Page 61 of Tuxedos and Tinsel
She didn’t dare ask about Lewis’s mother, suspecting she knew the answer. “Didn’t they let you join them?”
“Nah. Wasn’t part of the family,” he said, eyes looking off in the distance. In that moment, his profile looked so forlornly beautiful it made her throat clutch. She squeezed her coffee cup to keep from pulling him into a hug. Lewis shook his head. “I was too young.” Maybe she was projecting, but his offhand comment came out flat. “What about you,” he asked. “When did you figure it out?”
“Fourth grade.” She remembered well. “My classmates told me. Turned out I was the only one who was still a believer. The whole class got quite a laugh.” The memory of her embarrassment swirled in her stomach. “Oh, well,” she said. “Whatever. It was a long time ago. I’ve recovered.”
“My resilient little pea?”
His what? Right, they were two odd peas in a pod. Was it strange that whenever they shared sad childhood tales, she ended up feeling warm from the inside out?
She decided to change the subject before things became too maudlin. “Hamleys is only a block away. Ready to tackle the crowds?”
Breaching the gap between them, Lewis took her arm and tucked it in the crook of his own. “Crowds are what we want, luv. Remember?”
Good thing too because it was the opening weekend of Santa’s grotto. As a result, the toy store was filled with children dressed in their Christmas finery waiting to go upstairs for their chance to speak with the man himself while their parents snapped a photo for the annual Christmas card. If ever there would be a place where they’d be noticed, this was it. Most of the kids would be too young to recognize Lewis, but their parents weren’t. Susan saw a number of heads turn in their direction as they walked in.
“I think the science toys are on the second floor,” Susan told him.
She made it halfway to the staircase before she realized Lewis wasn’t following. Figuring someone must have stopped him for an autograph or photo, she turned and scanned the crowd. It wasn’t difficult to find his tall form in the crowd and she soon spied him by the animatronic display. The store was famous for its fantastical panoramas. This year, the wall was a winter resort with animals of all sorts enjoying the great outdoors. Teddy bears rode a ski lift. A pair of rabbits were ice skating on a pond. There was even a cutout of a lodge where a sloth lay stretched in a hammock by a roaring fire.
Lewis was mesmerized. His eyes were wide and shining and he had an almost slack-jawed look of wonder about him. Maddie wore a similar look when Susan had brought her last year. Lewis’s expression caused warmth to spread through her chest. He looked beautiful when his guard slipped. She wanted to wrap her arms around him and soak him up.
Suddenly it hit her. He was viewing the display with a child’s eye for good reason. “You’ve never been in here at Christmastime, have you?” she asked.
“Never been in here period,” he replied. “No reason to.”
And probably too far away when he was a child. How much childhood had he lost moving from home to home? While she was the odd person out in her family, she at least had one. Her heart ached picturing the little boy watching his foster siblings play with the toy he wished for. It wasn’t just the toy that caused the pain; it was being shut out.
Without giving it a second thought, she wrapped her arms around his biceps and rested a head on his shoulder. Her way of saying he wasn’t frozen out anymore. The shifting of muscles beneath her cheek told her Lewis had looked down in surprise, but he didn’t say a word.
“Pretty amazing, isn’t it?” she remarked. “It must take them months to plan everything out. All the little details.”
Lewis chuckled. “There’s a red squirrel dancing in one of the trees. I had a teammate who danced like that. Hector Menendez. Called it his booty dance. I should send him a video to show him how awkward he looked.” He took out his phone.
Susan was watching another set of rabbits, this pair chasing one another around a tree trunk. “My grandfather used to bring us here when we were little.”
“Same one who took you to the Kew Gardens?”
Susan nodded. “He took us a lot of places. The company museum was his favorite—always a good time.”
“Didn’t like learning about soap?”
“Thomas and Linus liked it. I was four years old. I just wanted ice cream. Come to think of it, there are days when I’d still rather eat ice cream than be at Collier’s. For that matter, I’d take ice cream over anything.”
“Anything?” Lewis asked. Actually he purred, making her insides flip. “I can think of a few things I might like better.”
There must be someone nearby watching because he had his nose dangerously close to her temple. Very well. She’d play along. “Is that so? Like what?”
“Sugar cookies, for starters.”
Susan nearly snorted. That was so not what she expected. But then, this was a show, not a seduction. Why shouldn’t he give a nonsensical answer? “Cookies over ice cream? Close call, but I don’t think so.”
“That’s your opinion. Lately I’ve been finding the aroma very tempting. Has anyone ever told you that you have gorgeous hair?”
The non sequitur threw her, along with a brush across the top of her head that felt a lot like a kiss.
For the crowd.
“I’ve gotten a few compliments,” she replied.
