Her Holiday Man Read online

  “I’m Will,” he said. “Gail’s son.”

  “Christina Forrester,” she said, extending her hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

  His hand closed around hers, enveloping it in tough, callused skin. “You and your son are big on manners.”

  She wasn’t sure if that was meant to be a compliment or an insult, so she withdrew her hand and gave him a polite smile. “Manners are the foundation of a civilized society.”

  That eyebrow rose a little bit higher. “If you say so.”

  He made her nervous, though she couldn’t put her finger on why. The frown, maybe. He certainly wasn’t as smoothly sophisticated as the men she’d known in her life. He should have moved out of her way immediately, for one thing, and he shouldn’t be looking at her in a way that made her feel self-conscious about her blond ponytail and slightly coffee-stained QuickStop polo shirt. She hadn’t yet gotten the hang of managing the coffee station without spilling some on herself.

  “Mommy!”

  Christina turned in time to catch Nathaniel, who came running out of the living room to launch himself at her. “Hey, how was school today?”

  “Good. It was pizza day!”

  Christina laughed and squeezed him. “Definitely a good day.”

  Since losing their personal chef—who Christina had to admit had been an arrogant food snob—and starting first grade, Nathaniel had discovered school pizza and had declared it to be the best thing he’d ever eaten.

  “What’s for supper? You’re late.”

  “I know I’m late. We’ll have hot dogs because they’re quick.”

  “You are not having hot dogs,” Gail said from behind her son.

  Christina was grateful when Will finally moved out of her way. The look he’d given her had been disconcerting and she moved forward until he was no longer in her line of vision. “I apologize for being late tonight, Gail. It seemed like everything and everybody ran behind today.”

  “Those days happen, hon, which is why I keep my famous spaghetti sauce in the freezer. When Will showed up, I put the water on to boil and we’re all going to have spaghetti for supper.”

  “You want to spend time with your son while he’s home. Nathaniel and I will get out of the way.”

  “It’s not while I’m home this time,” Will said from behind her. “I’m just home now. For good.”

  “Isn’t that wonderful?” Gail asked, happiness seeming to radiate from her.

  Christina nodded and glanced over her shoulder. “Welcome home, then.”

  He didn’t smile, but only gave a short nod of his head, so Christina turned away. It was hard to tell if he was an unfriendly sort in general or if he didn’t like her in particular.

  “I love Grammy Gail’s basghetti,” Nathaniel said, tugging at her hand. “Please, Mommy?”

  She didn’t want to sit at a table and share a meal with Will, but she knew Gail and Nathaniel well enough to know she wasn’t getting out of it. “I love her spaghetti, too. Only if you’re sure you don’t mind, Gail.”

  The older woman scoffed. “I never mind having this rascal at my dinner table. Especially since he does such a good job setting it.”

  Nathaniel grinned and grabbed his special stool out of the corner so he could reach the counter. Napkins first. He carried them to the table and folded each so they were rectangles instead of squares. Then he took the plates Gail handed him and set them around the kitchen table. There was a formal dining room, but Gail preferred eating in her kitchen. It was more homey, which was a sentiment Christina agreed with. She watched her son put silverware at each place setting, each item placed precisely as their staff had done back when they had staff. It made her proud and sad at the same time.

  “He obviously feels at home here,” Will said.

  Christina turned to face him, once again unable to interpret his tone. Was it a simple pleasantry or was it a criticism of his mother watching her son? “He loves spending time with your mom.”

  She refused to give him more of the story, especially with Nathaniel in the room. There was no doubt the minute she left, Will would grill Gail about their relationship with her, if he hadn’t already. She didn’t know how long he’d been there, of course. But she was coming to the realization his somewhat intimidating manner probably stemmed from a suspicion she’d somehow latched on to his mother and was taking advantage of her.

  All she could do was hope Gail would set him straight on that because after all Christina and Nathaniel had been through, losing her friendship would be a hard blow.

  * * *

  By the end of the meal, Will found himself relaxing and he even enjoyed listening to the chitchat at the table between the women and the boy. He still wasn’t sure what Christina’s story was, but the honest affection between her and his mother was obvious.

  He figured Christina was pushing thirty, which meant she was only a couple of years younger than him, though most of the time he felt older than thirty-two. Her bangs tended to obscure her blue eyes and the hair at the end of her ponytail was a paler blond than the rest of it. A polo shirt with the QuickStop logo and jeans emphasized her slim figure and, though her fingernails were short and bare, they were perfectly shaped and filed.

  When Christina caught him staring at her and gave him a questioning look, he turned his attention back to twirling spaghetti onto his fork. He much preferred listening to conversations to being part of them.

  He hadn’t missed that flash of sympathy in her eyes when she first arrived and realized who he was. The guy whose pregnant wife was killed by a drunk driver and just two weeks before Christmas, poor guy. As if losing his wife and unborn child would have been so much less tragic in March.

  For months after the funeral, that look and the murmurs of poor guy had followed him everywhere, until he’d thrown his stuff in his truck and headed to places where nobody knew he was that guy. Virginia. Alabama. A rough spot in Daytona Beach, where he learned he couldn’t drink and party the pain away. Texas. Missouri. He worked odd jobs in diners and garages and for landscapers to earn just enough money to keep him going.

  Then he landed in Ohio. It would never feel like home, but at least it looked like home, and he was starting to admit to himself he missed New Hampshire. Then his sister had called him at six-thirty one morning to tell him their father had gotten out of bed and just collapsed onto the braided throw rug. Will had just been home to visit the family for Easter and he’d always be grateful he’d so recently sat on the porch with his dad to share a six-pack and some stories.

  The trip home for the funeral had been brutal, though. The grief of his mother and sister only heightened his own, and the sympathy from friends had been nothing short of suffocating. It had dredged up the pain of losing Emily and their baby, mixed it up with the pain of losing his dad, and sent him back to Ohio. It was only when he’d come back in the fall to be there when they placed the headstone that his mother’s loss had punched through his walls and he’d realized she was alone and winter was coming.

  Sure, she could hire somebody to plow her driveway and rake the snow from the roof, but would she? She’d never liked driving in the snow all that much, letting her husband run her around to do errands in the winter, so a stretch of storms could leave her with no groceries. Her tears when he left had been the last straw.

  It didn’t seem she had been alone, though. His mother practically lit up when Nathaniel was in the room and taking care of the boy not only gave her something to do, but something to look forward to each day. If Christina and her son made his mother happy, that was enough for him.

  “Will, you’re being awfully quiet,” his mother said, and all eyes turned to him.

  “You taught me not to talk with my mouth full, so you can’t serve me the best spaghetti in three counties and then expect me to have a conversation.”
r />   They all laughed, but it was Christina’s laughter that caught his attention. It was light, almost musical, and he liked it. Her gaze met his, full of warmth, and he felt the first stirring of physical attraction.

  It was hard not to respond to the amusement on her face, so he found himself smiling at her before yanking his attention back to the spaghetti on his plate. He was supposed to be attracted to long-legged women with the promise of one night of fun in their eyes, not single moms who lived across the street and made for good company at his mother’s kitchen table. He hadn’t had an emotional response to a woman since Emily died and he had no intention of starting now.

  Throw in the facts his mother was attached to Christina and she had a child, and the neighbor was totally off limits.

  “Only three counties?” Christina shook her head. “I can’t believe there’s better spaghetti anywhere in the state.”

  “It’s hard enough to keep her humble about her cooking,” Will said. “And I’ve heard there’s an Italian restaurant in Salem that’s amazing.”

  His mother scoffed. “Ugly rumors.”

  Christina laughed and, once again, Will felt that pull of attraction and tried to ignore it by stuffing a forkful of pasta in his mouth. As soon as his plate was clean, he was on his feet. He rinsed his plate before putting it and his silverware in the dishwasher.

  “I should start getting settled in,” he said. “Thanks for dinner, Mom. And it was nice to meet you, Christina and Nathaniel.”

  Then he got the hell out of there. But as he walked into the garage and faced the steps to his apartment, his steps slowed until he was barely moving.

  Shortly after Will had proposed to Emily, he and his dad had remodeled the storage space over the three-car garage into a one-bedroom apartment for the newlyweds. It was understood that when they started a family, the living arrangement would switch. Will and Emily would take over the care and expense of the main house, freeing his parents to start wintering in Florida while keeping the apartment for summers in New Hampshire.

  Emily hadn’t wanted to take on a project like that while expecting, though, so they’d decided to wait until the baby was about a year old and would start needing more space to switch the households.

  Needless to say, it hadn’t happened that way and Will went up the stairs to what was supposed to be his family’s starter home. His mom went in every few weeks to dust and vacuum and generally freshen the place up, so he knew he wouldn’t have to do anything but carry his stuff up and put it away.

  The staircase opened into a narrow hallway. To the right was the bathroom and bedroom. Straight ahead was the small kitchen, and to the left was the living room, which had a door to the exterior stairs.

  There was very little of Emily left in the apartment. Their wedding portrait hung in the living room, and there were a few framed photographs on the shelf over the sofa. Almost everything in the kitchen had come from their wedding gift registry, which she’d definitely been in charge of. Most of the decorative choices were hers, though she’d stuck with Will’s preference for neutral tones.

  With the exception of a few special things in her hope chest at the foot of their bed, most of her personal belongings were gone. Her parents had driven over from Vermont and helped him choose what to keep, what they wanted to keep, and what they’d donate. It had been too soon and he hadn’t been ready, but his mother-in-law’s grief had been awful and she’d needed to do it. So he’d done it, spent a few nights in an apartment that felt stripped of what little he’d had left of his wife, and then hit the road.

  It didn’t smell like her anymore, he realized. Years and his mother’s cleaning products had given the place a generic smell, like a hotel. Taking a deep breath of the bland air, he walked across the living room and twisted the deadbolt to unlock the exterior door.

  It was time to move back into the life he’d run away from.

  Chapter Two

  By the time Christina was finished helping Gail clean up, over the other woman’s objections, it was almost Nathaniel’s bedtime, so they said their good-nights and crossed the street back to their own house.

  The entire downstairs of the Cape probably would have fit in the master bedroom suite of their home in Connecticut and the furnishings weren’t her usual style, but every night when she walked through the kitchen door, she was so grateful to have the house it almost brought tears to her eyes.

  “I like Will,” Nathaniel said, hanging his backpack on the hook by the door.

  “He seems nice.” A little closed off, maybe, but polite enough. “Did you get your homework done at Grammy Gail’s?”

  “Yup.”

  She smiled as she pulled the elastic from her hair with a sigh of relief. The yup was new since he’d started school here. Before it would have been a yes, ma’am, but she didn’t correct him. He was learning to fit in with his classmates and he was happy. The yup just didn’t bother her that much.

  “Can I skip taking a shower tonight?” When she gave him a stern look, he gave her the big eyes in return. “I didn’t get dirty today! Not even a little sweaty. And we ate supper late. Please, Mom?”

  She ruffled his hair. “Okay, but no video games.”

  He whooped and took off running, probably for his books. They didn’t have cable, so they went to the library once a week to check out DVDs and books. She’d used the last of the money she’d been able to spare for lawyers getting the judge to agree Nathaniel’s personal belongings were exempt from the fire sale, so he still had his toys and gaming system and his iPod Touch, at least.

  She’d taken most of his wardrobe to a consignment store in a well-to-do community nearby and gotten a good-sized credit for the name-brand clothes, which she’d used to get him plenty of jeans and the kinds of shirts the kids around here wore.

  Yup, she thought. They were doing okay.

  A beep caught her attention and she froze, wondering what it could be. She waited, listening intently, and whatever it was beeped again.

  Wandering from room to room, she finally found the source of the sound. The smoke detector at the top of the stairs was beeping. She put her hands on her hips and stared up at the thing as Nathaniel came out of his room.

  “What are you doing?”

  “The smoke detector is beeping.”

  “Is there a fire?”

  “No, honey. If there’s a fire, the alarms are really loud. They don’t beep like this.” She put her hand on his shoulder. “I went all through the house and there’s no smoke. I think it’s telling us it’s not working right.”

  “Should we go outside?”

  She shook her head. “None of the other ones are beeping, so they’re okay, I think. I’ll ask Grammy Gail if I can use her computer tomorrow and figure out why it’s beeping.”

  Every day seemed to bring a new challenge—learning to do things people must have handled for her in the past. At first, she’d found it exhausting and even depressing, but she’d learned to embrace the hurdles. Every thing she learned to do for herself was a victory and helped ensure nobody would ever be in a position to impact her or her son’s lives ever again.

  “No sense in watching it beep,” she said. “Get ready for bed, kiddo.”

  Once he’d changed into his pajamas and brushed his teeth, she stretched out next to him on the twin bed and read him a story. Usually he tried to read along with her as practice, but he was quiet tonight. She hoped he wasn’t worried about the smoke detector beeping.

  She got up to put the book away and then turned, expecting to find him curled up on his side with the stuffed moose wearing a New Hampshire T-shirt she’d bought him while they were living in the motel.

  Instead, he was sitting up, his expression sad. “If Will does my chores, will Grammy Gail still watch me after school?”

  The anxiety in his voi
ce tugged at her heart. Her son had lost practically everything and everybody in his life and had rolled with the punches better than Christina could have hoped. Losing Gail would devastate them both.

  “Grammy Gail lives in a big house and she has plenty of chores for everybody.” She bopped the tip of his nose with her finger. “And she gives you chores because she wants you to be a responsible young man, but she also likes having you visit after school because she likes you.”

  And just like that, his anxiety was gone. “I like her, too.”

  “So do I.” She kissed his forehead and then handed him his moose. “Time to sleep.”

  After tucking him in, Christina turned off his light and went down the hall to her room. Time to get out of her work clothes and take a shower. Then she could curl up with a library book until she got sleepy. She usually went to bed shortly after Nathaniel did because they were early risers. She often worked late enough that suppers and the evening routine could be hectic, so they always had a nice, long breakfast together before she put him on the bus to school.

  She’d lucked out with the QuickStop job, though. Chelsea, one of her co-workers, was married to a police officer who worked weekends, so she liked having Mondays and Tuesdays off with her husband. Even though she was the “new girl,” Christina got to have weekends off with her son and tomorrow they got to sleep in.

  Without turning on the light, she went around the bed to the chair she’d draped her bathrobe over. There was no master bathroom in their little house. She had to go down the hallway to the only bathroom and hope Nathaniel didn’t have to go pee during the ten minutes she was in there. Having one bathroom was one of the more interesting, if minor, challenges in their new life.

  As she passed the window, movement caught her eye outside, and Christina looked through the gap in the curtains in time to see Will stretching to reach into the bed of his pickup for a box.