What She Wants for Christmas. Janice Kay Johnson

you.” Teresa flashed him a grateful smile. “She is pretty, isn’t she?”

      “Looks a lot like her mother.”

      A shadow crossed Teresa’s face. “I don’t know if that’s a blessing or a curse.”

      He heard a car out in the driveway and assumed his men were back, but she didn’t seem to notice. “Because you have trouble being taken seriously?” he asked.

      “Uh-huh.” Her faraway expression faded and she jumped to her feet. “Listen to me. And I tell my kids not to whine. Will you have some apple pie, Joe?”

      He ran an internal check and decided he could squeeze in a slice.

      While she cut it, she chattered some more. “We have four cats and the two dogs—you’ve met them. Most vets have even more animals than that. It’s an occupational hazard. I keep encountering ones that need homes. At least they’re happy here.” She set two plates of pie on the table.

      “From our own trees,” she said with satisfaction, lifting a forkful to her mouth. “This is the life.”

      For how long? he wondered. About as long as he’d interest her? Or was he misjudging her?

      If he was smart, he wouldn’t bother finding out. But he’d never been accused of belonging in any program for the intellectually gifted, now had he? He told himself he’d hurt her feelings if he didn’t ask her out. They’d made too many spoken and unspoken acknowledgments to each other for him to drop it here.

      He insisted on carrying his dishes to the sink. There, he turned to face her. “Any chance you’d have dinner with me Friday night?” he asked casually enough that she wouldn’t feel pressured if he was reading her wrong.

      She smiled saucily. “I’d say there’s a chance.”

      “You remind me of my sister,” he said without thinking.

      “Jess?”

      “No, the other one. Rebecca.”

      “Looks? Or because we’re both mouthy?”

      He hesitated a little too long. Sooner or later she’d meet Rebecca and discover they didn’t look anything alike. Sure enough, it was the smart mouths they had in common.

      Apparently unoffended, Teresa laughed. “I’ll look forward to meeting her. Tell me her husband is a dairy farmer.”

      “Nope. Owns a string of rental stores.”

      “I’ve been in the one here in town. His?”

      “Mmm.”

      “Is there any pie your family doesn’t have its finger in?”

      “Not many,” Joe admitted. “My brother, Lee, owns an auto-body repair place on Third. Rebecca sells wallpaper and blinds out of Browder’s Flooring. Jess—but you know her. Her firm cleans the veterinary clinic, as I recall. Our father sold insurance until his heart attack a few years back.”

      “You must have a heck of a grapevine.”

      He grimaced. “You have no idea.”

      “Your men are peering in the windows,” she said suddenly.

      He turned and waved, hoping he wasn’t blushing. He could imagine how they’d razz him if they got a good look at his stocking feet and the pretty table set for two.

      “Six o’clock?” he said.

      She blinked. “Why does that remind me of five hundred dollars?”

      He stared at her. “I have no idea.”

      “Six,” she agreed, and he nodded.

      “Thanks for lunch.”

      He got another one of those impish grins. “Thanks for not dropping a tree on my house.”

      “Bad for the insurance rates,” he said laconically, and let the screen door slam behind him while he sat down on the porch to lace up his boots.

      CHAPTER TWO

      WHEN JOE HAD ASKED about Nicole, the very mention of her name had been enough to prick Teresa with exasperation, amusement, puzzlement, frustration and even reluctant admiration. She’d no doubt gotten an odd look on her face. There was a good reason for it. In the past week, Nicole had obviously changed her tactics. Teresa wasn’t foolish enough to think she’d given up.

      For example, last Wednesday Nicole had gone along sweetly and willingly to register at the high school. When Teresa stared doubtfully up at the building and said, “Gee, it’s kinda ugly, isn’t it?” Nicole didn’t jump right on her mother’s minor criticism and try to make something major out of it.

      Instead, she gave a dainty shrug and said, “It probably doesn’t matter, as long as the district has spent their money where it counts.”

      What kid ever thought of a school district in terms of a limited budget and priorities? Not Nicole, that was for sure. Wary, Teresa trailed her up the wide stairs and in the double doors.

      Sounding sanctimonious, her daughter whispered, “Don’t they have handicapped access?”

      “I’m sure they do,” Teresa returned dryly.

      The guidance counselor in the office was friendly. She agreed to put Nicole in third year French even though the class was technically full. Nicole’s face fell with exaggerated disappointment as she examined the offerings.

      “Oh, I was really looking forward to taking song writing this year.”

      “Maybe you should worry about bringing your algebra grade up, instead,” her mother suggested.

      The counselor had a twinkle in her eye. “Perhaps you’d like to try drama, Nicole. You look like acting might come naturally.”

      “Only if it’s in the form of melodrama,” Teresa muttered.

      Her daughter gave her a glare. “Yeah, okay,” she said to the counselor. “Why not? There isn’t anything else.”

      “It’s too bad you missed new-student orientation,” the counselor concluded brightly, “but there’s no reason you and your mother can’t wander around the building right now. Here’s a map, so you can find your classrooms—”

      “Are the rooms unlocked?” Nicole sounded so earnest Teresa was immediately suspicious.

      “Why, yes, I think so. You’ll probably find some of the teachers—getting ready for the onslaught tomorrow.”

      “Can we look around?” Nicole asked when they left the office.

      “Well, of course.” Teresa nodded at the map and schedule Nicole carried. “What’s your first class?”

      “Um…algebra. Room 233.” She peered around doubtfully. “Are we on the second floor here, do you think?”

      They were; 233 was just down the hall. Nicole insisted on glancing in. It looked like any other classroom to Teresa, if a little old-fashioned. The ceilings were high, the woodwork dark, and a smell of floor polish was underlaid with that of chalk and the pages of new textbooks, piled on a table by the door.

      The chemistry lab looked perfectly adequate to Teresa, as well; Nicole critiqued it as they wandered between high black-topped tables furnished with microscopes and glass beakers and petri dishes. Teresa, filled with nostalgia for her own high-school days, was able to tune her daughter out. She’d had a mad crush on her biology/chemistry teacher, in part because he inspired her with his own passionate interest in the unseen organisms that cause disease or well-being. It had taken her a while to realize she was more excited by cell division than she was by him.

      They progressed to the library, where Nicole prowled the shelves, returning to announce, “This collection is ancient! How does anybody do any research here?”