The Rock Star's Christmas Reunion: contemporary holiday romance (A Charisma series novel, The Connollys Book 1) (18 page)

“You should get on that.”

He sounded distracted, so she gestured to the door. “Would you like to come in? Or should I just grab Dare’s keys for you?”

He hesitated. “Did you hear about the break-ins on my street?”

“I did. I’m so glad they didn’t get into your house.”

“The police said it looked professional, not just kids like it usually is around here. They are hitting the high-end homes with definite targets in mind.”

Yakima’s eyes widened. “Like they know the owners?”

“No, like they are looking for guns, jewelry, stuff like that. Not just smash and grab. The police are going to do more drive-bys, but I decided I’m going to get a dog. Want to come with me?”

Her palms tingled. “I’m not really a dog person.”

He frowned. “You sound uneasy, Yakima. What’s wrong?”

“I have to make a presentation to a new client this afternoon anyway, so I don’t have time. We’re finishing samples.”

“So Haldana won’t want to join me either?” Bax’s voice sounded plaintive.

“She can after we finish. Come in and you can ask her.” She stepped back so Bax could enter.

He wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her close. She only wore a thin blouse and the cold of his clothes soaked through her immediately. Instead of leaning in, she instinctively recoiled.

“I like making the ladies shiver,” he said in her ear. “At least in other circumstances. What’s going on?”

“Your jacket is ice-cold,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

“Oh.” He released her immediately and looked sheepish as they walked into the kitchen.

“Hi hi,” Haldana said absently, as she whipped a sauce with a whisk.

“Looks like you’ve been busy.”

“Tasting menu for the New Year’s Eve party. I have to give them options,” Yakima explained.

“Not all your clients are as easy-going as me,” he said.

“Not all of my clients were my next door neighbor.”

“Or dating you,” Haldana interjected. “How’s that going? Planned a new date to recover from last night’s epic fail?”

“How helpful you are,” Bax deadpanned. “I was trying to get Yakima to go dog shopping with me.”

“She’s not a dog person,” Haldana said, peering at the contents of her sauce bowl. Satisfied, she dropped her whisk into a glass bowl in the center of the work table and poured the bright yellow sauce into a smaller container, then snapped on the lid.

“You really aren’t?”

Yakima shook her head. “How about a nice guard chicken or something? You have an acre, right? So you can have livestock.”

“Right.” He chuckled. “I called my security company and we did a system check. I’ve probably done enough to keep the average thief out, but I thought a dog would be good.”

“If you must,” Yakima said reluctantly.

“English bulldog,” Haldana said. “I like them the best.”

“Too friendly,” Bax said. “No one is going to be scared of a bulldog.”

“Great with kids,” Haldana singsonged.

Bax gave her a blank stare. Which answered one question Yakima had. He wasn’t after her to settle down and have an insta-family if he stayed around. She’d always heard once guys decided they were ready they just married the next woman they liked. And just being the next girl wasn’t terribly romantic.

Chapter Eleven

“I’m more worried about thieves than kids right now,” Bax said, leaning against the refrigerator. “No, I want a barker, a big dog. Irish Setter?”

“Labradoodle?” Haldana countered with a giggle.

“Labrador Retriever?” Bax tried next.

“Maltipoo?”

Haldana broke down giggling as Bax frowned. “I don’t even know what that is.”

“It’s a toy dog,” Yakima said. “She’s just teasing you.”

“Can’t you see Bax curled up on the sofa, cuddling his little white maltipoo?” Haldana said, with pauses broken by snorts. “There’s nothing cuter than one of those tiny cross breeds.”

Yakima’s phone dinged. “We have to load up and get me out of here,” she told Haldana. “And if you aren’t going dog shopping, you need to work on the cookies for tomorrow’s city council party. Can you believe it’s the twentieth tomorrow?”

“If you’re busy don’t worry about it,” Bax said. “I’d better settle on a breed, or a few breeds, before I fall in love with some adorable little face and take the wrong dog home.”

“Plus you need food and everything.”

“That will depend on what I get,” Bax said. He glanced at Yakima. “Right?”

She shrugged. “Really not a dog person.”

“Can dogs be vegan?” he asked.

“With a great deal of effort,” she said. “But not cats.”

“Hmmm, a guard cat,” Bax mused. “No, don’t think so.” He grabbed Dare’s keys off the counter, whistled a few bars of
Jingle Bells
, took one last look at the kitchen array, and wandered back out.

After the door shut, Haldana said, “I guess he doesn’t know about your dog issue.”

“Guess not,” Yakima said. “We’ll talk later. I need to get these samples over to our clients. God forbid we lose the job because I’m late.”

~

Early the next afternoon, Yakima spread a layer of raspberry jam over a vanilla cookie. They were finishing the last dozen cookies for the city council party that started in two hours.

Despite all of the varieties of cookies cooling on the work table, or already covered and packed up, she smelled peppermint. She’d found the time to make her favorite mint layer cookie bars, and sprinkled crushed peppermint over them from the oversized candy cane Bax had brought her the day before.

“Do I get to take the cookie bars home?” Haldana asked, with an exaggerated leer at the cooling cookie bar pan.

“You’re young enough to pig out on them without it leaving visible evidence on your thighs,” Yakima said. “But I made them for Bax.”

“I texted him last night to see if he got a dog.” Haldana stacked freshly washed prep bowls together and stored them under the work table. “He said he’s still researching. He called the local Humane Society to see what kinds of dogs they had.”

“Did he go down there?” She’d worked a dinner party last night, cooking food already purchased by a family whose main cook had been hit by the seasonal flu.

“No. I guess Dare showed up to apologize or something. Bax just texted me back with a ‘busy with Dare’ message and I didn’t hear from him again.”

“I see.” She scraped the bottom of the jam jar. Just enough to finish.

“Are you even going to be able to hang out at his house if there’s a big dog around?”

Yakima rubbed at the back of her calf with the top of her shoe. “It’s a big house.”

“You can’t be in a room with a dog?” Haldana said.

“The whole thing with the dog bite was pretty traumatic,” Yakima admitted. “I don’t remember being angry with Mr. and Mrs. Connolly the way my parents and brothers were, but maybe I didn’t even know my parents asked them to give the dog away and they refused.”

“You could talk to Uncle Harry.”

“It doesn’t matter now. I’m sure it had something to do with his wife and her issues.”

“I think I remember Aunt Tricia, but I might be imagining it. I was so young when she killed herself. Mostly I have a vague sense of dread about Christmas.” She shuddered. “Someday I’m going to have enough money to take off to somewhere with a beach right on the twenty-fourth.”

“Amen,” Yakima said.

“But right now, you have to decide what to do about Bax.”

“Is my fear of dogs worth losing him?”

"It’s just been a couple of dates so far."

"I know but it feels like the real thing." Yakima sighed. “To me, at least. He could have someone so much more fabulous than I am.”

“Not in Battlefield.” Haldana patted her arm. “No offense. I mean if he wanted an A-list celebrity girlfriend, well, we know he can get one. But if he wants to stay here, you’re well respected and well-liked. Look at all the work we’re getting. You must have met everyone in town by now.”

“I hope so. It’s the only way to make a living. We want complete market saturation.” Yakima reached for a cookie and discovered she had layered jam on all twelve. Gently, she placed the tops of the cookie sandwiches on each of the cookies, then placed them in a clean tin.

“So? What are you going to do about Bax?”

“Do you think we fit?”

“In the end, it’s what you have in common that makes a match work, right? Bax has been all around the world, but his heart is obviously here. I’m sure he’ll have to travel, but you’re independent. It won’t drive you nuts when he leaves for work.”

“No,” she agreed.

“You can stand up to him too, like you did with Remy. I think that’s good. You aren’t going to let him cheat on you and accept that.”

Her stomach lurched. “Is he a cheater?”

Haldana straightened her ponytail. “I know he wasn’t sleeping with Remy, and not for her lack of trying.”

Yakima’s timer went off. “I have a lot to think about, but it’s time to set up for the party. I still have to run to Starbucks and get the coffee.”

“I’ll finish packing everything up,” Haldana offered. “Why didn’t we do our own coffee? You bought the urns.”

“They have their own urns at the community center,” Yakima said. “But the mayor loves his Starbucks. I’ll be back in twenty minutes or so and we can load up.”

~

At five, the Santa and snowman trays were down to colorful crumbs. The coffee urns were almost empty and only half of one sugar cube remained in the bowl. The city council had gorged and chatted with city workers and everyone had left with a smile.

Yakima had a smile too, because the fire chief had booked her, with a check for the deposit, for a New Year’s Day football party at his house. His wife had just announced she’d be out of town and unable to make food for his annual afternoon with his cronies.

Not only that, the fire chief had told her about his son, who fostered abandoned animals on his property near Battlefield Lake. He encouraged her to go by and see what dogs were available for adoption. On her phone, she checked his son’s blog, which had updates on the dogs he was fostering.

She and Haldana packed up and tidied, stacking trays, throwing out paper plates, washing mugs.

“You’re awfully silent,” Haldana said.

“Just gathering my mojo. I’m thinking about going to visit the rescue animals Chief Wright told me about.”

“To see if you can cope with being around dogs?”

“And maybe find one for Bax.”

Haldana worked at her lower lip. “I don’t know. A dog is a man’s best friend. He should pick out his own.”

“But maybe if I pick one out that I like, I won’t be scared of it.”

Haldana shrugged. “I wouldn’t do it, but you like to be in charge.”

Yakima nodded. While Haldana took the garbage out to the dumpster, she called Tony Wright, who said she could stop by any time.

By six, she had dropped Haldana and their catering leftovers back at the commercial kitchen, and was driving the four miles out to Tony Wright’s property. She had never spent much time in the area around the lake. At this time of year, the narrow road spawned ice like it grew weeds along the sides in summer. The van skidded once. As she fought for control, the thought “the things we do for love” crossed her mind. But she forced the idea of loving Bax into the recesses of her mind, and focused on driving her old sedan. She rarely drove it anymore, since the catering van was her advertising vehicle, but if she took a dog, she couldn’t have it in the van.

Love for Bax was a puppy love, born of her teen years, and fanned by his teen idol fame. She’d outgrown him, or so she’d thought. But he’d grown too, into a dangerously sexy man who cared about his family and wanted to come home again. He enticed her like crazy, but was it love?

When she saw the sign for Wright Farm, she turned in through an opening gate with a wreath centered on the chain links. The barn was on the left. Tony Wright raised llamas or alpacas or something like that, for their wool. He also had an impressive kennel with a dog run, perfect for rescue animals.

She stepped out of her sedan, glad to see animals weren’t running free. The scar on the back of her calf itched. She needed to get over it. One bad scare and a few nips over the years shouldn’t make her phobic. She was stronger than this.

The front door of the low-slung house opened as she walked up the steps to the porch. “Yakima Wannassay?” called the man.

“Happy Holidays,” she called back. “Tony?”

“That’s me. I was in school with your brother Jay. I remember seeing you around the edges of a couple of birthday parties in grade school.”

“Oh? My mother went through a phase of inviting the entire class to birthday parties, but she was over it by the time I was having parties.”

“All those boys running around.” Tony laughed. He had a ruddy face, like his father, but none of the fire chief’s excess poundage. In fact, it looked like every inch of him was covered in muscle.