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“Let her sit in your lap so the kids can see her,” he said, shuffling over the dog to Mary Paige. He didn’t want to think about what the heat of Mary Paige’s hand had conjured within him. Not only a physical want, but also a spiritual desire he couldn’t name. Izzy seemed reluctant to move, and for one brief second, he thought about letting her stay. Something about a dog curled in his lap seemed…satisfying. He probably needed a drink or something.
“Come here, girl,” Mary Paige said, fixing the silly elf hat atop the dog’s head and holding her up to the window. The people immediately responded with bigger smiles and laughs. Izzy was, indeed, a hit.
It made Mary Paige laugh.
Which made his heart do weird loopy things.
Shit.
He needed to get off this well-used streetcar with its childhood memories, warm with laughter and Christmas carols.
But still the car rocked down the historic street spreading Christmas cheer like a rash. It had its mission of bringing Christmas joy, Brennan’s desires be damned.
“Did your parents ride with you?”
Mary Paige’s question was like an arrow to his chest. His parents. He tried not to think of them. Of the days they’d spent together, happy and oblivious to what would befall them. Lucinda Magee Henry and Malcolm Henry, III, New Orleans’s golden couple. Everyone had called his father Trent and he’d been the life of the party. King of Brennan’s world. Prince to the Henry fortune. And for a few years, Duke of the Diamond, pitching his way through the minors before returning to New Orleans as a cherished son, sitting beside football great Archie Manning’s boys and the Connicks on committees, feted, honored, loved. His mother had lovingly looked on. Until that day.
The day Brielle died.
“Yes, actually they did participate.” He hoped his voice conveyed the fact he didn’t want to talk about it.
“Oh, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be so nosy.” She gave an apologetic smile and shrug. “I’m from a small town.”
As if that explained it. Perhaps it did. They tended to know everyone’s business in small towns, didn’t they?
“My parents are deceased. Automobile accident over twenty-five years ago, so it’s been a while since anyone asked me about them.” Twenty-five years, eleven months, ten days to be exact.
Brennan locked down the memories and emotions, and instead pulled more candy and beads from the bag and handed them to her.
Okay, closed discussion.
“I’m sorry.” Her words were simple yet seemed heartfelt.
They neared Lee Circle and would soon reach the downtown core. Everyone came out to celebrate the lighting of the huge tree that sat where Poydras and Canal Streets joined, and where the anchor store of Henry Department Stores sat. New Orleans loved a party. Anything to tear them away from the mundane and give them reason to forget their cares.
It was the theme of Mardi Gras, after all.
“Ho, ho, ho!” Santa called from his perch at the front of the streetcar. The Christmas music seemed to grow louder and even Izzy tossed out a bark…mostly when she saw other dogs on leashes.
The cacophony was enough to make Brennan hop from the moving streetcar.
But he didn’t.
Because he’d given his grandfather his word. And he really wanted to be CEO. Lately, his grandfather’s requirements for the job seemed to include service and goodwill, as if those qualities were markers for a good leader. So, Brennan would wear the damn elf hat and look like a fool in front of the entire city.
Finally, they stopped before the dais, where local dignitaries and his grandfather sat. The crowd let loose a cheer as Santa stood at the open doors of the streetcar.
“Ho, ho, ho!” the elderly man bellowed, spreading his arms wide.
Two elves slipped beneath the arms of Santa and rolled out a red carpet that extended all the way to the platform. It looked impressive and Brennan wondered what minion of MBH Industries had traipsed out to the tracks and measured the distance between it and the platform.
Large speakers crackled with a tinny version of “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town” as the man himself laid his black boot on the red carpet.
“Come on, Izzy. Time to go see your daddy,” Mary Paige said in that falsetto voice people used when they talked to pets. It should have annoyed the hell out of Brennan, but it didn’t. Somehow his brain had interpreted it as kind of cute.
“Let’s get this over with.” He sighed and stood.
“Like taking a spoonful of cough syrup,” she said. “We’ll survive.”
