I chuckled. “I think you mean origami.”
“Yeah.”
Carefully dodging anything that was dripping glitter, I reached between the branches and pulled out a delicate dove that seemed to be made of ribbons woven together. “Surely you two didn’t make that?” It was an intricate little thing. The ribbons were silver with a hint of green. The shade reminded me a bit of Callie’s beautiful eyes.
“We did. Or Mom did. It took her a really long time, so she only made three.” He hunted around until he found the other two.
I turned to find Callie a couple feet away watching her son. “This is really well done. Where’d you learn to make it?”
“My grandmother taught me.”
“It’s beautiful. My mother loves birds, she’d love something like this.”
Callie looked pleased. “You can take one to her.”
“No, I couldn’t do that.”
Her smile was impish. “It’s definitely your turn to accept something from me.”
Hmm, I suppose she had a point. “I’m pretty sure I’ve already eaten my weight in Christmas cookies.”
She laughed, and it made her jade eyes gleam. The diamonds on her ears flashed when she turned her head, strands of blonde hair escaping from the loose bun she wore. She was wearing a sweatshirt, leggings, and ridiculously thick socks, yet she was still the prettiest thing I’d ever laid my eyes on—and she seemed to genuinely not realize it.
“I’d be honored if you wanted to give one of those doves to your mother.”
“Thank you. I know she’ll love it.”
“You still have to make a card,” Parker reminded me.
“Got it.”
“Hey, Mom, there’s still not enough stuff on this side of the tree.”
Callie laughed. “I’m afraid it’s going to have to stay that way. We’ve made every kind of ornament I can think of.”
Parker studied the tree and I joined him. Suddenly, I remembered something from my own childhood. “How about popcorn?”
“Are you hungry? I’m sorry, I should’ve offered you something other than cookies,” Callie said in a rush. Then she frowned. “But you probably need to get going, right?”
I couldn’t quite interpret the expression on her pretty face. Was she worried she was keeping me from something important? Or nervous about having me here? Or none of the above? She was a hard one to read. The kind of women I dated tended to be pretty obvious and straightforward about their desires. Callie was nothing like them—and I liked that about her.
I got to my feet, and she tilted her head to look up at me. “I didn’t mean to eat, I meant to string.”
“What do you mean?” Parker wanted to know.
“You can make a garland out of popcorn.”
His blue eyes remained puzzled, so Callie stepped in. “A garland is like a decorative rope. You use a needle and thread to make a string of popcorn and then you drape it over the tree branches.” Obviously she was better at explaining things to an eight-year-old than I was.
“Cool! Can we do that?”
“We can, but Mr. Ross might need to—”
“I’d love to,” I said, cutting her off.
For a moment, she wore that inscrutable expression again before she turned to her son. “Can you go in my room and get my sewing kit? It’s in my dresser, second drawer from the bottom.”
Parker took off at a run, an impressive feat in such a small apartment. I wasn’t sure if it was one bedroom or two, but I was pretty sure the entire thing could’ve fit in half of my office. Still, it was obvious that Callie had done her best to make it a nice place for her son. A bookcase in the corner held two shelves of children’s books and bins of toys. Blankets and a cream-colored slipcover made the sofa look a lot newer than it probably was, and cheerful yellow curtains hung from the windows. She’d definitely made it a cozy and welcoming place for her son, and I admired what she’d accomplished.
“You don’t have to stay. I know you just came over to drop off the earrings and didn’t expect Parker to drag you inside.”
“Speaking of the earrings, you were very sneaky to leave those in my office yesterday.”
A faint blush rose on her cheeks. “It’s not my fault you weren’t paying attention.”
I gave her a very direct look. “I was paying plenty of attention.”
Now the color on her cheeks deepened. “I meant what I said. Please don’t feel obligated to—”
I leaned in close and smelled something sweet coming from her hair. Vanilla, perhaps? I didn’t know if it was from her shampoo or from baking. Either way, it smelled delicious. “I’ll let you know if I feel obligated.”
“Found it.” Parker came back in the room with a plastic box in his hand.
Callie gave me a look of resignation. “I’ll go make some popcorn.”
While she was in the kitchen popping popcorn on the stove, Parker and I sat at the table and talked while he folded and cut out more snowflakes to put on the tree. I’d asked him about school, and he was busy telling me about his main teacher, his gym teacher, his music teacher, and pretty much every other teacher he’d ever had in his young life.
I nodded and asked questions in the right places, and it was surprisingly easy. He was a bright kid. He tended to talk really fast when he was excited, which seemed to be about half the time. From time to time, he asked me questions, too.
“Do you have a dog?”
“No.”
“Me either. Mom says our place is too small for one. Is your place too small?”
Trying not to laugh at the thought of my penthouse ever being described as small, I sidestepped his question. “I’m just not home enough to take care of a dog.”
Callie brought out a big bowl of popcorn and sat across from us. She bit her bottom lip as she focused on threading three needles. Every so often, it hit me how young she must’ve been when she had Parker. She couldn’t be much more than twenty-five or twenty-six now.
She handed out the needles, and I showed Parker how to slide the popcorn across the needle and onto the thread. Memories of sitting at a table doing that with my mother flooded my mind. That had probably been the last time I’d touched a needle and thread, too.
“It broke.”
“That’s okay, sometimes they crumble. Once you get it on, slide it carefully down the string.” My attention was distracted by the sight of Callie rising to her feet to go check something in the kitchen. Such an amazing figure. Slender, but curves everywhere they should be. She looked good no matter what she was wearing, but I longed to see her all dressed up for a night out on the town—with me.
“It broke again,” Parker explained.
“That means you get to eat the broken pieces.” I grinned when he did just that, plus a small handful from the bowl as well.
“Leo loves popcorn.”
“Who’s Leo?” I asked, but Parker had a mouthful of popcorn. An unpleasant thought hit me. “Is he your mom’s boyfriend?”
Parker shook his head. I was tempted to ask a follow-up question, but it seemed wrong to grill a little boy about his mother’s love life. Doing the right thing sucked sometimes.