Merry Mended Hearts (Santa’s Radio Christmas Romance #1)

7. Grace

GRACE

Stepping carefully, I meandered toward the door when my foot met with something spiny.

“Ow!”

I lifted my foot. A simple silver chain with an unremarkable pendant dangling from it was strung on the floor. I bent and picked the necklace up.

“Where did this come from?” Had Junie left it in here? I’d have to find her and return it.

Just as soon as I had some lunch.

Hurriedly, I tucked the necklace into my pocket, slipped my room key into my other pocket, got my shoes and phone, and headed down to the lobby. The smell of freshly baked rolls tantalized my stomach. One of the inn’s selling points, Mom had said, was the quality of exquisite food served by an on-hand chef.

Another woman stepped out from the door across the hall from mine in Room 9. She looked to be about my twenty-three years, had a thin nose, and auburn hair pooling down her shoulders. She was staring at her phone, but she lowered the device long enough to give me a friendly smile.

“Hey, there,” she said. “So you’re in Room 11?”

“Yeah,” I said. “And you?—”

“It’s a great room,” she said with a sigh.

I narrowed my eyes at her. Was something wrong? “Are you okay?”

“Hm? Oh, I—not really. But it’s okay. I’ll figure it out. I’ll see you around,” she said and then walked away before I could figure out what was bothering her.

Strange. Why did she seem bothered by the fact that I was in Room 11? Unless…

Had Junie done something after all? Had this woman been there first or something?

All the more reason to find her. I headed down the stairs and turned toward the reception desk. A woman didn’t recognize, with dark hair and heavy eyeliner, sat in Junie’s place. I was about to turn toward the dining room when something else caught my notice?—

The lobby was empty. I wanted to see it again now that I felt like an actual guest instead of an imposter. It was quite possibly my favorite room at this inn.

Muted light crackled from the fireplace, adding warmth and a sense of cozy secrets to the room as though these walls had witnessed their fair share of stories. Considering the story Boone had shared with me yesterday, that was saying something.

But Santa wasn’t real.

This radio was probably just a family heirloom.

In any case, the fire welcomed me to sit in the nearest armchair and start typing. I made a mental note to bring my laptop down here after lunch.

Heavy footfalls approached, and then my heart seized in my chest. Boone appeared in the doorway with a cut log in each hand. I fisted my hands at my sides. Did he have any idea what long-sleeved shirts like that did for his physique?

Either he was clueless, or he wore things like that on purpose.

Was he going to say anything about last night?

He barely glanced my way as he muttered a hasty, “Hey.”

“Hey,” I said, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear.

I wanted to say something else. Something amazing and flirty.

Would it be awkward to mention the fact that I’d slept in his bed last night? Or maybe to mention him being fully clothed? Because that was all my foolish, romance-crazed brain could come up with in the moment.

Why did being around him make me feel like an open jacket and he was the zipper? Like he could cinch me up tight, make me feel safe, and keep me warm?

Even as I had that thought, I pictured him wielding, not logs, but a staff and a sword in either hand like a sexy younger Gandalf, storming into the fae king’s hall with brooding vengeance in his eyes as his tangled mass of dark hair and the bleeding wound on his shoulder told of the perilous troubles he’d had just to reach the castle in the first place.

More of those rippling muscles made their debut as he thrust a staff at the unsuspecting king and demanded he rise and fight him.

The swooning maiden that the king had abducted from Hero Boone’s village fought against the shackles restraining her wrists so she could join her rescuer in his battle to free her.

She had no resemblance to me whatsoever, for the record—regardless of the fact that her hair was the same glistening shade of mahogany and her features were eerily comparable to mine.

And she craved for him to take her to him and answer the fiery call he instilled in her blood with his mere presence.

Yeesh. When did this room blaze hotter?

My eyes plastered to his movements as he crouched before the fire and tossed the logs onto the pile, stirring the ashes and making the orange flames dance out of the way.

Boone was built better than most men in a stop-and-stare kind of way, a way that made single women do a double take and married women force their gazes away to keep their attention where it belonged. A way that made me want him to whisk me away to hidden closets where we could explore our mutual attraction without onlooking eyes.

Except as far as I knew, the attraction stirring me into a quiet frenzy was only one-sided.

Get a grip, I told myself. This isn’t a romance novel!

Who was he? What was he doing working in the middle of a Montana wasteland?

He and Junie both mentioned his family had claims staked to this inn. Was that all there was to it?

Boone dusted his hands and lifted his gaze to mine. I was, ridiculously, still staring. But I didn’t feel like I needed hide that fact.

Something about him was magnetic. Did he feel it, too?

A line appeared between his brows. “Everything okay?”

“I—” I gestured to the fire. “I just have never seen anyone add logs to a fire before,” I said stupidly.

Yeah. Because that was where my attention had been.

I fought the urge to roll my eyes at myself.

His face remained stoic. “I like to make sure they stay lit during business hours.”

“That’s commendable of you. I—I’m not in your room anymore,” I said in an awkward subject-change.

His face darkened, and I wasn’t sure why. What had really been so bad about me being there? What did he have to hide?

“You find somewhere else to stay? You leaving?”

I twirled my hair around my finger. Was he interested because he was interested ? Or just being nice?

“A room came up. Open, I mean.”

“Like an availability?”

“Yeah.”

He nodded. I moved. And then we did this kind of shuffle thing, a dance without pre-planned steps the way people do when they accidentally both get in one another’s way and both of them try to correct it at once.

I giggled.

He grunted.

The third time, he gripped my arms with his big hands, and it felt like my soul filled with hot chocolate at the touch. Warm, oozing, filling, and sugary, sending a buzz through my entire body. Every one of my cells were screaming. The monkeys sank into the warm liquid and made little “aaah,” sounds as they did so.

Because Boone Harper was TOUCHING ME.

He held me in place, nudging me to the side while he stalked past toward the exit.

“I was just leaving,” he said again.

“Are you—” I began when a crackling noise pulled our conversation—such as it was—to a stop.

Boone’s forehead creased, his attention shifting toward the table of antiques on display across from the fireplace. Another crackle and some static followed.

“Was that the radio?” I asked.

“Impossible,” Boone said, lowering his hands from my arms.

He smelled like wind, like cinnamon and snowfall. I edged closer to him, and he didn’t move away as our shoulders brushed. My heart pounded as another whirring, crackling sound emitted from the radio.

“I thought you said it didn’t work,” I said.

He glared at the table. “It doesn’t.”

“Then where’s the sound coming from?”

“I don’t know.” He crouched to his hands and knees and lifted the lace tablecloth to peer beneath it.

I did the same, edging in close enough to smell the wind in his clothes. Our shoulders brushed once more, and I tried to see the wall. But there was no sign of a plug whatsoever.

Next, Boone rose and inspected the radio itself. With some effort, he lifted it to examine every angle. The radio wasn’t attached to any source at all, and there were certainly no battery receptacles in it.

How, then, was it making noise?

With the fire blazing at our backs, he placed the radio on the table once more. Almost at once, the whirring sound increased, and the faintest hint of a song began to eke from the antique speakers.

“… I thought I’d take a rise…seated by my side…”

“Is that…?” I began.

Boone silenced me with a hand, leaning in closer, turning his ear toward the sound.

“ …Bells…all the way. Oh, what fun it is to ride… ”

“That’s ‘Jingle Bells,’” I said.

“Unbelievable.” Boone’s statement and the goggling expression he gave the radio swept chills down my arms.

A tinkling sound emerged then, not from the radio. It was a sound with clinks and jangles. Metallic and rattling, and yet light enough to brush up my spine with all the tickling effect of a feather. It was just enough to trigger goosebumps along the base of my neck.

“What was that?” I asked.

“Sounded like it came from the chimney.”

The minute we turned, the fire that had blazed moments before swept out in a gust of smoke and ash.

“Whoa.” Boone furrowed his brows. “I just added those extra logs. That’s impossible.”

Chills skittered down my spine. What was going on?

Slowly, Boone’s gaze landed on mine. The last time we locked eyes, his had been guarded and distant. Now, I could swim in his expression. The depth in his gaze was so striking, I had to take a step back and exhale.

“How long did you say you’ve worked here?” I asked.

“Three years—though, I grew up here before that.”

“And you’ve never…”

“Never.”

My mind spun like a top, whirling on a point without an end in sight. “I’m not sure it was the radio,” I said.

“What else could it have been?”

“I—” How could I explain this without sounding like a complete loon? “Junie found a room for me, so I moved in there. Shortly afterward, I heard something similar. You know, music. And when I went looking for its source…”

I rifled through my pocket and removed the necklace. “I found this.”

Boone’s eyes widened. “Where did you get that? Did you take it from my room?”

His accusation startled me. From his room?

“I just told you, I heard a tinkling melody in my room and then?—”

“Here,” he said, cutting me off. He held his flattened hand toward me. “I’ll take it.”

“It’s yours?”

“Not exactly.”

He scowled, his frown deepening as I reluctantly placed the locket in his awaiting palm. Why did this bother him so much?

“Then what?—?”

The minute the pendant touched his skin, pain lanced through his expression, so I didn’t finish.

Boone closed his fingers around the chain. Then wordlessly, with the necklace still in his fist, he reached across the other items displayed on the table—old books with faded spines, teacups, black and white photographs on display—and gripped the radio.

He lifted it completely this time, bumping a few teacups on their stacked stands in the process and making them tinkle against their saucers. And he stormed from the room.

I hurried after him. “What are you doing?”

From the view through the large glass windows, the dining hall was filled with people enjoying their meals, but something told me he wasn’t taking the radio out to lunch. Instead, he veered to the right. Toward the door labeled Employees Only.

“Getting some answers,” he said through his teeth.

He didn’t wait for me, and this time, I didn’t follow him back into the old part of the inn. Was he putting the radio in his bedroom?

I stood with helpless hands in the hall, watching as he kicked open the door with his feet and disappeared inside.

“What just happened?” I asked no one but myself.

And of course, I couldn’t give myself any answers.

Boone’s behavior was beyond confusing. All I did was show him the necklace I’d found. Did he think I’d stolen it?

Why would he think it’d been in his room? How had it ended up in mine?

The radio, however, was more bizarre than anything. I couldn’t buy into the whole Santa story. The fact that it played was probably just a joke—a prank played by the inn staff. There was probably hidden speakers in the living room where they liked to tease guests who’d come eagerly to hear the radio’s story.

Why else would Boone have gotten so upset and removed it?

That still didn’t explain how the fire had vanished from the fireplace when it’d been at full blaze moments before. It wasn’t like it was one of those electric fireplaces that could be dimmed with a switch.

And then there was the completely unguarded wonderment in Boone’s handsome expression. Either he was a very good actor, or something else was at work here.