A Season of the Heart: Rocky Mountain ChristmasThe Christmas GiftsThe Christmas Charm

by Jillian Hart

  “That’s a lot of cakes. Any of ’em for me?”

  “Maybe. Depends on whether I like the reason you brought strangers into my home.”

  “You will.” He stole a browned sausage link and bit back a curse as the grease scorched his fingertips, but it was a sacrifice he was willing to make. He blew on one end of the link to cool it enough so he wouldn’t burn off his tongue. “How mad are you?”

  “Son, you’ve never done a thing like this before, so I figure there must be some reason behind it.” Sparkles lit up her gray eyes as she took a platter from the warmer and heaped on the last of the pancakes. “I trust you with my life. You would never bring harm to us. Your father thinks the same.”

  “Never.” If he had a heart, if any small bit of it had managed to survive, it would be warm as the red-sided cookstove with a son’s love. But as it was, he felt hollow as he turned away, for he knew that glimmer of hope on his mother’s face. The hope that he’d be able to leave Amelia buried in the past and marry again.

  Some things were not to be forgiven.

  “Is Pa at the shop?” Woodenly, he took a cinnamon roll from the plate on the counter.

  “He wanted to get the place warm before I got there, the dear man.”

  “It’s damn cold out there.” Mac dragged a chair out from the table with the toe of his boot and settled into it. He considered the impenetrable snow that writhed and whirled on the other side of the window and ate the sticky sweet roll with his fingers. “You shouldn’t go out in this alone. I’d best go with you.”

  “I’m perfectly capable of finding my way, storm or no. Besides, you need to wait for your guests upstairs.” More glints twinkled in her hopeful gaze, and her face gentled with love as she came, untying her apron as she went, to press a kiss on his brow. “Son, here’s some good advice. Take care with this day given to you. They are numbered for each of us, and should never be wasted.”

  He squeezed his eyes shut, willing down the pain. The ashes within him scattered. While he knew what his mother meant, how she always wanted to remind him that life went on, it did not for him. “You’re off in a hurry.”

  “You wouldn’t believe the orders! Stop by the shop and bring our houseguests with you.” She hurried on her way, lifting her hand in a wave even as she disappeared through the doorway and down the hall.

  But he wasn’t alone. He felt the whisper of her presence before he heard the brush of her step in the archway behind him. He hadn’t been able to catch more than a wink of sleep thinking about her. And not wanting to think about her.

  The tug within was there too, as if she’d given a good yank on that invisible lasso, and even his emptiness seemed less when he looked upon her.

  This was Carrie? He knew it was. The bulky coat was gone, and the weariness had vanished. The woman in a sedate gray wool dress with black buttons marching from her chin to hem did not look homeless or penniless.

  She looked like a dream. Her silken chestnut hair was drawn simply back at her nape in a braid. There was no mistaking the rich emerald of her eyes or the delicate cut of her porcelain face.

  “Good morning, Sheriff. I heard voices, and I wanted to come and thank your mother. I can’t remember the last time I’ve had such a good sleep. The room was so comfortable.”

  The height of color ebbing into her soft cheeks told him she was referring to the bed. He felt his face heat, too, at the image of her slim woman’s form stretched out on that wide feather bed. With her hair loose and untamed, and his fingers aching to wind through it—

  Whoa, tighten the rein on those thoughts, McKaslin. Realizing his blood was hot, his breathing changed and a heavy want was drumming like a heartbeat within, he bolted from the chair and headed straight to the stove. What was wrong with him? He’d seen lovely women and hadn’t reacted like this. Was he no better than Bose?

  His fingers shook as he grabbed down a clean cup from the shelves. “Coffee?”

  “That would be wonderful.”

  It was the way she’d said it, as if he’d offered her something rare, that made him realize the comforts surrounding him. And all he took for granted. And, he thought as he filled the cup, all he did not. “Is your little girl still asleep?”

  “Fast. Oh, this is a beautiful kitchen. And it smells so good, the way a home should.”

  Coffee and baking and wood smoke, and beneath it all the lemon polish his mother used. He tried not to remember the last time he’d had a real home—the house he’d built for his wife—and the emptiness inside him, where not even the ashes remained, stirred as if a wind whirled there. And brought with it pain.

  Firmly, he set the cup on the table, determined to stay right here in the present. He had no notion why his nightmares had crept into his waking day. “Help yourself to the food in the warmer. My mother made enough to feed a small army.”

  “Where is she? I want to meet her. I mean, we’re strangers, and surely she must worry what kind of person is in her home.”

  “She just left to join my father. They own a shop in town and are apparently very busy with Christmas orders.”

  Add to the equation the fact that his mother wanted him to enjoy time alone with Carrie, and that was the real reason she’d run for the door.

  What was he going to do with his poor hopeful ma? “Here’s a plate. Come, dish up.”

  “Oh.” She simply stared at the array of food.

  “How long has it been since you’ve had a home-cooked meal?”

  “You mean that wasn’t made over a campfire?”

  “This is winter. How long have you been cooking outdoors?”

  And with a child. Carrie could hear his unspoken question. In her defense, she’d worked hard to make sure her little one was warm enough, surely not as snug as she’d been this last night, but comfortable enough. Surely, a county or territorial orphanage was no warmer. She’d heard horror stories of the cold dormitories where there was no heat at all in the entire building.

  Likewise had been true with the boardinghouse where she’d last stayed. There was no heat in the individual rooms, no coal heaters, no stoves, no fireplaces.

  “This is why I was on the train.” She had so little dignity left, but she clung to it because it was all that was keeping her from a desperate life. “The work I was able to find was temporary—most jobs in this part of the country are, you know that.”

  “Because of the hard winters. It’s the same story around here. No farming, no logging. Except for the town stores, work comes to a standstill.”

  Relief filled her, for she heard understanding in his words. “I was hoping to go West. To Idaho or maybe Oregon or Washington Territory where the winters are mild and there are jobs year-round. I need to find work so I can take care of my child.”

  Since he handed her a serving spoon, she took it and dug into the hash potatoes in the bowl in the oven warmer. With a tap of steel on ironware, she dropped a scoop of buttery and steaming hash browns on her plate.

  “That’s all?” He took the spoon back but not unkindly. “That just isn’t going to work. Not in this house. You’d offend Ma if she saw that measly little serving.”

  He plopped a second, enormous scoop of soft, crispy potatoes next to the first. “I can see how this is going to go, so you’ll just have to suffer with me filling your plate. Sausage?”

  “Those are real links.”

  “I’ll take that as a big yes.” Mac forked half a dozen before she protested, then went on to the scrambled eggs.

  It was an odd thing, he thought as he dished up a big helping first on her plate and then on his. Somehow it felt intimate, familiar, having her at his side by the stove.

  It was a strange comfort that wrapped around him like the heat from the fire, driving away all coldness and dispelling the darkest of the shadows. After he dished up a big stack of pancakes, she thanked him and moved away to the table.

  You’ve gone a long time without a decent meal, haven’t you? While the coat she’d worn last night
had been large, there was no mistaking the too-big dress she wore. From the back, where her braid met the back of her collar, he could plainly see the thin column of her neck and the obvious, painful bumps of her neck bones. She did not fill out the dress. Last night, he’d mistakenly believed she’d worn secondhand clothes, but that had to be wrong.

  This was her dress, made for her, for the hem was the right length, offering glimpses of her shoes, but it did not fit her. The loose fabric whispered over the tiny cinch of her waist and, when she turned to slide her plate onto the table, he could plainly see the outline of her shoulder blades and, he feared, ribs, through the soft wool. He thought of the child upstairs with her soft cherub’s face. The girl had eaten while the mother had not.

  Sadness ebbed into him like a slow cold wave. Carrie was a young mother with no family and no help, no job and no money. She said she was hoping to find work. That was all. She did not deserve a stint in a jail cell. He no longer cared if the railroad threw a tantrum over this or if he even lost his job.

  He saw that he might be able to do some good after all. “What job did you used to have?”

  “I cleaned and cooked at a boardinghouse.” She accepted the sugar bowl he pushed her way and spooned two generous scoops into the steaming coffee cup. “It wasn’t a great job and it didn’t pay well, but I could keep Ebea with me while I worked.”

  “And that job ended?”

  “Yes. The workers who’d come to hire on to the farms went back on the trains and the mines closed down, and they didn’t need me anymore.” She thought of the day she’d walked away from the boardinghouse, with Ebea’s hand so small and trusting within hers and a fear she could taste gathering on her tongue. There hadn’t been money enough saved up. There hadn’t been anywhere to go or anyone to help. She said no more.

  The blizzard did not seem to blow so fierce as she cupped her hands around the ironware cup and let the coffee’s heat soak into her. She breathed in the rich fragrance, and the first sip was an unbelievable luxury. She let the sweet bitterness roll over her tongue and down her throat. It glowed in her stomach, warming her.

  “You seem to be enjoying that. I have a weakness for coffee, too. Can’t get moving unless I have my usual three cups. On mornings like this, four.”

  “It is one of my favorite things.”

  His wise eyes didn’t move from her face. “How long has it been since you’ve had any?”

  “My mother gave me a five-pound bag of beans for Christmas the year before last. Ebea was just a wee thing toddling about, and times were lean then, too.” She could read the question on his face; it wasn’t hard, for she could feel it in the air as if he’d written it in smoke. Two years without a cup of coffee?

  She didn’t say another word about it but simply took a second slow, satisfying sip. Mac was a decent man, it seemed to radiate from him, but he had a good-paying job, a home and family. He had people who loved him—surely he was married—and comforts all around him. He couldn’t understand. Especially the part about her Ebea’s future hanging in the balance.

  “Will you be taking me to jail after the meal?”

  “No.” He didn’t look her way as he picked up his fork and dug into the pile of eggs on his plate.

  The hard ball of fear dead center in her chest began to unravel. “If perhaps the rail company will agree not to charge me a passenger fare, but something lower, then I can pay part with my mother’s ring. When I find work, I could make payments on the balance of the debt. I would be good for it.”

  She waited, heart pounding while the sheriff chewed, swallowed and took a long gulp of coffee. His silence remained. The penetrating heat of his gaze seared her, as if he was trying to peer deep into her heart. She wrenched away to stare out the window where snow whirled and warred.

  Finally, he spoke. “The problem with that argument is that you don’t have a job.”

  “No. But I will find one. You know I have to. I have my Ebea. I will not fail her.”

  Although it felt she might already have. Desolate, she watched the white screen of the storm on the other side of the window. Pure white as spun sugar, the gales of snow did not seem so thick.

  Perhaps it was just wishful thinking or the brightness of the sun somewhere beyond the heavy mantle of cruel storm clouds that made the snow all the whiter. Through the veils of it, she caught sight of a white-draped fir’s bough, heavily weighted, and then it vanished.

  She felt like that tree, sagging beneath the weight of what she could not stop or escape.

  “It’s cute, but what kind of name is Ebea?”

  “It’s short for Elizabeth Beatrice. My mother made it up.” Carrie set down her fork. Her stomach fisted and she could not eat.

  He only stared at her with serious eyes she saw were gray. Not a cold and uncaring gray like a storm, but warm, like sun on steel. “The storm’s letting up, do you think?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Sometimes we get lucky and a blizzard is only a day. Two at the most. But not often.” He took the small pitcher in the center of the table and poured thick maple syrup over his stack of cakes. “I suppose being from the Dakotas you’re used to a blizzard or two.”

  “Wouldn’t be much of a woman in these parts if I wasn’t.”

  “True.” She hadn’t touched her meal. “The food’s gonna cool off if you don’t get busy. The good part about the storm is that if the winds keep going, the railroad will be shut down until it ends, what with avalanches and snowdrifts on the tracks. It takes half a day or so for crews to clear the way.”

  “Are you saying that I have some time?”

  “That’s what I’m saying.” He picked up his plate and cup, now that they had that settled.

  The vastness in his chest hurt and did not stop no matter how hard he willed it. Something like when men lost their limbs to accident or war and they could feel the hurting pain of the arm or leg that was no longer there. He could still feel the shadows of his heart, and the longing.

  And since it had been some time since he’d shared a morning table with a pretty woman, one who made him wish just a little, he found it easier to leave the room. He could make no excuse, and decided it couldn’t matter to her. She had her own problems.

  So he took refuge in the parlor where last night’s fire was nothing but black ashes in a cold grate and listened to the sounds of the storm outside, instead of to the one within.

  How long would the blizzard last? Carrie wondered as she wiped the last dish in the drainer. How long did she have? As the morning ticked by, the blizzard had seemed to lessen in intensity, but the white veil of snow continued to fall in a thick, unbreakable curtain.

  “Ma, Molly’s tummy is full.” Ebea looked up from cradling her baby doll on the floor before the cookstove.

  “You are a good mother, baby girl?”

  Ebea nodded as she cradled her doll, rocking her gently. Her sweet voice lifted in a familiar lullaby, and love warmed Carrie more than the wonderful heat from the stove ever could.

  Please, she thought, please let the blizzard last long enough. So I can figure out where to go from here. How to give her the future she deserves. The weight of it, and the hope, tugged heavily on her as she emptied the dishpan outside the back door and then wiped it down and the work counter.

  The sheriff had left as soon as he’d emptied his plate, with promises to return. So when she heard the front door wrangle open, she wasn’t worried.

  After wrestling with the wind and shaking the snow from his wraps, he ambled into the kitchen looking like a legend in his Stetson, buffalo coat and denims. “Howdy there. I see you ladies have been keeping busy. Carrie, you didn’t need to do the dishes.”

  “Yes, I did. I’m a guest here. It’s the least I can do to repay your mother’s hospitality.”

  “That’s exactly the point. You’re a guest.” Although he sure appreciated what she’d done. The kitchen shone. He guessed she’d cleaned the floor, too, judging by the look of things.

/>   Mac tucked his gloves into his pocket and held out his hands to the stove. He’d been out most of the morning helping folks who were more stubborn than the storm. He’d helped secure the ropes across the ends of the boardwalks, and assisted the shop owners needing help with clearing snow. Freeing a stuck sleigh that had been blocking Mountain Street had kept him out in the weather for hours.

  “I meant to come by earlier, but a sheriff’s job is never done. Are you ready to head out? My ma made me promise to bring you and your little one by the shop. She’ll box my ears if I don’t.”

  “Box your ears? If she does, I’m sure it’s no less than you deserve. I can have us ready in a few minutes.”

  “Fine, then.” The ache remained within him, lodged in the center of his chest, and it was a sharp, keening pain that made him wish he had a deputy on duty to handle this situation. Hand her off to someone else so he wouldn’t have to feel. But Larkin was out of town visiting family. And she’s your responsibility, anyway.

  He wasn’t surprised the silverware remained untouched in the bottom of the glass cabinet. Or that the child on the floor chanting a lullaby in a singsong voice was as neat as a picture with her hair so like her mother’s falling in a cloud of innocence. With her head bowed, she continued to sing, rocking her baby doll wrapped in a tattered length of pink cloth.

  Footsteps heralded Carrie’s approach and he knelt before the fuel door and grabbed the poker from its iron hook. He was busy breaking down the fire and banking the chunks of glowing embers when she tapped into the room, a reticule clutched in her hand and their wraps piled over her arm. Her skirts swished and the flannel petticoats beneath them whispered in a hush that was so distinctly feminine and somehow alluring that it set his teeth on edge.

  Why was she affecting him this way? He did not want her to. He did not wish it. He stubbed the last flicker of flame and covered it in ash. If only he could smother this feeling within him as easily.

  The little girl tipped back her head to gaze up at her mother, her soft face pinched with worry. “I wanna stay here.”