A Home for Christmas (3 page)

“Oh.” She seemed surprised. “You live here alone?”

“Yep. Just me and the mice.” He smiled. “They're too smart for traps. I'm in desperate need of a cat.”

“It's an awfully large place for just one person.”

He leaned an arm against the porch railing as he watched her move to the next bush. “Well, I hope to fill it up with about half a dozen kids some day.”

There was that surprised look again, except this one held an element of shock. “Do you have someone lined up to supply those for you? Or were you planning to adopt?”

“Well,” he rubbed the stubble lining his chin wishing he'd shaved, “I'd like to fall head over heels in love first. Then get married. You know, manage it the old-fashioned way.”

She didn't comment or look up at him, and he wondered . . . ”How 'bout you? Do you have kids?”

“No.”

He wanted to ask about a husband, but figured that would be too forward. She didn't wear a wedding band or engagement ring. That was encouraging, but she could be one of those modern types who didn't go for the sort of relationship where the woman wore her man's ring and took his name.

“I guess being a doctor keeps you pretty busy.” Probably too busy for a relationship of any kind. He thought of Doc Prescott, the town's doctor. He'd never married. Doctors had a lot of demands on their time.

“Yes,” she agreed, still working at the lights.

“What's your specialty?”

“I'm an internist. Finished.”

He'd been watching her face again and not paying any attention to her task. “Great.” He straightened away from the railing. “Let's plug 'em in.”

Stepping up onto the porch, he retrieved a long, green extension cord, plugged it into a receptacle, and unwound it as he carried it down to the bushes. He found the end of the cord and plugged in the lights. The miniature, multicolored bulbs twinkled against the dark green bushes.

Janice's smile told him she was pleased with her effort. “Perfect,” Blake confirmed.

“Can I do those over there, too?” She pointed to the bushes across the sidewalk.

“Sure. Use the lights in that pile.”

She retrieved the lights and primly sat on the steps untangling them as she had before. He shook his head. She'd probably never slumped a day in her life. He left her to it as he concentrated on getting the lights up on the house. Plain white lights in strings around the windows and icicle lights in the eaves. His progress was admittedly slowed by frequent glances in his guest's direction.

After they'd been working for some time, he noticed that Janice had allowed herself free rein in the placement of the lights. She'd finished the bushes and had started looping some of the strands with large multicolored bulbs around the porch railing. He didn't mind, but wondered if she was putting lights in places she remembered seeing them when she was a kid.

A car stopped in front the house, and he turned from watching Janice to see who it was.
Great
. Just what he needed. His brother, Cory. Did the guy have radar or what? He stepped out of his red Mercedes sports coupe, dripping designer clothes and pricey cologne.

“Hey, big brother. I see the annual day after Thanksgiving hanging of the lights is under way. Who's your charming assistant?”

Here we go,
Blake thought. He backed down the ladder and made the introductions when he reached the bottom. “This is Dr. Janice Thornton. Janice, this is my brother, Cory Ferguson.”

Cory took Janice's hand and held it entirely too long. “A doctor. Well, now, they sure do make them younger and prettier these days, don't they?”

Blake watched fascinated as Janice pulled her hand away from Cory's and rubbed her palm down her thigh as if trying to remove the feel of him. Blake smiled. He couldn't remember ever meeting a woman who wasn't affected by his brother's good looks and charm.

“What are you doing in town, Cory? I thought you were skiing this weekend.”

“Yes, well, that was the plan.” He eyed Janice like a choice piece of meat at the butcher shop. “Bebe's a little green around the gills and running me ragged fetching things for her. I'm thinking about hiring a nurse.”

Wife number four was pregnant with his brother's first child. A child was the greatest gift a woman could give a man, but to Cory, it was just an inconvenience.

“You stop by for a reason, Cory? Or is this just a social call?”

Janice eyed the two men with open curiosity.

“Mom and Dad asked me to come by today so we could discuss their Will.” Cory turned to Janice.

Here it comes, Blake thought.
The pronouncement
.

“I'm an attorney.”

Janice didn't look particularly impressed. Blake's smile widened.

“So, I was driving by and saw you out here. I just thought I'd stop and say hello.”

Blake nodded. If Cory was fishing for an invitation to stay, he was doomed to disappointment.

They all stood looking at each other for an awkward moment.

“Well,” Cory finally said, “guess I'll get on out to the farm.”

“Give Mom my best. Remind her I'll be by in the morning to help her with her decorations.”

“Sure. A pleasure to meet you, Dr. Thornton.”

Janice nodded, but didn't offer him her hand. Instead she slipped it into her pocket.

“Later, Bro.”

Cory slapped him on the shoulder and then turned to stroll back to his car. Janice and Blake watched until he pulled away from the curb.

“How many siblings do you have?” Janice asked.

“Five. I'm number three. Cory is number four.”

“He looks much older than you,” Janice commented.

He stood a little straighter at hearing her compliment. “There's only thirteen months between us. Mom had us all right together, except for my baby sister. She was a late-life surprise after all us boys.”

“Your mother must be an exceptional woman.”

He smiled down into Janice's upturned face. “She's pretty amazing. How 'bout some lunch?”

Janice glanced at her watch. “Oh, I didn't realize how late it was getting. I'd better be going. I have that appointment to get to, then I should call the hospital. I may need to do rounds later.”

“On a holiday weekend?”

“Someone has to do it, and since I don't have a family, I feel sort of obligated to let my partners spend time with theirs.”

Confirmation. No husband. “That's mighty considerate of you.”

She shrugged and just stood there, making no movement toward her car. Despite her words, she didn't seem in a hurry to leave.

“Maybe you could come back later. I'd hate for you to miss the lighting ceremony after all the hard work you've done. I'm going to be finished in record time, thanks to you.”

She looked up at the house, shielding her eyes from the sun. She wanted to. He could see it in her eyes and in the way she nibbled on her full, lower lip.

“I could make dinner.” Now where had that come from? He should just let her get in her car and drive away. He didn't know much about her, but if he would just think rationally, he'd realize he knew more than enough. She was a city girl. She lived a couple of hours away. She had a demanding, time-consuming job. All that added up to no time for a relationship, especially with someone who enjoyed the laid back, slower pace of a small town. He was at a point in his life when he didn't want or need to waste time on a dead-end relationship based solely on attraction.

But he could dream. He hoped she was tempted. If circumstances were different, he wouldn't mind having the chance to get to know her a little better. To explore the feelings she evoked in him.

“I'm on call. I shouldn't be so far from the hospital.”

Yet she'd spent the entire morning with him, hanging lights. He wondered again what had brought her here. It must have been something pretty compelling to pull her away from work when she was on call. Who in Angel Ridge would be important enough for her to drive all this way?

“It was a pleasure meeting you.”

She looked up at him then. Her slow smile fired his already overwrought senses.

“Likewise.”

She turned to walk away, and he followed, appreciating the view. Her pants hugged her curves in all the right places. When they reached her car, he opened the door for her. She turned and, with her hand beside his on the top of the door, said,

“Thank you for letting me help with the lights. I really enjoyed being here again.”

“Come back by any time.” As the words left his mouth, he told himself that he'd made the offer strictly because of her family connection to the place.

“Thank you.”

She got into the car and turned the key in the ignition. When the engine purred to life, he shut the door and watched her drive away, unsure if he'd ever see her again. He returned to the task of hanging the lights, but his joy in it had gone with his unexpected visitor.

Chapter 2

“Here you are. Come in, come in.”

The elderly man who met Janice at the door of his home-office did not jog one memory in her, despite the fact that he was her great uncle.

She took his hand and kissed his cheek above a downy white beard. “Hello, Uncle Charles.”

“My, you've grown into a beautiful woman, Janice. I must say, you look just like your mother.”

Janice wrinkled her nose, hating the comparison, but she supposed it was inevitable. He, on the other hand, reminded her pleasantly of her grandfather. Just looking at him brought another rush of warm memories to the surface. Memories of just-baked cookies and milk and crawling up into his lap and being rocked to sleep . . . .

“Come and have a seat in the back parlor.”

With the front of the old Victorian serving as waiting room and patient examination rooms, Charles Prescott kept an office and comfortable sitting room in the back for his private use. Funny, she couldn't ever remember visiting Angel Ridge's only doctor for either professional or personal reasons. Surely she must have seen him the Christmas she'd been sick and had stayed with her grandparents.

“It's good of you to come out here on a holiday weekend.” He indicated a pairing of wing chairs with a sweep of his hand, and they both sat.

“I must admit, I was intrigued by your call and a bit curious. May I be honest with you, Uncle Charles?”

“Please.”

Best to begin diplomatically. “It's been years since I've visited Angel Ridge, and honestly, I don't remember ever meeting you.” She didn't mention that her mother had never spoken of him.

“I'm not surprised. I saw you just once when you were a little thing, even though your grandfather was my brother. You had a high temperature and were sleeping fretfully when I came by. Your mother had left you with Bill and Edna while she went off to Europe or some such thing.”

“That's my mother.” She'd also been two days late picking her up from school that year because of a shopping trip to New York.

“I left a prescription that seemed to help. We never did figure out the source of your infection, but you were better by Christmas. Probably the flu.”

“Were you there? At Christmas, I mean?”

“Oh, sure. Don't you remember?” He chuckled merrily. “You thought I was Santa himself.”

“That was you?”

The kind, older man nodded, still laughing.

“I thought you
were
Santa.” Janice laughed as well.

“I'm sorry I wasn't able to spend more time with you that Christmas.” He rubbed his beard. “A lot of folks were sick that season. The other couple of times you visited Bill and Edna, I think I only managed to have dinner with you once. The doctor's life. You understand.”

“I do.” Too well. She didn't remember that dinner either. “I'm sorry I never got to know you, Uncle Charles.”

“Don't worry about that now, dear.” He leaned over and patted her hand. “I'm aware that your mother had little use for her family after she moved away and married your father.”

“I always wondered why she hated Angel Ridge so much. Do you know what happened? Did she have a falling out with Grandfather and Grandmother?”

He removed his round, wire-rimmed glasses and polished them with a crisp, white handkerchief. “Your mother, she was a beautiful girl. Folks around town gave her anything she wanted, and, well, she was more than a little spoiled by all the attention. She won every local beauty pageant there was: Homecoming Queen, Snow Ball Queen, County Fair Queen. When she told her parents she wanted to go to Knoxville on a school night to be in the Miss Knoxville pageant, they told her
no
.

“Well, Dotty wasn't accustomed to the negative response. So, she sneaked out her window and went on anyway. Won the thing, too.

“When they read about it in the paper, Bill and Edna had a fit and grounded her. Wouldn't let her go on to the state competition. That made an awful anger stew inside your mother. As soon as she turned eighteen, she took the first bus out of town and went to New York City.”

“Why did she go there?”

“To become a model or an actress, I suppose. We didn't hear much from her after she left. Broke Bill and Edna's heart.”

“That's where she met my father.” And became the quintessential trophy wife; the proper hostess who kept his house in order and looked good on his arm. Beyond that, they hardly ever saw each other, which seemed to suit them both.

“I enjoyed the time I had with my grandparents here. I wish I could have come more often, but my mother wouldn't allow it.”

He leaned toward her. “They loved having you. They knew you would have come more often if you could. Your letters meant a lot to them.”

Janice stared at her hands. “They always wrote back.” She had kept their letters all these years, storing them in plastic boxes.

He eased back in his leather wing chair and said, “I don't know who was more pleased when we learned that you wanted to become a doctor. Them or me.”

Surprised, Janice said, “I wasn't aware that . . . ”

“That I had kept tabs on what you've been doing?”

“Yes.”

“I didn't have children of my own. Too busy taking care of other folks' kids, I suppose. Bill and Edna shared your letters with me. I hope you don't mind.”