Maybe This Christmas (17 page)

“I’m friends with Sean and Jackson. Their relationships with Élise and Kayla haven’t affected our friendship.”

“That’s different. You’re not in love with Sean or Jackson. You’ll be cut out of Tyler’s life, and it will be as if your friendship had never happened.” There was a bitterness in her tone that even Brenna hadn’t heard before. And something else. A sadness.

Brenna felt a flash of guilt. Was her situation really so distressing for her mother?

“Tyler wouldn’t cut me out. We’ve known each other forever.”

“And if something was going to happen it would have happened by now. It’s time you faced the fact Tyler O’Neil doesn’t have those feelings for you.”

He’ll ski with you but he will never, ever, want to have sex with you.

“That’s enough, Mom.”

“You should walk away and build a new life somewhere else instead of humiliating yourself waiting around for a few crumbs from his table.”

“Can we talk about something else?”

“You can’t build a life on dreams, Brenna. You should date other men. See other people. Helen and Todd were in signing a license last week. Getting married first week in February. And Susan Carter was in last month. That wedding is going to be a big one. Visitors from out of town.” As Town Clerk, her mother had all the information on who was marrying whom.

There were times when she wished her mother had a different job. “I do date other men.”

“Who? When?”

Cornered, Brenna groped wildly in her brain. “I’m going out with Josh this week. Tuesday.” The words left her mouth before she could stop them. She saw her mother’s face brighten for the first time since she’d walked through the door and realized in a flood of panic that by trying to make things better, she’d made them worse. Her mother would probably tell Ellen Kelly in the store and before the snow had settled, everyone would know Brenna Daniels was dating Josh. Everyone, that was, except Josh himself. Somehow she had to retrieve the situation before Josh found out.

He was going to kill her.

“Mom—”

“Well—” Her mother breathed out slowly and her shoulders relaxed. “I’m pleased. Josh is well respected in this town. He’s the youngest chief of police ever appointed, and he has a calm, steady head on his shoulders. He’s not short of admirers.”

Oh,
crap.

Deciding to unravel that mess later, Brenna changed the subject. “So Helen and Todd are finally getting married. That’s great.” She talked about nothing, anything to pass the time and keep her mother from talking about Tyler.

Somehow she made it through breakfast but by the time she left, her head was throbbing and the small amount of egg she’d eaten had settled like a stone in her stomach.

She arrived at the Outdoor Center feeling emotionally exhausted and gave a groan when she recognized the four-wheel drive cruiser that belonged to the chief of police.

I’m going on a date with Josh.

Why did he have to be the first person she bumped into?

She pulled into the space next to him, closed her eyes and promised herself that if she untangled this mess she was never, ever telling a lie again.

The door opened, and she turned her head and saw him standing there.

“You look like you’ve had a hell of a day, and it’s not even nine-thirty. Want to talk about it?” His voice was calm, his gaze steady, and she felt color whoosh into her cheeks.

Half the girls in her class had been in love with him. The half that hadn’t been in love with one of the O’Neils. “I didn’t expect to see you here. Is this a social visit, or are we in trouble with the law?”

Josh raised an eyebrow. “I don’t know. Should you be?”

“I may have broken a rule or two in my time.” And told a lie. A big fat lie. Her tongue was stuck to the roof of her mouth.

“Been anywhere exciting?”

There was no reason not to tell him, especially as people would have seen her car outside her mother’s house. “Visiting my parents.”

“Ah.” Those dark eyes were perceptive. “And how did that go?”

“It was—” Brenna bit her lip “—stressful.”

“Want me to arrest them?” He gave a smile that was warm and sympathetic, and she wondered how long that smile would last once word spread and someone asked him about his “date.”

She slid out of the car, her nerve failing her as she found herself facing those broad shoulders. “Look, Josh—” It was going to be embarrassing to confess, but it was going to be much more embarrassing if he found out from someone else. “I need to tell you something—and I need you to listen and not get mad.”

He stood, legs spread, strong, dependable and thoroughly decent. “I’m listening.”

How was she supposed to do this? “
I—when I was with my mom, she was going on and on about how I was wasting my life, how I should have left Snow Crystal years ago instead of staying here. She was listing all the folks who are getting married—”

His eyes gleamed. “Ouch. Do you know what set her off?”

“Yes.” Her heart was hammering, and her palms were damp. “She’d heard that I’d moved in with Tyler.”

“You moved in with Tyler?”

She saw the change in him and wondered why everyone automatically assumed there was something going on. “Yes, because Kayla booked Forest Lodge and there was nowhere else to go! I’m staying with him until I can sort something else out.”

There was a long, pulsing silence. “I’m starting to understand why your mom was stressed out.”

“She wouldn’t stop talking about it. She told me I should move away, that I should see other people—oh, she went on and on and the only way to shut her up was—I mean, I told her I was—” she shrugged awkwardly “—well, seeing someone.”

Josh looked at her steadily. “Judging from your expression and the fact you haven’t been able to look me in the eye since you climbed out of your car, I’m guessing I’m that someone.”

“I’m sorry.” Guilt mingled with mortification, and she covered her face with her hands. “I don’t know why I said it. She wouldn’t stop telling me I was wasting my life, that I should date other people, and it slipped out, and then I tried to undo it and I couldn’t, and the whole thing is a mess, and I know she’s going to tell people because she thinks you’re the perfect catch—”

“Hey, calm down. That’s a lot of words in a short space of time.” Strong hands locked around her wrists, and he gently drew her hands away from her face. “You need to breathe, honey.”

The
honey
made her guilt worse. “I’m so sorry, Josh. I don’t know what I was thinking. And now you’re going to go into the store and everyone will be asking you and—oh, you know what they’re like. They gossip. I’m going to call her in a minute and tell her it was a lie. I’ll tell her she has to back off.”

“Don’t call her. I have a better idea.”

She forced herself to look at him, expecting anger and seeing amusement. “You do?”

“Yeah, we go on that date.”

“We can’t. Josh, there will be gossip.”

“I handle drunks, car thieves and even the occasional armed robber. I think I can handle gossip.”

“I can’t let you do that. I wish I’d never said it. I should have been assertive and told her my love life was my business, but the wrong thing came out of my mouth. I wanted to stop her.”

“Then let’s stop her. When is this
date
of ours?”

Her face was as hot as a fire pit. “I told her Tuesday.”

Josh considered. “It will take a bit of juggling, but I guess I can do Tuesday. I have a meeting with the mountain rescue team at six to talk about the winter season, but I’ll be through by seven-thirty.”

A skilled rock and ice climber, Josh was a training officer for the Snow Crystal Mountain Rescue Team.

“Are you sure?” She couldn’t shake the embarrassment. “I’ll pay. And I’ll meet you somewhere.”

“No.” He was thoughtful. “I’ll pick you up from Tyler’s place. Eight o’clock suit you? We need to go somewhere public so that news of our date will be spread around the local population. That will keep your mother happy for a while and keep her off your back. And now I have to go. I’m late for a planning meeting about the next snowfall heading our way.”

“You don’t have time for this.”

“It’s the usual drill. We’ll suspend parking, pre-treat the roads and keep the plows running through the storm. Whatever the weather brings, we still have to eat.” Josh was calm. “I’ll book somewhere in town.”

“It’s not fair to you.”

“It’s dinner, that’s all,” he said mildly. “Two friends sharing food and talking. It doesn’t have to be more complicated than that.”

“Doesn’t it? What happens afterward?”

“We’ll work that out when we get to the end of dinner. We can either have dinner again, or we can publicly declare we’re not suited. You can say you have an aversion to dating a cop. I don’t know—we’ll think of something.”

“I feel like I’m using you.”

“You’re not. You’ve been honest with me.” He hesitated. “Maybe I’m out of line saying this, especially as I think you know the way I feel about you, but we’ve known each other a long time, and I don’t want to see you hurt. In this case I think you should listen to your mom. Tyler isn’t the settling-down type. Having his daughter living with him isn’t going to change that.”

It was the first time he’d put his feelings into words, and hearing it was somehow worse than suspecting. “Josh—” It was agony to think he might be hurting as she was hurting. “We’ve been friends a long time and—you’ve never said anything and—” she breathed “—and I have no idea what to say.”

“You don’t have to say anything. My feelings, my problem.”

He was trying to make it easy for her, but it didn’t feel easy. Probably because she was in the same situation. Everything he was feeling, she was feeling, but for a different person.

“We can’t go out for dinner with you feeling the way you do. It would be wrong.”

“Like you can’t live with Tyler, feeling the way you do? I’m not about to read something into it that isn’t there. You don’t have to worry about that. Would I like more? Yes, but I’ll settle for friendship.”

And no one understood that better than she did.

She’d done the same, hadn’t she? All her life.

She felt a flash of envy for Élise and Kayla. Their love lives seemed so simple. Hers was a tangled mess.

“Why does everything have to be so complicated?”

Josh gave a soft laugh. “I think it’s called life.”

It should have been easy to love him. He was everything most women would look for in a man. But she knew love and logic weren’t necessarily close relations. “Are you going to be okay?”

“Big tough guy like me? Sure. I’ll go and arrest some folks to let off steam.”

It was typical Josh. Strong, patient and steady. It was the reason people still sent him Christmas cards even after he’d locked them up for the night.

Why couldn’t she have fallen in love with him?

Her mother was right. It would have been so much simpler.

“But I will say one thing.” Josh put his hands on her arms, and his tone was deceptively mild. “If Tyler ever hurts you, I’ll be the arresting officer.”

“My feelings, my problem.” She delivered his own words back to him, and Josh looked at her for a moment and then let go of her arms.

“Maybe. But if I see you with red eyes and I know you haven’t been peeling onions, then it’s going to be his problem, too.”

Hoping the situation between Tyler and Josh wasn’t about to deteriorate, she grabbed her backpack from the car, hurried toward the Outdoor Center and walked straight into Tyler.

“Hey—” he locked his hands on her shoulders, steadying her “—what are you running from? Fire or avalanche?”

Love.

She was running from love.

Seeing him unsettled her, coming so soon after the conversation with her mother and then Josh. Knowing that Josh was still outside, she decided it might be best to keep Tyler talking for a few minutes. She wouldn’t put it past the chief of police to read Tyler his rights.

How had it all got so complicated?

How on earth had she got herself into this mess?

By not speaking up.

She should have told Tyler she couldn’t move in with him, and she should have told her mother to mind her own business.

“Sorry. I haven’t had the greatest morning so far.”

“You had breakfast with your mom. From the look on your face, I’m guessing that went the way you were afraid it would.”

“I came away with indigestion and I don’t think it was because of the omelet.”

“She gave you a hard time?” He stood, legs spread, arms folded. She felt his impatience, the restless energy that was so much a part of him. He was the polar opposite of Josh’s quiet, steady calm.

He had none of Josh’s gentle subtlety, but his offer to listen touched her more because she knew he probably wouldn’t have made that offer to anyone but her. Tyler’s response to a stressful situation wasn’t to talk about it. He didn’t analyze or deconstruct, and his idea of therapy was to hurl himself down a vertical slope as fast as humanly possible.

“Nothing to talk about. It was a duty visit, and it’s done. But thank you.”

“Come on, Bren,” he sounded impatient, “tell me what upset you.”

“She thinks I’m wasting my life.” It was quicker to tell a half-truth than to argue or avoid the question. “She wants me to go and get a proper job.”

“Don’t do that. You belong here.” He brushed his fingers over her cheek. “You’re an honorary O’Neil.”

Her breath lodged in her throat.

Brenna O’Neil.

How many times had she scribbled those words in the back of her schoolbook?

“The truth is I spend more time with your family than I do with my own.”

“That tends to happen when your own gives you indigestion. Cheer up. You’re going to be too busy to go home for the next few weeks anyway. I’m coaching Jess again later, and then if there’s time we’re going to get a Christmas tree. Want to join us?” He dismissed the problem, moved on and Brenna was relieved.

“Maybe, if Jess doesn’t mind. I need to get my gear and then I’m teaching all day. You?”

“Jackson has asked me to join him for lunch with some visiting businessmen. I’m not looking forward to the conversation. It will be stocks, shares, bonds—” He looked so horrified, she couldn’t help laughing.