'Tis the Season (19 page)

Evan was happy to see his kids—but for one brief, shameless moment all he could think of was how he might be able to maneuver Filomena into that doorway, under the mistletoe.

“I told them I wasn't going to have a tree, so we decided to do this, instead,” she explained.

“What do you think, Daddy?” Gracie asked, bounding across the room and leaping into his arms. “Doesn't it smell good?”

“It sure does,” he agreed, swinging her high. The room smelled like a forest, clean and tangy. It smelled like life bursting through the first snow. It smelled like Christmas, like home.

“Your hair is wet,” Gracie said as he adjusted her against his chest. “Is it raining?”

“As a matter of fact, it's snowing.”

“Snowing!” Billy whooped, racing to the nearest window and peering out. Gracie wriggled in Evan's arms until he put her down, and she charged across the room to join her brother at the window.

“Just flurries,” Evan whispered to Filomena.

“It doesn't matter,” she whispered back. “It's the first snow of the season.” Her smile squeezed his heart. Her body—hidden beneath an oversize red sweater and loose-fitting jeans—tempted him. A pine needle was trapped in her hair, and he freed it, letting his hand dawdle for an extra moment, savoring the silky black softness. Just touching her that way, unraveling the stiff green needle and holding it in his palm so she could see it, made him feel unbearably close to her.

It had been so long since he'd felt close to a woman, really close. Close enough to trust her with his children. Close enough to share a holiday meal with her. Close enough to want to share much more with her. “You're probably ready for me to get the kids out of your hair, too,” he joked, just to clear his head of romantic mush.

She smiled. “They've been great. We saw a wonderful movie about a talking dog, and then we went to that nursery on the western end of Newcombe and bought all these Christmas plants and decorations, and we've been decorating the house. They might be sick of me, but I'm not sick of them.”

His kids would never be sick of Filomena. He couldn't imagine it. “You know,” he ventured, keeping his tone casual, “I just happen to have tons of food in my refrigerator. Leftover turkey and cranberry sauce, stuff like that. I could broil it all up and make a meal. Why don't you join us?”

Her eyes flashed. With apprehension or pleasure—or maybe both, he didn't know. “Evan, I—”

“Okay. I won't broil it,” he promised, cutting her off before she could decline the invitation. “I'll let you in on a secret—I know how to use a microwave. Don't tell the kids, because if they find out, they'll expect more of me than broiled whatever for dinner every night.”

She smiled again, almost in spite of herself. “I'd love to have dinner with you, but—”

“Great.”

She glanced toward the children, who were pressed to the window, jabbering about how many inches of snow the trivial flurries might produce. Then she hooked her hand around Evan's elbow and ushered him out of the living room—right under the mistletoe, but she was moving so quickly he couldn't take advantage of that. She dragged him through the dining room and into the kitchen, two rooms removed from the kids, and released his arm. “Evan,” she said, then fell silent.

God, she was beautiful. Her complexion had a golden undertone, even this late in autumn, when any lingering summer tan should have faded. Her lashes were as thick as mink, her lips the color of coral. The only thing that kept him from pulling her into his arms was the suspicion that she was trying really hard to keep her distance from him. Anything he did to close that distance would seem like coercion to her.

“Dinner,” he said, fighting to keep his hands at his sides. “That's all I asked you for.”

“Since I arrived in Arlington, I've had more dinners with you than I've had alone.”

“Would you rather be eating alone?”

She offered a hesitant smile. “No. But that's the problem. I'm afraid…”

“Afraid of what?”

“Becoming attached to you,” she said bluntly.

Too late, he thought. It was way too late to worry about becoming attached.

He stretched his brain to come up with the right response, one that would reassure her. “Last night you told me about how your parents had all these friends, lifelong friends from all walks of life who'd come to your Thanksgiving dinners. Right? Well, that's like you and me, Fil. We've become friends. Maybe we'll turn out to be lifelong friends.”
Maybe more
, he added silently. “So why shouldn't we eat together while you're in town? What's the harm in it? It beats eating alone.”

Sighing, she studied him pensively.

“Maybe you could bring along some of that leftover pumpkin pie,” he added, refusing to acknowledge her misgivings. “I notice you unloaded a lot of turkey on me, but you kept all the pie for yourself.”

“I tried to give you some pie,” she reminded him with a grin. “You refused it.”

“Because we only had three pairs of hands. Two,” he corrected himself. Gracie had fallen asleep when they'd been getting ready to leave. Evan had managed to rouse her so she could walk out to the car herself, but he hadn't trusted her to carry any of the food. “Come on, Fil. Turkey and the fixings, pumpkin pie and a few more minutes with my little monsters. You said you weren't sick of them yet.”

“All right,” she said, relenting, her eyes scooting past him as if she didn't want him to read her thoughts. Not that he'd ever had any talent when it came to reading a
woman's thoughts. For all he knew, the only reason Filomena had agreed to have dinner with him was so she could spend more time with Gracie and Billy.

And if that was her reason, Evan would accept it. Call it a foul tip. He might not have made it to first base yet, but he was still at the plate, still alive.

“Get the pie,” he murmured. “I'll get the kids.”

 

“P
ATTY
? I
T
'
S
F
IL
,” she said. The clock on the night table beside her bed read ten, not too late to be calling her closest friend down in New York—especially since the last two times she'd phoned, earlier in the day, Patty hadn't been home.

“Fil! I got your messages, but when I called back, you didn't answer.”

“I've been busy, in and out. And I haven't got an answering machine here.”

“How are you doing, babe? I feel so bad for you, up there in the sticks all by yourself.”

Filomena was hardly all by herself. And that was either a blessing or a profound problem. “I'm okay,” she reassured her friend. “How are things in the city?”

“Noisy. Dirty. The usual. Carlos broke up with Julia, and they're both moping, acting very put-upon. It's tedious.”

“This is the third time they've broken up,” Filomena remarked.

“Like I said. Tedious.”

“Which one are we getting custody of this time?”

“Carlos, I think. Julia's being bitchy. He left a couple of CDs at her place, and she's refusing to give them back.”

“Why?”

“She says he owes her for the Blue Man Group ticket she bought for him.”

“Oh, for God's sake. All right, we'll take custody of him.”

“Until they make up again,” Patty reminded her.

Filomena smiled and sank back against the pillows. She'd removed her boots, and her socks were as red as her sweater, making her feet feel warm and cheery. Catching up on the city gossip didn't cheer her quite as much. It reminded her of who she was.

Not an Arlington resident. Not a baby-sitter. Not a woman who had just spent yet another evening with Evan, pretending he didn't have the most alluring eyes she'd ever seen, pretending the planes and angles of his face didn't fascinate her, pretending his height, his lean proportions, the length of his legs and the breadth of his shoulders didn't bludgeon her with an almost painful awareness of how masculine he was.

“So, is everything all right with you, Fil?”

“Um…yeah, of course,” she said, her voice sounding strangely raspy.

“Are you sure?”

“Listen, Patty—” she swallowed and forced more strength into her tone “—I want to throw a party for New Year's Eve. You can all take the train up. There's a commuter line directly into Arlington. And I've got six bedrooms here. I could put everyone up overnight. It'll be kind of a farewell to the house before I sell it. What do you think?”

“Wait a minute,” Patty said. “You're asking me, would I rather risk life and limb in Times Square with a million piss-drunk idiots screaming their heads off while they watch the ball drop, or take the train with a bunch
of friends to your country villa for the night? I've got to think long and hard about this.” She didn't think long or hard. “Fabulous! You'll invite Carlos and not Julia?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. Who else? Danny and Liz?”

“Sure.”

“Kumiko?”

“Of course. I've got beds, and maybe a few people could bring sleeping bags, just in case.”

“It sounds great, Fil.” Patty hesitated. “What's going on?”

Filomena laughed. “What do you mean, what's going on? I'm planning a party.”

“Something's going on. I can hear it in your voice.”

“Hear what?” She was still smiling, but wariness mixed with her amusement.

“You don't sound…I don't know. Troubled.”

“I
don't
sound troubled? What does that mean? Am I supposed to be troubled?”

“Well, Fil, you traveled up there to mourn for your mother and close up your old family manse. Now, I'm not saying there's a right way and a wrong way to mourn. I'm just saying you sound happier than I would have expected, under the circumstances.”

“You're criticizing me for sounding happy.” Filomena laughed again.

“No. I'm being nosy. What's going on?”

“I've made some friends up here,” Filomena told her, choosing her words carefully.

“Okay.” Patty sounded as if she knew Filomena had more to tell her. “Some friends.”

“Some friends,” Filomena repeated. “You know what friends are, don't you?”

“What's his name?” Patty asked.

Filomena sighed and decided not to bother trying to conceal anything from Patty. There was nothing to conceal, after all. “Evan,” she said. “He's a divorced father of two. He runs a chain of sporting-goods stores. We have nothing in common.”

“Are you in love or what?”

“No, I'm not in love! I just said we had nothing in common.”

“And I'm saying you sound happy.”

“Because he's a nice friend.”

“A nice friend.” Patty snorted. Filomena had to admit it was an absurdly bland description, especially when applied to Evan. “Is he sexy?”

“Yes. But nothing's going on.” She sighed again, feeling a lot less happy than Patty seemed to think she sounded. “Nothing
can
go on. For one thing, as I said, we've got nothing in common. For another thing, I'm leaving in January.”

“So, have you slept with him yet?”

“Patty!” She closed her eyes and groaned, aware that her friend was teasing her, but also aware that the teasing cut a little too close to her heart. She still hadn't recovered from the sensation of Evan's fingers in her hair, and all he'd been doing was plucking a pine needle out of it. A simple bit of grooming assistance, probably less meaningful to him than brushing his daughter's hair out after a shampoo, and yet it had left Filomena weak and soft inside, yearning.

She couldn't bring herself to tell Patty she was actually working for him—as a baby-sitter, no less. That was about as unromantic a situation as possible. Admitting that their relationship was held together by money and
children would prompt Patty to lecture her on how truly foolish and dim-witted and
wrong
thinking about Evan as anything other than a friend was.

Filomena didn't need Patty to lecture her. She knew it was wrong. That was why she was trying to resist her attraction to him, trying to pretend that having him pull a pine needle out of her hair hadn't been the most erotic experience she'd had in ages.

“I haven't slept with him,” she told Patty. “I have no intention of sleeping with him. That's just not going to happen, so you can stop asking.”

“Will you invite him to the New Year's Eve party?”

“I don't know. Maybe. If you behave yourself and treat me with respect.”

“Great. I want to meet him.” Patty chuckled. “A divorced father who sells sporting goods. That's so suburban, Fil. I didn't know suburban guys could be sexy.”