A Lot Like Christmas

As she headed down the mall, a prickle of awareness made her look up to find Chase watching her from the second-floor landing to the office. She forced a smile and a wave, annoyed that her body automatically went all tight and warm and interested, despite the misery the man was causing her.

When she reached the top of the stairs, she smiled again, determined to stay cool and breezy, even though being near him made her tingle. “I wanted to apologize for any harshness I showed yesterday,” she said.

“I understand. You were shocked and hurt.”

“I was surprised,” she corrected, uncomfortable with her reactions being laid out so boldly. It made her sound weak and not very managerial. “Caught off guard. Especially since the decision was based on a misunderstanding about my plans.”

And the fact that Marshall thought her only capable of pouring coffee and making PowerPoint presentations.

“I can’t do my job without your help, Sylvie. So, how about a fresh start?”

“I’m sure we both want what’s best for the mall.”

“Of course.” Something flitted behind his eyes, a difference of opinion, a doubt that raised the hairs on the back of her neck.

He held out his hand. “It’s good to see you, Sylvie. It really is.” The confession seemed pulled from him against his will.

“It’s good to see you…too,” she said, taking his hand. His fingers were warm and strong, making her feel safe and desired and turning her knees to noodles….

Was she holding on too long? Not quite sure, she released her grip.

“I won’t leave you hanging like before,” he said.

“That was thoughtless of me to say, Chase. Starr was so sick. You had her on your mind and—”

“Let’s not,” he said.

“Okay, but I just… I would give anything if she hadn’t… I just miss her.” They’d lost so much when they lost Starr. Her gentle ways, her big-as-life smile, her kind words that hugged them close.

“Hey, hey, fresh start now,” Chase said, but she caught the flash of sadness before he blinked it away. “This could be fun, you know,” he said, giving her his charming grin. He had perfect teeth, white and straight except for a tiny crossover in front she’d always loved. A single flaw in all that perfection was really quite sexy.

Sylvie forced herself to focus. “Fun? I suppose so. If you enjoy twelve-hour days, troubleshooting that never ends and checklists on top of checklists, especially with the Black Friday promotion coming up.”

“Lead the way,” he said, motioning her ahead of him down the hall. She took him into Mary Beth’s office, then stopped cold. She’d forgotten the personal items she’d brought here when she’d assumed the job was hers—photographs, a gold pen set thank-you award from the Retailers Association, her leather planner and her Christmas cactus plant.

Hot with embarrassment, she gathered the plant and pen set. “Let me get these things out of your way.”

“Hang on.” Chase picked up the tri-fold photo frame and studied the pictures. “Graduation?” he said, looking at the one of her in cap and gown with her grandparents. They’d been killed in a car accident a few months later.

“Yep.” She reached for the frame, but Chase was now studying the middle picture—her and Desiree on Sylvie’s birthday four years ago, just after Desiree returned to Phoenix for good.

“Your mom, right?” He lifted his gaze to Sylvie’s face. “Same eyes and nose. Not the mouth so much. Your lips are…” He looked at them, licking his own, as if he wanted a taste of hers.

“Mine are…?” she prompted, getting that tingle again, her knees giving way just a little.

“Uh…different.” He blinked and it was over, like a light had been snapped off. “And this one’s the big party.”

“Starr took that shot.” Starr had set up Sylvie’s twenty-first birthday party at a restaurant, always doing what she could to fill in for Sylvie’s missing family.

“That was some night,” Chase said, shaking his head.

She cringed. Chase had caught her crying outside the ladies’ room after her mother called to say she’d missed her flight. “I don’t know why I was so upset. Desiree is Desiree. She came the next day with the handmade shawl she’d ordered for me, which was what made her miss her plane.” She shrugged.

“You wanted your mom there on your birthday. Of course you’d be upset.” Chase’s dark eyes held her, told her to let herself off the hook, something she rarely did.

“Anyway, that was a long time ago.”

“The dancing was fun,” he mused, dragging her back there. Let’s keep the party going, he’d said to ease her distress. At the club he took her to, she’d drunk more peach margaritas. They’d been dancing close, teasing each other, when their eyes met and locked and Chase had kissed her.

Desire had struck like the flare of a match, so bright it hurt. She’d felt unstoppable drive and aching need and triumph. Chase wanted her as a lover, not a kid sister. Hooray.

She’d wanted it, all of it, naked bodies sliding together, sex and more sex. Her first time for the whole glorious act of love, though she wouldn’t tell him that embarrassing detail.

Later, at her apartment, she’d been only halfway out of her dress when he somehow figured it out. Like there was a big red V on her forehead.

He’d stopped, then lifted her sleeves back onto her shoulders, zipped her up and patted her. Patted her.

She’d felt exactly like what she was, a nervous virgin.

The memory made her shudder.

“The drinking not so much.” She closed the frame with a sharp snap, then added it to the pile of belongings she hoped she’d soon be setting up in here for good.

Chase looked thoughtful, when she turned back, as if he was still thinking about that night. “Did you see the reports I sent you?” she asked, sticking to business.

“Did I…what? Oh, yes, I did.”

“You’re after net operating income?”

“Exactly.”

Unlike in residential real estate, where value was based on comparable sales, commercial property value was based on cash flow. Every dollar of increased revenue meant ten dollars in increased value due to the capitalization rate.

“There might be one final report on Mary Beth’s system,” she said. “She has all the material I sent you, as well.”

“That’s great, except I can’t make sense of her computer files. Any clues?”

“She had a quirky setup. I planned to organize it better. Back when I thought I had the job.”

“For now, save me some time and show me what you know.”

“Sure.” She dropped into the chair that should have been hers, moving the seat lower, since her legs were much shorter than Chase’s, which were long and muscular and…

He leaned over her, not quite touching, but making her aware of him. He smelled of a spicy cologne and laundry soap. Very nice.

“Here’s where she keeps the sales reports and the operations budgets I send her.” She clicked her way to the folders he needed, then found the file she wanted to add.

Abruptly, Chase crouched beside her, eye level, his hand on her chair arm, way too close, making her skin prickle. She explained when the monthly sales data came in from the stores and what Mary Beth did with the various spreadsheets. “Wait, here’s a directory. Let me print it for you.” She turned to the printer and caught Chase with his eyes half-closed, a faint smile on his lips.

“Chase?”

His eyes flew open. “Hmm? Oh. I was just… What do you wear that smells like a cherry pie? You’re making my stomach growl.”

“Probably my lotion. It’s from Heaven Scent. You want me to wear something less appetizing?”

“No, no.” He leaned in to inhale. “I’ll just have to get used to being hungry whenever I’m around you.”

The word hungry came out low and he suddenly wasn’t discussing pie anymore. Gone was the asexual, big-brother amusement in his gaze. She felt them both sink into the physical moment, their nearness, the longing they’d once shared back full force.

The air seemed to tremble between them, like heat off a summer sidewalk. Caramel sparks flashed in Chase’s coffee eyes.

The moment stretched out, brimming with inappropriate possibilities. All good sense fled in the face of this electric pulse. There was something about Chase.

Maybe the way he looked at her, really looked.

Whatever it was, she felt the same wild yearning. A first crush hits hard and locks on, but to feel the same eight years later? She’d had boyfriends. She’d had good sex.

Some people just ignited each other, right? This kind of thing didn’t happen every day, did it? It was startling and remarkable and she could see Chase was struggling, too.

He snapped to abruptly. “Anyway, you smell good, kid!” He rubbed the top of her head, then backed away and stood, wearing the goofiest look she’d ever seen.

Kid? He’d called her kid? And ruffling her hair was somehow worse than patting her back, the way he had so long ago. What a jerk.

She grabbed the printout, stapled the pages and headed over to where he’d gone—the old gray steel file cabinet. He pulled open the top drawer. “God, I typed these labels when I was in high school. I used to file for Mom after school.”

“Yeah. I remember seeing you. Starr used to let me play with the adding machine.”

“You hung around here a lot when you were little.” He turned to her, his arm on the top of the cabinet, fingers skimming the file tabs of the open drawer.

“Sure. I always loved the mall. We even have the same birthday. April 15, 1980. I was born at eight thirty-five and the mall opened at nine.”

“You know the exact date and time?”

“Desiree figured it out.”

“You call your mom Desiree?”

“She asked me to. After she’d been gone a while. Because of all her craft shows, she left me with my grandparents when I was seven. She used to bring me here while she hung out with Starr.”

“They were childhood friends, right?”

“Yeah. Desiree and I had our best times here, visiting all the stores, making little purchases, snacking at the food shops.”

“I remember you in the candy store one day. I was a freshman, so you must have been what…?”

“Eight. I remember.” Vividly, but she wouldn’t tell him that. Not after he’d called her kid.

“You were spending your allowance, I think.”

“Not allowance. Income. I earned that money emptying shoe boxes at Tracer’s Department Store.”

“Yeah? Anyway, I remember you had a fishtail sticking out of your mouth and your lips and teeth were bright blue.”

“Gummi sharks, right. You laughed at me.”

“Of course. You were this feminine little thing in a lacy dress brutalizing that poor fish.” Chase grinned. “You asked me to hand you down a lollipop that was as big as your head.”

“It was the best value. More candy per penny.”

“That’s pretty shrewd for an eight-year-old.”

“I had fifteen whole dollars and I wanted them to last.”

“So strict. Didn’t I try to buy it for you?”

“I couldn’t let you. Starr kept giving me things she claimed were discards and Grandma didn’t want me spoiled.”

“Knowing my mom, she meant you to have whatever she offered. She loved to give away stuff. That was part of owning the mall to her—sharing what she could.”

Sylvie’s throat tightened as she thought about Starr and those lovely days. “In a way, we grew up here, you and I.”

“This was always Mom’s place.” The words came out flat and he shoved the drawer closed with a sharp clang, like a jail door slammed between them. “Anyway, I hated filing. Mom would tell me even dream jobs have boring parts. I never bought that. I still don’t.”

“Yeah? Your work is exciting every day?”

“Always something new. That’s how I like it.”

“I can imagine,” she said, hoping he found mall work as dull as dirt. “And your project here—Home at Last—that’s exciting, too?”

“Very much so. The architect, builder and lenders are donating their services or cutting their rates to make this work. If all goes well Nadia’s son will be one of our first clients.”

“Nadia? Your housekeeper?”

“Yep. Her son Sergei and his wife and two little girls have been living with Nadia since they lost their home in the crash.”

“Wow. So it’s great that you can help them.”

“If it works out, yeah.” There was a light in his eye while he talked about this. He clearly would rather be there than here. That was a good sign for Sylvie, too. “So how about breakfast? Can I treat you to one of Sunni’s cranberry scones?”

“We should go over the Black Friday promotion, which I had to skip yesterday.” But Chase had a boyish, eager look that Sylvie couldn’t ignore. “I guess we could start with rounds.”

“Rounds? What, like in a hospital?”

“Exactly. The manager is kind of like a doctor. You keep your finger on the pulse of all the stores, triage the problems, offer cures. You’ll want to visit every tenant at least twice a week, maybe more, depending on what else is going on.”

“Twice a week for a checkup? That’s a lot.”

“Early diagnosis is crucial. If we keep the tenants happy and successful, they stay on. As the manager, you’re their friend, priest, therapist. Sometimes even parent. The owners will want to confide in you.”

“And complain?” he asked.

“That’s mostly my department. The AC’s not cool enough, the roll-up gate is sticking. All the building issues are mine. Utilities, maintenance, security. Capital requests, too, since I do all the budgets.”

“My job is handholding?”

“Sure, but you do need to be educated.” She picked up Mall Management, A-Z from Mary Beth’s bookshelf and held it out to him. “Bedside reading.”

“Maybe later.”

She set it on the desk. “I’m serious, Chase. You should know sales strategies, how to analyze market niches, assess advertising profiles, everything, really. The stores always need ideas for increasing their conversion rate.”

“The conversion rate?”

“Converting shopper to buyer. Mall lingo. No store makes money if all it gets is lookie-loos, so we have to turn shoppers into buyers to survive.”

“Makes sense.”

“There’s a lot to this, Chase. I want you to know what you’re in for.”

“Oh, I’m afraid I do.” Something about the way he said that gave her a pinch of concern.

“So, breakfast and rounds?” She grabbed the two boxes of red umbrellas with their cheery promise and felt a pang.

“What are those for?”

“A morale boost.” Sylvie opened an umbrella. “With Mary Beth leaving so abruptly, I wanted to reassure everyone. There’s one for each tenant. You can hand them out when I introduce you. I doubt everyone’s read my email about you being the new GM, so expect some startled looks.”

And each one would break her heart all over again. She’d expected today’s rounds to be a triumphant tour, a chance to reassure everyone that life at the mall would only get better with her in charge.

Don’t worry, be happy, she reminded herself, leading the way to the mall floor.

Their first stop was Jumpin’ Juice. “Hey, Theo,” she called to the owner.

He turned from one of his blenders, “Just who I needed to see,” he said, lifting the counter pass-through and joining them.

“I’d like you to meet Chase McCann, our new GM.”

“Yes, you mentioned that in your email,” he said coolly. Theo had wanted to circulate a petition of protest, but Sylvie had talked him out of it.

“Nice to meet you, Theo,” Chase said.

Theo looked him dead-on. “Just so you know, Sylvie is the glue that holds this mall together.”

“That’s what I hear,” Chase said.

“Do you have a minute to try some new combos?” Theo asked her. “You were right about the star fruit, by the way. Pear is cheaper and tastes just as good.”

“That will cut your costs. Would you bring Chase a Berry Blend protein shake? It’s my favorite,” she said to Chase. She led him to a tiny table, where they sat altogether too close, though she’d sat here many times with Theo and not thought twice about the intimacy.

She felt all too aware of Chase’s broad shoulders, muscular chest, the strong planes of his face and those dark eyes of his, which locked on to hers as if he never wanted to let go.

Was he this way with every woman? He confused her. One minute he looked like he wanted to eat her alive and the next he was giving her a noogie.

“When you laid out my duties you didn’t mention taste testing.” Chase tilted his head, teasing her.

“I do whatever they need me to do,” she said.

Theo returned with three juice mix samples, along with Chase’s shake, which he grudgingly slid across the table. Sylvie sipped each flavor, one at a time, savoring it against the roof of her mouth.

She pushed two of the cups toward Theo. “These two are great.” She tapped the third. “This one, the flavors clash too much.”

“You have the best taste buds,” Theo said with a sigh, along with that wistful look they both pretended didn’t exist. “Thanks, Sylvie.”

“This is for you,” Chase said, holding out an umbrella.

Theo took it, carrying it at arm’s length as if it smelled bad as he headed back to his booth.

“You have the best taste buds?” Chase whispered to her.

“He likes to get opinions, okay?”

“He’s hot for you, Sylvie.”

“We’re friends.”

“Not if he had his way, trust me.”

Theo was sweet, a good listener and an interesting man. If they didn’t work together, she might even consider going out with him. He’d be easy to spend time with. She kept her dating habits orderly. No more than two nights a week and nothing intense. She wasn’t ready for intense. She wasn’t sure she ever would be.

That awful crush she’d had on Chase was her first lesson in how crazy she might get. Her mother was the second. Desiree was impulsive and romantic, treating her heart like a throw pillow, tossing it to a guy way too early. Then, when he failed to catch it or threw it back, she sank into depression. Sylvie did not have the resilience for that much misery.

She needed a stable life with no roller coasters.

“You’ve probably got every unattached man here and half the married ones drooling over you,” Chase mused. “That’s ridiculous.”

He tilted his head. “You still don’t know how hot you are, do you? It’s probably better that way. You might be tempted to use your powers against us and we’d be putty in your hands.”

“That line work for you with the women?”

“Gotta call it real, dawg.” His rapper imitation made her smile. “That’s how I roll.”

“Even if that were true, I don’t date people from work.”

“Plus there’s your boyfriend in Seattle.”

“Not that again.”

“Sensitive subject?” He leaned in.

“I didn’t appreciate Mary Beth mentioning him to Fletcher. I went to Seattle for a visit. Not to move there. Finish your drink so we can get going.”

“Not sure I dare, with the evil eye Theo gave me.” He sniffed the shake. “Doesn’t arsenic smell like almonds?”

She had to laugh. “He knew I wanted to be GM, so he’s upset for me. He wouldn’t poison you—not without my say-so anyway.”

Chase laughed, then removed the straw and took a gulp. Sylvie watched, mesmerized by the swell of his neck muscles as he swallowed. He slammed the empty cup to the table. “There. If I’m going to die, at least I’ll go out with something tasty on my tongue.”

Tongue. The word alone gave her an inner twinge. Ridiculous. Sylvie grabbed her box and they set off.

“How was Mary Beth as a manager?” Chase asked as they walked.

“She worked hard. She cared. She was a bit disorganized, as you saw from her computer, and maybe too social. I filled in where I was needed. We made a decent team, I think.”

“You’d be good on any team, Sylvie.”

“I try.”

He stopped in front of her and touched her arm. “I’m serious. Despite what my father said about loyalty, no one would blame you if you wanted to move on. We’d give you a strong recommendation, of course.”

“What are you trying to say?” A chill shot through her. “Are you telling me to quit?”

“I’m just saying you have options beyond Starlight Desert.”

“I love it here and I intend to stay.”

“Got it,” he said, hands up at her vehemence.

She introduced him to more shop owners and he handed out umbrellas. When they reached the space Marshall had rented to his golf buddy, the jai alai booster, Chase stopped. “Jai alai?” He turned to her.

She shrugged. “This spot’s tough to rent and the president of the booster club is a friend of Marshall’s. They want to bring a professional team to Phoenix, I gather.”

“Sounds bizarre to me. Jai alai’s a big betting game in Florida, right? Those big high stadiums—frontons, I think they’re called.”

“I guess. This is just an office. They hold meetings and making fund-raising calls…. This is Free Arts,” she said, nodding at the space next door. Two heavily tattooed boys in muscle shirts were airbrushing a Virgen de Guadalupe onto the window. She recognized one of them. “Nice work, Rafael.”

He turned, puzzled. “You know me?”

“I saw your b-boy crew perform for Cinco de Mayo. You organized the group, right?”

“Yeah.” He nodded, pleased, but acting cool about it.

“Tell your guys there’s a gig here the day after Thanksgiving. We can’t pay, but there will be tons of people in the mall that day.”

“’Scool.” Rafael strutted a little, then turned back to his work. His friend hissed out, “dawg” to embarrass him for talking to the gringa mujer.

“What’s rent on that space?” Chase asked as they walked on.

“It’s a token amount since that’s a difficult section to keep tenants in. It’s part of our effort to support the community. Starlight Desert is a good neighbor.”

“I noticed a lot of For Sale signs driving here. Lots of boarded-up shops. Is the neighborhood going down?”

“There have been a few problems, but nothing that has affected us. People love Starlight Desert.”

“You love Starlight Desert, Sylvie. Everyone else just shops here. A mall is where you spend money or get a smoothie to escape the summer heat. People aren’t that loyal.”

She felt a stab of outrage. “You haven’t been here long enough to know. Read our surveys and the consultant’s report, talk to our tenants. You’ll see I’m right.”

The man who had stolen her job was trash-talking the place she loved. She would just have to give him the full picture right this minute.

CHAPTER FOUR

CHASE’S HEAD SPUN. The moment he mentioned that the mall was a business not a place of worship, Sylvie went crazy on him. The simple tour of the mall shops to introduce him to the tenants became a lecture on the Wide World of Retail Malls.

He listened as patiently as he could while she explained door-busters, per-foot kiosk rental charges and how Starlight Desert interspersed food venues among the shops to increase the shopper-to-buyer conversion rate due to “improved shopper eye scans,” which evidently was much better than the food-court ghetto at most malls.

In between speeches, he handed out those stupid umbrellas to the store owners, who clearly adored her. Face after face registered disappointment that Sylvie wasn’t the new GM.

Rose of Rose’s Hobby Hut thanked her for locating a cheaper supplier for dollhouse furniture. He gathered Sylvie built dollhouses in her limited spare time. She’d evidently loaned money to the camera store owner and mediated a fight that would have ended the Toy Town owners’ partnership.

Business peaked on Saturday, she informed him. Monday was decently busy due to the weekend’s lookie-loos. Tuesday was the quietest shopping day of the week.

She described the daily changeover: seniors walked the mall in the early mornings, moms with strollers arrived midmorning, followed by serious ladies-who-lunch shoppers. Kids washed through after school, working women breezed in to pick up cosmetics or panty hose after five.

As she talked, he amused himself by taking in her flashing eyes, her kissable lips wrapped around a torrent of words, her energetic gestures, the way she filled out that white blouse, and, of course, her fresh-baked pie scent.