Yours for Christmas. Сьюзен Мэллери

barely stretched to cover her bills. She wasn’t exactly a hunky-guy magnet.

      But that was the beauty of a crush. She could look and dream all she wanted, for free. And if the man in question happened to be coming in for a meeting that very morning, then she was simply going to have more to sigh about later. Which made today a very good day.

      * * *

      AS KENNY SCOTT’S friend Jack had once admitted, going to see Mayor Marsha was a bit like visiting the great and powerful Wizard of Oz. But without the flying monkeys or the man manipulating things behind the curtain. Unfortunately for Kenny, Mayor Marsha came by her power the old-fashioned way, and not through smoke and mirrors. If it were the latter, she would be so much easier to refuse.

      It wasn’t that he was afraid of the woman, he told himself as he walked toward city hall. It was that he didn’t like situations where he couldn’t say no. And with Mayor Marsha, no wasn’t a word people generally uttered.

      He knew he could tell himself to be strong. That she was merely an old woman. But the truth was far more complex than that. Mayor Marsha knew things she shouldn’t, and no one could figure out how. Kenny assumed she had a network of accomplices who fed her tidbits of information. She put them all into some retired NSA computer program that predicted behavior or something. He shook his head as he climbed the steps to the main entrance. Maybe he should simply accept the prevailing wisdom that the mayor wasn’t of this earth. Or had precognition. Regardless, she had summoned him and here he was.

      He took a flight of stairs to the second floor and walked down the wide hallway. A sign directed him to the mayor’s office.

      He walked through the open doorway only to get hit by a three-hundred-pound cornerback. Okay, not really, but that was what it felt like. He came to a stop, unnoticed by the single occupant of the office foyer, and told himself that he was imagining the body blow. And the attraction.

      He knew the curvy redhead sitting guard outside the mayor’s inner sanctum. He’d seen her dozens of times in town, had talked to her. He even knew her kid. But while seven-year-old Chloe was adorable and only a little dangerous, the same couldn’t be said for her mom. Bailey Voss was a walking, breathing temptation. She should come with a permanent warning sign and a quarantine zone. Because when he was within ten feet of her, his brain shut down and he became an idiot.

      He couldn’t figure out what it was about her that got to him. She was tall and he liked tall, but it wasn’t like that was so unusual in and of itself. The long, wavy red hair was sexy, but survivable. He wanted to say it was her big green eyes. There was an innocence there, a trust, and that appealed to him.

      Okay, fine. He would admit it. He was just as mentally simple as every other man on the planet. Sex was important and when he saw Bailey Voss all he could think about was getting her naked and having his way with her. He was pretty sure that three or four hundred times would do the trick.

      Under any other circumstances, he would ask her out, wow her with his charm, get her into bed and get over her. Or fall crazy in love with her. He was open to either. Only that wasn’t going to happen. Not ever. She was a single mom and he didn’t date single moms. Not now, not in the future. Because single moms came with kids and while a guy could get over falling for a woman, kids ripped out your heart and took it with them when they left. There was no recovering from that.

      He braced himself for the inevitable feeling of being all feet and no brain, then cleared his throat. Bailey looked up and smiled.

      That was all it took. One sweet smile and he was a goner. He’d played in the NFL—shouldn’t he be better than this?

      “Hi, Kenny,” she said. “You’re right on time.”

      “I figured if I wasn’t, she’d unleash the dragons.”

      Bailey’s smile turned into a little laugh. One of those soft, sweet sounds that made a man think about how he should have matching towels and maybe get something monogrammed. He’d read once that men might have conquered the West, but women had civilized it. Truer words, he thought glumly.

      “The mayor said to bring you right in,” Bailey told him.

      She rose and stepped out from behind the desk.

      She was wearing a dress. Some gray tweedy fabric that probably had a name or was the latest style. He didn’t care about the color or the style. What he liked was how the dress followed the generous lines of her body. The style emphasized her breasts and her hips. She wore boots with sensible flat heels and still came up past his shoulder.

      She moved closer and suddenly he could smell some girlie shampoo or soap. It made him think of Bailey in the shower, which was dangerous and fun at the same time.

      She moved toward the closed double doors and he followed. She came to an unexpected stop and he nearly plowed into her. Before he could move back, she turned to face him.

      Her green eyes were big and her lashes were long. Her full lips had some kind of gloss on them and he briefly wondered if it had a flavor. Because every now and then when he kissed a woman he got a twofer. A sweet, sexy mouth and a hint of piña colada. It was nice. Women were nice and Bailey was the nicest of them—

      He grabbed his self-control with both hands and deliberately took a step toward safety. Early in his career a coach had told him that he had one job on the field. To catch the football and run it to the end zone. Nothing else mattered. The advice had served him well.

      When it came to Bailey, he only had to remember one thing. She wasn’t for him. If he kept that in mind, he would be fine.

      “I should have asked,” she said. “Did you want some coffee? We have a pot going.”

      “I’m good.”

      Something flashed in her eyes and her smile broadened. He wanted to ask what she was thinking, but before he could, she’d opened the door to the mayor’s office and led the way inside.

      The space was large with a huge desk and big windows. There were three flags behind the mayor’s desk. The U.S. Flag, the California state flag and one that he guessed was the seal of Fool’s Gold.

      Mayor Marsha was in her sixties with white hair. She wore suits or dresses and pearls. On the surface she wasn’t the least bit intimidating, but he’d seen grown men bow to her bidding and be unable to explain why.

      Today she had on a red dress. She smiled welcomingly when he followed Bailey to her desk, then rose and shook his hand.

      “Mr. Scott, thank you so much for seeing me.”

      Uh-huh, like he believed he’d had a choice. “Kenny, please.”

      She motioned for him to sit. Bailey took the chair next to his and Mayor Marsha settled back in her seat.

      The older woman studied him for a moment before nodding. As if she’d just made a decision. Kenny briefly wondered how big a pain in his butt that decision was going to be.

      “As you know,” she began, “we have various service projects for our FWM groves.”

      “Sure.”

      Fool’s Gold had its own version of scouting. Future Warriors of the Máa-zib. The Máa-zib tribe was the former indigenous tribe of the area. They had been a matriarchal society, so the FWM was for girls from age six to maybe ten. They progressed from Acorns in year one to Sprouts and so on until their final year when they were Mighty Oaks. The girls were in “groves” and there was a Grove Keeper.

      Taryn, one of his business partners, was a co-leader of a grove with her husband, Angel. Chloe, Bailey’s daughter, was in their grove. Kenny had helped her and one of her friends learn knots this past spring.

      “You know the Sprouts?” the mayor asked.

      “Taryn’s grove? Sure.” He looked at Bailey, but she seemed as puzzled as he was.

      “Is there a problem with the Sprouts?” she asked her boss. “Chloe hasn’t said anything.”

      “All