Not Christmas Without You

“Charity was having a hard time and I thought it’d be good for her to get out of Marietta for a few days and we could learn about the improvements made at the Little Teton Resort. It seemed like a win-win.”

Everything Tricia was saying lined up with what Charity had told him at the resort, which only made him feel worse.

He rose from his chair and paced the length of the small office, before going to stand at the glass window with the view of the office and the agency’s front door. “You know her well?”

“I grew up next door to the Wrights. Charity and I are still neighbors on Chance Avenue. And Jenny—the one you went to school with—married my brother Colton three years ago. So we’re not just friends, but family.”

“Is that where she is now? At her house on Chance Avenue?”

“No. She works—” She broke off, expression stricken.

“Where?”

Tricia shuffled the papers on her desk, cheeks reddening. “I think I’ve said too much as it is.”

“I want to talk to her.”

Tricia kept moving papers around before stacking them into a tidy pile. “Give me your number and I’ll pass it on.”

“I need to talk to her.”

She avoided meeting his gaze. “I don’t know what to tell you.”

“No problem. I’ll figure it out for myself.” And then with a half nod in her direction he walked out.

*

Tricia called Charity’s cell phone the moment Quinn walked out of the travel agency office. The phone rang so long Tricia was afraid that it would go to voice mail, but finally Charity answered.

“Sorry,” Charity whispered. “Greg and Sam were having a conversation near my desk and I couldn’t pick up right away. Everything okay?”

“I don’t know.” Tricia hesitated. “I just had an interesting visitor. I’ll give you three guesses as to who might have stopped by to see me.”

“I don’t have time for guessing games. Why don’t you tell me,” Charity answered wearily.

“You okay?” Tricia asked. “You don’t sound very happy.”

“Greg is being exhausting. He’s constantly watching me and hovering around my desk, giving me pointless tasks… things he could easily do himself, but now won’t.”

“He’s a jerk.”

“You warned me. I didn’t listen.” Charity sighed. “Never mind all that. Tell me who came to see you.”

“Quinn Douglas.”

“Seattle Mariner Quinn?”

“The very one.”

“He wanted you to book him a trip?”

“Well, no. He said he spent last week with you at the Little Teton Resort—”

“No. It was all travel agents, thirteen women, one man, and then a sportswriter.”

“Are you sure? Because he said he’d spent the week hanging out with you. He, um, seemed to think you were me.”

Silence stretched. “What does he look like?”

“What do you mean, what does he look like? He’s gorgeous. Tall, built, really built, all body—” She broke off, hearing Charity’s faint choke. “And he’s looking for you,” she concluded.

“That makes no sense. I didn’t spend last week with Quinn Douglas.” She dropped her voice, aware that Greg was standing in his doorway watching her. Again. “My friend is a sportswriter named Douglas Quincy—oh. Oh, no.” She made a rough sound. “Douglas Quincy. That’s pretty much just Quinn Douglas backward.”

“Yep.”

Charity exhaled hard. “I can’t believe it. Quinn. Douglas. Oh dear.”

“That sounds serious.”

“It’s not. I’m just… shocked. Blown away, actually.”

“Did you two hook up? I wouldn’t blame you if you had. He is fine. Like, seriously, unbelievably fine—”

“I know what he looks like, and no, we didn’t hook up. We were just friends.”

“So why was he here in my office asking for you? Well, not you but me, because he thought you were me.”

“I don’t want to talk about him, Tricia. I went on the trip to escape heartache and, instead, I flung myself from the fire into the frying pan.”

“I thought you said nothing happened.”

“Nothing happened.” Charity’s voice rose and cracked and she made an effort to lower it. “But it didn’t mean…” She drew a slow, unsteady breath. “It didn’t mean that for a moment I didn’t kind of… care. I didn’t want to care, but you saw him. He is really handsome. And you talked to him. He is so likable. He is… was… wonderful. At least, he was wonderful until he kissed me—”

“So you did kiss?”

“Yes, just once, but it was enough for me to realize he’s trouble. Serious trouble. And I can’t do more trouble. I can’t have my heart stomped on anymore.”

“How does he kiss?”

“It doesn’t matter. He’s not for me. He’s a professional baseball player.

“He lives in Seattle. He travels all the time. And, heck, if I can’t even trust my boyfriend in Marietta to be faithful, how can I trust Quinn Douglas?”

“Quinn is a great guy.”

“Because why? All the newspapers say so? Because his fans love him?”

“We grew up with him, Charity.”

“Maybe you did, but I didn’t. And I’m not interested in him.”

“But you were at Little Teton.”

“I might have been mildly interested in the sportswriter named Douglas, not the Quinn Douglas from Paradise Valley.”

“He’s one and the same, girl.”

Silence stretched and then Charity groaned. “Did you know who he was the moment he walked in to the agency? Or did he have to introduce himself?”

“I knew who he was.” Tricia heard the soft, muffled curse at the other end of the line. “Why does it matter, Charity?”

“Because i

f I knew sports and followed sports, I would have recognized him, and none of this would have happened. I wouldn’t have spent so much time with him, and I most definitely wouldn’t have kissed him.” Her voice deepened, growing husky. “I am pathetic. I am the most useless pathetic—” She broke off, before adding faintly, “Oh, no. Tricia, he’s here. He’s here. Why did you tell him where I worked?”

“I didn’t. I swear.”

“Then how did he find me?”

“I don’t know.”

Chapter Four

It wasn’t often that Quinn Douglas felt played, but he felt a little played right now.

He’d come to Marietta thinking he was tracking down Tricia Thorpe to apologize for misleading her, and then planning to invite her to dinner with his family, and instead he was chasing a beautiful blonde receptionist named Charity Wright who had told him dozens of stories in Wyoming and now he didn’t know if any of her stories were true.

Fortunately, it hadn’t taken a lot of work to find Charity. One call to his sister McKenna and he learned where Charity worked, just two blocks north of the travel agency at Melk Realty on Main Street. Good old Main Street.

Quinn stepped inside the real estate office, and there she was at the reception desk, on the phone, looking blonde and beautiful, and guilty as heck.

“Hello, gorgeous,” he said as she swiftly hung up and shoved her mobile phone into a desk drawer.

She rose from behind her desk, her cheeks dark pink. “Hello, Douglas Quincy,” she said, emphasizing the name with an extra helping of sarcasm.

The corner of his mouth pulled. Was that the best she could do? He closed the distance, ignoring Sam Melk who’d come to his doorway, and another dark haired man in a suit and tie who was filling his doorway. “You’re not Tricia Thorpe,” he said, voice pitched low to keep the others from hearing.

“And you’re not a sportswriter,” she countered defiantly.

Her fierce tone made his lips curve and, as he stood next to her desk, gazing down at her, he had this odd thought—he should keep her.

And then another odd thought. He was here because she was supposed to be his.

Quinn Douglas had never chased a woman in is life. He hadn’t needed to, and yet he thought he’d do just about anything to give Charity time to know him and trust him.