Jingle Bell Rock Read online

  Jingle Bell Rock

  Linda Winstead Jones

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

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  Blue Christmas, Copyright 1997, 2013 by Linda Winstead Jones.

  Always on My Mind, Copyright 1998, 2013 by Linda Winstead Jones

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions.

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  Contents

  Blue Christmas

  Always on My Mind

  Recent Releases

  About the Author

  Blue Christmas

  Linda Winstead Jones

  Chapter One

  Jess tried to concentrate on the calendar on her desk and the appointments she’d jotted so neatly there for January, but she couldn’t. Her mind wandered, her fingers fluttered, and her eyes drifted from the calendar to the door. The noise in the main office, just outside that closed door, was more than distracting. It was maddening.

  Dean was doing his Elvis impersonation to encouraging hoots and hollers. It was a Christmas Eve tradition Jess had reluctantly become accustomed to, Dean’s rendition of “Blue Christmas,” sung very badly but with a great deal of enthusiasm. With a sigh she pushed her swivel chair back, and resigned herself to the fact that she wasn’t going to get any more work done tonight. Truth be told this was a sight she didn’t want to miss. After all, it only came once a year.

  She opened her office door to a Christmas party already in full swing. Sure enough, Dean had donned his Elvis wig and white jumpsuit—the one with red and green spangles, bell bottoms, and fringed sleeves—and he was standing on Lorraine’s desk as he performed for the crowd. Dark sunglasses hid his beady eyes. In an unmistakably sensual manner, he occasionally caressed the long scarf that hung around his neck.

  Maddening or not, the performance was great. Dean had his act down, complete with rotating pelvis and seductive sneer, both directed toward the females in the audience. If only he could carry a tune.

  The crowd was receptive, as always. Even Terry Bartlett, Vandiver Records’ no-nonsense accountant, grinned as he watched the show. Jess shook her head in wonder. She’d have thought that people who worked for a recording company would be more discriminating.

  All eyes were on Dean, including hers, so she didn’t realize that Jimmy Blue was making his way toward her until it was too late to retreat into her office without looking like a complete fool. She turned her head. His eyes instantly locked on hers, he smiled, and with a few fluid strides of those long legs, he was standing beside her.

  Compared to the festive apparel worn by every other female in the room, her perfectly tailored gray suit was drab, downright dowdy, and Jess was suddenly all too aware of that fact.

  “I thought maybe you were going to spend Christmas in your office,” Jimmy said with a smile, and Jess knew then that he’d been watching for her. Watching and waiting. He held two cups of putrid-green punch in his hands, and handed Jess one as he reached her.

  He looked particularly gorgeous, but then he always did. It was the thick dark hair, short but not so short that an errant strand didn’t brush his forehead now and again. It was the smoky gray eyes set in a face that was handsome without bring pretty. Gorgeous as he was, Jimmy had a man’s face, angular and sharp, tough and tanned. His long, lean body was, as usual, encased in worn denim. Hell, even if he couldn’t sing—and boy could he sing—he was going to be a star.

  Too bad.

  “I couldn’t possibly miss Dean’s annual performance,” she said coolly, trying to be friendly but not too friendly.

  Jimmy studied Dean for a moment. A pained expression came and went quickly. This was Jimmy’s first Christmas with Vandiver Records, and watching his A&R man put on a bad Elvis impersonation was obviously a shock. “You know,” he said in a low voice, “if I’d heard this before today, I don’t think I could’ve cut this song for the Christmas album.”

  The Christmas album had been Dean’s idea, and “Blue Christmas” was the title track. It was one of Dean’s favorite songs, and it seemed a perfect play on the rising star’s name.

  The first time Jess had heard the recording, she’d known Jimmy’s success with his first album was no fluke. “Legs” had been an instant success, and the title track had gotten great radio play, including a little crossover onto rock stations. The video—which was nothing more than Jimmy, his Sunburst Stratocaster, his band, and a small collection of women with appropriately impressive appendages—had played regularly for months, and still showed up on CMT now and again. It had an insane number of hits on YouTube.

  “Legs” was a good time, it was country sprinkled heavily with southern rock. The song was hard-hitting, a little raunchy, and it had spawned a short-lived dance that had shown up in clubs all across the country.

  “Legs” had put Jimmy on the map, but “Blue Christmas” was quickly making him a star. Jimmy Blue didn’t only look good in a tight pair of jeans; he could sing. His voice was natural, never forced or harsh. After the success of the slow and easy version of “Blue Christmas,” Dean was already talking ballads for Jimmy’s next album.

  “I tell you what.” Jimmy leaned just a bit closer and lowered his voice. “How ‘bout we leave Dean in Nashville and you come to L.A. with me next week.”

  In a room full of people—secretaries, executives, and musicians—it suddenly seemed as if she and Jimmy were all alone. They weren’t in the middle of things, here against the wall, but it wasn’t distance that separated them from the crowd. It was Jimmy Blue’s voice, and the way he shifted his body so that all Jess saw was him.

  She hated the way he did this to her, made her feel like a lovestruck teenager who allowed her hormones to rule her head and her heart. Her stomach knotted, her knees all but wobbled, and she could swear her heartbeat sped up considerably.

  “No, thanks,” she said calmly. “I’m sure Dean has big plans for you in Hollywood.”

  “That’s what I’m afraid of,” Jimmy whispered.

  A cameo in a Western comedy Jimmy had recorded a song for was taking him to Hollywood. The part was very small, just one line, but Dean was sure this was another step in making Jimmy Blue a big star.

  “Do you know what he’s bought me now?” Jimmy all but moaned. “A frock coat and a red silk vest. I swear, he’s trying to make me look like a riverboat gambler.”

  “So?” Jess refused to let her anxiety show. She could be tough when she had to. “You refused to wear the leather pants and the sequined jacket, and the beaded shirt and ten-gallon hat, and that other”—she waved her free hand as she searched for a proper description of the bizarre outfit Dean had recently tried to force upon Jimmy—“thing. Just tell him thanks but no th
anks.”

  No matter how Dean tried to reshape Jimmy Blue, he failed. Jimmy said, sang, and wore what he wanted. His wardrobe reflected his pre–showbiz life in Texas, and that meant jeans and cowboy boots, a very plain black cowboy hat, and simple shirts—Tshirts or button-down collars without adornment of any kind. Jimmy was every woman’s all-American dream, but Dean wasn’t quite satisfied with that.

  “I already did, but I hurt his feelings.”

  “I’ll let you in on a little secret. He doesn’t have any feelings,” Jess confided in a hoarse whisper.

  Dean launched into a new number, “Jailhouse Rock,” and Lorraine, who was normally an efficient and sensible employee, provided the obligatory swooning-female scream.

  Jimmy closed one eye and grimaced. It wasn’t Lorraine’s scream that distressed him, Jess knew, it was the fact that Dean was horrendously off-key.

  “I can’t take it,” Jimmy said softly, and with a gentle and strong hand he propelled Jess into her office. She took a single step backward, almost stumbled, and then Jimmy closed the door behind him and leaned against it.

  Jess recovered her balance and her composure, and slipped around the desk to take her chair. That simple move placed the desk between her and Jimmy—just as she’d planned.

  “Better,” he said as he stepped up to her desk. He placed his punch cup at the corner, next to hers, and sat casually on the edge, twisting his body so he could look down at her. “I have a favor to ask you, and I couldn’t do it while that was going on.”

  She could still hear Dean, but beyond the closed door his voice was muffled and distant.

  “A favor?” she asked when Jimmy hesitated.

  “Dean said you’re not going home for Christmas.”

  “No.” Thank goodness. Finally, a Christmas without a disaster. No family feud, no burned turkey, no annual holiday crisis. Well, all those family traditions would be present in the Lennox household; Jess just wouldn’t be there to participate. “I’ve got lots of work to pick up on right after the holidays, so it didn’t make much sense to try to make the trip to Florida.”

  Jimmy leaned toward her slightly. “What are you going to do?”

  Jess smiled, a true and easy smile. “I’m going to eat chocolate chip cookies and canned soup, wear pajamas all day, and watch television. You know, It’s a Wonderful Life, Miracle on 34th Street, The Grinch.”

  “So, you don’t have any plans.”

  “Those are my plans.”

  He nodded his head as if he understood, but he didn’t. She was sure of that.

  “I have kind of a problem, and you could really help me out, Jess.” He was using that down-home, good-ol’-boy, aw-shucks, honeyed voice he reserved for moments when he really wanted something. She’d been caught in this trap once before.

  Jess steeled her spine and strengthened her resolve. No matter what this favor might be, the answer was going to be no. “Get this over with Blue, and tell me what you want.” The sooner she got rid of him, the better.

  He smiled at her. God, he had a killer smile. It was enough to make any woman weak in the knees. “My whole family’s flying in tomorrow for Christmas. My folks, my sister, and five brothers. They haven’t seen the new place yet, and it seemed like a good time for them to make the trip.”

  She waited patiently for him to get to the point.

  “My mother, she’s been worried since I got here that I might fall in with the wrong crowd, and—”

  “Blue,” Jess interrupted. “You’re thirty-one years old, and your mother is worried that you might fall in with the wrong crowd?”

  He shrugged his shoulders slightly. “You know how it is.”

  She didn’t, actually, but she didn’t say so. Her own mother had openly rejoiced as each Lennox child—three of them—left the nest.

  “She kept asking me about the dancers in the “Legs” video, wanting to know if they were sweet girls from good families and if any of them were married. I told her I don’t know how many times that I didn’t know those girls at all, but she wouldn’t let up. Every week she wanted to know if I had a girlfriend, if I’d met any nice girls…”

  “Your mother takes quite an interest in your love life,” Jess said dryly.

  Jimmy raised his eyebrows slightly and leaned closer. “She wants me to get married. She wants grandchildren.”

  “Why is she picking on you, Blue? You have five brothers and a sister.”

  “All younger, and not a one of them married. Luke and Ginny are still in high school, John and Robbie are in college, and Frank and Will are working the ranch with Dad. As the oldest, I get harassed.”

  He looked genuinely distressed.

  “I hate to ask where I come in.”

  “I told my mother that I had a girlfriend, a really sweet girl I met at the studio.” Jimmy smiled. “She wants to meet her.”

  Jess couldn’t squelch the sudden horror that rose within her at the very idea of facing Jimmy’s large family, but she hid her reaction well, she thought. It didn’t make a bit of sense to avoid her own dysfunctional family, only to get caught up with someone else’s. “No way, Blue, am I giving up my chocolate chip cookies and Miracle on 34th Street to pretend to be your girlfriend so your mother will get off your back.”

  He glanced down at her calendar, and ran his fingers over the scribbled appointments there. “If you’d ever agree to go out with me again maybe you wouldn’t have to pretend.”

  “I don’t date—”

  “Musicians,” he finished for her. “I know, I know. This is a familiar tune, Jess. I don’t get it. We went out once, and I had a good time. I thought you did, too.”

  “That wasn’t a date, it was just two friends going out for dinner and a movie.”

  Jimmy had still been new in town, and he’d hit her with that deceptive aw-shucks voice and killer smile, and to be honest… she liked him. What was there not to like? He was sweet and funny and talented and gorgeous, so she’d broken her rule just that once. She’d had no idea how popular he would become almost overnight. The odds of that kind of success were slim, as anyone who tried to break into this business knew. Just her luck.

  “Look, Blue, there are probably a thousand girls in the Nashville area who would be thrilled to pose as your girlfriend for a day. A dozen of them are in the outer office right now, listening to Dean butcher the King’s memory.” A thousand girls, maybe more. And that was the problem.

  “Well, you see, that won’t work.”

  “Why not?”

  “My mother loves details. Facts. You can’t be vague with her. So I told her that my girlfriend’s name is Jess, and that she has curly dark blond hair and green eyes.” He reached out and slipped a finger under her chin and forced her to look up. “I told her this Jess is twenty-six years old, comes from Pensacola, Florida, and works in A&R right here at Vandiver Records.”

  “Why didn’t you just send her a picture?” Jess snapped.

  At least he had the good manners to look sheepish. “I did. You remember that party they threw when the Christmas album was released? The picture Dean took of us standing by the cover artwork? He said ‘Smile,’ I threw my arm around your shoulder… It’s a really good picture.”

  “Jimmy!”

  “I e-mailed it to her. I also told her that this was the woman I wrote “Legs” for, my very first night in Nashville.”

  Why did her heart skip a beat? “Liar.”

  He shook his head slowly. “Nope. It’s the truth. Dean brought me in here to show me around and introduce me to everybody. Hell, I wasn’t even sure I was going to stay in Nashville. I like to sing, I like to play guitar, but I never really planned to make it a career. And there you were, leaning up against Lorraine’s desk. Your skirt had hiked up, just a little…”

  Her face grew warm, and Jess knew she was blushing beet red.

  “… and I said ‘Damn, those are the finest legs I’ve ever seen.’ Dean advised me to keep my opinion to myself, said you wouldn’t appreciate
the compliment, and I took his advice. I sure as hell didn’t want to scare you off my first day in Nashville, so I kept my mouth shut. But when I got back to the hotel I wrote “Legs” on hotel stationery.”

  Jess was tempted to look down. Her legs were okay, but she’d never thought of them as great, and she’d surely never thought them to be inspirational.

  “But you’re telling me now,” she said, and her voice remained amazingly calm.

  Jimmy shrugged his shoulders. “Well, I’ve asked you a hundred times to go out with me, and except for that first time, which you claim wasn’t even a date, you turn me down flat. You won’t go out with me, it looks like you won’t even pretend to be my girlfriend for one day, so what have I got to lose by coming clean now?”

  Dean had launched a new number—“Blue Suede Shoes”—and Jess decided then and there that whoever had invented karaoke should be shot. Jimmy was leaning over her desk, waiting expectantly for some kind of answer. Beyond the door the party was in full swing.

  “I don’t date—”

  “Musicians,” he finished dully. “One of these days you’re going to say that and I’m going to believe you.”

  She wanted him to believe her. More than that, she wanted him to stop looking at her this way. Expectantly, intimately. Like there was something between them.

  Lorraine threw the door open, knocking as she swung the door in. “Hey, you two, you’re missing all the fun.”

  Lorraine evidently wasn’t surprised to see Jimmy perched on Jess’s desk. Of course, observant friend and wannabe matchmaker that she was, she’d probably seen them slip into the office and close the door.

  Vandiver Records’ office manager was wearing a Santa hat and dangly reindeer earrings. Her sweater was red and green with just a touch of sparkling gold. Five foot nothing with a shock of red hair and weighing in at maybe a hundred pounds, she looked remarkably like a Christmas elf.

  “Business,” Jess said sharply. Lorraine wasn’t put off by the biting tone of voice. She knew Jess too well.

  “On Christmas Eve?” Lorraine moaned. “Shame on you both. Now, get out here and have fun.”