It's Not Christmas Without You (The Holloway Series) (2 page)

They’d made contact. Yeah, Carrie was half yelling at the time, but Austin still considered it progress of sorts.

“That went well.” Spence shut the door to the makeshift office and joined his brother in watching Carrie practically run from the lot.

“It’s a start.”

“Were we listening to the same conversation?”

Austin tore his gaze away from her ass and tugged his gloves back on. He’d waited months to see her again. He could hold out a few more days to touch her. “She thinks I don’t appreciate the things she cares about.”

“Whatever that means.”

Spence could identify plant species, had handpicked every choice in their hothouses and on the sales floor, and could classify every tree on the three hundred acres they owned along with their father. But women? Not his area of expertise.

Since the brothers lived together on the top two floors of the farmhouse in Holloway whose bottom floor served as the business office for Thomas Nurseries, Austin had a front-row seat to the parade of women Spence slept with then showed the door. The guy didn’t do commitment. He barely did overnights.

Austin tried to explain his position anyway. “Carrie is big on the boyfriend support thing.”

“Aren’t all women?”

The man had a point. “I guess that’s why you run away from them so fast.”

A sea of red crept up Spence’s neck to his cheeks. “When did we start talking about my love life?”

That topic needed months of dissecting and a therapist. Austin wasn’t touching it. “My point is I know Carrie’s issues and can handle them.”

Spence snorted as he dropped down on the step to the office. “Since she’s living here and you’re living two hours away, you might want to work on the way you handle things.”

“And since one of us actually needs to work so we can sell trees and make money, can you hand me that?” Austin pointed to the pocket knife on the ground next to Spence’s foot.

“I have a job. Landscaping, running a family business.” He kicked the closed knife in Austin’s direction. “Any of this sound familiar?”

“Mitch is handling everything back home with the business while I take care of my problem with his sister here.”

“And you think I don’t get women.” Spence muttered something about idiots.

“Meaning?”

“You have more than a problem with Carrie. You have a full-blown disaster.”

As Carrie’s brother, Mitch was the one member of the Anders family Austin could read and depend on not to pack up the car and run. When Mitch had let it slip his sister might be dating as part of her new city life, fury had burned through Austin. He’d almost ripped down the trees on the back ten of their property with his bare hands.

Then Mitch said something about Carrie not coming home for the holidays and Austin funneled all his anger into action. He’d been waiting for her to realize she missed him and return to Holloway on her own. But, damn, women could be stubborn, especially this one. This coming-to-her-senses thing was taking her forever.

Her lack of a reaction left him with few options. After all, a guy had to have some pride. Racing after a woman and begging her to come back carried the stink of desperation. Not his style. Yeah, he missed her like hell, but he was not about to lick her shoes and cry like some neutered stooge.

Visiting her now was a totally different thing. Not lame at all, or so he kept insisting in his head. The plan was simple. He’d remind her of what she was missing. Seeing him might jumpstart something. Get the clock moving again. Unless he went bankrupt first. The amount of money he’d had to pay to get the permit for this site made his head pound. The cash came out of his pocket because he couldn’t ask his brother and Mitch to front it. But when Carrie returned home and got settled it would be worth it.

“If she calls the cops on you for stalking, you’re on your own.” Spence jumped to his feet and reached for the nearest tree. “I don’t have extra money for bail, so don’t ask.”

“I’m not stalking.”

“You crossed state lines to hunt her down then set up shop outside of her window.” Spence shook his head. “What would you call it?”

Austin had to admit pieces sounded bad when Spence laid them out like that. “She’s hiding. If she were really over me, she wouldn’t do everything she could to keep from seeing me. She’d meet me head-on.”

“Your logic is nuts.”

No, he’d worked it all out in his head and it made sense. “Her pride is in the way. Once I get around that we’re good.”

“Now you sound like an egotistical prick.”

Austin’s confidence took a kick but he didn’t even flinch. “I’m being realistic.”

“If that were true I’d be at home right now.”

“Look, this will only take a few days then you can get back to the nursery.” Austin had to believe that was true. If he entertained the idea of life going on as it had since she left…well, it couldn’t happen. It was that simple.

“She broke up with you,” Spence said, as if he read his brother’s mind.

“Yeah, I got that.”

“Several times. I’m not even talking about this time. There was that month when you were in college and she still was in high school. Then that other—”

“Are you done?”

Thanks to Carrie his family had joined in on drilling the break-up point home. But he knew what they didn’t. That they’d never really separated, not until she picked up and moved here. Even then she stared right at him and begged him to go with her. Instead of asking her stay or saying anything, he told her to leave if she had to and then fell into a drinking stupor when she actually listened and did it. Spence held the trunk of a five-foot pine and shot Austin one of those annoying older-brother looks. “The woman isn’t exactly being subtle here. That has me wondering how slow you are.”

When it came to Carrie, glacial. “She wants to be with me.”

“She’s hiding it well.”

“She needs to get the D.C. thing out of her system then we can get back to where we were before.”

“You mean before she took off.”

“Don’t make me kick your ass out here on the street where everyone can see you cry like a little girl.”

“Just saying love is making you stupid.”

Austin dropped the branch and let the tree he was holding fall back to the ground. “She ran because she was scared, not because we’re over.”

“Does she know that?”

“Give me one week.”

Spence snorted. “I already bet Mitch you’d be back in two weeks, all alone, so I’ll spot you an extra one.”

“Thanks for the support, man.”

“I love Carrie. I think you’re great when you’re actually together. Hell, I did a dance when she moved into your bedroom for those few months after Dad claimed the caretaker’s cottage as his new residence.” Spence shook his head. “And speaking of Dad, he keeps asking who’s going to take over the farm and nursery operation when he’s gone.”

The comment knocked Austin mentally off stride. Dad had been grooming them ever since he insisted they major in environmental science and business if they wanted to have jobs to come home to after college. “Other than us?”

“He’s on the hunt for grandchildren and told me twice to get serious ‘because thirty is long enough to fuck around’—yeah, he said that.”

The rough-edged voice played in Austin’s head and he laughed. “I can almost hear him.”

“I’d throw you a damn party if you could get Carrie down the aisle. Would take some of the pressure off me.”

Since that was the plan, Austin didn’t argue. “Happy to help whenever I can.”

“Bottom line is no one is cheering harder for you than me.” Spence’s words tumbled to a halt. He stood there, staring off into the distance for a full thirty seconds before turning back to Austin. “I just think you’re missing the signals here. I’d rather see you go back home and find someone who’s not going to rip you apart.”

“I’m fine.”

“Yeah, well, I’m the one who fished you out of the ten-day bar binge after she left six months ago. The one who had to call Dad when everything went to shit.”

Every day of those lost two weeks fell into a mental black hole. Austin remembered the beginning and turning to a bottle of scotch before working his way through a case. He drank at home and at work. He’d stayed in the town’s only bar until it closed and waited in desperation until it opened again the next day.

Losing her had carved out a piece of him the liquor couldn’t fill, though God knew he tried. If he was a different guy, and if he’d listened to Spence’s advice back then, he would have screwed his way out of his anger over Carrie’s decision to go. Let a long line of faceless women wash away her memory. Instead he’d turned to the bottle.

Or he had until he ran the tractor into the property’s pond and sank it to the bottom. It didn’t matter that he was twenty-eight and a grown man, or that he worked in a dangerous occupation, spending most of the day at the top of trees. He drank for ten solid days and kicked around in a haze for four more before that. But on that last drunken day, with his car keys in his hand, he headed toward his truck. Only a flash of common sense sent him to the barn instead. He saw the tractor and decided it would be brilliant to race it all over their land, saving him from hurting someone else.

He’d never driven drunk in his life, not even as a teenager. Thought people who did were irresponsible jackasses. But for a few seconds as an adult who should have known better, he’d toyed with the idea. The reality of how close he’d come to screwing up and taking his truck on a public road in that spaced-out state scared the shit out of him. And opening his eyes in the hospital to see the disappointment written all over his dad’s face pulled Austin back from the edge of stupidity.

“Man, I promised you before. That’s not going to happen ever again.” His voice cracked on the words. He’d made a vow and he would not break it.

Spence’s white-knuckle grip on the tree didn’t let up. “It was fucked up. That’s all I’m saying.”

“I’m not arguing. That’s why I’ve kept my drinking to an occasional beer since and limit even that to the house.” And when he did, three pairs of eyes watched him. Even Mitch joined in.

For weeks after the accident Austin would find his office at the nursery a bit too perfect. Straight stacks of paper and unlocked file drawers. As the business manager, Mitch had a vested interest in conducting alcohol sweeps. When Austin assured Mitch he wasn’t an alcoholic and made a promise to refrain from drinking in return for Carrie never hearing about those days, the covert searches ended.

“Ever tempted to lose control like again?” The tree shook in Spence’s hand.

“No.”

“That was a quick response.”

“I don’t need to think about it.”

“It’s just that…” Spence kicked the turf under his feet as his gaze turned down.

“I get it.” Austin wrapped a hand around his brother’s biceps. “I do.”

He’d put them through hell and done a number on his body. Even now he’d head to the fridge during a game and all conversation would cease. It was like a collective breath holding until he returned with a soda.

“Despite all that other shit, I want this to work for you,” Spence said.

Part of Austin wondered if his brother blamed Carrie for the death spiral. Austin refused to go there. He shouldered the guilt alone. He’d ordered the drinks and stumbled down that driveway. He had no one to blame for his stupidity but him. But he wasn’t sure Spence saw it that way. “Is that why you agreed to come with me? A combination of babysitting and support?”

“You’d do it for me.”

“Then you need to know I’m not leaving until she agrees to come home.”

Spence shook his head. “You better work on your skills because I’d give you a D so far.”

“Hey, I’m just getting started.”

Nine hours and three cups of coffee later Carrie sat at her desk and tried not to stare outside. It wasn’t her fault the window behind her computer monitor had a clear view of the tree lot across the street. Well, it did if she slouched down, ducked her head a little and peeked in the space between her clock and her pen holder. She also had to squint a bit, but she didn’t have any trouble making out Austin as he walked around under the lights.

The slow stride of his legs. The confident way he stood with his shoulders back and his hands tucked into his back pockets. He talked and the broad smile never left his lips. She had to guess at that last part, but knowing him the smile was guaranteed. He buzzed around the lot, greeting all the customers and shifting trees from piles to cars without resting.

She’d missed so much about him. She could watch him work for hours, listen to his deep voice forever.

But she had other priorities now, ones he refused to appreciate and share. Despite long hours, the piles of work never seemed to go down. She glanced at the open file in front of her. She had to finalize the museum’s summer education programs and get the contracts out to the artists and instructors who would fill the calendar. Too much procrastination and the deadlines stacked up. She had to get the agreements out, get the pamphlets printed and set up the advertising. The museum depended on the extra income, along with donations and grants, to pay for special exhibits.

Yeah, no pressure.

The black ink blurred on the pages in front of her. She rubbed her eyes, hoping to jumpstart her concentration. But her gaze wandered back outside and her stomach flip-flopped.

He was determined now, chasing her here and staying close, but how long would it last? She’d given him the chance months ago to come with her and live out her dream, and he told her to go alone. Being here now could be a mix of ego and loneliness, and she didn’t want a part of either.

He had work and a life two hours away. From what she’d witnessed that morning, he didn’t seem one inch closer to accepting the part of her life he didn’t understand. He thought he could wait her out and believed he was being so subtle with his plan. About as subtle as being hit in the head with a brick.

But he
was
here. All six irresistible feet of him. And the months apart hadn’t done anything to put out the fire inside that burned without end for him. She knew the sad drill. He wouldn’t change, would get sick of waiting, would leave and her heartache would spike all over again. Her only choice was to ride this out and not believe in the show.