The Millionaire's Snowbound Seduction

‘Yeah, that’s what I thought.’

Santa cocked an eye skyward as he opened the hood of the Explorer.

‘Storm’ll be here late tonight. Good thing you came down from the mountain or you’d have been snowbound for a week.’

‘Yes, I know. I…’Nick frowned. ‘You remember me?’

‘Oh, aye-up. Remember you well. Bought extra gas, some bags of sand…didn’t need any of it, I take it.’

‘No. No, the road was passable.’

‘And you decided not to stay, hmm?’

‘That’s right. I…’ Nick looked at the old guy. ‘I never said I was going to stay.’

‘Aye-up, that’s true enough. Let’s see…you’re a quart down. Regular, or the extra-expensive stuff?’

‘The extra-ex…’ Nick laughed. ‘Regular. Regular’s fine.’ He tucked his hands into his pockets. ‘So, you put on this outfit every Christmas?’

‘Just about.’

Nick smiled. ‘And does it sell extra gas?’

‘Does it…?’ Santa shook his head. ‘Don’t do it for that. I’m headin’ over to the home down on East Main. Been turnin’ up there every Christmas Eve for the past—’

‘Twenty years,’ Nick said slowly. ‘You mean the Hunter Home for Boys, right?’

‘Aye-up, that’s it.’

‘Man, but it’s a small world! I grew up there. You used to show up at Christmas and give us each a toy.’

‘Uh-huh.’

Nick smiled. ‘Wow. You were the best thing that happened to me all year.’

Santa shut the hood of the vehicle and wiped his hands on a bright red rag. ‘Thought as much, from the way you climbed up on my knee one time when you were maybe five or six, and whispered your one wish in my ear.’

Nick blanched. ‘You couldn’t remember that… Oh. Oh, of course. It’s what all the kids did, right?’

‘“Give me somebody to love,”’ you said. Remember?’

There were a couple of seconds of silence, and then Nick gave a little laugh. ‘Amazing,’ he said, ‘that we’d all have made that same wish.’

‘Then, when you got too big to climb on my lap, you said you had another wish.’

Nick’s smile faded. ‘I suppose you remember that, too.’

‘“I want to make lots of money when I grow up,”’ you said.’ The old man looked into Nick’s eyes. ‘Well,’ he said softly, ‘your wishes came true, son. I just hope you managed to figure out that money can’t buy happiness but it sure as heck can get in the way of it.’

Nick stared into Santa’s blue eyes. They’d seemed faded with age yesterday but now—now they were bright, and clear, and bottomless.

‘I found happiness,’ Nick said in a choked voice. ‘But I lost it.’

‘Lost it, or misplaced it? There’s a big difference.’

Nick shook his head. ‘Lost it. I was a damn fool. I let the woman I loved—the only woman I’ll ever love—think that my becoming successful was the most important thing in the world.’

‘Wasn’t it?’ Santa asked softly.

‘No! Hell, no. She was the most important thing. She still is. She’ll always be. It’s just that…’ He swallowed dryly. ‘I wanted to give her everything she’d given up, to marry me. It killed me to see her doing things she’d never had to do in her life, scrimping, sweating, counting pennies just to keep us going…’

‘Ah. I see.’ Santa nodded thoughtfully. ‘So, while she was supposed to be grateful you were knocking yourself out to give her everything, she was also supposed to understand that you didn’t want her to give you anything in return.’

‘You don’t understand. I’m not talking about turning away her gifts. I’m talking about not wanting to watch her work. She sewed, she cooked, she cleaned…’

‘She made you a home,’ Santa said quietly. ‘And you didn’t want it.’

‘No!’ Nick’s hands knotted into fists at his sides. ‘God, no! Of course I wanted it. I wanted her. I wanted…I wanted…’

And suddenly, after all the years and the sorrow, he saw it all. How Holly had tried to give him tangible proof of her love and how his own stiff-necked pride, his damnable ego, had made him blind to those tokens of the heart. How he had rejected her offerings again and again…

How he’d rejected them tonight.

Nick whisked his wallet out of his pocket and peeled off a bill. He pressed it into Santa’s mittened hand.