Mistletoe & Mayhem: Mistletoe & Mayhem / Santa's Sexy Secret

Jodie glanced at Irene and Sophie and read the determination in their eyes. It was going to be two against one, and it was their house. Reluctantly, she took the envelope from him just as Nadine arrived at the table.

“Your cappuccino will be right up, Jodie. Albert said to tell you he’s having a little trouble foaming the milk. And what can I get for you?” Fluttering her hands, Nadine aimed the question and her smile at Shane.

“A cappuccino sounds great. I haven’t indulged in one since I left California.”

“Ooh my, California. I’ve always wanted to go there. I’ll have to tell Albert we’ve got a connoisseur out here waiting to taste his cappuccino,” Nadine said before she hurried away.

“There’s only one letter in here,” Jodie said as she unfolded it.

“I can get more,” Shane replied easily.

Frowning, Jodie skimmed the paper. “The Kathy Dillon who signed it, is she the same Kathy who’s married to Sheriff Dillon?”

Shane nodded. “She’s a cousin. We haven’t quite pinned down whether it’s two or three times removed.”

“Well, then there’s no problem,” Irene said, patting her curls. “If Kathy Dillon can vouch for Shane, we won’t need those other references, will we, dear?”

Jodie stifled a sigh as Irene began to explain to Shane their plans for the house. She would call Kathy, but she knew the Rutherford sisters had won the battle. Battle? Why was she thinking of it in those terms. She glanced at Shane Sullivan again, wondering what it was about him that had made her feel so…what? Hot and cold, all at the same time? She couldn’t be…no, she really couldn’t be attracted to him. That was just not possible. Lightning could not possibly strike one person twice, at least not in the same year.

She was just suspicious of him. That’s what it was. Because he just didn’t look like a handyman—unless it was the kind of “handyman” a mafia boss might hire as a bodyguard.

“Is there some reason you’re staring at me?” Shane asked softly.

Jodie glanced quickly at Irene and Sophie, but they were heatedly debating the question of how many guest rooms they were eventually going to have.

“I wasn’t staring,” she said, leaning a little closer to him and keeping her voice low.

“It felt like staring to me,” Shane said.

“Who are you really?”

“Shane Sullivan. We were just introduced, weren’t we?”

“No one is really named Shane.”

“What was that, dear?” Irene asked.

“Nothing,” Jodie said, fixing a smile on her face as she turned her attention back to the sisters.

“Isn’t it time for you to get back to the library, dear?” Irene said. “Mr. Sullivan will be all settled in by the time you get home from work.”

Jodie glanced at her watch. She was due back at the college library in five minutes. Nadine arrived just as she rose and picked up her package.

“I brought your cappuccino to go,” Nadine said, handing her the lidded paper cup. “I know you’re never late.” Then she turned to present a foaming cup to Shane. “I hope it’s the way they make it in California.”

As Jodie made her way through Albert’s, she could hear Nadine’s laughter blend with that of the Rutherford sisters. So Shane Sullivan was a comedian as well as a…what? Whatever he was, she was sure he wasn’t a handyman. In the archway to the next room, she turned back. He was facing Irene and Sophie, and they were leaning forward, their attention riveted on him.

A strong sense of déjà vu moved through her and fear settled cold and hard in her stomach. Less than six months ago, she’d seen Irene and Sophie framed in the same window with their nephew Billy. When she’d come into the café, they’d waved to her to join them. That evening, they’d asked her to be their guest at the hotel for dinner. The rest had been history—one she didn’t care to repeat. Nor was she about to stand by and allow the Rutherford sisters to be taken in by another smooth-talking charmer.

A quick glance at her watch told her that she could either be on time for work, or she could stop by the sheriff’s office and ask him about his wife’s two-or-three-times-removed cousin. Once out on the street, she took the lid off her cup of cappuccino, inhaled the cinnamon, and took a long swallow. It might only be a baby step, but she was changing. Perhaps those foolish mottoes were working, after all. Either that or she was learning from her mistakes. Whatever it was, she was going to get to the truth about Shane Sullivan. Turning, she headed down the street toward the municipal building. No one could really be named Shane.

2

THE DOOR WITH Sheriff Dillon’s name on it stood open. Jodie paused, noting that the desk in the outer office was empty. That meant that his deputy, Mike Buckley, was either at lunch or working on a case.

“C’mon in. I’m here.” The voice came from the adjacent room and Jodie headed toward it. Mark Dillon, who’d been sheriff for as long as she could remember, was indeed in—deep in a book, as far as she could tell. His back was to her, his feet propped on a nearby window ledge. The moment she entered the room, he dog-eared his paperback with a grunt, swung his feet down and swiveled to face her. A smile spread slowly across his face as he waved her into a chair.

Sheriff Dillon hadn’t changed much from the first time she’d met him, except that his waist was a little thicker and his hair had started to thin. His smile was certainly the same, as was the shrewdness in his eyes. The kids at the college often underestimated him when they had the misfortune to cross his path, but he had a reputation for fairness among the students.

“I was going to stop by the library to talk to you.” His gaze dropped to his watch, then met hers. “Shouldn’t you be there right now?”

Good old predictable Jodie. The thought had her lifting her chin. “I’m going to be late. I doubt that the world will end.”

“No, I guess it won’t. I hear you had a prowler last night.”

It occurred to her that she hadn’t thought about the prowler once on her walk over. All she’d been thinking about was Shane Sullivan.

“And instead of reporting it,” Sheriff Dillon continued as he flipped his notebook open, “you decided to ask Hank Jefferson to sell you a gun.”

“Yes, I did.”

Mark Dillon sighed and leaned back in his chair. “Buying a gun? That doesn’t sound like you, Jodie.”

“Well, maybe I’m tired of being like me! Do you have any idea what it was like to wake up and know that someone was in the house, walking around in the attic? I tried to call you and the phone wouldn’t work. Irene left the extension in the kitchen off the hook. She swears not, but—”

“What time did this happen?” Dillon asked, pulling his notebook closer.

“Shortly after midnight. I hadn’t been asleep for long.”

“And you heard something that woke you up?”

Jodie frowned. “No. Sophie said she heard a muffled crash. But I must have slept through that.”

Dillon nodded. “And then what?”

“I waited and listened. Then I heard floorboards creak in the attic. I was tracking the steps across the floor when Sophie and Irene opened my door. They were armed with fireplace pokers, and Sophie insisted we go up there. I couldn’t talk her out of it. I shouted up the stairs that we were armed, and luckily, by the time we got up there, he was out the window and halfway down that old elm tree.”

“Did you get a good look at him or her?” Dillon asked.

Jodie thought for a minute. “I’d say it was a him. He was tall and slender. We could see him run off toward the road.”

“Was he carrying anything?”

Jodie shook her head. “He had to use both hands getting down that tree.”

Dillon set his pencil down. “Don’t you have a dog out there? What was he doing during all this?”

“Lazarus?” The dog was a stray she’d found nearly dead by the side of the road. “I don’t know if he was ever much of a watchdog, but since Doc Cheney brought him back from the dead, nothing interrupts his beauty sleep—which is why I need a gun.”