The Holiday Visitor

The silence was long enough for him to bow out of the conversation. To let her off the hook.

He didn’t. He simply sat there. Watching her. Waiting.

Time to clean up the cheese and crackers. To call Brutus over. To start breakfast. Or glue something.

“Yes.” Dammit. She’d known the word was coming. Should have tried harder to prevent it from slipping out. She had no idea where any of this could go.

No idea if he even noticed she was alive, other than as a hostess he was paying to take care of him for a few days.

“My surrogate family wants me to come over, as Dad and I have done every year since Mom died.”

“But you turned them down?” He didn’t sound critical. Or even as though he thought her crazy.

“I told them I was working. Breakfasts don’t cook and linens don’t get changed by themselves and I sure wasn’t going to call my cleaning lady, Grace, away from her family.”

Frowning, Craig set his glass on the claw-foot, cherry coffee table. “I’m keeping you away from your friends? I can go—”

“No!” What was it about him? And her? “I’d stay home whether you were here or not. Truly. I already told them I wasn’t coming.”

Her choice to live her life alone might seem odd to most people, but she didn’t have to justify herself. Nor would she. She was all grown up now. An adult. Her life was her own.

And she was happy.

She was also completely turned on for the first time in her life.

Chapter Four

CRAIG TRIED TO CALL Jenny when he went back to his room to grab a jacket before heading out for the short walk to a quaint little diner he’d seen about a block away from the inn. When she didn’t pick up, he stifled his frustration mixed with relief, quickly left a message letting her know that he’d arrived in Santa Barbara, that he was hoping she’d arrived safely, as well, and that he’d call her again in a day or so, reception allowing.

“Love you.” His final words were offered with sincerity.

Her flight might have been delayed. Or she could be out. Or with her family and not able to answer. She could have left her cell phone in her room. Or failed to charge it. One thing was for certain. If Miss Jenny Fournier-Chevalier didn’t end up safely at her folks’ castle situated on richly grown acres of French countryside, Craig McKellips would be hearing about it.

HE DIDN’T SEE his hostess again that night. Though he made eating a business, tackling the task efficiently, rather than lingering and appreciating the anomaly of free time, the door to her quarters had been firmly closed when he returned to the Orange Blossom. The light shining from beneath her door had called to him, though.

He’d thought about knocking. And thought about Brutus and privacy and the fact that he had nothing to offer the young, vibrant woman who lived on the other side of that portal—no matter how much he wanted to be in her presence. He was married. More, he had secrets, things Marybeth Lawson couldn’t ever know, things that prevented them from ever being more than casual acquaintances.

Craig spent more hours than he’d have liked in front of the window in the Juliet room that night, and again, the next morning staring at the ocean in the distance—unwinding, thinking, trying to come to terms with his life—until it was finally time to head downstairs to breakfast. Dressed in baggy black shorts and a white polo shirt topped with a black sweater to protect him from ocean breezes, he forced himself to take the steps one at a time when what he wanted to do was jog the whole way.

“Have you eaten?” he asked his beautiful hostess as he entered the dining room to see her filling a glass with orange juice from an antique-looking glass pitcher, at a table set for one.

She wore black jeans. A white cotton top that hugged her thin waist and outlined the swell of her breasts, and another one of those adorable Christmas sweaters—this one a cardigan sporting the embroidered design of dalmatians and hearths with stockings hanging from them.

“Good morning!” She seemed to be having just as hard a time not staring at him as he was not staring at her. “No, I haven’t eaten,” she continued, heading over to a heated sideboard that had to be portable because it looked identical to the one he’d seen in the living room the night before—scarred leg and all. “I wait until everyone else is finished and take whatever’s left over.”

“Since everyone else is just me, would it be completely awkward for you if I asked you to join me?” he asked without any remorse at all. “It being Christmas Eve and all, and I won’t eat much if I think I’m taking food from your mouth and…”

Hands in his pockets, feeling plain good for a moment, he was prepared to go on and on.

“Okay!” With a grin, she smiled at him. “But only because it’s a holiday and I’d hate to eat alone, too, if I were you.”

While ordinarily Craig would more than bristle at being a target of pity—even in play—if it meant Marybeth was joining him, he’d accept as much pity as she wanted to hand out.

And then, minutes later, as she glanced at his hand, her smile faded.

“You’re wearing a wedding ring this morning.”

They were just starting the first course—a concoction of fresh fruit and yogurt and he didn’t know what, served in parfait glasses. Or rather, he was. She sat, slightly slouched, frowning, her spoon poised above her dish, watching him.

He nodded. “This is great. Delicious. Did you make it yourself?”

“Yeah. I do all my own cooking. From scratch and I use freshly picked fruits and vegetables whenever possible.” Her voice had no inflection at all.

She took a bite. Chewed, her gaze distant.

“I’m married.”

There. That was done.

“I didn’t notice the ring last night.”

“I didn’t have it on.”

She didn’t say anything. He felt like an A-class jerk.

“Jenny and I…we’re…”

What was he doing? This woman was a stranger to him. Or should be.

“It’s okay,” she said, jumping up in spite of the fact that she’d only taken the one bite. “I don’t mean to pry. I’ll bring in the casserole. Do you prefer sausage, bacon or both?”

“Sausage, please.”

And she was gone, leaving him brimming with frustration at his own inadequacies.

He was no less fretful when his beautiful hostess returned less than two minutes later, two plates laden with an egg-and-sausage concoction, some kind of rosemary-looking potatoes and garnished with more fruit, in her hands.

“Jenny’s older than I am.” He gave her the most innocuous fact of his life. “By five years.”

“Oh.” She sat. Cut a piece of casserole. Put it in her mouth. Chewed. “Coffee?” She held up the pot.

Shaking his head, Craig watched her take another bite. Watched her lips.

And attacked his own breakfast.

“We’re both artists,” he offered, several minutes into the meal when all he could think about was touching his hostess’ hands to see if they were as soft as they looked.

“Painters?”