn’t you
like to adopt a little boy and have Christmas every day?”

The curtain closed for a scene change.

The Angel of Christmas Future, a caped wizard in borrowed eyeglasses, blindly flattened Scrooge’s gravestone and said his piece facing the donkey. “Scrooge, if you don’t mend your ways, and find generosity and love, you’ll die alone, and little boys like Tiny Tim will have a sad future.”

Tiny Tim, played by Zane, pulled a red wagon piled with empty soda cans across the stage.

The curtains closed for a longer scene change.

Travis, the hockey-playing Angel of Christmas Past, brought Scrooge far back in time, to the Nativity. “This is a real family,” Travis said. “See Mary trying to shush her crying baby, and Joseph making it shut up for her.”

Okay, Kira thought, so Travis ad-libbed a little, but the screaming baby sort of made it necessary, until Jason took it away from her and patted it against his shoulder.

“See Joseph caring for a boy not his own,” Travis said, “a boy who’ll always try to be good, and make his new parents proud.”

“I have to pee,” said a four-year-old sheep, so Kira took him, while everyone waited for the play to continue.

Jason gave Kira a thumbs-up when she returned, and she gave him one right back. He’d put their borrowed baby to sleep.

To end the performance, a heavenly host of angels filed onto the stage to stand on both sides of the stable: Robots, cowboys, motorcycle and linebacker angels, and one yellow bear angel with a jar of honey in his backpack, sang two altered, off-key verses of “All I Want for Christmas Is a Fa-mi-ly.”

When they finished singing, the children bowed to a standing ovation, cheers, and a couple of whistles.

Afterward, the boys made a beeline for the Christmas tree, where wrapped presents from Gram waited for each of them.

Potential parents watched the boys, read the program with pictures and bios, and gravitated toward the back to
speak with Sister Margaret. Others went right for the boys. One couple left after learning that baby Jesus was not up for adoption.

Travis entertained several potentials, while Zane leaned on Melody’s leg and watched his twin. “He won’t go without me,” Zane said. “He’ll take me, soon as he finds the right ones.”

“I’m glad we know the real Travis,” Jason said. “Why does he think he has to act like Mister Cool when he’s such a great kid?”

“He’s scared,” Kira said. “Can’t you tell?”

“Scared but brave,” Zane said. “Braver than me, but it’s okay; we’re
going
together.”

When Travis and Zane
were
adopted, which seemed wonderfully possible, Kira realized she’d lose something vital in her life.

Jason questioned her tears with a look.

“Hope,” she said on a shrug. “It’s all around us.”

And he nodded, looking like she felt . . . lost.

Donations followed the event, but it was the adoption applications that proved their success. Sister Margaret, however, would not give false hope, until all applicants had been screened.

Jason’s Wednesday and Friday afternoon hockey practices had dwindled to fourteen regulars, boys who were willing to work hard at learning to play the game, Travis among them.

It snowed the Friday following the Open Arms event, and Zane came as usual, but he seemed sad and wistful. “Jason,” Kira called, hoping Zane’s idol could cheer him.

“Hey, Zane,” Jason said, high-fiving him. “Your brother’s skating great, isn’t he?”

“Does it feel like flying?” Zane asked.

A simple question, but Melody’s heart tripped, and Jason cleared his throat and sat beside them. “It does, Zane, until you fall and smack your face on the ice.”

Zane giggled.

“Wait here for a minute,” Jason said. “I’ll be right back.”

It took Jason ten minutes to return, but when he did, Kira and Zane both straightened, because he skated toward them. “Come here,” he said, “both of you.”

When Kira and Zane got to the edge of the ice, Jason turned his back on them. “Kira, put Zane on my shoulders.”

“No! You’re going to ruin your knee. Are you sure you can do this?”

“You know I’ve been practicing. The knee’s much better. It really is. My doctor and my physical therapist agree. Wanna go for a skate around the rink, Zane?”

“Yes!”

“A short spin,” Jason cautioned the boy, “ ’cause Kira’s right; I don’t know how much my knee can take.”

“Okay, Jason.”

Kira sat Zane on Jason’s lowered shoulders, cringing when Jason rose, but his knee seemed fine.

He grasped Zane’s ankles. “Now, Zane, lean forward so your chin’s on my head, and grab my vest by the collar.”

Zane did everything Jason told him.

Standing next to them, Kira could feel the excitement radiating off both of them, Jason as wired as the boy.

Kira laughed when Jason kicked off, and Zane screamed, as if he were flying, then she sobbed before she could stop herself. Travis skated over and took her hand. His grin must have tasted like salt, Kira thought, because his eyes were as full as hers.