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Montana Wedding
by Cari Lynn Webb
PROLOGUE
EXCITEMENT SWIRLED THROUGH Georgie Harrison like stripes on a candy cane.
Christmas Eve, one of the best days, according to her and other eight-year-olds everywhere, had finally arrived.
Georgie surveyed the kitchen island. Flour covered the marble countertop like snow. Cookie cutters rested on a large cutting board. The sweet scent of sugar and cinnamon filled the air.
And caution wrapped around Georgie’s joy like the plastic cover protecting that candy cane. After all, accidents could happen, even on special days. Watching over her four sisters was especially important and a duty Georgie willingly accepted.
She checked the cookie sheets cooling on the stove top. The hot trays were far enough away from the decorating station and her sisters’ fingers. No one would get burned. Georgie picked up the rolling pin and set it back in its holder.
“Mrs. Claus needs her own cookies, too.” Fiona, the youngest of the five Harrison sisters, set a star-shaped cookie on a paper plate. “These are for her.”
“We’re making cookies for Santa.” Georgie nudged Fee, adjusting her sister until both her bare feet were centered on the stool she stood on. Fee might be steadier on her feet now that she was six years old, but falls happened at any age. Lily was proof of that. And Georgie had to be alert and prepared. “Mrs. Claus has to stay home.”
“That’s not fair.” Fiona frowned.
“Yes, it is.” Georgie sat on her stool at the island and dipped a thin spatula into the bowl of bright green frosting. “Mrs. Claus is the one who takes care of the elves and Santa. If an elf gets sick or hurt, she has to be there to help them.”
“What if Santa is hurt dropping off presents tonight?” Amanda, one-third of the Harrison triplet trio that included Georgie, tossed a handful of glittery silver sugar across a row of frosted cookies.
“Then the reindeers will fly him back home.” Georgie slathered a thick layer of green frosting over her tree-shaped cookie and grinned. Everyone got better at home.
Georgie had cared for Lily, the final triplet, after Lily returned home from her accident, and her sister had improved. Georgie added, “That way, Mrs. Claus can make Santa feel better.”
“Santa can’t be sick.” Lily walked into the kitchen and washed her hands. She had skipped cookie making to play soccer with her best friend, Danny Belmonte. One of the things you could still do in San Diego even though it was December.
Lily and Danny had already built snowmen out of sand and decorated palm trees in the front yard with Christmas lights. All thanks to the girls’ dad, Rudy Harrison, who had explained snow wasn’t necessary to get into the California Christmas spirit. What they needed, he’d said, was a little imagination.
“We won’t get any presents if Santa is sick.” Bits of grass stuck to Lily’s shirt, and mud smeared both her cheeks and forehead.
Georgie concentrated on Lily’s face, searching for scratches underneath the dirt, making certain her sister didn’t need her care.
“No presents?” Fiona pressed her sprinkle-and frosting-coated fingers against her pale cheeks. Her bottom lip trembled. “But we gotta have those. I’ve been very good.”
“Mom!” Peyton shouted from the family room. The oldest Harrison sister stood in front of the Christmas tree, where she’d been organizing the gifts from family by size and name. Peyton scowled at Georgie and yelled again. “Mom! Georgie is messing up Christmas Eve.”
“Aunt Pru will be here in an hour.” Susan Harrison rushed into the kitchen and hung up the cordless phone on the wall. Her gaze darted around the kitchen. “We need to finish the cookies, clean up and be ready for family pictures. We can do this.”
The Harrison sisters ignored their mother’s instructions and instead launched their complaints like rapid-fire snowballs.
“Santa is sick,” Fee cried.
“Georgie said so,” Amanda added.
“I did not,” Georgie hollered.
Lily steamrolled over Georgie’s denial. “Santa had to go home for the night. And it’s Christmas Eve. The most important night of the year.”
Fee threw her hands over her head. “We don’t get no presents.”
Amanda rounded on Georgie. “It’s all Georgie’s fault.”
“It is not.” Georgie jumped from her stool and straightened. Still she failed to look Amanda in the eyes. Her mother promised Georgie every night that she would grow taller soon, the same as Lily and Amanda, who were identical twins in their triplet trio with Georgie.
Lily and Amanda had sprouted like sunflowers, according to Great-Aunt Pru. Georgie might lack her sprout, but Pru had told her to always face the sun. Then Pru would hand Georgie a book from her private collection to nourish her mind, of course. After all, the tallest sunflower wasn’t always the one with the strongest roots. But Georgie liked the endless supply of books and simply wanted to be as tall as her sisters, to face them eye to eye.
“Santa is only going home if he gets sick.” Georgie set her hands on her hips and tipped her chin up. She might be short, but she was still a Harrison. “I never said he was sick.”
Amanda opened her mouth.
“Girls.” Their mother raised her voice above the beep of the timer on the oven. Her tone was firm. “Girls! That’s enough. No one is sick.”
“Told you so.” Georgie handed her mom the pair of oven mitts. None of the sisters, even Peyton, the fourth grader, could take out the cookies. Their mother had declared they had to be twelve years old to reach into a hot oven.
Amanda narrowed her eyes at Georgie, a small hint that Georgie hadn’t won yet, and returned to her cookie decorating.
“Peyton, find the cookie containers in the pantry. Fiona and Lily, you two go get cleaned up.” Their mother tugged on the oven mitts and continued issuing her orders. “Amanda and Georgie, you are on dish duty. One washes and one dries.”
A collection of sighs shifted through the kitchen.
“Move. Faster!” Their mother clapped her mitts together. The timer blared again, signaling the cookies were more than finished. “Aunt Pru is coming and we can’t have our guests think we live in such a mess. And what will Santa think?”
That got the girls’ full attention. Suddenly five sisters scrambled into action.
Peyton raced into the pantry. Lily guided Fee off the stool. Amanda sprinted to the sink and Georgie grabbed a clean towel from the drawer for drying. Their mother opened the oven door at the same time Lily and Fee squeezed behind her.
Georgie watched the oven mitt slip off and her mom’s bare forearm press against the inside of the oven door, then heard her mom’s loud gasp. Georgie dropped her drying towel and lunged forward. “Mom, are you okay?”
The oven door slammed shut. Her mom shook off her mitts and studied her arm. “It’s nothing.”
Georgie rushed into the pantry and grabbed the first-aid kit. She’d convinced her parents to put first-aid kits on both floors of their house, as well as inside the garage and on the screened-in porch, for easy access after Lily’s accident.
“But you’re hurt.” Fee wrapped her arms around their mom’s waist.
“She’s burned.” Amanda gaped. “Look how red her arm is.”
“It’s fine.” Their mom rubbed her forehead. Her voice shook.
“Mom, you need to put your arm under cold water.” Georgie guided her mom and Fee toward the kitchen sink and motioned for Amanda to turn the faucet on.
Peyton and Lily crowded closer. Worry worked across their faces. Georgie tested the water. “It’s not supposed to be too cold.”
“How do you know that?” Amanda asked.
“I read it in the safety book for kids that Dad got me on our birthday.” Georgie made sure the water flowed over her mom’s arm.
“What else does your book say?” her mother asked.
Georgie chewed on her bottom lip. “You can’t pop the blisters. That’s bad.”
Peyton leaned closer. “Does she have blisters?”
“Bad burns get bad blisters,” Georgie stated.
Fee buried her head in their mom’s waist and held on.
“Does she need to go to the hospital?” Fear speared through Lily’s whisper.
Lily had gone to the hospital in an ambulance after her bad fall. Lily didn’t remember much from that afternoon, but Georgie remembered every detail. The worst part had been when the paramedics told Georgie she wasn’t allowed to ride in the ambulance with her sister. Georgie hadn’t been there to hold Lily’s hand. To promise her everything would be all right.
Georgie grabbed her mom’s free hand and squeezed. “It’s okay to cry, Mom. You don’t have to be brave for us.”
“I don’t need to cry.” Her mom pressed a kiss on Georgie’s forehead. “I’m being so very well taken care of that all my tears are gone now.”
“I promise, Mom,” Georgie vowed. “I will always be here to take care of you.”
Copyright © 2020 by Cari Lynn Webb
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ISBN-13: 9781488068386
Christmas on the Ranch
Copyright © 2020 by Julianna Morris
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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Christmas on the Ranch--A Clean Romance Page 24
