Page 10 of Blame it on the Mistletoe
Her heart turned to lead, the box of cookies slipping from her fingers and landing on its side. A dozen iced gingerbread cookies tumbled onto the floor.
“Dear, are you okay?” Ester placed a hand on Faith’s shoulder.
No.She was most definitely not okay. Because there, sitting in the back seat of Noah Tucker’s Ranger-issued SUV, placing him on the other side of the law, was her kid brother. Her sweet and honest and oh so gentle-hearted brother, who was supposed to be safe and sound at Shelby’s house riding horses and doing normal boy things, was somehow imprisoned in the back seat of a government vehicle while being escorted through town for all the world to see, as if he was like his father—
A law-breaking criminal.
Chapter Three
A painful jolt of nausea churned in Faith’s gut, the same way it used to when the local police paid her family a weekly visit. Sometimes they had a warrant. Other times it was to question her mother’s man-of-the-hour about some crime he’d likely committed. But Faith hadn’t lived under the same roof with a convict since she was sixteen.
She worked hard to be honest and straightforward, always conscious of the decisions she made, choosing her circle of friends carefully. Her standards for men were so high that she rarely dated. When the planets actually did align, exposing a sliver of free time to go on an actual date, she never brought them around Pax.
Faith had sacrificed a lot, worked hard to be an upstanding citizen and role model in order to avoid this very situation.
“Can you watch the cash register?” she absently mumbled to Ester as she turned and hurriedly weaved through the diner and out the front door, jingle bells ringing in her wake.
Everything around her blurred together as her focus locked on the SUV, which had come to a stop right outside the diner’s entrance. She reached the car as the driver came around to open the back-passenger door—that only opened from the outside.
A dull roar filled her ears as Pax hopped out, his backpack slung over his shoulder, a bright orange and black laser tag gun in his hand. A toy gun that matched the one his best friend was carrying. Faith had a strict no gun rule in place. Not in the house. Not on his person. Not ever
“Dear God,” she whispered the moment his blue and white sneakers hit the asphalt. She moved quickly and, when the driver didn’t restrain Pax, Faith pulled him into her arms. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” Pax said, squirming out of her embrace.
“What is this? You know the rules.” She plucked the plastic gun from Pax’s hand. “Where did you get this?”
“In the Tuckers’ basement,” Pax said, studying the cracks in the sidewalk. “Decalin got the new Battle Rifle Pro for his Countdown to Christmas present, and he and some of the other guys were playing commando at the park.”
And here Faith had been excited to find Pax a Superhero advent calendar. Behind each door was a superhero-shaped chocolate—not a 500-dollar laser gun. But Decalin was the youngest Beaumont, and that family never did anything small.
Besides donating the brand-new community center stationed in the heart of downtown, they also hosted a New Year’s Eve party that was rumored to cost in the six figures. Not that Faith had ever been invited, but she’d heard all about it from her regulars at the B-Cubed. So it wasn’t surprising that the budget for Decalin’s advent calendar surpassed most folks’ entire holiday spending.
“Decalin said it was BYOG only and”—Pax shrugged—“I don’t have one.”
That was the golden ticket item that sat at the top of his Christmas list—had been for the past two years. Faith had mixed emotions about getting him a toy gun. It had never become an issue because every time she’d come close to having the money, something would come up. Last Christmas she’d needed new tires, a week before his birthday the fridge had gone out.
Pax toed the ground. “JT said we could both share his, but . . .”
But Pax would be too embarrassed.
“I remembered there were some in the basement,” JT offered, being a good wingman. “They were my dad’s and he never uses them anymore, so I told Pax he could have one.”
Which explained why they were big, black, and incredibly realistic, instead of neon like guns the other kids had.
“Bringing them to the park was my idea,” Pax admitted.
“I thought you were supposed to be helping Mr. Tucker clean out the barn and brush the horses.” She cupped his face, checking him over.
“We did.” Again he shrugged her off. “But we finished early and Ms. Shelby wasn’t home from work yet, and JT’s dad was on the other side of the ranch, so his uncle offered to drive us to the park.”
Ignoring for a moment that JT’s uncle,theone and only Noah Tucker, was standing three feet away, looking mighty fine in a pair of faded button-flies that hugged his backside to perfection, Faith pulled her brother against her.
The moment she wrapped her arms around him, and she could feel that he was safe and unharmed, Faith finally took a breath, a deep calming breath that forced her heart back into a normal rhythm.
“Why didn’t you call?” she asked, not sure if she was still scared or spittin’ mad. “When plans change, you’re supposed to call.”
“We were only going to the park. You let me go there all the time.”
