Chapter 4 – Merry Bartholomew
WINTER PICNICS AND OTHER CRAZY THINGS…
MERRY BARTHOLOMEW
Alow rumble jerks me to a stop and I glance over at the hulking man in the doorway. His eyes are drifting wildly over all the decorations and I grin at him.
“Looks great, doesn’t it?”
His sexy mouth opens and closes but no sound comes out. His big hand comes up to run through his dark hair. A streak of something gray falls out and clings to the ruffled pieces of his hair.
I inch closer and my hand comes up slowly, reaching out to pul at his hair. It’s soft and silky and my fingers sink in even deeper.
He jerks up and his blue eyes widen then narrow to icy pinpricks. “You…you…”. Nothing else comes out and I grin at him again.
I had no idea it was going to be so much fun to yank on this very controlled man’s nerves.
“It’s good, isn’t it? I’ve got a few more things to try and find and I’d like to go find a Christmas tree to put up.”
He shakes his head wildly.
“No? Why?”
“Allergic. To pine.”
“Hmmm. Well, I’ll look around and find a good fake one.”
His wide eyes come back on me and then he sighs and his broad shoulders sink. “I have one in the attic. I just haven’t used it in years.”
I clap my hands and he rolls his blue eyes. “Awesome! I’m going to head upstairs and get it and then I’ve got another surprise for you.”
“I’m not sure that I can take any more surprises,” he grumbles.
“You’ll love it!”
“I’m not sure that’s true, dammit.”
I walk away, fighting the urge to skip. He’s too much fun to mess with. Peaches yips at me and I lean down, petting her silky head and laughing. “Yeah. Trust me, your daddy needs this.”
It doesn’t take me more than twenty minutes to find the tree upstairs. I don’t know how that man managed it but even his attic is painfully organized.
“Jasper Bright is freaking scary,” I mutter to myself. No man should be this organized in an attic. He’s even got notecards up here on trunks and boxes to list it all.
I hear him downstairs and I groan as I yank at the tree. “Hello, Jasper! I could use a little help right now.”
“Really? Now you need help? I kinda thought you were holiday superwoman at this right,” he grumbles under his breath but I hear him.
He sounds grumpy and adorable and I shiver. My fingers itch to touch him when he stalks past me and drags the tree out of the room.
I never knew I had such a thing for grumpy men.
I smile wide as he glares back at me. “Can you take this downstairs? To that big parlor with the fireplace. I’m gonna set this up in there and I thought we could have a picnic under the lights.”
“It’s already past dinner time.”
“Dinner time doesn’t have to be a set time. You were working. I didn’t want to bother you but I bought a baked ham and some biscuits to make little sliders with some mustard and Swiss.”
His blue eyes stare at me but then he shakes his head and drags the tree into the room and throws the box into the corner, grunting.
I can’t help but smile at him and he stares at me like I’m a nut. I’ve seen that look for half my life. Ever since I lost my parents and wound up all alone in the world, nobody seems to understand me.
“What do you want now?”
I ignore the clipped tone and grin. “We need to set the tree up and throw the lights on it. Have you ever lain underneath a tree and listened to Christmas music with the tree lights on and all the other lights off?”
He shakes his dark head and I laugh. “I can’t believe that. I loved to do that every Christmas. My mom and I did it and it was one of our favorite things. We’d just talk about everything going on.”
“Why aren’t you with your parents, Merry? Surely they miss spending the holidays with you.”
My eyes skitter away from him and I wring my hands together. “I lost them right after I turned eighteen. I don’t have any more family. My parents were both only children.”
He hisses through his teeth and then sighs, “I’m sorry, Merry. That must be hard. I don’t understand how you can love the holidays as much as you do then. I lost my parents at the holidays and the last thing I want is to dig into all those damn memories.”
“You shouldn’t block out everything happy that you can remember. Those little things will help you make it through some rough days.”
I should know.
“I don’t know. I’ve got a lot of work to do. I should get some more stuff done tonight.”
I pad over to him and reach out to touch his arm gently. “Please? I’d love to really make this place feel good. For you.”
And sadly, maybe a little bit for me.
It’s been a long time since I had company at the holidays. I could become used to having somewhere to call my own.
His pale eyes meet mine and I try to keep my face blank. But then he sighs. “Fine. I’ll do this. But then tomorrow I need to work.”
My smile stretches so wide that it’s like that green guy from the movies.
“Yay! You won’t regret it.”
“Fat chance of that,” he mutters.
But we go to work and throw tinsel at the tree after we get it set up and then he wrenches the lights out of my hands and deftly wraps them around the fake tree.
Breaking into the new boxes of ornaments I study the space critically and take forever to place the first ornament.
I glance over as he huffs and then he takes a handful of ornaments and haphazardly slips them onto the green branches.
Over and over we cross and move around each other, our hands touching here and there, until my heart is pounding and my whole body feels like a live wire sparking in the dark.
After a good hour, we step back as one and I grin at him, holding my hand up for a high-five. He rolls his eyes and ignores my hand. “Looks good, grumpy.”
“Looks okay, angel.”
“Let’s eat and then we’ll get this all cleaned up and turn on the music. I can’t wait to see what it looks like.” It feels like forever since I hung out underneath a tree.
I can’t wait.
I pull out a huge picnic that I prepared and set it down on a red and green buffalo plaid blanket. His dark brow lifts and I chuckle.
“Let’s eat.”