Maverick Christmas Read online

  “We’ll squeeze,” Josh said.

  And squeeze they did. They were a mass of bump ing elbows and hands and short, swinging legs. Chrysie didn’t mind. She’d missed Josh terribly and missed the boys and even their chaos a lot more than she would have ever imagined.

  But she was still nervous about being here. She’d gotten the feeling over the last few days that Josh was ready to rush into something permanent, and she needed time.

  Besides, she’d married Jonathan impetuously. This time she wanted to take things more slowly, make certain she and Josh really knew each other, make certain the merged family situation could work. It was the psychologically sound thing to do.

  “Boy, you should have seen us out snowmobiling yesterday,” Danny said. “We were going over the hills like pow, pow, pow.” He slapped his hand against the table with every pow to demonstrate how they’d gone airborne with each crest.

  “We don’t have snow in Houston,” Jenny said.

  “Ever?”

  “I don’t think so. Do we, Mommy?”

  “It snows occasionally but usually only a few flurries, nothing like it snows in Montana.”

  “Yeah, Montana’s better,” Davy said. “I asked for a sled for Christmas.”

  “Can I ride it?” Mandy asked.

  “Well, it’s going to be fast one, and you’re just a little kid, so you might get hurt.”

  The waitress took their order and brought their drinks. Davy bumped Mandy’s soda with his elbow, and the paper cup went sliding across the table.

  Mandy wailed because her drink was spilled.

  Davy howled because his pants got soaked and the kids in the pageant would say he went to the bathroom on himself.

  Danny jumped out of his chair and ran to tell the waitress they had a spill. She followed him back with more paper napkins.

  “Can we have a quarter to play a video game?” Davy asked. “They got a bunch of them in that other room.”

  Josh grinned. “That’s the best idea you’ve had all night.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of quarters. Eight eager hands opened like the mouths of hungry baby birds. He passed the coins out evenly and they were off and running.

  Once they left, Josh reached for Chrysie’s hands across the table. “Nice to have you home.”

  Here’s where she had to be careful. It was difficult to think clearly when he touched her, impossible when he kissed her, the way he had at the airport.

  “It’s nice to see you and the boys,” she said. “I’ve missed you.”

  “We’ve for sure missed you.”

  “No pancakes?” she teased, trying to keep the moment light.

  “No good-night kisses.”

  “You can always visit me,” she said.

  His eyebrows arched. “Visit you in Houston?”

  “That’s where I live.”

  “I see.” The teasing had disappeared from his voice.

  She took a deep breath and plunged ahead before she weakened even more. “I’ve been offered a position as supervising staff psychologist at the clinic where I worked part-time before.”

  “What did you tell them?”

  “I accepted the offer.”

  Josh let go of her hands. “I don’t suppose anything I say would change that.”

  She took a deep breath. “I need to do this, Josh. I’ve been on the run for three years. I need time to find out what normalcy is before I make new commitments.”

  He looked away. “Not a lot of normalcy in the McCain clan. A small-town sheriff-rancher, a couple of rambunctious boys.”

  “This is as much for you as for me, Josh. We barely know each other, and most of the time we were together we were in a life-and-death struggle. We might feel differently about each other on a normal day-to-day basis.”

  “You might feel different. What you see is what you get with me, no matter what the situation.”

  She’d hurt him, and that was the last thing she’d wanted to do. But she was hurting, too. “I’m not sug gesting we stop seeing each other, Josh. All I’m asking is for a little time.”

  “Time that you’ll be in Houston, building a life there. Houston’s not me, Chrysie. It’s never going to be.”

  “Please, Josh. Don’t just throw us away. Even if this doesn’t work, we can at least be friends.”

  He shook his head and finally locked his gaze with hers. “I love you, Chrysie—or Cassandra, or whoever the hell you decide to be. I love you and I’d do anything for you—except be friends.” He took the keys from his pocket and tossed them onto the table. “You take the car tonight and you can just drop it off at the airport whenever you leave.”

  “How will you get to the pageant? How will you get home?”

  “Don’t worry about us. The boys and I will catch a ride with somebody.” He touched a hand to her shoulder. “Merry Christmas, Chrysie. I hope you have a hell of a life.”

  Her heart had never felt as empty as it did now, watching him walk out of her life without one backward glance.

  CHRYSIE FOUGHT TEARS for the rest of the evening, especially during the pageant. This wasn’t what she’d wanted. Josh was being unreasonable.

  She shifted in her back-row seat as the pageant came to a close. The girls had been perfect angels, thanks to Mrs. Larkey’s letting them just dance around the tree during the four choruses of “We Wish You a Merry Christmas.”

  Chrysie gathered the girls’ coats and hats as the performers prepared for the finale of bowing at center stage and parading down the center aisle and out the back door.

  The reindeer led the parade. They were supposed to prance, but Danny was the lead reindeer, and he extended his arms like an airplane and flew down the aisle.

  He stopped and waved when he saw her. She waved back. Davy didn’t just wave, he stopped and gave her a big hug. “This is my friend,” he announced to everybody in general.

  The tears that had been burning at the back of her eyelids escaped and started to flow down her cheeks. The girls were still onstage waiting to take their bows when Chrysie saw Josh slip out the side door of the auditorium.

  This might be the last time she ever saw him, and she couldn’t let it end like this. She had to at least thank him for saving her life. She followed the last drummer boy out the back door and ran to catch up with Josh.

  “Josh, wait!”

  He didn’t. She sloshed a few more feet, but she was losing ground.

  “Josh? Wait!” she called even louder than before. If he heard, he was too stubborn to turn around. Well, she was stubborn, too. Stooping, she scooped up a handful of wet snow.

  “Joooosh!” This time she yelled as loudly as she could.

  He turned around just as she let the snowball fly. It hit him squarely between the eyes, and snow splattered all over his face. He strode toward her, looking livid. She might have just made a big mistake.

  She turned and ran. She’d almost made it back to the door of the civic center when the return fire hit her in the back of the head.

  This was war. She made another snowball, but before she could hurl it at Josh, she was hit from the right side. And the left. And in the stomach.

  And then Danny jumped on her back and pushed a handful of snow down her collar. She lost her balance and fell to the snow with Danny still hanging on. Jenny and Davy piled on next. Mandy was the last.

  They were all five laughing and hugging and rolling in the snow when Josh reached them, his face still stern. “That’s enough, boys,” he ordered. “Stand up right now and leave Chrysie alone. She doesn’t want to play in the snow.”

  Oh, but she did. Why wouldn’t she? Some people might need months to know that they were happier than they’d ever been in their lives. Some might never realize that they were in the perfect place for them. A few were crazy enough to find love and then let it slip away.

  Josh extended his hand to help her up. She took it and pulled him into the pile with them. “Marry me, Josh,” she whispered. “Marry me,
for Christmas.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I love you and everything about you, especially your rambunctious sons. Because I want to keep loving you for the rest of my life.”

  “What about Houston?”

  “I could never live there,” she teased. “No snowball fights.”

  And there in the middle of a tumbling mass of laughing, hugging kids—their kids—and the cheers of half the population of Aohkii, Josh kissed her.

  She kissed him back, and this time tears of happiness ran down her cheeks. She was home to stay.

  ISBN: 978-1-4592-2249-6

  MAVERICK CHRISTMAS

  Copyright © 2006 by Jo Ann Vest

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.

  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

  This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

  ® and TM are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Trade Marks Office and in other countries.

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  * Hidden Passions

  † Hidden Passions: Full Moon Madness

  Table of Contents

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Books by Joanna Wayne

  Cast of Characters

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Copyright