Low Country Christmas

by Lee Tobin McClain

  “Uncle Cash!” Sean’s twins, Hope and Hayley, rushed over to hug him, and it lifted his spirits even though he’d forgotten to stop to buy them anything. He had been so frazzled that he hadn’t stocked up the way he usually did.

  What kind of father would he be when he couldn’t even remember the basic gifts required by his nieces?

  “If you could just...keep them entertained.” Sean sounded harassed. “I’ve got to go change HoHo’s diaper.”

  HoHo laughed and waved his arms, and Sean held him out at arm’s length, his nose wrinkling. “Be still, buddy! I forgot to bring a spare outfit.”

  Cash had to chuckle. Sean did great as a dad. It was fun to see his brother totally embracing the role. “I’ve got the girls,” Cash promised.

  Gino looked up at Cash fearfully and then buried his face in Liam’s leg.

  “Hey, little buddy, you remember me,” Cash said. “We hung out just the other night.” But Gino kept his face hidden.

  “He’s going through a fear stage, according to the social worker,” Liam said quietly. “Not really a surprise with all he’s been through. He’ll get used to you again soon.”

  “I’ll be here when he does.” Cash knelt in front of the twins, more certain of his welcome. “Hey, ladies. Are you excited about seeing Santa? What are you going to ask him for?”

  Hope and Hayley looked at each other, and then Hope beckoned him closer. “He’s not the real Santa,” she said with a worried frown on her face, patting his shoulder as if the news would be crushing to him.

  “Is that right?” Cash actually wasn’t sure where the girls stood in relation to Santa. Did they still believe in him? They were seven, so they probably did, but kids were pretty sophisticated these days. No telling what they had heard.

  Fortunately, a vendor walked by just then, carrying a rack of old-fashioned toys—ball and cups, wooden dolls that danced when you squeezed the base they stood on, brightly painted cars and trucks. Cash waved the man over. “Pick out what you want, girls,” he said, and when Hope couldn’t decide, he bought her both toys she liked, and then bought a second one for Hayley, to be fair. He picked out a colorful dog pull toy for Gino, too.

  Liam rolled his eyes as he helped Gino figure out how to pull the toy. “Good thing you’re just the rich uncle. You’d go broke if you had kids of your own.”

  Cash felt a chill skitter up his spine.

  Cash waved down another vendor and bought giant candy canes for the twins just as Sean came back with the always-cheerful HoHo. Around them, the noise of families rose, joyous and fussy in turn. Someone jostled Hope, who was the sensitive twin, so Cash positioned himself between her and the rest of the crowd, moving her more tightly into the family circle.

  Sean lifted an eyebrow at the candy and toys. “You don’t have to do that, you know,” he said to Cash. “They’ll love you even if you don’t spend a fortune on them.”

  “I like buying them stuff,” Cash said, defending himself.

  “Yeah, but when it’s junk food like that, it’s me and Anna who have to pay the price.”

  “Sorry.” Again, worry flashed through him. “It’s not like I know anything about kids.”

  Sean and Liam looked at each other and frowned. “Chill, bro, I didn’t mean that,” Sean said.

  “Cash!” A pretty woman—what was her name, Chelsea something-or-other?—came up with her little girl, just the twins’ size.

  “Hope! Hayley!” The little girl rushed to stand in front of the twins, smiling hugely. “We’re going to the playground. Want to come?”

  “Can we, Daddy?” Identical pairs of puppy-dog eyes looked up at Sean. “We don’t want to miss Santa,” Hope said.

  “We won’t,” Hayley assured her twin. “Will we, Daddy?”

  For some reason, hearing the twins call Sean “Daddy” choked up Cash. The twins’ biological father had been a scumbag and was serving a long prison sentence. They’d accepted Sean as a father and he loved them dearly, as dearly as he loved HoHo, his own son with Anna.

  Now, he knelt to discuss manners with them and Chelsea stepped closer to Cash. “How are you? I haven’t seen you in, like, forever!”

  “Doing fine, thanks. You’re looking good.” He’d dated Chelsea a couple of times but they hadn’t really clicked. “You sure you don’t mind taking my nieces over to the playground?”

  “Glad to,” Chelsea said with a winning smile. “You could come along.”

  “I, um, have to talk to my brothers about something.”

  “Sure,” she said easily. “I’ll bring ’em back when you get close to the front of the line. Maybe we could get some dinner later.”

  “Can’t, not tonight,” Cash said.

  The twins stuffed their new toys and candy into Sean’s arms. Chelsea shrugged and waved and headed over to the swings and slides, the three little girls orbiting her.

  “Whoa, you’re losing your touch, brother.” Liam was kneeling beside Gino, who was varooming the dog toy as if it was a car. “Chelsea turns a lot of heads over at the Palmetto Pig. Can’t believe you let an invite like that go.”

  “Other stuff on my mind,” Cash said.

  “So you really do want to talk to us?” Sean put HoHo into his stroller and handed him a blue vinyl duck, which he proceeded to stuff into his mouth.

  Liam looked up, then touched Gino’s chin. “You can play, but stay right here by my legs, understand?”

  The toddler nodded solemnly, then squatted beside the wooden dog Cash had bought him.

  Liam stood. “So what’s up?”

  “A lot,” Cash said, looking from him to Sean. His heart rate jumped a little. “You know Holly, that woman I brought to the tree lighting?”

  “Pretty,” Sean said, and Liam nodded.

  “You remember her baby?”

  “Sure,” Sean said. “About HoHo’s size.”

  Cash nodded, swallowed. Looked around to see if anyone was listening in, but the crowd was noisy, as everyone focused on their own family groups. “She’s, um. She’s mine.”

  Sean caught on first. “Your baby? Did you and Holly—?”

  “No, no,” Cash interrupted, waving a hand. “Her sister. Tiff. It’s her baby. Holly’s raising Penny because Tiff...” To his complete embarrassment, his throat tightened to where he couldn’t get out the rest of the words.

  His brothers waited, watching him.

  “Tiff died,” he choked out finally, and then knelt and tickled HoHo’s chin while he pulled himself together.

  He had no idea what his reaction was all about. He wasn’t usually emotional. It was like he’d caught some kind of pregnancy and childbirth hormones from being around Penny.

  “Sorry, man,” Liam said, his voice gruff. “When were you seeing her? Was she from Atlanta?”

  Sean extended a hand and pulled Cash to his feet. “Why didn’t you tell us you were serious about someone?”

  “I wasn’t.” He drew in a breath, calmer now. “It was casual. We spent a week together when she was here on vacation and I happened to be home.” He shook his head. “I never planned to have a baby. Thought it was all taken care of, you know?”

  “You sure Holly’s not scamming you?”

  He nodded. “Paternity test.”

  “Wow.”

  They were all quiet for a few minutes. Then the line moved forward, and Gino clung to Liam’s leg. “Don’t wanna see Santa.”

  Liam scooped him up, along with the wooden dog. “You don’t have to, buddy. You can just watch.”

  “Yeah, Santa already came to this crowd.” Sean eyed Cash as he shifted the armful of new toys the twins had left in his care.

  Pretty soon they reached the front of the line. The twins rushed back, worried they’d miss their chance, and everyone focused on the Santa visit. HoHo sat cheerfully on the exhausted-looking San
ta’s lap, and Gino crept close enough that a photo could be snapped, even though he refused to interact. The twins each had a turn reciting a list of their wants.

  “So what are you going to do?” Sean asked him as the twins posed.

  Cash shrugged. “Pay child support. See if there’s any other way I can help a little.” Ironic that he, who was always doing his best to avoid people trying to get their hands on his money, was willing to help out with Penny.

  But this was different. Penny was his child, according to the DNA results. That made it right for him to provide for her.

  “Throw money at it and that’s all?” Sean frowned.

  Cash lifted his hands, palms up. “What else can I do? I’ve had a million relationships, all bad.” And he didn’t want to say it out loud, but he knew the truth: he was like his father. Looked just like him, according to Sean, who remembered their father the best. More than that, he shared a lot of his father’s inner qualities, like loving money and always trying to find a way to make more of it. He remembered following their father around, even when his brothers and mother avoided him, listening to the way he talked to people, always making some kind of a deal.

  Cash had been his father’s favorite, and he’d admired him. Which said a lot about who Cash was, considering what type of person their father had turned out to be.

  In high school, even though Cash’s foster parents gave him plenty of material things, making money had been like a drug. He’d started a business helping people program their remote controls or video players and made a ton; he’d become president of the business club, organized fund-raisers that had financed every member’s trip to the state capital, and made the business club the cool place, gotten lots of cute girls to join. His brothers had just rolled their eyes at him. “Just like Dad,” they’d said, and, “You’re Dad’s son.”

  He walked away from Sean toward the twins and Santa, who were talking with a picture-taking elf.

  The Santa cleared his throat. “I remember you, young man,” he said, pointing a bony finger, which was at odds with his probably fake plump belly. “You created quite a disruption at the party for foster kids, oh, about twenty years ago.”

  Cash remembered all too well, and stared at the not-so-jovial man in the red suit. “You were there?”

  Santa nodded and then gestured for Hope and Hayley to smile for the camera.

  From behind him, Liam snickered. “I remember, too. You were the worst of all of us.”

  “Still am,” Cash said, turning away in time to catch Sean’s frown.

  They collected all the kids and their things and headed toward the spot they’d planned to meet the wives, a gazebo at the center of the park. “This is serious stuff,” Sean remarked as the twins coaxed Gino to run ahead with them. “You’ve got to figure out if Holly is even fit to parent that child. If she’s not...you need to take over.”

  “Me?” Cash stared at Sean. “I can’t take care of a baby.”

  “If it’s the right thing to do, you can.” Sean was implacable in his big-brother mode. “You’ve got to figure out a way to get to know her, get some perspective.” He looked at Cash, then at Liam, and a smile started to cross his face. “And I know just how and where you can do it.”

  Liam nodded slowly. “Out at Ma Dixie’s. Bring them both to the crab crack after Thanksgiving. Holly and the baby.”

  Cash frowned. “That’s a lot to spring on her. She’s not from around here. And she’s kind of quiet.”

  “But seems like she’s settling in,” Liam said. “What better way for her to get to know the area?”

  What could it hurt? It certainly wouldn’t make things any worse. “I’ll think about it.” And maybe he’d take her to meet Ma and Pudge first, one-on-one. Seeing her and Penny in that environment would definitely give him more information.

  He’d figured to limit his involvement to money, both because that was what Holly wanted and because he wasn’t good at deep relationships.

  But Sean was right; he had a responsibility to make sure his own child was being raised right.

  “My little brother, a daddy.” Sean pounded Cash’s shoulder, none too gently. “That’s almost sweet.”

  Except it wasn’t. Not at all. His brothers hadn’t freaked about him having a baby, but when they gave it more thought, they’d realize just how ridiculous it was.

  Maybe Ma and her longtime boyfriend, Pudge LeFrost, would have some ideas for how to handle the situation. Because Cash was fresh out of them, himself.

  * * *

  THE NEXT DAY, Holly trudged back to the apartment complex with Penny whimpering in her carrier. Penny, who suddenly seemed to weigh four hundred pounds. Walking two mastiffs while carrying a baby on her chest had been no joke. Especially when they’d been preceded by an excitable beagle and a pair of fussy, feisty Maltese mixes.

  At least she wouldn’t need to join a gym.

  Even though it was only midafternoon, her dog-walking duties were over for the day. Most working people wanted a lunchtime walk for their dogs, and she didn’t yet have any clients with afternoon or evening jobs. She tried to shove aside the tight feeling in her chest, but it wouldn’t stay away. It was going to be a lot harder to make a living when she could only walk dogs, not stay over to care for them while their owners were away. That had been the main moneymaker for her in the past, with a few dog walks in the middle of the day adding extra income.

  Now, with a baby to care for, the dog-walking was the main event. And people in a small Southern town wouldn’t pay the same high rates she’d gotten so easily in New York. Yeah, the cost of living was lower, but she still wasn’t convinced her budget would balance.

  “Hey, Holly!” Norma’s voice drew her to the pool enclosure, where multicolored Christmas lights already glowed on this overcast afternoon. Rita and Norma sat at one of the tables by the pool, both bundled up in thick coats. When Holly saw Norma put out a cigarette, she understood why the ladies were sitting outside even though it was chilly.

  Rita stood and came over to the gate. She reached out a hand and cupped Penny’s head. “How’s the little sweetie?”

  “That’s going to kill you, walking dogs with a baby strapped to you,” Norma added as she propped up her feet.

  “Anytime I’m not working, I’m happy to watch her,” Rita said. “After all, I’m her grandma.”

  Holly’s jaw dropped. “You know?”

  Rita nodded. “Cash told me today.”

  Holly studied her to see whether that revelation had upset her, but she was all smiles. “I love being a grandma,” she said. “It’s a real thrill to have another little one to love.”

  “Hand her over, and you go take a nap,” Norma suggested. “You look beat.”

  A part of Holly would’ve liked nothing better. But she was responsible for Penny. She and no one else, and you couldn’t count on other people—they let you down or wanted something in return. “That’s a nice offer,” she said, “but I’m fine.” She turned and headed toward the steps up to her apartment, trying to inject some energy into her walk so the ladies would believe her.

  Before she got halfway up the steps, the sound of loud music assailed her. Penny started to cry.

  Hmm, maybe she should have thought twice before taking the apartment here. It had been so quiet in the last few days, but this music was seriously loud. Not only that, but she also knew the song and cringed, waiting for the obscenity in the chorus.

  It didn’t come. Someone was at least playing a family-friendly version.

  When she reached the top of the stairs and looked down the walkway, she was stunned to see Cash gesturing and pointing as a couple of men carried boxes into the apartment next door. A speaker, small but obviously powerful, seemed to be the source of the music.

  “What are you doing here?” she yelled over it.

  He strode toward her, frowned,
then called back over his shoulder, “Turn it down, guys.” He took the key from her, opened her apartment door and held out his hands for the baby.

  She hesitated, then lifted Penny out of her carrier so Cash could take her. After all, he was her father, and although she wasn’t looking for him to be involved, she couldn’t deny him the right to see his child.

  Besides, Holly was really, really tired.

  Cash seemed to see that. He followed her inside and pulled out one of the kitchen chairs for her. Then he tapped at his cell phone and spoke rapidly into it in a language that sounded Asian, the tones rising and falling.

  “Hope you like Chinese food,” he said. “It’ll be here in thirty minutes.” He opened her refrigerator, found a pitcher of tea and poured her a glass.

  “Make yourself at home, why don’t you,” she said, but without heat. It was kind of nice to have someone taking care of her.

  “I am making myself at home. I’m moving in next door.”

  “What?” Her heart lifted dangerously at his words.

  “I’m your new neighbor,” he said. “Don’t look so shocked. I’m subletting until Christmas.”

  “But why? You have another place just a few miles away.”

  “Converting that into an office, a temporary one,” he said. “Look, I know you said you don’t need for me to be involved, but I figure I should at least help out while you get settled.”

  Whoa. Holly’s stomach knotted, and sweat broke out on her forehead and neck despite the cool day. Cash, here? Right next door? Staking a claim and invading her privacy?

  Despite her tension, she was surprised to feel her shoulders relax a little. It would be nice to have some help from Penny’s father, just for a bit. And she was reluctantly impressed that he seemed to want to be close to Penny, even if it meant setting up housekeeping in a place decorated with inflatable Swimming Santas.

  After she’d gulped down some tea and Cash had gotten Penny to stop crying, Holly warmed up a bottle and fed her. Cash went back next door to give more instructions to the guys who were moving him in.