Holiday Kisses

It was images like this that inspired the creation of man in the first place. She let out a long breath and pushed her nerves into the air. “The starter, huh? Okay. If you say so.” It had been over an hour since she’d closed the market. Over an hour since she’d sent the last of the Saturday morning customers off with their goodies. “What are you still doing here?”

“Listening.” He grinned. “Or trying to. I don’t seem to be very good at it. Let me take a look.”

“No, oh, no, please don’t. You’ll get your shirt—” She darted in front of him and grabbed hold of his arms with her grimy hands. “Dirty.” She released him as if burned but it was too late. The damage was done. “I’m sorry.”

She went to scrub her palms down the front of her dress only to have him drop his basket and stop her. His hands locked around her wrists, firmly but gently, as he drew her up.

“Oh, no,” she protested. The oil stains were never going to come out of that silk shirt.

He moved in, the warmth of his body radiating against her as he removed the wrench from her fingers. “Let me look.”

“Do you know how to fix cars?” Stella slammed the driver’s door after she climbed out of the ancient compact and waited for him by the engine.

“I grew up rebuilding engines with my grandfather.” Xander nudged Calliope aside and ducked under the hood. If he felt any reluctance about Stella watching him so closely, he didn’t show it. Though he displayed a pretense about his job as an architect, there was none of that when it came to his interacting with people. A charmer for sure, atypical of men she’d been attracted to in the past. And yet, for whatever reason, she reacted to him in new and confusing ways.

She took a long, cleansing breath. She didn’t have time to figure out puzzles. Not at this time of year, when the air was electrified by the excitement of the season. She definitely didn’t need a self-appointed knight in shining armor walking to her rescue with a basket of vegetables.

Calliope remained where she was, stone-still, as Xander and Stella’s conversation drifted over her. It wasn’t until she heard Stella giggle and Xander let out what she could only describe as a well-edited curse that she blinked back to the moment.

“Would you like the good news or the bad news?” Xander wielded the wrench a bit like a wand and faced her.

“Both.”

“The starter’s shot, but so’s your transmission and I saw at least one crack in the engine block.”

She could all but see every penny of profit from the last few months drifting into the sky. Calm, she told herself. Stay calm. “And that would be...”

“The bad news. Time to start looking for a new car.”

“And the good news?”

“Xander said he can drive us to see Mama.” Stella bounced on her sandal-encased toes, her red braids flying around her shoulders.

“Oh. Um, no.” She always seemed to be saying that around him. “We couldn’t ask you to do that.”

“You didn’t.” Xander shrugged. “I’m volunteering. Besides, my next plan of action is to head up to the property for the sanctuary and I can’t very well do that without you, can I?”

“You can.” Calliope pointed behind her. “It’s just up that road—”

“Correction.” Xander closed the hood on her car and bent down to scoop up his basket. “I don’t want to go up there without you. Clearly I need to see it through your eyes if I’m going to give the project the respect it deserves.”

“I never said anything about respect.”

“Sure, you did.” He tapped a finger against her forehead. “In here. You also called me an arrogant jerk for not seeing this as anything more than a filler job.”

“I did—”

“Admit it.” Xander’s grin did funny things to her stomach. “You did.”

“I don’t recall calling you a jerk, arrogant or otherwise.”

“I thought pretentious was another word for arrogant,” Stella said. “You had me look it up, remember?”

Calliope refused to look away as Xander smiled into her eyes.