Page 57 of A Very Naughty Christmas

That made her laugh outright. What’s more, she bent over double, roaring harder as she heard him say, “Pay Mama no mind, pretty girl. She’s had a long, hard day.”

“She’s got you fooled,” she replied, watching as her cat turned her head and her green gaze swept over her with the usual icy disdain. “Don’t be taken in by that pretty face; though I love her, she is the cat from hell.”

“This gorgeous creature? I don’t believe it.”

Lucy flicked her tail at the compliment as if she understood him perfectly. Evidently, she’d found a soulmate in Kyle.

Sadly, and with a touch of envy, Dixie shook her head. “I picked her up on the street. Well, it was more like I opened the door and coaxed her up with tuna because she wouldn’t let me touch her. She was pitiful: scrawny, half-starved, cold, and wet. I couldn’t leave her there.”

“Then she fell in love with you for saving her, and became this sweet kitty. Right? Listen to her purr.”

“No. I welcomed her into my home and gave her my dinner for the night. When she was warm and her belly was full, she changed on a dime. The sweet, pitiful kitty disappeared. It was an act, like a demon luring you in, then snatching you up and carrying you off to the bowels of hell.”

His chuckle was a deep enthralling rumble that clearly had the same stirring effect on Lucy as it did her because she closed her feline eyes in contentment and lifted her chin for him to scratch underneath, which he obligingly did. “I don’t believe a word of it.”

“Just you wait. Oh, and her name is Lucy because at first, I couldn’t get close enough to see that she had girl, not boy parts. Still, the male name I’d already dubbed her withseemed appropriate. So, instead of changing it completely, I shortened it. Kyle, meet Lucifer, or Lucy for short, my living penance for all of my past sins here on Earth.”

His chuckle expanded into a full laugh. If it had been her, and her two-faced, multiple personality possessed cat had deigned to sit beside her and she’d laughed, Lucy would have hissed at the very least. At her worst, without a warning, she would have left claw marks in her chest as she’d leaped off, then with her tail stuck straight in the air to show her displeasure, would have sauntered away to find a less noisy and more cooperative bed.

“Why don’t you get comfortable,” he said as he again patted the vacant spot beside him.

She eyed it dubiously. Cuddling up to his warm body was extremely tempting, except it was a really bad idea. Yet she couldn’t sit there all night. Tentatively, she laid down, stretching out on the edge of the mattress at arm’s length from him.

“Dixie,” he said softly. “I won’t bite. Might as well get comfortable, we’re snowbound for a while.”

“You don’t need to stay and babysit me. I’m a big girl used to being on my own.”

“I’m not leaving you here with no power and no way to get to shelter. If we didn’t already have over eight inches out there, I’d take you to my place. I’ve got fireplaces, plenty of chopped wood, and a generator. Unfortunately, I live twenty minutes out on Highway 25, so that wouldn’t be a smart move. That road gets impassable, not usually to my Expedition, but because it turns into a parking lot with all the folks trying to get home when they should have stayed put.” He gave her a knowing look.

“Like me?”

“Mm-hm. I couldn’t believe you were walking in this storm.”

She scooted back, propping her shoulders against the headboard. “Les offered to drive me.”

“So he said.”

“You went by the diner. Why?”

“I was checking on a certain stubborn waitress I know.”

“You couldn’t have known I was at work.”

“When aren’t you at work?”

Her mouth kicked up on one side. This was true.

“What happened to college? Didn’t you have a scholarship to UNC?”

She looked at him, surprised he knew that. “I did; sadly, it only covered tuition.”

“Didn’t you qualify for financial aid?”

Not wanting to mention that her aid didn’t come through because her mother hadn’t filed the paperwork on time, she shrugged. Mama had said that she would, but had gotten sick. In the end, Dixie had to come home to take care of her. As the depression worsened,one semester off had turned into several, and once she got a job full time at Pete’s instead of only summers and holidays, her mama started to depend on her and the money she brought in.

“It’s a long story,” she said with a sigh.

“We’ve got all night, and all day tomorrow by my guess.”

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