Baby, It's Cold Outside Read Free Page B

He had a mouth that promised sin and made her libido sit up and start begging.
    Which was so inappropriate. They were clearing up from a children’s party. She shouldn’t be thinking about Santa and how attractive he was. For all she knew, he could be married, or at least with someone. Though, she thought, given how wary he’d been with the children at first, she was pretty sure he didn’t have kids of his own.
    No. Nothing was going to happen. She was in America to help her godmother and to get her head together, not to start fantasizing about the first man who’d smiled at her.
    Between them they made short work of clearing up, and he helped her carry the leftover party food to the nursing staff.
    They walked to the entrance of the hospice together, and Ellie stood there, shocked by the drifts of white that confronted them. The last time she’d looked out of the window, huge flakes had been falling, but it had only just been starting to settle. Now, every surface was covered in snow. “Wow. I didn’t think you’d get that much snow in Philadelphia.”
    “It varies. Some winters, you get a sprinkle of snow; others, you get a major snowstorm. Obviously this is a snowstorm year.” Stand-in Santa looked at her. “How are you getting home, Chief Elf?”
    “I’m taking the bus.” Provided she could actually find the bus stop.
    “The bus?” He looked at her as if she had two heads.
    “I have a driving license, but I’m used to a right-hand-drive car, so I haven’t borrowed my godmother’s car,” she explained. “I got a lift here with Sally—she does the deliveries for my godmother.”
    “I’ll check the timetable for you. Which line do you need?” She told him and he checked his cell phone. “Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but it seems the buses aren’t running. The snow’s brought everything to a stop.”
    She shrugged. “Then it looks as if I’ll have to walk.” It was a pity she didn’t have her Wellingtons with her. She might get a bit cold and wet, and it’d take her a long time to walk back to Betty’s house, but her shoes were flat and had a decent grip, so she probably wouldn’t fall over and hurt herself.
    “Where are you going?”
    She told him the neighborhood.
    He shook his head. “You can’t possibly walk all that way. Look, my car’s just over here. I’ll give you a lift.”
    She could see how thickly the snow was lying in the roads, and there wasn’t a single car actually driving through the streets. He hadn’t been exaggerating about everything coming to a standstill. “Thanks, but I don’t think it’d be a good idea to drive in this.”
    “I’ve driven in worse. You just need to take it sensibly and slowly. Come on, let’s get going before the snow gets any deeper.”
    Ellie thought about it. She didn’t know him from Adam—and he wasn’t the man she’d expected to arrive as Santa. Then again, Santa had been expecting Betty, so she supposed that made them even.
    She wanted to trust him.
    But she was nearly four thousand miles away from home, and the only people she really knew in the city… Well, one of them was stuck in a hospital bed. The others, she’d have to check the employee records back at the bakery to find out where they actually lived.
    As if he guessed her worries, he said softly, “I should’ve introduced myself properly earlier. My name’s Mitch Carter. I work at Holford PR with C.J. Holford—the guy who was supposed to be Santa. You can look me up on the Internet if you want to make sure I’m who I say I am before you get in my car.”
    He sounded plausible enough. And she felt mean for actually checking. But the last time she’d taken someone on trust, it had ended in tears. Hers. So was it so bad to want to play it safe this time?
    He didn’t seem to mind waiting the few seconds while she looked up the firm on her cell phone and checked its website.
    And there was his name, right underneath his picture. Mitch Carter.
    He’d told