She suddenly couldnât help yearning to feel those sexy roller-coaster lips pressed to hersâ¦
Would they be as soft and warm as they looked? As supple? What kind of kisser was he? Not pinch-lipped the way Wes sometimes was, she thought. Relaxed, confident, naturalâthat was Dag and probably how Dag kissedâ¦
But that wasnât anything she should be thinking about!
She jerked her eyes away just about the time Dag said, more to himself than to her, âBut youâre engaged⦠to a Rumsonâ¦â
Dear Reader,
Itâs Christmastime in Northbridge and thereâs no place Dag McKendrick would rather be. Family, friends, decorations, festivities and genuine goodwill toward everyone. Itâs home.
For Shannon Duffy itâs something else. Itâs a place to spend the holiday with the biological brother who has come into her life after a year of losses. Losses that not only included her parents and her beloved grandmother, but also the end of her three-year-long relationship with a politician all of Montana thinks sheâs still engaged to.
Proximityâand the fact that Shannon is selling Dag her late grandmotherâs houseâbrings Shannon and Dag together. But Dagâs dauntless high spirits are just what she needs. So like any Christmas treat, Shannon lets herself indulge a little. And then a little more. And then a little more.
But thatâs Christmas for youâ¦
I hope yours is wonderful, and that the new year brings with it only the best of everything!
Happy, happy holidays!
Victoria Pade
âHo! Ho! Ho! What good skaters you are!â
Shannon Duffy smiled a little at what she saw and heard in the distance when she got out of her car.
After a long drive from Billings, sheâd just arrived in the small town of Northbridge, Montana. At the end of Main Street, sheâd spotted a parking space near the town square and pulled into it so she could get out and stretch for a minute.
Not far from the parking area was an open-air ice skating rink and it was there that a group of preschool-age children were apparently being taughtâby Santa Clausâhow to skate. Or at least they were being taught by a man dressed in a Santa suit, using the ho-ho-hos to encourage them.
Christmas was a little more than a week away and Shannon was anything but sorry to have it herald the close of the past year. It had been a rough year for her.
Very roughâ¦
But as she breathed in the cold, clear air of the country town, as she watched the joy of kids slip-sliding around the ice rink that was surrounded by a pine-bough-and-red-ribbon-adorned railing, she was glad sheâd come. She already felt just a tiny bit less disconnected than she had, just a tiny bit less alone, almost as if the small town her late grandmother had loved was holding out its arms to welcome her.
Shannon had suffered three losses this year. Four, if she counted Wes.
Sheâd lost her dad at the beginning of January, and her mom just three months after that. Their deaths hadnât come as a surprise; both of her parents had been ill most of their lives. But when, in August, her grandmother had suddenly and unexpectedly had a heart attack and died, too, that had been a shock. And it had meant that her entire family was gone in just a matter of months.
Then her relationship with Wes Rumson had ended on top of it allâ¦.
But now her trip to Northbridge was twofold. Primarily, she was there to attend the wedding of and spend the holiday with the people sheâd come to think of as her New Wave of family.
Two months earlier sheâd been contacted by a man named Chase Mackey. Out of the blue heâd made the announcement that he was one of three brothers and a sister sheâd been separated from when she was barely eighteen months old, when theyâd lost their parents to a car accident andâwith no other familyâhad been put into the system and up for adoption.
Shannon had known that she was adopted. She just hadnât knownâbefore Chase Mackeyâs callâthat she had biological siblings out in the world.
And not even too far out in the world at that since Chase Mackey had been calling her from Northbridge where her grandmother had lived and owned the small farm that Shannon had inherited at the end of the summer.
The farm was the second reason she was in Northbridge. Today she was to attend the closing on the sale of the property that she had no inclination to keep.