Harlequin Holiday Collection - Four Classic Seasonal Novellas

kitchen.
    They’d been playing a game of hide-and-seek with a body since the moment he’d arrived.
    “No, it was nothing like that,” she said. Holly pulled back a little, rubbing a weary hand over her eyes. “He was dead when he got here.”
    Hmm. FedEx’d corpse?
    Holly explained, leaving the pantry as she spoke, as if unable to stand the sight of the dead man. When he learned that Leo Meaney had tumbled from her enormous, bound evergreen like some kind of sick present straight out of The Nightmare Before Christmas, he didn’t know whether to laugh or groan.
    One thing quickly became clear, though—Kipling, Meaney’s partner, hadn’t gone back to the tree lot looking for the diamonds they’d stolen together. He’d returned for the partner he’d obviously killed.
    “Why didn’t you call the police immediately?”
    Her wide eyes, so tired and confused as she’d told him about her morning, suddenly shifted. Her hands twisting in front of her and her bottom lip disappearing between her teeth, she softly admitted, “I’m going to. After you and your crew finish the story on the inn.”
    Zach simply stared, his jaw falling open. Holly tilted her head, her chin up, almost defiant as she dared him to criticize her. Glancing toward her elderly grandparents, both watching with trepidation and anxiety, he remembered just how much this family had at stake today. From the sound of it, if they didn’t get some publicity—the good kind, not some involving dead bodies—they could very well lose this home. The home Holly’s grandfather had lived in his entire life.
    Catch twenty-two. Damn.
    He knew enough about law enforcement to know they should call the police right now, this very second.
    But could he do that to Holly’s grandparents? To her?

Chapter Eleven
    “All right. I’ll help you,” Zach Weldon said. “But only until after the crew leaves. Then we call the police immediately. ”
    Holly couldn’t believe it. She’d been prepared for Zach’s anger when she told him she’d been hiding a dead body. And though she’d seen all those emotions on Zach’s handsome face, he was now offering to do something crazy—illegal even.
    He was going to help her.
    “Are you serious?”
    “I’ll probably regret it,” he admitted, “but yes, I’m serious.”
    The college freshman who’d broken her heart probably would have done exactly what he wanted to do—call the police—no matter who it hurt. Just as he’d done what he wanted the night they had split up and slept with the first girl who’d give it up to him.
    But she could tell that this Zach was different. The warm, sympathetic expression on his face when he gazed at her near-homeless grandparents said how much he’d changed. He’d been a sexy, cute, charming guy the first time she’d fallen in love with him.
    Now he was a blazingly sexy, handsome, thoughtful man who was willing to, uh, bend the law in order to help her.
    Zach’s unexpected kindness didn’t just make her melt a little—it made the quietly banked inferno of desire inside her erupt until she was nearly engulfed by the flames.
    She’d wanted him from the moment he’d shown up at her door.
    Now Holly knew she was going to take him.
    “Thank you, Zach.” Unable to resist, Holly lifted her arms to encircle his broad shoulders and pressed against him in a quick, grateful hug. Only, it wasn’t exactly quick. He dropped his hands to her hips, holding her against him. For a long, heady moment, she forgot about the others in the room—or the corpse in the pantry—and enjoyed being in his arms again.
    The embrace he’d offered when he’d discovered the body had been one of comfort and concern. This was different. Though to the others it might appear to be strictly gratitude, both she and Zach knew it was more. He had to feel the way her heart was pounding out of her chest, had to hear her choppy breaths near his ear. Had to know that she was not only grateful, she was also very attracted to him. Just as she’d always been.
    And judging by the ridge of heat she could feel against her thighs, he felt the same way.
    When her grandfather cleared his throat, Holly finally remembered where they were and who was watching. She let Zach go, but didn’t step away. Instead, she turned around, blocking most of his body from view.
    Considering the guy was hard for her and her grandmother had eyes like a hawk, it was the least she could do.

    With Holly in his arms, the soft curves of