had a baby with him.
And isn’t this where the age-old story began? With no room at the inn?
She, who so desperately wanted to give everyone the perfect Christmas, turning away a stranger on the flimsy excuse that her need for predictability felt threatened by his cynical look and the dark mystery that clung to him like fog clinging to a dark forest?
By the treacherous little niggling of her own attraction? The part of her she would have sworn, even seconds ago, that she had completely tamed?
A primitive longing that if she indulged it, could turn her into her mother in a horrifying blink? Prepared to throw away everything—everything—for whatever it was that hard mouth promised.
She tried to reason with herself. He needed a place to stay. A few hours. That was hardly going to rock her world, mature business woman that she was now.
She pulled off the Santa hat.
His eyes went to her hair, something twitched along the firm line of his mouth, but then was gone.
“The highway patrol said you have the only accommodations in the entire Willowbrook area.” The way he said it made her feel as if he would have stayed elsewhere if he’d had a choice.
A modern hotel, stylish and without character. In his eyes, she saw all her hard work judged harshly, dismissed as corny, not charming. She did not like it one bit that the judgments of a complete stranger could hurt so badly. For a moment she wanted desperately to tell him she did not let rooms in the winter, which she didn’t.
But he had no choice. And neither did she. She was not sending that baby back out into the storm.
Despite the fact that none of the normal precautions were in place that protected her as a single woman running a business—the pre-visit information sheet, the credit card verification of ID—Emma felt only the danger of her attraction.
Something about the way he held the baby, protective, fierce, made her understand the only dangers he posed to her were emotional ones. But even if she were foolish enough to let forced proximity threaten her vows of independence, one look at his shuttered face assured her he would never be foolish.
She stepped back from the door, coolly professional. “I usually don’t operate as an inn in the winter, but I can clearly see that this is an emergency.”
If she hoped her aloof graciousness would give her the upper hand, she was mistaken. Scent swept in the door with him, the deeply masculine smells of soap and aftershave, the baby scents of powder and purity, quickly overpowering all the warm cookie and Christmas smells.
When she firmly closed the door against the weather, the ancient knob came off in her hand, making her feel not professional, and not gracious, either.
Not now, she warned the old house, stuffing the knob back in the hole, hoping he hadn’t noticed.
But when she turned back to him, she could see he was a man who noticed everything. He would have noticed even if the knob had not popped back out of the door and landed with a clatter on the floor.
She bent and picked it up, thoroughly flustered. “I don’t charge extra for the rustic charm,” she said breezily, trying to ignore the cold air whooshing through the round hole in the door where the knob should have been.
No smile.
“Ah.” He glanced around her front foyer, took in the small welcoming hallway tree, decorated entirely in tiny white angels, the garlands of white-bowed boughs that wove their way up the staircase and had, until seconds ago, filled her house with the sharp, fresh scents of pine and Christmas.
He stood directly under the sprig of mistletoe she had suspended from the ceiling, and that made her look at his lips.
And think a distressing thought, entirely inappropriate for an independent professional such as herself, about what they would taste like, and what price a woman would be willing to pay to know that.
Too much. The price would be too much. She was still reeling from her mistake in judgment about Peter. Guessing what a complete stranger’s lips might taste like was just proof, as if she needed more, that she was still capable of grave errors.
He frowned. “If you don’t operate as an inn at this time of year, do you do all of this decorating for your personal enjoyment?”
“I was expecting guests for the evening.” She fought further evidence of her poor judgment—a ridiculous temptation to drop the professional facade and to unburden herself about the disastrous inaugural evening of Holiday Happenings. Though his shoulders looked broad enough to cry on, his eyes did not look capable of sympathy.
His next words made her glad she had kept her confidences. “Do you have any rooms without the, er, Christmas theme?”
“You don’t like Christmas.” She said it flatly, a statement rather than a question. Given his expression, it was already more than obvious to her he did not like Christmas. And probably not puppies, love songs or tender movies, either.
Which was good. Very good. So much easier to get through a few hours of temptation—of her own bad decision-making abilities—if the effect of those intoxicating good looks were offset by a vile nature.
What kind of person doesn’t like Christmas? Especially with a baby! He practically has an obligation to like Christmas!
The baby gurgled, reached up from under the blanket and inserted a pudgy finger in her mouth.
Nothing in the man’s expression softened, but the baby didn’t seem to notice.
“Mama,” the baby whispered, and laid her head on his shoulder in a way that confirmed what Emma already knew. Her guest might be cynical and Christmas-hating, but she could trust him with her life, just as that baby, now slurping contentedly on her thumb, did.
“Is she wanting her mama?” Emma asked, struck by the backward bonnet again, by the incongruity of this man, seemingly without any kind of softness, being with this baby. Of course. A mother. That made her safe from this feeling, hot and liquid, unfurling like a sail catching a wind. He was taken. Her relief, her profound sense of escape was short-lived.
“No,” he said, and then astonishingly, a flush of red moved up his neck, and Emma saw the tiniest hint of vulnerability in those closed features.
He hesitated, “Unfortunately, that’s what she calls me.”
Again, Emma felt a tickle of laughter. And again it was cut off before it materialized, because of the unwanted softness for him when she thought of him being called Mama. It was a startling contradiction to the forbidding presence of him, ridiculously sweet.
Even though she knew it was none of her business, she had to know.
“Where is her mother?”
Something shot through his eyes with such intensity it sucked all the warmth from the room. It was more than sadness, for a moment she glimpsed a soul stripped of joy, of hope. She glimpsed a man lost in a storm far worse than the one that howled outside her door.
“She’s dead,” he said quietly, and the window that had opened briefly to a tormented soul slammed shut. His voice was flat and calm, his eyes warned her against probing his soul any deeper.
“I’m so sorry,” Emma said. “Here, let me take her while you get your coat off.”
But when she held out her arms, she realized she was still holding the broken door knob.
He juggled the baby, and took the doorknob with his free hand, his gloved fingers brushing hers just long enough for her to feel the heat beneath those gloves.
Effortlessly, he turned and inserted the knob in the door, jiggled it into place and then turned back to her.
His easy competence made Emma feel more off center, incompetent, as if her stupid doorknob was sending out messages about her every failing as an