Christmas in Eternity Springs (3 page)

He heard the splash and then a feminine cough. “Mercy. This is my first time to visit the mineral springs. I hadn't realized exactly how bad they smell.”

“You'll get accustomed to it after a couple of minutes. Now, you might not smell anything else for two days afterward, but your sense of smell will return.”

“I'll take your word for it. Soaking in a mineral spring is supposed to have health benefits, right? Like soothing sore muscles?”

Jax nodded. “Yes, although I don't know how effective it is. Still, mineral springs have attracted people all across the world throughout history, so on that basis alone, I think there must be something to it. Personally, I like it here because I find this relaxing.”

“And I'm interrupting your peace with my chatter. I apologize.”

“No need. I'm always happy to…” Jax bit back the words “share my tub with a beautiful lady” and settled for something that sounded less like a come-on. “Meet new people. I'm Jax Lancaster.”

“Claire Branham. I've recently moved to Eternity Springs and opened a business, which is keeping me busy and is why I haven't visited these pools before tonight. Are you a guest at Angel's Rest, Jax?”

“I am. I'm here for a couple of days to pick up my son from the Rocking L summer camp.”

“Oh.” The note of sympathy and understanding she managed to insert into the tone of that one short word revealed that she knew the Rocking L wasn't an ordinary camp. “The Rocking L program is fabulous. I know the children who get to attend are thrilled with the experience. How old is your son?”

“Nicholas is eight.” Jax hesitated, then because he was curious to get another perspective on the Rocking L program, he added, “He's been having a rough time of it. He was with his mother when she died a year and a half ago, and it damaged him. I'm hoping the weeks he's spent at camp will kick-start his recovery.”

“I'm so sorry for your loss.”

“His loss, not mine,” Jax clarified. Then he winced. “That sounds terrible, doesn't it? That's not what I intended. We were divorced. His mother and I were divorced. Acrimoniously. Ugly custody battle. I've been in the navy and they don't always just let you quit when you want, so Nicholas has been living with her parents and I'm babbling. Sorry. Too much traveling through too many time zones and I'm punch-drunk and nervous about picking him up tomorrow.”

“Don't worry about it. I've been known to babble, myself. Frequently. So where did you begin your travels?”

The specific information was classified. Jax picked a point in the middle. “Seventy-two hours ago I was in Dubai.”

“Whoa. I'll bet the jet lag is brutal.”

His mouth twisted in a rueful grin. “I don't ordinarily spill my guts to strangers. I've embarrassed myself. I'll shut up now.”

“Oh, don't be embarrassed. Sometimes sharing a burden makes it easier to carry. And doing so with a stranger instead of a friend protects against potential blowback.”

“Blowback?”

“Haven't you ever been a little too honest with friends or family and it comes back to haunt you?”

He thought of the conversation with Lara right before he left on the deployment that doomed his marriage. Oh, yeah. He understood the risk of too much honesty. Been there, done that, got the divorce. However, not even his jet-lagged tongue was loose enough to go there, so he stuck with something lighter. “You mean like telling my ex that those yellow slacks did indeed make her butt look big?”

Claire snorted. “You didn't.”

“We started dating our freshman year in college. I was very young and stupid at the time, but I did learn.”
Just not fast enough.
Wanting to direct the conversation away from himself, Jax asked, “How about you, Claire? Has honesty come back to haunt you with a significant other?”

“I'm not married. I ended a relationship not long ago, but it wasn't due to too much honesty.” Her tone turned bitter as she added, “Just the opposite, in fact.”

“Sounds like you have a burden to unload, yourself. Go for it. You won't get any blowback from me.”

“Hmm…” She shot him a narrow-eyed look. “You said you're only in town for a couple of days?”

“We leave the day after tomorrow for San Diego. I'll pack up my place there, and then it's on to Seattle where Nicholas has been living.”

Claire shifted her position in the pool so that she faced the sunset rather than Jax. A full minute of silence ticked by before she spoke again. “I should be celebrating tonight. I should be drinking champagne and having wild sex with a ski instructor named Stamina Sven. Instead I'm soaking an old softball injury in a stinky, steamy pool while drinking sparkling water and spilling my secrets to a stranger.”

Jax's brows arched.
Stamina Sven?
“It's obvious you have a shoulder injury when you throw a hanging curve ball like that one.”

“Let me guess,” she drawled. “Your middle name is Sven.”

He waggled his brows. “You can call me Stamina for short. And I understand that room service delivers out here. I'm happy to order a bottle of bubbly.”

“Thanks, but no.”

“So what are we not celebrating?”

She sighed heavily. “Lawyers.”

Jax lifted an imaginary champagne goblet in toast. “I can definitely drink to that.”

“And Christmas.”

“Christmas? Well, it is July.”

“Forever Christmas. My shop. It's doing great. It's on the corner of Cottonwood and Third. I opened it this spring and this month I'm going to finish in the black. By a kitten's whisker, but black is black, right?”

“Right.” A Christmas store. Guess that accounted for the Rudolph tote bag.

“I'm trying hard to take pleasure in my shop. I'm giving myself a pass on the angels, although I'm trying very hard to hold on to the rest of my joy, but it's hanging by a strand of tinsel. See, I'd lost it, then I found it, but I discovered it was a lie. Well, he was a lie. What I felt wasn't a lie.”

“You loved him.”

“Yes, I loved him. I loved the thought of making a life with him, of having Christmas with him. After all those years of missing it, hating it, wishing I could go to a deserted island from Black Friday to January second, I put up a tree in my house and even bought silly holiday towels! He ruined it with his lies, but I'm not letting him ruin anything else. No way. That's what I'm trying to hold on to. I won't let him steal it from me. It's bad enough that I was stupid enough to be fooled by a dirty rotten lying lawyer, that I let him break my heart. I won't allow him to steal my joy.”

Jax wondered what sort of problem she had with angels, but he didn't interrupt to ask. She was on a roll.

“I tell everyone that the reason I moved to Eternity Springs was because I saw a business opportunity, but that's not really true. I was running away. From him. From reminders of him. From reality. Eternity Springs was my place to hide and to heal. I thought I was doing a pretty decent job of it. I'm making friends. I'm becoming involved in town life. Forever Christmas is an in-your-face declaration that he's not going to win. It's good. I'm tooling along, getting along, thinking maybe I've got this thing whipped, when today …
boom
!” She clapped her hands. “The lousy lawyer and his great big lie followed me home.”

Jax sat up straight. Every protective instinct he possessed went into full alert. “This jerk is stalking you?”

 

Chapter Two

“Stalking me?” she repeated. She lifted her gaze toward the mountains as she considered the question a moment before speaking. “No. Not in person, anyway. I feel as if I'm being hunted, because he did hire a private detective to find me so he's been making constant attempts to contact me, but that can't be termed stalking. He's sending paperwork.”

“Paperwork?”

“Paperwork. It's a legal thing I can't sever right now. And whenever I receive communication from him, I can't help but get my Grinch on.”

“Ah.” Jax relaxed back down into the water.

She gave her head a shake. “But enough talk of lizards. Let's talk about something happier. Tell me about your son. He's eight, you said? What's he like? Is Nicholas adventurous and strong-willed? Talkative and imaginative? Thoughtful and diplomatic?”

Jax tore his gaze away from the glistening sunset of her hair. He didn't want to admit that he didn't know his son well enough to answer her question. “Nicholas has always been detailed and orderly. When he was just a toddler, he spent hours stacking blocks. They had to be color coordinated and positioned exactly so.”

The corners of Jax's mouth lifted.
My little engineer,
he remembered thinking. “Before his mother died…”—
before our divorce—
“Nicholas was lively and talkative. I'm hopeful his time at this summer camp will put us on the road to finding that happy little boy again.”

She encouraged him with a smile. “Well, from everything I hear about the Rocking L, you couldn't ask for a more dedicated staff.”

“Do you know any of them personally? Anything you can tell me about the camp from a local point of view?”

“Well, hmm.” She considered a few moments, then said, “Like I said, I'm a relative newcomer to town, myself. I don't believe I've met any of the staff. I have met the camp's benefactors, the Davenports, and I like them very much. I also know a couple of the people from town who volunteer up there—the local vet and the owner here at Angel's Rest, Celeste Blessing.”

“I met Celeste when I checked in. She told me she leads nature hikes up at the camp.”

“I've heard they are fabulous. She seems to have extraordinary luck when it comes to sighting wildlife.”

“According to her, my boy has had a great time.”

“If Celeste said it, you can believe it. She has her fingers on the pulse of everything that happens in this valley. Plus, she's very … well … I guess I'd call it intuitive. She has an uncanny ability to say exactly what I need to hear when I need to hear it.” She gave a soft, self-deprecating laugh then added, “Unfortunately, she didn't stop by the store today.”

“She's quite the ambassador for Eternity Springs,” Jax said. “I asked what Nicholas and I should do tomorrow afternoon, and she gave me a list that would take two weeks to complete. Do you have any ideas for me?”

Claire offered her suggestions for afternoon activities in and around Eternity Springs, and after that discussion, conversation naturally paused as they both watched in silent appreciation as a full moon rose over the Rockies.

“It's beautiful here,” Jax said.

“Yes, it is. Eternity Springs is a good place. It has good energy. Positive energy.”

Jax thought of what lay before him and observed, “I wish there was a way to bottle it up and take it with me.”

“You should ask Celeste.”

A voice rang out of the shadows behind Jax. “Ask me what?”

Jax glanced over his shoulder to see Celeste Blessing approach, carrying a tray holding a bucket of champagne and two flutes. “I didn't order champagne,” he murmured.

“It's for the newlyweds in our honeymoon cottage,” Celeste explained. “I noticed Claire headed this way earlier, and I wanted to ask her if she has any news about my special order.”

“The Lalique angel? No, I'm afraid not. I called about it this afternoon, and they've promised me a firm ship date tomorrow. If I haven't heard from them by noon, I'll give them another call.”

“Lovely. Thank you, dear. Now, Mr. Lancaster, what question may I answer for you?”

Embarrassment turned his smile bashful. “We were just talking about Eternity Springs.”

“Jax wished there was a way to bottle up the valley's positive energy to take with him when he leaves,” Claire added. “If anyone knows a way to do it, you would, Celeste.”

The older woman laughed with delight. “Well, of course I do. That's easy enough.”

“I don't think they'll let me on an airplane with bottles of mineral water,” Jax observed.

“Oh, it's not the mineral water. It's the basic state of mind. A positive thought in the morning sets the tone for your entire day.”

Jax was fairly certain he'd seen that platitude on a T-shirt.

However, Celeste took it a step further. “Now, the key to having that positive thought each morning starts the night before. I suggest that each night before you go to sleep, you make note of one positive thing that happened in your day. Even the darkest of days will have one moment of light. Make note of it. Write it down. Use it to jump-start your day the following morning. It's like a cup of coffee for your attitude.”

“I like it,” Claire said.

“Thank you, dear. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to get this champagne to our honeymooners. Enjoy the rest of your evening and think of something positive that happened today when you go to sleep tonight.”

Celeste's words hung in the air long after her departure. Claire twisted her head around to meet Jax's gaze. “See what I mean? She's a wise woman. That's a commonsense idea and it makes so much sense to me.”

“It's simplistic,” Jax cautioned. “Life seldom is.”

“True. Maybe that's the problem. Maybe that's part of what makes Eternity Springs special. I think it's possible to live a somewhat simple life here.”

“Because it's a small town?”

“No. More because Eternity Springs had a near-death experience, and it changed the outlook of those who live here.”

An easy gust of summer breeze swept petals from the nearby rose garden into the hot springs. Jax idly watched the yellow petals float in lazy circles on the moonlit surface of the pool as Claire told him how the little town had been on the brink of financial failure when Celeste decided to open Angel's Rest, which led to the rebirth of Eternity Springs.