Merry Ex-Mas

“That’s my point,” she said, straightening up. “We’re not married and I don’t think you should be running around the house in your underwear.” Now she sounded both snippy and bossy. She was never bossy. Never!

He stopped next to her. That close proximity still did things to her.

Used to do things to her. Used to! She told the goose bumps on her arms to settle down.

He grinned at her, a wicked, taunting grin. “Does it…bother you?”

She could feel a guilty-as-charged heat on her cheeks. “It’s not proper.” Snippy, bossy and prissy—who was this new and unimproved Ella? “You don’t see me running around the house in my underwear.”

“I wouldn’t mind.”

She upgraded her frown to a scowl. “We may be sharing this house but it’s strictly business.”

“I am strictly business, and if my boxers bother you, move.”

Like she could afford to move? She didn’t have any more money in the bank than he did.

“Go stay with your mama.”

He might as well have added, “Mama’s girl.”

She wasn’t a mama’s girl and she had as much right to be here until the house sold as he did. She was an adult. She didn’t have to run home to her mother.

Anyway, Mims had downsized to a condo in the spiffy new Mountain Ridge condominiums outside town and they didn’t allow dogs Tiny’s size. If Jake thought she was leaving Tiny to him, he could think again. Tiny needed a mommy and a daddy. Even when they went their separate ways, they’d have joint custody of him. And besides, Ella needed to stay to make sure the house was kept in good condition to show. If she wasn’t there, potential buyers would see nothing but dirty toilets, dishes in the sink and beer cans on the coffee table, and they’d never be able to sell the place.

Sell the place—the thought of doing that still hurt. But it was only one in a string of many hurts she’d endured in the past year. For one wild, crazy moment, she wanted to put a hand to Jake’s face and ask, “What happened to us? Why are we doing this?” But she knew what had happened, and there was no going back now. The jet hadn’t just taxied down the runway or left the airport. It had left the city. The state. The country. They needed to move on, both of them.

She sighed. “Look, we’re stuck here until the place sells. Can’t we try and get along?”

He regarded her with those beautiful, dark Irish eyes. Roving eyes! “I’m not the one who started all this, El,” he said softly.

“Oh?” Who had “started” it by coming home with another woman’s phone number in his pants pocket?

There was no point in bringing that up. He’d just stick with his stupid story about the keyboard player dying to be in his band. Yeah? That wasn’t all the woman was dying for. The voice message Ella had gotten when she called the woman’s number said it all. I’m not home right now so leave a message. If this is Jake, I can meet you anytime, anyplace.

For what? A private audition? It had all been downhill from there.

He’d already let his perfect-husband mask slip before that, though, flirting with every little groupie who sashayed up to the bandstand when his band Ricochet was playing. She’d even caught him taking some girl’s black thong one night when the band was on break and he was supposed to be getting a Coke. He’d seen Ella coming and handed it back like it was a hot potato. A lacy hot potato.

“That came out of left field. I was so surprised I didn’t know what to do,” he’d said.

Just like he hadn’t known what to do with a certain keyboard player’s phone number? How dumb had he thought she was? And once she had proof…oh, he’d climbed on his high horse and acted all insulted that her mother’d had the nerve to hire a private detective to follow him. Who could blame her after hearing about the way he was sneaking around behind her daughter’s back, collecting other women’s panties?

But there was no denying what was plain in those pictures—her husband on another woman’s doorstep, hugging that woman. After being in her house for an hour. An hour! He’d claimed that he’d simply stopped by to drop off some music lead sheets. The kind of sheets they’d been using had nothing to do with music. How many quickies could an unfaithful husband squeeze into an hour? She didn’t want to do the math. Boy, whoever said one picture was worth a thousand words must have had a cheating husband.

Well, he’d gotten his keyboard player and Ella had gotten her divorce. They both got what they wanted. “You’re better off without him,” Mims had said. “He’s never going to amount to anything and you’d have been poor all your life. Starving musicians are a losing proposition.”

“I didn’t marry Jake to get rich,” Ella had protested.

“Congratulations, you succeeded,” Mims had retorted. Men might not have been necessary, but as far as her mother was concerned, once a girl had one, he darn well needed to earn his keep.

Her mother was right. Jake was immature and irresponsible and, worst of all, a cheater. She was well rid of him. Even if he did look hot in his boxers.

He frowned at her again. “Never mind. There’s no point talking anymore. I could talk till I’m blue in the face and you wouldn’t hear a thing I said.” With that parting remark, he marched up the stairs.

Ella turned her back on him. She was not—not!—going to look at his butt.

In fact, she wasn’t even going to stay in this house. By eight he’d be gone, on his way to the Red Barn, a honky-tonk a few miles outside of town. There he’d spend the night crooning country songs for people who were more interested in brawling and hooking up than listening to his band.

Ella had always loved listening to the band.

Oh, enough already, she scolded herself.

A moment later Jake was downstairs again and on his way down the hall to the kitchen. He’d covered the boxers with jeans but he was still bare-chested and that brought the goose bumps back for another visit. “The kitchen’s mine for twenty more minutes,” he called over his shoulder.

“Stay there as long as you want.” Messing everything up. “I’m leaving,” she called.

“Got a hot date?”

None of his business. She declined to answer. Instead, she grabbed her purse and started for the door. Tiny followed her hopefully.

She knelt in front of him and rubbed his side. “I promise I’ll be back as soon as he’s gone,” she whispered. “Then I’ll give you a good brushing.”

Tiny let out a groan and drool dripped from his chin. (Tiny did his share of mess-making, but unlike the other male in this house, he couldn’t help it.)

She kissed the top of his head, then slipped out the door, guilt riding on her shoulder. Poor Tiny. He felt the unhappy vibes in the house. In his doggy heart did he wonder what he’d done to deserve getting adopted into a broken home? If she’d known this was going to happen she’d never have visited that rescue site.

There was nothing she could do about that now. She’d make it up to him, somehow. How, exactly, she didn’t know. She hoped she could find someplace to rent that allowed big dogs that drooled and had a tendency to shed. Oh, dear.

Her Black Friday was getting blacker by the minute. She left the house, punching in Cecily Sterling’s phone number on her cell as she walked.

Ella and Cecily had been friends since high school. In fact, it was Cecily who had gotten Ella and Jake together. They’d lost touch when Cecily moved to L.A. but had reconnected when she returned to Icicle Falls earlier in the year. Cecily had been shocked to hear about the divorce but she’d been sympathetic and supportive. She had men interested in her, two to be exact, but she was done with men (or so she claimed), which made her the ideal dinner companion.

“Have you eaten yet?” Ella asked.

“Nope,” Cecily answered. “I just got in the door.”

“I don’t suppose you’d like to go back out the door, would you?”

“Maybe. What did you have in mind?”

“I need a place to hang out for a couple of hours. Dinner at Zelda’s?” Even though it was Friday night and the town was packed with tourists gearing up for Saturday shopping, Charlene Albach could always find a table for her friends.

“Jake’s still home?” Cecily guessed.

“Yeah,” Ella admitted. This was silly. She couldn’t keep running over to Charley’s restaurant every time Jake was home.

“I could go for a huckleberry martini,” Cecily said.