A Winter Wonderland

by Fern Michaels

  The tragic irony was staggering to Jenna. Serving in a world war, only to be wounded by your own side. And all while celebrating America’s victory.

  “Did you break up because of your injury?” she dared to ask.

  “If it weren’t for an infection, things might’ve been different. But you see, I couldn’t work for some time. And alcohol helped dull the pain.” He clutched the book as he continued. “Back then, being a man meant earning a paycheck. You couldn’t have a woman doing it for you. Wartime was one thing, but back at home, life was supposed to be normal. Besides, Stella was too good for that. I promised I’d take care of her, and somehow it all got turned around. I actually had myself convinced it’d be a relief for us both when we went our separate ways.”

  Estelle’s efforts to break from the past began to make sense. Jenna’s soap-opera theories fizzled on the spot.

  Tom released the book. He attempted to flatten the edges he’d bent. “Important thing is, when I happened across her husband’s obituary, listing their kids and grandkids, I knew she’d had a good life. Just like I had with Noreen—God rest her. So really, it all worked out for the best.”

  “Had you ever thought about contacting Stella? To tell her all of this?”

  He stifled a small laugh. “Wrote at least six versions of a letter over the years. In the end, always felt like nudging a beehive. Didn’t seem right to disturb her life.”

  Jenna nodded, relating to the intent. The couple’s circumstances, though, had changed. “Maybe it’s time to mail one of those letters.”

  His gaze dropped to the photos. He shrugged a shoulder and said, “Oh . . . I don’t know. . . .”

  “Mr. Redding, you came here today, worrying it was too late. But now you know it’s not.”

  “Yeah, well. We’ll see.” His tone didn’t sound promising.

  He patted the book, a farewell motion, and rose to his feet. “I’d really best get going.”

  “Are you sure? There’s really no reason to rush.”

  “Nah, nah. I’ve taken up enough of your time.”

  She yielded with reluctance and walked him to the door, where they traded holiday tidings. He was a few steps outside when he pivoted back. “Miss,” he said, “I want to thank you for that.”

  Thanks for what? For allowing Jenna to pry open old wounds?

  “I really didn’t do anything you should be grateful for.”

  His lips curved into a wistful smile that argued otherwise.

  Chapter 12

  Although part of him still resisted the change, Reece had to admit the setup was better than he’d expected. In the basement of his parents’ house, the walls of his old bedroom had always been the color of stone. Fitting for a teenager, it had provided a brooding backdrop for posters of rock groups and rebel athletes. The feeling of being separate from the house had made it an ideal spot during high school.

  He rotated slowly now, hardly recognizing the space. A fresh coat of buttery yellow paint had transformed the dungeon into a cozy cove. A miniature kitchen appeared where a storage closet once stood. Best of all, elements of his grandma’s home were sprinkled throughout: a mounted shelf of porcelain figurines; down bedding and a claw-footed hope chest; floral curtains that virtually matched her own.

  Below the two windows, his grandma sat in her rocking chair, sifting through Christmas cards forwarded from her old house. A tasseled lamp glowed on the nightstand, brightening her pallor. She looked remarkably better than she did in the hospital. Hard to believe that was only four days ago.

  Reece held up the poinsettias, the pot wrapped in a silver bow. “A little housewarming gift for you.”

  She merely flicked them a glance. “Lovely, dear.”

  In the wedge of quiet, he set the plant on her dresser, another furnishing from her house.

  “Why didn’t Dad ever say he was going to fix it up like this?” Reece said this more to himself than her.

  “Could be that you never asked.”

  True. Although he couldn’t imagine asking his father much of anything at the moment. Thankfully, the guy was holed up in his garage, making it easy for Reece to slip in and out before dinner.

  Just then, the aroma of baked crescent rolls wafted from upstairs. The slight trace of burnt dough delivered an idea.

  “You know, with you being here now,” Reece suggested, “Mom can finally pick up some cooking tips.”

  After a halfhearted smile, his grandma continued to study her cards in an absent manner. Adjusting to a new way of life was never easy. Quiet time to dwell often made things worse.

  “Hey, how about some music?” He turned the knob of her antique RCA radio. He’d forgotten how touchy those dials were to find a station without static. At last, an FM channel projected a clear tune, “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer.” The repetitive chorus tended to grind at his nerves, but he hoped the lyrics might give her a giggle. Which they didn’t.

  He was grateful the song ended, until he registered the next one: “I’ll Be Home for Christmas.” He clicked the radio off.

  “Mom says she’s set aside an area in the backyard so you can garden in the spring.”

  His grandma murmured her acknowledgment.

  “Also, I hear some of your friends have been calling to check on you. I think they’ve been hoping you’ll join their quilting group again.”

  He waited for a wisecrack about hanging out with blind old biddies. But nothing came.

  Reece couldn’t stand seeing her this way. He understood where she was; he’d been there before himself. And it was his grandma’s no-nonsense advice that had ultimately yanked him out of his cave. Serving up that same tidbit to her now, about throwing a solo pity party, was tempting. Unfortunately, he doubted his own ability to deliver the words with his grandma’s charm.

  He perched on the end of her hope chest, wishing he possessed a magic formula to revive the strong grandmother he knew.

  He’d done his best to stamp out thoughts of Jenna the last several days—the powdery fragrance of her skin, how close he’d come to kissing her and, once again, screwing up his life—but at this moment, her assurances returned with unavoidable clarity. She’d seemed certain of his grandmother’s courage, all based on a past Reece knew nothing about. It could be helpful, reminding his grandma of her younger days, when her military service required independence and bravery.

  Surely it was worth a try.

  He clasped his hands, elbows on his knees, and leaned closer. “Jenna Matthews—the girl working at your house—she told me about a box she found. Things you saved from the war.”

  His grandma’s hands went still. Her gaze remained on her lap.

  “Is it true you served in an army hospital?”

  Her silence served as confirmation, along with the sense that she’d hoped to keep that nugget under wraps. But why? Why the cover-up, the lies?

  “At first, I told Jenna she had to be mistaken. That you’d even said you’d never been to Asia before.”

  “Vacationed,” she corrected boldly, and raised her head. “I said that I never vacationed there. Aside from a few coconut cocktails, it wasn’t exactly Club Med.”

  One could argue it a technicality, but at least she wasn’t denying the claim.

  “I just don’t get it,” he said. “Being an army nurse is something you should be proud of. Why didn’t you ever mention it?” Reece could see vets not wanting to share details, given how gruesome he imagined the war had been, but not hiding their service altogether.

  “Please, Grandma,” he insisted gently. “You can tell me about it.”

  Following a lengthy pause, she looked into his eyes and appeared to recognize her own stubbornness—meaning Reece wasn’t about to let the subject go.

  She sat back in her chair and set her cards aside. Then she sighed, as if dusting off stored-up words. “We weren’t nurses,” she clarified. “That would have taken a lot more training than enlisting in the WAC, and I was too eager to do my bit. Once there,
of course, we took to their duties all the same.”

  “So you were stationed in the jungle?”

  “It was nothing like Gilligan’s Island, I can tell you that much. After a few days in Hollandia, we sure didn’t resemble Ginger or Mary Ann.” She let out a small laugh. “You should have seen my parents’ faces. About had a conniption over my appearance when I got home. It just supported why they were against me joining up in the first place.”

  “And that’s why you never talked about it,” Reece concluded, still trying to understand.

  “It wasn’t just them. Society’s never been a fan of change, dear. Once we came back, I learned real fast that putting WAC on a résumé was a surefire way not to get hired. The soldiers we’d helped, they knew the truth, but most people at home preferred to believe we’d helped boost morale in . . . well, other ways.”

  Reece got the point, along with her motivation for secrecy. Shame dictated she close that chapter of her life as though it had never happened.

  “Then, years later,” she said, eyes glimmering behind her glasses, “I met your grandfather. Together we created a family I couldn’t be prouder of.” She paused before reaching over to pat Reece’s forearm. “Way I see it, better to focus on the path ahead, rather than hanging on to what’s already done.”

  Her pointed remark wasn’t lost on him. Clearly, she had overheard him and his father bickering at the hospital. Considering their volume, how could she have avoided it? Maybe Reece was long overdue to drop the weights of his own past. “I hear what you’re saying, Grandma,” he conceded.

  But then, recalling where this conversation began, he sent the lesson right back at her. “Who knows, I might even get the itch to join a quilting group. Visit old friends, start cooking, gardening. That kind of thing.”

  She pursed her lips, fighting a smile that ultimately won out. “Who on earth taught you to be such a smart aleck?”

  “Must be hereditary.”

  “Must be.”

  As they laughed together, the room gained an even cozier feel. That’s precisely how it remained throughout the rest of their chat, which shifted to lighter topics. It went unspoken that their thoughts and emotions needed a break. And so, they engaged in the usual discussions of books and weather and Wheel of Fortune.

  At a natural lull, their talk having run its course, Reece prepared to leave. He stood and gave her a soft peck on the cheek.

  “Oh, wait, before you go,” she said, gesturing toward her jewelry box. “Got something for you in the bottom drawer.”

  It didn’t dawn on him what that something would be until he grabbed the knob. A velvet ring box stared back at him.

  “You still wanted that, didn’t you, dear?”

  He creaked open the case. Inside, a small marquise diamond topped a beautiful silver band. Amazing how a whole future could rest on such a small object.

  Reece turned to his grandma, replying with a smile.

  Time to live without regrets.

  Chapter 13

  Jenna shifted in her director’s chair, fending off the urge to fidget. Lightbulbs framing the mirror compounded the heat generated by her nerves. She should have skipped her morning latte. The caffeine was proving anything but soothing.

  Mia, the makeup artist, pulled a comb from the apron tied around her hefty middle. Her almond-shaped eyes and cornrows lent her an exotic look. Candy cane earrings shimmered against her chocolate skin. “Okay if I touch up your hair?” she asked, aerosol already in hand.

  “Spray away.” Jenna pinned on a smile, which she dropped once she felt her cheeks tremble. A guest spot on a talk show had sounded so exciting. But after arriving early at the station, the producer had put such stress on the live-air aspect of Morning Portland, Jenna now feared a tongue-tied disaster. It didn’t help that her mother had told everyone on the planet about the program.

  “Been on the show before?” Mia asked while launching a shower of hairspray.

  Jenna coughed on a mouthful and shook her head.

  “Well then, I’ll make sure your debut looks fabulous. You’re talking about used jewelry, right?”

  “Right,” she squeezed out.

  The woman deshined Jenna’s face with a brush full of powder. “Buying or selling it?”

  Once the air cleared enough, Jenna said, “Both.”

  Their fractured conversation resembled visits with her dental hygienist, who never failed to ask a question when Jenna’s mouth was stuffed with cotton, cardboard, or bubble gum fluoride. As the current exchange trudged along, she tried not to grimace at the heavy application of red lipstick and rosy blush—although her mother would be thrilled. Jenna repeatedly reminded herself that the studio lights washed out color.

  “Don’t know about you,” Mia remarked, “but I couldn’t do it.”

  A pointed pause hauled Jenna back to the discussion. “I’m sorry . . . ?”

  “Wear a divorced person’s ring. Or even a hawked engagement band, for that matter. Just so much sadness and turmoil tied to those kinda things.”

  Jenna countered with her usual: “Yes, but they could bring a lot of happiness to the new buyer.”

  “I don’t know, maybe . . .” Mia worked at taming a lock of Jenna’s shag. “Then again, I’m more of the sentimental type. Every spring I vow to clean out my daughter’s art projects from school, now with her off at college, but just can’t bring myself to do it.”

  Jenna easily visualized the boxes, crammed with wrinkled handprint paintings and glitter-shedding snowflakes—none of which would be viewed more than twice.

  “What about you?” Mia asked with another spritz. If she was perpetuating conversation to ease a nervous guest, the attempt was failing.

  “I don’t have kids.”

  “No, I meant is there anything you collect?”

  That word again. “There’s nothing.”

  “Oh, surely there’s something you cherish enough to hang on to.”

  Jenna shook her head against the disbelief that blared in the woman’s tone. Why was the concept so hard to get? “I am not a collector.”

  Mia paused the primping, fist on her hip. The woman was only making small talk. When had Jenna become so neurotic?

  In the stiffening silence, the woman sharpened an eyebrow pencil.

  Jenna searched for a way to backpedal before Mia added, “Way I see it, we’re all collectors in one way or another. Keepers of memories, if nothing else. Some aren’t as pretty as others, but wipe out one half and you’d lose the other. . . .”

  As her words trailed off, Tom Redding’s face appeared in Jenna’s mind. Wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, as well as his mouth, bespoke smiles and frowns, happy and sad moments, like the memories in Estelle’s box.

  That darn haunting box.

  Jenna still couldn’t bring herself to throw the thing away, yet she should have. Life had been easier before its complicating ties. Disposing of others’ items had always brought relief—at least until the craving returned. Which it always did. Like an addiction, some might say. Like cigarettes or alcohol, or . . . hoarding.

  “Miss Matthews?” The intern who’d initially greeted Jenna poked her head in from the greenroom. “We’re ready for you.”

  Jenna sprang from her chair, thankful for the interruption.

  “Not just yet,” Mia ordered, filling Jenna with dread. Had the woman somehow read her thoughts?

  Mia merely removed the protective tissues she’d tucked into the collar of Jenna’s sweater, which the producer had borrowed from wardrobe for a festive look.

  Jenna reviewed herself in the mirror. Between the bright red garment and matching lipstick, she felt like a Rudolph the Red-lipped Reindeer.

  “Right this way,” the intern said. She led Jenna down the same hall she’d traversed earlier to set up her display.

  Again, they wove through the station’s maze, past editing rooms with walls of monitors and enough buttons and switches for a NASA control center. With a wave of the girl’s bad
ge over a security pad, an alarm beeped once and the door opened.

  “Watch your step,” she said as they approached an obstacle course of thick black cords. Each was connected to one of several mounted cameras facing the empty news anchors’ desk. A solid green wall denoted the meteorologist’s area. Reporting the weather in Portland—rain, drizzle, downpour—had to be as thrilling as reporting sunshine in Hawaii.

  The intern held a finger to her lips, a warning to Jenna that the microphones were hot. In the studio kitchen, the host, whose former role as a sportscaster befit his appearance, was sampling a Cajun twist on Christmas turkey. Judging from the sweat beading on his forehead, the meat had fully absorbed the chef ’s Southern spice.

  When the show broke for a commercial, a floor director clipped Jenna’s mike in place, then rushed her to the table of jewelry. Jenna had borrowed some from her boss, some from coworkers; others she’d snagged from a pawnshop. The host threw her a quick hello before guzzling water from a glass and flipping through a script. The female floor director launched a countdown. A cameraman gripped his handles as he spoke into his headset while the other camera moved on its own.

  Amid the chaos of the room, Jenna’s ears turned hot. She smoothed her hair over both lobes, praying they weren’t the same shade as her sweater.

  Focus on the table, she told herself. She would work her way from left to right, just as she’d practiced, starting with a gemmed bracelet that only needed a few minor repairs to double its value.

  “We’re live in five, four . . .” The floor director continued silently with three fingers. Two. One. Then a red light glowed on the camera as she pointed to the host.

  “Welcome back to Morning Portland,” he said, standing beside Jenna. “ ’Tis the season of gift giving. If your pocketbook is a little light this year, not to worry. Used jewelry could save the day. Here to tell us how is Jenna Matthews, an estate liquidator who’s built a career on pricing and selling off other people’s treasures.”

  Jenna winced at the introduction. Yeah, it was true, technically, but it sounded so pilfering stated that way.