Christmas in Eternity Springs (33 page)

“Sarah's recipe, my fortunes.” She slipped her arm through his and ushered him toward the door. “Now, thank you for the help, but you should run along back to your truck. You don't want to keep your son waiting. Thanks again for the help.”

“No problem. Thanks, Celeste.”

He was halfway down the street when he heard her call, “Oh, Jax?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“Be sure to listen closely. You'll hear your angel cheering you on.”

As Jax approached his truck, Nicholas exited Forever Christmas carrying a box wrapped for mailing. “It's all ready, Dad. Miss Claire let me call Mimi and I got her address.”

They stopped at the post office. Jax waited in the truck while his son mailed his package, and his gaze stole toward the box of fortune cookies. “What the heck.”

He opened the box, took a cookie, and cracked it open. He removed the little white paper from inside and unrolled it. Aloud, he read, “‘Forgiveness is fresh air for the soul.'”

Forgiveness? Who was he supposed to forgive? For what?

Or maybe he was the one who needed to be forgiven.

“Huh.”

Nicholas returned to the truck, and as they continued the drive to Three Bears Valley, Jax subtly questioned the boy about the time he'd spent with Claire. He listened very closely to Nicholas's answers.

The kid said a lot. He didn't shut up the whole way home. Nevertheless, Jax didn't hear one damned thing he would label as a “truth.”

Nicholas played with Captain while Jax worked at Papa Bear that afternoon. He fixed hamburgers for supper, and when bedtime rolled around, read more Percy Jackson to Nicholas along with his new Christmas book—
The Christmas Angel Waiting Room.

When Jax went to bed that night, an oppressive silence seemed to hang over Mama Bear. He couldn't fall asleep and couldn't get comfortable, tossing and turning and punching his feather pillow into shape.

So far, his angel wasn't talking.

So much for help from Celeste and his “hearing aid.”

Deciding a late-night snack was in order, Jax went downstairs to raid the pantry. Pickings were slim.

Then he remembered the cookies.

He chose three cookies, set them on a paper plate, and poured a glass of milk. He cracked open all three cookies and ate them without bothering to read the fortunes inside. The cookies were good. Full of flavor. Cinnamon and ginger and something else he couldn't quite place. Almond, perhaps?

He drank his milk. Stared at the fortunes. Listened for those cheers Celeste had promised. Sighing heavily, he unrolled the three papers and read them one after the other.

Don't give up. Let go.

Take a leap of faith and fly.

Believe.

Jax drained his glass of milk. He picked up the slips of paper and took them upstairs to his bedroom. There, he dug the fortune he'd opened earlier from the pocket of his jeans and added it to the stack.

He picked up his journal and a pen and wrote, “I think I might have heard my angel today.”

When he closed the book, he traced the embossed word upon the cover with his finger and thought of Claire.
Believe.

Then he tucked the four angel-cookie fortunes in the journal and turned off his light. That night, Jax slept like a baby and dreamed of a red-haired angel atop a Christmas tree.

 

Chapter Twenty

You've done dumber things in your life. It's just been a while.

—JAX

“Hand me the knife,” Claire said, extending her palm like a surgeon in the operating room.

Brick Callahan's wary voice drawled, “You're not going to stab me with it, are you?”

Kneeling on the floor of an old silver-mine-turned-storage-facility on the grounds of Angel's Rest, she looked up sharply at her friend. “What?”

“I'm not exactly sure why, although I do have my suspicions, but I'm already bleeding from a thousand cuts from that tongue of yours. Are you ready to put me out of your misery?”

“I … oh.” Awareness washed over her and she winced. “I'm sorry, Brick. I'm terrible.”

“You're in a terrible mood.” He handed her the box cutter. “Have been for a week or so.”

Claire couldn't argue with the observation, so rather than respond, she busied herself by slicing through cardboard and packing tape with the blade and yanking the box open. Inside she spied the lighted green wreaths with red all-weather bows that would be mounted around the streetlights in town.

Under other circumstances, the sight would make Claire smile. Celeste had lobbied the chamber for this style because, she'd confessed to Claire, they reminded her of halos. Count on Celeste to get her angel on whenever possible.

Only, Claire didn't have any smiles inside her. She was not a happy woman.

“Want to tell Dr. Brick why you are such a grouch?” When she didn't immediately answer, he added, “I suspect it has something to do with a certain hammer-swinging sailor. He's been almost as pleasant to be around as you of late.”

Her attention perked up at that, and the recognition of her reaction only served to stoke her temper. “Men are so stupid.”

“Because … what … we forget to put the toilet seat down?”

“Because … just because.” She handed him the box cutter and said, “Would you please open up the other boxes for me? I've learned the hard way how important it is to inspect each box. I'd hate to wait until next Friday to discover that something was shipped wrong or is damaged.”

Brick chastised her with a look, but thankfully refrained from commenting.

Claire knew she was acting crabby, but honestly, she was tired of being nice. Tired of pasting a smile on her face and acting like holly-jolly Miss Christmas when she was feeling Halloween witchy. Black hats and black cats and a high-pitched cackle—that suited her much better than the Twelve Dogs of Christmas these days.

Men
were
stupid. But
she
was an idiot.

She'd let her guard down. Again. It had bit her in the broomstick. Again. One would think that after the debacle that was Landon the Lying Lizard Lawyer, she would have known better. But oh, no. The first low-slung tool belt who struts by makes her forget everything she'd learned. She'd let her glands do her thinking for her, and she'd let Mr. Mistletoe into her heart. She'd fallen head over heels for his son, and she'd allowed herself to dream of love and marriage and family.

Again.

Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.

Her temper hadn't cooled in the two weeks since she'd returned from Silver Eden. If anything, the constant reminders of her foolishness served to stoke its fire. It didn't help that she couldn't seem to get away from the man. Every time she turned around, something was there to bring Jax Lancaster to mind.

Go to brush her teeth and there was the bathroom sink that leaked before Jax fixed it. A stop at the market to pick up produce and she automatically reached for bananas. She didn't eat bananas. Jax and Nicholas had one every morning with their breakfast. And then there was the blasted mistletoe. Every time she turned around someone was buying something mistletoe related. It didn't help that over the past six weeks she'd ordered a ridiculous amount of mistletoe-themed items. Nor was she happy that the Chamber of Commerce had elected to store their new Christmas decorations in the space Celeste had donated in Mistletoe Mine.

Maybe she should close the shop and go on a vacation. One that lasted until June.

“Okay, sugarplum,” Brick said. “All the boxes are open. Are you sure Eternity Springs has enough public square to display all of this stuff?”

“Oh, yes. The committee was quite deliberate about what they ordered. Thanks for the help, Brick.”

“I'm always ready to help a friend.” Following a deliberate pause, he added, “That includes listening. Why don't you tell me what Lancaster did that has put a burr beneath your saddle?”

“I don't want to talk about him.” She rose to her feet and braced her hands on her hips. “Or his idiotic pride. Or his exceedingly stupid prejudice.”

“Okay.”

“I had a fling. No strings. No big deal. It happened. It's over.”

“Sure it is.”

Now she folded her arms and glared at him. “Wait a minute. What do you mean by that?”

“If it's over, then why the attitude? You should be happy as a pig in mud right now, checking in the fruits of your not insignificant labor.” He waved his arm expansively toward the row of open boxes. “You worked hard to make this happen. You should be enjoying it.”

“I am enjoying it,” she snapped.

He rolled his tongue around his cheek. “Uh-huh.”

“I am. I'm proud of my contribution to this project. I can't wait to decorate next Friday.”

It was such a lie. The Christmas Comfort-and-Joy Season bore down upon her like a big black tornado. Which reminded her. All the lights and ornaments and, yes, the angel tree topper that she'd taken out of inventory and set aside for the tree she'd hoped to put up at Mama Bear next week needed to go back into stock. What Landon had begun, Jax had finished.

“I talked to him yesterday. He's no happier than your are.”

Claire went still. She should tell Brick she didn't want to hear anything about Jax Lancaster.

“He said he's tried to talk to you, but that you refuse to let it happen.”

“He has no business spreading my personal business around town.”

“Wasn't exactly around town. He was finishing up the work on the dance hall at the North Forty, and he was swinging his hammer so hard I thought he might hit right through the wall. Not all that different from the way you handled that box cutter a few minutes ago. I asked him what the heck was wrong, and he said the two of you had a misunderstanding.“

A misunderstanding? A misunderstanding! “Grrr…”

Brick looked at her and shook his head. “Honey, as someone with up-close-and-personal experience with living with a broken heart, I think—”

“He did not break my heart,” she snapped. “I don't want to talk about Jax Lancaster, Brick.”

He held up his hands in surrender. “Okay. Okay. I'll change the subject. What do you need me to do next here?”

She put him to work testing strings of lights, and by the time they completed their job and departed Mistletoe Mine, she had a short list of items that needed to be exchanged and a longer packing list of items she needed for the ski trip to Aspen she'd just decided to take. She would close the shop, load up Tinsel, and spend Thanksgiving on the slopes.

Happy with her plan, she returned to Forever Christmas and made reservations at a pet-friendly lodge in Aspen. Then she chose a piece of holiday-themed printer paper and wrote out a
CLOSED
notice for her front door that included the day of her return—Black Friday.

“Wait.” She crumpled up the paper, tossed it into the trash, and got another sheet. “Just because your outlook has changed…”

She changed the return date on the second notice to “Deck the Halls Friday.”

She'd have some disgruntled customers from now until then, but she didn't really care. People could delay their shopping until Deck the Halls Friday. She was the boss. She could close the shop whenever she wanted, and what's the use in being rich as Midas if she never spent anything? She wanted away from Eternity Springs. Away from Three Bears Valley.

Away from Jax Lancaster.

Maybe she'd go to Aspen and find a boy toy to use for the weekend. She could have another fling. An Aspen fling. Mistletoe didn't grow in aspen trees, did it?

She should have known better than to go down that mistletoe path from the start. After all, mistletoe was a parasite. She should have picked up on the message of that.

Except, Jax was the farthest thing from a parasite there was. Unlike Landon. Landon was … is … a parasite.

As she carried her notice and Scotch tape toward the front door, it opened and a whirlwind blew inside, calling, “Miss Claire! Miss Claire! Guess what?”

Nicholas came to a halt in front of her and pushed his black-framed glasses up on his nose. “You'll never guess what happened at school today!”

Excitement lit the boy up like the Christmas tree behind him, and Claire couldn't help but smile in the face of his joy. “Hmm … whatever happened is obviously very exciting. Did somebody throw up their lunch or break their arm at recess?”

“No! I got a part in our Christmas pageant. I get to be an angel and I get to say something. I was hoping I'd get to be a camel because they get to wear a hump, but it's okay that Galen got that part. I get to talk. Will you help me make my costume, Miss Claire? I need wings. And a halo.”

Oh, Nicholas. You already have them.

“You will come watch me in the pageant, won't you?”

“Of course I'll be there. I'll go early and do my best to get a seat in the front row.”

“And the costume? You'll help me with the costume? I think we are gonna have to sew something this time, and you know Dad.”

Yes, she knew his dad. If only she could figure out a way to forget him.

As Nicholas continued to rattle on about his costume, Claire's attention remained divided between his actions and his words. Nicholas explored while he talked. He picked up snow globes and shook them. He pushed buttons and switched on switches. He flipped through the pages of books.

Claire's heart gave a little bittersweet twist. Look at him. He'd told her and Jax back before the Twelve Dogs of Christmas reception how badly he wanted to be like everyone else—a normal kid. As he turned and watched the miniature electric train chug through her Christmas village display, it was clear that Nicholas had defeated his demons.

She wished she knew his secret.

*   *   *