Page 1 of One Christmas Eve
Chapter One
November first was shaping up to be one of Zoe Randall’s least favorite days of the year.
The purple fairy lights. The saucy witch statue with her glowing book of spells. The tiny fog machine. Halloween was over and it was time for the huge bay window of Cedar Street Books to be stripped bare of one of her most fun book displays yet.
To make way for the month of November, which didn’t exactly lend itself to fun. First up was Veterans Day, for which she had a special display planned, but then came Thanksgiving.
Zoe muttered about an entire month devoted to a turkey dinner as she climbed into the window display and sat cross-legged next to the little witch.
“Are you talking to me, yourself, or the witch?”
Carly, her cousin and partner in the bookstore, paused on her way by, and Zoe laughed. “I’m just ranting about Thanksgiving because I want to jump right to the Christmas decorations. Turkeys aren’t irresistible and they’re not going to lure customers in.”
“Cookbooks might,” Carly said, and Zoe wrinkled her nose. “I know, but we have to try harder in November if we don’t want too much of a dip.”
“I know.” Novembers in a small New Hampshire town driven by tourism could be tough. The lake people had wrapped their water toys in blue plastic and gone home. The foliage was dead on the ground and the ski season hadn’t yet begun. There was literally nothing for people to do.
Except read, Zoe reminded herself firmly.
She hadn’t shown up on her cousin’s doorstep, with everything she owned and freshly signed divorce papers, determined to make their childhood dream of co-owning a bookstore come true just to whine about turkeys.
After the attitude self-adjustment, Zoe reached for the witch, but from the corner of her eye, movement caught her attention and she turned her head to see a man standing on the sidewalk.
He was staring, but whether at her or the sexy witch or the very steamy paranormal romance covers, she couldn’t tell.
She could tell he was hot as hell, though, in a buttoned-up way. He was wearing a very well-tailored gray suit, with a subdued tie in a darker gray. His brown hair was cut in a standard business style, but her gaze still lingered because there were so many hues of gold and red, she wondered if it could be natural.
He wasn’t somebody she remembered seeing around town, and she was pretty sure she wouldn’t have forgotten him if she had. The man really knew how to wear a suit.
She gave him a friendly wave and a smile, hoping to lure him inside, but he didn’t smile back. In fact, his expression was anything but friendly.
Disapproval.
Zoe knew that look. She’d divorced the man she’d thought she was going to spend the rest of her life with—a man who’d claimed to love and cherish her—because of that look, so she wasn’t about to accept it from a total stranger.
Arching one eyebrow, she gave him her best bitch face. And not the resting kind, either. Hers was a fully active bitch face.
The man scowled and—after casting a final, dismissing glance at the display around her—he turned on his heel and walked away.
Zoe rolled her eyes and was picking up a stack of popular paranormal romances that had been part of the Halloween display when she noticed he hadn’t gone very far. In fact, he’d only taken a few steps and now the blue door of her shop was swinging open, making the small brass bell ring.
Crap.Carly was in the back room, so now she was alone with a strange man who didn’t look very friendly. Zoe rarely let fear get the best of her since her divorce, but she wasn’t stupid, either.
“Mrs. Walker wants us to order the third book in that trilogy you recommended to her,” she said in a conversational tone to hopefully give the impression somebody was just on the other side of the bookshelves. And then, to distract from the lack of response she was going to get, she turned to the man closing the door behind him. “Can I help you find something today?”
She knew she should be smiling, but he was still looking at her with a faint air of judgment and she couldn’t make herself do it.
“I’m looking for Carly or Zoe,” he said in a voice that wasn’t threatening, but just deep enough to make her shiver.
The good kind of shiver, though. The voice went so perfectly with the stern expression and the tie just begging to be loosened. He’d probably be a lot less judgmental if her fingers were mussing his hair and undoing the tiny buttons of his crisp, white shirt.
She cleared her throat as the realization sank in that he was looking for them, specifically by name, so hadn’t come in just to hassle her about the look she’d given him. And she should probably pay attention to whatherfacial expression was doing while she was mentally undressing him. “I’m Zoe.”
“Joe Randall said I could get the key to the office next door from you.”
It took a few seconds for Zoe’s brain to stop obsessing about how long and thick his eyelashes were and catch up with the conversation. “You’re the new tenant?”
“Yes, I am. Preston Wheeler. I’m renting the office space from Joe and we signed the papers last week, but the painters and the cleaning crew hadn’t finished up yet, so he told me he’d leave the key with you.”
