Christmas with Him: The Tycoon's Christmas Proposal / A Bravo Christmas Reunion / Marry-Me Christmas

“I don’t know, Mr. Burke. You still feel awfully tense to me,” she objected.

Out of the corner of his eye, he thought he saw Eve’s full lips twitch.

“I’m fine.” To Eve he said, “Give me fifteen minutes and we’ll go over your concerns.”

“Sure.”

This time he was positive she was holding back a smile when she sauntered from the room.

Eve waited in a sitting room that was tucked just off the kitchen. The housekeeper had thoughtfully brought her a cup of hot tea. She sipped it now as she stared into the flames of the fire that was flickering cheerfully in the hearth and contemplated her client.

Dawson Burke was a surprise, and not because he’d been clothed in nothing more than a bedsheet at their introduction. He was not the paunchy, middle-aged workaholic who so often relied on her services. God bless those men since they had been helping to pay her bills for nearly a decade, but she hadn’t expected Dawson to be quite so young or handsome or—she sipped her tea—physically fit.

As an unattached woman of not quite thirty, there was no way details such as those were going to escape her attention.

Eve was relatively new to the Denver area, and the state of Colorado for that matter. The beauty of her job was that she could do it anywhere. She’d been looking for a fresh start after a particularly nasty breakup the previous spring, and after some Internet research she’d decided that anyplace with a view as pretty and panoramic as the one the Mile High City boasted just might provide it.

So she’d been settling in, building up a client list and sinking down roots. She’d caught a lucky break when she’d met Carole Deming while shopping in a boutique a couple of months back. The two women had hit it off right away. The fact that Carole was fifteen years older and they were technically competitors hadn’t stood in the way of their friendship. Indeed, Carole had been kind enough to toss some of her clients Eve’s way while she recuperated from surgery.

What was it she’d said about Dawson Burke? “I think you’ll find him a challenge.”

At the time, Eve had assumed Carole was referring to his gift needs, not his personality. Now she suspected she understood perfectly why the other woman had laughed while saying it. A challenge? Just getting past his pit bull of a secretary had taken an effort, which was why she’d decided to drop by his home unannounced.

Eve didn’t mind difficult clients. She’d worked for plenty of them in the past, picky people who gave her cart blanche to buy presents for others or clothing for themselves only to veto her every choice later. But this was different. She simply couldn’t do what Dawson wanted her to do without gathering more information, gaining more insight. It wasn’t right. As far as Eve was concerned, family members deserved more thought when it came to gifts. She had no qualms about buying for them, but she wouldn’t allow the purchases to be impersonal.

She set the tea aside and stood, walking closer to the fire when memories left her chilled. Her mother had died when Eve was eight years old. Suicide, or so it had been rumored. The alternative, an accidental drug overdose, had carried nearly as much stigma, especially since her mother’s family blamed her father. Growing up, she’d been shuttled from one relative’s house to another’s. Her dad had hit the road, ostensibly to try to turn his pipe dream of being a musician into a bona fide profession. More accurately, though, he’d been running from a reality he could not accept.

The last she’d heard, he had a gig at a pub in Myrtle Beach. At nearly sixty, Buck Hawley was no longer waiting for his big break. But he was still running.

He’d missed out on more than two decades of Eve’s life, though he always managed to send her a gift to mark another birthday and Christmas. She hated those gifts. They were always impersonal things that Eve knew upon opening he hadn’t picked out. For that matter, even the signatures on most of the cards hadn’t been his.

While growing up, that had pained her. All these years later it still hurt. She’d needed her father’s time, craved his attention as a child. At the very least, she’d wanted to know he thought about her while picking out gifts. So, when clients asked her to buy for their loved ones, she required more than the name and age Dawson had provided on his list.

“Would you care for more tea?”

She turned to find the man in question standing in the doorway. His dark hair was combed back from his forehead, lean cheeks freshly shaved. He was wearing an expertly cut charcoal suit with a white shirt and conservatively patterned tie, yet her heart did the same little somersault it had upon seeing far more of his skin.

“I’m fine.” Eve spoke the words for her own benefit as well as his.

He nodded. “Well, not to rush you, but I do have someplace I need to be. I believe you said you wouldn’t take much of my time.”

“Right.” She retrieved her briefcase from the side of the chair. “I do things a little differently than Carole.”

“So I gathered,” he said dryly.

“For starters, when I shop for close relatives such as those on your list, I need to know something about them.” He opened his mouth, but before he could speak Eve added, “Something beyond their sex and age and your price range. For instance, what are their hobbies? Do they have a favorite color? Do they collect something? For the children, are they into video games, sports? Who’s their favorite recording artist? And for the record, I don’t believe in gift cards, fruit baskets, flower arrangements or the like. Anyone can purchase and send those. They don’t take any effort or require any thought. I won’t buy gifts like that.”

“Maybe I have the wrong person for the job.”

Dollar signs flashed in neon green before her eyes. This was a big account, the biggest by far of the ones Carole had fed her. The commission it was likely to bring would go a long way toward fattening up the bank account her cross-country move had depleted. Still, Eve crossed her arms, blinked the dollar signs away and said, “Maybe you do. It’s a matter of principle for me.”

He studied her a long moment before sighing. “What do you need?”

Eve opened her case and pulled out a folder, which she handed to him. “Given how difficult it’s been to reach you, I decided that instead of conducting an interview I would give you this questionnaire. Fill it out at your convenience, but if I could have it back to me by next Monday, that would great.”

“Anything else?”

She didn’t miss the sarcasm in his tone, but she chose to ignore it. “Actually, there is. While I don’t mind flying blind when it comes to buying gifts for business associates and clients, if you have any insights or personal anecdotes about any of the people on your list, I’d welcome them. Feel free to jot down anything that comes to you on the line I’ve provided next to their names.”

“Maybe I should go shopping with you.”

Again, she ignored his sarcasm. Smiling sweetly, she replied, “It’s kind of you to offer, but that won’t be necessary. Unless you really want to. I can always use someone to carry the purchases out to the parking lot.”

She wasn’t sure why she had just baited him, other than the fact that his arrogance rubbed her the wrong way.

“Excuse me, Mr. Burke?” the housekeeper said from the doorway. “The driver has brought the car around.”

“Fine.” He turned his attention back to Eve. “I believe we’re finished.”

“For now,” she affirmed and had the satisfaction of watching him scowl.

CHAPTER TWO

DAWSON prided himself on being the sort of man who thought outside the box when finding solutions for problems. It was one of the things that had helped make him a success in business. So, when adversity knocked Friday afternoon, he let opportunity answer the door.

“Your mother is on line one and Eve Hawley is on line two,” Rachel informed him.

“I’ll take the call from my mother. Tell Miss Hawley I’ll call her back.” As he said it, he glanced in the direction of his in-box, where the questionnaire she’d given him remained untouched. He had a good idea of the reason behind Eve’s call. He also knew why his mother was phoning. The charity ball was Saturday.

“Hello, Mom.”

“Dawson, darling. How are you?” she asked.

“Fine.”

“So, you always say,” she chided. “But I still worry about you.”

“There’s no need to, really.”

But she disagreed. “It’s a mother’s job.”

“I’m an adult, Mom. Thirty-eight last month,” he reminded her.

“Your age doesn’t matter. Nor, for that matter, does mine.” Tallulah was quiet for a moment. Then she said, “I know this is a difficult time of year for you.”

“Mom—”

“It’s a difficult time of the year for everyone,” she went on. “We all miss Sheila and Isabelle.”