Eli sighed, arm tightening slightly.
“You okay?” I asked, turning over to face him.
He smiled, but it wasn’t quite right. “Just thinking.”
“I’d ask you to talk to me about it, but I can tell by the look on your face that you won’t.”
He moved, propping on his elbow and resting his head on his palm. He sighed deeply again. “It isn’t that I don’t want to talk to you about it, Nova. It’s that… well, I can’t. See, I made a promise. Only, I hadn’t thought it would be so hard to keep it.”
That was news to me. “Everyone is allowed their secrets, Eli. You shouldn’t beat yourself up over them. As long as they aren’t hurting someone else, you shouldn’t feel guilty.”
He gave me a real smile and then rolled onto his back, arm stretching out to gather me against him.
His body was warm. His heart a steady beat under my cheek. “It’s hurting you, though. To keep the secret, I mean,” I said.
“It’s eating me alive, and I don’t know how to let it not. I feel like I’ll burst if I don’t tell you. And then I feel ashamed of myself for even thinking about telling you because of the promise I made,” he explained.
His hand moved with slow strokes up and down my arm. I breathed in the silence. There wasn’t much I could say to make him feel better. Whatever Eli struggled with, he had to work it out on his own, or with whomever it was he promised to keep the secret for.
“What bothers me the most,” he said, settling further into his pillow, “is that even if I did talk about it, I don’t think anyone would understand.”
He shifted and blew out a long breath. “I don’t even understand it.”
“Eli, maybe you should talk to whoever it is who swore you to secrecy. Maybe if you talk to them about what it is that’s bothering you, it might make you feel better. I mean, it’s possible that’s all you need—just someone to talk to.”
“Nova, this goes so much further than talking to someone. I—” He cut himself off, then drew in a deep breath that lifted my face as his chest rose. A long rush of words came out of him. Words that hit me hard enough to take my breath away as he explained what had really happened to him in Mongolia.
We both sat up as he took my hands in his, unable to let one another go. Unable to break the connection between us because if we did, death might creep back in and take him once more.
“I’m sorry,” he said. He closed his eyes and lowered his head.
“Don’t do that. Don’t apologize. How can you be sorry for something out of your control? Was it your choice to go to Siberia? No. Was it you who fired the gun? No. Whatever Cole did… however he did it… it brought you back to us. It brought you back to me.” Tears blurred my vision, and I brought our hands up to dash them away.
“We can’t tell anyone, Nova. I broke my promise by telling you, but I couldn’t hold it back from you. Not anymore. Not when it feels like you’re everything I was missing. Having you here, knowing you’ll be wherever I am? That’s more than I could have ever hoped for in this lifetime. I didn’t just want to tell you… I had to tell you. Now, when it sets heavy on me, I know I can talk to you about it and push it back into the recess of my mind.”
I leaned forward and kissed him. “And I’ll make you a promise. I’ll never say a word. I know what it cost you to talk to me about it. To tell me when you weren’t supposed to tell anyone at all.”
He let go of my hand and cupped my face. “You are my heart. Do you know that? You’ve been my heart since the moment I met you, Nova. And for a brief moment in time, you were the star who guided me back home.”
“I dreamed of you,” I said, remembering the odd dream I’d had of us sitting side by side while we watched the northern lights. “It was the oddest dream, too.”
He sucked in a sharp breath. “You called my name. The light got really bright, and you called my name.”
I nodded, blinking more tears away and leaving them to roll down my cheeks. Even in death, we’d somehow been connected.
“I saw her,” he said.
“Who?”
“Noni. She was so beautiful, Nova. Her eyes were so clear. She’s at peace. I know that without a doubt,” he said, leaning forward until our foreheads met.
I cried, and he let me without trying to gather me close or shush me. He let me feel the pain and then, when I was ready, he held his arms out. I moved to his lap. My head rested on his shoulder, and his arms went around me. Together, we sighed. We healed.
“This is turning out to be one hell of a Christmas, huh?” he asked.
I chuckled. “You can say that again. But you know what? I wouldn’t change it for the world.”
A sound of contentment pushed past his lips. “Me either.”
“I love you, Eli. Today, tomorrow… always.”
“Love you too, my Nova.”
Chapter 3
Josh
“What the hell am I supposed to buy for Aiden? Muscle shirts? A subscription to the beef jerky club? What the hell is all of this?” Ella asked, waving the crumpled paper under my nose.
I snatched it. “Well, for starters, it was supposed to be a surprise who we each got. But since you’ve blurted it out to me, maybe I can help with your dilemma. Switch me. I have Paige, and I don’t have a clue what any of this sh—er, stuff is,” I said, handing her the once-crumpled sheet with Paige’s name on it.
She snatched it out of my hands. “This I can work with.”
“So, we should go shopping soon,” I said, hoping we could sneak out and back in before someone noticed and the whole crew decided to go. Not that I minded going with everyone, but I didn’t want to be out shopping all day long. Just thinking about it made me antsy.
“We can go now, if you want. Tomorrow, I’m going with the girls so we can get our other shopping done,” Ella said, shoving Paige’s list in her wallet.
“Speaking of other shopping, what do you want for Christmas?” I asked.
I’d literally wracked my brain trying to think of something, and I was having the worst time coming up with ideas. All I knew was I wanted to do a few little things, and something a bit bigger. Something with meaning since it was our first Christmas together.
“Don’t get carried away. We’ll be paying Oliver back for the rest of our lives for these,” Ella said, wiggling her rings in the direction of the one on my hand.
I shrugged off what she said. “We have nothing else to pay for, so spending a little money on one another isn’t going to break us.”
Her eyebrow arched. “Okay, well, I’ve had my eye on a Smith and Wesson—”
“No firearms,” I said, putting my hand against her mouth. “No. For your birthday, sure, but not Christmas, okay?”
She nodded, but not before rolling her eyes and pulling my hand from her mouth. “Fine. What about you? What do you want for Christmas?”
I hadn’t thought about it. Not really. Coming up with ideas to put on the list we’d filled out had been hard enough. I shrugged. “Honestly? Being here with you at Christmas is probably the best gift I could have received.”
“Cheesy much?” she teased.
Ella and I hadn’t had a lot of time to learn much about one another, so I didn’t take what she said personally.
“If that’s what you want to call it. But, for the record, I’m being serious. Being here with everyone at this time of year… Who would have thought it possible? I never would have, that’s for sure. It’s like having a bit of normalcy in the chaos.”
“Well, it makes me a little twitchy. I mean, why give us this kind of downtime? The evil minds of the world aren’t going to stop. Why should we?” she said, walking over to the closet and pulling out our jackets.
It was a good point, but what Ella failed to understand was Nadia and Grant knew what it had done to us when we thought we’d lost Eli. For them to give us Christmas together was like giving us a chance to heal.
It was true that evil didn’t sleep, and even more true
in our situation. We’d never rid the world of the bad that plagued it, but we’d do our part. And for that, we needed our own downtime. “Well, Ms. Twitchy, let’s get you out of the house and on a mission then.”
“Mission?” she asked, screwing up her face and tossing my jacket into my outstretched hand.
“The ultimate Christmas gift mission… should you choose to accept it,” I said, winking.
“Like I said, cheesy.”
“Yeah, but you love me anyway. Come on, tide, time, and Christmas wait for no man.”
She laughed. “Wouldn’t want to be late for any of those.”
“That’s the spirit,” I said, tapping her on the end of the nose.
“I can’t believe there’s an actual beef jerky store,” Ella said, coming to a stop in front of the storefront window.
“Doubt they sell subscriptions, but I can get a bunch of different flavors for Aiden. That way, he can try them,” I said, tipping my head toward the door. “You game?”
“Oh, har-har. Yeah, sure, I’m game.”
“Be still my heart. My Ella made a joke all on her own. I knew I’d rub off on you… eventually,” I said as happiness erupted inside of me.
She mumbled something under her breath as we stepped inside what could only be called the mecca of dried meat. Everything. They had everything.
Ella wandered to the back where a small setup of merchandise was on display. I started at one end of the store, reading the tags on each barrel.
I’d made it halfway around when Ella strolled over with the clerk. “He said you can try some if you’d like.”
“Me? I don’t—”
“Well, you might not want to, but I do,” Ella said. She ran that poor clerk ragged getting her samples. I’d bet it was the smile she gave him every time she found another one she wanted to try that kept him going.
By the time we’d made it to the last barrel, Ella had tried almost all the jerky.
“I think Aiden might be on to something here,” Ella said, looking over her shoulder as we left the store. “Who would have thought dried kangaroo would be so good?”
I shuddered. “Not me. Hopefully, Aiden will like it since he’s getting ten pounds of it.”
“Here, you carry it,” she said, handing over the bulging bag in her hand.
“Oh, I see, give the bag of dried meat to me so if any wild animals catch the scent, it’s me who gets attacked,” I said, swinging the bag up to hang over my shoulder.
“You can handle it,” she said, smirking.
“Where to next?” I asked, eyes scanning over the storefronts across the mall, taking in the people around us.
Once I learned how to keep my guard, I never dropped it. Not that I was expecting any trouble, because I wasn’t. But I’d be ready for it regardless. Me and my ten-pound bag of dried meat.
I saw the direction Ella was headed and grimaced. I didn’t mind scented lotions or perfumes. But a whole store full tended to make my nose go completely ape shit, and I wasn’t looking forward to being subjected to scent overload. “Uh, how about I just wait for you out here?”
“Okay, be out in just a few,” she said, leaving me to cool my heels out in front of the store with what looked like a handful of other husbands.
It hit me then, like it always did when I wasn’t thinking about it. All of a sudden, the realization warmed me all over. I’m a husband. I have a wife. We’re married. Wow.
“What are you smiling about?” Ella asked, popping up beside me.
“That was fast,” I said, eyeing the large bag in her hand.
“I don’t play around when I’m shopping. I get what I want, and then I get the hell out,” she said. “I’m thirsty, let’s head toward the food court.”
I put my hand out and felt her fingers slide between my own.
“Are you happy, Ella?” I asked, sitting across from her as we sipped our overly priced coffees.
The question caught her off guard, considering mere moments before we were deciding on the last of our Christmas shopping for Aiden and Paige.
“In general, do you mean? Or that we’re almost done shopping?” she asked.
I leaned forward, elbows resting on the table. “I mean with me.”
She smiled, and I felt something ease inside my chest.
“If I wasn’t happy, Josh, you’d be the first to know. But it isn’t just happiness. I’m content. I haven’t felt that way in a very long time. Yet, somehow when I’m with you, I am.”
“Good,” I said, taking a sip of my coffee.
“What about you? Married life all it was cracked up to be?” she asked with a trace of humor softening her features.
I shrugged. “I never thought about it, or what it might be like. I mean, I have my parents as an example. They’ve always been a… unit, I guess is the best way to put it. If love had a face, it would be theirs.”
She sighed. “That was probably one of the most romantic things I think I’ve heard come out of you.”
I wiggled my eyebrows. “Stick around. Plenty more where that came from.”
“Come on, Romeo, let’s finish shopping so we can go home,” she said.
“We’d wondered where you two made off to,” Riley said, eyeing us like we’d snuck off for a quickie.
“Just knocking out some Christmas shopping before the stores get too busy,” I said, heading for the stairs with Ella on my heels.
The oven dinged. The most amazing smell floated along the air, and I came to a stumbling halt. My mouth watered, and I dropped the bags. “Are those—”
“Fresh-out-of-the-oven shortbread cookies?” Riley answered. “Yep. Want one?”
“One? I want the whole pan,” I said, darting into the kitchen and standing over the batch she’d set on the counter.
She chuckled. “We’ll have to fight it out, because I was thinking about eating all of them by myself, too.”
I put my hands on her shoulders and moved her back a few steps. “As your friend, it seems only fair that I eat these so you don’t get fat.”
She brought her hand up, a spatula clutched in her fist. “Who’s fat?”
I took a quick step back. “I didn’t say you were fat. I said if you ate all of those you’d… Hey, look, a kangaroo!” I raised my voice and pointed behind her.
“What?”
When she half turned to look, I snatched a handful of cookies out of the container she’d been filling and then rushed out of the kitchen. I paused long enough to grab the bags I’d dropped on the floor before making like a bandit to the safety of the bedroom.
“Well, at least you were smart enough not to grab the ones on the pan,” she said, raising her voice so I’d hear her.
“I hope you know you’re sharing those,” Ella said, reaching out to nab a cookie.
I spun, and her fingertips grazed the top of one. It broke, scattering crumbs. “I stole these for myself. If you want some, go steal your own,” I said. I licked the crumbs from my hand and then closed the bedroom door.
“Oh? Haven’t you heard the saying, ‘what’s mine is mine, and what’s yours is mine’?” she asked, poking me in the side where she knew I was ticklish.
I danced away, shoved a cookie in my mouth, and grinned, which was hard to do while chewing. “Give me just a second to finish these and you can have what’s yours.”
She rolled her eyes when I wiggled my eyebrows. “Ass.”
“Ah, now, that’s part of the ‘yours is mine’ clause specifically written in just for me. Hey, wait, where are you going?” I called out when she jerked the bedroom door open and stormed down the hallway.
“To get my own damn cookies,” she snapped.
“Cookies? Oh, damn, those smell amazing,” Eli said, poking his head out of his bedroom.
“Uh-uh… I’m not sharing with any of you Six. Go back to what you were doing, Eli. It’s safer that way,” Ella huffed.
Just as Ella passed by Jared’s room, he wrenched the door open and was hit smack in the
face with the scent driving us all mad. “Cookies?”
“Damn it,” Ella said, tossing a dirty look over her shoulder at me.
I leaned against the doorjamb. Taking a bite of the last cookie I’d pilfered, I smirked at her.
“Race ya to the kitchen,” Eli said to Jared.
“Oh, you’re on,” Jared fired back. “Count us down, Ella.”
Ella stood in the middle of the hallway, mouth hanging open, but only momentarily. It was sudden, the change on her face. One second, she was gobsmacked, and then she wasn’t. My Ella had a plan.
She looked between Jared and Eli, nodded, and then said. “Fine. Jared, go stand beside Eli so you get an equal start.
Jared jogged down the hallway. Once he was shoulder to shoulder with Eli, he said, “This should be easy enough. You’re not up to a full sprint, brother.”
“Sugar. Cookies,” Eli answered, as if those two words explained it all.
Jared chuckled. “We’re ready.”
Ella nodded. “On your mark. Get set…” and then she turned and hauled ass down the hallway.
Eli busted out laughing, and then slugged Jared in the arm. “She acts just like you.”
“Eats like you, too, Jared,” I said, closing the bedroom door before joining them.
Jared gasped. “We better hurry up or there won’t even be a crumb left!”
“They ate all of them?” Ace asked, peering into the empty container.
“Every last crumb.” Riley sighed, tossing a dish towel over her shoulder. She turned her face up as Ace leaned down and kissed her.
“I may have saved you a few, though,” she said, moving to the far cabinet and digging out a good-sized plastic container. She handed it to him.
“More cookies?” Jared asked, popping up from his chair and heading for Ace.
Riley rounded on him, and then brought a wooden spoon down on his hand with a loud crack.
He jumped back, hissing. “Dang, Riley.”
“Those are for Jake. Don’t even think about touching them,” she warned.
“Yeah, don’t even think about touching them,” Ace said, prying the lid up and stuffing a cookie in his mouth.
A Very Merry Sixmas Page 3
