“I’ll consider it.”
“Then I’m listening, Miss…?”
“Kate.”
“Kate.”
It must have been a strong, random winter wind sending chills through her body; it couldn’t have been the almost tender way he said her name. She coughed and tightened her arms across her chest, hoping the pressure would stop the sensation.
“What should I call you? Scrooge McDuck, or…?”
To her surprise, he laughed. It wasn’t an evil movie villain laugh or anything, just a nice chuckle with a warm ring to it. She dismissed how much she liked it as a fluke. Even cold, unfeeling statues sometimes look almost human in the right lighting.
“You can call me Clark.”
Kate didn’t repeat his name as he did hers. It somehow felt wrong to call him by his first name; she felt more comfortable calling her former high school teachers by their first names than she did calling him Clark. It was such a wholesome, all-American kind of name. Clark Kent. Clark Gable. Clark Woodward wasn’t the correct third for that trio.
“Listen.” All of Kate’s strength went into fueling her empathy for this man. Focusing on her friends and family would just leave her angry and bitter; focusing on him would give her a much better shot. Most men liked an appeal to vanity. Maybe it would work on him. “I don’t know you. I don’t know anything about you. But your Uncle Christopher was a good man. He believed in this town. I mean, your family basically built this place. The library is named after you. The school auditorium. The football field. The gazebo in the park, for goodness’ sake. It’s all yours. You can do whatever you want with it—”
“Great. You understand where I’m coming from.”
“No. I mean, yes, but you don’t understand where I’m coming from.” He raised an eyebrow, which she took as a sign to continue. “You have a town full of people who stare at your name every day with hope. And gratitude. Are you going to betray all of these people? Take away their livelihoods?”
“I don’t know any of these people. I don’t care about any of these people.”
Those two statements landed on Kate’s jaw like a string of one-two punches. What kind of man just…didn’t care?
“If they want jobs, they can herd cattle like the rest of my employees, but I can’t waste money on this Christmas foolishness for another day.”
“But your uncle—”
“I am not my uncle!”
It was a roar, a statement to the heavens; the force of it almost knocked Kate back a step. Somehow, she managed to hold her ground even as she couldn’t quite understand the nerve she’d struck. Everyone wanted to be Mr. Woodward; he was as kind as he was insanely rich. The perfect combination. What kind of man hated a man like that?
“Clearly.”
The sharp flash of emotion dissolved as quickly as it appeared. Clark straightened his jacket.
“I think I’ve heard enough. You can go ahead and give me that phone number now.”
“One last thing,” Kate said.
“Yes?”
“During your… During your little speech, you didn’t even wish us a Merry Christmas.”
His refusal to do so left her with a nasty taste in her mouth. A small gesture it might have been, but its absence was so blatant she couldn’t let it go.
“That’s because I don’t celebrate Christmas.”
“Don’t celebrate Christmas?” Kate choked.
“No. Now, give me the number.”
Dumbstruck, Kate’s brain didn’t quite possess the processing power to say anything as she gave him the number. The cogs in her mind were too busy trying to puzzle out his declaration. But once he had the number, he was gone, leaving her with nothing but questions. There was no goodbye. No, “for what it’s worth, I’m sorry.” Just a curt “thanks,” as he walked away dialing. Kate stood alone on the sidewalk for only the briefest of seconds before a hand touched her shoulder. She didn’t turn around or tear her gaze from the spot where Clark stood just a moment ago; she knew who would be there.
“How’d it go, dear?”
The pity in Miss Carolyn’s question stung. Kate hadn’t even realized tears were forming in her eyes until they left cold tracks down her flushed cheeks. She failed. She tried to save her town, and she failed. With a weak shrug, she decided a little gallows humor was probably for the best.
“Do you know if any places are hiring?”
Chapter Two
Christmas Eve
Kate Buckner was on a roll, as far as rants went. Since arriving almost thirty minutes ago, she’d yammered nonstop, flooding her companion and the empty restaurant with her every stray thought. The faster she spoke, the faster they came, leaving her to race to catch up.
“But you know what I really can’t stand?”
It was 7:15 on the morning of Christmas Eve, and for the first time since she was seven years old, Kate wasn’t ironing a petticoat or setting up trays of mince pies. For once, she sat at the end of the bar at Mel’s Diner, drinking a steaming cup of coffee and relishing the hearty scents of bacon and maple syrup. On a regular morning in, say, March, the old diner was the greatest breakfast joint in the known universe.
But this Christmastime? She hated it. Mel’s was a staple of the Miller’s Point diet and she came in here at least once a week, but that was part of the problem. Without the festival, this felt like just another Tuesday. Bing Crosby’s holiday standards on the old jukebox just weren’t enough to convince her this was actually Christmas Eve.
“What can’t you stand?”
Michael Newman, her breakfast companion and best friend since they were cast as Fred and Fred’s wife in high school, couldn’t have been more different than Clark Woodward. Where the out-of-towner played perpetual poker, Michael slapped himself open and let you read every page of him. He was the all-American type, dark-skinned
