Once Upon a Christmas Eve by Christine Flynn

Closed. The shade had no sooner fallen back into place than he heard the metallic clicks of a latch being unbolted and a lock opening.
    The moment he stepped into the warmth of the dim room, Tommi closed the door behind him. The faint scents of cinnamon and something savory drifted from the kitchen. What he noticed more was that the top buttons of the longer white chef’s jacket she wore were again undone.
    â€œThis will only take a minute.” Ignoring the enticing vee of skin below the hollow of her throat, he watched her slide lock and latch back into place and pulled a manila envelope from inside his sweat jacket. “I just want to point out a couple of areas on the recaps that might be confusing.”
    The room held little more than shades of gray. Though bright light spilled through the open kitchen door, it barely reached a dozen feet into the quiet and empty space. The only other illumination came from the cone-shaped red pendant lights and the two spotlights above the small coffee and wine bar.
    The bar was where she motioned. “Let’s go back there. It’ll be easier to see.”
    With a small smile, she turned to lead him between the neatly set tables. He’d barely glimpsed her face, but the weak light made her skin look like alabaster, impossibly smooth, translucent, pale.
    Despite the better light, her skin still had that pale quality when they reached the bar with its row of low stools.
    Not wanting to think about her skin, the shine of her upswept hair or anything else that might distract him from his purpose, he laid the papers he’d pulled from the envelope on the bar’s black-granite surface.
    â€œThese are profit projections based on two different expansion phases. The second is a continuation of the first, so it shows you how you can grow in stages.”
    She stood at his elbow, her attention on the sheets. He caught the soft scents of lemon and herbal shampoo. Moving the first sheet in front of her, more conscious of her scent than he wanted to be, he pointed to the bottom line.
    â€œThis is the projected difference in your gross income after a year with the first phase. I called the leasing agent for this building to get figures for leasing the vacant space next door. The initial costs of expansion would eat up a lot of the first-year profits, but after that, you’d see a forty percent increase.”
    He pulled the other sheet forward. “The second phase has to do with staying open seven days a week and adding catering. That will require additional staffing,” he warned her, “but you’d have six months or so to work new people in.”
    With the bistro not yet open, the space surrounding them felt different to him. There was no clinking of utensils and glass. No murmur of conversation. No bustle. Just a tunefrom a radio in the kitchen that was so faint he couldn’t even tell what it was. All that quiet made him even more aware of Tommi’s silence as he watched her push back a strand of hair that had slipped from its clip. Her chef’s cap lay on the stool beside her, set there, apparently, when she’d pulled it from her head and dislodged the strand that promptly fell back to her cheek.
    She gave an almost imperceptible shake of her head.
    Discouraged, trying hard not to be, Tommi looked from the neat columns of figures on the pages. His bottom lines were truly impressive. Far beyond anything she’d ever imagined possible. But then, she’d never thought in terms of large profits, or a larger place. “Bigger” had never been part of her dream. She wanted her bistro just the way it was. Small. Intimate. Hers. And hers alone.
    She already knew the status quo was no longer possible. It was just hard letting go, even though she knew, too, that she would have to concede parts of her dream to keep even a modified version of that dream alive. But all she could think about just then was of how much more work his more