Bailey removed his own hat, wig and beard.
She brought her arm around to her front again and tried to reach the back of the dress from over her shoulder, still without success.
He should offer to help. That would be the polite and gentlemanly thing to do. But as his sister-in-law had noted, he was a Grooge and, still stinging from Mrs. Claus’s sharp rebuke, not in a very charitable or helpful mood. Instead, he unbuckled his wide belt, removed the heavy jacket and padded belly, eager to shed the external trappings of his own role.
Finally, she huffed out a breath. “You could offer to help, you know?”
“If you need help, you could ask,” he countered.
“Would you please help me unzip my dress?” she finally said.
“Usually I buy a woman dinner before I try to get her out of her clothes.” He couldn’t resist teasing. “But since you asked...”
She turned her back to give Bailey access to the zipper, but not before he saw her roll her eyes in response to his comment. “Do you have to work at being offensive or is it a natural talent?”
“It’s a defense mechanism,” he said, surprising them both with his honesty. “I screwed up in there—I know I did. I knew I would. That’s why I didn’t want to put on the stupid suit and pretend to be jolly.”
“You ever try actually being jolly instead of just pretending?” she asked, as he tugged on the zipper pull.
“Yeah, but it didn’t work out so well.”
“I’m sorry.” She pulled her arms out of the sleeves and let the bodice fall forward, then stepped out of the skirt to reveal her own clothes: a snug-fitting scoop neck sweater in Christmas red over a pair of skinny jeans tucked into knee-high boots.
A definite hottie with curves that should have warning signs.
He looked away from the danger zone, pushing the suspenders off his shoulders and stepping out of Santa’s oversize pants, leaving him clad in a long-sleeve Henley and well-worn jeans. He picked up the flannel shirt he’d shed before donning the Santa coat and put it on over the Henley.
She neatly folded her dress and tucked it into a shopping bag. He watched her out of the corner of his eye, unable to shake the feeling that, though he couldn’t think of her name, he was certain he knew her from somewhere.
Before he could ask her if they’d met before, there was a knock at the door.
“Come in.”
They both said it at the same time, then she smiled at him, and that easy curve of her lips only increased her hotness factor.
The door opened and Annie poked her head in.
“Oh, Serena, I’m so glad to see that you made it.”
“I did. Sorry I was almost late. There was some excitement at the clinic this morning.”
Serena.
Clinic.
The pieces finally clicked into place and Bailey realized why the substitute Mrs. Claus looked familiar. She was Serena Langley, a vet tech at the same clinic where his sister-in-law was the receptionist.
“What kind of excitement?” Annie asked, immediately concerned.
“Alistair Warren brought in a fat stray that he found under his porch. The cat turned out not to be fat but pregnant and gave birth to nine kittens.”
“Nine?” Annie echoed.
Serena nodded. “Exam Room Three is going to be out of commission for a while, because Brooks doesn’t want to disturb the new mom or her babies.”
“I can’t wait to see them,” Annie enthused. “But right now, I want to hear about the substitute Santa’s visit with the local scout troop so that I can report back to his more-sick-than-jolly brother.”
Bailey turned to Serena again. Truthfully, his gaze had hardly shifted away from her since they’d entered the dressing room. He’d thought it was because he was trying to figure out where they might have crossed paths before, but even with that question now answered, he found his attention riveted on her.
He waited for Serena to say that the substitute Santa had sucked and that the event had been a disaster—although maybe not in terms quite so blunt and harsh. At the very least, he anticipated her telling his sister-in-law that Bailey had screwed up and almost made a kid cry. And he couldn’t have disputed either of those points, because they were both true.
But Serena seemed content to let him respond to the inquiry, and he did so, only saying, “It was...an experience.”
His sister-in-law’s brows lifted. “I’m not sure how to interpret that.”
Bailey looked at Mrs. Claus again.
“Everything went well,” Serena assured her friend.
Annie exhaled, obviously relieved. “Of course, I knew the two of you would be able to pull it off.”
“If you were so confident, you wouldn’t have rushed over here to interrogate us,” he pointed out. “Although I suspect your concerns were really about Santa and not Mrs. Claus.”
“Well, you were the more reluctant substitute,” she told him. “Serena didn’t hesitate when I asked her to fill in.”
“I’m always happy to help a friend,” Serena said. “But now I should be on my way.”
“What’s your hurry?” Annie asked.
“I’m not in a hurry,” she denied. “It’s just that I left early this morning and...well, you know that Marvin doesn’t like it when I’m gone all day.”
She seemed a little embarrassed by this admission, or so he guessed by the way her gaze dropped away.
Bailey frowned, wondering about this Marvin and the nature of his relationship with Serena. Was he her husband? Boyfriend? How did he express his disapproval of her absence? Did he give her the cold shoulder when she got home? Or did he have a hot temper?
The possibility roused his ire. Lord knew he wasn’t without faults of his own and tried not to judge others by their shortcomings, but he had no tolerance for men who bullied women or children.
“You worry too much about Marvin,” Annie chided.
“You know I can’t stand it when he looks at me with those big sad eyes.”
“I know you let him use those big sad eyes to manipulate you,” Annie said. “You need to stand firm and let him know he’s not the boss of you.”
Bailey didn’t think his sister-in-law should be so quick to disregard her friend’s concerns. No one knew
