One Mistletoe Wish
One Mistletoe Wish
A.C. Arthur
All she wants for Christmas…Everything schoolteacher Morgan Hill loves is in her hometown of Temptation, Virginia—her twins, her students, and the charming community center where she’s staging their holiday play. But now the building’s new owner, Grayson Taylor, is putting sexy visions into Morgan's head, making the young widow long for a future even Santa couldn’t deliver.As the oldest of sextuplets, Gray grew up in the media spotlight. His family’s fame once helped Temptation thrive, but drove his parents apart. Coming back is just a bittersweet necessity until he meets petite firecracker Morgan. Somehow she gets the handsome tech guru to forget about big business in favor of small-town delights…and steamy winter nights. It’s a life he never knew he wanted, but can he put his past aside to turn a festive fling into the sweetest forever?
All she wants for Christmas...
Everything schoolteacher Morgan Hill loves is in her hometown of Temptation, Virginia—her twins, her students and the charming community center where she’s staging their holiday play. But now the building’s new owner, Grayson Taylor, is putting sexy visions into Morgan’s head, making the young widow long for a future even Santa couldn’t deliver.
As the oldest of sextuplets, Gray grew up in the media spotlight. His family’s fame once helped Temptation thrive, but drove his parents apart. Coming back is just a bittersweet necessity until he meets petite firecracker Morgan. Somehow she gets the handsome tech guru to forget about big business in favor of small-town delights...and steamy winter nights. It’s a life he never knew he wanted, but can he put his past aside to turn a festive fling into the sweetest forever?
Then he moved quicker than she’d anticipated, and before she could stop him, he’d wrapped his arms around her waist and pushed her back against the wall.
“What if I said I want you?” he asked, his breath fanning warmly over her face.
“For...for Christmas?” she asked, and felt like a colossal idiot.
He didn’t smile, but shook his head, his hands slipping under her coat to rub along her back. “No. Right now. I want you, Morgan.”
He moved again and Morgan saw his arm lifting. He was going to touch her. No, wait, he was already touching her. She should move. She should put lots of distance between them to keep whatever was about to happen from happening. But she didn’t. She couldn’t. His fingers grazed her jaw, came over her chin, then up to tap her bottom lip.
“You can’t want me,” she said, her body beginning to tremble even though it was the last thing she wanted to do.
Dear Reader (#u2c9b3b18-08d8-54c5-8f46-d7460f2900d8),
I love writing Christmas stories!
With that said, I was more than excited to begin the new Taylors of Temptation series with a Christmas-themed book. Gray and Morgan were the perfect couple to start with, as they were both struggling with things that distracted them from the holidays.
The Taylor sextuplets were born in Temptation, Virginia—a small town that I created because I like the community and closeness of small-town stories. The sextuplets were taken away from their hometown at a young age, now they’ve all come back, some to stay, and some just to visit. But when they return, they’ll remember all the magic that was once there.
When Gray returned to Temptation, he was certain that it would be temporarily, until he met Morgan and her twins. Their love wasn’t instant, but that initial incessant pull that refuses to let go when a couple first meets was definitely present. Unraveling all the layers of Gray’s past feelings and Morgan’s past losses was a task. Thankfully, I had lots of Christmas music and movies to help me along the way!
I hope you enjoy this first glimpse at the Taylors and have fun spending the holidays in Temptation!
Happy reading,
A.C. Arthur
One Mistletoe Wish
A.C. Arthur
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
A.C. ARTHUR was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland, where she currently resides with her husband and three children. An active imagination and a love for reading encouraged her to begin writing in high school, and she hasn’t stopped since.
Working in the legal field for almost thirteen years, she’s seen lots of horrific things and longs for the safe haven reading a romance novel brings. Determined to bring a new edge to romance, she continues to develop intriguing plots, sensual love scenes, racy characters and fresh dialogue—thus keeping readers on their toes!
For all the latest news on A.C. Arthur’s books, giveaways, appearances and discussions, join A.C.’s Book Lounge on Facebook at Facebook.com/pages/AC-Arthurs-Book-Lounge/140199625996114 (https://www.Facebook.com/pages/AC-Arthurs-Book-Lounge/140199625996114).
To those who watch Christmas movies and listen to Christmas music all year long. You rock!
Contents
Cover (#u07dbda55-f4c0-584a-a817-2b62f6851b78)
Back Cover Text (#u09b2d140-827d-544e-a47e-2b2d03f66416)
Introduction (#u4a687bb3-9445-5993-b9a6-6b611631252c)
Dear Reader (#u160a77ba-5bba-536c-969d-1ae099abdddf)
Title Page (#u5271909b-ce01-5413-8e05-935cb1d797eb)
About the Author (#u066754a0-0a7a-5e62-a9df-8d7fb1e4defe)
Dedication (#u360cf199-274b-583b-9e09-030b471b9002)
Chapter 1 (#u17186fe7-8eda-5051-bf63-a865f494bf05)
Chapter 2 (#u5369981d-f4af-58af-bbd1-9290dfff16db)
Chapter 3 (#uc85113c9-2dbd-5627-ae2f-5888f41843c3)
Chapter 4 (#uca3dce8f-2f7d-5310-8d19-0d77137eea58)
Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 13 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 14 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 15 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 16 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 17 (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 1 (#u2c9b3b18-08d8-54c5-8f46-d7460f2900d8)
“Bah, hamburger!” Ethan Malloy shouted. His skinny arms were wrapped around his chest, lips poked out and still red from the punch he’d had during the break.
Morgan Hill rubbed her temples and held back a sigh.
“It’s humbug, Ethan. Say it slower this time and remember the word is humbug.”
He wouldn’t remember. Or rather, he did know the correct pronunciation, but Ethan thought he was a five-year-old Kevin Hart, minus the cursing. So everything he said or did was in search of a chuckle or a laugh from those around him—his audience, so to speak. His personality worked Morgan’s last nerve. She’d chastised herself more than once about feeling this way about a little boy. She was trained to deal with children, as she’d gone to the University of Maryland and received her bachelor’s degree in elementary education. Unfortunately, there were no classes that would have prepared her for Ethan Malloy.
He was the only child of Rayford Malloy, the sixty-three-year-old president of the Temptation town council, and Ivonne Danner-Malloy, his twenty-five-year-old video-dance-queen wife. Between his father being too busy and too tired to discipline him and his mother being too young, too conceited and too everything else to be bothered, Ethan never had a chance. Those were the reasons Morgan used a good portion of her patience with the child. Morgan’s granny always said—whenever Ida Mae Bonet had the displeasure of being in the presence of her brother’s children—“we don’t get to choose who our parents are.”
That was certainly the truth, Morgan thought as she watched Ethan continue with his rendition of the scene where Ebenezer Scrooge continued to refuse heat or any other comfort for his only employee, Bob Cratchit, played by seven-year-old Wesley Walker. Wesley, unlike Ethan, knew his lines and probably the lines of everyone else in the play. He was a perfectionist and determined to prove himself to everyone in this small town, despite the fact that his father had run off and left his mother with four kids, a broken-down old Nissan and a mountain of debt. It was a shame, Morgan thought as she watched the young fella on stage, walking around and holding his head up high—even though Bob Cratchit wasn’t such a proud man. But a boy at such a tender age shouldn’t be faced with the gossip and cruelty that could be dished out in a small town.
They lived in Temptation, Virginia, population 14,364 as of the last census, two years ago. Temptation had a rich history and struggled to catch up with the modern world. With its ten-member town council—the majority of whom were descendants from families that had been around since the town’s inception in the 1800s—and the newly elected mayor, Cinda Pullum, going toe-to-toe in battles over everything from revitalizing Mountainview Park to the weekly trash pickup, Temptation could be as lively as any of the reality shows that littered today’s television channels.
The town could also be as traditional and heartwarming as an old black-and-white movie with things such as the annual Christmas Eve celebration, which included the play that Morgan and her crew of youngsters were now painstakingly rehearsing. There were two things Morgan loved about living in Temptation—the traditions and the resilience of the citizens. No matter what the people of this town had gone through—from the Civil War to the dark days of the Great Depression and the hostile times of the Civil Rights movement—they’d always bounced back and they never stopped doing the things that made the town so special in the first place. The families were the heart of Temptation, as they were determined to live in harmony in their little part of the world. More recent and localized catastrophes had hit Temptation and now, sadly, Morgan found herself living through her own test as a citizen of the town.
“You should put him out, Mama.”
The soft voice of Morgan’s five-year-old daughter, Lily, interrupted her thoughts.
“What?” Morgan asked.
Lily looked up from where she was sitting cross-legged on the floor with an unruly stack of twinkle lights in her lap. Her little hands had been moving over the strands in an attempt to separate the tangled mass for the last half hour. There hadn’t been much progress but Lily was much more patient than Morgan would ever claim to be. She was also the prettiest little girl Morgan had seen in all her twenty-eight years.
Her daughter shook her head, two long ponytails swaying with the motion.
“He’s a mess,” she told Morgan. “A hot mess, like Aunt Wendy says all the time.”
Morgan couldn’t help it, she smiled. Wendy, her older sister by barely a year, talked a mile a minute and Lily always seemed to be around soaking up each and every word that fell out of Wendy’s mouth, good or bad.
“He’s trying,” Morgan told her, knowing without any doubt who her daughter thought was a hot mess. “We have to give him a chance.”
Lily shook her head again. “No, we don’t. You’re in charge.”
She was, Morgan thought, even if she didn’t feel that way. She hadn’t wanted Ethan for the lead in the play in the first place. But Rayford had stopped by her house the Monday before Thanksgiving and told her in no uncertain terms that he expected his “boy” to have a prominent part in the play this year. Especially since this was most likely the last year the community center would be open to house the play and the Christmas celebration. Morgan and a good majority of the town had been worried about this hundred-year-old building and two others—the Plympton House, which had been converted into a hospital during the war, then restored, expanded and renamed All Saints Hospital in the sixties, and the Taylor House, a now almost dilapidated Victorian that had once been the home of the town’s biggest financial benefactor. She’d been so concerned with the possible loss of three of the town’s historic buildings that she hadn’t had the energy to fight with Rayford about something as trivial as his son’s part in a play. Now, however, she wished she’d mustered up some resistance because Lily was right, Ethan was a hot mess.
“I wanna load the presents,” another child’s voice called from behind Morgan and before she could move a hand, there was tugging on the hem of her shirt.
“Didn’t you say it was my turn to load the presents in the sleigh, Mama? You told me last night, ’cause I’m tall enough to do it.”
Morgan turned around ready to reply to her son with his dark brown eyes—slanted slightly in the corners as a result of his father’s half Korean, half African American heritage—and butter-toned complexion, courtesy of Morgan’s mother and grandmother, who were descendants of the Creole-born Bonets of Louisiana. His twin sister had the same features. Jack and Lily were different, not only by their gender, but they also had opposite personalities. Where Lily was quiet and somewhat serious, Jack was boisterous and playful. They were sometimes like night and day, but always the very best of Morgan and her late husband, James. Each day she looked into their precious little faces she was reminded of that fact and, at the same time, overwhelmed with love and grief.
James Stuart Hill had been a wonderful man. Kind, loving, compassionate and totally committed to his young wife and family. Morgan had met him in Baltimore, during her senior year of college. He’d been on leave from the army to finalize the sale of his late mother’s convenience store and her house. An American-born Korean, Mary Kim had raised her only child alone, after his African American father had been shot to death in an attempted robbery. Although Morgan had never met Mary, she felt she’d known the woman through the great man she’d raised.
Their courtship had been fast and passionate and by the time Morgan graduated from college, she’d learned that she was pregnant. James was leaving for a year-long tour in Hawaii two weeks later. So they married quickly in Granny’s backyard and then traveled to Honolulu, where she gave birth to her two precious jewels. A year later James received a temporary assignment in Virginia and Morgan came home to Temptation with her twins, where the four of them had lived a happy, normal life. Until James was shipped off to Afghanistan. He was killed a week before the twins’ second birthday. Three years later, the pain of that day still had the power to take Morgan’s breath away.
“Some people are only in your life for a season,” Granny had said as she’d stood leaning on her cane.
They’d been at the cemetery then, the one in Maryland right next to where James had buried his mother. Hours later they were back in Temptation and Morgan was tasked with raising her two young children alone. With the love and support from her grandmother and her sister, she’d managed to make it through those first tough weeks. She’d taken a job as a first-grade teacher at the elementary school, went to church on Sundays and played all day with her babies on Saturdays. Her life had managed to move on even though there were still some days when all she wanted to do was cry for all the possibilities that had been lost.
“Marley’s coming! Marley’s coming!” Alana, a six-year-old playing one of Bob Cratchit’s children, yelled from where she was sitting at the end of the stage.
“It’s not time yet,” Ethan complained. “I’m not finished saying ‘bah, hamburger.’”
“He needs to shut up,” Lily said with a sigh.
“You’re not adding the chains this time, Mama,” Jack stated loudly. As if the noisier he said it, the faster she would start doing it.
Usually, when it was time for Jacob Marley—played by Malcolm Washington, who was missing one of his front teeth—to make his ghostly appearance, Wendy, who was her part-time assistant whenever she wasn’t on duty at the hospital, would knock on the desk to make the footstep sounds and rattle the bike chains in her bag. But Ethan was right, it wasn’t time for Jacob’s appearance quite yet.
Still, Morgan could not deny the sound of footsteps coming fast and almost furiously down the hallway toward the hall where they were rehearsing.
“Hush, children,” she said as she stood.
Morgan was walking toward the door, or rather tiptoeing like she actually expected to see the ghost of Jacob Marley come through that doorway, just like she knew the now-quiet children were. The footsteps continued and so did Morgan. She was wearing her bright orange-and-fuchsia tennis shoes today, along with her black running suit, which Wendy said made her look more like a teenage track star than a grown woman. Morgan tended to ignore her older sister when it came to dressing because Wendy was a proud member of the single, sexy and seriously looking club. Whereas Morgan was a mother and a teacher and she was perfectly content with that.
“Oh!” she yelled.
“Sorry,” a voice said as he reached out to grab her shoulders and keep her upright.
She’d bumped into what felt like a concrete wall and was embarrassed to discover it was simply a man’s chest. Well, there was really nothing simple about this man or his chest, which she figured out the moment she stepped back and looked up at him.
He was tall with a honey-brown complexion, a strong jaw, a precisely cut goatee and seductive dark brown eyes. His shoulders were broad, the suit he wore expertly cut. His hair was wavy and black, his lips of medium thickness.
Morgan almost sighed. If this was the ghost of Jacob Marley, then she was seriously going to consider crossing over to the land of the walking dead, because standing before her was one fine-ass black man.
* * *
Gray removed his hands from her instantly. He had no choice. The warmth that had immediately spread up his arms and to his chest was so intense he thought of the heart attack that had killed his father two months ago. Sure, Gray visited his internist once a year for a physical, so he knew that he was in perfect health, but the feeling had shocked him.
She had shocked him.
“Are you all right?” he asked. She’d taken a step back from him, looking as if she’d seen a ghost.
A number of children had almost instantly flocked around her, as if offering their juvenile protection, should he be there for some nefarious reason. He wasn’t, or at least he didn’t think of it that way. Still, they were all glaring at him. Something else that made Gray uncomfortable.
“I’m fine,” she answered, clearing her throat. “Can I help you with something?”
Gray didn’t need anyone’s help. He hadn’t for a very long time, but that was not his response. At thirty years old, Gray had been running his own company for fifteen years, supervising billion-dollar deals and working with brilliant tech minds to create the most innovative products in the world. He could certainly travel back to the small, dilapidated town that had torn his family apart and take care of the sale of three measly buildings without anyone’s help. Hence the reason he had secured a limited power-of-attorney document from each of his siblings. There was no need for all of them to come back to the place they all hated. He was the oldest and, as usual, he’d decided to bear the brunt of an unpleasant task.
“My name is Grayson Taylor,” he told her. “I own this building.”
“Oh,” she’d said, taking another step back as if she was afraid he’d reach out and touch her again.
Gray frowned.
“I’m just stopping by to take a look around as I’ll be selling the building hopefully in the next couple of months.”
“Christmas is next month,” the little girl holding tightly to the woman’s hand told him matter-of-factly.
He nodded. “Yes. It is.”
She was a cute little girl, with an intense stare that shouldn’t have unnerved him, but just like touching the woman had, it did.
“Even though the sales probably won’t be official until after the first of the year, I need to do a walk-through before then. I’ll send my lawyers a report and they’ll get started with the listing. If you don’t mind, could you show me around?” he asked, returning his gaze to the woman.
His question was met with immediate silence and after a few seconds she shook her head. “I’m rehearsing with the children. We’re just getting started with regularly scheduled rehearsals and the play is in four weeks. They have school during the day. We only have the weekends and an hour and a half in the evenings to rehearse.”
Gray presumed she was telling him “no.” That wasn’t a word women usually used with him, but his ego wasn’t bruised. This was business after all.
“Fine. I’ll wait until the rehearsal is finished,” he said. “Can I sit over here?”
There were chairs scattered about the spacious room, some lined directly in front of the small stage, where he suspected they were rehearsing their little play.
“You can watch me be Scrooge,” a boy wearing a frizzy white wig and an oversize black tuxedo jacket with tails told him.
He’d stepped away from the woman and her entourage and motioned for Gray to follow him. Admiring the child’s initiative, Gray walked behind him, leaving the still-leery gaze of the woman behind.
She didn’t say another word, but moved across the room and gave instructions for the children to resume their places and continue. The little girl who had been holding her hand still stood right beside her, but the child peeked back at Gray more than once. She had questions, he thought. Who was he? Why was he here and what did that possibly mean for them? He’d stared into her pensive eyes and felt the urge to answer all her questions in a way that would make her stop looking at him with such sincere inquisitiveness. It was the strangest thought he’d ever had, especially since Gray wasn’t known to get caught up in anyone’s emotions about anything.
He was the strongest of the Taylor sextuplets, the first one to be born on that humid July evening thirty years ago. His brothers and sisters all shared his birthday, but none of them had ever shared the weight of being the first baby born of the first set of multiples in the town of Temptation. That had been his title for the first seven years of his life—“the first born of the first Temptation sextuplets.” The Taylors of Temptation was what they’d named the reality show that featured his parents as they brought home their six bundles of joy and lived in the huge blue-and-white Victorian with the river at its back. As Gray recalled, the show would have been more aptly named if it had been called Terror of the Taylors instead.
“Do you like Christmas?”
He was yanked from his thoughts by the soft voice of the little girl who had been sneaking glances at him. Her hair was dark and long, brushing past her shoulders with red bows at the end of each ponytail. She wore jeans and a red-and-white striped sweater. Her boots had black-and-white polka dots.
“I don’t know,” he replied. “Do you like Christmas?”
She nodded and said, “Yes. I do. So does my mother.”
As she said those words Gray nodded. “Is your mother up there directing the play?”
“Yes. Her name is Morgan Hill. She’s a teacher, too.”
“You’re not supposed to talk to strangers,” a little boy said as he came up beside the girl and pulled on her arm.
She jerked away. “He’s not a stranger. His name is Grayson Taylor and he owns this building.”
Gray didn’t like the stoic way in which she’d mimicked his previous words.
“We don’t know him, so he’s a stranger,” the boy, who looked a little like the girl, said. “I’m gonna tell Mama.”
Gray almost smiled, but he felt his forehead drawing into a frown instead. Twins?
“No need to tell,” he declared. “How about we all go up front and sit with your mother? That way she’ll know where you both are.”
It would also give Gray a chance to ask a few questions about the building. From the looks of the outside, he didn’t think he’d get much for the building itself, but the land might be worth something. Between the sale of this building, the hospital and the house, the total should be a good chunk to split between the six of them. Not that Gray needed the money. His vision and the talented people he’d hired to work at Gray Technologies had made him a rich man years ago. No, any money that came from the properties would be what the Taylor sextuplets thought of as their father’s payment for destroying their lives all those years ago.
“Mama, he wants to sit with you,” the little girl said when they’d come to a stop next to the chair where her mother sat.
Morgan looked up from her clipboard and then hastily stood. “Oh, I apologize,” she said. “I hope they weren’t bothering you.”
Now it was Gray’s turn to simply stare. She was very pretty, he thought, as if he hadn’t noticed that before. Her skin was smooth and unmarred by any cosmetics. Gray was used to seeing more glamorous women, from the ones he worked with to the ones trying to get into his bed. High heels, tight dresses, heavily made-up faces and beaming smiles—that’s what he was used to.
Morgan was looking at him like she couldn’t decide whether to curse him out or be cordial to him. The look, coupled with the stubborn lift of her chin and the set of her shoulders, tugged at something deep inside him. Glancing away was not an option.
“He doesn’t know if he likes Christmas, Mama,” the little girl said.
“She’s always telling,” the boy added with a shake of his head.
“Hush,” Morgan told them.
“Ms. Hill! Ms. Hill! Ethan forgot what to say,” another child’s voice exclaimed.
“I did not! I’m imposizing. That’s what actors do,” the boy in the white wig—who Gray now knew was named Ethan—argued.
“The word is improvising, Ethan, and I’d prefer if you just repeated what’s written in the script,” Morgan replied.
She’d moved quickly, heading to the stage where the two arguing children stood. She spoke in a voice that was much calmer than he suspected she was feeling. She guided the children to where she wanted them to stand on the stage and spoke the lines she wanted them to repeat, all while Ethan looked as if he had other, more exciting things to do.
“He thinks he knows everything,” the little girl told Gray.
She’d scooted onto one of the chairs by then.
“Be quiet, Lily. Mama’s gonna show Ethan who’s the boss,” the boy told her.
“I think he’s the boss,” Lily said to her brother and they both looked up to Gray.
He was just about to speak—to say what, Gray wasn’t totally sure—when the lights suddenly went out. Screams were immediate and should have been expected since Gray didn’t think there was anyone in this room over the age of six or seven, besides him and Morgan.
“Stay calm,” he heard Morgan say over the growing chaos of children’s voices. “It’s probably just a blown fuse again. I’ll take care of it.”
Gray slipped his phone from his jacket pocket and turned on the flashlight app, but when he attempted to take a step toward the stage, he found his moves hampered. Gray was six-two and he weighed two hundred and thirty-five pounds, which consisted of mostly muscle thanks to the ten to twelve hours a week he spent at the gym. Last year he’d run in the 5K marathon to fight diabetes and finished in under fifteen minutes, so there should have been no problem with him walking across this room to assist Morgan in whatever was going on. Except for the two sets of arms that had wrapped tightly around each of his thighs, holding him down like weights.
Chapter 2 (#u2c9b3b18-08d8-54c5-8f46-d7460f2900d8)
“Here’s the fuse box,” Morgan stated about two seconds before Gray’s hands brushed over hers.
“I’ll take care of it,” he said, moving her hand to the side.
“You don’t know anything about this building,” she snapped. Her hand was still warm from where he’d touched her and Morgan rubbed it against her thigh as if she thought that would erase her reaction to his touch.
He was holding his phone, with its glaring light, pointed toward the fuse box, but Morgan could see the shadow of his face as he turned to look at her.
“I own this building,” he replied.
Morgan huffed. “That doesn’t mean you know your way around it, or how much it means to the people of this town,” she quipped.
It was really hot in here. They were in the basement and Morgan tried to take a step back, but there was only a wall behind her. To her right was a door that led to the crawl space. To her left, the wall with the fuse box. Directly in front of her, the man with the flashlight and delicious-smelling cologne.
“But I do know how to turn on,” he began, still watching her and, if she wasn’t mistaken, moving a step closer.
Morgan tried to shift to the side, but she stumbled on some cords that were lying on the floor and ended up against his chest, again. The light from the phone wavered as his hands dropped to her shoulders, sliding down slowly as he kept her from falling. Embarrassed and irritated by the heat that had spread quickly from the hand that he’d touched moments ago to the rest of her body, Morgan tried to pull away from him. She slammed her back into the wall.
He shone the light in her face at that point, then looked at her as if he was going to...no, he wasn’t, Morgan thought quickly. He wouldn’t dare.
“It’s the last circuit breaker,” she said, hastily pointing over his shoulder. “That’s the one that usually blows. It’s been doing that for the past couple of months. Harry said he was going to look at it, but he hasn’t had a chance.”
Harry Reed owned the hardware store and worked part-time at his family’s B and B. He also did handiwork around the town in his spare time, for which Morgan knew a lot of people were very grateful.
Now Grayson looked confused, which was just fine because that’s exactly how Morgan was feeling.
“You just open the box and—”
He backed away from her and said, “I know how to flip the circuit breakers and turn on the lights.”
The phone’s flashlight moved and she could see him opening the box now.
“You’re right,” he told her as he began flipping the first breaker off and then on. “I don’t know about this building, but I do know about fuse boxes. Turn everything off and hopefully, when you turn it back on...” He let his voice trail off as that last fuse clicked off and then...
“All power is restored,” he said the moment the tight hallway they’d been standing in was once again illuminated.
Behind him, the kids who they couldn’t leave in the dark room alone cheered.
“Great,” Morgan replied. “Thank you.”
She let out a whoosh of breath as she hurriedly slipped past him. It was a weird move, she knew, as she flattened against one wall and shimmied around the spot where he still stood, but Morgan didn’t care. She simply needed to get out of that corner with him.
“That was fun,” Ethan said immediately as she approached. “Can we do it again?”
“I’m hungry, Ms. Hill,” Daisy Lynn added with a baleful look.
Morgan had a headache.
She looked at her watch and let out a sigh. “It’s almost time for your parents to pick you up anyway. So let’s get back upstairs and clean up our props. We’ll rehearse again tomorrow after Sunday services,” she told them.
She led the group up the basement steps and through the double doors. When they’d come down moments ago Morgan had instructed them to hold hands and onto the railing. This time, since the lights were on and probably because Morgan’s thoughts were somewhere else, she hadn’t instructed them to do the same. The lights were brighter in the upstairs hallways and the children ran to the main hall, where they’d been rehearsing. She was walking and thinking about him, but somehow completely forgetting that she’d left Grayson Taylor down in the basement.
“Considering running away before giving me the tour of the place?” he said from behind her.
“What?” Morgan said as she spun around to face him. Her feet almost twisted as she did, but luckily she was able to right herself. Why had she become so clumsy around this man? “I’m not running anywhere. I have to tend to the children first,” she told him.
He nodded, but didn’t seem to believe her. That irritated Morgan and her headache throbbed more insistently.
“Look,” she said with a sigh, “I may not be the right person to give you this tour. I’m pretty attached to this building. And to the hospital, since I was born there. That means I’m going to be pretty irritated when you knock down the buildings or sell them off to some developer who’ll knock them down to build a strip mall or some other big-city franchise that we don’t need around here.”
Damn. She hadn’t meant to say all that, at least not to his face. He slipped his hands into the front pockets of his pants and watched as she wondered what to say next. Nothing about her personal feelings, she decided. Temptation was her home. These buildings, the landmarks and the people all meant something to her. She understood that it would be difficult for outsiders to understand that connection, but Grayson Taylor wasn’t an outsider. At least, he shouldn’t have been.
“Millie Randall works with the chamber of commerce. Her office is in city hall. She’ll be the better person to show you around. They open Monday at nine,” she said with finality and turned to walk away.
“It’s not my intention to knock anything down,” he told her. “I plan for a quick sale.”
“That’s your business, Mr. Taylor,” she replied without turning to face him.
“I’m not your enemy,” he said when he’d easily caught up with her.
“And you’re not a friend,” she replied. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go.”
She did have to go. The children were waiting for her. Their parents would arrive soon and she needed to clean up the hall and then get Lily and Jack home to feed them dinner. She did not have time to hang around at the community center with the man who could single-handedly take the building away from them. She definitely did not have to like how he looked and smelled, and damn, how it felt whenever he touched her. No, she didn’t and wouldn’t like any of that. Morgan promised herself she would not.
* * *
Gray ran fast and hard across the field of crisp frost-tipped grass. The air was cool and the sky a dull gray. The scents of nearby animals and the sounds of early-morning farm life wafted all around. This wasn’t the NordicTrack he used in his home gym, or the three-mile track that looped around the top level of the condo building where he lived. Gray ran on either of those on a daily basis. When he was out of town on business, the five-star hotels where he stayed always had state-of-the-art gyms with top-of-the-line equipment, including pools where he could indulge in slow leisurely laps to relax his muscles after a hard workout.
The brochure on the table in the room had called it the Owner’s Suite, but to him, it looked like a top floor had been added to an old horse’s stable.
Gray had been out for more than an hour and he was sure he’d run well over five miles by now and seen more grassy hills and fog-covered mountaintops than he had in all his life. It would have been a breathtaking view for someone who didn’t prefer the city life of bright lights, fast cars and hot women.
The latter, Gray thought as he made his way back to the portion of the Haystack Farm & Resort he’d rented, was what had him up at the crack of dawn. A hot woman camouflaged in a baggy running suit and surrounded by a circus of kids. He’d thought about her all night long. To the point where what sounded to him like someone strangling a rooster woke him just before he’d embarrassed himself with only the second wet dream of his life.
His feet crunched over the graveled walkway that led to the stables and Gray slowed down to a brisk walk. Stretching his arms above his head as he continued to move, he inhaled deeply and exhaled quickly, hoping the immediate slaps of cool air would erase the memories. All of them.
It didn’t work. As he approached the steps Gray stopped. He did a series of three quick squats, then lowered his back leg and began stretching. She wasn’t tall, he thought as he switched legs, his hands resting on his thigh as he lunged. Five feet and two or three inches tall, tops. She wasn’t built, either. Her clothes had been loose but Gray had always been able to spot a great female body. Hers was tight, compact, curvy in all the right places and trim in the others. She had intelligent eyes and a stubborn chin. Her hair was short, styled but not overdone. Her face was cute, not gorgeous, but stick-in-the-mind pretty.
Gray sighed and stood up straight. He put his hands on his hips and let his head fall back as he looked up to the sky. No clouds, no sun, just a blanket of slate. Only one day in this small town and he missed Miami already.
He ran up the steps and let himself into the loft suite that carried the faint smell of the air fresheners that were plugged into every electrical socket in the space, and the earthier scents of hay and horseflesh. There were no five-star hotels in Temptation. Only two bed-and-breakfasts and this fully functional farm, which also billed itself as a resort. There were no televisions, either. No internet connection and no phones. The signal on his cell was weak, but the electrical outlets worked well enough so at least they kept his phone and tablet charged.
The shower worked, he thought with a frown. Thank the heavens for that. Stripping as he made his way back to the bathroom, Gray reminded himself why he was here.
To inspect the buildings and put them on the market.
That was all.
When he stepped beneath the spray of hot water, he whispered again, “That is all.”
But the moment he closed his eyes and tipped his head beneath the water, he saw her face. Big hazel eyes, a pert nose and small, very kissable lips. He’d wanted to kiss her as they’d been standing in that dark hallway. When he’d stepped closer to her it had been his intention to lean in and touch his lips to hers. It wasn’t going to be gentle, rather demanding, hungry and needy. Gray dropped his head at the thought. He didn’t need anyone. He never had.
If it was for sex, which his body was telling him with no uncertainty that it was, then he could call any number of women the moment he arrived back in Miami. He did not need to acknowledge his arousal around some small-town woman with a chip on her shoulder. Except that when she’d brushed up against him, his erection had come quick and hard, both times. Just that brush of her soft body against his had made him want her. Gray cursed. It had been a very long time since he’d wanted anything, or anyone.
He picked up the bar of soap and used the cloth he’d grabbed before entering the shower. Building a thick lather, he placed the soap back into the vintage silver tray and began to wash the sweat from his body. Only each stroke of that warm and sudsy cloth over his skin had him aching more with need. After the first few seconds Gray wanted to drop that cloth and wrap his hands around his burgeoning length. He wanted to stroke and stroke until there was a blessed release. His eyes opened quickly with that thought as he gritted his teeth and fought like hell to keep his hands on any other part of his body aside from his throbbing arousal.
When she’d looked up at him he’d wanted to whisper her name.
Morgan.
Morgan Hill.
She was just a woman.
Just a woman that he wanted to sink so deep inside of that everything about this dismal small town and what it had done to his family would be washed from his mind, once and for all. Gray had no idea if that would work, or if he even wanted to bother. Morgan had children, which meant there was most likely a father to those children in the picture somewhere. That was another entanglement Gray did not have the time or the inclination to manage.
With jerking movements he continued to wash and then rinsed beneath the steamy water. Once his shower was complete he dressed and sat at the little desk that faced the window. The view was breathtaking, if one liked such a thing. Gray did not. A country setting, simple living—neither was for him. He reached into his leather bag and pulled out the files he’d brought with him. Without internet access in this room, he would have uninterrupted time to go over his most recent sales projections and R&D reports. There was no doubt that once he logged into his email there would be numerous issues for him to address. Even on a Sunday morning.
His mother used to love Sundays, Gray thought as he stared down at the papers, then up to the window. She loved walking in the sand and watching the tide roll in just outside the house they’d lived in on Pensacola Beach. That was the only time Olivia Taylor had looked peaceful, Gray recalled. The only time after his father had left them.
“Hello?” Gray answered his cell phone, which had begun to ring loudly, snatching him out of his thoughts.
“Hi. How’s it going?”
It was his sister Gemma. She was the oldest of the girls and the one Gray had been closest to since the two of them had taken care of the others when their mother began to get sick.
“Slowly” was his tired reply. “Apparently, the chamber of commerce doesn’t open on Sundays. Nothing in this sleepy little town does.”
“Weekends as a means of relaxation should be a crime,” Gemma replied with her ready humor. “This is the only day of the week that I have all to myself so I don’t want to hear one negative thing about it.”
Gemma was a hair stylist. She owned one of the largest and most reputable salons in Washington, DC.
“I’m not complaining,” Gray told her. “But I won’t lie, if I could get this taken care of sooner, rather than later, I’d be much happier.”
“I don’t know that I’ve ever seen you happy, Gray,” his sister said softly.
Oh, no, Gray thought with a shake of his head. They were not about to have this conversation. Gemma was the only one of his siblings who believed in the fairy tale of love, even though she’d yet to find her knight in shining armor. The fact that their mother had nursed a broken heart until her dying day didn’t seem to matter to his sister. Gemma staunchly believed that love would always find a way. Gray usually allowed his sister her dream, but today he wasn’t in the mood to humor her.
“First thing tomorrow morning I plan to march into city hall and speak with the rep at the chamber of commerce. It’ll be good to get an idea of what the buildings are currently being used for.”
“Why? I thought we were just going to sell them,” Gemma replied. “You don’t need that type of information to put them on the market.”
Gray had thought of that last night as he’d left the community center. He hadn’t needed to personally come back to Temptation, nor did he need an escort to show him around the buildings, either. It would have been much simpler to call his attorney and let him deal with the Realtors and the sale, an action he could have easily taken from his desk in his Miami office. There was just one thing stopping Gray from handling this the way he would any other business deal.
His mother.
“She would have wanted to know,” he admitted quietly.
Gemma remained silent for a few seconds.
“She would have,” she eventually agreed. “She’d always wanted to know about the town and how it was doing after we’d left. One of her greatest heartbreaks was that the loss of the money from our show and how the scandal that had followed our departure would have a negative effect on the town. She would have been happy to know the buildings were being used for something good, and she might not want us to sell them if they are.”
Gray rubbed a hand over his forehead. “I’ve thought about all that, too. Garrek and Gen were on the fence about selling when I spoke to them,” he said.
“Gia’s trying to open another restaurant, so she says the money from the sale would come in handy,” Gemma added.
“And Gage,” Gray said before sighing as he thought about the youngest brother.
Gemma made a sound that mimicked his frustration with their brother. “He’s so busy putting in hours at the hospital that he barely had time to sign that paper you had me take to him,” she said and then sighed again. “It would have been a lot better if all of us could have gotten together and talked this through. Mama would not be happy knowing that it’s been years since we were all in the same place, at the same time.”
“We were born in the same place, at the same time,” Gray stated drily.
“Now you sound like Gen, hating the way we came into this world.”
Gray shook his head at that remark. “No, I don’t hate that we were born. I just don’t like all the attention that came afterward and the way this town that supposedly loved the Taylors of Temptation weren’t there for us when everything came crashing down.”
It didn’t matter, Gray told himself immediately. When his mother decided to leave Temptation, her grandfather offered his vacation home in Pensacola Beach for her and the children to live in. His father, in a rare moment of generosity, hadn’t contested the divorce or the spousal support and alimony payments. Eventually, years later, their family began to feel the benefit of Theodor’s successful business endeavors through higher monthly payments. It was apparently much easier to write a check to his wife and six children than it was to live in the same house with them. The bottom line was that they hadn’t needed anyone from this town back then and Gray definitely didn’t owe them anything now.
“Look, I plan to have this wrapped up in the next day or so. I’ll send a group email when the listings are up and then keep everyone posted on the sales.”
“Right,” Gemma said. “Business as usual. That’s fine, Gray. I’ll be sending out my gifts in the next couple of weeks, so be sure to check the mail at your condo.”
Gray resisted the urge to sigh again. Instead, he squeezed the bridge of his nose. “You send us all Christmas gifts every year like you’re our secret Santa. We’re not kids anymore, Gemma.”
“No,” she said adamantly. “We’re not. But Mama loved Christmas. She always had gifts for us under that tree no matter the circumstances. It’s the least I can do to keep her alive in my heart, Gray. I know all of you have your way of dealing with the hand we were dealt in life, but this is mine so don’t try to take it away from me.”
After a few seconds of silence Gray replied, “I wouldn’t think of it.”
Gemma was right—she needed to deal with her life, in her way, just as the rest of his siblings did. Just as he did.
Gray ended the call with his sister and he was able to get lots of work done as the hours passed. Now, at close to six in the evening, he realized he hadn’t eaten all day. Grabbing his jacket, Gray left the room and headed into town. He had driven to Virginia from Miami, deciding that he might enjoy the peace and quiet of the fifteen-hour drive. It was a drastic change from using his private jet to travel the globe and hiring drivers for the shorter distances when he traveled for business. This time it was personal, and Gray was certain he could handle maneuvering the streets of the small town.
That thought was short-lived. Almost an hour later, after going up and down street after street looking for a restaurant of his liking, Gray finally parked his car in front of Pearl’s Diner on the corner of Sunset Drive and Evergreen Way. The first thing he noticed when he stepped out of his Porsche Panamera Turbo—besides the fact that the i and the e in diner were out on the lighted sign hanging in front of the establishment—was all the Christmas decorations. Thanksgiving had only been two days ago, but the holiday season was clearly in full swing in Temptation. Black lampposts positioned about six to eight feet apart had wreaths around the lighted tops and huge red ribbons in the center. Strung above the wires holding the street lights were large snowflakes formed from stencils and cheerful white lights. Funny, when he’d driven into town yesterday he hadn’t seen any of this, or perhaps he hadn’t wanted to see it. Could Gemma’s earlier reference to how much his mother had loved Christmas be the cause of his revelation now?
Another reason he may not have noticed the decorations before—the more logical one that Gray preferred to consider—was that he’d avoided driving through the main streets of town when he arrived. Instead, he’d made a wrong turn the moment he entered the town from the highway, forcing his GPS to reconfigure the directions to the community center. That had worked just as Gray planned and he’d ended up traveling through narrow streets lined with houses before pulling up on Century Road, where the old planked structure of the community center sat on a corner. Gray hadn’t wanted anyone to see him driving his fancy car through the old town. He recalled from his mother’s stories how quickly news—good or bad—traveled in Temptation and how much the townsfolk enjoyed spreading such news.
Gray was still standing in front of the diner, looking at the holiday decorations, when he was approached by the first person in Temptation to lend credence to his mother’s words.
“Well, aren’t you a sight for these sore old eyes,” a woman said. “You and that spicy little car you’re driving.”
She’d walked right up to him and now had a hand resting on his arm. Her perfectly coiffed dark brown hair was streaked with what looked like bronze in the front. Wrapped around her shoulders was some sort of black cape and she wore a festive red scarf.
“Good evening,” Gray finally said, remembering once again how everyone in small towns thought they knew everybody else.
They’d all thought they knew how good a father and husband Theodor Taylor was, until the day he’d up and left his family in that big old house on Peach Tree Lane. So had Gray’s mother, Olivia, and his siblings. That had been the moment of truth for Gray, one he would never forget, no matter how many years had passed, or how far away he managed to get from this town.
“You look awfully familiar,” she said, squinting her eyes and moving in closer.
Her perfume was strong and her fingers clenched his arm a little tighter as if she thought the contact might jog her memory. For as much as Gray would like to have gone unnoticed a little while longer, he knew his presence would be made known eventually. Especially after he’d already introduced himself to the pretty woman at the community center last night.
“I’m Grayson Taylor and I’m just heading into the diner to have dinner,” he told her.
“My word, Grayson Taylor,” she said, a smile spreading instantly across her face. “The last time I saw you I don’t think you came past here.”
Here was the level near her thigh that she’d shown with a motion of her hand.
“How old were you then? Six or seven? That’s when Olivia packed up and shuffled you poor children out of your home in the dark of night.” She was shaking her head as she talked. “Shame the way she did that. You should have been allowed to grow up in your home, around the people that loved and cared about you all.”
What she really meant was the people that loved all the revenue that the reality show his family had starred in brought to the town. The birth of the sextuplets had come at a time when Temptation was struggling to use its historic background to bring tourists and, subsequently, money into the town. The show had been a savior for the town, but a death sentence to his parents’ marriage.
“I was seven years old back then, ma’am, and I really am hungry, so if you’ll please excuse me,” he said and attempted to walk away.
“Oh, don’t go in there. Pearl doesn’t work on Sundays. Her daughter, Gail, does, but she’s not as good a cook as her mama. You come on over to the hospital with me. They’re having their annual charity ball and that food will be catered. Hopefully, it’ll be better than Gail’s since I know they paid this fancy new chef a ton of money.”
She looped her arm around his and had started walking them across the street before Gray could accept or decline her offer.
“Ma’am, I’d rather not intrude,” he began after a couple of steps.
“You can drop the ma’am and call me Millie. Millie Randall, that’s what everybody around here calls me. And you’re not intruding. We heard your daddy died a couple months back, poor fella. And with a young lady in his bed. At least that’s what we heard.” Millie whispered those last sentences.
She shook her head and continued before Gray could interject.
“So I suspect you’re here about his properties. The hospital is one of them, so you might as well come on inside and see what you own.”
First, Gray wasn’t certain why the whispering was necessary, since they were the only two people outside at the moment. Second, her assumptions about his father’s death were wrong and totally inappropriate, but still, he tried to keep his irritation under control.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Randall,” he said because he’d already noted the gigantic diamond on her ring finger and he recalled Morgan mentioning her name last night. “I really don’t think this is a good idea. I have other business to take care of.”
“Always in a rush,” Millie said with a shake of her head. She took two steps away from Gray and then turned back. “You get that from your mother. Olivia was always trying to move faster than she should have. Running to those fancy doctors and using all that money to produce that ungodly pregnancy.”
“Wait a minute,” Gray said, finally fed up with this woman and her comments.
He didn’t give a damn who she was or where she worked. As he’d told Gemma earlier, he didn’t need anyone in this town to show him the buildings he owned. He was simply trying to honor his mother’s memory by coming back here and doing business as civilly as he could. That didn’t mean he had to deal with any of this petty, small-town BS in the process.
“I’m here to handle current business, not to rehash the past,” he told her curtly.
It was the best he could do, especially since instinct and habit were telling him to defend his mother and put this busybody in her place.
“Well, that’s fine,” she snapped and continued walking toward the building. “But we don’t rush around in Temptation. It’s not our way, so you’ll just have to get used to that.”
Gray frowned as he reluctantly walked behind her. He didn’t want to get used to anything in Temptation.
Chapter 3 (#u2c9b3b18-08d8-54c5-8f46-d7460f2900d8)
“You’re just not used to being close to men anymore,” Wendy said as she zipped the back of Morgan’s dress.
Morgan turned away from the full-length mirror and closed the closet door it hung on. “I don’t have a problem being around men, I just don’t like arrogant and snobbish men,” she replied.
After stewing about the issue all night she’d finally broken down and told Wendy about meeting Grayson Taylor last night. Lily and Jack were staying with her grandmother tonight, while she attended the annual holiday charity banquet at the hospital with Wendy. The event was to benefit the Widows and Orphans Fund, which had been started years ago by an anonymous mother who at one point had lost everything, but then came into a huge sum of money and wanted to give back. No one in town had ever seen this woman in person, but they’d accepted the money and agreed to continue the efforts, using each year’s proceeds to help support single mothers with young children.
Wendy had worked at the hospital for the past five years. So Morgan had been attending this event before becoming a widow herself. She’d always believed in its purpose, and now, being a single parent, she knew firsthand how important it was to have assistance. In her corner were Granny and Wendy. Her parents had been gone since Morgan was a sophomore in high school, when her father received a job offer in Australia.
“I hear he’s sexy as hell,” Wendy continued.
She was standing near Morgan’s dresser now, fluffing her loose curls. Her older sister was gorgeous, from her five-seven height to the generous curves she’d been blessed with and the bubbly personality that had landed her as captain of the cheerleading squad in high school. They shared the same creamy brown complexion and wide, expressive eyes, but that’s where the similarities ended. Where Morgan loved the fall and Christmas carols, Wendy wanted to swim in the lake every day of the summer and detested the cold.
“All of them,” she continued. “There are three boys and three girls. I don’t think any of them signed over the rights for the show to go into syndication or onto DVD, but Granny told me just the other day how good-looking they all had grown up to be.”
“And how would she know?” Morgan asked after she’d slipped her feet into the four-inch-heel platform red shoes that she’d treated herself to. “You know she hates the internet. That computer we bought her two years ago would have inches of dust on it if she wasn’t such a neat freak.”
Wendy shook her head. “And you know that’s the truth,” her sister agreed while laughing. “But you know her and Ms. Dessa love reading the tabloids down at the supermarket. She said there was a story about them a few months back when the father died.”
Morgan pulled at the hem of the dress that she’d already deemed too short. Wendy thought it was perfect—red, festive and flirty, she’d said. Morgan figured she was either going to freeze her buns off tonight trying to be cute, or fall flat on her face the moment she walked into the Olivia Taylor Hall at the hospital.
Olivia Taylor had been the equivalent of the Virgin Mary in Temptation. Thirty years ago, when she and her husband had been bold enough to travel to Maryland so that she could be artificially inseminated with multiple eggs, she’d shown every women in Temptation that it was okay to take their fate in their own hands. Morgan, and just about everyone who lived in Temptation, knew the story.
“They both need to find something else better to do during the day,” Morgan said, grabbing her shawl from the bed and heading for the door.
Wendy laughed as she followed her out. “They need a man! Two of them, or maybe one and they can share.”
Morgan shook her head. “You’re ridiculous,” she said.
The shawl would be for when she was inside the hospital. As for right now, her long wool coat was warranted as the temperature was expected to drop below freezing later that evening. While Morgan loved the season and the crisp cold winter air, she did not like shivering and shaking from the deep freeze that Temptation was known to receive this time of year.
“Not ridiculous, just practical,” Wendy said while slipping into her short leather jacket. “What woman wouldn’t want a nice handsome hunk of man to keep her warm on a night like this?”
Morgan stepped out into the evening air, recalling immediately how warm she’d felt each time Grayson had touched her. She continued walking to the car, feeling the cold breeze as it whipped through the air.
“I don’t have any problem keeping myself warm,” she told her sister as she climbed into the passenger side of Wendy’s SUV.
Still, she was shivering when she finally pulled the door closed, her traitorous body begging to differ.
* * *
“This wing of the hospital was named after your mother,” Millie told Gray.
Her voice had begun to grate on him, like nails sliding over a chalkboard. She’d been talking, mixing historical facts about the town with quick jabs of gossip and innuendo, like they were part of some insider tour. If they were, Gray didn’t want to partake—not a second longer.
“I think I’ve seen enough,” he told her. He was certain that the twenty minutes that she’d taken to walk him around the hospital had been nineteen minutes too long in her company.
Based on this tour alone, he knew exactly what he would do once he finally found a spot with internet access. Gray would tell his attorney to sell, sell, sell! This town was just as bland and behind the times as he’d recalled and he would be glad to leave first thing tomorrow morning. Actually, he thought as Millie touched her jeweled fingers to his arm for about the billionth time, he would be more than glad.
“So you see, it makes sense for you to be here tonight at the charity event,” she told him, blinking those unnaturally long lashes at him.
She’d been doing that as if she thought the action was somehow coercing him. It wasn’t. Instead, that action and Millie’s comments were beginning to irritate the hell out of him.
“I’m really not up for attending any type of event,” he began. “Besides, I’m not dressed for anything formal.”
“Oh, we rarely do formal here in Temptation. You should remember that,” she chided, slipping her hand right through his arm again and turning him toward glass double doors at the end of the hallway.
The tiled floor was old here, just as Gray had noticed throughout the rest of the facility. There were a number of areas that could be refreshed and updated, he’d thought as he walked through. Windows could have better coverings, computers at the main desk on all of the floors looked to be at least ten years old, which in any field these days was not good. A hospital especially should have the most up-to-date equipment possible.
“You see we kept your mother’s name right over the doors, just the way they were when we put them there years ago. She never did come back to see it, though. Her cousin, BJ, never understood that. She always thought Olivia was ungrateful, but you know how family can be,” Millie continued as she walked him closer to those doors.
“It was very nice of the town to dedicate this portion of the hospital to my mother. I’m sure she was very grateful,” Gray told her.
“Not enough to come back, though,” Millie continued with a shake of her head. “But tonight’s about new beginnings. We all start afresh with the New Year, so this charity dinner gives us a head start. You know, moneywise.”
Gray nodded because that was another point Millie had made sure to hit home. The town needed money.
“Really,” Gray said, coming almost to a stop before they could get closer to the doors. “I should get going. I have emails to send and calls to make.”
Millie shook her head. “Always got something better to do. Just like your father. It’s just a dinner, Grayson. And you said you were hungry, so come in, sit down and have a bite to eat. Then you can rush on and do what you have to do. But I’ll tell you, if you’re thinking of selling these buildings and running out on this town again, I beg you to think again. Whether you like it or not this is your heritage. It’s where you were born and where your children should have a chance to grow up and experience all the things you never did.”
“I don’t plan on having children,” Gray replied immediately.
He had no idea why he’d told her that, just felt the words slipping out without his permission.
Millie’s smile spread slowly. “You never know what this world’s got in store for you. Despite what your mother thought at first, she soon found out that everything doesn’t always go as planned.”
Gray was just about to tell her he was totally different from both his parents. He was going to assure her that she was wrong and that he would definitely not be getting married or having any children. Ever.
Then she approached. He’d heard the clicking of heels across the floor but hadn’t bothered to look away from Millie until the other woman was standing right there behind the older one. He’d glimpsed at the bright red of her dress first, then realized how little material there actually was as his gaze soon rested on her stocking-clad legs. Then moved slowly to the swell of her pert breasts over the bodice. Her hair was tapered on the sides and curly on top, her makeup light, but alluring.
There was another woman with her, Gray noticed when he figured staring was probably just as rude as it was embarrassing on his part.
“Hi, Millie. You trying to keep all the handsome men out here with you tonight?” the third woman asked, her smile wide and her eyes cheerful as she looked at Gray.
She was a couple inches taller than Morgan, who he had noticed was wearing some pretty sexy heels tonight. The other woman also had on heels. Her hair was longer, curls relaxing on her shoulders as long, icicle-like earrings dangled and glowed. Pretty wasn’t a bold enough word for this one and the tight black dress she wore, with a festive red choker that had small jingle bells dangling from it, was definitely something to stare at. Still, Gray’s gaze went right back to Morgan.
“Not at all,” Millie said, her smile faltering. “This is Grayson Taylor. You know, he’s one of the Taylors of Temptation.”
Gray didn’t like that title any more than he liked the way Millie had said it—as if he was the Dracula of Transylvania.
“Hello, Grayson Taylor,” the woman said as she extended her hand to him. “I’m Wendy Langston. I’m one of the Langstons of Temptation. We’ve been here forever, too, but most of us have done the smart thing and escaped as well.” She chuckled and so did Gray, liking her instantly.
“Please,” he said, taking her hand and shaking it. “Call me Gray.”
“Well, Gray, you should come on in and join the fun. You can sit with me and my sister, Morgan. I hear Magnolia Daniels was this year’s caterer. She just graduated from some fancy culinary college in New York, so she was anxious to come back home and show us all her skills,” Wendy told him.
“My sister attended a culinary school in New York as well,” he said. “She owns her own restaurant now and teaches at the college. I wonder if it’s the same school Magnolia attended.”
“There’s only one way for us to find out,” Wendy said as she easily stepped in front of Millie to snag Gray’s arm.
This time, Gray wasn’t as irritated. In fact, he thought, he could appreciate Wendy’s cheerful demeanor. He could also like the fact that Morgan had looked a bit chagrined at the way her sister so easily stepped up to him.
They walked through the double doors that Gray had sworn he hadn’t wanted to enter and he was pleasantly surprised, at least for a few moments. The lights were dim and there were tables all around the floor, covered in festive red cloths with what looked like little gingerbread houses in the center. Holiday music played softly in the background as fifty or so people walked around or hovered over the punch table.
“I’m going to get something to drink,” he heard Morgan say and then looked up in enough time to see her walking hastily away from the table where Wendy had led him.
“I believe you’ve met my younger sister already,” Wendy said as she took a seat in one of the folding chairs.
Gray sat in a chair beside her after he’d forced himself to look away from Morgan’s retreating body.
“Yes. We met last night at the community center,” he replied.
Wendy nodded. “You interrupted Jacob Marley’s grand entrance in Mountainview Elementary’s first-grade-class presentation of A Christmas Carol.”
“Is that what they were doing?” he asked, then recalled the little boy named Ethan saying something about “bah, hamburger” when he’d taken his place on the stage after Gray first arrived.
“Yes. It’s one of Morgan’s favorites, so she begged the town council to let her class present the play, as opposed to the older members of the theater club, who had wanted to perform The Sound of Music. I think we’re better off with the kids and that has nothing to do with my sister being the director,” Wendy continued, chuckling again.
“I hope it turns out well,” Gray responsed.
He’d been wondering how long it was going to take Morgan to return. Not that he didn’t like talking to her sister. Well, actually, Gray wasn’t really in the mood to talk any more tonight. He did, however, want to be near Morgan Hill once again. That thought hadn’t occurred to him earlier when he’d been busily immersed in his work. Yet, the moment he saw her, he was unable—or unwilling...he couldn’t figure out which one just yet—to think about anything else.
“It’s going to be fun. You should think about sticking around town to see the finished product.”
This sister liked to talk. Gray was certain he hadn’t gotten this many words out of Morgan the night before and they’d been together longer. He looked at Wendy now, and asked, “When is the production taking place?”
“Christmas Eve,” she told him. “You weren’t planning on selling the community center before then, were you?”
Gray didn’t immediately respond. Christmas was weeks away. There was no way he planned on staying in town for that long, and while he was immediately going to put the buildings on the market, he wasn’t optimistic that they would sell so quickly. Who would want to buy run-down buildings in this small town? There was no market value to the purchases, only sentimental value, which he’d figured out from his talk with Millie, and Morgan’s immediate reaction to finding out who he was.
“I don’t think they’ll be sold before Christmas,” he answered. “Maybe I’ll go help Morgan with the drinks.”
Wendy had seemed to look at him knowingly as she replied, “Sure. You go right ahead and do that.”
Regardless of what she said or thought about Gray as he walked away, he kept moving. Too many people wanted to chitchat with him in this town and he didn’t want any of that. What he wanted... Gray wasn’t quite certain. Sure, he’d thought he knew, just last night when he’d driven into town, and earlier, when he talked to Gemma, but at this moment...
Morgan turned away from the punch table just as he walked up behind her. Quick footwork had him moving just before she could turn with her outstretched hands, which held two glasses filled with red punch. The red punch that Gray had no doubt would have splashed all over his white shirt had they collided in the way they’d seemed destined to do.
“Let me help you with that,” Gray offered and reached for one of the glasses.
She opened her mouth as if she was about to speak, then clapped her lips closed and allowed him to take the glass from her hand.
“Why don’t we enjoy this over there near the tree,” he said.
“That one is for my sister,” she said, nodding toward the glass in his hand.
He shook his head and did not hesitate to lie. “She said she’d get something later.”
“Why do you want to go over there? We can go back to our table,” she said before lifting her glass to her lips and taking a sip.
“I want to be alone with you,” he said, again without any hesitation.
Or any thought to what he was doing. All Gray could admit to with any sort of definitiveness was that he wanted to be with Morgan. His salacious thoughts from last night were at the forefront of his mind as he stood close to her, the light scent of her perfume wafting through the air.
“And I like Christmas trees,” he continued when she only glared at him, one brow lifted in silent question.
“Lily said you didn’t like Christmas,” she replied after another few moments of silence.
“Your daughter,” he said when he remembered the solemn-faced little girl from last night. “She and your son are twins, correct?”
Morgan nodded. “They’re the loves of my life,” she replied, then looked up quickly as if she hadn’t meant to say that.
Gray decided to let it slide because there was another pressing question he wanted an answer to. “And their father? Is he also the love of your life?”
For the first time ever Gray held his breath as he waited for the answer.
Her fingers seemed to tighten around the glass she held before she replied, “My husband died in Afghanistan.”
It was a simple statement and yet it held as much power as if she’d reached out and socked him herself.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” he said.
Gray moved beside her then, taking her elbow lightly, and began to walk toward the tree. “Do you like Christmas?”
“What?” she asked as they moved.
“Do you like Christmas? That’s what Lily asked me last night. Now I want to know your answer.”
“Yes, I love Christmas,” she said before taking another sip of her punch.
Gray hadn’t bothered to sip his.
“It’s a wonderful time of year. A time for family and fellowship, miracles and happiness.”
“You sound like one of those greeting-card commercials,” he replied.
“And you sound like the star of my play, Ebenezer Scrooge,” she snapped back.
They’d come to a stop near the huge Christmas tree that was nestled in a far corner of the room. It had to be at least ten feet tall and was decorated with what looked like every sort of bulb, bell, ribbon and light ever created for this season.
“I don’t have anything in particular against the holiday,” Gray confided. He’d walked farther around the tree toward the side that was facing two large windows.
The old window shades were tattered at the edges and if anyone attempted to pull them down farther, they’d surely crumple into pieces. So more than half the window was bare, leaving a view of the side street, where only two cars were parked and the sidewalk was clear. At this time of evening on a Sunday night, if Gray had looked out the window of his penthouse in Miami he was sure to see lines of traffic and people headed toward the clubs or the beach. There was always something going on in the city, some party or meeting, a huge wedding, or a celebrity sighting. Never a dull moment, and never a quiet street like this.
“Do you normally spend the holiday with the rest of your family?”
Gray lifted his head to see Morgan standing right beside him. She’d put her glass down on the windowsill and he did the same before thinking about an answer to her question. He hadn’t thought of his siblings in the traditional sense of the word family. The fact that they each lived in different states could be the reason for that. They’d been born together and had lived together for eighteen years. They were the closest thing to friends Gray had ever had, and the only ones who shared the same dark disappointments of the past with him.
“No. My sisters and brothers have their own lives,” he replied.
“There are six of you—surely you find time to spend with each other at some point. I only have one sister and it seems like we’re never apart,” she told him.
She looked across the room and Gray followed her gaze. More people had come in, filling up the tables. The sound of numerous voices had grown a bit louder. The instrumental holiday music still sounded over the guests’ voices and Gray found himself thankful for the partial privacy of this corner. He didn’t want to talk to any of the people out there, but here, on this side of the tree with all its twinkling lights reflecting off the window, he was content to stand with this woman.
“Yes, there are six of us. I’m the oldest. Born almost immediately after me were Garrek, Gemma, Genevieve, Gage and Gia. Once we turned eighteen we all went our separate ways.”
“And you don’t keep in touch? That’s not good. I mean, it’s kind of sad. I would think that you would be closer,” she said, then clamped her lips shut again.
Gray shook his head. “It’s not a problem. A lot of people think a lot of things about the Taylor sextuplets. They have since the first airing of that damn television show. None of them know the truth.”
“You sound as if the truth is sad,” she replied quietly.
Gray shrugged. “It is what it is.”
She nodded. “Just like you selling the buildings, I guess.”
Her back was to the window and Gray moved to stand in front of her. He rubbed the backs of his fingers lightly over her cheek.
“Those buildings mean something to you, don’t they?” he asked her.
She shrugged this time, shifting from one foot to the other as if his proximity was making her nervous. Being this close to her was making him hot and aroused. He wondered if that’s what she was really feeling as well.
“This town means something to me. There are good people here and we’re trying to do good things.”
“That’s what my mother used to say,” Gray continued, loving the feel of her smooth skin beneath his touch. “Temptation was a good place. Love, family, loyalty. They meant something to the town. Always. That’s what she used to tell us when we were young. But that was after the show, after my father found something better outside of this precious town of Temptation.”
Gray could hear the sting to his tone, felt the tensing of his muscles that came each time he thought about Theodor Taylor and all that he’d done to his family. Yes, Gray had buried his father two months ago. He’d followed the old man’s wishes right down to the ornate gold handles on the slate-gray casket, but Gray still hated him. He still despised any man who could walk away from his family without ever looking back.
“Show me something better,” he said as he stared down into Morgan’s light brown eyes. “Show me what this town is really about and maybe I’ll reconsider selling.”
“Are you making a bargain with me?” she asked. “Because if you are, I don’t know what to say. I’m not used to wheeling-and-dealing big businessmen like you.”
“I’m asking you to give me a reason why I shouldn’t sell those buildings. Just one will do. If you can convince me—”
She was already shaking her head. “I won’t sleep with you, if that’s what you mean by convince you.”
Gray blinked. That wasn’t what he’d meant and the vehement way in which she’d made that declaration had scraped his ego raw.
“I didn’t ask you to sleep with me,” he told her and took a step closer. “But if I did...” He purposely let his words trail off, the tip of his finger sliding closer to the edge of her lips.
“I’d still say no. I don’t sleep with uptight businessmen,” she told him, that stubborn chin of hers jutting forward.
If she could have, Gray was certain she would have backed all the way out of that window to get away from him. That wasn’t going to happen, especially not when he snaked an arm around her waist and pulled her closer to him, until she was flush against his chest the same way she had been last night when she’d bumped into him. He liked her right there, liked the heat that immediately spread throughout his body with her in this position.
“Don’t worry,” he whispered. “I won’t ask you. I don’t sleep with small-town women with chips on their shoulders.”
“I’m not—” she began but Gray quieted her words by touching his lips immediately to hers.
White-hot heat seared through him at the touch. His tongue swooped inside, taking her by surprise. A warm and delicious surprise that had him wrapping his other arm around her and holding her tight. Her hands came around to his back, clenching the material of his suit jacket as she opened her mouth wider to his assault. They were consuming each other, right here in the corner of this room at the hospital where Gray and his siblings had been born.
He wanted to turn her just a little, to press her back against the wall and take her right here, just like this. He could feel how hot she was and could imagine that same heat pouring over him as she came. She would wrap her legs around him, her short but strong legs would hold him tightly, keeping him securely embedded inside her. They would be short of breath, but love every second of their joining. It would be the best sex...no, it would be really good sex, for Gray, something he hadn’t indulged in often enough.
It would be... Something moved at his side. It made a noise and moved again. She stilled in his arms, then abruptly pulled back. Gray was cursing as he realized what was moving was his vibrating cell phone. With a frown Gray pulled it out of his pocket and looked down at the text on the lighted screen. He would have never considered that Morgan might look down as well.
“I’ll let you go tend to Kym,” she said icily, before stepping around him and making a hasty exit.
Chapter 4 (#u2c9b3b18-08d8-54c5-8f46-d7460f2900d8)
The Sunnydale Bed-and-Breakfast was a stately white colonial with black shutters nestled in the center of a cul-de-sac and surrounded by a number of beautifully mature trees. Gray admitted the next afternoon as he approached the dwelling that it looked as if it should be featured on a postcard boasting the simplicity of small-town living. The American flag flying high above the black double doors and brick walkway slammed home the patriotic angle, while chubby shrubs lined the perimeter with the precise planning of a Better Homes and Gardens portrait. Once inside, the historic charm continued with scuffed wood-planked floors, emerald-green-and-white textured wallpaper stretching throughout the front foyer and along the wall next to a winding glossed cherry-wood railing.
There was just enough of the new world interspersed with the old, as the front desk clerk had spoken to Gray after hanging up the telephone and was taking an inordinately long time to type a reservation into a computer.
“I’m here to see Kym Hutchins. I believe she has a room here,” Gray told the clerk, who was staring at him over gold wire-rimmed glasses.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” the older gentleman began. “Millie wasn’t lying after all.”
“Pardon me?” Gray asked even though he had a hunch what was about to take place.
The man shook his head before coming around the desk to stand right in front of Gray. He wore tan pants that were at least three sizes too big, held up by black suspenders, which again, didn’t really fit him well, but were drawn so tight they looked almost painful on his shoulders. His short-sleeved dress shirt was a lighter shade of tan, and a wrinkled handkerchief poked out of his breast pocket. His skin was a very weathered almond color, while his hair—what was left of it—was short, gray and curled close to his scalp.
“You’re one of the Taylors, all right. Tall and broad just like your daddy was,” the man said as he continued to look Gray up and down. “Got some fancy clothes on, too. I know because no stores in Temptation even carry dress pants with studs at the bottom, or shirts with those fancy gold cuffs you’re wearing. Nowhere to go in town where you gotta be that sharp, unless it’s in your own casket.”
Gray frowned. People in this town said whatever came to their mind, whenever they saw fit. It was a good thing Temptation was still somewhat thriving because its people wouldn’t make it in the big city.
“Sir, if you’ll be so kind as to let Ms. Hutchins know that I’m here,” Gray said, again employing all his patience to deal with the older members of this town.
“Oh, she’s already waiting in the parlor. Came down in her fancy dress and par-r-r-fume,” he said, mispronouncing and dragging the word out until it sounded totally ridiculous.
Ridiculous and just a little bit funny, as the man’s face had contorted in a way that Gray presumed was his rendition of being upper class.
“Then I’ll just go on in and see her,” Gray said and turned to the right to go through a walkway.
“The parlor’s this way,” the man told Gray.
He’d turned and walked, his posture a little bent over, toward double pocket doors to the left.
“Guess you two got someplace to go all dressed up like you are,” he continued. “I don’t reckon any man around here wears suits and ties on a daily basis. And the women, they don’t wear skirts with matching jackets unless they’re going to church. Me, I don’t go anywhere I need to put on shiny suit jacket and shave. Used to tell my Ethel that all the time. If I go to church I put on pants and a shirt. I brush my teeth and my hair and I’m done. She never understood, but she never left me, either.”
He was chuckling so hard, Gray thought he might actually tip over from the effort. He stood close just in case that did happen. Instead, the man began to wheeze just as they stepped into the parlor, which had a plush burgundy carpet.
“Ma’am, you got a beau come to see you,” he told Kym.
“Thank you, Otis,” Kym said when she stood from the spot where she’d been sitting.
“You’re quite welcome, ma’am,” Otis replied and turned to leave.
Gray glanced at the man once more, trying to figure out if he was really blushing or if there was some other health condition going on.
“She’s a looker,” Otis whispered, his bushy eyebrows dancing up and down as he grinned.
Gray couldn’t help but smile—the man might be old in years, but he hadn’t lost a step when it came to women.
Kym Hutchins was indeed a good-looking woman. She was tall at five foot nine and a half inches, with a slim figure, a light golden complexion and long black hair that was always perfectly styled. Her makeup was flawless, as usual, her legs long in the knee-length navy blue skirt with the matching jacket, which perfectly accented her sophisticated and professional demeanor. She was a very intelligent woman and she was his executive assistant. None of which explained why she was here in Temptation.
“Hello, Grayson,” Kym said when Otis had meandered away, leaving them alone in the cozy parlor.
There were heavy-looking drapes hanging almost from floor to ceiling in a strange mustard color and four round mahogany tables with matching chairs around them. In the center of each table was a bouquet of roses, in the exact shade that was on Kym’s lips as she gave him a brilliant smile.
“Hello,” he replied. “I’m not sure how you knew I was here. I didn’t put anything on my calendar.”
With a flick of her hand, the large curls that had been draped over her shoulders were pushed back as her chin tilted slightly.
“I came by your place to drop off the Miago contracts but you weren’t there. When I spoke to your doorman he indicated that you’d taken the Porsche and said you would return in a week. I know you’ve been handling your father’s estate so I took an educated guess,” she told him.
“And you showed up without me inviting you? Without letting me know your intentions?” Gray wasn’t certain how he should feel about that.
“Why don’t we have a seat, Grayson. Otis is going to bring us a beverage. I asked for wine spritzers but he politely informed me that this establishment does not sell or serve alcoholic beverages. Can you imagine?” she asked with a shake of her head.
Kym was already taking a seat, crossing her long, bare legs as she did. Gray figured it made sense to sit and talk to her, even though he was still trying to figure out why she’d come all this way in the first place.
“Did you know they don’t have any hotels in this town?” With that said, Kym let out a short sigh. “I don’t know what they do with the tourists, whenever they get them.”
“They have two B and Bs and a resort,” he told her, keeping it to himself that the resort was actually a farm.
“No four-star hotels, no wine. It’s a wonder they’re still functioning at all,” she replied.
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A.C. Arthur
All she wants for Christmas…Everything schoolteacher Morgan Hill loves is in her hometown of Temptation, Virginia—her twins, her students, and the charming community center where she’s staging their holiday play. But now the building’s new owner, Grayson Taylor, is putting sexy visions into Morgan's head, making the young widow long for a future even Santa couldn’t deliver.As the oldest of sextuplets, Gray grew up in the media spotlight. His family’s fame once helped Temptation thrive, but drove his parents apart. Coming back is just a bittersweet necessity until he meets petite firecracker Morgan. Somehow she gets the handsome tech guru to forget about big business in favor of small-town delights…and steamy winter nights. It’s a life he never knew he wanted, but can he put his past aside to turn a festive fling into the sweetest forever?
All she wants for Christmas...
Everything schoolteacher Morgan Hill loves is in her hometown of Temptation, Virginia—her twins, her students and the charming community center where she’s staging their holiday play. But now the building’s new owner, Grayson Taylor, is putting sexy visions into Morgan’s head, making the young widow long for a future even Santa couldn’t deliver.
As the oldest of sextuplets, Gray grew up in the media spotlight. His family’s fame once helped Temptation thrive, but drove his parents apart. Coming back is just a bittersweet necessity until he meets petite firecracker Morgan. Somehow she gets the handsome tech guru to forget about big business in favor of small-town delights...and steamy winter nights. It’s a life he never knew he wanted, but can he put his past aside to turn a festive fling into the sweetest forever?
Then he moved quicker than she’d anticipated, and before she could stop him, he’d wrapped his arms around her waist and pushed her back against the wall.
“What if I said I want you?” he asked, his breath fanning warmly over her face.
“For...for Christmas?” she asked, and felt like a colossal idiot.
He didn’t smile, but shook his head, his hands slipping under her coat to rub along her back. “No. Right now. I want you, Morgan.”
He moved again and Morgan saw his arm lifting. He was going to touch her. No, wait, he was already touching her. She should move. She should put lots of distance between them to keep whatever was about to happen from happening. But she didn’t. She couldn’t. His fingers grazed her jaw, came over her chin, then up to tap her bottom lip.
“You can’t want me,” she said, her body beginning to tremble even though it was the last thing she wanted to do.
Dear Reader (#u2c9b3b18-08d8-54c5-8f46-d7460f2900d8),
I love writing Christmas stories!
With that said, I was more than excited to begin the new Taylors of Temptation series with a Christmas-themed book. Gray and Morgan were the perfect couple to start with, as they were both struggling with things that distracted them from the holidays.
The Taylor sextuplets were born in Temptation, Virginia—a small town that I created because I like the community and closeness of small-town stories. The sextuplets were taken away from their hometown at a young age, now they’ve all come back, some to stay, and some just to visit. But when they return, they’ll remember all the magic that was once there.
When Gray returned to Temptation, he was certain that it would be temporarily, until he met Morgan and her twins. Their love wasn’t instant, but that initial incessant pull that refuses to let go when a couple first meets was definitely present. Unraveling all the layers of Gray’s past feelings and Morgan’s past losses was a task. Thankfully, I had lots of Christmas music and movies to help me along the way!
I hope you enjoy this first glimpse at the Taylors and have fun spending the holidays in Temptation!
Happy reading,
A.C. Arthur
One Mistletoe Wish
A.C. Arthur
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
A.C. ARTHUR was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland, where she currently resides with her husband and three children. An active imagination and a love for reading encouraged her to begin writing in high school, and she hasn’t stopped since.
Working in the legal field for almost thirteen years, she’s seen lots of horrific things and longs for the safe haven reading a romance novel brings. Determined to bring a new edge to romance, she continues to develop intriguing plots, sensual love scenes, racy characters and fresh dialogue—thus keeping readers on their toes!
For all the latest news on A.C. Arthur’s books, giveaways, appearances and discussions, join A.C.’s Book Lounge on Facebook at Facebook.com/pages/AC-Arthurs-Book-Lounge/140199625996114 (https://www.Facebook.com/pages/AC-Arthurs-Book-Lounge/140199625996114).
To those who watch Christmas movies and listen to Christmas music all year long. You rock!
Contents
Cover (#u07dbda55-f4c0-584a-a817-2b62f6851b78)
Back Cover Text (#u09b2d140-827d-544e-a47e-2b2d03f66416)
Introduction (#u4a687bb3-9445-5993-b9a6-6b611631252c)
Dear Reader (#u160a77ba-5bba-536c-969d-1ae099abdddf)
Title Page (#u5271909b-ce01-5413-8e05-935cb1d797eb)
About the Author (#u066754a0-0a7a-5e62-a9df-8d7fb1e4defe)
Dedication (#u360cf199-274b-583b-9e09-030b471b9002)
Chapter 1 (#u17186fe7-8eda-5051-bf63-a865f494bf05)
Chapter 2 (#u5369981d-f4af-58af-bbd1-9290dfff16db)
Chapter 3 (#uc85113c9-2dbd-5627-ae2f-5888f41843c3)
Chapter 4 (#uca3dce8f-2f7d-5310-8d19-0d77137eea58)
Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 13 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 14 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 15 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 16 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 17 (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 1 (#u2c9b3b18-08d8-54c5-8f46-d7460f2900d8)
“Bah, hamburger!” Ethan Malloy shouted. His skinny arms were wrapped around his chest, lips poked out and still red from the punch he’d had during the break.
Morgan Hill rubbed her temples and held back a sigh.
“It’s humbug, Ethan. Say it slower this time and remember the word is humbug.”
He wouldn’t remember. Or rather, he did know the correct pronunciation, but Ethan thought he was a five-year-old Kevin Hart, minus the cursing. So everything he said or did was in search of a chuckle or a laugh from those around him—his audience, so to speak. His personality worked Morgan’s last nerve. She’d chastised herself more than once about feeling this way about a little boy. She was trained to deal with children, as she’d gone to the University of Maryland and received her bachelor’s degree in elementary education. Unfortunately, there were no classes that would have prepared her for Ethan Malloy.
He was the only child of Rayford Malloy, the sixty-three-year-old president of the Temptation town council, and Ivonne Danner-Malloy, his twenty-five-year-old video-dance-queen wife. Between his father being too busy and too tired to discipline him and his mother being too young, too conceited and too everything else to be bothered, Ethan never had a chance. Those were the reasons Morgan used a good portion of her patience with the child. Morgan’s granny always said—whenever Ida Mae Bonet had the displeasure of being in the presence of her brother’s children—“we don’t get to choose who our parents are.”
That was certainly the truth, Morgan thought as she watched Ethan continue with his rendition of the scene where Ebenezer Scrooge continued to refuse heat or any other comfort for his only employee, Bob Cratchit, played by seven-year-old Wesley Walker. Wesley, unlike Ethan, knew his lines and probably the lines of everyone else in the play. He was a perfectionist and determined to prove himself to everyone in this small town, despite the fact that his father had run off and left his mother with four kids, a broken-down old Nissan and a mountain of debt. It was a shame, Morgan thought as she watched the young fella on stage, walking around and holding his head up high—even though Bob Cratchit wasn’t such a proud man. But a boy at such a tender age shouldn’t be faced with the gossip and cruelty that could be dished out in a small town.
They lived in Temptation, Virginia, population 14,364 as of the last census, two years ago. Temptation had a rich history and struggled to catch up with the modern world. With its ten-member town council—the majority of whom were descendants from families that had been around since the town’s inception in the 1800s—and the newly elected mayor, Cinda Pullum, going toe-to-toe in battles over everything from revitalizing Mountainview Park to the weekly trash pickup, Temptation could be as lively as any of the reality shows that littered today’s television channels.
The town could also be as traditional and heartwarming as an old black-and-white movie with things such as the annual Christmas Eve celebration, which included the play that Morgan and her crew of youngsters were now painstakingly rehearsing. There were two things Morgan loved about living in Temptation—the traditions and the resilience of the citizens. No matter what the people of this town had gone through—from the Civil War to the dark days of the Great Depression and the hostile times of the Civil Rights movement—they’d always bounced back and they never stopped doing the things that made the town so special in the first place. The families were the heart of Temptation, as they were determined to live in harmony in their little part of the world. More recent and localized catastrophes had hit Temptation and now, sadly, Morgan found herself living through her own test as a citizen of the town.
“You should put him out, Mama.”
The soft voice of Morgan’s five-year-old daughter, Lily, interrupted her thoughts.
“What?” Morgan asked.
Lily looked up from where she was sitting cross-legged on the floor with an unruly stack of twinkle lights in her lap. Her little hands had been moving over the strands in an attempt to separate the tangled mass for the last half hour. There hadn’t been much progress but Lily was much more patient than Morgan would ever claim to be. She was also the prettiest little girl Morgan had seen in all her twenty-eight years.
Her daughter shook her head, two long ponytails swaying with the motion.
“He’s a mess,” she told Morgan. “A hot mess, like Aunt Wendy says all the time.”
Morgan couldn’t help it, she smiled. Wendy, her older sister by barely a year, talked a mile a minute and Lily always seemed to be around soaking up each and every word that fell out of Wendy’s mouth, good or bad.
“He’s trying,” Morgan told her, knowing without any doubt who her daughter thought was a hot mess. “We have to give him a chance.”
Lily shook her head again. “No, we don’t. You’re in charge.”
She was, Morgan thought, even if she didn’t feel that way. She hadn’t wanted Ethan for the lead in the play in the first place. But Rayford had stopped by her house the Monday before Thanksgiving and told her in no uncertain terms that he expected his “boy” to have a prominent part in the play this year. Especially since this was most likely the last year the community center would be open to house the play and the Christmas celebration. Morgan and a good majority of the town had been worried about this hundred-year-old building and two others—the Plympton House, which had been converted into a hospital during the war, then restored, expanded and renamed All Saints Hospital in the sixties, and the Taylor House, a now almost dilapidated Victorian that had once been the home of the town’s biggest financial benefactor. She’d been so concerned with the possible loss of three of the town’s historic buildings that she hadn’t had the energy to fight with Rayford about something as trivial as his son’s part in a play. Now, however, she wished she’d mustered up some resistance because Lily was right, Ethan was a hot mess.
“I wanna load the presents,” another child’s voice called from behind Morgan and before she could move a hand, there was tugging on the hem of her shirt.
“Didn’t you say it was my turn to load the presents in the sleigh, Mama? You told me last night, ’cause I’m tall enough to do it.”
Morgan turned around ready to reply to her son with his dark brown eyes—slanted slightly in the corners as a result of his father’s half Korean, half African American heritage—and butter-toned complexion, courtesy of Morgan’s mother and grandmother, who were descendants of the Creole-born Bonets of Louisiana. His twin sister had the same features. Jack and Lily were different, not only by their gender, but they also had opposite personalities. Where Lily was quiet and somewhat serious, Jack was boisterous and playful. They were sometimes like night and day, but always the very best of Morgan and her late husband, James. Each day she looked into their precious little faces she was reminded of that fact and, at the same time, overwhelmed with love and grief.
James Stuart Hill had been a wonderful man. Kind, loving, compassionate and totally committed to his young wife and family. Morgan had met him in Baltimore, during her senior year of college. He’d been on leave from the army to finalize the sale of his late mother’s convenience store and her house. An American-born Korean, Mary Kim had raised her only child alone, after his African American father had been shot to death in an attempted robbery. Although Morgan had never met Mary, she felt she’d known the woman through the great man she’d raised.
Their courtship had been fast and passionate and by the time Morgan graduated from college, she’d learned that she was pregnant. James was leaving for a year-long tour in Hawaii two weeks later. So they married quickly in Granny’s backyard and then traveled to Honolulu, where she gave birth to her two precious jewels. A year later James received a temporary assignment in Virginia and Morgan came home to Temptation with her twins, where the four of them had lived a happy, normal life. Until James was shipped off to Afghanistan. He was killed a week before the twins’ second birthday. Three years later, the pain of that day still had the power to take Morgan’s breath away.
“Some people are only in your life for a season,” Granny had said as she’d stood leaning on her cane.
They’d been at the cemetery then, the one in Maryland right next to where James had buried his mother. Hours later they were back in Temptation and Morgan was tasked with raising her two young children alone. With the love and support from her grandmother and her sister, she’d managed to make it through those first tough weeks. She’d taken a job as a first-grade teacher at the elementary school, went to church on Sundays and played all day with her babies on Saturdays. Her life had managed to move on even though there were still some days when all she wanted to do was cry for all the possibilities that had been lost.
“Marley’s coming! Marley’s coming!” Alana, a six-year-old playing one of Bob Cratchit’s children, yelled from where she was sitting at the end of the stage.
“It’s not time yet,” Ethan complained. “I’m not finished saying ‘bah, hamburger.’”
“He needs to shut up,” Lily said with a sigh.
“You’re not adding the chains this time, Mama,” Jack stated loudly. As if the noisier he said it, the faster she would start doing it.
Usually, when it was time for Jacob Marley—played by Malcolm Washington, who was missing one of his front teeth—to make his ghostly appearance, Wendy, who was her part-time assistant whenever she wasn’t on duty at the hospital, would knock on the desk to make the footstep sounds and rattle the bike chains in her bag. But Ethan was right, it wasn’t time for Jacob’s appearance quite yet.
Still, Morgan could not deny the sound of footsteps coming fast and almost furiously down the hallway toward the hall where they were rehearsing.
“Hush, children,” she said as she stood.
Morgan was walking toward the door, or rather tiptoeing like she actually expected to see the ghost of Jacob Marley come through that doorway, just like she knew the now-quiet children were. The footsteps continued and so did Morgan. She was wearing her bright orange-and-fuchsia tennis shoes today, along with her black running suit, which Wendy said made her look more like a teenage track star than a grown woman. Morgan tended to ignore her older sister when it came to dressing because Wendy was a proud member of the single, sexy and seriously looking club. Whereas Morgan was a mother and a teacher and she was perfectly content with that.
“Oh!” she yelled.
“Sorry,” a voice said as he reached out to grab her shoulders and keep her upright.
She’d bumped into what felt like a concrete wall and was embarrassed to discover it was simply a man’s chest. Well, there was really nothing simple about this man or his chest, which she figured out the moment she stepped back and looked up at him.
He was tall with a honey-brown complexion, a strong jaw, a precisely cut goatee and seductive dark brown eyes. His shoulders were broad, the suit he wore expertly cut. His hair was wavy and black, his lips of medium thickness.
Morgan almost sighed. If this was the ghost of Jacob Marley, then she was seriously going to consider crossing over to the land of the walking dead, because standing before her was one fine-ass black man.
* * *
Gray removed his hands from her instantly. He had no choice. The warmth that had immediately spread up his arms and to his chest was so intense he thought of the heart attack that had killed his father two months ago. Sure, Gray visited his internist once a year for a physical, so he knew that he was in perfect health, but the feeling had shocked him.
She had shocked him.
“Are you all right?” he asked. She’d taken a step back from him, looking as if she’d seen a ghost.
A number of children had almost instantly flocked around her, as if offering their juvenile protection, should he be there for some nefarious reason. He wasn’t, or at least he didn’t think of it that way. Still, they were all glaring at him. Something else that made Gray uncomfortable.
“I’m fine,” she answered, clearing her throat. “Can I help you with something?”
Gray didn’t need anyone’s help. He hadn’t for a very long time, but that was not his response. At thirty years old, Gray had been running his own company for fifteen years, supervising billion-dollar deals and working with brilliant tech minds to create the most innovative products in the world. He could certainly travel back to the small, dilapidated town that had torn his family apart and take care of the sale of three measly buildings without anyone’s help. Hence the reason he had secured a limited power-of-attorney document from each of his siblings. There was no need for all of them to come back to the place they all hated. He was the oldest and, as usual, he’d decided to bear the brunt of an unpleasant task.
“My name is Grayson Taylor,” he told her. “I own this building.”
“Oh,” she’d said, taking another step back as if she was afraid he’d reach out and touch her again.
Gray frowned.
“I’m just stopping by to take a look around as I’ll be selling the building hopefully in the next couple of months.”
“Christmas is next month,” the little girl holding tightly to the woman’s hand told him matter-of-factly.
He nodded. “Yes. It is.”
She was a cute little girl, with an intense stare that shouldn’t have unnerved him, but just like touching the woman had, it did.
“Even though the sales probably won’t be official until after the first of the year, I need to do a walk-through before then. I’ll send my lawyers a report and they’ll get started with the listing. If you don’t mind, could you show me around?” he asked, returning his gaze to the woman.
His question was met with immediate silence and after a few seconds she shook her head. “I’m rehearsing with the children. We’re just getting started with regularly scheduled rehearsals and the play is in four weeks. They have school during the day. We only have the weekends and an hour and a half in the evenings to rehearse.”
Gray presumed she was telling him “no.” That wasn’t a word women usually used with him, but his ego wasn’t bruised. This was business after all.
“Fine. I’ll wait until the rehearsal is finished,” he said. “Can I sit over here?”
There were chairs scattered about the spacious room, some lined directly in front of the small stage, where he suspected they were rehearsing their little play.
“You can watch me be Scrooge,” a boy wearing a frizzy white wig and an oversize black tuxedo jacket with tails told him.
He’d stepped away from the woman and her entourage and motioned for Gray to follow him. Admiring the child’s initiative, Gray walked behind him, leaving the still-leery gaze of the woman behind.
She didn’t say another word, but moved across the room and gave instructions for the children to resume their places and continue. The little girl who had been holding her hand still stood right beside her, but the child peeked back at Gray more than once. She had questions, he thought. Who was he? Why was he here and what did that possibly mean for them? He’d stared into her pensive eyes and felt the urge to answer all her questions in a way that would make her stop looking at him with such sincere inquisitiveness. It was the strangest thought he’d ever had, especially since Gray wasn’t known to get caught up in anyone’s emotions about anything.
He was the strongest of the Taylor sextuplets, the first one to be born on that humid July evening thirty years ago. His brothers and sisters all shared his birthday, but none of them had ever shared the weight of being the first baby born of the first set of multiples in the town of Temptation. That had been his title for the first seven years of his life—“the first born of the first Temptation sextuplets.” The Taylors of Temptation was what they’d named the reality show that featured his parents as they brought home their six bundles of joy and lived in the huge blue-and-white Victorian with the river at its back. As Gray recalled, the show would have been more aptly named if it had been called Terror of the Taylors instead.
“Do you like Christmas?”
He was yanked from his thoughts by the soft voice of the little girl who had been sneaking glances at him. Her hair was dark and long, brushing past her shoulders with red bows at the end of each ponytail. She wore jeans and a red-and-white striped sweater. Her boots had black-and-white polka dots.
“I don’t know,” he replied. “Do you like Christmas?”
She nodded and said, “Yes. I do. So does my mother.”
As she said those words Gray nodded. “Is your mother up there directing the play?”
“Yes. Her name is Morgan Hill. She’s a teacher, too.”
“You’re not supposed to talk to strangers,” a little boy said as he came up beside the girl and pulled on her arm.
She jerked away. “He’s not a stranger. His name is Grayson Taylor and he owns this building.”
Gray didn’t like the stoic way in which she’d mimicked his previous words.
“We don’t know him, so he’s a stranger,” the boy, who looked a little like the girl, said. “I’m gonna tell Mama.”
Gray almost smiled, but he felt his forehead drawing into a frown instead. Twins?
“No need to tell,” he declared. “How about we all go up front and sit with your mother? That way she’ll know where you both are.”
It would also give Gray a chance to ask a few questions about the building. From the looks of the outside, he didn’t think he’d get much for the building itself, but the land might be worth something. Between the sale of this building, the hospital and the house, the total should be a good chunk to split between the six of them. Not that Gray needed the money. His vision and the talented people he’d hired to work at Gray Technologies had made him a rich man years ago. No, any money that came from the properties would be what the Taylor sextuplets thought of as their father’s payment for destroying their lives all those years ago.
“Mama, he wants to sit with you,” the little girl said when they’d come to a stop next to the chair where her mother sat.
Morgan looked up from her clipboard and then hastily stood. “Oh, I apologize,” she said. “I hope they weren’t bothering you.”
Now it was Gray’s turn to simply stare. She was very pretty, he thought, as if he hadn’t noticed that before. Her skin was smooth and unmarred by any cosmetics. Gray was used to seeing more glamorous women, from the ones he worked with to the ones trying to get into his bed. High heels, tight dresses, heavily made-up faces and beaming smiles—that’s what he was used to.
Morgan was looking at him like she couldn’t decide whether to curse him out or be cordial to him. The look, coupled with the stubborn lift of her chin and the set of her shoulders, tugged at something deep inside him. Glancing away was not an option.
“He doesn’t know if he likes Christmas, Mama,” the little girl said.
“She’s always telling,” the boy added with a shake of his head.
“Hush,” Morgan told them.
“Ms. Hill! Ms. Hill! Ethan forgot what to say,” another child’s voice exclaimed.
“I did not! I’m imposizing. That’s what actors do,” the boy in the white wig—who Gray now knew was named Ethan—argued.
“The word is improvising, Ethan, and I’d prefer if you just repeated what’s written in the script,” Morgan replied.
She’d moved quickly, heading to the stage where the two arguing children stood. She spoke in a voice that was much calmer than he suspected she was feeling. She guided the children to where she wanted them to stand on the stage and spoke the lines she wanted them to repeat, all while Ethan looked as if he had other, more exciting things to do.
“He thinks he knows everything,” the little girl told Gray.
She’d scooted onto one of the chairs by then.
“Be quiet, Lily. Mama’s gonna show Ethan who’s the boss,” the boy told her.
“I think he’s the boss,” Lily said to her brother and they both looked up to Gray.
He was just about to speak—to say what, Gray wasn’t totally sure—when the lights suddenly went out. Screams were immediate and should have been expected since Gray didn’t think there was anyone in this room over the age of six or seven, besides him and Morgan.
“Stay calm,” he heard Morgan say over the growing chaos of children’s voices. “It’s probably just a blown fuse again. I’ll take care of it.”
Gray slipped his phone from his jacket pocket and turned on the flashlight app, but when he attempted to take a step toward the stage, he found his moves hampered. Gray was six-two and he weighed two hundred and thirty-five pounds, which consisted of mostly muscle thanks to the ten to twelve hours a week he spent at the gym. Last year he’d run in the 5K marathon to fight diabetes and finished in under fifteen minutes, so there should have been no problem with him walking across this room to assist Morgan in whatever was going on. Except for the two sets of arms that had wrapped tightly around each of his thighs, holding him down like weights.
Chapter 2 (#u2c9b3b18-08d8-54c5-8f46-d7460f2900d8)
“Here’s the fuse box,” Morgan stated about two seconds before Gray’s hands brushed over hers.
“I’ll take care of it,” he said, moving her hand to the side.
“You don’t know anything about this building,” she snapped. Her hand was still warm from where he’d touched her and Morgan rubbed it against her thigh as if she thought that would erase her reaction to his touch.
He was holding his phone, with its glaring light, pointed toward the fuse box, but Morgan could see the shadow of his face as he turned to look at her.
“I own this building,” he replied.
Morgan huffed. “That doesn’t mean you know your way around it, or how much it means to the people of this town,” she quipped.
It was really hot in here. They were in the basement and Morgan tried to take a step back, but there was only a wall behind her. To her right was a door that led to the crawl space. To her left, the wall with the fuse box. Directly in front of her, the man with the flashlight and delicious-smelling cologne.
“But I do know how to turn on,” he began, still watching her and, if she wasn’t mistaken, moving a step closer.
Morgan tried to shift to the side, but she stumbled on some cords that were lying on the floor and ended up against his chest, again. The light from the phone wavered as his hands dropped to her shoulders, sliding down slowly as he kept her from falling. Embarrassed and irritated by the heat that had spread quickly from the hand that he’d touched moments ago to the rest of her body, Morgan tried to pull away from him. She slammed her back into the wall.
He shone the light in her face at that point, then looked at her as if he was going to...no, he wasn’t, Morgan thought quickly. He wouldn’t dare.
“It’s the last circuit breaker,” she said, hastily pointing over his shoulder. “That’s the one that usually blows. It’s been doing that for the past couple of months. Harry said he was going to look at it, but he hasn’t had a chance.”
Harry Reed owned the hardware store and worked part-time at his family’s B and B. He also did handiwork around the town in his spare time, for which Morgan knew a lot of people were very grateful.
Now Grayson looked confused, which was just fine because that’s exactly how Morgan was feeling.
“You just open the box and—”
He backed away from her and said, “I know how to flip the circuit breakers and turn on the lights.”
The phone’s flashlight moved and she could see him opening the box now.
“You’re right,” he told her as he began flipping the first breaker off and then on. “I don’t know about this building, but I do know about fuse boxes. Turn everything off and hopefully, when you turn it back on...” He let his voice trail off as that last fuse clicked off and then...
“All power is restored,” he said the moment the tight hallway they’d been standing in was once again illuminated.
Behind him, the kids who they couldn’t leave in the dark room alone cheered.
“Great,” Morgan replied. “Thank you.”
She let out a whoosh of breath as she hurriedly slipped past him. It was a weird move, she knew, as she flattened against one wall and shimmied around the spot where he still stood, but Morgan didn’t care. She simply needed to get out of that corner with him.
“That was fun,” Ethan said immediately as she approached. “Can we do it again?”
“I’m hungry, Ms. Hill,” Daisy Lynn added with a baleful look.
Morgan had a headache.
She looked at her watch and let out a sigh. “It’s almost time for your parents to pick you up anyway. So let’s get back upstairs and clean up our props. We’ll rehearse again tomorrow after Sunday services,” she told them.
She led the group up the basement steps and through the double doors. When they’d come down moments ago Morgan had instructed them to hold hands and onto the railing. This time, since the lights were on and probably because Morgan’s thoughts were somewhere else, she hadn’t instructed them to do the same. The lights were brighter in the upstairs hallways and the children ran to the main hall, where they’d been rehearsing. She was walking and thinking about him, but somehow completely forgetting that she’d left Grayson Taylor down in the basement.
“Considering running away before giving me the tour of the place?” he said from behind her.
“What?” Morgan said as she spun around to face him. Her feet almost twisted as she did, but luckily she was able to right herself. Why had she become so clumsy around this man? “I’m not running anywhere. I have to tend to the children first,” she told him.
He nodded, but didn’t seem to believe her. That irritated Morgan and her headache throbbed more insistently.
“Look,” she said with a sigh, “I may not be the right person to give you this tour. I’m pretty attached to this building. And to the hospital, since I was born there. That means I’m going to be pretty irritated when you knock down the buildings or sell them off to some developer who’ll knock them down to build a strip mall or some other big-city franchise that we don’t need around here.”
Damn. She hadn’t meant to say all that, at least not to his face. He slipped his hands into the front pockets of his pants and watched as she wondered what to say next. Nothing about her personal feelings, she decided. Temptation was her home. These buildings, the landmarks and the people all meant something to her. She understood that it would be difficult for outsiders to understand that connection, but Grayson Taylor wasn’t an outsider. At least, he shouldn’t have been.
“Millie Randall works with the chamber of commerce. Her office is in city hall. She’ll be the better person to show you around. They open Monday at nine,” she said with finality and turned to walk away.
“It’s not my intention to knock anything down,” he told her. “I plan for a quick sale.”
“That’s your business, Mr. Taylor,” she replied without turning to face him.
“I’m not your enemy,” he said when he’d easily caught up with her.
“And you’re not a friend,” she replied. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go.”
She did have to go. The children were waiting for her. Their parents would arrive soon and she needed to clean up the hall and then get Lily and Jack home to feed them dinner. She did not have time to hang around at the community center with the man who could single-handedly take the building away from them. She definitely did not have to like how he looked and smelled, and damn, how it felt whenever he touched her. No, she didn’t and wouldn’t like any of that. Morgan promised herself she would not.
* * *
Gray ran fast and hard across the field of crisp frost-tipped grass. The air was cool and the sky a dull gray. The scents of nearby animals and the sounds of early-morning farm life wafted all around. This wasn’t the NordicTrack he used in his home gym, or the three-mile track that looped around the top level of the condo building where he lived. Gray ran on either of those on a daily basis. When he was out of town on business, the five-star hotels where he stayed always had state-of-the-art gyms with top-of-the-line equipment, including pools where he could indulge in slow leisurely laps to relax his muscles after a hard workout.
The brochure on the table in the room had called it the Owner’s Suite, but to him, it looked like a top floor had been added to an old horse’s stable.
Gray had been out for more than an hour and he was sure he’d run well over five miles by now and seen more grassy hills and fog-covered mountaintops than he had in all his life. It would have been a breathtaking view for someone who didn’t prefer the city life of bright lights, fast cars and hot women.
The latter, Gray thought as he made his way back to the portion of the Haystack Farm & Resort he’d rented, was what had him up at the crack of dawn. A hot woman camouflaged in a baggy running suit and surrounded by a circus of kids. He’d thought about her all night long. To the point where what sounded to him like someone strangling a rooster woke him just before he’d embarrassed himself with only the second wet dream of his life.
His feet crunched over the graveled walkway that led to the stables and Gray slowed down to a brisk walk. Stretching his arms above his head as he continued to move, he inhaled deeply and exhaled quickly, hoping the immediate slaps of cool air would erase the memories. All of them.
It didn’t work. As he approached the steps Gray stopped. He did a series of three quick squats, then lowered his back leg and began stretching. She wasn’t tall, he thought as he switched legs, his hands resting on his thigh as he lunged. Five feet and two or three inches tall, tops. She wasn’t built, either. Her clothes had been loose but Gray had always been able to spot a great female body. Hers was tight, compact, curvy in all the right places and trim in the others. She had intelligent eyes and a stubborn chin. Her hair was short, styled but not overdone. Her face was cute, not gorgeous, but stick-in-the-mind pretty.
Gray sighed and stood up straight. He put his hands on his hips and let his head fall back as he looked up to the sky. No clouds, no sun, just a blanket of slate. Only one day in this small town and he missed Miami already.
He ran up the steps and let himself into the loft suite that carried the faint smell of the air fresheners that were plugged into every electrical socket in the space, and the earthier scents of hay and horseflesh. There were no five-star hotels in Temptation. Only two bed-and-breakfasts and this fully functional farm, which also billed itself as a resort. There were no televisions, either. No internet connection and no phones. The signal on his cell was weak, but the electrical outlets worked well enough so at least they kept his phone and tablet charged.
The shower worked, he thought with a frown. Thank the heavens for that. Stripping as he made his way back to the bathroom, Gray reminded himself why he was here.
To inspect the buildings and put them on the market.
That was all.
When he stepped beneath the spray of hot water, he whispered again, “That is all.”
But the moment he closed his eyes and tipped his head beneath the water, he saw her face. Big hazel eyes, a pert nose and small, very kissable lips. He’d wanted to kiss her as they’d been standing in that dark hallway. When he’d stepped closer to her it had been his intention to lean in and touch his lips to hers. It wasn’t going to be gentle, rather demanding, hungry and needy. Gray dropped his head at the thought. He didn’t need anyone. He never had.
If it was for sex, which his body was telling him with no uncertainty that it was, then he could call any number of women the moment he arrived back in Miami. He did not need to acknowledge his arousal around some small-town woman with a chip on her shoulder. Except that when she’d brushed up against him, his erection had come quick and hard, both times. Just that brush of her soft body against his had made him want her. Gray cursed. It had been a very long time since he’d wanted anything, or anyone.
He picked up the bar of soap and used the cloth he’d grabbed before entering the shower. Building a thick lather, he placed the soap back into the vintage silver tray and began to wash the sweat from his body. Only each stroke of that warm and sudsy cloth over his skin had him aching more with need. After the first few seconds Gray wanted to drop that cloth and wrap his hands around his burgeoning length. He wanted to stroke and stroke until there was a blessed release. His eyes opened quickly with that thought as he gritted his teeth and fought like hell to keep his hands on any other part of his body aside from his throbbing arousal.
When she’d looked up at him he’d wanted to whisper her name.
Morgan.
Morgan Hill.
She was just a woman.
Just a woman that he wanted to sink so deep inside of that everything about this dismal small town and what it had done to his family would be washed from his mind, once and for all. Gray had no idea if that would work, or if he even wanted to bother. Morgan had children, which meant there was most likely a father to those children in the picture somewhere. That was another entanglement Gray did not have the time or the inclination to manage.
With jerking movements he continued to wash and then rinsed beneath the steamy water. Once his shower was complete he dressed and sat at the little desk that faced the window. The view was breathtaking, if one liked such a thing. Gray did not. A country setting, simple living—neither was for him. He reached into his leather bag and pulled out the files he’d brought with him. Without internet access in this room, he would have uninterrupted time to go over his most recent sales projections and R&D reports. There was no doubt that once he logged into his email there would be numerous issues for him to address. Even on a Sunday morning.
His mother used to love Sundays, Gray thought as he stared down at the papers, then up to the window. She loved walking in the sand and watching the tide roll in just outside the house they’d lived in on Pensacola Beach. That was the only time Olivia Taylor had looked peaceful, Gray recalled. The only time after his father had left them.
“Hello?” Gray answered his cell phone, which had begun to ring loudly, snatching him out of his thoughts.
“Hi. How’s it going?”
It was his sister Gemma. She was the oldest of the girls and the one Gray had been closest to since the two of them had taken care of the others when their mother began to get sick.
“Slowly” was his tired reply. “Apparently, the chamber of commerce doesn’t open on Sundays. Nothing in this sleepy little town does.”
“Weekends as a means of relaxation should be a crime,” Gemma replied with her ready humor. “This is the only day of the week that I have all to myself so I don’t want to hear one negative thing about it.”
Gemma was a hair stylist. She owned one of the largest and most reputable salons in Washington, DC.
“I’m not complaining,” Gray told her. “But I won’t lie, if I could get this taken care of sooner, rather than later, I’d be much happier.”
“I don’t know that I’ve ever seen you happy, Gray,” his sister said softly.
Oh, no, Gray thought with a shake of his head. They were not about to have this conversation. Gemma was the only one of his siblings who believed in the fairy tale of love, even though she’d yet to find her knight in shining armor. The fact that their mother had nursed a broken heart until her dying day didn’t seem to matter to his sister. Gemma staunchly believed that love would always find a way. Gray usually allowed his sister her dream, but today he wasn’t in the mood to humor her.
“First thing tomorrow morning I plan to march into city hall and speak with the rep at the chamber of commerce. It’ll be good to get an idea of what the buildings are currently being used for.”
“Why? I thought we were just going to sell them,” Gemma replied. “You don’t need that type of information to put them on the market.”
Gray had thought of that last night as he’d left the community center. He hadn’t needed to personally come back to Temptation, nor did he need an escort to show him around the buildings, either. It would have been much simpler to call his attorney and let him deal with the Realtors and the sale, an action he could have easily taken from his desk in his Miami office. There was just one thing stopping Gray from handling this the way he would any other business deal.
His mother.
“She would have wanted to know,” he admitted quietly.
Gemma remained silent for a few seconds.
“She would have,” she eventually agreed. “She’d always wanted to know about the town and how it was doing after we’d left. One of her greatest heartbreaks was that the loss of the money from our show and how the scandal that had followed our departure would have a negative effect on the town. She would have been happy to know the buildings were being used for something good, and she might not want us to sell them if they are.”
Gray rubbed a hand over his forehead. “I’ve thought about all that, too. Garrek and Gen were on the fence about selling when I spoke to them,” he said.
“Gia’s trying to open another restaurant, so she says the money from the sale would come in handy,” Gemma added.
“And Gage,” Gray said before sighing as he thought about the youngest brother.
Gemma made a sound that mimicked his frustration with their brother. “He’s so busy putting in hours at the hospital that he barely had time to sign that paper you had me take to him,” she said and then sighed again. “It would have been a lot better if all of us could have gotten together and talked this through. Mama would not be happy knowing that it’s been years since we were all in the same place, at the same time.”
“We were born in the same place, at the same time,” Gray stated drily.
“Now you sound like Gen, hating the way we came into this world.”
Gray shook his head at that remark. “No, I don’t hate that we were born. I just don’t like all the attention that came afterward and the way this town that supposedly loved the Taylors of Temptation weren’t there for us when everything came crashing down.”
It didn’t matter, Gray told himself immediately. When his mother decided to leave Temptation, her grandfather offered his vacation home in Pensacola Beach for her and the children to live in. His father, in a rare moment of generosity, hadn’t contested the divorce or the spousal support and alimony payments. Eventually, years later, their family began to feel the benefit of Theodor’s successful business endeavors through higher monthly payments. It was apparently much easier to write a check to his wife and six children than it was to live in the same house with them. The bottom line was that they hadn’t needed anyone from this town back then and Gray definitely didn’t owe them anything now.
“Look, I plan to have this wrapped up in the next day or so. I’ll send a group email when the listings are up and then keep everyone posted on the sales.”
“Right,” Gemma said. “Business as usual. That’s fine, Gray. I’ll be sending out my gifts in the next couple of weeks, so be sure to check the mail at your condo.”
Gray resisted the urge to sigh again. Instead, he squeezed the bridge of his nose. “You send us all Christmas gifts every year like you’re our secret Santa. We’re not kids anymore, Gemma.”
“No,” she said adamantly. “We’re not. But Mama loved Christmas. She always had gifts for us under that tree no matter the circumstances. It’s the least I can do to keep her alive in my heart, Gray. I know all of you have your way of dealing with the hand we were dealt in life, but this is mine so don’t try to take it away from me.”
After a few seconds of silence Gray replied, “I wouldn’t think of it.”
Gemma was right—she needed to deal with her life, in her way, just as the rest of his siblings did. Just as he did.
Gray ended the call with his sister and he was able to get lots of work done as the hours passed. Now, at close to six in the evening, he realized he hadn’t eaten all day. Grabbing his jacket, Gray left the room and headed into town. He had driven to Virginia from Miami, deciding that he might enjoy the peace and quiet of the fifteen-hour drive. It was a drastic change from using his private jet to travel the globe and hiring drivers for the shorter distances when he traveled for business. This time it was personal, and Gray was certain he could handle maneuvering the streets of the small town.
That thought was short-lived. Almost an hour later, after going up and down street after street looking for a restaurant of his liking, Gray finally parked his car in front of Pearl’s Diner on the corner of Sunset Drive and Evergreen Way. The first thing he noticed when he stepped out of his Porsche Panamera Turbo—besides the fact that the i and the e in diner were out on the lighted sign hanging in front of the establishment—was all the Christmas decorations. Thanksgiving had only been two days ago, but the holiday season was clearly in full swing in Temptation. Black lampposts positioned about six to eight feet apart had wreaths around the lighted tops and huge red ribbons in the center. Strung above the wires holding the street lights were large snowflakes formed from stencils and cheerful white lights. Funny, when he’d driven into town yesterday he hadn’t seen any of this, or perhaps he hadn’t wanted to see it. Could Gemma’s earlier reference to how much his mother had loved Christmas be the cause of his revelation now?
Another reason he may not have noticed the decorations before—the more logical one that Gray preferred to consider—was that he’d avoided driving through the main streets of town when he arrived. Instead, he’d made a wrong turn the moment he entered the town from the highway, forcing his GPS to reconfigure the directions to the community center. That had worked just as Gray planned and he’d ended up traveling through narrow streets lined with houses before pulling up on Century Road, where the old planked structure of the community center sat on a corner. Gray hadn’t wanted anyone to see him driving his fancy car through the old town. He recalled from his mother’s stories how quickly news—good or bad—traveled in Temptation and how much the townsfolk enjoyed spreading such news.
Gray was still standing in front of the diner, looking at the holiday decorations, when he was approached by the first person in Temptation to lend credence to his mother’s words.
“Well, aren’t you a sight for these sore old eyes,” a woman said. “You and that spicy little car you’re driving.”
She’d walked right up to him and now had a hand resting on his arm. Her perfectly coiffed dark brown hair was streaked with what looked like bronze in the front. Wrapped around her shoulders was some sort of black cape and she wore a festive red scarf.
“Good evening,” Gray finally said, remembering once again how everyone in small towns thought they knew everybody else.
They’d all thought they knew how good a father and husband Theodor Taylor was, until the day he’d up and left his family in that big old house on Peach Tree Lane. So had Gray’s mother, Olivia, and his siblings. That had been the moment of truth for Gray, one he would never forget, no matter how many years had passed, or how far away he managed to get from this town.
“You look awfully familiar,” she said, squinting her eyes and moving in closer.
Her perfume was strong and her fingers clenched his arm a little tighter as if she thought the contact might jog her memory. For as much as Gray would like to have gone unnoticed a little while longer, he knew his presence would be made known eventually. Especially after he’d already introduced himself to the pretty woman at the community center last night.
“I’m Grayson Taylor and I’m just heading into the diner to have dinner,” he told her.
“My word, Grayson Taylor,” she said, a smile spreading instantly across her face. “The last time I saw you I don’t think you came past here.”
Here was the level near her thigh that she’d shown with a motion of her hand.
“How old were you then? Six or seven? That’s when Olivia packed up and shuffled you poor children out of your home in the dark of night.” She was shaking her head as she talked. “Shame the way she did that. You should have been allowed to grow up in your home, around the people that loved and cared about you all.”
What she really meant was the people that loved all the revenue that the reality show his family had starred in brought to the town. The birth of the sextuplets had come at a time when Temptation was struggling to use its historic background to bring tourists and, subsequently, money into the town. The show had been a savior for the town, but a death sentence to his parents’ marriage.
“I was seven years old back then, ma’am, and I really am hungry, so if you’ll please excuse me,” he said and attempted to walk away.
“Oh, don’t go in there. Pearl doesn’t work on Sundays. Her daughter, Gail, does, but she’s not as good a cook as her mama. You come on over to the hospital with me. They’re having their annual charity ball and that food will be catered. Hopefully, it’ll be better than Gail’s since I know they paid this fancy new chef a ton of money.”
She looped her arm around his and had started walking them across the street before Gray could accept or decline her offer.
“Ma’am, I’d rather not intrude,” he began after a couple of steps.
“You can drop the ma’am and call me Millie. Millie Randall, that’s what everybody around here calls me. And you’re not intruding. We heard your daddy died a couple months back, poor fella. And with a young lady in his bed. At least that’s what we heard.” Millie whispered those last sentences.
She shook her head and continued before Gray could interject.
“So I suspect you’re here about his properties. The hospital is one of them, so you might as well come on inside and see what you own.”
First, Gray wasn’t certain why the whispering was necessary, since they were the only two people outside at the moment. Second, her assumptions about his father’s death were wrong and totally inappropriate, but still, he tried to keep his irritation under control.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Randall,” he said because he’d already noted the gigantic diamond on her ring finger and he recalled Morgan mentioning her name last night. “I really don’t think this is a good idea. I have other business to take care of.”
“Always in a rush,” Millie said with a shake of her head. She took two steps away from Gray and then turned back. “You get that from your mother. Olivia was always trying to move faster than she should have. Running to those fancy doctors and using all that money to produce that ungodly pregnancy.”
“Wait a minute,” Gray said, finally fed up with this woman and her comments.
He didn’t give a damn who she was or where she worked. As he’d told Gemma earlier, he didn’t need anyone in this town to show him the buildings he owned. He was simply trying to honor his mother’s memory by coming back here and doing business as civilly as he could. That didn’t mean he had to deal with any of this petty, small-town BS in the process.
“I’m here to handle current business, not to rehash the past,” he told her curtly.
It was the best he could do, especially since instinct and habit were telling him to defend his mother and put this busybody in her place.
“Well, that’s fine,” she snapped and continued walking toward the building. “But we don’t rush around in Temptation. It’s not our way, so you’ll just have to get used to that.”
Gray frowned as he reluctantly walked behind her. He didn’t want to get used to anything in Temptation.
Chapter 3 (#u2c9b3b18-08d8-54c5-8f46-d7460f2900d8)
“You’re just not used to being close to men anymore,” Wendy said as she zipped the back of Morgan’s dress.
Morgan turned away from the full-length mirror and closed the closet door it hung on. “I don’t have a problem being around men, I just don’t like arrogant and snobbish men,” she replied.
After stewing about the issue all night she’d finally broken down and told Wendy about meeting Grayson Taylor last night. Lily and Jack were staying with her grandmother tonight, while she attended the annual holiday charity banquet at the hospital with Wendy. The event was to benefit the Widows and Orphans Fund, which had been started years ago by an anonymous mother who at one point had lost everything, but then came into a huge sum of money and wanted to give back. No one in town had ever seen this woman in person, but they’d accepted the money and agreed to continue the efforts, using each year’s proceeds to help support single mothers with young children.
Wendy had worked at the hospital for the past five years. So Morgan had been attending this event before becoming a widow herself. She’d always believed in its purpose, and now, being a single parent, she knew firsthand how important it was to have assistance. In her corner were Granny and Wendy. Her parents had been gone since Morgan was a sophomore in high school, when her father received a job offer in Australia.
“I hear he’s sexy as hell,” Wendy continued.
She was standing near Morgan’s dresser now, fluffing her loose curls. Her older sister was gorgeous, from her five-seven height to the generous curves she’d been blessed with and the bubbly personality that had landed her as captain of the cheerleading squad in high school. They shared the same creamy brown complexion and wide, expressive eyes, but that’s where the similarities ended. Where Morgan loved the fall and Christmas carols, Wendy wanted to swim in the lake every day of the summer and detested the cold.
“All of them,” she continued. “There are three boys and three girls. I don’t think any of them signed over the rights for the show to go into syndication or onto DVD, but Granny told me just the other day how good-looking they all had grown up to be.”
“And how would she know?” Morgan asked after she’d slipped her feet into the four-inch-heel platform red shoes that she’d treated herself to. “You know she hates the internet. That computer we bought her two years ago would have inches of dust on it if she wasn’t such a neat freak.”
Wendy shook her head. “And you know that’s the truth,” her sister agreed while laughing. “But you know her and Ms. Dessa love reading the tabloids down at the supermarket. She said there was a story about them a few months back when the father died.”
Morgan pulled at the hem of the dress that she’d already deemed too short. Wendy thought it was perfect—red, festive and flirty, she’d said. Morgan figured she was either going to freeze her buns off tonight trying to be cute, or fall flat on her face the moment she walked into the Olivia Taylor Hall at the hospital.
Olivia Taylor had been the equivalent of the Virgin Mary in Temptation. Thirty years ago, when she and her husband had been bold enough to travel to Maryland so that she could be artificially inseminated with multiple eggs, she’d shown every women in Temptation that it was okay to take their fate in their own hands. Morgan, and just about everyone who lived in Temptation, knew the story.
“They both need to find something else better to do during the day,” Morgan said, grabbing her shawl from the bed and heading for the door.
Wendy laughed as she followed her out. “They need a man! Two of them, or maybe one and they can share.”
Morgan shook her head. “You’re ridiculous,” she said.
The shawl would be for when she was inside the hospital. As for right now, her long wool coat was warranted as the temperature was expected to drop below freezing later that evening. While Morgan loved the season and the crisp cold winter air, she did not like shivering and shaking from the deep freeze that Temptation was known to receive this time of year.
“Not ridiculous, just practical,” Wendy said while slipping into her short leather jacket. “What woman wouldn’t want a nice handsome hunk of man to keep her warm on a night like this?”
Morgan stepped out into the evening air, recalling immediately how warm she’d felt each time Grayson had touched her. She continued walking to the car, feeling the cold breeze as it whipped through the air.
“I don’t have any problem keeping myself warm,” she told her sister as she climbed into the passenger side of Wendy’s SUV.
Still, she was shivering when she finally pulled the door closed, her traitorous body begging to differ.
* * *
“This wing of the hospital was named after your mother,” Millie told Gray.
Her voice had begun to grate on him, like nails sliding over a chalkboard. She’d been talking, mixing historical facts about the town with quick jabs of gossip and innuendo, like they were part of some insider tour. If they were, Gray didn’t want to partake—not a second longer.
“I think I’ve seen enough,” he told her. He was certain that the twenty minutes that she’d taken to walk him around the hospital had been nineteen minutes too long in her company.
Based on this tour alone, he knew exactly what he would do once he finally found a spot with internet access. Gray would tell his attorney to sell, sell, sell! This town was just as bland and behind the times as he’d recalled and he would be glad to leave first thing tomorrow morning. Actually, he thought as Millie touched her jeweled fingers to his arm for about the billionth time, he would be more than glad.
“So you see, it makes sense for you to be here tonight at the charity event,” she told him, blinking those unnaturally long lashes at him.
She’d been doing that as if she thought the action was somehow coercing him. It wasn’t. Instead, that action and Millie’s comments were beginning to irritate the hell out of him.
“I’m really not up for attending any type of event,” he began. “Besides, I’m not dressed for anything formal.”
“Oh, we rarely do formal here in Temptation. You should remember that,” she chided, slipping her hand right through his arm again and turning him toward glass double doors at the end of the hallway.
The tiled floor was old here, just as Gray had noticed throughout the rest of the facility. There were a number of areas that could be refreshed and updated, he’d thought as he walked through. Windows could have better coverings, computers at the main desk on all of the floors looked to be at least ten years old, which in any field these days was not good. A hospital especially should have the most up-to-date equipment possible.
“You see we kept your mother’s name right over the doors, just the way they were when we put them there years ago. She never did come back to see it, though. Her cousin, BJ, never understood that. She always thought Olivia was ungrateful, but you know how family can be,” Millie continued as she walked him closer to those doors.
“It was very nice of the town to dedicate this portion of the hospital to my mother. I’m sure she was very grateful,” Gray told her.
“Not enough to come back, though,” Millie continued with a shake of her head. “But tonight’s about new beginnings. We all start afresh with the New Year, so this charity dinner gives us a head start. You know, moneywise.”
Gray nodded because that was another point Millie had made sure to hit home. The town needed money.
“Really,” Gray said, coming almost to a stop before they could get closer to the doors. “I should get going. I have emails to send and calls to make.”
Millie shook her head. “Always got something better to do. Just like your father. It’s just a dinner, Grayson. And you said you were hungry, so come in, sit down and have a bite to eat. Then you can rush on and do what you have to do. But I’ll tell you, if you’re thinking of selling these buildings and running out on this town again, I beg you to think again. Whether you like it or not this is your heritage. It’s where you were born and where your children should have a chance to grow up and experience all the things you never did.”
“I don’t plan on having children,” Gray replied immediately.
He had no idea why he’d told her that, just felt the words slipping out without his permission.
Millie’s smile spread slowly. “You never know what this world’s got in store for you. Despite what your mother thought at first, she soon found out that everything doesn’t always go as planned.”
Gray was just about to tell her he was totally different from both his parents. He was going to assure her that she was wrong and that he would definitely not be getting married or having any children. Ever.
Then she approached. He’d heard the clicking of heels across the floor but hadn’t bothered to look away from Millie until the other woman was standing right there behind the older one. He’d glimpsed at the bright red of her dress first, then realized how little material there actually was as his gaze soon rested on her stocking-clad legs. Then moved slowly to the swell of her pert breasts over the bodice. Her hair was tapered on the sides and curly on top, her makeup light, but alluring.
There was another woman with her, Gray noticed when he figured staring was probably just as rude as it was embarrassing on his part.
“Hi, Millie. You trying to keep all the handsome men out here with you tonight?” the third woman asked, her smile wide and her eyes cheerful as she looked at Gray.
She was a couple inches taller than Morgan, who he had noticed was wearing some pretty sexy heels tonight. The other woman also had on heels. Her hair was longer, curls relaxing on her shoulders as long, icicle-like earrings dangled and glowed. Pretty wasn’t a bold enough word for this one and the tight black dress she wore, with a festive red choker that had small jingle bells dangling from it, was definitely something to stare at. Still, Gray’s gaze went right back to Morgan.
“Not at all,” Millie said, her smile faltering. “This is Grayson Taylor. You know, he’s one of the Taylors of Temptation.”
Gray didn’t like that title any more than he liked the way Millie had said it—as if he was the Dracula of Transylvania.
“Hello, Grayson Taylor,” the woman said as she extended her hand to him. “I’m Wendy Langston. I’m one of the Langstons of Temptation. We’ve been here forever, too, but most of us have done the smart thing and escaped as well.” She chuckled and so did Gray, liking her instantly.
“Please,” he said, taking her hand and shaking it. “Call me Gray.”
“Well, Gray, you should come on in and join the fun. You can sit with me and my sister, Morgan. I hear Magnolia Daniels was this year’s caterer. She just graduated from some fancy culinary college in New York, so she was anxious to come back home and show us all her skills,” Wendy told him.
“My sister attended a culinary school in New York as well,” he said. “She owns her own restaurant now and teaches at the college. I wonder if it’s the same school Magnolia attended.”
“There’s only one way for us to find out,” Wendy said as she easily stepped in front of Millie to snag Gray’s arm.
This time, Gray wasn’t as irritated. In fact, he thought, he could appreciate Wendy’s cheerful demeanor. He could also like the fact that Morgan had looked a bit chagrined at the way her sister so easily stepped up to him.
They walked through the double doors that Gray had sworn he hadn’t wanted to enter and he was pleasantly surprised, at least for a few moments. The lights were dim and there were tables all around the floor, covered in festive red cloths with what looked like little gingerbread houses in the center. Holiday music played softly in the background as fifty or so people walked around or hovered over the punch table.
“I’m going to get something to drink,” he heard Morgan say and then looked up in enough time to see her walking hastily away from the table where Wendy had led him.
“I believe you’ve met my younger sister already,” Wendy said as she took a seat in one of the folding chairs.
Gray sat in a chair beside her after he’d forced himself to look away from Morgan’s retreating body.
“Yes. We met last night at the community center,” he replied.
Wendy nodded. “You interrupted Jacob Marley’s grand entrance in Mountainview Elementary’s first-grade-class presentation of A Christmas Carol.”
“Is that what they were doing?” he asked, then recalled the little boy named Ethan saying something about “bah, hamburger” when he’d taken his place on the stage after Gray first arrived.
“Yes. It’s one of Morgan’s favorites, so she begged the town council to let her class present the play, as opposed to the older members of the theater club, who had wanted to perform The Sound of Music. I think we’re better off with the kids and that has nothing to do with my sister being the director,” Wendy continued, chuckling again.
“I hope it turns out well,” Gray responsed.
He’d been wondering how long it was going to take Morgan to return. Not that he didn’t like talking to her sister. Well, actually, Gray wasn’t really in the mood to talk any more tonight. He did, however, want to be near Morgan Hill once again. That thought hadn’t occurred to him earlier when he’d been busily immersed in his work. Yet, the moment he saw her, he was unable—or unwilling...he couldn’t figure out which one just yet—to think about anything else.
“It’s going to be fun. You should think about sticking around town to see the finished product.”
This sister liked to talk. Gray was certain he hadn’t gotten this many words out of Morgan the night before and they’d been together longer. He looked at Wendy now, and asked, “When is the production taking place?”
“Christmas Eve,” she told him. “You weren’t planning on selling the community center before then, were you?”
Gray didn’t immediately respond. Christmas was weeks away. There was no way he planned on staying in town for that long, and while he was immediately going to put the buildings on the market, he wasn’t optimistic that they would sell so quickly. Who would want to buy run-down buildings in this small town? There was no market value to the purchases, only sentimental value, which he’d figured out from his talk with Millie, and Morgan’s immediate reaction to finding out who he was.
“I don’t think they’ll be sold before Christmas,” he answered. “Maybe I’ll go help Morgan with the drinks.”
Wendy had seemed to look at him knowingly as she replied, “Sure. You go right ahead and do that.”
Regardless of what she said or thought about Gray as he walked away, he kept moving. Too many people wanted to chitchat with him in this town and he didn’t want any of that. What he wanted... Gray wasn’t quite certain. Sure, he’d thought he knew, just last night when he’d driven into town, and earlier, when he talked to Gemma, but at this moment...
Morgan turned away from the punch table just as he walked up behind her. Quick footwork had him moving just before she could turn with her outstretched hands, which held two glasses filled with red punch. The red punch that Gray had no doubt would have splashed all over his white shirt had they collided in the way they’d seemed destined to do.
“Let me help you with that,” Gray offered and reached for one of the glasses.
She opened her mouth as if she was about to speak, then clapped her lips closed and allowed him to take the glass from her hand.
“Why don’t we enjoy this over there near the tree,” he said.
“That one is for my sister,” she said, nodding toward the glass in his hand.
He shook his head and did not hesitate to lie. “She said she’d get something later.”
“Why do you want to go over there? We can go back to our table,” she said before lifting her glass to her lips and taking a sip.
“I want to be alone with you,” he said, again without any hesitation.
Or any thought to what he was doing. All Gray could admit to with any sort of definitiveness was that he wanted to be with Morgan. His salacious thoughts from last night were at the forefront of his mind as he stood close to her, the light scent of her perfume wafting through the air.
“And I like Christmas trees,” he continued when she only glared at him, one brow lifted in silent question.
“Lily said you didn’t like Christmas,” she replied after another few moments of silence.
“Your daughter,” he said when he remembered the solemn-faced little girl from last night. “She and your son are twins, correct?”
Morgan nodded. “They’re the loves of my life,” she replied, then looked up quickly as if she hadn’t meant to say that.
Gray decided to let it slide because there was another pressing question he wanted an answer to. “And their father? Is he also the love of your life?”
For the first time ever Gray held his breath as he waited for the answer.
Her fingers seemed to tighten around the glass she held before she replied, “My husband died in Afghanistan.”
It was a simple statement and yet it held as much power as if she’d reached out and socked him herself.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” he said.
Gray moved beside her then, taking her elbow lightly, and began to walk toward the tree. “Do you like Christmas?”
“What?” she asked as they moved.
“Do you like Christmas? That’s what Lily asked me last night. Now I want to know your answer.”
“Yes, I love Christmas,” she said before taking another sip of her punch.
Gray hadn’t bothered to sip his.
“It’s a wonderful time of year. A time for family and fellowship, miracles and happiness.”
“You sound like one of those greeting-card commercials,” he replied.
“And you sound like the star of my play, Ebenezer Scrooge,” she snapped back.
They’d come to a stop near the huge Christmas tree that was nestled in a far corner of the room. It had to be at least ten feet tall and was decorated with what looked like every sort of bulb, bell, ribbon and light ever created for this season.
“I don’t have anything in particular against the holiday,” Gray confided. He’d walked farther around the tree toward the side that was facing two large windows.
The old window shades were tattered at the edges and if anyone attempted to pull them down farther, they’d surely crumple into pieces. So more than half the window was bare, leaving a view of the side street, where only two cars were parked and the sidewalk was clear. At this time of evening on a Sunday night, if Gray had looked out the window of his penthouse in Miami he was sure to see lines of traffic and people headed toward the clubs or the beach. There was always something going on in the city, some party or meeting, a huge wedding, or a celebrity sighting. Never a dull moment, and never a quiet street like this.
“Do you normally spend the holiday with the rest of your family?”
Gray lifted his head to see Morgan standing right beside him. She’d put her glass down on the windowsill and he did the same before thinking about an answer to her question. He hadn’t thought of his siblings in the traditional sense of the word family. The fact that they each lived in different states could be the reason for that. They’d been born together and had lived together for eighteen years. They were the closest thing to friends Gray had ever had, and the only ones who shared the same dark disappointments of the past with him.
“No. My sisters and brothers have their own lives,” he replied.
“There are six of you—surely you find time to spend with each other at some point. I only have one sister and it seems like we’re never apart,” she told him.
She looked across the room and Gray followed her gaze. More people had come in, filling up the tables. The sound of numerous voices had grown a bit louder. The instrumental holiday music still sounded over the guests’ voices and Gray found himself thankful for the partial privacy of this corner. He didn’t want to talk to any of the people out there, but here, on this side of the tree with all its twinkling lights reflecting off the window, he was content to stand with this woman.
“Yes, there are six of us. I’m the oldest. Born almost immediately after me were Garrek, Gemma, Genevieve, Gage and Gia. Once we turned eighteen we all went our separate ways.”
“And you don’t keep in touch? That’s not good. I mean, it’s kind of sad. I would think that you would be closer,” she said, then clamped her lips shut again.
Gray shook his head. “It’s not a problem. A lot of people think a lot of things about the Taylor sextuplets. They have since the first airing of that damn television show. None of them know the truth.”
“You sound as if the truth is sad,” she replied quietly.
Gray shrugged. “It is what it is.”
She nodded. “Just like you selling the buildings, I guess.”
Her back was to the window and Gray moved to stand in front of her. He rubbed the backs of his fingers lightly over her cheek.
“Those buildings mean something to you, don’t they?” he asked her.
She shrugged this time, shifting from one foot to the other as if his proximity was making her nervous. Being this close to her was making him hot and aroused. He wondered if that’s what she was really feeling as well.
“This town means something to me. There are good people here and we’re trying to do good things.”
“That’s what my mother used to say,” Gray continued, loving the feel of her smooth skin beneath his touch. “Temptation was a good place. Love, family, loyalty. They meant something to the town. Always. That’s what she used to tell us when we were young. But that was after the show, after my father found something better outside of this precious town of Temptation.”
Gray could hear the sting to his tone, felt the tensing of his muscles that came each time he thought about Theodor Taylor and all that he’d done to his family. Yes, Gray had buried his father two months ago. He’d followed the old man’s wishes right down to the ornate gold handles on the slate-gray casket, but Gray still hated him. He still despised any man who could walk away from his family without ever looking back.
“Show me something better,” he said as he stared down into Morgan’s light brown eyes. “Show me what this town is really about and maybe I’ll reconsider selling.”
“Are you making a bargain with me?” she asked. “Because if you are, I don’t know what to say. I’m not used to wheeling-and-dealing big businessmen like you.”
“I’m asking you to give me a reason why I shouldn’t sell those buildings. Just one will do. If you can convince me—”
She was already shaking her head. “I won’t sleep with you, if that’s what you mean by convince you.”
Gray blinked. That wasn’t what he’d meant and the vehement way in which she’d made that declaration had scraped his ego raw.
“I didn’t ask you to sleep with me,” he told her and took a step closer. “But if I did...” He purposely let his words trail off, the tip of his finger sliding closer to the edge of her lips.
“I’d still say no. I don’t sleep with uptight businessmen,” she told him, that stubborn chin of hers jutting forward.
If she could have, Gray was certain she would have backed all the way out of that window to get away from him. That wasn’t going to happen, especially not when he snaked an arm around her waist and pulled her closer to him, until she was flush against his chest the same way she had been last night when she’d bumped into him. He liked her right there, liked the heat that immediately spread throughout his body with her in this position.
“Don’t worry,” he whispered. “I won’t ask you. I don’t sleep with small-town women with chips on their shoulders.”
“I’m not—” she began but Gray quieted her words by touching his lips immediately to hers.
White-hot heat seared through him at the touch. His tongue swooped inside, taking her by surprise. A warm and delicious surprise that had him wrapping his other arm around her and holding her tight. Her hands came around to his back, clenching the material of his suit jacket as she opened her mouth wider to his assault. They were consuming each other, right here in the corner of this room at the hospital where Gray and his siblings had been born.
He wanted to turn her just a little, to press her back against the wall and take her right here, just like this. He could feel how hot she was and could imagine that same heat pouring over him as she came. She would wrap her legs around him, her short but strong legs would hold him tightly, keeping him securely embedded inside her. They would be short of breath, but love every second of their joining. It would be the best sex...no, it would be really good sex, for Gray, something he hadn’t indulged in often enough.
It would be... Something moved at his side. It made a noise and moved again. She stilled in his arms, then abruptly pulled back. Gray was cursing as he realized what was moving was his vibrating cell phone. With a frown Gray pulled it out of his pocket and looked down at the text on the lighted screen. He would have never considered that Morgan might look down as well.
“I’ll let you go tend to Kym,” she said icily, before stepping around him and making a hasty exit.
Chapter 4 (#u2c9b3b18-08d8-54c5-8f46-d7460f2900d8)
The Sunnydale Bed-and-Breakfast was a stately white colonial with black shutters nestled in the center of a cul-de-sac and surrounded by a number of beautifully mature trees. Gray admitted the next afternoon as he approached the dwelling that it looked as if it should be featured on a postcard boasting the simplicity of small-town living. The American flag flying high above the black double doors and brick walkway slammed home the patriotic angle, while chubby shrubs lined the perimeter with the precise planning of a Better Homes and Gardens portrait. Once inside, the historic charm continued with scuffed wood-planked floors, emerald-green-and-white textured wallpaper stretching throughout the front foyer and along the wall next to a winding glossed cherry-wood railing.
There was just enough of the new world interspersed with the old, as the front desk clerk had spoken to Gray after hanging up the telephone and was taking an inordinately long time to type a reservation into a computer.
“I’m here to see Kym Hutchins. I believe she has a room here,” Gray told the clerk, who was staring at him over gold wire-rimmed glasses.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” the older gentleman began. “Millie wasn’t lying after all.”
“Pardon me?” Gray asked even though he had a hunch what was about to take place.
The man shook his head before coming around the desk to stand right in front of Gray. He wore tan pants that were at least three sizes too big, held up by black suspenders, which again, didn’t really fit him well, but were drawn so tight they looked almost painful on his shoulders. His short-sleeved dress shirt was a lighter shade of tan, and a wrinkled handkerchief poked out of his breast pocket. His skin was a very weathered almond color, while his hair—what was left of it—was short, gray and curled close to his scalp.
“You’re one of the Taylors, all right. Tall and broad just like your daddy was,” the man said as he continued to look Gray up and down. “Got some fancy clothes on, too. I know because no stores in Temptation even carry dress pants with studs at the bottom, or shirts with those fancy gold cuffs you’re wearing. Nowhere to go in town where you gotta be that sharp, unless it’s in your own casket.”
Gray frowned. People in this town said whatever came to their mind, whenever they saw fit. It was a good thing Temptation was still somewhat thriving because its people wouldn’t make it in the big city.
“Sir, if you’ll be so kind as to let Ms. Hutchins know that I’m here,” Gray said, again employing all his patience to deal with the older members of this town.
“Oh, she’s already waiting in the parlor. Came down in her fancy dress and par-r-r-fume,” he said, mispronouncing and dragging the word out until it sounded totally ridiculous.
Ridiculous and just a little bit funny, as the man’s face had contorted in a way that Gray presumed was his rendition of being upper class.
“Then I’ll just go on in and see her,” Gray said and turned to the right to go through a walkway.
“The parlor’s this way,” the man told Gray.
He’d turned and walked, his posture a little bent over, toward double pocket doors to the left.
“Guess you two got someplace to go all dressed up like you are,” he continued. “I don’t reckon any man around here wears suits and ties on a daily basis. And the women, they don’t wear skirts with matching jackets unless they’re going to church. Me, I don’t go anywhere I need to put on shiny suit jacket and shave. Used to tell my Ethel that all the time. If I go to church I put on pants and a shirt. I brush my teeth and my hair and I’m done. She never understood, but she never left me, either.”
He was chuckling so hard, Gray thought he might actually tip over from the effort. He stood close just in case that did happen. Instead, the man began to wheeze just as they stepped into the parlor, which had a plush burgundy carpet.
“Ma’am, you got a beau come to see you,” he told Kym.
“Thank you, Otis,” Kym said when she stood from the spot where she’d been sitting.
“You’re quite welcome, ma’am,” Otis replied and turned to leave.
Gray glanced at the man once more, trying to figure out if he was really blushing or if there was some other health condition going on.
“She’s a looker,” Otis whispered, his bushy eyebrows dancing up and down as he grinned.
Gray couldn’t help but smile—the man might be old in years, but he hadn’t lost a step when it came to women.
Kym Hutchins was indeed a good-looking woman. She was tall at five foot nine and a half inches, with a slim figure, a light golden complexion and long black hair that was always perfectly styled. Her makeup was flawless, as usual, her legs long in the knee-length navy blue skirt with the matching jacket, which perfectly accented her sophisticated and professional demeanor. She was a very intelligent woman and she was his executive assistant. None of which explained why she was here in Temptation.
“Hello, Grayson,” Kym said when Otis had meandered away, leaving them alone in the cozy parlor.
There were heavy-looking drapes hanging almost from floor to ceiling in a strange mustard color and four round mahogany tables with matching chairs around them. In the center of each table was a bouquet of roses, in the exact shade that was on Kym’s lips as she gave him a brilliant smile.
“Hello,” he replied. “I’m not sure how you knew I was here. I didn’t put anything on my calendar.”
With a flick of her hand, the large curls that had been draped over her shoulders were pushed back as her chin tilted slightly.
“I came by your place to drop off the Miago contracts but you weren’t there. When I spoke to your doorman he indicated that you’d taken the Porsche and said you would return in a week. I know you’ve been handling your father’s estate so I took an educated guess,” she told him.
“And you showed up without me inviting you? Without letting me know your intentions?” Gray wasn’t certain how he should feel about that.
“Why don’t we have a seat, Grayson. Otis is going to bring us a beverage. I asked for wine spritzers but he politely informed me that this establishment does not sell or serve alcoholic beverages. Can you imagine?” she asked with a shake of her head.
Kym was already taking a seat, crossing her long, bare legs as she did. Gray figured it made sense to sit and talk to her, even though he was still trying to figure out why she’d come all this way in the first place.
“Did you know they don’t have any hotels in this town?” With that said, Kym let out a short sigh. “I don’t know what they do with the tourists, whenever they get them.”
“They have two B and Bs and a resort,” he told her, keeping it to himself that the resort was actually a farm.
“No four-star hotels, no wine. It’s a wonder they’re still functioning at all,” she replied.
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A.C. Arthur
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: All she wants for Christmas…Everything schoolteacher Morgan Hill loves is in her hometown of Temptation, Virginia—her twins, her students, and the charming community center where she’s staging their holiday play. But now the building’s new owner, Grayson Taylor, is putting sexy visions into Morgan′s head, making the young widow long for a future even Santa couldn’t deliver.As the oldest of sextuplets, Gray grew up in the media spotlight. His family’s fame once helped Temptation thrive, but drove his parents apart. Coming back is just a bittersweet necessity until he meets petite firecracker Morgan. Somehow she gets the handsome tech guru to forget about big business in favor of small-town delights…and steamy winter nights. It’s a life he never knew he wanted, but can he put his past aside to turn a festive fling into the sweetest forever?