Wicked Wonderland (30 page)

As he swallowed the last bite and finished off his beer, a huge yawn took him by surprise. Lord, he was tired. But not too tired to have sex on the brain. He reached across the table and took her hand. “I’m sorry we were interrupted the other night. I can’t get you out of my head. I love having you here, Hallie.”

She squeezed his fingers, her expression guarded.“I missed you while you were gone. Even with all the Denmans around for company.”

“I missed you, too,” he said, pleased that she felt comfortable enough with him to admit that. “How have things been going? It seems like you’re a natural at this B&B thing. The Denmans all look like they’re having a great time.”

“They’re wonderful. I’ve enjoyed getting to know them all.”

“Did you pursue contacting a news station to feature their story?”

She grimaced.“I didn’t even broach the subject with Robbie. After I saw how they are with each other . . . how much they love Timothy . . . how worried they are about his deployment ... I couldn’t bring myself to capitalize on that. It seemed wrong.”

He nodded and then cocked his head. “Have you thought about what you’re going to do when this gig is up?”

The long pause seemed to last forever. His gut clenched when Hallie didn’t answer. He was pushing too hard. He knew it. But the urgency he felt couldn’t be denied. He swallowed and tried to back away from the heavy tone he’d unwittingly introduced. “I’d be more than happy to help you with that decision.” This time the tone of his voice was teasing, but he was dead serious.

She sighed deeply, drawing her hand away. “I have friends in Seattle ... and a nice town house.”

“But no job.”

She gnawed her lower lip. “I’ll need to polish my résumé. But something will turn up.”

“Damn, you’re stubborn.”

She stood up so quickly that her chair almost tipped over. “I can’t think straight in the midst of all this forced Christmas cheer.”

He frowned. “Forced?”

She cleared the table with quick, jerky movements.

She motioned toward the other part of the house. “Don’t you get it? Christmas has a dark side. People spend a lot of time pretending.” She slammed the refrigerator door and knocked a moose magnet to the floor. Her face was flushed, her eyes too bright. “Poor Timothy is being shipped off to Iraq or Afghanistan or who knows where in January, and they’re all in there playing Yahtzee and pretending that everything is just fine.”

Daniel didn’t think of himself as the most perceptive man on the planet, but it was plain to see Hallie was hurting.

He wanted to take her in his arms and comfort her, but her body language said,
Back off
. So he leaned back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest. “I’m sorry your mother is gone, Hallie. And I know I’m a piss-poor substitute, but talk to me ... please. What kinds of little things did the two of you do to make the holidays special?”

She swiped a hand at her damp eyes and sat back down, almost deflating, it seemed. Her bottom lip began to tremble, but she managed to get herself in hand. “We always made candy-cane cookies. And we watched
It’s a Wonderful Life
. Sometimes we took little gifts to the nursing home in our neighborhood.”

He smiled at her. “Sounds pretty special. She must have been very proud of you.”

Color returned to her cheeks.“I was lucky. She was a great mom.”

“You will be, too, someday.” He shocked the hell out of himself.Where had those words come from?

Now he had embarrassed her. She looked down at the table, her silky hair shielding her expression.

He got to his feet and stretched, bidding adios to his dream of hot sex and an early night. “On your feet, Prentiss. We’ve got a houseful of guests who—I’m willing to bet—would love to chow down on Christmas cookies while they watch Jimmy Stewart.”

Her head snapped up, her expression equal parts hope and uncertainty. “Do we have time?”

He opened one of the recipe books and thumbed to the back. “Hazel has a few ‘cheating’ recipes. Stuff she throws together in a hurry. These sugar cookies will do the trick. Add some red and green sprinkles and they’ll think you’re Martha Stewart.”

 

An hour later, Hallie was curled up on the sofa with Daniel’s arm tucked around her shoulders. The scent of freshly baked cookies filled the air, but the only remaining evidence of their existence was a smattering of sprinkles stuck to the empty plates sitting on the coffee table.

On the TV screen, townspeople were dumping baskets of money in George Bailey’s living room to save him from financial ruin.

And all around Hallie and Daniel, the Denmans, Timothy included, were sprawled in chairs and sofas and on the floor, enjoying the evening.

Hallie stared pensively at the television as the classic movie wound to a close. George Bailey was a man who had everything that was important . . . a loving wife, sweet children, a boatload of friends. But when something went terribly wrong in his life, it took a dramatic experience to make him realize that his life was worth something.

Braving winter in Alaska wasn’t quite the same as having an angel send you into an “alternate ending” life experience, but even so, this unexpected trip was a pretty drastic change from Hallie’s normal life. And she had to admit . . . being here, especially with Daniel and the Denmans, was causing her to do some hard thinking.

She closed her eyes and absorbed the moment. None of the people in this room were related to her by blood. But she had welcomed them, had provided a home away from home for them so that they could share the holidays with their son.

And Daniel. His family was far away, but he seemed comfortable and happy here. He was everything a man should be. Honorable. Caring. Not to mention sexy as hell.

She stirred restlessly and felt him press a kiss to the top of her head. Was it really so simple? Could she start something new amidst the ashes of the life that had once seemed so complete?

And what if Daniel changed his mind? What if his interest in her was fleeting? It would be foolish to base a decision on the romance of northern lights.

The credits rolled, and the grown-ups made a united push to get the kids upstairs to bed. In the resulting commotion, Hallie and Daniel picked up plates and straightened the room. They bade their guests good night, and Daniel began turning off lights.

When Hallie finished loading the dishwasher, she turned to find Daniel staring at her.

Her heart skipped two beats. “Are you headed to bed?”

He reached for her hand, smiling a crooked smile. “Not alone.”

He tugged her down the hallway toward her room, passing his on the way. Her suite was at the far back corner of the house, and there would be no reason for any guests to wander this way.

Daniel reached for the doorknob and matter-of-factly locked the door behind them as they entered.The quick snick of the mechanism sounded abnormally loud to Hallie. She could feel her heart beating in her ears.

He faced her, no longer smiling. The planes and angles of his face seemed sharper, more defined. Nothing was left of the jovial Santa from earlier in the week. This man looked predatory ... determined.

He slid his hands into her hair, cupped her head, and ravaged her mouth in a hungry, desperate kiss. Her knees lost their starch. She leaned into him, matching him kiss for kiss.

He muttered as he teased the shell of her ear with his tongue, “I had a hard time keeping you out of my head when I was supposed to be working. You’ve bewitched me, Hallie Prentiss.”

“The house seemed empty without you.” She shivered as she made the confession. It was true. This exile in Alaska wouldn’t have been nearly as much fun without Daniel.

He chuckled. “I doubt that.” He removed her clothes with stunning speed and helped her do the same to his. Then he handed her a condom with a dare in his eyes.

She felt herself flush, but she opened the packet with shaking hands and rolled the protection onto Daniel’s ready-for-action erection.

When she was done, he lifted her up and urged her legs around his waist. “Are you getting used to the cold in Alaska?” he asked hoarsely.

She sucked in a sharp breath, feeling every inch of his considerable length and girth fill her completely from this new angle. “I’m never cold when you’re here, Daniel,” she whispered. She tightened her arms around his neck.

His arms rippled with muscle, and he made her feel dainty and sexy, even though she was far from petite.

He flexed his hips, causing them both to gasp.“You’re perfect, Hallie. In every way.”

Her throat tightened, and she wanted so badly to believe him. Was Daniel her own personal Christmas miracle? Or was he a bright, shiny toy that would lose its sparkle in the light of day?

He pressed her back and butt against the door and pumped with firm steady strokes. She buried her face in his neck and held on, not sure if the sensation of vulnerability was exciting or disturbing. She had lost so much this year. She didn’t want to set herself up for more pain ... more disappointment.

But with Daniel making love to her as if she were the only woman in the world that mattered, her heart beat an extra stroke or two in hopes that this crazy, unexpected relationship was not as ephemeral as the aurora borealis. She needed desperately to know that some things lasted.

His fingers bit into the yielding flesh of her ass. He drove into her relentlessly, the shaft of his cock stroking her clit in wild, sharp bursts of pleasure. Their bodies were slick with sweat. His breathing was labored, and hers had long since deteriorated into oxygen-starved whimpers.

He was hot and hard, all over. She was boneless in his embrace, totally dependent upon his strength.

Just when she thought she would die if she didn’t come, he backed away from the door, carried her toward the bed, and dropped her on her back.“Roll over,” he commanded hoarsely. “On your hands and knees.”

She obeyed mindlessly and felt him fill her in this new position. His thighs were warm behind her legs. His hands stroked down from her shoulders, over the length of her spine. He toyed with her ass, kneading the flesh and deliberately slowing the speed of his strokes.

He reached one hand between her legs and found the spot that begged for attention. His touch was like a match to tinder. Hallie cried out, feeling an unstoppable orgasm swell from between her thighs and engulf her entire body in waves of pleasure.

Daniel wasn’t done with her yet.

He gave her barely a second to recover. With a sleight of hand worthy of the finest magician, he rearranged their damp, heated bodies one more time, and soon he had her spread-eagled on the bed with his face buried between her thighs.

She tried to push him away. It was too much, too soon. But he wasn’t to be stopped. His mouth was diabolical, no quarter given. His lips and his tongue combined to drive her senseless. She arched her back in a shocked, ragged cry of completion, and before she could catch her breath, Daniel was inside her again.

This time, his mighty control unraveled rapidly. His thrusts were jerky, unrestrained. He took her wildly and shook all over as he came. He groaned loudly in her ear and slumped on top of her.

His weight was not unpleasant. She liked it, in fact. In bed with Daniel she felt secure. She believed, in the intimacy of their embrace, that nothing bad could happen. Sex with Daniel was perfect and comfortable.

Right up until the moment when he nuzzled her neck and whispered in her ear, his words barely audible,“I think I’m falling in love with you, Hallie.”

T
he days on the calendar tumbled by rapidly, like reindeer scrambling across the sky to meet their December 25 deadline. Hallie cooked, shopped, cleaned, and then started the cycle all over again.

The Denmans soon tired of eating out, and since they were the B&B’s only guests, Robbie cajoled Hallie into letting them take over the kitchen for lunches and dinners. Soon, the smells of lasagna, pork roast, spaghetti, and fried chicken filled the air.

The refrigerator was overflowing with all sorts of goodies, and when Robbie bought a dozen Christmas tins and began filling them with cookies of every size and shape, Hallie wondered if her waistline would ever recover.

Hallie and Daniel were in a holding pattern, no pun intended. The evening he mentioned “love,” and she pointedly didn’t respond, things between them became strained. But they still made love every night, sometimes in his bed, sometimes in hers.

It stunned her that he had learned her body so quickly. He could bring her to a gasping, desperate peak in bare moments, or he could drag out the anticipation of release with long, slow, achingly wonderful lovemaking that made her melt in his arms.

She’d stopped telling herself that she wasn’t crazy about him. Daniel was the man she had been looking for all her life . . . at least when she wasn’t too busy trying to climb the corporate ladder. But he’d shown up at the wrong place, the wrong time.

Her life was in chaos, the future murky and uncertain. She had to decide where to go next. She had to rewrite her five-year life plan.

One morning, when the house was amazingly empty and quiet, Hallie collapsed on the sofa and stared balefully at the two-foot-tall ceramic Santa on the coffee table. His arms were stretched over his head supporting a candy dish filled with peppermints. His red-suit-clad belly was appropriately rotund, and his black, painted eyes sparkled with mischief.

Hallie propped her ankles near him and leaned back, feeling the pleasant ache of well-used muscles. She had just finished scrubbing bathrooms and making beds, and she realized, much to her surprise, that she actually enjoyed the hands-on labor.

At the hotel in Seattle, her job had been more managerial—arbitrating disputes, juggling crises. But here at the Dancing Elves B&B, she was the whole staff . . . from maintenance to housekeeping to concierge and everything in between.