Kicking and screaming and thrashing, she pounded his back with her free hand. She dug her fingernails into the palm of his cuffed hand. She landed a pointed toe on his thigh.
“Ouch!”
Finally he set Little Orphan Tiffany down next to his car, and immediately raised both her flailing arms over her head and held them on the car roof by the wrists with his cuffed hand. He pressed his lower body against hers to keep her from escaping or doing him more bodily harm, not an easy task with both of their pillow-bellies.
Angry himself now and sick of this game which had gotten way out of hand, he tore off his disguise, tossing the cap and beard and wig to the snow-covered ground. Then he yanked off her beard. Finally he got his first good gander at his surprising Santa.
Time seemed to stand still.
An ethereal silence surrounded them as snowflakes as big as golfballs came down, landing with feather lightness on her mane of curly red hair, in her eyelashes…on her parted lips.
She no longer struggled. In fact, she stared at him with equal awe.
Tears burned in his eyes for reasons he couldn’t explain. All he knew was that the tight knot surrounding his heart—a knot he hadn’t even realized was there—began to unravel. And he felt as light as the snowflakes caressing his face. And hopeful.
It was so strange.
“Are you an angel? A Christmas mirage?” he murmured. Lowering his lips toward hers—those luscious lips that had drawn him from the start, he sighed.
Instead of protesting, she arched upward, meeting him halfway. “I’m no angel.”
“Thank God.”
Against his lips she whispered, “I’m not really a nun, either.”
“I know,” he smiled, then repeated, “Thank God.”
“You shouldn’t kiss me,” she demurred even as she parted her lips. “My Christmas Curse might rub off on you.”
“Rub all you want, babe,” he growled, grinding his big belly against hers. “I’m cursed already.”
“What’s that hard thing?” she asked suddenly.
He laughed.
“Not that. Under your jacket.”
“A bulletproof vest.”
She raised a brow. “So, you weren’t afraid of me at all.”
“Oh, I was afraid of what you’d do. I still am.”
She smiled enigmatically, as if he’d better be.
But he couldn’t think about that now. All he could think about was this tempting redhead in his arms.
Cupping her jaw with his free hand to hold her in place, he slanted his lips over hers, shaping her for his kiss, relishing the contrast of cool lips and hot breath. Hard and demanding, soft and cajoling.
She whimpered.
He groaned.
Powerful, bone-melting sensations overwhelmed him. Suddenly he wanted so many things, and they all seemed to revolve around this woman—this stranger. Pulling away slightly, he studied her face—misty eyes locked with his in question, mouth already swollen from his kisses. Their warm breaths, panting, frosted in the cold air between them. Hearts thudding in unison, they tried to comprehend what was happening.
In that instant, he understood. Blood hammered in his ears as the realization hit Luke like a thunderbolt.
I love her, he thought, disbelieving, at first. Then he smiled, happier than he’d been in ages. I love her.
He’d never believed in love at first sight before. He did now. I love her. He couldn’t stop saying the words in his head.
Should he tell her?
No, not yet. He didn’t want to scare her away. Besides, he needed more time to think. He rolled the words around in his mind with a joyous relish: I love her.
“I feel weird,” she said, as if reading his mind.
“So do I, babe. So do I.”
She blinked at him. “It must be the Christmas Curse.”
He shook his head vehemently. “No, it’s a Christmas Miracle.”
Chapter Three
“Are you still cold?” Luke asked the shivering woman next to him as he pulled out onto the highway. Lord, how he wanted to stop the car and take her in his arms, but he didn’t have the right…yet. She already appeared scared to death of him. Instead, he turned up the heat.
Jessie—that was the name of the woman he loved, Jessica Jones…she’d just told him so—shook her head and bit her bottom lip in concentration. She was probably planning another heist. Perhaps a cathouse this time, he thought with a chuckle. God, I love her.
Or maybe she was having second thoughts about their killer kiss.
Uh-oh. No, he wouldn’t let himself think that. Now that he’d found a woman he could love, after all these years, he wouldn’t let her go. She would love him. He was determined.
But he was nervous, too, and that was something new for him. For the past five years, ever since Ginny died, he’d had more women than he could handle. But he hadn’t cared about a single one of them.
Now that he did care, would he be rejected?
Luke clenched the steering wheel tighter. He had to believe that everything would work out all right. God didn’t hand out miracles and then yank them away. Nope, all he needed was a little time.
Luke considered his next move as he drove back to the Piggly Jiggly parking lot. Jessie insisted she had to get the van and return to “Clara’s House,” mission unaccomplished. Alone.
Hah! Not if I have anything to do with it.
He could barely see through the wildly swinging windshield wipers which couldn’t keep pace with the falling snow. It would be a white Christmas this year, after all, if this blizzard kept up. He’d already tried using the storm as an excuse to keep Jessie with him, but she’d refused adamantly, pointing out that the van had snow tires.
Luckily they’d been able to find the handcuff key under the back seat floor mat, after some amusing calisthenics necessitated by their bound wrists. Amusing to him, at least. In the close confines, with all her squirming, he’d gotten a real good idea of what kind of body his Santa babe hid under her suit—tall, curvy, not too lean. Perfect.
So now he and Jessie sat unattached for the first time in hours. And Luke felt as if a mile separated them, not three feet.
He reached over and twined his fingers with hers.
Startled, she glanced first at their linked hands, then at him, questioning. He hoped she got the silent message he was unable to speak out loud, just yet.
Fear flashed through her wide doe-brown eyes for a moment—of what, he wasn’t sure—but he suspected she was about to pull away.