Navy Christmas (Whidbey Island) Read online

Serena laughed. “Just don’t expect me to spin the alpaca fiber. I like my yarn already carded, washed and spun.” Serena was content to own and keep two alpacas, but once she resumed her law practice, she’d have little time for anything but the basic knitting that she enjoyed.

  “I’ll make you catch the spinning bug yet.” Winnie winked.

  She had all types of fiber classes at her shop, from basic knit and crochet, to how to take freshly shorn wool from the sheep to the skein. This included cleaning, or carding, the fiber before spinning it into unique, high-quality yarn.

  “No, I don’t think so. Keep your shelves stacked at the store for me.”

  “No problem.”

  “I’m grateful for your support, Winnie. It’s important to me to make the farmhouse Pepé’s and my home, and bringing it back to the way it was when our ancestors built it. It would’ve been too much for me to have the alpacas if I had to be responsible for the shearing and all.”

  “Speaking of the farmhouse, have you heard any more grumbling from the Scotts?” Winnie had been a supportive friend and confidante in the aftermath of Dottie’s death and Serena’s inheritance.

  “No, no grumbles, no nothing, until the youngest got back from deployment a couple weeks ago.” Serena sipped her drink.

  “Do you mean Jonas?”

  Serena nodded, hoping the heat she felt on her cheeks wasn’t too obvious.

  “He really had his heart set on getting the house. Apparently Dottie promised it to him. Which makes me feel a bit like a jerk, since Pepé and I are so happy there.”

  “Don’t even go there, Serena. Dottie was her own person. The whole town knew her and adored her, but it doesn’t mean she didn’t have her own quirky way of doing things. For some reason she changed her mind and willed it to you. Jonas isn’t hurting financially, right? He has the means to build a second home if he wants.”

  Serena looked at Winnie’s huge Christmas tree. It was everything a tree should represent—the joy of the holiday, the warmth of a home and the love of a family.

  Had she stolen that from Jonas when she’d accepted the house from Dottie?

  “I’m not going to be a hypocrite and say that I’m sorry about any of it. The minute Dottie had us over for dinner, I knew I’d come home. Dottie became part of our family. I never expected her to give me the house, of course.”

  Serena had planned to buy a home once she and Pepé had found their favorite part of the island. That decision was, needless to say, taken out of her hands.

  “I don’t want to hear one hint that you’re feeling badly for Jonas, Serena. He’s a big boy and he’ll get over it. You’ve had a lot on your plate these past couple of years—you and Pepé deserve every drop of happiness you can get. Your farmhouse is part of that.”

  Winnie and Max knew the Scotts from when Jonas’s older brother did extensive landscaping on their house and became friends with Max and Winnie.

  When Serena had first confided in Winnie, she’d encouraged Serena to accept the house without reservation. She’d also given Serena the gift of insight into Jonas’s background—from someone who knew much more about him.

  Jonas had been a bit of a wild child, until he found his calling in medicine and the Navy. Dottie’s community reputation had been on the line with him several times while he was in high school, but she didn’t give up on him, ever.

  She also didn’t enable him. Dottie had loved Jonas when he needed it most and he’d grown into the successful military professional he was today.

  Who loved Jonas like that now that Dottie was gone?

  “He came by the house,” Serena said. Winnie’s eyes widened. “When?”

  “Last week. He was very nice. Even charming. Yet he made it clear that he hasn’t given up on getting me to sell.”

  “Typical Jonas. What a jackass thing to do!” Winnie shook her head. “He put Dottie through the wringer with his last girlfriend. It looked like they were going to get married, and the girl had all these dreams of making Dottie’s place into a bed-and-breakfast. Can you imagine? She told Dottie all about her plans, acted like it was a fait accompli that Jonas would get the place and, of course, that she’d be with him when he did.”

  “What happened then?”

  “Dottie handled it in her usual straightforward manner and told Jonas she never wanted to see her family home turned into a hotel.”

  “No, I mean what happened with his girlfriend?”

  Winnie waved her hand in a dismissive gesture. “Just like the others, she broke up with him once she realized his first love is the Navy. She didn’t want to wait for him to settle down.”

  “Is she still here?”

  “Yes, she’s over there.” Winnie nodded toward the fireplace, which was the center of the Ford home. Max stood with their infant daughter in his arms while their two older girls, Winnie’s from her first marriage, stood next to him.

  All four were mesmerized by a slim blonde who spoke animatedly, her arms floating about her as she emphasized her words.

  “Joy Alexander.”

  “She’s beautiful.” And everything Serena physically wasn’t.

  Why did she care?

  “Yes, but they weren’t good as a couple—it was more of a convenience hookup. She’d been alone a long while, as had he. It was a partnership of the lonely. They just didn’t have that spark, you know what I mean?”

  “Hmm.” Serena didn’t want to tell Winnie that she understood all too well what she meant. Seeing Jonas always seemed to send sparks down her spine.

  She’d worked with a lot of men in her profession; she wasn’t swayed by just any man, no matter how attractive. Jonas Scott was different.

  * * *

  JONAS SAW HER the minute she walked through Max and Winnie’s front door. The dark fall of her hair reflected the twinkling lights from the Fords’ Christmas tree and made her look more sensuous, more beautiful, than she’d been at her house last week. If that was even possible.

  He wasn’t a fool. He wasn’t a stranger to sudden sexual attraction, infatuation. Add in a long spell without a woman and of course a beauty like Serena would make his need all the more urgent.

  It didn’t mean any more than that; his body was reacting to a gorgeous woman. He was still alive.

  Unlike the kids he’d been unable to save.

  He swallowed back the bile spewed by the unwanted memory. He wasn’t a pediatric specialist; it wasn’t his fault those two siblings had died. They’d been suffering from malnutrition on top of their war wounds—it was unlikely they had the strength to heal from the mortar injuries even if they’d made it to the trauma unit sooner.

  Still, he couldn’t get their soft brown eyes, filled with pain and fear, out of his mind. Or how sweetly they’d accepted his ministrations, the needles, the meds, without a single whimper.

  They’d believed the Americans could save them.

  And he hadn’t.

  Jonas took a swig of his beer. This was his first Christmas celebration since he’d come home and no one needed his morose regret to smother the twinkling holiday spirit.

  “You still moping that you didn’t get your farmhouse, Jonas?” Max had waited until Joy walked off before he got to the point, which reminded Jonas why he liked Max as much as he did.

  Max always got to the point of any issue. It was one of the reasons Jonas respected him so much.

  “It’s not the house, Max.” Bitterness stoked his guilt. He’d give up his quest for the farmhouse to have those kids back, alive. In a nanosecond.

  “Maybe this was all part of Dottie’s plan, to get you to learn to share.” Max Ford smiled at him, his baby daughter on his hip.

  Jonas didn’t want to tell Max why he was so upset with himself. Not tonight, at a Christmas party.

  “You’ve gone
soft, Max. When I first met you ten years ago, you were as tough as nails. Now look at you—you’re married to a woman who has you wrapped around her finger and your baby on your hip.”

  They both guffawed and Jonas gave Max a playful slap on his shoulder.

  “It’s been the most humbling, and the best, experience of my life, Jonas. I highly recommend it.”

  “Humph.”

  “Now you sound like Scrooge.”

  “I feel like Scrooge, man, but I’m trying to fight it. This is my first Christmas back home in over five years, between deployments and other tours. For the first time, I’m alone.” Max knew about the disastrous Christmas Jonas had spent with Joy. They’d taken a cruise to sunnier weather. Both he and Joy had regretted it—they would’ve preferred to be with their own families, not together.

  “You dating anyone since you came back?”

  “Me? Nope. And that’s okay—not to say I wouldn’t mind a companion, but I’m not ready for the baggage that comes with it.” Jonas looked at Max’s baby girl.

  Max gave him the stink eye.

  “Hey, I’m sorry, man. I didn’t mean anything by that. You know I’m happy for you.”

  Max smiled. “I get it, Jonas, more than you realize. But be forewarned—the minute I gave up on ever having a lifelong relationship, gave up on finding the woman of my dreams, she showed up.”

  “I remember.” Jonas nodded.

  Max had found out long after the fact that he’d fathered his and Winnie’s middle girl during a one-night affair before he’d left on an extended deployment.

  “Weren’t you angry at Winnie for not telling you sooner, Max?”

  “Of course I was. But what can I say? I couldn’t change the past. I figured out that if I wanted to live my life to its fullest, I had to let go of whatever had happened before, whatever my expectations had been.”

  “You’re one of the lucky ones.”

  “Yeah, I’m lucky. But Winnie and I do the groundwork, believe me.” Max hoisted his little girl higher in his arms and sniffed. “You need a diaper change, don’t you, sweetie pie?”

  She giggled, her cherubic cheeks rosy from the warmth of the fire and being in her dad’s arms.

  Some visceral emotion hit Jonas. He was sure it was just post-deployment letdown. He’d always thought he’d have a family and kids...someday. “Someday” hadn’t come yet. Although he had to admit he envied Max’s certainty that his family was the source of his happiness.

  “Excuse me, Jonas, but this little lady needs to freshen up. Help yourself to the buffet—Winnie went all out and had her friend Ro bake up some of her delicious desserts.”

  “Will do. Thanks, Max.”

  Jonas turned around and leaned against the mantel. The heat of the fire made him uncomfortably warm, so he wasn’t going to be able to hang out here long, but he wanted to take it all in.

  Stop kidding yourself at least.

  He wanted to take her in.

  Serena leaned against a far wall of the great room as she spoke to Winnie, Max’s wife. She laughed at something Winnie said and took a sip from her flute of champagne.

  Champagne. He’d have to file that away.

  Why? Why was he torturing himself like this? He wasn’t going to charm her. But he sure as hell could try.

  The fact that his need to talk to her right now had nothing to do with the farmhouse was something he’d examine later.

  He dropped his empty beer bottle into a pop-up bin placed strategically near the kitchen counter and walked over to Serena.

  She looked over Winnie’s shoulder and made eye contact with him. The sizzle in their shared glance made him grateful he was a man, grateful he was back on terra firma, U.S.A., grateful he could still feel this kind of interest in another human being.

  Winnie smiled as she turned toward him. Was that a wink?

  “Hey, Jonas. I’m so glad you made it tonight.” She tilted her face toward him and he placed a quick peck on her cheek.

  “Thanks for having me.”

  “Welcome home! I heard you’re working in the Peds unit on base?”

  He nodded. “Nothing I volunteered for, believe me. My specialty is trauma, as you know. But Peds needs the help and who am I to complain? For the first time in forever I have regular hours.”

  “With regular grumpy parents and sick kids,” Serena chimed in, and he couldn’t help the grin that spread across his face.

  “Touché. Hello, Serena.”

  She gave him a small smile. “Jonas.”

  He looked into her eyes a beat longer than he probably needed to before he turned back to their hostess.

  “Serena’s still sore from overhearing my inappropriate comments at the base clinic. She caught me at my worst, I’m afraid.”

  Winnie laughed. “Well, I hope we don’t see you very often at the hospital, but with the girls being out of school for the holidays and the older two so active with gymnastics practice, we may.”

  “We’re there if you need us. And don’t ever hesitate to call me at home if it’s after hours and something comes up. Kids are unpredictable.”

  “Thanks, Jonas. You may live to regret your offer.” Winnie glanced past their small group. “Where was Max heading? I saw you talking to him.”

  “Your little girl needed a diaper change. Max is a great father.”

  “Yes, he is. Our marriage, the girls—we’re so blessed.”

  Winnie smiled at him, then at Serena. It was painfully clear that “blessed” meant “in love.” What was it with the Fords? Why did they see romance everywhere they looked?

  “Will you two excuse me? I have to make sure the beef isn’t overcooked.” Winnie walked off and Jonas felt like he and Serena were the only two people in the room.

  As if she was the only woman in the universe who mattered to him.

  CHAPTER TEN

  “I DIDN’T KNOW you were friends with the Fords.” Serena licked her upper lip after she spoke, spinning the stem of her glass between her fingers.

  Did he make her nervous?

  Or maybe she was feeling the same sexual crackle he did.

  Good.

  “We haven’t exactly spent time comparing our mutual acquaintances, have we?” He angled his body closer to her warmth, her sizzle.

  “No, I suppose we haven’t, Jonas.” She pursed her lips as if deep in thought and Jonas ignored the urge to tell her she had the most luscious mouth. He shook his head.

  “Everyone’s friends with the Fords. They’re a great couple, a wonderful family. Max and I go way back, and Winnie is friends with my sister-in-law, who’s a rabid knitter.”

  Serena giggled and it produced a feeling of warmth in his chest.

  “I like to knit, too, but I don’t consider myself ‘rabid’ about it. I let it go for a while right after...after Phil died, but lately I’ve been at it again. Whidbey is the perfect place to knit, and Winnie’s shop is fabulous. In fact, she’s convinced me to...to—”

  She cut herself off abruptly and sipped her drink. “Convinced you to...?”

  Guilt, maybe apology, flashed across her expression. “Have my own alpacas.”

  “Oh. Well, I don’t know anything about alpacas, or sheep, but the farm used to have dairy cows, back in the day.”

  “Yes, I know. I’m not interested in the work cows would need, and I don’t want to clear the area needed for sheep, but there are other fiber animals, like alpacas, that could be very happy there. Will be happy there. At the farm. Not that it’s a full-fledged farm. I’m not a farmer, per se.”

  His gut tightened. “Go on.”

  “I don’t suppose you noticed the barn upgrades I had done? The new addition on the other side?”

  He had. The piles of lumber and new coat of paint, along
with a new door to the stone foundation building, had caught his eye as he left yesterday, but he wasn’t about to go back and ask her about it. Not after he’d almost kissed her in the upstairs room.

  “Let me guess—not just for show or for aesthetics? You’re not planning on using the barn as a storage unit for your hobbies, your yarn?”

  She gave him a soft smile. He wondered if Serena knew how pretty, how damned attractive, she was.

  Sexy was more like it.

  “Not yarn in skeins. I’ve agreed to keep two alpacas on the property for a trial period. Winnie’s helping me, as is her friend I’m purchasing the animals from.”

  “You’re purchasing trial animals?” His incredulity at this made him smile. Serena’s smile widened into a grin.

  “Okay, I’ve bought the animals, but I can always give them back.”

  “Like a rental car?”

  “All I’m doing is taking care of them. Winnie’s friend will handle the shearing and cleaning, and the rest of the fiber processing. It’s a good thing for Pepé, too, to give him a sense of belonging, a connection to his roots with the farmhouse. His biological family farmed on Whidbey almost a century before he was born.”

  “Alpacas, eh?” He didn’t give a darn if she put emus in the barn. All he wanted to do was watch her lips form words, see her tongue lick them, sneak looks at her breasts.

  He should walk. Away. Now.

  “It’s my responsibility to restore and maintain the property, Jonas. I’m not going to restore it to the kind of farm it once was, but I do hope to keep it the way my great-grandfather intended—a place to raise a family and provide a small income.”

  His conscience urged him to open up and tell her what he’d been holding back. Still, he waited.

  Not yet.

  “Do you ever wonder what this could be like—” he motioned between them “—if you hadn’t got Dottie’s house, if we weren’t related, if we’d just met?”

  “First, we’re not related. Second, I did get Dottie’s house. Third, I’m not ready to date yet.” Serena didn’t pretend she didn’t know what he was talking about. He liked her direct frankness.