by Leah Atwood
“You always know how to make me feel so safe and loved,” she whispered.
“I promise to always keep you safe. And I’m fairly certain I vowed to love you for a lifetime,” Alec teased as he once again lowered his mouth to her lips. Maggie let out a sigh as his lips roamed over hers with a possessive edge. He’d missed her! She could feel it in his kiss. Powerful sensations coursed through her like quicksilver. This was the man she had pledged her life to. She grabbed hold of the back of his head, skimming her fingers along his cropped hair. It felt amazing to be able to just reach out and touch her husband. How she loved this man!
The shrill peal of the house phone startled both of them. She struggled to raise herself off the couch, hampered by Alec’s hand on her wrist.
“Ignore it!” he whispered as his lips tickled the side of her neck. “I’ve missed my wife.”
“Baby, I can’t ignore the phone call,” she said with a sigh. “I’m on call for another hour. One of my clients might be calling about an emergency.”
Alec groaned and shifted his body so Maggie could scoot by him. He knew what her work at Breeze Point Hospital meant to her. Being surrounded by children had been a little tough after the miscarriages, although ultimately Maggie had found comfort in their peaceful spirits and quiet acts of courage. Having dealt with tragedy in her own life, she wanted to help families deal with their own difficult circumstances. Sometimes, adversity did make a person stronger. And with God’s divine grace, each family might find a measure of peace, no matter where their journey ended up.
As she raced to grab the house phone she heard Alec mutter a few words in a frustrated tone. She shot him a playful look and let out a low chuckle.
He’s not used to somebody telling him no, she thought as feelings of happiness fluttered through her. He was home. Nothing else mattered. Everything else that had come before was trumped by this one moment in time. Christmas with Alec. A chance to settle in to married life before he had to go back overseas. Perhaps they could try for another baby while he was on leave. Yes, indeed. When you least expected it, joy came in abundance.
“Maggie Donahue’s line,” she said in a breathless voice as she answered the phone.
“Is he back, Maggie? Is he back in Breeze Point?” a voice screamed out on the other end of the line.
Maggie had to hold the phone away from her ear due to the ear-splitting cries coming from the other end of the line. Somehow her mother-in-law had received word of Alec’s arrival in Breeze Point.
“Dottie, slow down,” she urged in a calm voice. “Take a deep breath.”
“Well, is he? Don’t keep me in suspense,” she barked.
She glanced over at Alec and glimpsed him rolling his eyes. He knew all too well about his mother’s larger than life personality and her tendency to get overly excited, particularly about her boys.
It had been one of the first things he'd told her about himself when they’d gone out on one of their first dates. I have a very intense mother. She's really close to me and my brothers. He'd been a little sheepish about it at the time, not wanting to portray himself as a Mama’s boy, yet striving to convey the importance of his mother in his life. It had won him instant brownie points with her. As a woman who’d lost both her parents in a tragic accident, she valued family above all else. Alec’s devotion to his mother and father was heartwarming. A person only had to meet Dottie Donahue once to know the indisputable truth. Her mother-in-law loved her four sons with the ferocity of a Mama grizzly bear. It was evident in every word, every touch and every look. Maggie hoped someday she too would love her children just as fiercely.
And with the death of Alec’s father from cancer a year ago, Dottie clung even more tightly to her brood. Maggie fully understood Dottie’s feelings. Her own loss of her parents gave her a great deal of empathy toward Alec and his entire family.
“Yes, he’s here, Dottie. How did you...” She gestured to him, trying to figure out if he wanted to get on the phone with his mother. Later. Alec mouthed the words and she nodded her head before telling his mother, “Um...he's a little busy at the moment, but I’ll have him give you call later. Okay, Dottie. Sure. Will do.”
As Maggie ended the call, Alec walked into the kitchen and opened up the fridge, helping himself to a carton of milk before grabbing a handful of chocolate chip cookies from the counter. She watched him tilt back his head, raise the carton of milk to his lips and down it in a few gulps, his throat convulsing as he swallowed. Maggie watched in appreciation as he raked his hand across his mouth and wiped away all remnants of milk. As far as she was concerned, her husband could drink out of the carton to his heart’s desire. All she cared about was that he was home, safe and sound.
Goodness! There was something incredibly appealing about a gorgeous man drinking milk straight from the carton. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that her mother had always forbidden her to drink straight out of the carton when she was a child. Being an adult certainly had its perks.
“Your mother made me promise to have you call her first thing tomorrow morning. And she’s expecting us tomorrow night for her holiday party and for Christmas dinner at the house.” Maggie broke out into a grin. “She said she’ll leave you alone tonight since...well, since she wants us to have private time.”
A slow, sly smile began to break out on Alec’s face. His eyes narrowed and he gazed at her with a look of such intense longing that it made her shiver. He’d missed her. It radiated in his eyes like a beam of sapphire light. And, although she wanted to sit and cuddle with him and be affectionate, she was nervous. Now that she could see he was all right and in one piece, her mind had shifted to other concerns. There was so much that remained unspoken between them, so many issues they’d never dealt with before he'd deployed the last time.
Sharing intimate time with her husband would be amazing, but it wouldn’t change the issues that were pulling them apart or the friction that hovered just beneath the surface. It wouldn’t stop her marriage from coming apart at the seams.
“Home is the place where you can lay down all your burdens
and find nothing but acceptance.”
Maggie Donahue
Chapter Nine
It took every ounce of will he possessed not to kiss his wife senseless. When she looked at him with those emerald green eyes it made him want to scoop her up in his one good arm and sweep her off her feet in romantic fashion. She looked as gorgeous as ever. His wife. The other half of him. Although he’d never been partial to red heads, Maggie’s stunning looks had blown him away the first time he’d laid eyes on her. And nothing had changed since then. With her shoulder length, auburn hair, stunning eyes and a terrific figure that would turn many a male head, Maggie was a knockout. The fact that her nose was slightly off kilter—a huge flaw according to her—only added to her appeal.
She was imperfectly perfect.
He was in need of his wife, badly. One on one, alone time together. Just kissing her had reminded him of all the tender nights he’d held her in his arms. He’d dreamed of those nights together in the worst moments of his deployment. And there was an ache of loneliness inside him that only Maggie could soothe with her sweet, comforting manner. She was his best friend. His soulmate. And there were so many things he wanted to whisper to her in the hours between darkness and dawn. A lifetime of dreams.
Things between them seemed good, even though there was underlying tension between them. He wanted to romance his wife, to woo her, to remind her of all the reasons that they’d gotten together in the first place. He wanted to make her forget about the distance between them and the terrible argument they'd had the last time he’d been stateside.
More than anything, he wanted to know deep down inside his soul that Maggie still wanted to be his wife. We shouldn’t have gotten married. The words still gutted him, made him want to run for cover. The very idea that Maggie might regret becoming his wife was too devastating a concept for him to even process. So, to the best of his
ability, he’d shut out all the white noise and kept his head down, pretending that those words hadn’t ripped him to shreds.
There was no way he could ever tell her what it had done to him, how he’d replayed the words repeatedly in his head. He’d studied the words like a detective analyzing the evidence. Even when he'd left Breeze Point to head back to the service, Maggie’s words had lingered, festering in his brain like a cancer. It had been a distraction in an endeavor where distractions led to loss of life. Death. Destruction. Casualties. He’d seen it all.
Why hadn’t he told her how he felt? Isn’t that what married people did? Communicate with each other? His answer had just been to shut down.
Not that he had any clue at his age about the inner workings of married couples other than his parents, who’d been high school sweethearts and joined at the hip since they were teenagers. Pain roared through him at the realization that his father was gone now, taken by a vicious cancer that kept coming back relentlessly to attack his body. His mother was now a widow, having lost the love of her life. Dottie Donahue was a tough woman, but losing the man she loved had brought her to her knees.
Alec had been the first in his circle of friends to settle down. Most of his buddies were too busy trying to make ends meet in a tight Massachusetts economy, while the rest weren’t quite ready to give up the bar scene. A hint of a smile tugged at the corners of his mouth as he remembered how quickly he’d given up the singles scene after meeting Maggie. Everyone liked to joke about how quickly they’d tied the knot, but for him it had been an effortless decision once he’d wrapped his head around it. Like breathing, he remembered thinking as they exchanged vows in their moving, heartfelt ceremony. Being in love with Maggie had always been as simple as drawing breath. Until now. He was walking on egg shells, performing a delicate dance in a mine field. For a man who didn’t like avoidance it was pure torture.
No, he couldn’t do it any longer. He was too much of a straight shooter to play games. If this thing had a chance of going the distance he had to be true to himself.
“Maggie, I think we should talk.”
She looked at him with wounded eyes, as if she knew he was going to be dredging up topics that wouldn’t be comfortable for either of them.
A crashing sound rang out, shattering the stillness of their home and turning it into chaos. Maggie let out a cry of alarm. He stepped protectively in front of her, assuming a defensive posture as a dozen different scenarios ran through his mind. He watched as all three of his brothers barreled into the sanctity of their home like a herd of stampeding cattle.
“What in the world is going on?” Alec shouted, his jaw practically dropping to the floor as he was swept up in a human avalanche. His brothers surrounded him, taking hold of him in tight, bear hugs that left him breathless. He felt his body being bombarded on all sides. While one brother slapped him on the back, another was putting him in a head lock as another was shouting in his ear.
A sharp whistle rent the air. All of the boys looked up, startled expressions stamped on their faces. Maggie was standing in the kitchen doorway, her hands on her hips, an aggravated expression distorting her perfect features.
“Tim! Matthew! Jude! Back away from Alec. In case you didn’t notice, he has his arm in a sling, courtesy of a sniper’s bullet.” Her nostrils flared as she took a deep breath. “And the next time you pay a visit, don’t even think about busting in here like a wild pack of wolves. I know your mother raised you better than that. Is that understood?”
Tim, Jude and Matthew immediately let go of Alec and took a few steps away from him. They uttered a string of apologies. A look of fear was etched on their collective faces.
He cast his brothers a smug look. Maggie had reduced his brothers to three quivering masses of jelly. He surrendered to a full-fledged grin. It wasn’t every day that a female had the Donahue brothers quaking in their boots. Even his mother sometimes had difficulty pulling off that trick.
“Now that we have that settled, why don’t you boys help yourselves to some chocolate chip cookies. I just baked them this morning.” Maggie was smiling in their direction and acting as if she hadn’t just ripped them apart a few seconds earlier.
The boys practically tripped over themselves to get to the cookies. Maggie busied herself taking three glasses down from the shelf and then pouring milk into them from a fresh carton.
“Oh, these are scrumptious. When are you going to open that bakery you keep talking about?” Jude said through a mouthful of cookies.
“When I win the lottery,” Maggie cracked. Opening a bakery was her big dream, one she’d been dreaming about more and more as time wore on. Some nights she and Alec had lain awake for hours talking about names and locations for their future business. But they both knew it was an expensive venture, one they couldn’t afford at the moment. Once Alec left the service and was stateside for good, the dream could be realized. Her mind was beginning to whirl with the possibilities. They had some money in savings, and if they really scrimped and saved and took out a business loan then perhaps it could work. Maybe the someday they’d always talked about was sooner than she realized, she mused. Someday they would have the most popular bakery in Breeze Point.
“We didn’t just come by to welcome you back home, big bro,” Tim said as he shoved another cookie in his mouth.
Alec raised an eyebrow. When it came to his brothers, experience had taught him to always expect the unexpected. He had no idea what they had up their sleeves, nor did it matter since he had the rest of the day and evening all planned out. He was going to have a heart to heart with Maggie and once they aired everything out he wanted to spend the rest of the evening with her lying in his arms.
“Mama says it’s pretty much a crime against nature that you guys don’t have a tree up yet,” Matthew said with a grim look on his face.
Alec rolled his eyes. That sounded like something his mother might say.
“We're going to help you remedy that pitiful situation,” Jude added. “That’s why we’re here.”
Alec turned towards the living room, noticing for the first time that there was no Christmas tree gracing their home. In the Donahue family, it was sacrilege. It surprised him since Christmas was Maggie’s favorite time of year. She loved every aspect of it—the good cheer, the presents, the festivities, decorating the tree, midnight worship. Their first Christmas together as a married couple, she'd greeting the holiday with more enthusiasm than a child awaiting Santa’s arrival. It was such a special time of the year.
He looked over at her, his eyes sending her a message, searching for an explanation.
She shrugged. “With you being gone I just couldn’t put one up. My heart simply wasn’t in it.”
“And now?” he asked, his eyes seeking acknowledgement that his presence made all the difference.
She nodded at him. “I want a tree with all the trimmings. The bigger, the better.”
“Let’s do it then!” Alec said, determined to find the biggest, fluffiest pine tree in all of Nottingham woods. For Maggie. For his wonderful, amazing woman.
Tim pointed at Alec's arm. “You sure you’re up to it?”
Alec glared at him, looking down at him with a two-inch height advantage. “I’ve been through three tours of duty overseas. I think I can handle a Christmas tree.”
“So, how about it Maggie? Are you ready to tackle the big bad woods?” Matthew asked as he rubbed his hands together.
Maggie’s eyes bulged. “Me? You’re inviting me?”
“Of course, we’re inviting you,” Jude said. “Last time I checked, you’re the only sister-in-law we’ve got.”
Alec watched as joy spread over Maggie’s face and her eyes misted over with tears. This invitation from his brothers meant the world to her. A tightness constricted his chest as a wave of emotion swept over him.
“I thought this was a tradition for Donahue men.” She thumped her chest like a cave man. “Men go cut down tree. Women cook meal.”
&n
bsp; Jude groaned. “We’re not total Neanderthals!”
“We just pretend to be,” Matthew said with a grin.
A lop-sided smile broke out over Tim’s face. “Traditions can always be tweaked a bit.”
Maggie threw herself into Tim’s arms, then placed a kiss on his cheek. She reached out for Jude, then Matthew and repeated the same ritual.
“Just give me five minutes to change into my snow gear,” she said before scooting out of the kitchen.
Once she left the room, Matthew sidled over to Alec while Tim and Jude made a beeline for the living room couch.
“Thanks for including her. I know it means the world to her,” Alec said.
“No problem. You know we love Maggie to pieces. And it’s been real tough on her while you’ve been deployed.” He paused, and his face crinkled. “So, you two are good?” Matthew asked with a pointed look.
Although he knew his brother meant well, the question set him on edge. It caused him to remember all the things that still weren’t settled between him and Maggie. Private things only to be discussed between man and wife. His brother clearly cared about their situation, but he was reluctant to open the subject up.
He shrugged and let out a pent-up sigh. “I guess so.”
His brother’s eyes bugged. “What do you mean, you guess so? Haven’t the two of you talked?”
“I’ve been back in this house for less than an hour, Matty. Not to mention the fact that I was having a very private moment with my wife when the Three Stooges burst into my house.”
Matthew snorted. “We’re family, Alec. We don’t stand on ceremony. That’s what we Donahues do.” He shook his head at his older brother. “Married life has made you soft. You’re like a puppy dog whenever Maggie is within a five-mile radius.”
