Shannon Stacey - Mistletoe & Margaritas

He’d be there any second to pick her up, so she slid her driver’s license and debit card into her back pocket and clipped her cell phone to one front pocket while dropping her keys into the other. She’d wait to pull on her favorite fleece pullover until he pulled into the driveway.

On her way through the apartment, she paused as usual and looked at the row of photos sitting atop her bookshelf-the ones Penny had been looking at-her gazing coming to rest on the silver frame just to the left of her formal wedding portrait.

It was a double frame, holding two 5x7 photos side by side. On the left was a picture of Brendan and Justin standing in front of the elementary school on their first day of fourth grade. Both of them grinned at Brendan’s mom, who’d held the camera, obviously excited to be embarking on a grand new school year together.

The photo on the right, taken at her reception, was her favorite picture of the two guys together. They both looked outrageously handsome in their tuxes-both tall and athletic, but Brendan was blond and fair-skinned, while Justin had darker hair and the tanned complexion of a man who worked outdoors. She’d looked at the photo a hundred or more times since Brendan died.

This time, though, her gaze lingered on his best friend. The photographer had captured them laughing and Justin’s honey-brown eyes practically sparkled out at her from the frame.

She’d been noticing his eyes a lot lately. The warmth in them when he looked at her. The something-almost sadness-in them when she caught him watching her. And he watched her a lot.

No, she wasn’t sure what was up with him, but she had to admit-even if only to herself-that she watched him a lot, too.

It was a natural thing, she told herself. With a little over two years for her heart to come to grips with Brendan’s death, her body was awakening again. She missed sex and Justin was a very good-looking guy. It was only natural she’d sometimes wonder what it would be like if he touched her-or so she tried to convince herself.

She jumped when the chime on her cell phone alerted her to a new text, as if she’d been caught doing something wrong. Grabbing her sweatshirt, she pulled up the message as she locked her door behind her.

Here.

She rolled her eyes and slid the phone back into its holster. Justin hated texting. He claimed his hands were too big and his fingertips too callused for the small buttons, but she loved his hands. They were the working hands of a capable man, strong and rough, and for a few seconds she found herself wondering what they would feel like against her soft, naked skin. Then she shove the errant, confusing image away and went down the stairs to the driveway.

He smiled at her as she climbed up into his truck and pulled the door closed. “Hey. We might need two pizzas. I’ve been thinking about it all afternoon.”

While she’d been thinking about him. “If we get two, you can have mushrooms on yours and we’ll both have leftovers for supper tomorrow.”

The smile spread into a grin. “You might have leftovers. I’m starving.”

He used his mirrors to back down her driveway, but to see down the busy main road, he twisted his body to look out the back window of the truck, resting his arm across the back of the seat. He’d done it a hundred times, but this time she was aware of how close his fingertips were to brushing her shoulder. This time she had the urge to shove his pile of paperwork and business cards and supply house slips onto the floor and slide to the middle seat, into the shelter of his arm.

She didn’t, though. Instead she looked out her window and cursed Penny for putting the thought in her head.

Justin had a slice of pizza in one hand, a pool cue in the other, and was trash-talking Claire’s shot when the Rutledges walked through the front door. Brendan’s parents saw him immediately through the big window to the game room and he felt the same quick flash of shame he’d felt every time he saw them since Brendan had introduced them to Claire. Then he smiled and waved with the hand holding the pizza.

Claire turned to see who he was waving at and he didn’t miss the way her face lit up. There had been no in-law drama surrounding the Smith-Rutledge wedding since the families had hit it off almost as well as Claire and Brendan. It was storybook, really. Except the ending. The ending had sucked.

“I forgot Tuesday was pool night,” Judy Rutledge said as she and Phil turned the corner into the game room.

Claire kissed them each on the cheek, then it was Justin’s turn to get a kiss from Judy and a handshake from Phil. They’d been like second parents to him since they’d moved to town the summer before Brendan and Justin started fourth grade and struck up a friendship. The Rutledges had a family room, two televisions, a never-ending supply of freshly baked cookies and no time limit on video games, so the boys had hung out there a lot more than at the McCormick house. Justin’s mom worked a lot of hours at her hair salon and was just as happy to have her only child out of her hair as much as possible.

“All ready for Christmas?” Phil asked, because that was the usual conversation opener two and a half weeks before the big day.

“No,” Justin and Claire said together.

Claire laughed. “I’m going to get a Christmas tree on Saturday and I’ll probably get around to shopping next week. Maybe.”

Judy shook her head. “I expect to see you both Christmas Eve.”

“Wouldn’t miss it,” Justin said. That was the plan. An appearance at the Rutledge family Christmas Eve party, then he and Claire at her place, watching National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. It was a tradition.

The Rutledges went to order their take-out and since Chris Jones was just walking in, Claire handed her pool cue to him and went to sit with Judy and Phil while they waited.

Chris had youth and a pretty face on his side, but not much in the way of book smarts. And his work ethic was a little iffy at best, too, which Justin knew since he employed the kid off and on during the summer. When Chris’s beer and video-game money ran low, he’d help out on a roof or two, then take off again.

“Must be about time for you to head north,” Justin said. In the winter Chris worked and lived at one of the fancy resorts because an almost freakish natural ability to teach rich people to ski was another thing he had on his side.

“Monday. But for the fifteenth, I managed to score a few hours off in the middle of the day. You in?”

“Hell, yeah.” That was the day the gates were officially opened on the snowmobile trails. “A few hours is better than nothing. I’ll text you when I get there and we can head out.”

“So you get with that yet?” Chris asked, and Justin realized he’d been watching Claire through the window as she laughed at something Judy said.

He forced his attention back to the pool table. “I told you, it’s not like that.”

“I don’t know what the problem is. She’s hot and you hang out more than a married couple.”

“We’re friends, Chris. It’s possible for a man and a hot woman to be friends without having sex.” It wasn’t easy, but it was possible.

Judy and Phil poked their heads in to say goodbye when their food was ready and Justin gave Chris a warning look behind Claire’s back. That subject was closed, at least as far as the other guy was concerned. It was never closed in Justin’s mind.

“Who won?” Claire asked, grabbing another slice of pizza from the tray.

“Me,” Chris said. “Smoked him, actually. His mind must have been on something else.”

Since her back wasn’t turned, he couldn’t send another glare in Chris’s direction, so he concentrated on keeping his expression neutral. “I let you win. Figured your ego could use the boost.”

“Whatever, dude. Claire, you in?”

“Rack ’em up.”

Since watching the two of them play really meant watching Claire bend over the table to line up her shots, Justin lined some quarters up along the edge of the pinball game and set about taking out his frustrations on the metal ball. The action was loud and fast and just what he needed to distract himself from the game behind him.

Until Claire moved up beside him to watch and he smelled the slightly tropical scent of her soap and shampoo and imagined he could feel the warmth of her body standing so close to his and the metal ball went down the chute with an electronic flushing sound of failure.

“Good timing,” she said. “I just kicked his ass, so you’re up again.”

“Be right there.” He picked up the quarters he hadn’t used and shoved them back into his pocket, taking the opportunity to adjust the crotch of his jeans.

Time to have another talk with himself about cutting back on the time he spent with Claire. Tomorrow.

It was still dark when Claire woke feeling flushed, a little breathless and a lot confused.

She dreamed about sex a lot, which was probably normal considering she was a twenty-eight-year-old woman who hadn’t had the real thing in two years. But this was the first time the dream had been so deliciously potent and the imaginary sex so mind-blowingly good she’d awakened with her body aching for more.

Which wasn’t good because it also happened to be the first time she’d dreamed about having sex with Justin. That couldn’t be a coincidence.

Moxie, sensing she was awake, strolled up the bed to bump heads with her, but Claire rolled onto her stomach and buried her face in the pillow. She’d just had the best sex of her life. Too bad it wasn’t real. And it was with the one person she shouldn’t be thinking about having sex with.

Everybody knew the quickest way for a man and a woman to ruin a friendship was to have sex.

Moxie mewed plaintively, kneading Claire’s shoulder, and she sighed. Five-thirty or not, it was time to get up. If she went back to sleep she might have imaginary sex with her best friend again and her nerves said once was enough.

“It’s Penny’s fault,” she muttered to the cat as she sat up. “She planted these thoughts in my head.”

She started the coffeepot brewing and hit the bathroom, but the shaky, off-kilter feeling didn’t fade. The first cup and the early morning news didn’t help, nor did Moxie nudging her, wanting to know what was wrong. She wasn’t so far gone she was going to try to explain being blindsided by an erotic dream about her best friend to her cat.

Maybe she didn’t want to have sex with Justin. Maybe it was her body’s less-than-subtle way of telling her it was time to wade back into the dating pool. Actually, her body wanted her to cannonball off the diving board, but her heart wasn’t up to more than dipping her toes into the shallow end.

She realized she was twisting her wedding band around on her finger and forced herself to stop. Nobody wanted to explore even the shallow end of the dating pool with a woman wearing a wedding ring. Well, not any guy worth dating, anyway.

Maybe it was time to take it off and put it away. Quick and painless.

Or it would have been if the band didn’t hang up on her knuckle. Dish soap didn’t do it. Butter didn’t help. When even a liberal application of olive oil didn’t budge the ring, she leaned against the counter, tears running down her cheeks unchecked because her hand were so gunked up she couldn’t wipe her eyes.

Maybe it was a sign. If she couldn’t get the wedding band off, she didn’t have to think about dating again. She laughed through the tears and Moxie, who’d been watching her with disdainful interest, retreated to the back of the couch.

“It’s not a sign,” she said out loud. “It’s all those potato chips I ate watching The Biggest Loser.”

After ten minutes with her hand stuck between two baggies of crushed ice and another dousing with olive oil, she was able to work the ring over her knuckle.

Claire set it, slimy and glistening, on the counter while she washed her hands. Even though winter was setting in, she’d spent a lot of autumn outside and the white circle of flesh was stark against the tan that had yet to fade. When her hands were clean, she washed the ring and then rubbed it dry.

Brendan’s wedding ring was on her dresser, in a small wooden box covered in tiny shells-a Cape Cod honeymoon souvenir so tacky they’d had to have it. She opened the lid and took out the gold band that was identical to hers, except larger. It had gotten hung up on his knuckle during the ceremony, though potato chips probably weren’t to blame. They hadn’t had to resort to begging hand lotion from a guest, though Justin had told her in a low voice to spit on it. Instead she’d shoved, Brendan winced and they all laughed about it at the reception.