Honky Tonk Christmas (24 page)

“How about one of those game things that you hook up to the television and play against each other?” Holt asked.

Waylon leaned over and whispered and Judd shook her head. He put down another finger.

“But that might be the second thing on our list,” Judd said.

“One last guess? You got any ideas, Sharlene?” Holt asked.

“Not a one.”

“Okay, then you want…” Holt pretended to be deep in thought as he drew his eyebrows down and tapped on the steering wheel. “Let me see, not a swing set, not a Play Station game, could it be… no, that wouldn’t be it.”

The children giggled and put their heads together as they whispered.

“Give me a hint,” Holt said.

“It’s got something to do with dinnertime,” Judd told him.

“You want a turkey?” Holt asked.

They both held their ribs and Waylon put down his other finger. “Guesses all gone.”

“That’s not fair,” Sharlene said. “You teased that last one out of him so he gets one more guess.”

“No, he don’t. He said turkey and…” Judd started laughing again. “Why would we want a turkey?”

“If you let us have baby goats you won’t have to guess anymore,” Waylon said.

Sharlene came to the rescue. “Hey, I bet Henry would let you name two of his baby goats like Hank did the two calves. And if you name them then you have to go see them at least once a month so they don’t forget you. You already have to visit Beast and Luther every few weeks and check up on them. So I don’t suppose it would be any big problem for you to name a couple of baby goats and check on them, would it? You’d have to be careful and not let Beast and Luther get their feelings hurt and think you were paying too much attention to the goats, but I think you might manage that. What do you think?”

Judd uncrossed her arms and chewed on her lower lip. Waylon’s attention went from watching Palo Pinto County going by at sixty miles an hour out the side window back to Sharlene.

“I’m naming my goat Billy,” Waylon said quickly.

“Well, I’m naming mine Blake after that man that sings about the dog. I think he’s pretty and I like his songs,” Judd said.

They put their heads together and began to whisper. Sharlene heard snatches of the conversation and the gist seemed to be that they’d build a cart from the lumber pile. The argument was whether it would be painted like their house or plain old red like Henry’s cart.

“Thank you,” Holt said.

Sharlene smiled.

His heart melted. She really was good with the children. Even when she had children of her own he could never see her making a difference in them and Judd and Waylon. She’d never be a clinging, demanding wife because she was independent as hell and had proven she could take care of herself. Why did she have to run a damn bar anyway? Life was not fair.

He parked the truck behind the new addition. The kids bailed out and took off toward the jungle gym. He’d planned to take it down when he and the guys finished the job but Sharlene had asked him to leave it. After all, she’d have the children a couple of hours each afternoon and they could enjoy it a while longer.

“Texas has the most beautiful sunsets.” Sharlene got out of the truck and walked around to the back side of the garage.

Holt followed her. “It is pretty tonight, isn’t it?”

She sat down against the building and patted the space beside her. “They had a lot of fun today. And I got to get my baby fix for a few weeks. How’d you and Hank get on?”

“Just fine. Shot a few rounds from a tree stand. Hank is a stand-up sort of fellow. It’d be hard not to like him,” Holt said.

“We’ll be changing the clocks in two weeks and the sunsets will be a lot earlier,” she changed the subject. She was itching to ask what he and Hank talked about all afternoon but then she’d have to be honest if he turned the tables on her. And there was no way she was telling him that Larissa tried to play matchmaker with every other word.

“It’s bath time and believe me they need one tonight. They both smell like goats and sweat.” Holt stood up and extended a hand to help her.

She took it and he pulled. But when she was standing he continued to draw her nearer until she was flat against his body with his arms around her tightly. She looked up to find his eyes searching her face. It seemed like slow motion when he bent forward and she tiptoed so their lips could clash in a hard kiss that sent them both spiraling out of control again.

She ended the kiss and stepped back. “Whew!”

“I know. What are we going to do about that?”

“About what?” she asked.

“You know what,” Holt said softly.

“You tell me what we’re going to do, Holt. There’s nothing to talk about or to do, is there? You are a surrogate father and a damn fine one. I’m a bartender and a damn fine one. It’d be like trying to mix up a holy-roller preacher and a whorehouse madam. It wouldn’t work.”

“I’m not a preacher,” he argued.

“I’m not a whorehouse madam.”

“Then what are you talking about?” he asked.

“Go home and think about it, Holt. I’ll see you when you get the kids tomorrow afternoon.”

He yelled at Judd and Waylon and left her behind the garage still watching her sunset.

Holt read the children a bedtime story, put a load of laundry in the washer, folded the towels right out of the dryer, and picked up the remote but couldn’t find anything on television to hold his attention. Finally, he spread out draft paper on the kitchen table and did a rough drawing of the barn that he planned to begin for Elmer the next week.

Either there was work or else the people in town were trying to keep him there. If the latter was the case, then there was only one reason and that was matchmaking. That brought his thoughts back around to Sharlene. He imagined coming home from work every day to sit down at the supper table with her and the children. To be able to kiss her anytime he wanted; to hold her while they fell asleep or make love to her until they were both exhausted.

In reality life with her would be coming home from work to supper with her and the kids, kissing her good-bye at the door before eight o’clock, and being very quiet so as not to wake her in the morning. It would involve him still taking the kids to school and spending about two hours with Sharlene in the evenings, sleeping alone, and making love on Sunday night. Reality wasn’t as pretty as the first picture he painted.

He put away his supplies and went to bed, only to lie awake for an hour trying to rid his mind of the woman he could not have. It was still dark when he awoke sitting up in bed with both eyes wide open and straining his ears to pick up whatever sound had awakened him. A quick check of the bedside clock said it was two thirty so it wasn’t the children up and around before the alarm went off. He heard it again loud and clear and it was outside, not inside. Was Sharlene out there again?

The windows had been painted shut years before and with the arrival of the air-conditioning and heating unit there’d been no reason to open them again. He slipped on pajama bottoms and moved quietly through the house—from his bedroom to the kids’ room to the kitchen to the living room, peeking outside each window as he went. When he reached the living room he discovered Sharlene was back. She hadn’t been there since the night they’d fallen asleep and the kids had caught them the next morning. His breath caught in his chest at the sight of her. He grabbed a sweatshirt from the back of the sofa and jerked it down over his head, put on his cowboy boots, and eased out the back door.

“Hello,” he said as he rounded the house.

Sharlene’s flight mode went into effect and she jumped up so quick that she knocked the rocker backwards with a thump. “You scared the shit out of me, Holt.”

“Sharlene, come inside and talk to me about what it is that keeps you awake at night and sends you to my front porch. Is it the moon or Iraq or what?”

“Technically it’s my porch and it’s my business. I’ll go on back to the Tonk if it bothers you all that much,” she said.

He raked his fingers through his thick dark hair. “Good God, Sharlene, it’s not safe for a woman to be out in the middle of the night sitting on a porch staring off into the wild blue yonder. I’m glad I woke up. How many times have you been here when I didn’t wake up?”

She shook a forefinger at him. “Don’t yell; you’ll wake the kids. And FYI, you have a sixth sense. You wake up every time I come around. And if this was my house and I was sitting on the porch at this time of night, no one would question it, so why are you? And besides, I wasn’t staring off into the wild blue yonder. It’s dark out here so I was looking at the stars.”

He moved to the porch and set the chair back up on its rockers. “That’s a moot point. It’s not safe and you know it or you wouldn’t be arguing with me.”

She plopped down in the chair. “I can damn well take care of myself.”

“You’re not big enough to whip a good-sized Texas mosquito,” he said.

She set the rocker to going with the heel of her cowboy boot. She wore gray sweat bottoms and a matching hooded sweatshirt zipped up to the neck. The night air was crisp for the first week in November. Tomorrow night they’d change the time and it would get dark even earlier. Before long, he’d be leaving and taking the children with him. Her heart hurt just thinking about that day.

He inhaled deeply and didn’t smell smoke; so she’d showered after work. She looked cute and fragile at the same time in her gray sweats, with her hair pulled back in a frizzy ponytail.

“You don’t have any idea what I’m capable of,” she said.

“Oh ho, did the big bad army train you to be an assassin?” he asked.

She took a deep breath. It was time to sink the growing relationship or else let it grow. She’d never ever, not one time, said the words aloud and didn’t know if they’d come out of her mouth when she tried.

“Did you ever see that movie
The Shooter
?”

“Back when it came out. Did you watch it tonight and get scared or something?” he asked.

“Remember the very beginning of the movie when he was sitting up on that high spot all covered up in camo with his rifle trained on a convoy? He and his spotter had a radio and were in contact with the home base. They got left out in the dry with no support and his spotter got killed. Well, trade that for desert sand. My shooter was a married man from Kentucky. His name was Jonah Black and he had three cute little boys and he didn’t go home either. They didn’t leave me out there to die. They rescued me and Jonah and the next day I stood beside the plane with dozens of others as they flew his body back home to his wife and kids. I couldn’t even let on that he’d been my partner or tell anyone about it. I’m not supposed to be talking about it right now and I keep reliving it in my dreams.”

Holt swallowed hard. “Women don’t do that kind of job.”

“No, they don’t. I worked in hospital administration but from the first time I qualified with a rifle, they knew what I could do. I was always good with guns. Guess it comes from competing with my brothers. First time I picked one up it was like an extension of me. Daddy said I had a natural eye for shooting. The military recognized it. I could get into places a lot of times where men had trouble going. So don’t worry about me sitting on a porch in the dark in Mingus, Texas, in the middle of the night. I mean it when I say I can take care of myself.”

“You don’t have a gun and there’s drunks coming out of two bars on this side of town. What if…” He hesitated.

“You be the drunk man and try to mess with me if you want me to prove my point,” she said.

He sat there long enough that she’d given up on him doing role-play. The tension left her body and she relaxed. She’d said the words out loud. It was as if an elephant had been lifted from her chest and she could breathe again. Sure, she’d been to therapists when she first came home but it wasn’t the same. The two ton weight inside her was still there even after she talked to them. Now it was gone.

One second he was sitting in the chair with his hands on the arms, the next those same hands were around her throat. In three swift moves he was on the porch on his stomach and one arm was hurting really bad.

“Anything else you’d like, cowboy?” she asked.

He flipped over and suddenly she was pinned under him. He had both her arms above her head and his lips found hers in a crashing kiss. The stars paled in comparison to the sparks floating down around them.

He moved down to run his tongue across the soft, tender spot on her neck right below her ear. “Maybe a little of this.”

She pulled her arms free and wrapped them around his neck, toying with his hair with her fingertips. When he pulled away she dragged his lips back down to hers and kissed him just as passionately as he’d kissed her.

He pushed off and sat up on the porch. He couldn’t go any further. He refused to be nothing but friends with sex benefits and he wouldn’t use Sharlene. She deserved more than that. She was a good friend, a good person, a good woman. She was kind, sweet, funny, and independent as hell—all the things that would have normally attracted him to a woman. But…

“What?” she asked.

“We can’t do this anymore. I can’t… you aren’t… we…” he stammered.

She wiggled away from him. “I understand. I won’t use your rockers again as long as you live in the house. Sorry I woke you up. See you tomorrow when you pick up the kids.” She walked away without looking back. He didn’t need to use words. His actions said it all.

In half a dozen long strides he was behind her. He scooped her up into his arms and carried her back to one of the chairs where he sat down and rocked her without saying a word.

She buried her face in his chest and let the tears bathe her face. Four years they’d been in the making and she didn’t care if Holt thought she was a pansy as she mourned for her friend and spotter, Jonah Black.

“Thank you,” she finally said between sobs. “I’m going home now.”

“You can stay and talk about it,” he said.

“No, I’ve got to go. I really have to go.” Sharlene pushed out of his arms and hurried across the yard.

When she was in her apartment she threw her sweats on the sofa and went straight to the shower. Maybe if she washed away his kisses and touches it would remove the desire from her body.

I’ve fallen for Holt Jackson and I cannot have him. So the Tonk really did end the lucky charm after the third time. What I’ve got is the curse that follows.

She stepped out of the shower and wrapped a big towel around her body. She went to the kitchen and made a cup of hot chocolate. Surely chocolate would cure the doldrums brought on by rejection.

I’ve got to work on stopping the attraction, not feeding it with hot, wild kisses. So from this day forth I shall not think about Holt Jackson, dream about him, or get all gushy when I’m in his presence. I shall not kiss him, let him kiss me, or wish for even more than that. And I’ll believe all that when there’s a snow storm in Texas in the middle of July.

It was near daylight when she finished off the second cup of hot chocolate and fell asleep on the sofa with nothing but a quilt wrapped around her only to dream again of bombed out buildings, sand, and Jonah.