Montana Secret Santa Read online

  Montana Secret Santa

  A Love at the Chocolate Shop Romance

  Debra Salonen

  Montana Secret Santa

  Copyright © 2016 Debra Salonen

  EPUB Edition

  The Tule Publishing Group, LLC

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  ISBN: 978-1-945879-02-9

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  Dedication

  This book is dedicated to the inner Santa in everyone. You never know how much a simple act of kindness or generosity can mean to a person.

  And to my fellow Love at the Chocolate Shop authors! I feel so blessed to be sharing this exciting adventure with C.J., Roxanne, Melissa, Steena and Marin. I’ve never collaborated with a more generous group!

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Dear Reader

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Love at the Chocolate Shop series

  The Big Sky Mavericks Series

  About the Author

  Dear Reader,

  I hope you have/had a delightful holiday season. I had so much fun integrating a new Big Sky Mavericks story into the Love at the Chocolate Shop series. If you’ve read any of my Mavericks, you probably spotted a familiar name or two in Montana Secret Santa. If this is your first time picking up one of my books, I hope it sparked a bit of curiosity about the Zabrinski family, a name you’ll hear around Marietta from time to time.

  Who are the Zabrinskis? A close-knit, multigenerational Marietta family, first and foremost. As real and flawed as any you know. They’re also successful business owners who have pooled their time, energy and money to create a philanthropic group named after the childhood game that encouraged them to believe anything they dreamed was possible.

  Over the course of ten books, the heroes and heroines of the Big Sky Mavericks have attracted a diverse pool of interesting characters, including artists, a world-class photographer, a renowned mountain climber, a smoke jumper and a pastor, to name a few.

  If you like connected stories, I hope you’ll give the Big Sky Mavericks a try, starting with Paul and Bailey’s story, MONTANA COWGIRL. Yes, cowgirl, you can go home again.

  All the best and happy reading,

  Deb

  Chapter One

  Stilettos and snow? Bad idea.

  Krista Martin had lived and worked in Marietta, Montana, long enough to grasp the importance of proper winter footwear. But today she needed the height and authority that came with heels. One didn’t tell one’s best friend and business partner—the person responsible for Krista moving halfway across the country to help create Blue Sky Promotions—that said partner and friend’s work lately had become substandard, uninspired and phoned-in without adequate body armor and a large travel mug filled with Sage Carrigan’s cocoa.

  Krista feared Copper Mountain Chocolates—her favorite downtown Marietta haunt—was the reason she could barely snap the waistband of her black Armani pencil skirt. A bad-mommy-forgot-your-birthday gift from Krista’s producer/screenwriter mother a couple of years back. In the year and a half that Krista had lived in Montana, not a single member of her family—from either coast—had made the effort to visit her. Normally, Krista was too busy to care. But once the holiday season set in, all those old hurts and grievances seemed to rise to the surface of her consciousness.

  She’d been banking on a big uptick in business to keep her too distracted to feel sorry for herself, but between Sage Carrigan’s decision to table any talk of expansion until after the first of the year and Amanda Heller-Montgomery’s general ennui when it came to their ad agency, Krista was close to reaching level ten on her frustration meter.

  She paused a foot from the doorway to take a gulp of fortitude before leaving the warm, fragrant safety of the chocolatier. Sweet, rich, and chocolaty warmth slid like hot lava down her gullet to her mostly empty tummy. She’d been too busy practicing her speech to eat breakfast.

  She still hadn’t decided which approach to take.

  Direct and businesslike?

  Amanda. We have a problem. Blue Sky is underperforming and the obvious correlation to this decline can be tracked back to your marriage to Tucker Montgomery. I’m concerned that marriage has completely gutted your work ethic.

  Or something a bit more diplomatic?

  Amanda. Girlfriend. We need to talk. You’re more than my business partner and best friend. But I’m worried that we’re not going to meet our year-end goals if you don’t return to your pre-marriage self.

  Krista hesitated before reaching for the door. Blaming marriage might backfire. Amanda was the happiest Krista had ever seen her. But, the harsh reality couldn’t be avoided. The Amanda who invited Krista to join her on the new frontier where—to paraphrase Amanda, “…all you need is drive, brains, and decent Wi-Fi to blow the glass ceiling of NYC advertising out of the market”—was MIA.

  And, while Krista wasn’t shy about sharing her goals and ambitions, she’d let the situation at Blue Sky slide for the past nine months, hoping Amanda would return to her normal highly focused and efficient self after the first blush of marital bliss dissipated.

  They’d made a pretty fantastic team to start out. Amanda brought her local contacts to the table. Krista’s family had enough connections on both coasts to fill any gaps. And Blue Sky’s highly acclaimed promotion of last year’s Big Sky Mavericks’ New Year’s Eve Masked Ball had resulted in a dozen or more excellent paying leads.

  Their first quarter rocked. Then, Amanda took off a week at the end of February to join her soon-to-be-fiancé at Mardi Gras in New Orleans. Tucker proposed, Amanda said yes, and the snowball rolled.

  Thanks to Tucker’s connection to the Zabrinski family—all successful entrepreneurs and pilots, with several airplanes at their disposal—Krista and nine other Marietta friends flew to Louisiana to celebrate the Heller-Montgomery nuptials.

  While Krista could appreciate the romance of the near-elopement, she put no trust in grand gestures. She’d seen plenty growing up in a family of actors. But promised vows were as empty as an actor’s lines. Love and family soon became relegated to the backburner of life so each partner could pour his or her heart and soul into their respective careers.

  She truly hoped that whole happily-ever-after thing worked out better for Amanda and Tucker. They certainly seemed happy, committed, and in love. But, for the moment, at least, Krista needed to stay focused on the personal fulfillment side of life.

  Crunch time. I can do this.

  She set her travel mug on a convenient display table, laden with chocolate treasures, while she tugged on her faux rabbit fur-lined leather gloves and re-tucked
the soft alpaca scarf into the “V” of her white tuxedo-style shirt. Anticipating the single digit wind chill she’d already encountered when she scraped a thick layer of ice from the windshield of her Subaru, she pulled up the collar of her knee-length, cranberry wool coat. Even with expensive hose, she expected her legs to be numb by the time she reached the Blue Sky offices about a block and a half away.

  She grabbed her mug and turned to leave just as an older woman in a bulky, masculine-looking Carhartt jacket, grubby jeans, and cowboy boots blew in on a gust of arctic air. The woman looked familiar but Krista avoided making eye contact so she wouldn’t get pulled into a neighborly exchange of nonpersonal hi-how-are-yous.

  Grabbing the edge of the door with her free hand, she hurried outside. The cold hit like a full-on blast from a high power fire hose. Her stride required mincing steps to keep her thighs together. The last thing she needed was frostbite on her privates. Bad enough a former romantic interest had accused her of “freezing him out of the pleasure zone”.

  Who says things like that? Pleasure zone. Bah—

  The humbug required to finish the thought disappeared the instant a knee-high dog shot, headfirst, between her legs. A nearly invisible tether attached to a harness hidden beneath the animal’s stylish red and black plaid fleece overcoat snapped taut, sending Krista’s skirt to mid-thigh. She squeezed her legs tight in self-defense.

  Wobbling like a tightrope walker, she’d nearly recovered her balance when a shrill zipping sound of the dog’s coated wire tether being recalled—too late, in her opinion—yanked the animal—now square to Krista’s body—sideways against her shins.

  Things went downhill pretty fast after that. Although every action and reaction felt like slow motion from Krista’s perspective, the entire debacle probably took seconds.

  “Wait. No. Oh, crap.” The last came out on a protracted cry as her skinny pumps shifted sideways on a patch of black ice.

  Her wonderful, badly needed insulated cup of Sage’s divine cocoa went flying. Her small, smart patent leather shoulder bag shot upward to conk Krista on the chin, which caused her to windmill backwards straight into the open arms of the person reeling in their stupid dog.

  Since Krista closed her eyes, she couldn’t say for sure what happened next, but it involved ear-piercing barks, grunts and groans, and several colorful curses, which might have come from her. Luckily, the person in meager control of the dog’s leash turned out to be a man, large enough and strong enough to catch her mid-fall. She recognized his gender by his deep voice and the rock solid arm that locked around her chest as they went down. The thick padding of his winter jacket—along with a nicely built torso—cushioned her impact when they hit the sidewalk. The angle of their repose told her they’d taken another casualty with them.

  She blinked as the pile beneath them morphed into a small golden moose with floppy ears, a big black nose, and a tongue about a mile long. Too hairy for a Great Dane. The beast yanked her rescuer’s arm—the one that had been around her chest—out and back like a spastic puppeteer when it caught a whiff of her warm cocoa, spreading like a blood stain across the thin layer of ice and snow.

  The man ungallantly shoved Krista aside so he could scramble to his knees and do a hand-over-hand motion to reel in the giant dog. “River Jack, no. Cocoa is not on your diet, dude. And Mom said dogs are never supposed to eat chocolate.”

  River Jack? Odd name. She might have been intrigued if she weren’t busy taking stock of her situation.

  She pulled down her skirt the best she could.

  “It’s mostly milk. And Sage’s chocolate is the best. It won’t kill him. Them,” she corrected, noticing the beagle and a puffy hairball with a curly tail had joined River Jack at the quickly freezing trough of goodness.

  “Bear,” the guy cried, fumbling with the rat’s nest of leads in his hands. “Not you, too.

  “Bear? River Jack? What’s with the strange names?” she muttered, mostly to herself.

  The man found the right leash and tugged the largest beast away from the spill.

  “Jack is my parents’ recent rescue dog adoptee. He was a lonely hearts dog.”

  The dog in question lumbered toward them with a friendly manner, big, pink tongue still licking its chops.

  “‘Lonely hearts.’ I don’t know what that is.”

  The guy opened his arms, which barely fit around the animal’s girth, and buried his face in the fluffy blond coat. “Mom said that’s what the staff calls animals that have been at the shelter for months, even years.”

  Krista stared, transfixed by the sweet bond evident between man and dog. An emotion she couldn’t quite name—yearning? wistfulness?—climbed up her throat making speech impossible.

  The man looked her way, his smile bemused. “I suck at dog-sitting.”

  Krista agreed on one level but, since she’d never owned pets and didn’t have a great deal of patience with other people’s animals, she’d learned to keep her opinion to herself. After a quick inventory to make sure the only thing bruised was her pride, she tried to figure out the most graceful way to stand without putting her nylon-covered knees on the trampled, crusty snow.

  With an even more impatient sound, the dog walker tossed the ends of the leashes on the ground and jumped to his feet. “River Jack, stay.” He turned toward her and extended his hand, his glove coated in dog hair. “What’s wrong with me? Screw Jack’s diet. I can’t believe I left a beautiful girl sitting on the ice and snow. Double suck.”

  “Double suck?” She barely got the words out before he grabbed her by the upper arms and lifted her to her feet.

  He didn’t let go right away. “Are you hurt?”

  His thick, tanned, buckskin leather gloves looked huge against the cranberry wool of her coat.

  She shifted her gaze to his interesting blue-gray eyes that crinkled at the corners when he smiled. A smile that sent shivers—the hot sort—up her spine like a mini-burst of lightening.

  He was a hunk. In a scruffy, just tumbled out of bed sort of way. What’s someone his age doing walking dogs at this time of day?

  Cute and unemployed? No thanks. She went for the high-achiever, goal-oriented, make-partner-by-thirty type. “A male version of you,” Amanda had said recently. “That’s what you’re holding out for and, frankly, Krista, they’re not that easy to come by—especially in Montana.”

  A point supported by Krista’s three dates in a year and a half. But having no man in her life was better than wasting time on the wrong man. A lesson she’d learned the hard way.

  “I’m okay. Nothing’s broken.”

  “Thank God.” He let go of her to make a pretend brow-swipe of relief. “I’ve only been home a week. My brother would never let me live it down if I wound up getting sued the first time I walked the dogs on my own.”

  “I’m not going to sue you. Your dog? Maybe.”

  He picked up the leashes again and coaxed all three animals to his side. “Bindi,” he said, addressing the animal. “Apologize at once. I mean it. This lady has every right to be mad at us. Mostly me, but you know how you get when you’re focused on a scent.”

  His tone—and humor—took the edge off her irritation.

  “Bindi was a gift from my sister after Mom and Dad’s fourteen-year-old beagle died. She’s only four. Or five. Which is probably a teenager in dog years. And teens are just… well… impossible.”

  She refused to smile but the teasing look in his eyes made it tough not to give in to his goofy good humor.

  “And Bear is short for Teddy Bear. Look at that face. Self-explanatory, right? He’s a chow mix they inherited from my brother who was dating a girl who worked at the animal rescue at the time.”

  Krista looked at the dog in question. The fuzzy square face with coal black eyes, short ears, and shiny nose could easily have fit on a shelf with a selection of stuffed animals. “You’re right. He does.”

  She noticed the dogs studying her with varying expressions of interest. She had
a feeling they weren’t impressed by what they saw.

  “Jack has an eating disorder.” He lowered his voice and leaned closer to whisper, “Mom says we’re not supposed to use the word f-a-t because that’s a form of body shaming. Nobody knows Jack’s story, but it probably didn’t involve a lot of exercise, hence our twice-daily walking routine.”

  He held up his hand, boy scout-like. “I promise to pay better attention in the future and avoid the chocolate shop at all cost.”

  Coming from New Jersey, Krista rarely, if ever, was left without a snappy comeback, but the sincerity behind this guy’s slightly abashed look robbed her of speech. Crazy, ridiculous, disparate thoughts played tag in her head. Is he for real? Could this be a prank? Is my brother hiding in one of these storefronts with a film crew? Why can’t I stop looking at him?

  Fortunately, the door of the chocolate shop opened and two people rushed out. Dakota, Sage’s clerk, must have witnessed the debacle through the store window because she carried a handful of napkins and a replacement cocoa. The same cowboy-woman who Krista recalled passing on her way out of the shop followed. “Young lady, you need to get yourself a pair of snow boots.”

  Krista couldn’t remember the last time she’d been scolded. Her lips parted but no words came out. Dumbfounded twice in one morning. This did not bode well for her upcoming meeting. And when she saw the dog walker’s gaze on her, her cheeks turned icy hot.

  “And you, young man, need to keep your eye on the ball. Or on the dogs, as the case may be.” She petted and praised all three canines before looking at the human holding their leashes.

  Her demeanor instantly became less schoolmarm and more schoolgirl. “Oh, my word. Jonah Andrews,” she exclaimed, pointing him out to the small crowd that had gathered to gawk. “I should have recognized the dogs. Your mother said you were going to be house sitting and dog walking for a few months. Looks like you need more practice.”