Cole For Christmas. Darlene Gardner

awful baritone.

      By the time they were well into another carol, Cole’s arms circled her from behind. Before they’d finished for the night, her back was against his chest with his chin resting on the top of her head.

      Somehow, she never did muster the will to move.

      “I HAD A GREAT TIME,” Cole said as Anna’s family gathered around him in the foyer. “I can’t thank you enough for having me.”

      Anna’s mother handed him the black wool overcoat she took out of the coat closet.

      “We’re the ones who should thank you for impressing Anna enough that she wanted us to meet you,” she said.

      Anna didn’t rise to that particular bait, possibly because she was occupied with helping him put on his coat. She applied pressure at the small of his back, the better to shove him out the door.

      He stubbornly held his ground. He’d bonded with her family over dinner, caroling and midnight services. He’d be damned if he cut his goodbyes short.

      “Me, impress Anna?” he asked rhetorically. He ignored the warning look Anna shot him. “You got that wrong. Anna’s the impressive one.”

      “What a nice thing to say,” Grandma Ziemanski offered. “Anna, you better keep this one. When you’re as old and set in your ways as you are, there aren’t many good ones left.”

      “Thank you for that thought, Grandma,” Anna said wryly. She tapped the face of her watch. “It’s late. Cole needs to leave so we can all get to sleep. If we don’t, we’ll be too tired to enjoy Christmas day.”

      She pushed at his back but not hard enough to budge him. He didn’t spend hours at the gym for nothing.

      “Say good-night, Cole,” Anna said.

      “Good night, everyone,” he said, mostly because he couldn’t prolong his leave-taking indefinitely. “And Merry Christmas.”

      “Speaking of Christmas, Cole, what are you doing tomorrow?” Miranda asked. “Peter and I are having everybody over to our house. You’re more than welcome to join us.”

      “Yes,” her husband immediately added. “We’d be happy to have you. You and I never did get a chance to talk about the stock market.”

      Cole’s lifting spirits had nothing to do with the Dow Jones Industrial Average. He realized he was reluctant to leave because spending the rest of the holiday alone had lost its appeal.

      “He can’t come,” Anna interjected, shooting him a dagger of a look. “He’s busy.”

      “What could he be busy doing that can’t wait until after Christmas?” Rosemary asked incredulously.

      Cole kept his mouth shut, especially because Anna’s mother had directed the question at her daughter. He crossed his arms over his chest and watched Anna sweat.

      “He’s busy…working,” she said, wiping her brow. Her big, doe eyes flew to him for help, but her mouth flattened when she realized he didn’t intend to provide any. “He needs to finish up what he was working on tonight. He can’t have any distractions.”

      Cole sent her a sharp look before it dawned on him that she couldn’t possibly know he’d waited until the office was deserted so he could go over the company’s marketing plan.

      Anna wasn’t the retiring type. If she’d guessed what he was doing, she would have said something.

      “But it’s Christmas,” Grandma Ziemanski protested. “Nobody works on Christmas.”

      “And you’re his boss, Anna,” Rosemary said. “I know I raised you to be career-minded, but you can’t mean to make your boyfriend work on Christmas Day.”

      “He’s not my—” Anna began.

      “Of course Cole’s not working Christmas Day,” her father said. “He’s coming to Miranda and Peter’s house.”

      “Maybe he doesn’t want to come,” Anna said in what was obviously one last-ditch attempt to exclude him from her family’s plans.

      “Nonsense,” Grandpa Ziemanski roared. “The boy wants to spend Christmas with us. Don’t you, Cole?”

      Cole gazed from the expectant faces of Anna’s family members to Anna, who was imperceptibly shaking her head back and forth.

      If he did her bidding and said no, he’d risk offending the people who had gone out of their way to make him feel welcome tonight.

      Not to mention relegating himself to a lonely Christmas in his new apartment with nothing to keep him company except his miniature Christmas tree, the printouts of Skillington’s financial records his father had given him and the memory of the way Anna had felt in his arms.

      He gave Anna what he hoped she could tell was an apologetic look before smiling at the people gathered around her.

      “Thanks for thinking of me,” he said. “I’d love to spend Christmas Day with you.”

      3

      “THIS IS A DISASTER,” Anna said after she chased Cole into the cold, calm night. She shivered. She’d been in such a rush to right things that putting on a coat hadn’t occurred to her. “What are we going to do now?”

      Cole stuck his hands in his pockets, looking maddeningly untroubled by their problem, not to mention impossibly handsome. She bit the inside of her lip. When had she started thinking of him in those terms?

      “I thought we’d enjoy each other’s company tomorrow,” he said.

      Anna threw up her hands. “I’d say we did a little too much enjoying tonight. Otherwise we wouldn’t be in this predicament.”

      “I thought tonight went well,” he said over his shoulder as he descended the three porch steps to the sidewalk.

      The better to make a quick getaway to his car, she thought.

      “Tonight did not go well,” she refuted emphatically as she chased after him. His legs were so much longer than her own long legs that she had to practically run to keep up with him. “You heard my family. They think we’re involved.”

      He was halfway to the car before he abruptly turned to face her. When he spoke, she could see his breath. “So what? We know we’re not so I don’t see that it’s a problem.”

      She knew her mouth had dropped open by the cold air that swooshed inside. “How can you say that? Didn’t you listen to them tonight? They’re probably inside right now talking about what they’ll get us for wedding presents.”

      He laughed and skimmed his fingertips down her cheek. She wasn’t sure if her shiver was from his touch or her negligence in putting on a coat to walk him to the car.

      “You’re exaggerating,” he said.

      Clouds obscured the moon but the Christmas lights scattered over the property made it possible to read his expression. The harsh lines of his face had softened, and his eyes roamed over her with appreciation. This time her shiver was definitely not from the cold.

      “You’re doing it again,” she accused.

      “Doing what?”

      She put her hands on her hips. At least she thought they were her hips. She was so frozen she could barely tell where one body part ended and another began. “Touching me. And looking at me like you want to kiss me. No wonder my family thinks we’ve got something going.”

      He focused on her lips while his tongue flicked out and licked his bottom one. “I can’t help the way I look at you,” he said in a hypnotically soft voice.

      Her heartbeat sped up but she wasn’t about to let him know that. She narrowed her eyes, which had begun to water from the cold. She only hoped her