Christmas Blessings: Seven Inspirational Romances of Faith, Hope, and Love

by Leah Atwood

  “Howdy, folks.” A short man with bronze skin and long black hair greeted them. He might have been Native American, but it was hard to tell in the glare from his headlights. His pronounced Texas drawl confused the image.

  “I was driving, and then the thermostat started going up, and before I knew it, steam was pouring out of the engine.” Avery started explaining the problem.

  The short man from the tall truck held out his hand. “Name’s John. Nice to meet you.”

  Avery shook his hand even though she didn’t really care to spend any time on small talk. “I’m Avery. Do you think you can help us?”

  He gave her a relaxed smile as if he had all the time in the world. “Pop the hood, and I’ll see what I can do for you.” He casually walked back to his rig and started pulling out gear, including a clamp-able work light to illuminate the engine compartment.

  Not sure what to make of him, Avery peered from his retreating back to Gavin and Eli but didn’t say anything.

  Eli made his way over to her and put his arm around her shoulders, giving her a quick side hug. “It’ll be fine, Mom. I don’t have school tomorrow, and the only work you have is somewhere down this road. If he can’t get this baby started, I’d say he’s got enough room in his SUV to give us all a lift to the nearest motel.” Then he slapped his knee and laughed. “At Mr. Jones’ expense, of course.”

  “Mothers who love their sons don’t drag them out into the desert in the middle of the night, putting them at risk of hypothermia, illness—”

  “—and don’t forget the danger of being eaten by wild bears.” Her son kindly interrupted.

  Avery elbowed him lightly. “I’ll protect you from any bears that come, but you’re on your own if it’s a snake.”

  John moseyed back over to the hatchback, mounted his light to the edge of the hood, lit up the engine, and started poking around. He studied the ground under the car. “No water down there, so I don’t think your radiator blew.” He pushed and pulled on various pieces of the engine before looking up at them again. “Your hoses all look to be in decent shape.”

  Then he pulled out his phone and made a call. He spoke to the person on the other end in an unfamiliar language that had a haunting cadence, while he removed the cap from the radiator. His conversation continued as he filled the reservoir with coolant and put the cap back on.

  By the time John finally hung up, Avery couldn’t stand it any longer. “Was that the man who usually drives the tow truck? Was he able to tell you what was wrong?”

  John laughed for a minute before winding down. “That was my wife. I was supposed to call her and tell her you weren’t a band of thieving murderers lying in wait for me.”

  “Oh.” So much for Avery’s worry that their bait-shop-owning-tall-truck-driving rescuer might actually be a serial killer who preyed on stranded tourists.

  “My sister drives the tow truck. I talked to her earlier. She said if the hoses and radiator were fine to tell you it’s likely the thermostat. That’s not something I can fix, and we don’t have any place in Tucumcari that would have the part in stock. You need to keep heading on down the road until you get to a bigger town.”

  Avery started to interrupt with dozens of questions that begged to be asked. John lifted his eyebrows, his face the picture of patience. Her anxious interrogation was completely derailed.

  When she held her tongue, he continued. “Avoid running the heater. Driving a little bit slower might help, too, although I’m not sure. Stop and let the engine cool back down at least every hour, or anytime the temperature gauge climbs up too high.”

  Gavin asked the question Avery was thinking. “What does the thermostat do?”

  John scratched his head and gaped at them the way someone from up north looks at pickled pigs’ feet. “The thermostat checks the temperature of your engine. When the thermostat says the engine has heated up to a certain point, it tells the radiator to start circulating fluid through the engine to cool it down. If the thermostat’s not working, it can’t tell the radiator what to do and the fluid either circulates all the time or not at all. In your case, it looks like not at all, which is a problem. It don’t matter how cold it is outside, your engine will still get hot and overheat if there’s no circulation.”

  When they all just stared at him, John shook his head. “What brings y’all out on the road tonight of all nights in this heap of… in this car?”

  “What do you mean ‘tonight of all nights’?” Gavin looked up at the dark sky.

  “S’posed to be a whiteout. Worst snow storm in decades, they’re sayin’.”

  Avery’s inner need to be right all the time bubbled to the surface, and she argued. “But I thought it was forecast for central Texas? We’re cutting across the panhandle.”

  “There aren’t a lot of mountains around here to block a storm. If something comes blowing in, it usually gets a lot further north than it’s supposed to. You sure y’all going to be safe? Might be a good idea to find somewhere to hole up for the night.”

  “We have a deadline.” Gavin and Avery said it at the same time.

  He nodded in understanding. “This is one of them TV shows where you have to overcome obstacles to win a prize at the end, isn’t it?”

  Avery and Gavin smirked at each other and shrugged. “Not exactly.” Gavin scratched his chin. “But I can see why you might think that.”

  John collected his equipment and returned it all to where it belonged. He came back and shook everybody’s hand. As he did so, he had a strange look on his face. Finally, he started to head back toward his rig. Partway there, he swung back around to face them. “You know you don’t have a back bumper?”

  “We know.” Avery and Gavin again answered in unison.

  “What happened to it?”

  “It fell off.” Gavin’s voice was matter-of-fact.

  Eli piped up. “The duct tape gave out.”

  Avery nodded toward the back of the car. “Without the duct tape, the paperclips couldn’t hold it in place any longer.”

  “We left it with someone in Moriarty. We’ll pick it up on our way back through.” Gavin completed the explanation.

  John stared at them, mouth agape, for a minute. Then he shook his head, pivoted toward his too-tall SUV, and pulled himself up into it.

  With Gavin driving, they were soon underway. Avery sat back, mulling over her reaction to the man sitting beside her. She normally rebelled against being the passenger. Despite her deeply ingrained independence, though, something about Gavin made her comfortable with giving up that control.

  As Avery pondered her revelation, Eli spoke to Gavin. “Don’t you know anything about cars?”

  Gavin shrugged. “I know the basics, but steam from the engine is beyond my skill set. What about you? Do you know anything about cars?”

  Eli laughed. “If I had a better signal, I’d look up a video online telling me what to do to fix it. I thought all adults were already supposed to know those sorts of things. You know, because you grew up in the dark ages before smart phones and Internet.”

  Crumbling up a napkin that had been sitting on the console, Gavin tossed it back at Eli. “You’ve got a lot to learn if you want to get anywhere in life there, bucko. Telling people they look and smell as good as dinosaurs isn’t going to get you too far.”

  Eli dodged the napkin. “Hey, I never said anything about dinosaurs. You’re the one who brought them up.”

  Then the teen stuck his earbuds back in and tucked his blanket snugly around his body.

  “It’s getting colder, isn’t it?” A chill worked its way up Avery’s spine.

  Gavin nodded. “You can check the temperature on your phone if it would make you happy. Not that knowing how cold it is will make us feel any warmer.”

  Avery pulled out her phone and clicked away. “Didn’t it almost get up to seventy earlier today?”

  “Mmm-hmm.” Gavin hummed his reply.

  “Well, it’s in the low forties at the moment. It still
says snow in central Texas, but it looks as if the cloud coverage might be moving our way.”

  “Tonight would be a good night for a heater. I’m losing feeling in my toes.”

  Avery forced a smile. “On the bright side, we’re all crammed in so closely together our body heat should be able to keep us warm.”

  “I have a feeling all the heat is seeping out where the bumper used to be.” Gavin chuckled.

  Silence fell between them, but it was comfortable. The constant tinny hum of the engine, the empty road, and the darkness surrounding them all worked together to make it, for Avery at least, a relaxing part of the drive.

  A short time later, Gavin broke into the quiet. “Can I ask you something?” His voice, normally rich as Swiss chocolate fondue, sounded hesitant.

  Avery scrutinized Gavin for a minute before answering. “Usually when somebody asks permission to ask a question, it’s because they think the other person won’t want to answer.”

  “Maybe. You can tell me it’s none of my business, and I won’t mind.”

  “Fire away.” She crossed her arms. “But I’m not making any promises.”

  Gavin glanced in the rearview mirror. Avery, too, took a peek back at Eli, who appeared to be sleeping. “I wondered about Eli’s dad. I can usually tell by the way a kid acts, but Eli doesn’t seem to have any tells. Are you divorced? A widow?”

  The question hung between them for a moment. Avery reached for her water bottle and then chuckled. “This is as cold as it would be straight from the fridge.” Gavin gave her a half-smile. She suspected he would let her drop the whole subject if she asked. She decided not to ask. “I was never married.”

  Yes, she’d had a child out of wedlock. Now what was Mr. Gavin Eastly going to do with that bit of information.

  He nodded. “I wouldn’t have guessed, but it makes sense. Thank you for telling me.”

  Silence stretched between them, but Avery was okay with it. Even stronger than before, she believed there was more to Gavin than what she saw on the surface. It made her increasingly curious to learn why he’d disappeared from the world of photography when he had.

  Something about him made her want to back off rather than push until he revealed more of himself. It was almost as if she saw two people in him. When she examined Gavin straight on, he seemed strong, confident, and even a touch arrogant. On the other hand, when she sought his profile, Avery saw a vulnerability that touched a place in her heart she’d long since thought had been closed off from the world.

  Chapter Eight

  Between Tucumcari, NM, and Amarillo, TX

  December 24, 12:30 a.m.

  “The temperature’s starting to climb again. We’re going to have to pull over.” Gavin needed a break. Steadily picking up in speed since he’d started driving, the wind had gotten strong enough that he now had to fight to keep the little hatchback on the road.

  “We’re still about ninety miles from Amarillo. No chance we can make it that far?” Avery’s voice had a breathless quality, and her words were stretched out longer than usual.

  Gavin tried to read the situation, but he couldn’t tell if she was imploring him about something or if she was worried. “Even if we could drive straight through, at the rate we’re going, it’ll take us three hours to cover those ninety miles. Why? What’s up?”

  He heard Avery’s sigh. “I need to use the restroom.”

  “Oh.” Gavin brought the car to a stop on the shoulder and maneuvered in his seat so he could face her. “It’s the morning of Christmas Eve. We’re on the side of a freeway with limited visibility. The wind is strong, I’d say at least thirty miles an hour.” The look on her face grew more urgent with each passing second, making him relent. “I always carry an emergency roll of toilet paper when I’m traveling. If you want to use it, you’re more than welcome. I don’t want to think about you getting lost out there, so you’ll need a flashlight, too.” He gave her a stern look. “I still don’t think this is the best location for that kind of pit stop.”

  “I can’t wait. Give me a flashlight and TP, and I’ll go.”

  “For all I know, we could be parked right next to a barbed-wire fence with a raging bull on the other side.”

  She wriggled in her seat. “I’ll take my chances.”

  Gavin reached around behind him to where his backpack was stored. He extricated the toilet paper and a flashlight and handed them to her.

  She smiled. “Dare I ask why you carry emergency toilet paper?”

  He shook his head. “Some things are better left to the imagination. Trust me when I say that story is one of them.”

  Avery shut the door quietly after she got out. The soft sound of Eli’s snores filled the car. Gavin reached back into his oversized bag and pulled out a big cherry and silver UNM sweatshirt and a pair of grey sweatpants. He wasn’t sure exactly how to make the offer, but he wanted to have them handy in case she needed them when she returned. It was far too cold out there to be squatting in the snow.

  Ten minutes passed with no sign of Avery, and he began to worry. She could have fallen, encountered a wild animal, or gotten tangled up in barbed wire. He should have gone with her. With a snort, he whispered into the car, “Yeah. Like she would have ever allowed that.”

  When another five minutes passed, Gavin started rummaging through his bag, hoping to find another flashlight.

  He was about to wake Eli when the door opened, and Avery climbed into the passenger seat. Her teeth were chattering. Leaving the interior light off in deference to the sleeping teen, Gavin twisted in his seat and reached over to her. He took her hands in his own. “You feel like ice.” He enveloped her hands and hoped his body heat would help warm them up.

  “G-oing pee in the sn-ow is not f-un.” Her teeth were chattering so forcefully he had difficulty understanding her.

  “I was getting ready to come find you. You shouldn’t have been gone that long. I got worried.”

  “Fell d-own. Twice. In the sn-ow. You’re c-orrect. It’s a w-et snow. Either that, or someb-ody else had already used it for a bathr-oom.” She shuddered. “Gr-oss. I don’t even want t-to think about that.”

  “Nobody else is out here on the road. I’m sure you fell in wet snow.”

  “I’ve got snow all ov-er my jacket. My p-ants, too. Maybe even inside of th-em. I can’t remember the last time I was this c-old.”

  Her hands started to feel a shade warmer, and Gavin let them go. “I’m going to take your scarf and jacket off.” He again reached out toward her in the inky darkness of the car. “I’ve got a sweatshirt you can put on in place of the jacket, and then I’ll give you your scarf back if it’s dry enough. You can’t sit there in wet clothes. It won’t be good for you, and if Eli finds out I let you, he’ll throw things at me once he wakes up.”

  Avery tried to help but eventually gave up. “I can’t get the sn-aps on my jacket. My hands are too st-iff.”

  “Don’t worry about it. I’ll get the snaps. Just promise not to slap me for trying to save your life.”

  “This is hardly life and death.”

  Relief coursed through him. The chattering of her teeth was fading, and her words were becoming more distinguishable. “Of course it’s not. We’re stranded on the side of the road with spotty cell service in subzero temperatures. We have no way to get warm, no means of escape, and you’re in wet clothes.”

  A small laugh escaped. “You’re exaggerating.”

  He got the last snap, and she turned her back to him so he could more easily pull her jacket off. He draped it over the luggage next to Eli then reached out with the sweatshirt, tugging it down over her head and helping her to get both arms through the sleeves. When he grabbed her scarf, it felt wet and icy, so he put it with the jacket and unwound the scarf from around his own neck before handing it to her.

  “You can’t give me your scarf. You’ll get cold now.”

  “I didn’t spend the last fifteen minutes rolling around in the snow. I’ll be fine.”

>   He paused long enough to take a deep breath before he spoke again. “You’re going to have to take off your pants.”

  A squeak escaped her. “I think I misheard you.”

  Gavin handed her the sweatpants. “Your pants are soaked, and you said yourself, you’ve got snow inside them as well as on the outside. Here’s a pair of sweatpants. I’ll close my eyes and turn away, but you need to get into something dry.”

  “I’m fine, really.”

  “You’re not fine. You’re freezing, and it’s cold in here. Be sensible.”

  “Have you continued sending rant emails to Mitchell?” Her voice was suspicious.

  “Why? You want me to tell him about this?”

  “I very specifically do not want you telling him. Nobody finds out about this, understood?” Hearing that voice, he wondered how Eli could ever dare defy his mother. He was one brave kid.

  “Not a word. I promise. Although, for the record, I’m sure everyone would understand.”

  “No, they wouldn’t. They’d take one look at you, and understanding the situation would be the last thing on their minds. Now turn. Face the window. Close your eyes. Cover your ears. And hum.”

  Gavin did as he was told, but he couldn’t prevent the smile stretching his mouth. Avery was awfully prim for someone so independent. He rather liked it. Not that he’d tell her so, of course.

  After a few minutes, she grunted and muttered. “Okay, you can turn around.”

  He tried to wipe the smile from his face as she handed him her soaked jeans. He added them to the growing pile on top of the luggage. “Does that feel better?”

  “I already feel warmer. Thank you.”

  “So, uh, what did you mean that once people saw me they wouldn’t understand the situation?”

  As he waited for her answer, he turned the engine over and pulled back out onto the freeway, hoping he’d allowed the engine enough time to cool so they would at least be able to get in another hour of driving before it overheated again.