Santa In Montana (Calder Saga 11)

Cat gripped the phone a little tighter, conscious of the surge of gladness shooting through her. “I’ll look forward to seeing you then.” She flicked a glance at her father. “I’ll give you back to my…”

“No need. Chase and I were finished. Tell him I’ll see him next week. Bye, Cat.”

“Good-bye.” She handed the phone back to Chase. “He said he’d stop the first of the week.”

Only a blind man would fail to notice the way Cat’s eyes were shining, and Chase was not blind. Wisely he chose not to comment on it.

“I’m glad you told him we’d all welcome him,” he said instead.

She gave him a narrowed look of sudden wariness. “Dad, when he comes, don’t you dare start in with that husband nonsense again.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it. After all,” Chase added with a barely suppressed smile, “we wouldn’t want to scare him off, would we?”

“Dad!” Cat protested, all indignant.

“Don’t worry. Your secret’s safe with me.” He pushed his chair back from the desk and collected his cane.

Cat opened her mouth to deny that she had any secret, then released all that righteous anger in a sigh and shook her head in amusement. “Arguing with you is hopeless.”

She spun away and crossed to the doorway, meeting Trey on his way in with Chase’s cup of cocoa. “I hope you’d like some hot cocoa, Gramps, because we fixed you a cup.”

With the coming of the weekend, a warm front moved in, lifting the daytime temperatures into the forties and making conditions ideal for a trip into the foothills to find the perfect Christmas tree. Several candidates were located, but it was the one Jake picked out that they hauled back to the Homestead. Sunday afternoon was spent decorating it, with the whole family taking part, although Chase played more of a supervisory role.

Monday morning Cat awoke with a heady sense of anticipation. “First of the week,” that’s when Wade had said he would be stopping by again.

As she went about her daily routine, Cat kept one ear tuned to outside noises. The sound of a vehicle pulling up to the Homestead prompted a quick glance out a front window in hopes it might be Wade arriving. But Monday came and went without any sign of him.

When Tuesday morning turned out to be a repeat of the previous day, Cat finally faced the possibility that something had come up and Wade wouldn’t be dropping by at all. Disappointment came, quick and strong.

With the entire afternoon ahead of her, Cat refused to let it hold sway. Instead she lifted her chin and squared her shoulders, silently chiding herself to stop acting like a schoolgirl. Behind her the dishwasher clicked into its next cycle. Absently she glanced around the kitchen.

Now that the noon meal was over, she virtually had the house to herself. Chase was in his room taking a nap. Jessy had gone back to the ranch office. Laredo had volunteered to run a part to an outlying camp, and Trey had taken charge of Jake so Sloan could make another trip to Wolf Meadow to track down a couple items on the inventory list.

Faced with all this free time, Cat decided to fill it by whipping up a batch of Christmas cookies. Twenty minutes later she placed the finished dough in the refrigerator to chill while she got out the rolling pin, cookie cutters, baking sheets, and parchment paper.

After dusting the countertop with flour, Cat started to put the nearly empty canister away, then changed her mind and decided to refill it first. As she went to take a new sack from the pantry shelf, she happened to notice there weren’t any bags of powdered sugar on the shelf.

“Like it or not, I guess I’m going to the commissary for some sugar,” Cat muttered to herself. “At least I discovered it before I started to make the icing.”

She carried the sack of flour over to the canister. Just as she was about to pour it in, a voice came from the entryway, “Hello? Anybody home?”

It was Wade Rogers. She nearly dropped the flour sack. As it was, she spilled some of it on the counter. “I’ll be right there!” she called back and hastily set the sack on the counter, then exited the kitchen at a running walk.

Cat found him in the entryway, as expected. He was dressed much more casually than on his last visit, in a pair of blue jeans and an insulated vest over a blue chambray shirt. He smiled when he saw her, the action carving those sexy dimples in his cheeks and stirring up her pulse.

“I had decided you weren’t going to be stopping by after all.” Cat heard the breathy note in her voice, an echo of the fluttering excitement she felt inside.

“Sorry. I invited myself in.” The deep timbre of his voice vibrated through her like a caress. “The last time I was here, Chase told me that only strangers knock.”

“That’s true. Welcome back.” As she extended a hand to greet him, Cat noticed the dusting of white flour on it and hastily pulled it back to brush it away. “Sorry. I was in the kitchen doing some baking.”

“In that case, I won’t keep you. I don’t want to be the cause of you ruining something. Is Chase in the den?” He gestured toward the room.

“Actually he’s taking a nap. I’ll wake him for you.” She took a step in the direction of her father’s first-floor bedroom.

A staying hand checked her movement. “Don’t do that.” He added a quick shake of his head. “I’ll go outside and wander around a bit. Maybe check out that old barn, if that’s alright?”

“Of course. Although—” Cat hesitated, then plunged on, hoping she didn’t sound too forward, “—as it happens, I need to go down to the commissary. I don’t have enough powdered sugar to frost the Christmas cookies. Just give me a minute to get my coat and boots on and we can walk together.”