Blue Christmas (The Moody Blue Trilogy | Book One) (14 page)

They were settling into the loft when the doorbell rang. Just returning
from the restroom, Hannah was closest to the front stairway. “Jason, do you
want me to get it?”

“That’d be great. It’s probably Gevin and Rissa.”

As she skipped lightly down the steps, her cell phone vibrated in her
jeans’ pocket just as someone hammered the doorbell making it ring incessantly.
She dug the phone out of her pocket, noticed it was a text message from Kylie.
She started to read the message when she heard someone yelling, “Open up! We’re
freezing out here!”

“Come on in, I’m comeeeeeen—” Hannah flew off a step, her phone
catapulting out of her hand as she bounced off every step on her rear end. It
didn’t hurt, but she felt like an idiot. When she finally came to a stop at the
base of the stairs, she was too stunned to move. The front door opened.

Suddenly, imagining what she must look like, she burst into laughter.
Hannah looked up through her tears expecting to find Gevin and Marissa.

“HAPPY NEW Y—whoa! Who the heck are you and
what
are you doing?”

Jackson Greer stopped dead in his tracks at the sight of her. Hannah’s
eyes flew wide open as she tried to catch her breath to stop laughing. Seeing
his face for the first time—here like this—mortified her, making her laugh even
harder.

“Hannah! Are you okay?” Jason’s voice floated down from the top of the
stairs. She looked sheepishly back at Jackson. One of his eyebrows was raised.
He looked like he’d seen a two-headed freak at the circus.

But he’s so much more handsome than any of those pictures I had
plastered on my walls back home! I had no idea he was so tall. Course, anyone’s
tall from down here.

She tried to regain her composure. “Nice to meet you, Jackson. I’m—” She
lost it again, the sheer embarrassment making the laughter wheeze out of her.
The harder she tried to stop, the harder she laughed. Her stomach began to
ache.

She felt Jason’s hands
under her arms attempting to lift her. He must have forgotten how ticklish she
was until she lurched at him, still unable to catch her breath. Her sudden
movement caused him to lose his balance so that he fell, landing right on top
of her. He rolled back beside her, losing control as well. Finally, he caught
his breath and looked up at Jackson.  “Hey Jax, how’s it goin’?”

A giggling face appeared peeking out from behind Jackson, her long
brunette hair swinging as her head tipped sideways to see what was going on.

“Alli!” Jason shouted, “Come on in! I want you to meet Hannah!”

Another round of laughter made it impossible for him or Hannah to get up.
She couldn’t even see Jackson much less Alli for the tears blurring her eyes.

Alli tucked her arm under Jackson’s, her smile broad. “Nice to meet you,
Hannah. Wow, you make a great first impression.”

“Yeah—unforgettable, isn’t she?” Jason cried, finally catching his breath.

Hannah completely forgot about her cell phone and the message she never
read from Kylie.

Chapter 10

G
evin and Marissa arrived moments later, joining
the fiasco in the entryway. After massive hugs and high-fives, they all drifted
back upstairs to the loft. Hannah couldn’t believe the noise level coming from
so few people. Then again, these guys were used to screaming fans and music at
decibels beyond the endurance of the average Joe. Or Jane.

The pizza delivery
guy unloaded an armload of pepperoni, supreme, and veggie pizzas which quickly
disappeared.

“Tracey, what I
don’t understand is how these guys stay in shape,” Hannah mused, wiping her
mouth. “They’re stuffing their faces every time I turn around. Jason’s been
eating since the minute we met—his mom’s home cooking, her turkey dinner on
Christmas day, Patty’s calzones, ice cream—”

“Hey!” Jason
jabbed her in the ribs. He stood up to strut like a WWF wrestler. “Do you see
one ounce of fat on this body? Huh? I ask you—is this not a lean, mean fighting
machine?” He continued posturing, striking all the signature body-builder poses.

“Jason, sit down.
I’m still eatin’ here. Do you mind?” Rissa shouted over the music.

And so it began.
Jason stripped off his shirt and grunted like a linebacker, hopping onto the wide
hearth. JT and Jackson followed suit, ripping off their shirts and throwing
them like prizes to the girls who shouted fake groans in response, hiding their
eyes from the onslaught of bare-chested men.

In one united
effort, Alli, Hannah, and Tracey threw the shirts back at them with a barrage
of cat calls.

“Put ’em back on!”

“I’m still
digesting here! Do you mind?”

“Give us a break!”

Behind the pretense of complaints, Hannah couldn’t help peeking at the
idols of her adolescent years, admiring their muscles and biceps.
Don’t know
how they do it, but these guys obviously work out. A lot.
Realizing she was
holding her breath, Hannah forced her eyes away from Jason’s six-pack, then
quickly looked back, trying hard not to stare.

And for the first time, she noticed the tiny line down the center of Jason’s
chest. A slender, pale scar, the remnant from surgery years ago to repair a hole
in his heart. How well she remembered that scary event. Every
Blue
fan
around the world held a collective breath as they waited for news from his team
of surgeons. Had he made it through the surgery? Would he be all right again?
Could he still keep up with the stress and rigors of the crazy lifestyle he
led? She brushed off the memory, interrupted by Alli’s laughter.

“How’s a girl
supposed to eat with all this going on?”

Alli’s sarcastic remark
brought Jackson off the hearth. He plopped himself on her lap, the image of wounded
feelings.

“You’re mocking
me, Alli? Making fun of
me
? Your one and only? I—I think I might
just—yes, yes. Here come the tears. Here they come. I’m crying here! You made
me
cr
y!” His sniffs and snorts didn’t fool any of them.

Jason stepped down
slowly, acting indifferent. “That’s okay. I’m man enough. I can take it.”

“Poor baby,”
Hannah cooed. “Did we hurt your little feelers? Come on, sit down and I’ll make
it all better.” She patted the seat beside her. Jason wriggled his eyebrows at
the others and squeezed in next to her in the Lazy Boy. “Yo, Jason—a little
snug for both of us here. Do you mind?”

He grabbed her,
plopping her on his lap despite her protests. “There. Now we’re all better.”

Gevin and Marissa
shook their heads at all the antics around them. The two were stretched out on
the floor, propped up on their elbows still eating. “What am I gonna do with
these guys?” Gevin asked her as if overwrought. “I try and I try to teach these
boys. Tell them it’s time to grow up. And do you see what I get? It’s nothing
but work, work, work for me. Never a moment’s rest.”

Marissa wrapped
her arm across his shoulders. “I know, honey, I know. And a fine job you do,
baby. But look what you’ve got to work with? There’s only so much you can do.”

JT pulled his
shirt back on. “Jax, I don’t know about you but I’m still in shock about these
two.” He tossed a nod toward Gevin and Marissa.

Jackson, still
sitting shirtless on Alli’s lap, shook his head. “I know, man. All those months
on the road, acting like such ‘professional acquaintances.’
Geez,
guys—why all the secrecy? What’s up with all the subterfuge?”

Gevin picked a
piece of pepperoni and popped it in his mouth. “Jackson, where does it say we
have to tell anybody anything, man? We just kinda liked the privacy, y’know?
Right, Rissa?”

“Right, baby,” she
said kissing his greasy lips. “Guys, here’s the deal. We didn’t want all the
hassle and hype and publicity until we knew we were really sure about it. You
know how it is out there. We just decided to sit on it until we were ready to take
the plunge. And when Gevin proposed—”

“—and she said
yes—”

“Well, we decided
it was time to move on to the next step. And here we are.” She beamed, tapping
her head against his.

JT sat on the
floor leaning back against Tracey’s legs. “Well, I can only speak for myself,
but I couldn’t be happier. Rissa? Gevin? All the best. I love you guys.”

“Me too,” Jackson
said. “Hey wait—does Sergio know? Where is he, anyway? Still in Hawaii?”

Jason rolled his
neck. “Yeah, last I heard from him, he was planning on staying most of this
week. But he’ll be here for the party on New Year’s.”

“I bet he’s having
a
wonderful
time.”

Hannah didn’t miss
the sarcasm in Alli’s comment.

“Don’t you know
it,” Tracey groaned. “I’m just glad he’s there and we’re here.”

“Wait, I don’t get
it,” Hannah said. “What am I missing here? Who
wouldn’t
want to be in Hawaii?”

They all looked
back and forth at each other. Finally, Jason tightened his arms around her
waist. “It’s not Hawaii. It’s Liza. And you’ve not yet had the pleasure of meeting
the
lovely
Liza.”

“Be nice, JMac,” Jackson
warned.

“Well, first of
all, Hannah,” JT began, “Liza is a party girl, okay? Let’s just say the girl never
met a bottle she didn’t love.”

“Whoa, baby,
you’re being way too kind,” Tracey admonished. “Hannah, to put it bluntly, she’s
a lush.”

“A drunk?” Hannah
asked. “So does Sergio drink a lot too?”

“No, that’s just
it,” JT piped in. “Serg rarely takes a drink. So we can’t figure out why he
puts up with her. We’ve all tried to talk to him about her, but he just blows
us off. Which is not like Serg at all.”

“So is she drop-dead
gorgeous? Is that it?”

Alli laughed. “I
guess that depends on your taste. The deal is, we’re really not being mean. We
all love Sergio. But we’re concerned about him because she’s obviously got some
kind of major voodoo spell on him or something.”

“Yeah,
unfortunately she tries to cast that voodoo on the rest of us,” Gevin said.

“What do you mean?

“It means she puts
the moves on all the guys behind Sergio’s back,” Alli answered. “You wouldn’t
believe it.”

“And Sergio
refuses to see it,” Jason continued. “He all but goes postal if you approach
him about it. Won’t talk about it. I’m sure it sounds like we’re exaggerating,
but we’re not. She’s unbelievable, Hannah. You’ve never seen anything like her.
She’s so—”

“Slick. That girl
is downright slick.” Marissa shook her head. “I’ve never seen anyone so blatant
about it, and believe me—I’ve seen it all in this business.”

Hannah took a sip
of her Coke. “So what does Sergio see in her?”

“Beats me,” JT
answered. “I guess she’s attractive enough, but that’s not it. We’re hardly
naive, but let me tell you, she is one hot little number.”

“You mean she’s a
hoochy-mama?” Hannah asked.

“A ‘hoochy-mama’?”
Jason laughed. “A
hoochy mama
? Where do you get this stuff?”

“Hey, it’s not
exactly Greek, Jason,” Alli added. “And it certainly describes Liza.”

Hannah felt
something akin to dread drifting through her. “So how do you handle her when
she’s around?”

“It’s not much
fun,” Jackson said. “We don’t want to be rude for Sergio’s sake.

But man, you sure
have to watch out for her. You can’t give her the time of day or she’ll give
you a little . . . 
hooch
, is it?” he said, looking
at Hannah.

“She gives
you
any
hooch and I’ll wrap your tonsils around your ears, Jackson Greer” Alli wrapped
her slender fingers around his throat.

“Hey! What did I
do? Can I help it if she thinks I’m sexy?”

Tracey and Marissa
pelted him with throw pillows. Alli whacked him over the head with one of them,
then narrowed her eyes. “One word, babe: Tonsils.”

Jason leaned into
Hannah who still sat on his lap. “Jackson and Alli have been together since
they had side-by-side incubators in the hospital nursery.”

“You’re kidding.”

“No, and he never
ever looks at another woman because she’s got this tight leash on him. The kind
of leash you’d see on a rottweiler, y’know?” He continued, his words animated. “So
it doesn’t matter where we are—anywhere in the world—he never even
thinks
of window shopping, if you know what I mean. He’s hopelessly smitten.” Jason
paused, then faux-whispered, “Not to mention
scared
.”

“Very funny,
Jason,” Alli chided. “Thing is, Hannah, I don’t
need
a leash on this
guy. He loves me. Don’tcha, Jax?”

Jackson pretended
to tremble. “Yes, ma’am. I mean, yes, dear. I mean—”

She whacked him
again.

“See what I mean?”
Jason whispered.

“Ah, Hannah, don’t
listen to Jason,” JT said. “We all love Alli. She’s like one of the family.
When we got Jax, we got Alli. Package deal. They go way back and what they’ve
got is the kind of love that lasts a lifetime. And it goes both ways, so don’t
you let Jason mess you up on that. Jackson’s crazy about her.”

Alli smiled. “Well,
thanks, JT.”

Jackson stood up
and pumped his chest out. “Yeah, there’s broken hearts all over the world
because of this woman.”

“Yeah, and they’re
all twelve years old,” Gevin quipped.

The jabs kept
flying. Finally, Jackson asked an innocent question. “So Gevin, when did you
say the wedding is?”

Gevin and Marissa
shifted their eyes to Jason, who in turn looked at Hannah.

“There they go
again!” JT yelled. “What’s up with you all?”

“What do you
mean?” Jackson asked, pulling his Bucs sweatshirt over his head. He wiggled his
back side, motioning for Alli to make room for him in the big recliner. In one
motion, he plopped down and kicked the foot rest, throwing the chair—and
them—back.