Christmas Mountain Romance Collection (Morgan, Faith, Lacey) by Susan Hatler

Author:Susan Hatler
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Hatco Publishing

Chapter Twelve

The weekend passed by in a blur of housecleaning and Christmas shopping. On Monday, I was working late when I got a frantic phone call from Joe, the man in charge of the reindeer up at Santa’s Grotto. One of the younger reindeer, Rudy, had escaped, and nobody could find him. Even though Adam had been working on finishing some figures for his second meeting with Miles Wilson, he hadn’t hesitated to grab his jacket and come with me.

As we got near to the stables, we saw torchlights as many of Silver Bells’ workers had come out in force to find the missing little reindeer. I grabbed Joe’s sleeve as he rushed past me. “What happened, Joe? It’s not like Rudy to bolt like that.”

“I know.” Joe nodded. “Something must’ve spooked him. Judging by the tracks in the snow, I reckon a mountain lion came prowling.”

Adam turned to me. “Rudy? As in Rudolph?”

I nodded. “Actually, it’s Rudolph the third, but he’s just Rudy to us.”

“Well, we should find him easily then, right?” Adam pressed his hands together and rubbed his palms. “He has a nose that glows.”

“I wish,” I said, shaking my head. Maybe he’d been trying to lighten the mood of the volunteers around us, but this wasn’t a missing poodle in a New York building. Little Rudy could get eaten by a wild animal out here and the longer we took to find him the lower his chances were of surviving. “We need Rudy back, Adam. Not only do we love him, but he’s our leading reindeer on the Grotto tours and we have a whole bunch of five-year-olds coming tomorrow, who are expecting to have their sleigh pulled by Santa’s most favorite reindeer.”

Adam gave me a side-glance. “Can’t you just use another reindeer in his place? I mean, a reindeer is a reindeer, right?”

The volunteers went so silent you could have heard tinsel drop. Then the protests started.

“You can’t lie to kids.”

“It wouldn’t be Rudy.”

“Are you for real, man?”

I flinched at that last comment. Clueless or not, Adam was still our boss. “Let’s all just focus on finding Rudy. We need to stay positive,” I said.

“Sorry, I was trying to think from a business point of view so the kids wouldn’t be disappointed tomorrow.” He placed his hand over his heart in an apologetic way. “I’m new to this, but I want to help. What can I do?”

Joe allocated sections of terrain to cover to each pair of volunteers. Minutes later, armed with a torch and a whistle, Adam and I set off into the snowy woodland.

“I thought I was going to get smacked with a torch back there,” Adam said.

I almost gave him a smart answer back, but I realized he didn’t know and love Silver Bells the way the rest of us did. “You’re lucky you’re our boss, or you would’ve been.”

He stepped in front of me and stopped, so we were face to face. “Is that how you still see me, Faith? As

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