To Santa With Love

  “YOU KNOW HOW I FEEL ABOUT YOU.

  HOW UNWILLING I WOULD BE TO HAVE YOU—”

  “Unwilling?” A chuckle sounded deep in his throat. “Really? You?”

  “Stop it!” She was furious again but no longer irrational. “You’re just trying to scare me. You wouldn’t dare touch me.”

  The tawny yellow eyes never left her face as he moved lazily toward her. Jacquie’s first impulse was to retreat, but that was what he wanted her to do. She stood her ground, refusing to give him the satisfaction he sought and not believing for an instant that he meant one word he’d said.

  When he stopped in front of her, Choya reached out and caught a handful of hair. It shimmered white gold against his sun-browned fingers. Jacquie didn’t move. She wouldn’t struggle like a mouse under a cat’s paw.

  His other hand came up to cup the back of her head. Its warmth lulled her for a fraction of a second. And Choya kissed her again. It was the gentlest possible kiss but her senses were on fire as the strong band of his arm encircled her. An ounce more of pressure and she was sure she’d lose her mind.

  Also Available by Janet Dailey

  LET’S BE JOLLY

  HAPPY HOLIDAYS

  MAYBE THIS CHRISTMAS

  SCROOGE WORE SPURS

  EVE’S CHRISTMAS

  SEARCHING FOR SANTA

  MISTLETOE AND MOLLY

  AMERICAN DREAMS

  AMERICAN DESTINY

  SANTA IN A STETSON

  MASQUERADE

  TANGLED VINES

  SOMETHING MORE

  HEIRESS

  RIVALS

  BANNON BROTHERS: TRUST

  From the Calder Family series

  SANTA IN MONTANA

  CALDER STORM

  LONE CALDER STAR

  CALDER PROMISE

  SHIFTING CALDER WIND

  GREEN CALDER GRASS

  Published by Kensington Publishing Corporation

  To Santa

  With Love

  JANET DAILEY

  ZEBRA BOOKS

  KENSINGTON PUBLISHING CORP.

  http://www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  “YOU KNOW HOW I FEEL ABOUT YOU. - HOW UNWILLING I WOULD BE TO HAVE YOU—”

  Also Available by Janet Dailey

  Title Page

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Teaser chapter

  Copyright Page

  Chapter 1

  After traveling westward from Dallas for what seemed like forever, the unending desert scenery had begun to bore Jacqueline Grey. The cloudless sky was bleached of blue, arching over a vast landscape of jumbled rocks and arid soil. The gnarled shrubs that survived here were more gray than green beneath the late November sun.

  Jacquie raised a hand and let her gold bracelets jangle away from her wristwatch. It was almost noon. She’d gotten a late start out of Bisbee, Arizona, but considering that she hadn’t gone to bed until after midnight, she figured she deserved credit for being behind the wheel and well on her way.

  A wry smile curved her full lips. No one using a computer program to map out a trip from Dallas to Los Angeles would ever be routed through Bisbee, Arizona. The detour had been her idea. Her girlfriend Tammy had recently moved there with her husband. The old mining town definitely had charm, bustling with visitors admiring its Victorian houses and climbing its hilly streets. But something about it had unsettled Jacquie. Maybe it was seeing Christmas decorations going up in the shops and boutiques—everything from strings of chili-pepper lights to a cowboy Santa with eight tiny coyotes pulling his sleigh. It just seemed too early for the seasonal displays, no matter what the calendar said. All the same, she’d been grateful for Tammy’s hospitality, though she had been eager to get going again. Until she’d hit this unvarying stretch of road.

  The sun glared on the asphalt ahead. A dull pain throbbed at Jacquie’s temples, an unpleasant reminder of too many margaritas last night. With one hand on the steering wheel, she fumbled through her leather purse for sunglasses.

  Once in place on the bridge of her nose, the lightly tinted lenses shaded her eyes, hiding their unusual turquoise-green color without concealing the curling length of her thick lashes. A raking movement of her long fingernails flipped the hair that had fallen across her cheek back over her shoulder. Sleek as cornsilk, her hair was a mix of pale gold and fine silver, an unusual but completely natural hue.

  She glanced at her reflection in the rearview mirror without really seeing it, feeling the headache begin to fade away.

  Jacquie was aware of her looks without being conceited about them—since she’d hit her teens, she got noticed a lot and she didn’t mind. As a child she was told often enough that she was going to grow up to be a beautiful young woman, and she still got more than her fair share of compliments, which she didn’t dismiss. But she had her parents to thank for good genes, healthy habits, and an excellent dentist.

  As for faults, Jacquie would readily admit to having her share of those too. For starters, she was too much her father’s daughter—headstrong, independent, and proud. Secondly, she was spoiled. As an only child of relatively well-off parents, she’d been, to a certain extent, pampered and indulged. Naturally, she had a temper, a very human trait. And a few other shortcomings, just like everyone else.

  Miles and miles of driving down lonely roads were making her cranky and self-absorbed, Jacquie thought irritably. The radio wasn’t pulling in any stations and she’d switched it off. She’d tried singing to herself but the songs she could remember only echoed the restless mood that had bugged her for the last several months—and brought her here to southern Arizona en route to California.

  When she’d finally made it to Tammy’s house, she’d tried to make her road trip sound like a fabulous adventure. She’d struck out on her own for the first time, stopping only occasionally on the fifteen-hour drive from Dallas to Bisbee. The argument she’d had with her dad, Cameron Grey, before she’d left home had been laughingly related for Tammy’s benefit.

  But in reality it hadn’t been funny at all. Remembering it, Jacquie wished she could take back some of the bitter words she’d hurled. Since she hadn’t understood the reason for her restlessness, she hadn’t been able to explain it to her father or, later, her mother.

  Looking to the horizon for oncoming trucks on the road—there were none and no cars either—she mentally replayed the fight. Round One: her announcement that she hadn’t taken her midterm exams. Without telling her parents in advance, Jacquie had filed to withdraw from all her courses, essentially putting her university education on hold. She wasn’t sure she wanted to continue. She hadn’t known why. But maybe, in retrospect, she’d waited a little too long to ’fess up to what she’d done.

  “What do you mean?” her father had demanded, an incredulous frown wrinkling his forehead. “You only have two years before you get your degree.”

  “My degree in what, Dad?” Jacquie had replied somewhat cynically. “I’m a liberal arts major, which means I’m just getting an education in a little bit of everything because I don’t know what I want.”

  “College is your best chance to figure that out,” he’d retorted. “At least you’re getting an education.”

  He
just didn’t want to understand. “I told you—it’s not as if I’m flunking everything,” she’d said heatedly. “Students in good standing are allowed to withdraw if they file in time. There’s no penalty.”

  “Maybe so. But there are a lot of people in this world who’d love to trade places with you.”

  “You’re so right.” Jacquie had seized on her father’s attempt to remind her of her good fortune. “And one of them can take my place. The university admits less than one-tenth of applicants. I’m making room for someone out there on the waiting list.”

  “My, my. How magnanimous of you,” her father had mocked. “And just what do you plan to do instead of attending college?”

  “The very same thing I would do after I graduate.” She’d been on shaky ground and she’d known it, but she was unable to keep the sarcasm out of her voice. “Get a job.”

  Frustrated, her father ran a hand through his silvergray hair. “Really. Good luck. Without an education, what kind of job do you think you’ll get? In this economy—”

  “I don’t even know what kind of job I want,” she interrupted him, adding quickly, “and sitting in a classroom isn’t going to tell me.” She’d steered clear of the subject of the economy, not wanting her dad, a devotee of financial news and online money blogs, to go off on a tangent.

  “A degree is worth more than you seem to think. A lot more. Let me give you an idea of jobs that don’t require one. Waitress. Sales associate. Hairdresser. Office go-fer. Housekeeper.”

  “Excuse me?” Jacquie hadn’t liked the condescending tone of his voice. “Those happen to be honest jobs.”

  “I never said they weren’t,” he answered defensively. “But is it wrong to want something more for my daughter?”

  “Like what?”

  “A career,” he retorted. “Do I have to spell it out?” He didn’t wait for an answer, forging on. “Don’t you want to find challenging work that you love? Would it be so bad if it paid well? And someday,” he added, going for broke, “how about you find yourself a husband with smarts and ambition? I don’t see you marrying a truck driver, if you really want to know.”

  “Don’t be a snob,” she said scornfully. “Truck drivers make pretty good money, from what I hear.”

  “You’re not planning—”

  “To drive a semi? No, Dad. But I’m keeping an open mind. Besides, you aren’t paying fifty thousand a year in tuition just so I can meet Mr. Right. Believe me, he hasn’t showed and besides, I want to be on my own for a while.”

  He’d glared at her. “What do you know about earning your own living, Jacquie? You haven’t done a day’s work in your life!” he snapped. “It’s rare to even see you helping your mother around the house!”

  That was the point when really angry words had flown back and forth. Her father’s angry accusations, mostly to the effect that Jacquie was expecting a free ride, financed by him, forced her to insist on her right to live the way she wanted—and she backed it up by vowing that she wanted nothing from him. Her mother, wiser than both of them, had stayed out of it completely. Thinking of her, Jacquie felt a pang of guilt.

  The fight had concluded with slammed doors and mutual antagonism. She’d known her father would simmer down eventually. Whether he would ever understand her point of view was an open question. But no matter what, she’d had to leave, if only to see if she really could make it on her own, at least for a while.

  The end result of the argument: she was on her way to Los Angeles to start a whole new life. Why there? No particular reason. It’d been the first big city that came to mind when her dad demanded to know where she was going.

  Before she had answered his question, he’d bitterly added that he was sure she would stay close enough to run home when the world got too rough—and just like that, Los Angeles had popped into her head. It was as far west as she could go, that was all, and not the city she would have chosen if she’d given it more thought. But once the answer was out of her mouth, Jacquie was too stubborn to be talked out of her choice.

  A glance at the speedometer of her foreign economy car made her ease up on the accelerator with a rueful sigh. So far she’d gotten a speeding ticket in Texas, another in New Mexico, and a hangover in Bisbee. Not an auspicious beginning for her whole new life.

  She was still trying to ignore the niggling feeling that her dad might be right. Once out of the pleasant neighborhood she’d grown up in and heading down the highway, she had realized it would take weeks to get settled elsewhere, even temporarily, and find work. And there were other things to consider.

  Like the holidays.

  When she and her father had retreated to their corners, he’d seemed to assume that she’d given up or given in, but she hadn’t. Jacquie startled him into speechlessness with her second announcement: she was going to get a head start on her plans by leaving home before Thanksgiving. Her mother still hadn’t wanted to get between her stiffnecked husband and just-as-stubborn daughter. Maureen Grey had said with a sigh that there were a million turkeys in the world and one would now be spared, and added that there would be other Thanksgivings in the future. But Jacquie still felt bad about taking off the way she had.

  Christmas was five weeks away. Even if she could land a job in California, she knew that time off wouldn’t be automatic for a new hire. It looked like she wouldn’t be going home for the holidays. This little rattletrap wasn’t built for thousand-mile commutes and her pride wouldn’t let her accept airfare from her parents.

  Never in her life had Jacquie imagined a Thanksgiving without family, but by that Thursday morning, she’d arrived at Tammy’s. Later in the day, the three of them had gone to a good restaurant in Bisbee for a fixed-price, home-style feast featuring chestnut stuffing, cream gravy, cranberry sauce, and a gigantic roast turkey, sliced to order, that made the rounds of the dining room on a clanking cart. Not quite like home.

  But there’d been no cooking to do and no cleanup—Tammy disliked both and her husband was fine with whatever she wanted. Secretly, Jacquie found her girlfriend’s solution a little depressing. She’d managed to be a good sport, but she’d learned her lesson. Spending Christmas on her own with casual pals and no family at all wasn’t going to be wonderful.

  Jacquie sighed. She would just have to think about how she’d handle that when the time came. Not now.

  She jabbed a manicured finger at the radio buttons again, picking up a country music station playing a vaguely familiar melody. When she realized she was listening to an instrumental arrangement of a Christmas carol, she frowned and switched the radio off. She must be nearing civilization, she thought, looking for a radio or microwave tower, not seeing either. But the desert wasn’t as empty as it appeared.

  Before long the roofs of a small town appeared ahead of her. Jacquie had had only coffee for breakfast, her stomach not up for anything more substantial in the morning, even with her late start. She realized that the hollow, queasy feeling was linked to her persistent headache.

  She felt no curiosity as to what small town it might be. Other than verifying which highway would take her into Tucson, Jacquie hadn’t paid much attention to the route she’d picked out that morning on a gas station map. The car didn’t have GPS, and her smartphone had chirped its last and died in Bisbee. Somewhere along the way she’d realized that the charger for it was back in Dallas and it wasn’t the kind you could pick up just anywhere. Especially not in . . . she squinted at the sign that announced the town limits of Tombstone, Arizona.

  Driving on, she caught her first glimpses of the place. It wasn’t very big. Colorful signs done up in old-timey lettering adorned storefronts and other enterprises. The covered sidewalks made of planks provided shade for a few aimless tourists in neatly pressed chinos and fanny packs, and jeans-clad locals going about their business.

  Turning the car into the driveway of a service station, Jacquie entertained an idle thought of having lunch somewhere around here, then wandering through the historic western town. It wa
sn’t totally decked out with holiday stuff yet, though she caught a few glimpses of red and green.

  She spoke to the station attendant, a young guy in coveralls, who gave her directions to the restaurants located on the main street of the town, two short blocks from the highway.

  More concerned with her destination than oncoming traffic, Jacquie started to accelerate across the road. A horn blared. Her startled gaze swung toward the sound, seeing the jeep an instant before it crunched and bounced off the front side of her car. Neither vehicle had been traveling very fast, but the collision gave her a heavy-duty jolt.

  Shaken but unhurt, Jacquie tried to open her car door. The glimpse just before the impact of a little blond boy sitting in the passenger seat of the jeep filled her mind with terrifying thoughts. Her door was jammed. Her frightened attempts to open it failed until a superior force from outside yanked it open.

  Jacquie stared into the tanned, lean face bending toward her. The man’s cheekbones and jawline could have been sculptured out of granite, relentlessly hard and grim. His mouth was thinned into a forbidding line—she couldn’t see much more of his face. A dusty brown Stetson was pulled low on his forehead. The sunglasses he wore revealed only the silvery, slightly distorted reflection of her own image.

  She was clutching the wheel for dear life even though the car had come to a halt, looking up at him, stunned and shocked. Not liking what she could see of herself, Jacquie turned her head away from him.

  “Are you all right?” his growling voice demanded.

  Her heart seemed to be lodged in her throat, choking off any words she might have wanted to speak. Jacquie was reduced to nodding numbly to let him know that she was okay. There was an ominous tightening of the man’s jawline before he straightened and moved away.

  On wobbly legs, Jacquie forced herself to step out of the car. Her heart raced at a crazy pace and her breathing was much too shallow—both aftereffects of the collision, she told herself unsteadily. She pressed fingertips to her temples, which were throbbing again, harder, wondering if she’d blacked out for a second or two at impact, or worse, suffered a concussion. Then she raised her head to gaze at the man standing tall in front of her.