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Books. Change. Lives.
Cover and internal design © 2019 by Sourcebooks
Cover art by Gregg Gulbronson
Internal images © Lavandaart/Shutterstock
The publisher acknowledges the copyright holders of the individual works as follows:
A Fairy Tale Christmas © 1994, 2011, 2019 by Leigh Greenwood
Christmas in Paradise © 2019 by Rosanne Bittner
A Christmas Wedding © 2019 by Linda Broday
A Love Letter to Santa © 2019 by Margaret Brownley
One Snowy Christmas Eve © 2019 by Anna Schmidt
Through the Storm © 2019 by Amy Sandas
Sourcebooks and the colophon are registered trademarks of Sourcebooks.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing from its publisher, Sourcebooks.
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.
Published by Sourcebooks Casablanca, an imprint of Sourcebooks
P.O. Box 4410, Naperville, Illinois 60567-4410
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Contents
Front Cover
Title Page
Copyright
A Fairy Tale Christmas
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
About the Author
Christmas in Paradise
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
About the Author
Author’s Note
A Christmas Wedding
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
About the Author
A Love Letter to Santa
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
About the Author
Author’s Note
One Snowy Christmas Eve
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
About the Author
Through the Storm
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
About the Author
Back Cover
One
Shenandoah Valley, Virginia
1880
“It’s too much work, Gertie,” Nan said to the thin, middle-aged woman at her side. “And with Gideon not coming home this year, it just doesn’t seem worth it.”
Nan Carson stood with her farm manager’s wife in the wide hall of her family home, Spruce Meadow. The dark oak floors gleamed with fresh wax. White wallpaper with tiny bunches of red poppies and blue cornflowers lightened the gloom created by the dark-stained oak doorways and the stairway that rose to a landing above. Pocket doors opened to reveal on one side an enormous formal parlor furnished with elegant Victorian furniture upholstered in wine-colored velvet and on the other a less formal gathering room furnished with dark leather, cotton prints, and overstuffed cushions.
“But Jake and Eli have already put a pile of cedar and holly on the back porch,” Gertie replied.
“I’ll tell somebody at the church to come get it. They can always use some extra.”
“It won’t seem right not seeing this place decorated,” Gertie said, persevering. “Folks come all the way out here from town to look at it. Won’t seem like Christmas to half of them. Gideon liked it, too.”
“Well, if he’d wanted the decorations put up, he should have come home,” Nan said.
She still hadn’t gotten over the disappointment of learning that Gideon was going to spend Christmas with his fiancée. It wasn’t that Nan disliked Doris Morgan. She’d never met her. And Christmas was probably the best time for Gideon to visit his future in-laws, but this was the first year since their mother’s death that Nan had been alone at Christmas, and she was finding it hard to keep her spirits up.
She was also finding it hard to accept the fact that her little brother was getting married while she seemed doomed to die an old maid. Not that thirty-one felt very old, but in Beaker’s Bend she might as well be sixty. People got married by the time they were eighteen—or they moved away and never came back.
“Are you going to make cookies?” Gertie asked.
“Of course,” Nan said, coming out of her abstraction. “Children get hungry every year.”
“Then you’d better get started. Though how you have the patience to decorate so many I’ll never understand, especially after taking care of this huge old house.”
“It’s no trouble. All I have to do is dust and make my bed. There’s nobody to mess anything up.”
Framed black-and-white pictures covered the walls in the hall, pictures of her father and mother, pictures of Gideon with his football and baseball teams.
There were none of her.
Nan pushed the loneliness aside. She was fortunate to live in a nice home, own the best farm in the valley, and have so many wonderful friends. So what if she wasn’t going to have a husband and children? She shouldn’t complain when she had so many other blessings.
She wasn’t complaining exactly. It was just that there was an emptiness inside her that seemed to get a little bit deeper and wider each day. She felt like a pumpkin dusted with November frost, the last in the field. The outside was still firm and brightly colored, but the inside was slowly drying up.
“Maybe I’ll make gingerbread people this winter,” Nan said, giving her shawl a twitch and settling a smile on her lips. “I made the Christmas village last year.”
“The children love your gingerbread.” Gertie chuckled. “Only you got to be careful they don’t look like nobody. Last time they took to calling one the preacher’s wife. She got so mad she nearly disgraced herself right there in the church social hall.”
Nan’s smile owed more to her sense of mischief than to contrition. “Maybelle Hanks will be safe. I’ll make certain there are no tall, spindly, sour-faced gingerbr
ead women this year.”
The butter hadn’t had time to soften before the sharp, insistent ring of the doorbell brought Nan from the warm kitchen back into the chilly hall. “I’m coming,” she muttered as she hurried along, her steps muffled by the runner.
The cut and beveled glass in the heavy front door distorted the world outside beyond recognition. Nan looked through the sidelights that flanked the door. On the porch, Wilmer Crider huddled into a heavy coat and cap, earflaps folded down. Nan picked up a wool shawl and wrapped it around her shoulders. A wintry blast whipped her skirts about her legs when she opened the door.
“What are you doing here?” Nan asked. “Who’s at the inn?” She knew that Wilmer’s wife, Lucy, had gone to stay with Ruby, her youngest daughter, through a difficult pregnancy. There wasn’t anybody at the inn except Wilmer.
“L.P. and I got a sick fella out here.” Wilmer pointed to the wagon just outside the front gate. “He walked through the door and fell down in a dead faint.”
“What did Dr. Moore say?”
“Doc’s with Ruby. She started having pains during the night.”
Nan had a gift for healing, especially for making sick people feel comfortable and happy. Folks in the valley came to her when they needed help, some even when the doctor was available.
She heaved a sigh. “I’ll take a look at him.”
“You bundle up good,” Gertie called from the back of the hall.
“I’m just going to the road.”
“There’s icicles hanging from the porch roof. You bundle up good.”
Nan put on a heavy coat and wound a thick scarf around her neck.
“You can’t go outside in those shoes,” Gertie said, coming down the hall with a pair of sturdy shoes.
“I hope he’s not very sick,” Nan complained. “He could be dead before I get out the front door.”
“I’ll not have you down in the bed sick on Christmas,” Gertie said.
The December air was frigid. The leaves of magnolias, hollies, and boxwood looked stiff, as if they would crack or break if they moved. Nan’s breath billowed in white clouds before her, and the frozen ground crunched under her feet. The smell of a hickory and oak fire hung in the air. That would be Eli. He hated coal. Said it made the house smell bad. Nan pulled the rough wool of the scarf more securely around her neck.
The mountains that enclosed her valley rose in the distance, their tree-covered flanks dusted with a light covering of snow. Clouds heavy with snow filled the dull sky. Waiting. Threatening. The woolly worms had sported an especially thick coat this year.
The man lay almost buried in a pile of quilts in the back of Wilmer’s wagon.
“I don’t like the look of him,” Wilmer said.
Nan didn’t like the look of him either. He looked exhausted, glassy-eyed with fever. Chestnut-brown hair covered his head in waves. Several strands were matted to his damp forehead. His eyelids were only half open, almost obscuring the deep brown of his eyes. His face had lost all color, but it was clear and handsome and young. He was tall, so tall Wilmer had bent his legs to fit him in the wagon. His suit, starched shirt, and boiled collar announced that he was from a city. Probably somewhere up north. Nobody in the Shenandoah Valley dressed like that.
“Who is he?”
“Will Atkins. Comes from Boston.”
“What’s he doing down here?” Nan examined him carefully. “I’m sure he’ll be all right once his fever breaks, but he’ll need somebody to sit up with him tonight. Is there anybody with him?”
“His daughter.”
“Good. I’ll explain everything to her. Where is she?”
“There,” Wilmer said, pointing to a person previously hidden by L.P.’s substantial bulk.
Nan’s knees nearly went out from under her. A little girl of no more than four or five sat twisted around on the wagon seat. Her enormous, fear-widened brown eyes stared out from the most angelic face Nan had ever seen.
She was scared almost out of her wits.
Nan felt something clutch at her heart. This child was the image of the daughter she used to dream of having someday.
Nan wrenched her thoughts free of such fantasy.
She had no daughter, and this little girl was alone, frightened, tired, and probably hungry as well.
“Where’s her mother?” Nan asked.
“There ain’t no mother, just them two.”
“She couldn’t have come alone. Who looked after her?”
“Her father, I guess.”
“Then she’ll need someone to care for her until her father gets well.”
“Don’t look at me,” Wilmer said. “I’m closing the inn. Got to go to Locust Hollow. Ruby’s husband has come down with a fever, too. There’s nobody to do the chores till he gets back on his feet.”
“What are you going to do with this man?”
“I was hoping you’d take him in.”
“I’m a maiden lady.”
“Nobody’s going to talk, especially not with him passed out cold as a trout and Gertie and Jake here to look after you. Besides, who’s going to take care of her?” He pointed to the child.
Nan walked around to the other side of the wagon. The little girl was bundled up in a coat and mittens, staring out from a fur-lined hood. Her leggings and shoes were city clothes, too thin to protect her from the ice and snow of this mountain valley. She had to be cold all the way through. Even if her father hadn’t been sick, Nan couldn’t have abandoned her.
“Hi. My name is Nan Carson. What’s your name?”
The child didn’t answer, just stared back at her. Nan saw fear in her clenched hands, her ramrod-stiff posture, her anxious stare.
“Where are you going?”
Again, nothing.
“Do you know anybody here in Beaker’s Bend?”
“You know they don’t,” Wilmer said, “not with them dressed like that.”
“I guess not,” Nan agreed, “but they’ve got to be going somewhere. Somebody must be expecting them.”
“Well, they’ll not be getting there today.”
“Not for several days,” Nan said, coming to a decision. “Bring Mr. Atkins inside. I’ll take care of him until his fever breaks, but you’ve got to take him again after that.”
“Sure,” Wilmer said.
“You’re going to stay at my house,” Nan said to the little girl. She held out her hand, but the child didn’t move. Tears welled up in the child’s eyes and rolled down her cheeks.
“Please don’t let my daddy die.”
A lump formed in Nan’s throat. She reached out, unclasped the child’s hands, and took them in her own. “Your father’s going to get well, I promise. I’m going to take very good care of him. And I’m going to fix you something good to eat and tuck you up in a nice, warm bed.”
The little girl still looked fearful, but Nan felt her tiny hands relax and return her pressure. When Wilmer and L.P. lifted her father out of the wagon, the tears flowed faster and her hand squeezed tighter. Nan felt as if her heart would break. She put her arms around the child and drew her close. The tiny body felt frail, yet stiff with fear. Nan wanted desperately to comfort her, but she knew that only time would overcome her dread of being in an unfamiliar town surrounded by strangers, her father very ill. She must feel utterly alone. Abandoned.
Nan picked up the child. “I’ve never had a little girl of my own,” she said. “For tonight, let’s pretend I’m your mommy.”
The child spoke unexpectedly. “My mommy’s gone to heaven. Is Daddy going to heaven, too?”
Nan hugged the child a little closer. “No, your daddy’s going to get well, and you’re going to have the best Christmas ever.”
The child put her arms around Nan’s neck and held tight. Unwilling to break her hold, Nan carried her to the house down a rock-
lined path past a bed of dead roses, an empty flower bed, and a half acre of brown, withered grass. She waited while Wilmer and L.P. struggled to carry Will Atkins up the steps. Gertie held the door open.
“Take him straight back,” Nan told Wilmer.
“But that’s your room,” Gertie objected.
The big room, once Nan’s parents’, lay at the back of the house across the wide hall from the kitchen. Nan directed them to place Will on an oversized bed piled high with thick, soft mattresses. The room was filled with ornately carved, dark cherrywood furniture, but Nan’s touches could be seen in the gingham bed cover and lace curtains at the window to let in the light.
“I’ll sleep in my old room,” Nan said.
She put the little girl down. The child wouldn’t let go of Nan’s hand, so Nan knelt beside her. “I’m going to take you to the kitchen while I see about your father.” The child clutched tighter. “This is Gertie,” Nan said, introducing her farm manager’s wife. “She’ll get you something to eat.”
The child still clung to Nan. Nan choked up. How many times had she dreamed of holding her own child just like this? She didn’t want to let go, but she knew she had to see to the father.
“You don’t have to be afraid. I’ll be right here.”
Still she wouldn’t let go. Nan didn’t have the heart to force her to go with Gertie. Still kneeling, still holding the child’s hand, she said to Gertie, “Bring some warm milk and bread and jam to the bedroom.”
She turned to the child. “Would you like that?”
The girl didn’t answer, but Nan thought she detected a brightness in her eyes. Nan led her into the bedroom, to a chair close to the bed. “Sit right here. You can watch everything that happens to your daddy. We’re going to make him better. I’m going to light the fire. It’ll soon be warm as toast.” Nan lifted her into a chair. “I won’t leave you, I promise. But I’ve got to make your father better. You want that, don’t you?”
The child nodded.
“Then sit right here. I’ll be back in a moment.” The child looked scared, but determined to be brave.
Wilmer and L.P. had undressed Mr. Atkins and put him into Nan’s father’s nightshirt. Nan put her hand to his forehead. He was burning up with fever. His pulse was calm and steady, but she would have to keep him warm. She took an extra quilt out of a tall wardrobe and asked L.P. to bring in more firewood for the woodbox. She went out and returned in a few minutes with a cool compress for her patient’s forehead and a hot-water bottle for his feet. She would give him some hot herbal tea as soon as it was ready, but right now she was more concerned about keeping him warm.
Longing for a Cowboy Christmas Page 1
