The Rancher's Christmas Bride

by Brenda Minton

  She’d stayed in Bluebonnet. For Dan.

  As his mind had wandered, he’d lost Bea. She had moved to the piano bench and was in the process of scooting Marissa over so that she could sit next to her.

  Marissa glanced at the other woman and gave her a sweet smile, but kept playing. They were quite a pair, Marissa in her blue jeans and oversize flannel shirt; Bea in her floral house dress, still wearing her hairnet from work. But Bea’s feet were bouncing in time to the music and, without warning, she started singing the chorus of “Silent Night.”

  She blew the roof off that little old church with the sweetest rendition of that song Alex had ever heard. From the looks of things, the music was having a similar effect on everyone. The hammers stopped. Pastor Matthews and the men sat down. The ladies stood silently in the background. Bea and Marissa entered a world of their own.

  Alex desperately wanted to be in that world with them, because from the expressions on their faces, it was a good place to be.

  As “Silent Night” ended, it became clear that Bea was on a roll. She flipped the pages to another song. Marissa nodded and began to play. This time she joined Bea and the two of them sang “Carol of the Bells.” It was clear that Bea was directing things. She would sing and occasionally point at the music and Marissa would chime in.

  When they finished, Bea turned red and hung her head. Emotion hung heavy in the air and no one spoke. They were all too stunned. Alex sat back, watching as Marissa hugged the other woman tight and told her something that encouraged her to smile and look up. Marissa took her hand and stood with her. That’s when everyone stood and applauded the duo.

  Alex’s gaze connected with Marissa’s and he was almost knocked over from the strength of emotion that stretched between them. It was more than the song. He tried to tell himself it was the moment or the music, but he knew better. And he knew he had to do something to break this connection.

  He walked away—he’d think up an excuse later.

  * * *

  Marissa knew a person couldn’t really forget how to breathe but that’s how she felt when she looked up and met Alex’s gaze. His dark eyes had been full of emotion. And then he’d simply turned and walked away.

  It hurt that he would walk away from her. She got that it didn’t make sense, this imagined connection between the two of them. She shouldn’t give it more credence than it deserved. She had always dealt in hard facts. She had managed for a very long time to keep her emotions in firm check. For her sake. For her mother’s.

  Stop crying, her mother had told her all of those years ago. Just stop. She couldn’t undo what had happened with tears. She couldn’t make it all okay again.

  But she’d tried. She’d tried so hard. With every tear she blinked away. With every test she aced. With every award she earned. She had tried.

  What had it gotten her?

  Lonely. It had gotten her loneliness. It had brought her to the doorstep of a grandfather she hadn’t known existed and into the life of a man who didn’t want to be troubled by her.

  Further thoughts were interrupted by the approach of Pastor Matthews. He looked from Marissa to Bea and back before shaking his head and grinning. She didn’t know what to say to that, because she had been just as astounded by Bea’s voice.

  “That was amazing. Will the two of you perform for the Christmas program?”

  The invitation took her by surprise. She glanced past him to Alex, who had taken up a hammer and was helping the men put shingles on the makeshift stable. Someone plugged in the cord attached to the star and it lit up, glowing bright with Christmas lights.

  Alex shifted just a bit, his dark eyes boring into her. She shook off the lingering feelings of losing something important.

  Next to her, Bea didn’t hesitate. “We would love to, Preacher. I do love to sing. Mama always told me not to go around town bragging about my singing. She said it was a sin. That’s what Pastor Palermo told her. She sure liked the pastor. But I like you better.” She glanced at Alex. “I’m sorry about that, Alex.”

  “I’m not sure if I’ll be here,” Marissa answered when Pastor Matthews directed his attention to her.

  “But you have to,” Bea interjected. She gave Marissa and then Alex a reproachful look before leaning toward Pastor Matthews. “Alex has been neighborly and my mama said that’s a sin.”

  “Being neighborly is a sin, Bea? How is that?” Pastor Matthews looked truly confused.

  “Don’t. Ask,” Alex shouted, getting everyone’s attention. He swung the hammer at a nail and then jerked his hand back. “Ouch.”

  “That’s what a temper will get you Alex Palermo.” Bea shook her head. “He needs to repent. He also needs to repent because he looks at Marissa like he wants to kiss her.”

  “Bea, I think it’s about time I take you home.” Aunt Essie to the rescue.

  Bea grumbled as she grabbed her enormous purse and swung it over her shoulder. “You’re the one who said it, Essie. You told Libby that Alex is in big trouble and he can’t look at—”

  “Stop,” Essie whispered a little too loudly.

  Marissa was stuck somewhere between humor and wanting the floor to open and swallow her up. Essie offered a sheepish smile.

  “I’m going to take Bea home. But I do hope you can be here for the Christmas program, Marissa. That music was beautiful.”

  “Thank you,” she answered. Turning to Bea, she said, “Bea, I’m not sure how a beautiful voice like yours could ever be a sin and I hope you sing often.”

  “And I concur,” Pastor Matthews added.

  Bea gave him a narrow-eyed look. “If I wasn’t getting in trouble by Miss Essie, I’d ask what concur means.”

  “It means I agree, Bea. Having your beautiful voice and singing those songs for God is not a sin.” Pastor Matthews hugged Bea. “I’m looking forward to hearing you sing more.”

  Marissa excused herself and went in search of Alex. He was no longer working on the stable. The other men were packing up tools and the star had been unplugged. She walked through the church and didn’t find him anywhere. She wondered if he might have left, forgetting that she needed a ride. Or maybe not caring.

  He hadn’t left her, though. She found him outside, a short distance from the church, sitting on a bench near the playground. As she approached, he looked up, unsmiling.

  “I’m sorry.” She didn’t know what else to say.

  “For what?”

  She sat down next to him. “I’m not sure. It would help if you would tell me what I’m apologizing for.”

  One side of his mouth tugged upward, easing the tension in his expression. “I’m not mad at you, so you don’t have to apologize.”

  “Bea?”

  He shook his head. “No, I would never be angry with Bea. She says whatever is on her mind. She can’t help that. I’m angry because my father told her she shouldn’t sing. That voice, tonight when she sang and you played, that was amazing. It made me feel maybe a little bit of the awe those shepherds felt when they approached the stable, knowing they’d find their savior inside.”

  He managed to put into words what she’d felt sitting next to Bea. As she’d played, the men had ceased working on the stable, but one of them had continued to work on the star. The lights would twinkle and go out and they would try again. It had brought that long-ago night to life in her imagination. Silent night, holy night.

  “A gift like Bea’s shouldn’t be wasted,” Alex said. “But my father, for whatever reason, had tried to silence that voice. Maybe because of what happened to Bea. Or he might have been jealous. Logic never mattered to Jesse Palermo.”

  “I’m sorry.” Somehow his hand ended up in hers.

  “Thank you.” He gave her hand a light squeeze. “We should go. Pastor Matthews would be upset if he thought we were being neighborly in f
ront of the church.”

  She giggled. “Bea does have a way with words.”

  “Yes, she does.” He stood, still holding her hand, and led her to his truck.

  The night was cool and crystal clear with millions of stars twinkling overhead in the inky darkness of the sky. The world seemed so much bigger here, with no buildings to mar the skyline, no lights to compete with the brightness of the moon or the stars. She’d always thought the city, with all of the people, the cars, the buildings, was big. But this quiet, country night changed that for her.

  When a person could stand in the yard and see the sun come up in the east, the colors as brilliant as spilled paint across the morning sky, and then in the evening watch the sun set on the opposite horizon, there was a hugeness in that.

  She drew in a deep breath of the cold December air, closing her eyes as she waited for Alex to unlock and open the truck door.

  “There’s nothing like this air,” she told him.

  “No, there isn’t. And a night like this, when the moon is that bright.”

  She looked up, nodding her agreement. “It almost looks as if you could reach out and touch it.”

  “Yes, it does.”

  She became aware of the man standing in front of her. His hand was touching her cheek and there was a sweetness in his expression.

  “Bea would be appalled,” he whispered. “But I’m about to kiss you.”

  “We shouldn’t.”

  “Yeah, I’ve never been the best at should and shouldn’t.”

  He kissed her as his fingers stroked a sweet line along her jaw. The kiss was everything. It made her feel treasured and beautiful. It made her feel like the woman she wanted to be. His woman.

  No. She wasn’t his. She didn’t know how to trust what she felt, not after Aidan. She had tried to be who Aidan wanted her to be, too. She’d tried to fit into his world. The same way she’d always tried to please her parents, she realized. And here she was, feeding chickens and driving a tractor.

  Kissing a cowboy and wanting to be the person who fit in his life.

  The sounds of people talking and laughing, a car starting, helped to bring her back to reality. She moved a step back from Alex, and from emotions that were jumbled up.

  It made sense that they shouldn’t talk just yet, so she was glad when wordlessly he opened the door for her. She climbed inside the warm, confining space of the truck cab. Alex got in and started to speak.

  “I’m going to miss you.”

  She would miss him, too. “I’ll be back from time to time.”

  “Right. Of course.”

  That wasn’t the answer he wanted but she didn’t know what else to say. The kiss had been a revelation. It had also revealed some things about her life and how she’d been living it. Pleasing others, trying to be who they wanted her to be.

  She had obligations, responsibilities, back in Dallas. Most of all she knew that it was time for her to figure out what she really wanted out of life and who she really wanted to be.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Marissa bit back the grin she knew her grandfather wouldn’t appreciate. He was sitting next to her in the church pew wearing his Sunday best, which happened to be new bib overalls and a button-up shirt with his good boots.

  “Church,” he grumbled. “I can’t believe I let you talk me into going to church.”

  “It isn’t going to hurt you,” she said calmly.

  “You don’t know that it isn’t. And don’t sass me.”

  “I’m not sassing, I’m telling you that this won’t hurt you.”

  A few rows of ahead of them, Alex sat with his family. Aunt Essie, his sister Lucy and her husband, Dane, and his younger sister, Maria. Alex glanced back at them, teeth flashing as he grinned. Next to him, Essie gave him a pointed look. A warning, if Marissa had to guess.

  The warnings should have come sooner. Someone should have warned Marissa that a too-charming cowboy with funny ears would make it difficult for her to leave Bluebonnet Springs behind. Even when she knew she did have to go. She’d signed a contract for a teaching position. She wasn’t the country girl she’d been pretending to be.

  “Stop looking at the boy that way. People are going to wonder.” Her grandfather spoke in a too-loud whisper, and the people around them giggled.

  “Shh,” Marissa warned her grandfather.

  He chuckled as if it happened to be great fun. Her heart filled up. With love for him, for this town and for a God who was as real to her today as He had been all of those years ago when she’d been a child in Sunday school.

  The service started. She’d never been so thankful for anything. She could sit there in relative peace, sing songs she hadn’t forgotten, listen to a message of hope and stare at the back of Alex’s head.

  The service ended and people started making their way to the fellowship hall. Dan and Marissa joined the crowd, somehow falling in with Alex and his family as they made their way down the short hallway to the kitchen area.

  “That wasn’t so bad, was it, Dan?” Alex asked as they entered the big, fluorescent-lit room with the many tables and chairs set up with pretty evergreen centerpieces.

  “No, not bad at all.” But he pulled on his collar and shivered. “There sure are a bunch of people here.”

  Marissa took her took her grandfather by the hand. “Yes, there are. And you need to sit down.”

  He bristled a bit. “I think I know when I need to sit down.”

  “Of course you do.” She paused and waited.

  “Now I need to sit down.” His blue eyes twinkled. “I just like to decide these things for myself.”

  Essie walked past. “Dan, you look pretty spiffy today.”

  “Charm me all you want, Essie, you’re not getting my money.”

  “You might smell kind of good, but you don’t have that much money.”

  He took a seat and looked around. “Now what is the plan? I thought you were going to feed us.”

  “We have to get the food set out and then we’ll start a line,” Essie informed him with a pat on his shoulder. “You won’t be sorry, Dan.”

  “I know I won’t.”

  “What can I do to help?” Marissa asked as Essie started to hurry off.

  Essie glanced toward the kitchen and then looked around. “I don’t really know. There are already too many women in the kitchen. There are some smaller children that are starting to look restless. Would you corral them while their mothers finish getting the food ready?”

  Children, she knew how to handle. “Of course. Can I take them outside?”

  Essie lifted a shoulder. “Suits me. In the closet by the door there are bubbles, balls and other outdoor toys.”

  Alex had disappeared. He’d mentioned helping the pastor put something in the attic. Marissa wouldn’t wait for him. She could handle a few children on her own. She gathered up the kids, who seemed restless, and headed them out the door, stopping on her way to get bubbles, Frisbees and a ball.

  “What are we going to do?” Amy, the little girl she’d met on her previous trips to the church, asked.

  “Whatever you want, as long as it is safe.” Marissa led them to the playground and she laid out the items she’d procured from the closet. “What do you all want to do?”

  “Tag!” one of the boys yelled.

  A chant of, “Tag, tag!” went up from the group of half a dozen children.

  “Okay, tag it is. Who is going to be ‘it’ first?”

  The biggest boy touched her arm. “You’re ‘it.’”

  That didn’t seem fair. But before she could protest, they ran, scattering across the lawn. She chased after one of the bigger boys but he quickly outran her. She went after another and he laughed as he slid past her and kept going. She could see that t
his wasn’t going to go very well for her. If she had any hope of catching any of them, it was one of the little girls. They’d managed to get farther away as the boys kept Marissa distracted.

  She went after little Julie. The dark-haired child was laughing and running backward. “Not too close to the parking lot,” Marissa called out.

  The little girl stopped for a moment, laughing a real belly laugh. A truck suddenly pulled into the parking lot.

  “Stay where you’re at until the truck stops,” Marissa warned.

  The little girl peered around the cars to see the truck, then she screamed. Marissa ran forward. Had a bee or a wasp stung her?

  “What’s wrong?” she asked as she knelt in front of the child. She noticed the other children had congregated at the picnic table and were blowing bubbles.

  “My daddy,” she whispered through her tears. “I have to go. He can’t be here.” And then the child ran off.

  Marissa stood up. When she turned around, someone caught her from behind. “Go inside,” she screamed.

  The children all ran away.

  “I’m just here to get my kid.” The man held her tight and she heard the flick as he moved his hand. A knife. He had a knife.

  “I’m sorry,” she said quietly. “I’m new to the area. I didn’t know which child was yours.”

  “I think you did. And I think you’re going to help me get her back. You’re going to keep walking toward the church. Nice and steady. You’re going to tell my wife to hand over my daughter and then you’re going to walk me back to the truck.”

  “They won’t give her to you.”

  “That’s why my day got a little better when you showed up,” he told her. His breath smelled of onions. His clothes were dirty. She was aware of the rough stubble of his unshaven face as he leaned close.

  She wanted away from him. First she wanted the children safe. The older ones had herded the younger children inside. Pastor Matthews stepped outside, Alex and a few other men close behind him.

  For some reason she thought about the food getting cold. She laughed at the thought.

  “Are you crazy?” the man holding her tightly against his body asked. She felt the knife thump against her arm. She tried to move and he dug it into her forearm. The sting of pain across her arm took her by surprise.