A Family for the Holidays. Victoria Pade

since she’d agreed to go with him he’d been looking forward to the damn dinner just so he could have a little concentrated time with her. And if he wanted to be with her badly enough to make him look forward to this dinner? He wanted to be with her too badly to cancel out now.

      “So apparently you’re plenty stupid,” he answered his own question of a moment before.

      But he wasn’t going to refuse himself the only thing he’d actually wanted to do in as long as he could remember. He would just make sure to abide by the terms she’d set, he told himself as he turned off the water and reached for his towel.

      No strings attached—that was what she’d said. And that was what he needed—and wanted—too.

      They’d go to the dinner as friends, and maybe his showing up with her on his arm would be the key to shutting down those freaking sympathetic looks he kept being the recipient of, and Shandie would get to meet some people—everybody would come out ahead.

      Yeah, that was another way to look at it.

      Then Shandie Solomon would go on about her business and he would go on about his—no harm, no foul, no strings.

      Maybe this was actually the best route to take.

      Or maybe he was kidding himself.

      But for once—and unlike his usual perspective these days—he decided to opt for the better of the scenarios and believe that this evening would accomplish a few good things.

      He already knew for a fact that something positive would come of it—he was going to get to see the new blonde on the block for a while tonight. And that was definitely something good.

      Good enough to almost make him feel as if things were already looking up….

      “Did you say you were from Denver?”

      “I did,” Shandie confirmed in answer to the question Dax asked her as he pulled away from her house Wednesday night.

      He’d come to her door only a few minutes earlier and won more of Kayla’s fondness by giving the three-year-old a set of toy racing motorcycles complete with a track. Then he’d helped Shandie on with her black, calf-length coat while telling her she looked terrific in her gray pin-striped, cuffed trousers and the white angora sweater she’d judged just dressy enough for the evening.

      She’d returned Dax’s compliment, but it had been an understatement. He didn’t merely look nice, he looked jaw-droppingly fabulous in charcoal slacks and a black turtleneck sweater that gave him a man-of-mystery-and-danger sort of edge while still dressing him up, too.

      But now that they were on their way, he was making small talk that Shandie thought was designed to conceal that he was very much on edge. And while she didn’t wish him any stress or discord from his other relationships, she just hoped his tension wasn’t a result of being with her.

      “I was born and raised in Denver,” she continued. “It’s where I’ve lived all my life.”

      He smelled wonderful, too, she thought as the scent of a clean, airy cologne wafted to her in the cab of his truck.

      “And you just decided to chuck it all and move to Thunder Canyon?” he asked.

      “Well, I wasn’t really ‘chucking it all.’ I was a late-in-life baby, and both my parents are gone. Judy is all the family Kayla and I have left, so when she offered me a partnership in the Clip ’n Curl and it meant moving up here, I thought why not? Especially since Thunder Canyon is relatively small—it just seemed like it might be a better place to raise a child on my own.”

      Dax nodded.

      “What about you?” Shandie asked to keep the ball rolling. “Are you from here or from somewhere else?”

      “Thunder Canyon—born and bred.”

      “And you’ve always lived here?”

      “I’ve done some traveling but, yeah, this has always been home. For better or for worse.”

      “Do you not like it here?” Shandie inquired, wondering if that was what he was implying.

      “No, I like it. Well enough not to leave it, I guess.”

      “Has that been a possibility? Your moving away?”

      “It’s something I think about from time to time,” he said. “But don’t let that change your mind about Thunder Canyon—you’re right, it is a good place to raise kids. I had a lot of fun growing up here. I think Kayla will, too. If Jack S. gets off her back.”

      “I don’t know. Kayla and Jack S. seem to have a love-hate thing going,” Shandie joked.

      They’d arrived at the main lodge of the Thunder Canyon Resort by then.

      Like a tour guide, Dax informed her that what had begun as a ski resort was now a four-season destination that drew upscale tourists from around the world.

      Shandie wasn’t surprised that the beauty of the rustically elegant Alpine-flavored gateway to the mountain had become a big draw.

      There were parking spots closer to the entrance, but several cars had pulled in just in front of them and Dax seemed to hang back from where they were all headed, choosing a spot behind them.

      “Looks like everybody’s getting here at once,” he observed, apparently recognizing the cars.

      “Then we won’t be too early or too late,” Shan-die said brightly, as if she hadn’t noted the more somber note that had edged Dax’s comment.

      He turned off the engine, removed the keys from the ignition and put them in his pocket, but he made no move to leave the truck. Instead, his gaze was glued to those other cars and the people who were emerging from them without any hesitation.

      “Who’s who?” Shandie asked as they all seemed to gather to say hello without any knowledge that she and Dax were there watching.

      “The tallest guy in the coat that looks like it came straight out of a magazine? That’s Grant Clifton. He manages the resort now, which seems right since he’s always been driven and ambitious. He’s the man to make it be all that it can be.”

      “And the woman he’s holding hands with?”

      “Stephanie Julen. Steph, Grant’s fiancée. She’s our nature girl—more at home on the back of a horse than anyone I’ve ever known. Next to them—the guy built like a brick wall—is Mitchell Cates. He’s the founder and president of Cates International, a company that sells farm and ranch equipment. He caused some trouble when we were kids,” Dax said affectionately and clearly with fond memories of the trouble. “But he’s pretty serious now. That’s Lizbeth Stanton with him…”

      Dax’s tone had slowly brightened as he’d talked about his friends, and Shandie could tell that he was genuinely fond of them and even proud of their accomplishments and attributes. But that brighter tone dimmed with the mention of the woman Shandie had heard he’d been engaged to.

      Was he jealous now that Lizbeth Stanton was with his old friend? Shandie wondered. Or were there harder feelings between him and his former fiancée than he’d let on when he’d said what little he’d said before about her being at this dinner?

      But Dax didn’t offer anything else on the subject of Lizbeth Stanton, and Shandie didn’t think it was the right time to pry.

      So, instead, she prompted him to go on by saying, “Next to them?”

      “That’s Marshall—Mitchell’s brother.” The warmer tone returned to his voice. “He’s a doctor. Sports medicine. He practices at the resort now that it’s grown, but he was at the hospital in town before. He’s with Mia—she’s actually an heiress who came to Thunder Canyon to hide out. That’s how they hooked up.”

      “They look happy,” Shandie commented, feeling a twinge for what she’d lost herself as she looked