Penelope was dancing on the bar in a suggestive manner to a rowdy group of men cheering her on. Darryl took note of the mayor watching her who clapped along, obviously enjoying her dance, and his captain, who was clearly too in love with her now to see anything but how good she’d been to the people in their town. Darryl turned back to Penelope and sighed as he watched a mirror image of her dance on the fountain that first night he saw her again. Only this time, Amelia was also there yelling at her to get down. “What happened?” he asked Maisie. “The last time I saw Penelope, she was fine.”
Maisie shrugged. “I have no idea, but by the looks of this, something bad.”
Yeah, Darryl agreed. Because now he knew when this wild side of Penelope came out, it was because she was hurting. The past four days with her had told him that. And for once, the cop didn’t come out when he stared at her, the man did, and seeing her break apart made him want to hurt whatever or whoever was hurting her.
“Clara is out in the car waiting for us,” Maisie said, bringing Darryl’s attention back to her. “Help. Please. Before she does something she can’t take back.”
Darryl doubted anything she did could ruin the town’s perception of her now. He nodded anyway then approached the men, not blind to the jealous heat that rushed through his veins at the way they gawked at her. “Move along,” he told the men firmly, who were regulars on the bar scene. “Now.” He tried to erase the bite in his voice and failed miserably.
Each man frowned his way before heading back onto the dance floor.
Darryl pushed a stool out of the way then got closer to the bar and slowly glanced up. “Penelope.”
“Oooh, there’s my sexy Santa,” she practically purred, hands in the air, dancing her heart out.
Damn she was beautiful.
She waggled her eyebrows at him. “Why don’t you hop up here and we’ll give ’em a real good Christmas show.”
“Penelope,” he said softer now. Before when he saw her this way at the fountain, he thought she was reckless and wild and pure trouble. Now…well, now he saw her heart bleeding in her glossy eyes. And that was the endgame for him. That pain, he wanted it gone. Plus, from the glossiness of her eyes, he suspected whatever shots she’d downed had only begun to hit her. “It’s time to come down now, sugar.”
She rolled her hips. “You wanna go down on me?”
Yeah, most times, he did.
But this was taking a downward direction. Fast. Before this went from fun and games to something embarrassing, he grabbed her around the legs until he had her over his shoulder. The crowd cheered her on as Penelope burst out laughing. To keep everything light, Darryl turned to crowd, purposely glancing in the mayor’s and the captain’s direction. “This elf is calling it a night. She apparently helped with the cause a little too much.”
The captain smiled. The mayor laughed. The bullet had been dodged.
Darryl followed Maisie and Amelia out to where Clara was waiting outside the car, her arms crossed, her lips in a thin line. “Give me a minute, all right?” he asked her cousins.
Clara frowned at Penelope then nodded at Darryl. “Yeah, all right.” She moved behind him to join her sisters.
Darryl slowly lowered a laughing Penelope down, then helped her into the back seat of the car. He squatted next to the open door and waited for her to acknowledge him there. She finally did and turned her head, her eyes beaming. “Are you planning on tucking me into bed too, Santa?” she asked playfully. “Want me to be a bad girl this Christmas?”
Did he ever.
Also, not the right time to indulge those thoughts.
He tucked her hair behind her ear, staring into the sweetness of her soul. For all the time he desperately worried about his promotion and making sure everything was perfect, he realized that none of it really mattered when Penelope was sad. “What happened tonight?” he asked.
“I danced.” She smiled. “And…maybe…had a shot or two.”
She’d run from this conversation. He knew she wanted to. She’d proven good at dodging things that left her exposed. For some reason, he couldn’t let her do that anymore. He took her chin, capturing her gaze. “What happened that made you take that first shot?”
She jerked her chin away.
“Penelope.” He waited for a moment then gently turned her chin back to him, not letting her run. Not anymore. “What happened?”
Her eyes welled and her chin quivered. “I called home.”
Those three words told him everything he needed to know. The pain was written all over her face. The rejection. The loneliness. Something terrible had happened on the phone call, and he didn’t doubt that something had to do with her shitty parents. “Penelope,” he said softly. “Talk to me. Please.”
“I can’t.” She shut her eyes, but not before a tear escaped down her cheek. “I don’t want to think about this. I just want to go back to my cousins’ house.”
That he understood. He’d dealt with rejection for years as a kid when his father came back. And the loneliness when his mother passed away and his father still never made contact. Until Darryl realized he was better without him. Sometimes the pain was too hard to deal with, especially when you couldn’t control how others acted. Sometimes you just had to deal with the shit that life threw at you the best you knew how. And that’s what she had been doing for the last ten years—surviving. But Darryl knew a better way.