The Christmas Groom Read online

  She shot him a curt glance. “You need socks?”

  “Maybe.” He grinned. “I guess I’ll have to come back tomorrow on your big merchandise pushing day and buy some.”

  She shook her head, her face falling. “I don’t know how I’m going to do what Ken wants. I won’t even be able to start selling until after lunch; I have to work in the morning.”

  Looking at all the work she was doing, he couldn’t stop himself from asking, “Where do you work during the day?”

  She picked up her phone and looked at the time. “I have to hurry.” She shoved more stuff into a bin.

  He picked up the pace. “Where do you work?”

  “Uh, I was an Olympic skier.” She frowned. “Hurt my knee, blah blah blah, ended up not being good enough for the Olympics to take me a second time, but good enough to do shoots for products. Magazine covers.” She shrugged. “Not my products, unfortunately. Haven’t figured out how to finance that yet. I’m hoping something works out soon.”

  He could swear he saw her lip tremble.

  “Something has to.” She whispered. She filled the last bin, turned for the snowboards, and paused.

  “Where are you going tonight?”

  Glancing briefly at him, she frowned. “Are you always this pushy with a girl you just met?”

  Caught, he smiled. “Nope.”

  Squinting at him, she asked, “So what’s your deal? Are you just here to ski?”

  He nodded, unsure why he was suddenly nervous. “Yep, here until Christmas. Then I’m going to stay with my brother and new sister-in-law.”

  “New sister-in-law?”

  “Yep.” He remembered Sterling and Sayla’s wedding in Jackson. His father had been there. It’d been a perfect day. He frowned, thinking of how, less than a month later, his father had passed away. They’d known about his heart, but it had never seemed possible he’d ever be gone.

  “So you get to ski for five days?” Pure jealousy was written all over her face. “Then go on vacation?”

  Shaken from his thoughts, he put on his best real smile. “Yep.”

  “What’s wrong with you?”

  “What do you mean?”

  She looked him up and down. “I don’t know. You seem manic. You’re fake happy. Then there are these slivers of pain in your eyes.”

  He looked away. “It’s nothing.”

  She sighed. “Okay, never mind. I have enough of my own junk to handle.”

  They were both quiet for a few seconds. He tried to shake this intense feeling between them. She’d been the first person to ever notice his moods. Strike that—she’d been the first to call him on it. He wondered if others were simply afraid to. Purposefully, he changed the topic. “Hey, you live here and probably ski or snowboard every day.”

  She let slip a sarcastic laugh. “Well, yeah, but that’s mixed into work.”

  “Still.” He countered. “You live here.”

  “Not in Park City.” She turned away, looking sad.

  “Where?”

  “Uh, no. I don’t tell people where I live. No stalkers, thanks.”

  He laughed. “Yeah.” Little did she know he could make one call and find out anything he wanted to know about her from his contacts in less than ten minutes. That was the benefit of having to background check people for a life in politics.

  He didn’t know what to say, but could tell she was holding something back which was ludicrous because he’d just met her. “I don’t need to stalk women.” It was the truth, but it sounded like he was at a bad political debate defending himself.

  He didn’t have to say anything because the look in her eye let him know he was going to regret pestering her. “Do you mind helping me load all this into my truck? Since you’re a do-gooder and all?”

  Her tone made him smile. He thought about how he’d actually forgotten how hungry and sore he was since meeting her. Man oh man, he didn’t understand how he’d gotten so lucky. “Sure, but only if you let me buy you dinner.”

  She headed down the sidewalk. “Can’t tonight.” She called back. “Like I said, I have somewhere I have to be.”

  He watched her jog to the parking lot and realized the more she said, the more he wanted to know about her. The Olympics? Her injury? And the number one question rattling around in his brain: was she married? Or did she have a boyfriend?

  A few minutes later, she pulled up and kept the truck running as they quickly loaded the bins and gear. Once they finished, he shut the tailgate and turned to her. “So will you let me take you out to dinner tomorrow night?” He tried not to sound too hopeful.

  She moved to the driver’s side door then paused. “Don’t date out-of-towners. Sorry.” She gave a mock smile. “I’m not the ‘hang around the slopes and wait for a rich guy’ type.”

  Man, he was liking this woman more and more.

  She got into her truck and rolled down the window. “But I do appreciate the help.”

  “You’re going to be here tomorrow, right?”

  She crossed her arms. “I told you, no stalkers.”

  He laughed.

  She grinned and said somewhat reluctantly, “I have a shoot tomorrow, but I will open the tent doors at one.” Putting her hands on the wheel, she looked thoughtful. “Thanks for your help. Maybe you can stop and give me some more sales tips another time.”

  Not believing he was doing this, he put his hand on the window. “Wait, let’s make a deal. I’ll show up and help you sell your merchandise. If I sell more than you, I take you to dinner.”

  She gave him a doubtful look. “You’re going to help me sell merchandise, and if you do better than me, you take me to dinner?”

  He shrugged. “It’s a win-win for you.”

  When she bit her bottom lip, he couldn’t help but think how pretty her heart-shaped face was. “C’mon, it’ll be fun.”

  Both eyebrows rose. “What do you get out of this?”

  He shrugged. “Oh, believe me, my ego will get plenty out of outselling you after you put me in the dust on the slope earlier.”

  She tried to hide a smile.

  “C’mon.” He pressed.

  She spread her hands in a gesture of mock defeat. “What can I say? I need the help as you’ve clearly pointed out. Since you’re so good with all the sales tips, I guess we’ll see if you’re as good of a salesman.”

  “All right then. It’s a date.”

  She laughed. “I wouldn’t call it a date.”

  “Fast track, right? If you believe it, you can achieve it. I know I can outsell you.” He grinned, feeling cocky. “I’ll bet you I can outsell you and whoever else you want to bring too.”

  She rolled up the window. “Fine.” She winked at him. “Okay, I guess you’ll put up or shut up. See you tomorrow afternoon at two.”

  “Two? I thought you opened at one?”

  She shrugged. “Give me time to set up. Plus, skiers are usually done skiing between two and five. It gets too dark.”

  “Sounds good.” Nathan watched her drive away, and a wide grin spread across his face. This could be an interesting couple of days after all. He took off, heading back in the direction of the hotel attached to the resort. The night was still young, and he felt good enough to skip the hot tub, take a shower, and go out and find another pretty smile with his dinner. This was gonna be a good trip. He could feel it.

  Chapter 2

  The next day, Nathan sat at the coffee shop next to the outdoor market and watched as Storm and another guy set up her booth. FastTrack. He liked the name of it.

  He glanced at his phone. There were still five minutes until two o’clock. Taking another sip of his coffee, he thought about how he couldn’t get this woman out of his mind. Last night, after dinner, he’d ended up just going to bed. Then, this morning, he’d gotten up and skied, but all he could do was look for her. If anyone had on her gear, he checked to see if it was her. On every run, he had watched for her, hoping he’d run into her or see her off to the side doing a photo
shoot. But he hadn’t.

  All he had was her first name. Storm. He hadn’t even gotten her last name. He’d seriously slipped on his charm!

  Not wanting to overdo it today, he’d stopped skiing after lunch, going back to his hotel and taking care to shower and wear warm clothes in preparation for a day spent standing outside in the cold. Unable to believe what he was doing, he psyched himself up to make some sales. Why had he even made this stupid bet?

  The night before, he’d done some research. Looking up her brand online, he’d seen her website that was just okay. It was obvious she maintained it herself. It was a pleasant surprise to see she’d actually done hard work on the clothes. They were specially designed and made. As he watched some of her videos where she spoke about the clothes, he couldn’t help but enjoy the way she laughed and smiled on camera. Very photogenic.

  He’d watched the foot traffic around her place and noticed lots of happy-looking skiers. They were probably like him, well-off tourists on vacation. His gut told him he could sell a lot if he wanted to.

  The most disconcerting part of the past hour was the man that had come with her to set up. The guy looked roughly as tall as Nathan. He had long blond hair and looked like a surfer dude from California. Unable to check his male ego, Nathan wondered if he could kick his butt in a fight. Maybe. Maybe not. Might be an equal match.

  Even though Nathan worked long hours, he worked out a lot too, always getting in a run and lifting three times a week. He also made sure to swim laps or do some cross-training every day.

  It occurred to him that this guy looked like a skier. Or a snowboarder. Maybe one of her model friends he surmised.

  Standing, he pulled on his new coat, the one he’d bought last night, put on his hat and gloves, and decided he would find out what this guy meant to her.

  As he approached the tent, his eyes met hers, and a slow smile slid onto her face. She patted the sweatshirt she’d neatly folded on the table. “I was wondering if you would show up.”

  The surfer-looking guy wasn’t around at the moment. Nathan moved into the tent and put on his political smile, the one that could sway a politician to vote how he needed them to vote. “I’m a man of my word.”

  Dang, she looked good. Today she had extra makeup on that accentuated her blue eyes and Swiss blond hair. Her eyelashes were long and her A-line hair was curled in a hip, messy way. “You look good.” He couldn’t help himself.

  She scoffed. “Well, I did have someone do me up today. Gotta look good for the magazine.”

  As he got closer, he caught a whiff of something fruity. “You smell good too.”

  Her eyes widened, and she looked him up and down. “You clean up okay.”

  It would have been comical if Nathan had been watching this scene in a movie—two adults, who barely knew each other, smiling at each other like a bunch of awkward teenagers. Especially after the way they started off the night before.

  Someone cleared his throat. “And who is this, Storm?”

  Nathan turned, seeing Surfer Dude with a not so “relaxed and happy California dreamin’” expression on his face. No, the look on the guy’s face was pretty obvious: protective boyfriend.

  Shaking her head and moving to another sweatshirt to fold, Storm blushed. “Oh, this …” She met his eye. “Wasn’t it Nathan Pennington on the credit card slip last night?”

  He beamed. “Ah, so you remembered, did you?”

  She laughed, but Surfer Dude scowled and crossed his arms. Nathan noticed the coat he wore wasn’t her brand. Stiffly the guy put out his hand. “I’m Sky.”

  Nathan shook it. “You’re Sky, and she’s Storm. That’s funny.”

  Sky kept his hand extra long and squeezed it hard. “Yeah, it’s like we were meant to be together. At least, that’s what my mom always said.”

  “Okay.” Nathan extricated his hand and wondered if he was looking into the eyes of a serial killer. His mother? Weird.

  Storm finished another shirt but kept her eyes on Nathan’s. “Chill, Sky. The guy’s here because he thinks he can outsell me.” Her tone had a teasing ring to it. “Actually, us.”

  The guy let out another not-so-happy laugh. “Storm, you said we were hanging out here today.”

  Storm suddenly looked tired. “We are hanging out, Sky. But hey, I can always use the sales help.”

  Sky scoffed. “That’s for sure. I still don’t know how you’re going to cover the cost of all this stuff.” He didn’t seem to care when she glared at him.

  Nathan eyed him. The guy reeked of desperate with a bit of crazy as if he would completely lose it if someone pushed him. He turned back to Storm and took off his glove and held out his hand. “You still haven’t told me your last name.”

  Not removing hers, she put her hand out, looking suspicious. “You need my last name to sell?”

  Their hands met, and Nathan held hers without shaking it. “No, I just wanted to know it before I take you to dinner.”

  A strained laugh escaped Surfer Dude’s lips. “Whoa, wait. What’s going on? You guys are going to dinner?”

  Storm rolled her eyes at him, retrieved her hand, and straightened another sweatshirt. “Sky, don’t worry about it.”

  “But—”

  “Sky, it’s fine. Let’s just get this merchandise moving, okay?”

  Nathan saw the peeved look on Sky’s face shift from her and settle on Nathan. The side of Sky’s lip pulled back, and Nathan knew the guy wanted to punch him.

  Sky restrained himself though and shrugged. “Fine, let’s get to work.”

  A half an hour later, Nathan was out on the pavement in front of the tent, talking to every person who had walked by. The foot traffic he’d directed into the shop had left both Storm and Sky busy on the registers, checking out the customers and bagging the their purchases.

  “And did you know,” he said to a couple he could tell would both buy complete sets, “Storm Goodman was an Olympic athlete? Took home the silver. Now she lives in this area and does photo shoots. She’s spent countless hours researching the best material for skiers. After her knee injury, she knew she wanted clothing with the most capacity to stretch while skiing and still keep you warm—the kind of material that whisks away moisture but doesn’t make you cold.”

  The woman perked up, looking into the tent. “She’s an Olympic skier?”

  “Was.” Storm called out.

  Nathan put on a frown. “Hurt the knee. She no longer competes, but she does do photo-ops for fancy magazines.” He pulled out his phone and pulled up a photo he’d found on Twitter only minutes ago from the shoot she did earlier that day. “Check it out.”

  The woman and man bent to see the picture then turned to the tent with purpose. “Honey,” the woman said, “I have been a bit cold in these snow pants. Maybe we should take a look.”

  “Agreed,” said the man as he picked up a pair of gloves. “I like the look of these.”

  That was all Nathan had to do: smile at the onlookers, engage them in talk about skiing or where they were from, and figure out if they were more interested in the clothes because of Storm, for innovation, or because the clothes were made out of high-quality material.

  Easy peasy lemon squeezy, as his mother always said when he was little. It surprised him that his mother had crept into his thoughts. He’d trained himself not to think of her because it made him feel guilty.

  But today he couldn’t force out the thought of him and Sterling, probably only five and seven, out on the beach in the Hamptons with a lemonade stand. His mother had totally supported their idea and had bought lemons, sugar, ice, a big dispenser, and paper cups—anything they needed. They’d pulled over three chairs and one of the little tables on the deck, and she’d showed them how to sell, how to talk to people. She’d been beautiful then, before the cancer. Young. He hadn’t thought of her being so wispy and carefree on the beach with them in a long time. She’d worn a light turquoise scarf that flew back in the breeze. He remembered his father had
brought it to her the night before and put it gently around her neck, pulled her into him, and kissed her so tenderly.

  The memory shocked him, the force and the beauty of it. Blinking away moisture, he was startled when he realized Storm was staring at him. “Are you okay?” she asked softly.

  He let out an embarrassed laugh and shook himself back to reality. “I’m great.” He turned to look at the line of five people waiting to check out with their new FastTrack gear.

  Her eyebrows furrowed.

  “What? Business is good.” He nodded to the line of people. “We’re going to get most of this merchandise moved by tonight.”

  “How do you do it? How did you get person after person into my little tent for the last hour? My sales are through the roof. You’re so friendly. Also, it feels like you’ve known the products forever.”

  It would be a lie to say that her compliments didn’t have an effect on his ego. He grinned modestly. “It’s politics really. Everything is politics on some level.”

  She abruptly looked a bit shy, putting her hands together and staring at the ground. “So you’re in politics?”

  It was something he didn’t want to be recognized for, but it was too much to try to hide it. He didn’t though, just said, “Kind of.”

  Another pair of customers moved up to him. “What’s going on at this shop?”

  Nathan loved how easy it was to attract people once you had a lot of momentum going. “A party. Want to come in?”

  The couple laughed and nodded, following the line.

  Nathan stayed by them for a couple of minutes, picking up one of the coats and pointing out the quality and value. Then he looked back and said, “And you know, you’ve got to come meet the owner and designer of these products before you walk out. Storm Goodman was also in the Olympics four years ago and came out with the silver.”

  “Ahh.” The woman’s eyes widened as she looked back at Storm. “We will.” She picked up some snow pants and told her husband to get some too, and they made their way down to Sky at the cash register, ready to buy entire outfits.