What She Wants for Christmas

“Mark never seems to lift a finger, but he gets perfect grades. He’ll be starting in the gifted program, which I’m excited about. I know he gets bored sometimes.”

Joe only nodded. His face was annoyingly expressionless. She couldn’t decide whether she was boring him or whether he was only waiting for her to go on. Well, if he was bored—tough. She came as a package with her kids.

“Nicole’s a good student, too, but what she loves—besides boys, of course—is to dance. Ballet and jazz both.”

“There’s a dance school in White Horse, you know.”

“Is there?” She set down her fork. They were eating at a waterfront restaurant on Marine View Drive in Everett. Boats at a marina just below the big windows bobbed gently on quiet shimmering swells. “I hadn’t checked into it yet. I ought to get her started.”

“Two of my nieces dance.” Joe grinned ruefully. “I get to see the recital every year. Thank God they’ve progressed from the junior recital to the senior one. The first year, I thought the three-year-olds in their pink tutus were cute. By the second year, I was wondering why the hell their parents were paying for dance lessons when they were obviously too young even to learn how to stay in line, never mind how to pirouette.”

“I remember those days.” Oh, boy, did she. “Ragged rows of little girls—and an occasional boy whose friends hadn’t yet persuaded him it was unmanly to dance. Usually there’d be a couple who had some vague idea what to do, and one or two sucking their thumbs, frozen in terror. The rest would just kind of wander around.”

“One of my nieces was a thumb sucker. We have it captured for all time on videotape.”

“You sound like a fond uncle.”

His big shoulders moved uneasily, as though he didn’t know how to take compliments. “Yeah, I guess so. Tell you the truth, I’ve tried to stand in for Rebecca’s first husband and Jess’s ex. Neither of them was any great shakes as a parent. Alan especially—Rebecca’s boy—needed a man around sometimes. Before Rebecca remarried of course. I, uh, didn’t mind.”

Okay, so he hadn’t been bored; he liked kids. Definitely husband material. Except that he couldn’t be as good as he looked. Otherwise, why wasn’t he married? Teresa didn’t believe in that “waiting for the right woman” stuff. Just like animals, humans reached an age when they were ready to mate. Occasionally that urge got sidetracked—it often happened to vet students, because they were too busy and too tired for the dating rounds. But Joe must be in his mid-thirties at least. So what had he been doing, instead of marrying?

“How old are you?” she asked.

He looked startled, but answered willingly enough. “Thirty-six. You?”

“Thirty-five. And yes, before you count back, I had Nicole before I started veterinary school. I must have been nuts. Fortunately, while Tom may have had his flaws, he was a great father. We did wait to have Mark until I was done with my schooling, though.”

“Does Mark even remember his father?”

“Yes, but his memories are fading,” she said with sharp regret. “He was in his second day of kindergarten when I had to meet him at the bus with the news that his dad was dead. It’s natural that he’ll forget him. I mean, all you have to do is think back. If you’re like me, you can hardly remember your kindergarten days.”

“I remember them.” Before she could begin to speculate about what his flat tone meant, he added, “That must mean you just passed the anniversary of your husband’s death. Does it still hit you hard?”

“It has before, but not so much this year.” She made a face. “I was so damned mad at a farmer who decided he didn’t really need a vet when he saw me get out of the car, it carried me through the day.”

His mouth had an odd twist. “Anger is a useful emotion.”

“Mmm.” All she had to do was remember the days after Tom’s death. “Very.”

Joe glanced at his watch. “Still in the mood for a movie?”

“You bet. I even looked at the listings in the paper. I don’t suppose you like sword and sorcery?”

He lifted an eyebrow. “Swordplay usually leads to some blood and gore. Don’t I remember that being forbidden?”

“It’s different from a contemporary shoot ’em up,” she tried to explain. “Less realistic. In a fantasy, the blood doesn’t count.”

He loomed above her as he helped her out of her chair. More of that sense of being fragile and feminine that she usually hated. “I think you’re splitting hairs,” he said in amusement.

“Swirling capes and galloping horses are romantic.”

“The truth comes out! All women want is romance.”

She had to ask. “Is there something wrong with romance?”

Their eyes met, held. Her skin tingled. “No,” he said quietly. “There’s nothing wrong with romance.”

The other patrons and the hovering waitress blurred; for a heartbeat, only the two of them existed. Then she blinked, or he did, and the moment passed. He was laying some bills on the table, thanking the waitress, holding out Teresa’s sweater for her. Slipping her arms into it, Teresa gave her head a small shake. Had she imagined the intensity of that look?

Then Joe’s eyes met hers again, and she thought, No. I didn’t imagine it. Why else was he so wary now?

Her dates in recent years had taken her to French restaurants and the symphony and the opera. When half an hour later she settled into the plush seat at the movie theater, her upper arm just brushing Joe’s, Teresa decided this was more romantic, no matter what movie was projected onto the big screen.

The lights were already dimming; she was very conscious of the man so close beside her. She felt his every breath, knew when he glanced at her, even though she pretended to watch the previews. Would he put his arm around her? She would have liked to lay her hand on his thigh. Her eyes and the nearly forgotten recesses of her memory told her it would be solid, bulky. The muscles might ripple under her touch.

She swallowed hard, disconcerted by the strength of her longing. What was wrong with her?

Joe reached out and took her hand. She jumped, and he whispered, “Sorry,” and started to let her go.

She grabbed his hand and held on. His went still for a surprised moment, then relaxed and returned her clasp. He exhaled what might have been a chuckle.

Then he lifted their clasped hands and laid them on his thigh. Oh God, had he read her mind? He shifted in his seat, and the muscles under the fabric of his pants bunched. Teresa sat motionless, taking in every sensation. Heaven.

It wasn’t Joe in particular, she told herself in panic; it couldn’t be, not so quickly. He must just represent something to her—solidity, masculinity, a calm reassuring presence. A sexy body, honesty made her add; a sensual mouth, hands that knew how to touch a woman. In other words, a man. She’d turned into that pathetic creature, a sex-starved widow who’d take whatever she could get.

Well, no. She’d had other chances to take, and turned them down. This was the first time she’d been tempted to grab and hold on. Literally and figuratively. So maybe it was Joe. Maybe him in particular, or because he represented whatever she’d been looking for when she bought into the White Horse Animal Hospital and practice.

It might be fun to find out.

Eventually Joe let her hand go, and she made a tiny noise of disappointment she prayed he hadn’t heard. But apparently he’d only released her so that he could put his arm around her shoulders. Now he tugged her closer to his warmth. Of course, the arm of the theater seat dug into her rib cage, but who was noticing? The feel of his mouth against her hair was far too tantalizing.

After a while, he murmured, “Ever necked in a movie theater?”

She sneaked a glance around to make sure no one had sat near them. Only a few others were scattered throughout the theater. The movie had been out for weeks and was probably about ready to disappear from Everett. Nobody was nearby at all.

“Not since I was young enough for a curfew.”

“Me, neither. Want to pretend we’re too young and horny to wait until we can find a deserted side road?”

Pretend. Oh, sure. She could do that. “Why not?” she whispered, and turned her head to meet his mouth. Pure excitement shot through her. It added eagerness and urgency to their kiss from the moment his lips claimed hers.

They kept it discreet. Nobody moaned or whimpered. Joe didn’t rip her clothes off or throw her down onto the sloping aisle. Not, as far as she was concerned, for lack of wanting. After the first few seconds, pretty much anything would have been fine with her. Which was, when she thought about it for a fleeting moment, alarming. What was happening to her?

Whatever it was, it felt good. His hand brushed her breast, cupped it. His teeth grazed her neck. She nipped the lobe of his ear. She tasted the skin at the base of his strong brown throat. She kneaded the muscles on his shoulders and neck. She hadn’t the slightest idea what happened to the sorceress in distress up on the movie screen. She didn’t care.

When the credits rolled, they rearranged their clothing to leave. Teresa was very careful not to look at anyone else, just in case they’d glanced over their shoulders and noticed the couple in back. She didn’t want to face a knowing smile or disapproving frown. Blast it, she was blushing again!

Thank God, she thought suddenly, that Nicole hadn’t made any friends! What if one of them had seen her mother carry on this way? Nicole would have run away from home.

Teresa wasn’t eager to meet Joe’s eyes, either. They passed through the lobby and out into the night. A mist scented the air and glistened off the pavement and car windshields under the yellow sodium lamps. Joe unlocked the passenger door first and held it open for her. Inside, she stared straight ahead while he circled the pickup and climbed in behind the wheel. He didn’t start the engine. She felt his gaze.

“I don’t suppose you want to find that deserted road.”

“I, uh, don’t think that’d be such a good idea.”

“Are you embarrassed or mad?”

She appreciated his bluntness. It made it easier to turn toward him. “Embarrassed,” she admitted.

“I don’t usually act like a randy teenager.”

“I didn’t do any better.”

“I enjoyed it,” he confessed.

“Me, too.”

“Then?” He waited.

“Oh, heck.” She fidgeted with the seat belt. “I just don’t want you to think—”

“I don’t.”

“Oh, well, since we’ve settled that…”

He must have liked her sarcasm, because he laughed. “I’ll give you a chaste good-night kiss. On the cheek.”

“Something to live for.”

He laughed again, the sound less rusty than the first time she’d heard it. She had some use in life.

The good-night kiss wasn’t all that chaste. But this time, there wasn’t any potential audience, either. Her legs felt a little shaky when Joe walked her to the front door. She didn’t want him to go tonight, either, which made her wonder with renewed panic where, and how quickly, this relationship was headed. How long would he—would she—be content with kisses? Was she really ready to have an affair with a man she hadn’t met three weeks ago?

And in all honesty she had to admit she didn’t know him very well. They talked, they laughed, but he hadn’t let her see below the surface. Maybe he had no profound secrets, but everyone had a darker side. Every time she edged too close to a truly personal issue, his face went expressionless. Even kissing her, he hadn’t yet reached the edge of control. How could she make love with a man she’d never seen angry, despairing, laughing helplessly? She wanted to know that he went deeper than amusement, amiable charm, lazy sensuality.

Maybe she was expecting too much after two dates—well, counting the lunch, two and a half. It wasn’t as if she’d done anything to goad him to anger or despair, or that she was all that funny.

But then, she shouldn’t be thinking about making love with him, either. It was too soon.

Oh, how she wished it wasn’t.

CHAPTER FOUR

“DAMN IT, WE’LL JUST send you, anyway.” Eric dropped his scalpel and reached for a handful of gauze sponges. He was working on a shepherd with an ear hematoma. Teresa had anesthetized the dog and now stood watching her partner. It was a pleasure—in more ways than one. He worked quickly and neatly. He also looked damned good while he was doing it. Tall and rangy, he had close-cropped blond hair, a narrow intelligent face and gray-green eyes that could be as sharp as his scalpel. He didn’t stir up her hormones, though, and she couldn’t figure out why. In his own way, he was as sexy as Joe Hughes.

“What can they say?” Eric continued. “Even if you were incompetent, it’s not as though you could do any damage on a preg check.”

“Except be wrong,” she said. Knowing as early as possible that a breeding had taken was critical to the dairy farmers—thus the monthly pregnancy checks.

He grunted and clipped off a piece of suture material. “You know, we’ve been letting a few of the old farts keep you from doing farm calls. Truth is, plenty of the younger dairy farmers wouldn’t mind a woman. Some of them have wives who are darn near equal partners. All they care is whether you can do the job.”

“I can do it.”

“Then you take the farm calls today.” He nodded toward the office. “It’ll be a hell of a day. Ten farms, I think. You’ll be shoulder deep in—”

She didn’t need him to tell her what she’d be shoulder deep in. Cows—especially dairy cows—made a toddler with diarrhea seem like a poor producer. “I don’t mind,” she said.

Eric flashed her a quick grin. “Have fun.”

“And if we make someone mad?”

“We can afford to lose some customers. They get damned good service from us. If they go with another veterinarian, so be it. Their loss.”

“You’re a prince,” Teresa told him, and headed off to finish loading up the truck.

An hour later, she was driving through one of the mountain valleys, where an early snowfall already gleamed on the peaks. She found the first farm with no problem. A Dairy of Merit sign hung proudly out front. Long low red barns and green fenced pastures beyond made a postcard-pretty scene.

Teresa parked in front of the nearest barn and climbed out. She already wore rubber boots and overalls over a heavy flannel shirt. She was shrugging into the vinyl vest and reaching for a plastic sleeve to cover her arm when the farmer appeared in the barn door.

“Hi,” she said, holding out a hand. “Eric was tied up today. I’m Dr. Burkett, his new partner.”

The middle-aged man in the dairyman’s customary costume of jeans and high rubber boots shook her hand without noticeable enthusiasm. “Know dairy cows?”

“You bet.” She’d done some reading to update her knowledge, acquired during an internship in Minnesota. After that year, she’d looked forward to working in a warm clinic on animals she outweighed. But the cold stinky physical parts of the job had faded quickly from her memory, leaving the good parts: the satisfaction of helping with a difficult birth, of curing instantly a cow down with milk fever, the relationships with farmers. She’d come to miss the Jerseys and Holsteins, with their generally good natures and soft brown eyes.

This farmer jerked his head toward the open double doors. “I have the first batch locked in.”

Figuring he’d prefer someone laconic, she only nodded and grabbed her tray of syringes, prepared with anything she might need.

They passed the milking parlor, spotlessly clean. A dozen black-and-white Holsteins were lined up, heads locked into stanchions, in a concrete holding area. Teresa breathed in the odors, which she’d never found objectionable. Setting down the tray, she went straight to work.

“Number 23,” she said, peering at the ear tag.

The farmer nodded and referred to his clipboard. “Bred September 5.”

Teresa inserted her hand into the cow’s rectum and began cleaning it out. Green manure splashed at her feet. Eventually, concentrating, she reached in deep, feeling through the wall of the rectum for the uterus and the pea-size growth of a new calf. She smiled when she found it.

“Pregnant.”

The farmer nodded and made a check on his list.

“Number 138,” she said, moving on to the next cow. The rump shifted away and she grabbed the tail.

“September 10.”

“Nope,” she concluded at last.

They fell into a rhythm that she remembered and enjoyed; few words were exchanged, and those were to the point. Along with the pregnancy checks, she examined the cows that had recently given birth, treating a few for infections.

When she finished the first batch, the farmer released the metal stanchions and waved the animals out into a loafing area. Another man chased the next ten in. Grain lured them to thrust their heads through the locking mechanism. Teresa shook liquid manure off her arm, clad in clear plastic, and called out the first number.

When she was done, she threw away her plastic sleeve and hosed herself down. Manure sluiced off her boots and overalls.

The farmer asked if she wanted to look around, and she agreed. In a separate barn, she paused, gazing down at the calves. She scratched a snowy white soft head, and lips nuzzled her hand.

“Daughter takes care of those,” the farmer said.

Teresa nodded. Bottle-feeding the calves was often a woman’s job on a dairy farm. Typically the newborn calves were allowed to nurse for the first three to four days, for the sake of the health-giving colostrum, then bottle-raised on a milk replacer so the more valuable milk could be sold. By the time they were a month old, the calves were weaned even from that.

“Do you raise your own heifers?” Teresa asked.

He shook his head. “We send ours at three or four months to a farm in eastern Washington to be raised. Don’t have enough pasture here.”

That, too, she’d gathered, was typical of dairies on this side of the mountains. This farmer had a dairy herd of perhaps 160 cows, and as little as fifty or sixty acres. He wouldn’t be growing his own hay, either, as a larger farm might. Yet she was impressed with the cleanliness of the barns and the condition of the herd. The pregnancy rate was high, too, a sign that everything else was going well.

The tour over, the farmer walked her out to her truck. “Eric be back next month?”

Her heart sank at the question. “Probably,” she said, “although eventually we’d like me to be handling half the calls.”

“You’re quicker at the preg checks than he is,” the dairyman said unexpectedly.

A compliment? Or was he implying that she’d gone so fast as to seem careless?

“I always had a knack.”

“Either of you want to handle calls here, that’s fine.”

She felt like babbling gratefully. Instead, she nodded and offered him a smile with enough wattage to hint that he’d given her a gift. “You have a nice place. I look forward to working with you.”

He nodded now; she climbed into the truck, waved and drove away. Barely out of his sight, she began caroling, “Oh, what a beautiful morning!”

Of course, her whole day couldn’t be that easy. Three of the remaining farmers greeted her matter-of-factly. Three were wary and noncommittal. Two refused to let her do the preg checks. The last grudgingly let her into the barn only because he had two cases of milk fever and desperately needed her to wield the syringe that would have his cows leaping to their feet and strolling off to the loafing shed as though nothing had ever been wrong.

He watched them go suspiciously, as though she might somehow have tricked both the cows and him. After a moment he grunted. “Since you’re already here…”

She was tempted to try to work even faster to impress him. She curtailed the temptation. A mistake would kill her reputation for good. Instead, she worked deliberately, calling out numbers, wrestling with recalcitrant cow butts, confirming and denying pregnancy.

She was examining a pretty little Jersey when the farmer said gruffly, “That one has a blocked teat. Feels like a pea in there.”

“I’ll take a look when I’m done,” she said.

They herded the Jersey into a station in the milking parlor, where Teresa could stand in the center aisle, three feet below the stall level. As the cow shifted restlessly, she manipulated the long pale teat.

“Let me tranquilize her,” Teresa said after a moment. She chose the base of the tail for the injection and waited until the cow swayed. Then she pulled out her forceps and probed inside. It took only a moment to remove the hard whitish blob.

She showed it to the farmer. “Scar tissue. Probably left over from mastitis.”

He grunted. “Snipped the teat, did you? I suppose we’d better treat her for mastitis now.”

“I didn’t have to cut it,” Teresa said. “Just keep an eye on her.”

“Ah.” The look he gave Teresa wasn’t warm, but it had thawed. Treating for mastitis meant the cow’s milk was unusable. She’d just saved him some bucks.

He, too, walked her out to the truck. “So you’re the new partner.”

“That’s right.” She unbuckled the rubber overalls and peeled them down.

“I suppose I’ll be seeing you again.”

“We’ll try to accommodate preferences,” she said evenly. “But that may not always be possible.”

He nodded, which could have meant anything from understanding to acquiescence. Teresa chose to take it as the latter. She’d done well.

Eric agreed when she got back to the hospital. “Two phone calls saying they liked you,” he informed her when she’d tracked him down to the kennel. Their resident cat, a huge fat tortoiseshell, sat slavishly at his feet. He was petting the still-groggy shepherd, who now had one floppy ear.

She crossed her arms. “And the two who wouldn’t let me in their barns?”

“One wants to know when I can come. The other says he’s changing services.”

“Oh, for Pete’s sake!” She stomped across the room, then swung around violently. “If they’d just give me a chance…”

Eric closed the cage door and rose to his feet, a smile playing at the corners of his mouth. “Ol’ Man Eide says he did only because he couldn’t wait. He sounded grudging, but he’s willing to concede you’re okay.”

“Eide? That was my last call.”

“Yup.”

“And he phoned you to praise me?”

“I think ‘okay’ is praise in his book.”

Teresa pumped her fist. “Yes!”

Eric slapped her on the back. “You’ll win ’em over.”

Already, she reflected as she unloaded the truck, it felt as if she and Eric had worked together forever. As if they were best friends. It was a good thing they didn’t stir each other’s hormones.

“HE’S HERE AGAIN,” Nicole said into the telephone to her best friend from Bellevue. “He didn’t even make an excuse for stopping by this time!”

“He?” Jayne echoed. “Oh. You mean that guy. The one your mom is seeing.”

“If she marries him, we’ll be stuck here forever!” Nicole said hopelessly.

“Hold on. My call waiting is beeping.”

While Nicole sat listening to silence, she brooded. Couldn’t Jayne tell how upset she was? Like some other phone call was so important.

Leaning against her bed, her door shut, she could still hear voices drifting up the stairs. Laughter. She felt…shut out. Even though she knew she wasn’t really. Mark was down there in the kitchen with them. But she didn’t belong.

Five minutes must have passed before her friend came back on the line with a rush. “That was him,” she said dramatically.

“Him?” But Nicole knew.

“Russ Harlan. He wanted to know if I’m going to a party tomorrow night. As if I’m going to say no.”

Nicole’s chest burned with envy and hurt. She struggled to say something. Cool. I hope he asks you out. Something. But she couldn’t. It was a relief to hear a beep in her ear.

“My call waiting,” she said. “Just a sec.”

The voice was hesitant and male. “Can I talk to Nicole?”

“Speaking,” she said coolly.