Headlights from the driveway drew her gaze downward.
"OH. MY. GOD."
Matthew could not believe that in a few short hours, the tumbledown farmhouse had turned into the tackiest display he'd ever seen. Lights lined the roof, up into the peak and down and along the edges. They lined every window, painting their borders in color. They outlined the door, twisted candy-cane-like over the railings that flanked the front steps, and marched all the way around the front porch. It looked like something out of a children's theme park.
He shut off the car, and opened the door to get out.
"Hello!" someone called.
Slowly, he lifted his gaze, following the sound of that voice, gazing through the tumbling jumbo-sized snowflakes until he saw her. That crazy, good-looking hippie was on the roof! His stomach knotted up. "What the hell are you doing?"
"Decorating." She shook her head. "As if that's not obvious. Do me a favor and turn your headlights back on?"
"Huh?"
"Car. Headlights. On." She thumped a fist on her chest. "Jane need light."
He almost smiled. Almost. He stopped himself barely in time. Instead he leaned back into the car and flipped on the headlights. They didn't help much, he imagined, but a little. She bent then and tugged, and he saw reindeer flying. Well, not actually flying. They were sort of rising, as she pulled them up by the rope.
And the snow, he thought, was coming down harder. "Look, it's gonna get very slick up there very fast. You need to come down before you break your neck."
"I promise I won't break my neck."
"You will if you fall."
"Don't make me think about falling. I wasn't even thinking about falling. Now you've gone and put falling into my head, which makes it possible."
"Huh?"
"What, you don't believe in quantum physics?" She turned, the rope slung over her shoulder now, and dragged the reindeer higher up onto the roof. Then she sat on the peak, one leg over each side. A position he thought was much more stable than her former one. So he relaxed a little. She stood the reindeer up, bending over their feet and fastening whatever device she'd rigged to hold them there. It worked great. She was more than a hippie, she was a female MacGyver, he thought. Then she made her way back to the edge and sat down beside the ladder, her oversized boots, which looked like furry moonboots to him, dangling over the side. She was holding something in one mittened hand.
"Would you do me a favor and toss me the business end of that extension cord?" She pointed as she said it, and he saw the heavy-duty cord twined at the bottom of the ladder, one end snaked toward the house, and he saw that it was already plugged into a heavy-duty, outdoor outlet.
He sighed. "I can't believe I'm going to be a party to this."
"What?"
"Nothing," he muttered. He went to the cord, unwound a length, and tossed the end up to her.
She caught it easily, a huge smile on her face. "Ready?" she asked.
"Not exactly."
She plugged it in. Santa's sleigh lit up like the runway lights at Detroit Metro. His reins glowed, his sleigh's entire shape was lined in lights, and they twinkled from key points on his suit. Every reindeer's harness glowed, illuminating its face. All nine of them. The traditional eight, plus one riding point with a glowing red nose.
"Happy birthday, Jesus," he muttered.
"How does it look?" she called. She was standing now, right on the edge, turning her back to him to try to get a better look at the display. He lifted his hands in a "stop" kind of gesture, and grunted the opening syllable of a stern warning. But that was as far as he got before she fell.
He tried to catch her, but only resulted in breaking her fall a bit.
She landed on her back right at his feet.
Her eyes were closed. Not in an unconscious sort of a way, but in an "I'm scrunching up my entire face in agony" kind of a way.
"Ouch," she said. And then her face unscrunched and her eyes popped open. "Isn't this the place where you're supposed to be dropping to your knees, and lifting my broken body up and asking in a desperate, emotion-choked voice if I'm okay?"
He shrugged and remained standing. "You okay?"
"Yeah."
He extended a hand. "Help you up?"
"My hero." She clasped his hand with her mitten, and he braced while she pulled herself to her feet. "You're a romantic devil, aren't you?"
He chose to ignore her comment. "I told you you were going to fall," he said instead.
"And that's why I did. Thanks a lot."
"You deserved it. This poor house would hide its face in humiliation if it could."
"I beg your pardon! This house loves to dress up and show off. It hasn't had the chance for a while. And I happen to think it looks great!" She stood staring at it, arms crossed over her chest, and then turned to look at him again. "Why are you here, anyway?"
"The place is for sale. I was thinking about buying it, and the Realtor refused to show it to me tonight. So I thought maybe you could give me the grand tour yourself."
She narrowed her eyes on him. "My ass hurts," she said. "I really don't feel like taking that giant ladder down and stashing it back in the shed."
He lifted his brows. "Uh-huh. And if I were willing to do that for you?"
"Then I'd ask you to bring in some firewood. Enough to last overnight."
"This is getting to be a pricey tour. And if I do both those things?"
"Then I'll give you the grand tour, and tell you everything I know about this house. And I know most everything about it. I grew up here."
He nodded. "Deal."
"Cool. I'm Holly, by the way."
"Of course you are."
She frowned at him, and he quickly said, "Matthew."
"Nice to meet you, Matthew." She looked up at the sky. "Man, I hope this isn't lake effect."
He looked up, too. "I heard that term in town, but then someone said it was only going to be a few inches."
"Phew. That's a relief. Tell you what, I'll put on some hot cocoa. You like hot cocoa?"
He didn't. It was too damn festive and Christmassy. But he didn't answer her, because his grumpy "no" might have made her change her happy little mind about letting him in at all.
The trucker opened the door of his rig when he arrived at his destination, in Binghamton. It was snowing there, and on a whim, he snapped up the old felt fedora and dropped it onto his head before climbing down from his rig.
But the wind had other ideas. It scooped the hat right off his head, andblew it crazily into the air, even as he gave chase, snapping his hands together overhead in an effort to catch it.
It was no use, though. The hat rose higher, and then sailed in a way he'd never seen anything that big sail before.
Shaking his head, he watched it go, and said, "Damn, that hat seems to have a mind of its own."
Five
HOLLY WENT INSIDE, RUBBING HER HANDS TOGETHER AND heading straight for the fireplace. Bending, she added the last two sticks of firewood in the house. She'd brought in only a couple of arms full--just enough to take the chill off and chase the dampness out of the house while she was outside stringing lights.
She tugged off her mittens and set them on the mantle with their ends hanging over the front to dry. Shrugging out of her coat, which wasn't damp at all, she hung it on a peg by the door, then she sat on the hearthstone to tug off her boots, and put them beside her, as close to the fire as was safe.
Sitting there, her back to the flames, she looked around what had once been the family living room. For a moment, she was swept into the past, to one Christmas morning long ago. The smell of pine, the twinkling lights, as she and her sister pounded down the stairs at about a quarter to dawn. The fireplace crackling, just like it was now. The presents, and paper and bows, and the candy canes on the tree.
Something tightened in her chest and she had a little trouble taking a breath. "Why did you call me back here?" she whispered.
Matthew came in, loaded do
wn with more firewood than she could have carried in three trips, deposited it next to the fireplace, and then bent over and started stacking it more neatly.
Holly looked at him, then looked upward, her brows raised. "Really?"
"Really what?" he asked.
"I, uh--wasn't talking to you."
He frowned, looking around the place as if expecting to see someone else there. She shook her head, and crossed the room to where he stood. "Never mind. You just keep bringing the wood in. I'll take care of piling it neatly." And as she said it, she reached up to brush fresh white snow from his shoulders with her hand. "Looks like it's really coming down out there."
Her hand hopped from a pair of what she'd discovered to be nicely broad, strong shoulders, to his dark hair, where she continued brushing snowflakes away. But only for a moment, because he went very still and his eyes kind of slid around until they met hers.
Melted chocolate eyes. Yum, she thought.
Something crackled, and her hand went still in his hair. Whoa, that was something. And it was something potent, and delicious and exciting. And a little ridiculous. She didn't even know this man--and what she did know about him didn't exactly scream compatability. He drove an expensive car, too fast, was impatient, and thought her Christmas lights were gaudy. What was to like about any of that?
Her hand, she realized, was still buried in his hair. She drew it away, laughed a little to break the tension. "You ought to have a hat."
"Did, once," he said.
She frowned, tilted her head, and searched his face. There was something lost in his eyes when he said that.
He turned and headed back to the door.
Holly watched him go, then she felt the cold that rushed in as he went out, and rubbed her arms. She licked her lips. Was he the reason she'd been drawn back here? Was she supposed to meet him for some reason? Were they--nah. She added a few more chunks to the fire to distract herself from thinking along those lines, and got busy stacking the rest of the wood.
Twenty minutes later, they had enough wood to last for at least two nights, stacked neatly beside the fireplace. Matthew was shaking the bark and snow off his expensive black coat and taking off his boots by then. At least he hadn't dressed like a city slicker in a Porsche. He wore jeans, Timberland boots, heavy socks underneath them, a nice sweater over another shirt. The sweater was brown, the shirt, pale blue--at least that was the color of the collar.
He hung the coat by the front door, next to hers, then carried his boots over to set them beside hers near the fire. She'd already swept up the trail of bark and snow after he'd unloaded the last armful of wood, and wiped the damp spots from the floor with a handful of paper towels.
"Thank you," she said. "You really didn't have to do that, you know. I would have shown you around the house anyway."
"Oh, sure, now you tell me." He took a seat on the hearth, where she'd been sitting earlier.
She ran into the kitchen for the steaming mugs of cocoa she'd left out there, and brought them in. She handed him one and then sat down beside him.
"So," she said. "Grand tour begins in ten minutes. After you've had time to rest up, warm up, and drink your cocoa." She took a sip of her own. "Meanwhile, tell me what a guy like you wants with a tumbledown old fixer-upper in the middle of the booming metropolis of Oswego, aka 'Snowbelt Central.'"
He sipped his cocoa as she watched his face. A face that seemed get more attractive every time she looked at it. Hell. He lifted his eyebrows as he licked his luscious lips. "This is actually good."
"You sound surprised."
He shrugged and sipped some more. "I buy lots of old houses like this one. They usually sell for exceptionally low prices, 'cause they don't look like much. But if it's structurally sound, and the only work it needs is cosmetic, I usually double my money."
She blinked. "Double? Really?"
"Sometimes better."
She frowned, looking around at the house as she enjoyed her cocoa. "So what would you do to fix it up?"
"It's pretty much the same with every house. You slap on fresh Sheetrock, a couple of coats of paint, put some kind of flooring down, whatever looks good and costs least. Replace any windows and doors that need it. But only the ones that need it. You make sure the wiring and plumbing are up to par, maybe upgrade the heating system. Then you go to the outside, pop on some vinyl siding, hire a crew to spend a couple of days sprucing up the lawn, make sure the roof's intact, and voila. It looks like a brand-new house."
"And how long does all that work take you?" She was thinking in terms of years.
He said, "Me? It doesn't take me any time at all. I hire contractors to do it. A job like this one--maybe three months, tops." He looked at her face and said, "Why are you frowning so hard?"
She tried to ease the muscles in her face, which had scrunched up into what must be a fairly unattractive scowl. "It just sounds so...cold. So impersonal. I mean, do you even pick the colors?"
"Of course I do. Siding's white. Interior, eggshell."
"Blaaah!" She made the sound long and expressive and stuck out her tongue as she emitted it.
"You, uh--have something caught in your throat?"
"You know I don't. God, the thought of this place--thisplace--of all places being sided in white and painted...I can't even say it."
"Eggshell," he repeated. "Or maybe ivory."
"It's hideous."
"Well, I can see where the person who put up the lightshow from hell would see it that way, but really, plainly decorated places sell faster and bring more."
"Plain, maybe. Decorated? No. White siding and ivory paint do not count as decorating."
"Clearly not to you." He nodded toward the window, where multicolored flashes were turning the glass pane and the snowflakes beyond it red, then blue, then green, then yellow.
"Man, look at it snow." She slugged down the last of her cocoa, and got to her feet.
He did the same.
"Well," she said, turning, "where to begin. I guess you've figured out that this is the living room."
"Yes, that much is obvious. The picture window is going to be a selling point."
"Mmm. As would the plank floors. Dad was always going to sand them off and refinish them. Seven coats of poly, he used to say. He never got to it, but--"
"Vinyl flooring would be faster. Probably cheaper, too."
"They're maple," she said. "Maple floors are rare. Probably would be another...selling point."
"It's a thought." He examined the wide, worn-looking planks that made up the floor at the moment.
She ran her palms over the walls. "The Sheetrock does need replacing. But after sitting here unheated for so long--"
"It's to be expected."
"The sofa used to be here, by this wall. Most of the year there was a big old antique stand in front of that window, all covered in Mom's knicknacks. But once Thanksgiving passed, we'd move the table out, and that's where the Christmas tree went."
She turned. "There was a chair there, another one here, love seat over there. And the mantle was cluttered with pictures of my mom and dad and Aunt Sheila and Noelle and me. At least, it was most of the time. During the holidays, they got moved, too, and the mantle hosted Mom's Christmas village--until the collection got too big for it. That was the year Noelle was born."
"And then what?" he asked, sounding amused.
"Then we got a second dining room table. A giant one." She led him into the dining room as she spoke. It was just a big empty room now. Same plank floors, and worn-looking walls. "The one we used for actual dining was on this side of the room. And the one on the other side was Christmastown, USA. Mom would cover the table in that white, sparkly fabric that looks like fluffy fake snow. All her little buildings would be set up, just so. The church, the general store, the houses and shops, the ice-skating rink, the little miniature carolers that really sang. And there was a train that wound and twisted through the whole thing, with Santa in an engineer's hat, and a whistle th
at really blew."
"Wow."
It wasn't, she thought, an impressed wow. It was more of an "I-had-no-idea-people-were-so-sappy" sort of an exclamation.
She looked at him, awaiting a comment. He shifted as if slightly uncomfortable, then said, "I think the woodwork around the windows can be salvaged. That's a plus."
"Oh joy. Oh rapture." She said it in a deliberate monotone. "Kitchen next, I need more cocoa."
"Yeah, me, too," he said. "Make mine a double."
SHE SIPPED HER COCOA AS SHE LED HIM THROUGH THE REST of the house, filling every room with stories about her happy, idyllic childhood, and it began to seem as if every major event in her life was linked, somehow, to the holidays. Every Christmas memory ended with, "And that was the year Daddy got his raise." Or "And that was the year I learned to ride a bike." And so on.
She was a cheerful little thing, he had to give her that. Cheerful people, in his considered opinion, were only so because they didn't understand hardship. If you knew what life was really about, you couldn't go dancing through it with a butterfly net in one hand and an ice cream sundae in the other. Life sucked. It made you hard, once you saw that. This little thing, though pretty--okay, freaking gorgeous--and friendly, hadn't seen anything yet. Give it time. See how long her positive attitude bull lasted once she'd tasted the grit of real life.
She'd finished the tour. They were on the second floor, where she'd just given him a painstaking description of how she'd decorated her baby sister's room for the holiday with a miniature tree she'd picked out and decorated all by herself. It seems the young Noelle hated to go to sleep at night because she loved looking at the big tree downstairs and its twinkling lights so much. So little Holly had used her allowance money to purchase a small tree and a string of lights, which she had then erected in little Noelle's bedroom.
It was all so damn special, he thought with an inner grimace.
And then she added, "That was the Christmas they died."
They'd been standing there in that final room, which had been a toddler's bedroom, when she said it, and Matthew thought the bottom fell right out of his stomach.
He stared at her, and tried to speak, and thought he must have heard her wrong. "They...who?"