Second Chance Christmas (The Colorado Cades) by Tanya Michaels

avoiding us . “He assured me in his last message that he will absolutely be here for Christmas, but I don’t have specifics. He won’t let you down, Arden. No worries, okay?”
    “No worries.” Her emotion-clogged tone clashed with the carefree words. Turning her head, she surreptitiously wiped at the tears she seemed to think he couldn’t see.
    As a family who’d already had their turn with Santa passed by on the outside of the velvet ropes, Arden gasped indignantly. “Did you see the picture she was carrying? It was off-center, and the lighting was completely wrong.”
    He laughed. “I should have known better than to accompany a professional photographer to let someone else take her picture. Is this like that saying about doctors making the worst patients?”
    “I’m not being difficult,” she said defensively.
    “Never said you were, sis.”
    “It’s not wrong to have standards and pride in my work.” She narrowed her eyes as if daring him to correct her.
    Ha! He wasn’t stupid.
    “You know, it isn’t too late to scrap this plan,” he told her. “We could go to your studio. I know a few older ski bums who could let me borrow a red suit and some padding. You can take the high-quality portrait Garrett and Hope deserve.”
    She poked him in the ribs. “You’re just looking for an excuse to leave.”
    “Being here is freaking me out,” he admitted, wondering if he could explain his sudden onset of claustrophobia in a way that would make sense to her.
    “This freaks you out?” she echoed. “This? Correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t you have dawn patrol this morning where you hiked through the mountains with several pounds of dynamite strapped to your back?”
    “Carefully stowed in my backpack, yes. I’ve had extensive training and years of practice for doing avalanche prevention.” After heavy snowfalls, such as the town had experienced late last night, a patrol often went out to do avalanche prevention. The blasting created controlled avalanches, rather than waiting for an unsuspecting tourist to trigger a slab. Although there hadn’t been much accumulation today, they were expecting another front to move in, dropping more snow tonight and possibly bringing about blizzard conditions. Patrollers knew that “blizzard” didn’t just mean a lot of the white stuff, it referred to dangerously high winds and a serious lack of visibility.
    “Guess I was so busy learning about safety on the mountain,” he said, “that I missed the sessions on how to survive the mall during Yuletide.”
    “Take heart,” Arden told him. “I think we’ve moved up two places in the past ten minutes.”
    “If it keeps up like this, we’ll reach the front just in time for her to have her picture taken with the Easter Bunny,” he quipped. “Are you sure I can’t convince you to go to your studio?”
    “Quite. As you pointed out in your story about me, a baby’s first Santa photo is a rite of passage. Besides, practically every photo I’ve given Garrett of her so far has been taken by me. This will be a nice change of pace. But speaking of my studio, Elisabeth called yesterday evening. They were happy with the engagement photos.”
    “Was there ever any doubt?”
    “Actually...” She pursed her lips. “Some of the takes were great, but there were others I was less pleased with. My job is more than technical proficiency with the equipment. I have to put my clients at ease, find the real them, so to speak.”
    “You’re not going to get all New Agey on me and start talking about trying to capture people’s auras on camera, are you?”
    She ignored him. “I feel like maybe I didn’t succeed in putting them at ease. A few of the pictures had a stilted quality where they didn’t look like two people in love so much as two people who are supposed to look like they’re in love, like models in a bridal magazine, if that makes any sense.”
    He didn’t want to hear this. Elisabeth wasn’t part of his