CHAPTER TEN

There was no slowing down Christmas. It was bearing down on Stone Creek at full throttle, hell-bent-for-election, as Big John used to say. Watering Charlie Brown in her living room before braving snowy roads to get to the clinic for a full day of appointments, Olivia hummed a carol under her breath.

The week since Ashley had come home from Tennessee had been a busy one, rushing by. Olivia had had supper with Sophie and Tanner twice, once at her place, once at theirs.

And she hadn’t been able to shake off loving him.

It was for real.

The big tree in the center of town would be lighted as soon as the sun went down that night, to the noisy delight of the whole community, and after that, over at the high school gymnasium, the chamber of commerce was throwing their annual Christmas carnival, with a dance to follow.

In the kitchen Ginger began to bark.

Olivia frowned and went to investigate. They’d already been outside, and she hadn’t heard anybody drive in.

Passing the kitchen window, she saw a late-model truck pulling in at Starcross, pulling a long, mud-splashed horse trailer behind it.

Sophie’s much-anticipated aunt Tessa, Tanner’s sister, had finally arrived. That would be a relief to Tanner—more than once over the past week he’d admitted he was on the verge of heading out to look for Tessa. Even though Tessa called every night, according to Sophie, to report her progress, Tanner had been jumpy.

“He worries a lot about what could happen,” Sophie had told Olivia, on the q.t., while the two of them were frying chicken in the kitchen at Starcross. Then, as if concerned that Olivia might be turned off by the admission, she’d added, “But he’s really brave. He saved Uncle Jack’s life twice in the Gulf War.”

“And modest, too,” Olivia had teased.

But Sophie’s expression was serious. “Uncle Jack told me about it,” she’d said. “Not Dad.”

Now, with Ginger barking fit to deafen her, Olivia made an executive decision. She’d stop by Starcross on the way to town and offer a brief welcome to Tessa. It was the neighborly thing to do, after all.

And if she was more than a little curious about the soon-to-be-divorced former TV star, well, nothing wrong with that. Brad would have to share his local-celebrity status, at least temporarily.

Showing up would be an intrusion of sorts, though, Olivia reasoned as she and Ginger slipped and slid down the icy driveway to the main road. Who knew what kind of shape Tessa Quinn Whoever might be in after driving practically across country with a load of horses and a broken heart?

All the more reason to offer a friendly greeting, Olivia decided.

Tanner had probably already left for the construction site in town, and Sophie was surely in school, secretly lusting after the role of Emily in next year’s production of Our Town. Stone Creek never got tired of that play—perhaps because it reminded them to be grateful for ordinary blessings.

It bothered Olivia to think Tessa might have no one to welcome her, help her unload her prized horses and settle them into stalls. Since all her morning appointments were things a veterinary assistant could handle, Olivia decided she’d offer whatever assistance she could.

Only, Tanner was there when Olivia arrived, and so was Sophie.

She and Tessa—a tall, dark-haired woman who resembled Tanner—were just breaking up a hug. Tanner was pulling out the ramp on the horse trailer, but he stopped and smiled as Olivia drove up.

Her heart beat double time.

Sophie was obviously filling Tessa in on the new arrival as Olivia got out of the Suburban, leaving Ginger behind in the passenger seat. Tessa’s wide-set gray eyes, friendly but reserved, too, took Olivia’s measure as she approached, hands in the pockets of her down vest.

What, if anything, Olivia wondered, had Tanner told his sister about the veterinarian-next-door?

Nothing, Olivia hoped. And everything.

Except for a few stolen kisses when Sophie happened to be out of range, nothing had happened between Olivia and Tanner since Thanksgiving.

For all that she was playing with fire and she knew it, Olivia was past ready for another round of hot sex with the first man she’d ever loved—and probably the last.

Tanner made introductions; Tessa wiped her palms down the slim thighs of her gray corduroy pants before offering Olivia a handshake. The caution lingered in her eyes, though, and she slipped an arm around Sophie’s shoulders after the hellos had been said, and pulled her against her side.

“I’m trying to talk Tessa into going to the tree-lighting and the Christmas carnival and dance tonight,” Tanner said, watching his sister with an expression of fond, worried relief. “So far, it’s no-go.”

“It’s been a long drive,” Tessa said, smiling somewhat feebly. “I’d rather stay here. Maybe I’ll stop feeling as if the road is still rolling under me.”

“I’ll stay with you,” Sophie told her aunt, clinging with both arms and looking up with a delight that made Olivia feel an unbecoming rush of envy. “We can order pizza.”

“You don’t want to miss the tree-lighting,” Tessa said to Sophie, squeezing her once and kissing the top of her head. “Or the carnival. That sounds like a lot of fun.” The woman looked almost shell-shocked, the way Ashley had when Brad brought her home from Tennessee, and it wasn’t because of the endless highways and roadside hotels.

Will I look like that when Tanner’s gone? Olivia asked herself, even though she already knew the answer.

“Dad could bring me back after,” Sophie insisted. “Couldn’t you, Dad?”

Tanner looked at Olivia.

Tessa’s glance bounced between the two of them.

“Are you up for a Christmas dance, Doc?” Tanner asked. It was a simple question, but it sounded grave under the watchful eyes of Tessa and Sophie.

“I guess so,” Olivia said, because jumping up and down and shouting “Yes, yes, yes!” would have given her away.

“Note the wild enthusiasm,” Tanner said, grinning.

“I think she said yes,” Tessa remarked, her smile warming noticeably.

“Do you have a dress?” Sophie inquired, her brow furrowed. Clearly she was worried that Olivia would skip off to the Christmas festivities in her customary cow-doctor getup.

“Maybe I’ll buy one,” Olivia said, after chuckling. She still felt as if she’d swallowed a handful of jumping beans, though.

Buying a dress she’d probably never wear again?

What I did for love.

When she was a creaky old spinster veterinarian, she’d show the dress to her brother’s and sisters’ kids and tell them the story. The G-rated part, anyway.

She checked her watch, which was a perfectly normal thing to do. She even smiled. “I guess I’d better get to the clinic,” she said. Then, achingly aware of Tanner standing at the edge of her vision, she added, “Unless you need some help unloading those horses?”

“I think I can handle it, Doc,” he said good-naturedly. “But if you’re in a favor-doing mood, you can drop Sophie off at school.”

“Sure,” Olivia said, pleased.

“I thought I’d take today off,” Sophie piped up.

“You’re in or you’re out, kiddo,” Tanner told her. “You were dead set on continuing your education, remember?”

“Go,” Tessa told her niece. “I’ll probably be asleep all day anyway.”

Sophie nodded, very reluctantly, but in that quicksilver way of children, she had a warm smile going by the time she climbed into the front seat of the Suburban. Ginger, always accommodating, when it came to Sophie, anyway, had already moved to the back, her big furry head blocking the rearview mirror.

“Where are you going to plant Charlie Brown when Christmas is over?” Sophie asked, snapping her seat belt into place and settling in.

“I hadn’t thought about it,” Olivia admitted. “Maybe in town, on the grounds of the new shelter. I’ll be living upstairs when it’s finished.”

“I wish all Christmas trees came in pots, so they could be planted afterward,” Sophie said. “That way, they wouldn’t die.”

“Me, too,” Olivia said.

“Do you think trees have feelings?”

Ginger had shifted just enough to allow Olivia a glance in the rearview. Olivia caught a glimpse of Tanner, leading the first horse down the ramp and toward the newly refurbished barn.

“I don’t know,” Olivia answered belatedly, “but they’re living things, and they deserve good treatment.”

Mercifully, the conversation took a different track after that, though the subject of trees lingered in Olivia’s mind, leading to Kris Kringle at the lot in town, and finally to Rodney, who was living the high life in Brad’s barn at Stone Creek Ranch. For that little stretch of time, she didn’t think about Tanner.

Much.

“Aunt Tessa is pretty, don’t you think?” Sophie asked as ramshackle country fences whizzed by on both sides of the Suburban.

“She certainly is,” Olivia agreed, feeling unusually self-conscious about her clothes and her bobbed hair. Tessa’s locks flowed, wavy and almost as dark as Tanner’s, past her shoulders. “I don’t recall seeing her on TV, though.”

“We got you the season one DVD of California Women for Christmas,” Sophie said with a spark of mischief in her eyes. “It was supposed to be a surprise, though.”

Sophie and Tanner had bought her a Christmas present?

Lord, what was she going to give them in return? She hadn’t even shopped for Mac yet, let alone Brad and Meg, Ashley and Melissa, and the office staff and the other vets she worked with at the clinic.

“It’s no big deal,” Sophie assured her, evidently reading her expression.

Fruitcake? Olivia wondered, distracted. One of those things that came in a colorful tin and had a postapocalyptic sell-by date? If they didn’t eat it, it could double as a doorstop.

“How come you’re frowning like that?” Sophie pressed.

“I’m just thinking,” Olivia said as they reached the outskirts of town. The hardware store had fruitcake; she’d seen a display when she bought the lights and ornaments for Charlie Brown.

And what kind of loser bought bakery goods in a hardware store?

This was a job for super-Ashley, she of the wildly wielded rolling pin and the flour-specked hair. Olivia would drop in on her on her lunch break, she decided, to (a) borrow a dress for the dance, thereby saving posterity from the tale, and (b) persuade her sister to whip up something impressive for the Quinns’ Christmas present.

“This is cool,” Sophie said a few minutes later when Olivia pulled up to the curb in front of Stone Creek Middle School. “Almost like having a mom.” Having dropped that one, she turned to say a quick goodbye to Ginger, and then she disappeared into the gaggle of kids milling on the lawn.

Olivia’s hands trembled on the steering wheel as she eased out of a tangle of leaving and arriving traffic.

“We still have half an hour before you’re due at the clinic,” Ginger said, brushing Olivia’s face with her plumy tail as she returned to the front seat. “Let’s go by the tree lot and have a word with Kris Kringle. For Rodney’s sake, we need to know he’s on the level.”

“Not going to happen,” Olivia said firmly. “I’ve got some paperwork to catch up on before I start seeing patients and, besides, Kringle checked out with Indian Rock PD. Plus, Rodney’s doing okay at the homeplace. I get daily reports from either Meg or Brad, and we’ve been to visit our reindeer buddy twice in the last three days.”

Ginger was determined to be helpful, apparently. Or just to butt in. “How’s your mother?”

“I do not want to talk about my mother.”

“Denial,” Ginger accused. “Sooner or later, you’re going to have to see her, just to get closure.”

“You need to stop watching talk-TV while I’m at work,” Olivia said. “Besides, Mommy dearest is in the clink right now.”

“No, she isn’t. Brad got her a lawyer and had her moved to a swanky ‘recovery center’ in Flagstaff.”

Olivia almost ran the one red light in Stone Creek. “How do you know these things?”

“Rodney told me the last time we visited. He heard Brad and Meg talking about it in the barn.”

“And you’re just getting around to mentioning this now?”

“I knew you wouldn’t take it well. And there’s the being in love with Tanner thing.”

Olivia grabbed her cell phone and speed-dialed her sneaky brother. Mr. Tough, refusing to bail their mom out of the hoosegow back in Tennessee. He hadn’t said a single word to her about bringing Delia to Arizona, or to the twins, either. They’d have told her if he had.

“Is Mom in a treatment center in Flagstaff?” she demanded the moment Brad said hello.

“How did you know that?” Brad asked, sounding both baffled and guilty.

“Never mind how I know. I just do.”

Brad heaved a major sigh. “Okay. Yes. Mom’s in Flagstaff. I was going to tell you and the twins after Christmas.”

“Why the change of heart, Brad?” Olivia snapped, annoyed for the obvious reason and, also, because Ginger was right. If she wanted any closure, she’d have to visit her mother, and after what had happened to Ashley, the prospect had all the appeal of locking herself in a cage with a crazed grizzly bear.

“She’s our mother,” Brad said after a long silence. “I wanted to turn my back on her, the way she turned hers on us, but in the end I couldn’t do it.”

Olivia’s eyes stung. Good thing she was pulling into the clinic lot, because she couldn’t see well enough to drive at the moment. “I know you did the right thing,” she said as Ginger nudged her shoulder sympathetically. “But I’ll be a while getting used to the idea of Mom living right up the road, after all these years.”

“Tell me about it,” Brad said. “It’s a long-term thing, Liv. Basically, the prognosis for her recovery isn’t good.”

Olivia sat very still in the Suburban, nosed up to the wall of the clinic, clutching the phone so tightly in her right hand that her knuckles ached. “Are you telling me she’s dying?”

“We’re all dying,” Brad answered. “I’m telling you that, in this case, ‘treatment center’ is a euphemism for one of the best mental hospitals in the world. She could live to be a hundred, but she’ll probably never leave Palm Haven.”

“She’s crazy?”

“She’s fried her brain, between the booze and snorting a line of coke whenever she could scrape the money together. So, yeah. She’s crazy.”

“Oh, God.”

“They’re adjusting her medication, and she’ll eat regularly, anyway. I’m not planning to pay her a visit until sometime after the first, and I’d suggest you wait, too. This is Mac’s first Christmas, and I plan to enjoy it.”

Becky, the receptionist, beckoned from the side door of the clinic.

“I’ve got to go,” Olivia said, nodding to Becky that she’d be right in. “Will you and Meg be at the tree-lighting and all that?”

“Definitely the tree-lighting. Probably the carnival, too. But maybe not the dance. Mac’s getting a tooth, so he’s not his usual sunny self.”

Olivia laughed, blinked away tears.

This was life, she supposed. Their mother’s tragedy on the one hand, a baby having his first Christmas and sprouting teeth on the other.

Falling in love with the wrong man at the wrong time.

What could you do but tough it out?

* * *

The Sophie-of-Christmas-future haunted Tanner—she still came to him almost every night in his dreams, and of course he mulled them over during the days. In one memorable visit he’d found her living alone in an expensive but sparsely furnished apartment, with only a little ceramic tree to mark the presence of a holiday. He’d counted two Christmas cards tacked to her wall. In another, she tried to get through to him by phone, wanting to wish him a Merry Christmas. He’d been unreachable. And in a third installment he’d seen her standing wistfully at the edge of a city playground, watching a flock of young mothers and their children skating on a frozen pond.

Was this really a glimpse of the future, Ebenezer Scrooge–style, or was he just torturing himself with parental guilt?

Either way, he’d come to dread closing his eyes at night.

“Sophie looks happy,” Tessa remarked from her seat at the kitchen table. Now that she’d finally arrived safely at Starcross at least, Tanner had one fewer thing to worry about. “And I like Olivia. Something special going on between the two of you?”

“What makes you think that?” he asked, hedging.

Tessa smiled at him over the rim of her coffee cup. “Oh, maybe the way you sort of held your breath when you asked her to the dance, until she said yes, and the way she blushed—”

“If I remember correctly,” Tanner broke in, “she said ‘I guess so.’”

“Could it be you’re finally thinking of settling down, Big Brother?”

Tanner dragged back a chair and sat. “A week ago, even a day ago, I probably would have said no. Emphatically. But I’m getting pretty worried about Sophie.”

Tessa arched an eyebrow, waited in silence.

“I’ve been having these crazy dreams,” he confessed, after a few moments spent trying to convince himself that Tessa would think he was nuts if he told her about them.

“What kind of crazy dreams?” Tessa asked gently, pushing her coffee cup aside, folding her arms and resting them on the table’s edge.

Tanner shoved a hand through his hair. “It’s as if I travel through time,” he admitted, every word torn out of him like a strip of hide. “Sophie’s in her thirties, and she’s a doctor, but she’s alone in the world.”

“Hmmm,” Tessa said. “The doctor is in. Advice, five cents.”

Tanner gave a raw chuckle. “Put it on my bill,” he said.

“How do you fit into these dreams?”

“I’m off building something, in some other part of the world. At the same time, I’m there somehow, watching Sophie. And who knows where you are. I don’t want to scare you or anything, but you haven’t been a guest star.”

“Go on,” Tessa said.

“I love my daughter, Tessa,” Tanner said. “I don’t want her to end up—well, alone like that.”

Tessa’s gray eyes widened, and a smile flicked at the corner of her mouth. She was still beautiful, and she still got acting offers, but she always turned them down because it would mean leaving her horses. “Sophie’s been miserable at boarding school,” she said. “Last fall, when it was time for her to go back, she begged me to let her stay on with me at the farm. I wanted so much to say yes, and damn your opinion in the matter, but things were going downhill fast between Paul and me even then. She’d heard us fighting all summer, and I knew it wasn’t good for her.”

“I thought she was safe at school.”

“‘Thought’? Past tense? What’s happened, Tanner?”

Briefly Tanner explained what Sophie had told him about the easy availability of meth and ice at Briarwood. “It’s not like Stone Creek is Brigadoon or anything.” He sighed. “A kid can probably score any kind of drug right here in rural America. But I really thought I had all the bases covered.”

“Give Sophie a little credit,” Tessa said, and though her tone was firm, she reached across the table to touch Tanner’s hand. “She’s way too smart to do drugs.”

“I know,” Tanner answered. “But I’ve always thought she’d be happy when she grew up—that she’d come to understand that I had her best interests at heart, sending her away to school….”

“And the dreams made you question that?”

Tanner nodded. “They’re so—so real, Tess. I can’t shake the feeling that Sophie’s going to have no life outside her work—all because she doesn’t know how to be part of a family.”

“Heavy stuff,” Tessa said. “Are you in love with Olivia?”

“I don’t know what I feel,” Tanner answered, after a long silence. “And I don’t necessarily have to get married to give Sophie a home, do I? I could sell off the overseas part of the business, or just close it down. I’d still have to do some traveling, but if you were here—”

“Hold it,” Tessa broke in. “I can’t promise I’m going to stay, Tanner. And one way or the other, I don’t intend to live off your generosity like some poor relation.”

“You won’t have to,” Tanner said. “There’s money, Tess. Kat and I set it aside for you a long time ago.”

Tessa’s cheeks colored up. Her pride was kicking in, just as Tanner had known it would. “What?”

“You put me through college on what you earned when you were acting, Tessa,” he reminded her. “You took care of Gram while I was in the service and then getting the business started. You’re entitled to all the help I can give you.”

Tessa went from pink to pale. Her eyes narrowed. “I can provide for myself,” she said.

“Can you?” Tanner countered. “Good for you. Because that’s more than I could do when I was in college and for a long time after that, and it’s more than Gram could have managed, too, with just her Social Security and the take from that roadside vegetable stand of hers.”

“How much money, Tanner?”

“Enough,” Tanner said. He got up, walked to the small desk in the corner of the kitchen and jerked a bound folder out of the drawer. Returning to the table, he tossed it down in front of her.

Tessa opened the portfolio and stared at the figures, her eyes rounding at all those zeroes.

“The magic of compound interest,” Tanner said.

“This money should be Sophie’s,” Tessa whispered, her voice thin and very soft. “My God, Tanner, this is a fortune.”

“Sophie has a trust fund. I started it with Kat’s life insurance check, and the last time I looked, it was around twice that much.”

Tessa swallowed, looked up at him in shock, momentarily speechless.

“You can draw on it, or let it grow. My accountant has the tax angle all figured out, and it’s in my name until the divorce is final, so Paul can’t touch it.” Still standing, Tanner folded his arms. “It’s up to you, Tess. You’re real good at giving. How are you at receiving?”

Tessa huffed out a stunned breath. “I could buy out Paul’s half of the horse farm—”

“Or you could start over, right here, with a place of your own. No bad memories attached. Times are hard, and there are a lot of good people looking to sell all or part of their land.”

“I can’t think. Tanner, this is—this is unbelievable! I knew you were doing well, but I had no idea…”

“I’m late,” he said.

On his way out, he checked on the puppies, found them sleeping in their box by the stove, curled up together as if they were still in the womb. They were so small, so helpless, so wholly trusting.

His throat tightened as he took his coat off the peg on the wall by the back door. He couldn’t help drawing a parallel between the pups and Sophie.

“I’ll be at the job site in town,” he said. “You have my cell number if you need anything.”

Tessa was still hunched over the portfolio. Her shoulders were shaking a little, so Tanner figured she was crying, though he couldn’t be sure, with her back to him and all.

“Will you be okay here alone?” he asked gruffly.

She nodded vigorously, but didn’t turn around to meet his gaze.

That damnable pride again.

Grabbing up his truck keys from the counter, he left the house. It was snowing so hard by then, he figured he’d probably let the construction crew off an hour or two early.

And Olivia had agreed to go to the dance with him that night.

It wasn’t quite the date he’d had in mind, but she was planning to wear a dress, and Tessa would be on hand to keep an eye on Sophie after the tree-lighting and the carnival.

This was shaping up to be a half-decent Christmas.

Climbing behind the wheel of the truck, Tanner started the engine, whistling “Jingle Bells” under his breath, and headed for town.

* * *

Ashley, with the help of a few very tall elves in college sweatshirts, was on a high ladder decorating her annual mongo Christmas tree when Olivia and Ginger showed up at noon.

“I need to borrow a dress for the dance,” Olivia said.

“Hello to you, too,” Ashley replied. She still looked a little feeble, but she was obviously into the holiday spirit, or she wouldn’t have been decking the halls. And if she had a clue that Delia was in Flagstaff, luxuriously hospitalized, it didn’t show. “I’m taller than you are. Anything I loaned you would have to be hemmed. I don’t have time for that, and you can’t sew.”

“I sew all the time. It’s called surgery. Ashley, this is an emergency. Can I raid your closet? Please? The hardware store doesn’t sell dresses, and I don’t have time to drive up to Flagstaff and shop.”

Ashley waved her toward the stairs. “Anything but the blue velvet number with the little beads. I’m wearing that myself.”

Olivia wiggled her eyebrows. Ginger snugged herself up on the hooked rug in front of the crackling blaze in the fireplace and relaxed into a power nap. That dog was at home anywhere. And everywhere.

“You have a date?” Olivia asked.

“As a matter of fact, I do,” Ashley replied, carefully draping a single strand of tinsel over a branch. She’d do that two jillion times, to make the tree look perfect. “It’s a blind date, if you must know. A friend of Tanner Quinn’s—he’s going to be staying here. The friend, not Tanner.”

Olivia paused at the base of the stairway. “I hope it goes well,” she said. “It could be awkward living under the same roof with a bad date until next spring.”

“Thanks a heap, Liv. Now I’m twice as nervous.”

Olivia hurried up the stairs. She still had to broach the subject of Ashley whipping up something spectacular for her to give Tanner, Sophie and Tessa for Christmas. An ice castle, made of sugar, she thought. Failing that, fancy cookies would work—the kind with colored frosting and sugar sparkles.

But the outfit had to come first.

Ashley’s room was almost painfully tidy—the bed made, all the furniture matching, the prints tastefully arranged on the pale pink walls. Everywhere she looked, there was lace, or ruffles, or both.

It was almost impossible to imagine a man in that room.

Olivia sighed, thinking of her own jumbled bed, liberally sprinkled with dog hair. Her clothes were all over the floor, and she hadn’t seen the surface of the dresser in weeks.

Yikes. If the date with Tanner went the way she hoped it would, she’d wish she’d spruced the place up a little—but at least he wouldn’t have to contend with lace and ruffles.

She would cut out of the clinic an hour early that afternoon, assuming there were no disasters in the interim. Run the vacuum cleaner, dust a little, change the sheets.

She turned her mind back to the task at hand. Ashley’s closet was jammed, but organized. Even color coded, for heaven’s sake. Olivia swiped a pair of black velvet palazzo pants—probably gaucho pants on Ashley—and tried them on. If she rolled them up at the waist and wore her high-heeled boots, she probably wouldn’t catch a toe in a hem and fall on her face.

A red silk tank top and a glittering silver shawl completed the ensemble.

Piece of cake, Olivia thought smugly, heading out of the room and back down the stairs with the garments draped over one arm.

At the bottom of the steps, just opening her mouth to pitch the sugar-ice-castle idea to Ashley, she stopped in her tracks.

A guy stood just inside the front door, and what a guy he was. Military haircut, hard body, straight back and shoulders. Wearing black from head to foot. Only the twinkle in his hazel eyes as he looked up at Ashley saved him from looking like a CIA agent trying to infiltrate a terrorist cell.

Ashley, staring back at him, seemed in imminent danger of toppling right off the ladder.

The air sizzled.

“Jack McCall,” Ashley marveled. “You son of a bitch!”