Slipping out of his coat, he pulled a red-bound book from the breast pocket, which he handed to her. Distracted by the slender volume, she barely reacted to him as he laid his coat over her shoulders and wrapped his red scarf around her throat. He took pains to brush her skin as little as possible, a task that proved almost impossible and left him with tiny electric shocks every time they did touch.

“The one you left under my tree yesterday.”

“Oh.”

As reverent as opening a prayer book, Kate turned over the pages until she stared at the title page engraving, a picture of an old man with a small boy on his shoulder. Clark didn’t concede to wearing old age makeup as Emily suggested, but if he had, he and Bradley would have looked almost identical to the picture she traced with her red-painted nails now.

“A Christmas Carol,” she muttered.

“Good title.”

His quip went ignored as she thumbed the pages. Clark tried to rescue the moment.

“No one’s ever seen me before. Or wanted the best for me. And you were right yesterday when you said I took your Christmas away, so…I thought it was only fair I try to give a little bit back to you.”

“Why? Because you want to rub it in my face or what? You hated me yesterday.”

“I was wrong.”

“Yeah? Maybe I was wrong, too. I liked you and you treated me like dirt. You thought I was trying to manipulate you when all I wanted was the best thing for everyone.” She’d long since given up trying to take off the uncomfortable shoes. Curling up under herself, she drew her knees into her chest, making herself as small as possible. Clark couldn’t begin to see a way out of this. He’d taken a willful, loving woman and broken her like he’d been broken. The whispers in town were right. He was a monster. Kate sniffed and turned her head away from him, resting her head on her knees. “All I wanted was for everyone to be happy.”

“I know. And that’s what I didn’t understand. I’ve never known someone who genuinely wants good things for other people. I wanted to be right. I think I wanted to believe you were only out for yourself and your town, that you didn’t really care about me at all.”

“Why?”