Santa Viking (23 page)

When he noticed Clay in the doorway, the boy set his school books aside and turned down the volume. “You’re up. Finally.”

“Where’s the bathroom?”

“Gotta take a leak, huh?” the boy inquired crudely. “My name’s Johnny,” he informed him cheerily. “You’re Clay, right? Annie says you’re gonna stay with us for a while. Cool. Do you like Elvis?” The boy never waited for answers to his questions, just chattered away as he led the way to the end of the hall.

By the time they got there, Clay was practically crossing his legs
 . . .
not an easy feat when walking with a sprained ankle. Was there only one bathroom to serve more than a half dozen people? There were eight bathrooms in his home, and he was the sole inhabitant these days, except for the cook and gardener, Doris and George, and they lived over the old carriage house.

Clay soon found himself in the small bathroom with an old-fashioned claw-footed tub and pedestal porcelain sink. No shower stall here, just a showerhead and plastic curtain that hung from an oval aluminum rod, suspended from the ceiling and surrounding the tub on all sides. At least there was a toilet, Clay thought, releasing a long sigh of near ecstasy after relieving himself. He’d barely zipped up his pants and washed his hands when there was a knock on the door. “You decent?” a male voice called out.

Define decent. Hobbling around barefooted, decent? Wearing nothing but a knot on my head the size of a fist and a pair of wrinkled slacks, decent? Caught practically mid-leak, decent? Under the influence of drugs, decent?
“Yeah, I’m decent.”

The door creaked open, and the oldest brother, the father of the baby, stuck his head inside. He apparently hadn’t showered yet because he still had the Elvis hair-do, though the St. Joseph outfit was gone in favor of jeans and a sweatshirt. “Hi. My name’s Chet. Annie told me to give you these.” He shoved a pair of jeans, white undershirt, blue plaid flannel shirt, socks and raggedy sneakers at him. “You look about the same size as me.”

Clay took the items hesitantly. He was about to tell him that he wouldn’t need them since he intended to go back to the hotel, ASAP, and call his lawyer. Before he could speak, though, the man . . . about twenty-five years old . . . asked with genuine concern, “How ya feelin’? Your body must feel like a bulldozer ran over it.”

“Do you mean your sister?”

Chet threw his head back and laughed. “Annie does have that effect sometimes, doesn’t she? No, I meant the boink to your head and your twisted ankle.”

Clay shrugged. “I’ll be all right.”

Just then Clay noticed the black satin bra hanging on the doorknob. The cups were full and enticingly feminine. He was pretty sure the wispy undergarment didn’t belong to Aunt Liza. Hmmm. It would seem the scarecrow Madonna was hiding something under her virgin robes.

“Hey, that’s my sister you’re having indecent thoughts about,” Chet protested, interrupting his reverie.

“I was not,” Clay lied, hoping his flushed face didn’t betray him.

“Yeah, right. Anyhow, dinner’s almost ready. Do you want me to bring a tray upstairs? Or can you make it downstairs?”

Clay debated briefly whether to eat here or wait till he got back to the hotel. The embarrassing rumble in his gut decided for him. Clay told him he’d be down shortly and went back to the bedroom to change clothes while Chet made use of the shower.

A short time later, he sat at the huge oak trestle table in the kitchen, waiting for Annie to come in from the barn with two of her brothers, Roy, a twenty-two-year-old vet student, and Hank, a high school senior. They were completing the second milking of the day for the dairy herd. All this information was relayed by Aunt Liza. That’s what the woman had demanded that he call her after he’d addressed her as “ma’am” one too many times.

Had he ever eaten dinner in a kitchen? He didn’t think so.

Did he have a personal acquaintance with anyone who had ever milked a cow? He was fairly certain he didn’t.

Aunt Liza wore an apron that fit over her shoulders and hung to her knees, where flesh-covered support hose bagged conspicuously under her housedress. She hustled about the commercial-size stove off to one side of the kitchen. Sitting on benches that lined both sides of the table, chatting amiably with him as if it were perfectly normal for him to be there, were Chet, Johnny, whom he already met, and Jerry Lee, a fifteen-year-old. This family bred kids like rabbits, apparently. The baby was up in his crib, down for the night, Chet said hopefully.

A radio sitting on a counter was set on a twenty-four hour country music station.
Surprise, surprise.

“Do you people honestly like that music?” Clay asked. It was probably a rude question to ask when he was in someone else’s home, but he really would like to understand the attraction this crap held for the masses.

“Yeah,” Chet, Jerry Lee, Johnny, and Aunt Liza said as one.

“But it’s so
 . . .
so hokey,” Clay argued. “Listen to that one. ‘I Changed Her Oil, She Changed My Life.’”

They all laughed.

“That’s just it. Country music makes you feel good. You could be in a funky mood, and it makes you smile.” Jerry Lee thought about what he’d said for a moment, then chuckled. “One of my favorites is ‘She Got the Ring, I Got the Finger.’”

“Jerry Lee Fallon, I told you about using such vulgarities in this house,” Aunt Liza admonished. Then she chuckled, too. “I’m partial to ‘You Done Tore Out My Heart and Stomped That Sucker Flat.’”

“I like ‘I Would Have Wrote You a Letter But I Couldn’t Spell Yuck,’” Johnny said.

“Well, the all-time best one,” Chet offered, “is ‘Get Your Tongue Outta My Mouth ’Cause I’m Kissing You Good-Bye.’”

Some of the other titles tossed out then by one Fallon family member after another were: “How Can I Miss You If You Won’t Go Away,” “I’ve Been Flushed From the Bathroom Of Your Heart,” “If I Can’t Be Number One In Your Life, Then Number Two On You,” “You Can’t Have Your Cake and Edith Too,” and the one they all agreed was best, “I Shaved My Legs For
This
?”

Despite himself, Clay found himself laughing with the whole crazy bunch.

Just then, the back door could be heard opening onto a mudroom. Voices rang out with teasing banter.

“You better not have mooned any passersby, Hank? All we need is a police citation on top of everything else,” Annie was chastising her brother.

“I didn’t say he mooned the girl,” another male said. It must be Roy, the vet student. “I said he was mooning
over
her.”

There was the sound of laughter then and running water as they presumably washed their hands in a utility sink.

Seconds later, two males entered the room, rubbing their hands briskly against the outside chill which they carried in with them. They nodded at him in greeting and sat down on the benches, maneuvering their long legs awkwardly under the table.

Only then did Clay notice the woman who stepped through the doorway. She was tall and thin. Her long,
long
legs that went from here to the Texas Panhandle were encased in soft, faded jeans, which were tucked into a pair of work boots. An oversized denim shirt
 . . .
probably belonging to one of her brothers
 . . .
covered her on the top, hanging down to her knees with sleeves rolled up to the elbows. A swath of sandy brunette hair laid straight and thick to her shoulders. Not a lick of make-up covered her clear complexion. Even so, her lips were full
 . . .
almost too full for her thin face
 . . .
and parted over large, even white teeth. She resembled a thinner, younger, more beautiful version of Julia Roberts.

Clay put his forehead down on the table and groaned.

He knew everyone was probably gawking at him as if he’d lost his mind, but he couldn’t help himself. He knew even before the fever flooded his face and arms and legs and that particular hot zone in between
 . . .
he knew exactly who this stranger was. It was, unbelievably, Annie Fallon.

He cracked his eyes open a bit, still with his face in his plate, and glanced sideways at her where she still stood, equally stunned, in the doorway. Neither of them seemed to notice the hooting voices surrounding them.

How could he have been so blind?

How could he not have seen what was happening here?

How could he not have listened to the cautionary voice of the bellhop who’d warned of destiny and God’s big toe?

All the pieces fit together now in the puzzle that had plagued Clay since he’d arrived in Memphis. God’s big toe had apparently delivered him a holy kick in the ass. Not to mention the fever He’d apparently sent to thaw his icy heart.

Clay, a sophisticated, wealthy venture capitalist, was falling head over heels in love at first sight with a farmer. Old McAnnie.

Donald Trump and Daisy Mae.

Hell! It will never work
.

Will it?

He raised his head and took a longer look at the woman who was frozen in place, staring at him with equal incredulity. It was a sign of the madness that had overcome them both that the laughter rippling around them failed to penetrate their numbed consciousnesses.

He knew for sure that he was lost when a traitorous thought slipped out, and he actually spoke it aloud.

“Where’s the hayloft, honey?”

(Please continue reading for information about Sandra Hill)

Sandra Hill is the bestselling author of more than thirty romantic humor novels. Whether they be historicals, contemporaries, time travels, or Christmas novellas, whether they be Vikings, Cajuns, Navy SEALs or sexy Santas, the common element in all her books is humor.

As the mother of four sons and the loooong-time wife of a stock broker, Sandra says that she had to develop a sense of humor as a survival skill in the all-male bastion she calls home. (Even her German Shepherd is a male.) And as a newspaper journalist, before turning to fiction, she managed to find a lighter side to even the darkest stories.

It’s been said that love makes the world go ’round, but in Sandra’s world, love with a dash of laughter, makes it spin.