The Twins' Family Christmas (Redemption Ranch Book 2)

by Lee Tobin McClain

  Carson was offering a relationship, or at least the start of one. But a relationship without honesty would never work.

  And she was starting to think that maybe, just maybe, she was worthy of love and could be loved. That she could build a community and a life in this cold but warmhearted place.

  “It’s about Pam,” she blurted out before she could lose courage. But then she did lose courage, her heart pounding hard and fast like some tribal drum.

  He smiled at her, his face gentle. “What about Pam?”

  She drew in a shaky breath. “It’s...not good.”

  He reached out and covered her hand with his. “Lily, whatever Pam did, it’s no reflection on you.”

  But he didn’t know what she’d done to cause Pam’s death. “Carson, shortly before Pam died, I—”

  “Miss Lily, Miss Lily, come and see!”

  “And help us!”

  Carson squeezed her hand. “Just a minute, girls,” he called upstairs.

  “Daddy, you can’t come! You stay down there!”

  “Come on, Miss Lily, you have to help us now!”

  The girls’ voices were loud. She looked at Carson.

  She should get this confession out of the way. She’d started; she’d come this far.

  But no way could they have a real conversation with the girls clamoring for attention upstairs.

  “Go ahead,” he said. “We can talk later. Maybe tonight.” His voice was full of promise.

  Oh, how she hoped that promise would remain once he’d heard what she had to say.

  She smiled and walked by him and climbed the ladder to the loft. Carson stood behind her, always protective, there to catch her if she fell.

  His kind, compassionate nature made her hope that he’d be able to understand what had happened. He’d learned forgiveness, had modeled it, in his years of being a pastor. She hoped it would apply to her.

  She reached the top, and immediately the twins rushed to her. “Miss Lily, come see what we made Daddy!”

  She went over to the bed, where the girls had laid out a large poster board. On it was a dizzying array of photographs and drawings, ribbons and medals and...

  Medals?

  Then she saw the headline: Our Mommy.

  She looked more closely at the photographs. Pam was in every one.

  “Wow, this is...really something.” Lily swallowed hard at all the images of her friend: with the girls, in her uniform, with Carson.

  “It’s for Daddy,” Skye explained. “’Cuz we listened to Mr. Long John saying he needed to get over her.”

  “Deal with her,” Sunny corrected.

  “And face the truth about her.”

  “And then he could move on, and maybe we could get a new mommy!”

  “Oh.” As Lily’s legs went jelly-ish, she sat down on the bed beside the poster to look at it more closely and try to collect herself, getting a little wet paint on her wrist in the process.

  There, in the center of the poster board, was an official-looking paper. She leaned forward to read it.

  DISCHARGE UNDER OTHER THAN HONORABLE CONDITIONS.

  Her heart thumped painfully. “Where did you get this?” she asked the twins, who’d started arguing over who had to clean up some spilled glue.

  “Oh! That came in the mail,” Skye said.

  “So we hid it away with all our Mommy stuff before Daddy could see.”

  “Because sometimes papers that look like that make Daddy sad.”

  Lily swallowed. “How long ago?”

  The twins looked at each other. “A long time,” Sunny said.

  “Maybe when we were five,” Skye added.

  “We have a big box of Mommy things. We stopped at home for it yesterday, when we went to town for the birthday party, ’cause we knew then we wanted to make this.”

  “And we sneaked it outside. We told Daddy it was toys.” Skye frowned. “Do you think that was a bad lie, Miss Lily?”

  “What?” Lily had been barely paying attention to the twins’ explanations, because she was trying to understand the situation and figure out what to do.

  The twins couldn’t read the dishonorable discharge, obviously; it was full of military jargon, words too big for them to understand at six. They thought the paper was a good thing.

  Carson certainly wouldn’t.

  Right after Pam had died, Lily had talked to a superior officer about whether Pam’s discharge would have been effective immediately, such that her family wouldn’t get military benefits. They’d figured out that since Pam’s death had come only hours after the discharge meeting, it wouldn’t have been official yet.

  In her limited conversations with Carson, Lily had realized that he didn’t know about the discharge. She’d guessed, had hoped, it had never been processed.

  But here was the paperwork to suggest otherwise. One of those mix-ups that tended to happen in a giant, form-heavy organization like the US Army.

  If, as she suspected, Carson didn’t know, then there was a whole layer of information he’d need to come to terms with, in addition to the way Pam had died.

  He wouldn’t like it, not any of it, not one bit.

  “Can you help us carry it down to Daddy?” Sunny asked. “It’s still a little wet from glue, and we don’t want to mess it up.”

  Could she do that? Deliver the bad news with her own hands?

  “Girls, I’m not sure this paper will make Daddy happy,” she said, pointing at the discharge letter.

  Their faces fell. “Why not?”

  How did you explain something like that? “It’s complicated,” she said weakly.

  “Should we take it off?” Skye asked.

  “If we take it off, it’ll rip, because we put that on first,” Sunny said. “Why do you think it won’t make Daddy happy, Miss Lily?”

  The sound of footsteps on the ladder forestalled her from any impossible answer she might make. “What’s going on up here?” Carson boomed in a comical, read-aloud voice.

  “Daddy, you can’t look! Because Miss Lily thinks you won’t like it!”

  “I think he will,” Sunny said stubbornly. “And Miss Lily is mean for saying he won’t.”

  Carson’s head and then the rest of him appeared at the top of the ladder.

  Lily looked at the twins’ faces and then at Carson’s. Whatever she said, whatever she did, someone would get hurt.

  “I think your daddy will love your gift because of the work you did,” she said, looking at Carson, trying to telegraph to him that he needed to school his reaction. “Even if some of the things on it are a surprise, or make him a little sad, he knows you girls are trying to make him happy.”

  “And get him ready for our new mommy,” added the irrepressible Sunny.

  “Sunny. I told you not to talk about that.” Carson climbed the rest of the way up the ladder and walked over, ducking his head to avoid hitting it on the loft’s slanted roof.

  “Ta-daaah!” Sunny cried, and after a second’s pause, Skye echoed her twin’s words.

  A smile curved Carson’s lips as he looked down at the poster, and Lily tried to freeze that smile in her head, to remember how kind and happy he looked.

  She had a feeling she wasn’t going to see that expression on his face again.

  And sure enough, his smile faded as he saw the topic of the poster. “Our Mommy,” he read aloud, and looked from one twin to the other.

  “Because you have to face it,” Skye explained. “Mr. Long John said.”

  He put an arm around her shoulders, and then Sunny came to his other side, and all three bent over the poster.

  “See, there’s the time she took us to the playground,” Sunny said.

  “And here’s when she cooked us a birthday cake.”

  The girls prattled on, pointing o
ut various photos with an emphasis on themselves.

  Lily saw the moment when Carson read the military paper, because his shoulders stiffened. “Other than honorable... Where did you girls get this paper?”

  Skye glanced nervously back at Lily. “Does it make you too sad, Daddy?”

  “Where did you get it?” he repeated.

  “It came in an envelope, and we hid it,” Skye said, her voice shaky. “But not to be bad. We just thought papers with that picture—” she pointed at the official army insignia “—sometimes they make you sad. We didn’t know you needed to face it.”

  He nodded and patted Skye’s shoulder, his lips pressed tightly together. Then he looked up at Lily. “Did you know about this?”

  She looked into his dear, hurt eyes and nodded. “About the discharge, yes.” The last word came out in a croak, pushing through her tight throat.

  He opened his mouth to ask another question and then looked down at his daughters, both watching him, both faces concerned, Skye’s scrunching up toward tears.

  “I love the thoughtfulness and caring you put into this gift,” he said, his voice a little husky. He knelt down and pulled them both close.

  His wrinkled forehead and downturned mouth, as he looked at Lily over the heads of the little girls, told another story.

  He was confused and upset, of course. He was learning something terrible about his wife.

  It still wasn’t the worst thing, though.

  He stood and clapped his hands. “I’m going to take this downstairs where the light is better, so I can look at it more,” he said. “And then I’m going to take you girls over to see Long John, because he told me Rockette is getting lonely.”

  “Yes!” Sunny pumped her fist.

  “Are you mad at us, Daddy?” Skye asked.

  He put his hands on Skye’s shoulders. “No, of course not. It’s a very caring gift.” He kissed her forehead. “Now, clean up a little and then we’ll hurry over to Long John’s.”

  “Okay!” Skye rushed over to where Sunny was already stuffing paper scraps into a trash can.

  Carson looked at Lily. “I need to talk to you.”

  * * *

  She couldn’t tell him the truth. But now she couldn’t not tell him.

  Lily watched Carson walk up the road toward Long John’s cabin, a twin on either side, holding their hands. It was a picture of idyllic family happiness, etched against the blue sky and the mountains.

  But Lily knew Carson well enough to see the unusual rigidity of his shoulders.

  He’d invented that planned visit to Long John. He was going to come back here and demand to know everything.

  It would start with the discharge and go on from there. And when he found out the whole truth about Pam, he’d be furious at Lily for not telling him right away. Worse, he’d be devastated.

  She shouldn’t have kept the secret, but how could she not when the whole thing was her fault in the first place?

  She’d never been able to navigate the complicated waters of her parents’ relationship, keeping them both happy and providing the buffer they needed, being there when they wanted her and away when they didn’t.

  She’d been a difficult child, as her mother had so often told her.

  This past week, immersed in the mountains and in the culture of Esperanza Springs, she’d started to feel different about herself. The acceptance from Carson, the uncomplicated affection of the twins, the joy of a Christmas that had started out lonely and ended up warmly connected—all of it had begun to work a change in Lily. New birth, new life, fitting for the Christmas season.

  But it had all been a facade, because she wasn’t reborn. She was the same old messed-up Lily.

  Only now the consequences were devastating, and every minute brought closer the time when more people would be hurt.

  How could she cut the pain? How could she make it at least a little better for Carson and the girls?

  She squinted out the window. The little family was almost to Long John’s place now, two colorful specks with a tall, dark figure between them.

  In less than a week, they’d come to mean so much to her. The trusting little girls, the funny, warm pastor...the way they’d accepted her into their circle, cared for her...it was all she’d ever wanted.

  Maybe she could tell Carson the truth in a way that would make him understand. Maybe she could explain part, but not all, of the details of Pam’s death, sparing him the worst of it.

  But knowing Carson, how observant he was, he’d know there was more and would insist on the truth. And it would break his heart.

  Did she have the right to break his heart?

  Did she have the strength to do what was necessary to avoid breaking it? To sacrifice her own happiness for his?

  The three figures had disappeared from sight. They had to be inside Long John’s cabin by now, which meant that Carson would be striding back any minute, insisting on an explanation that would devastate him.

  She rushed to the kitchen table, found pen and paper, and composed a note. Prayed a quick apology for lying, and hoped she was right that the damage to Carson and the girls would be minimized by the act.

  Then she ran to her cabin, threw her belongings into her suitcase willy-nilly and carried them to the door.

  Bella whined, looking mournfully up at her, seeming to know something momentous was going on.

  The sight of the dog’s concerned face released the tears Lily had been fighting off. She knelt and wrapped her arms around the big, bony dog. Bella licked at her cheeks, gently wiping her tears.

  Oh, how she wanted to take Bella with her. But the dog was too old and frail to make the trip, especially since Lily’s destination was uncertain. Better to leave her here in the warm cabin as she’d originally planned.

  She’d asked it in the note, and so Carson would take care of Bella. Lily trusted him for that.

  Her throat impossibly tight, she picked up her bag, slipped out the cabin door and closed it behind her. Minutes later she’d started down toward the highway, wiping tears with the backs of her cold hands.

  Heading to Arizona, simply because she had nowhere else to go.

  * * *

  Carson marched back to the cabin at military pace, almost a jog, fueled by anger and confusion and pain.

  Pam had been other-than-honorably discharged?

  He didn’t want to believe it. It didn’t make sense. He and the girls had received the survivors’ benefits. Nobody at the VA had said anything about a discharge, let alone a dishonorable one.

  Halfway there, his steps slowed.

  Unpleasant facts were pushing their way into his consciousness. The things a couple of friends had said about Pam’s behavior overseas. Her impatient mentions, during Skype calls, of meetings with commanding officers, of mix-ups about whether she was allowed to go off base or not.

  Pam’s thrill-seeking personality, the behaviors that had gotten her in trouble stateside, had been at odds with the discipline required of soldiers.

  Lately, he’d realized how far from perfect Pam had been as a wife and mother. She’d had serious flaws. But if she’d also gotten into trouble as a soldier—trouble significant enough to lead to a bad discharge—was there nothing good to say about her?

  The pedestal on which he’d placed his beautiful wife, already cracked, began to crumble into pieces.

  Shying away from those thoughts, his mind settled on Lily. On her sad, knowing face as she’d admitted that, yes, she knew about the discharge.

  No wonder Lily hadn’t wanted to talk about Pam! She’d been hiding huge pieces of the puzzle. Why, he couldn’t understand. What did Lily stand to gain from lying to him?

  A light snow was starting to fall. He looked ahead toward his cabin and suddenly was filled with a bursting desire to know the truth, the whole truth, about Pam’s
last days and her death. He practically ran up the steps, flung open the door. “Lily! I want some answers.”

  But she was nowhere in sight.

  He hunted quickly through the main room and then climbed the ladder to the loft. No Lily.

  So she’d gone back to her place.

  No way was he letting this slide. He’d go over there, right now.

  On his way to the door, he looked down at the table and saw a paper that didn’t belong. Picked up the hastily scrawled note.

  Carson, I’m sorry, but I’ve decided to leave the area. The isolation and lack of cultural resources bother me, and I feel that you and the girls are getting too attached to me when I’ll never be able to return the feelings.

  Regards,

  Lily

  PS: Could you please put Bella back in the kennel for me?

  He stared at the cold note and tried to reconcile it with the woman he knew.

  No “give my best to the girls”?

  “Regards”?

  It didn’t sound anything like Lily, but it was undeniably her handwriting.

  Maybe he hadn’t known her at all. His legs suddenly weak, he shrugged out of his coat and sat down. Lily’s complaint about the region was far too familiar. It was what Pam had said at first, before the real problem surfaced: he was too boring, too tame, too upright.

  But being boring has its strong points, Pam. Like, you don’t get in so much trouble that you’re dishonorably discharged from the armed forces.

  He couldn’t figure it out. Was Lily just trying to escape a difficult conversation, or did she feel the same way Pam did?

  He looked out the window, his stomach knotting. He tried to focus on the beautiful faraway mountains that had been here before his petty human problems and would be here after. Tried to connect with the divine force that had made them.

  Why, God, why?

  He’d started to think Lily’s coming here showed God’s hand, that the Lord had brought them together for a reason, healing for both of them and for the girls. The Christmas Eve celebration in Long John’s cabin, when she’d helped the girls decorate those cookies that were even now blaring their colors and sparkles from a plate on the table. The way she’d smiled as she’d photographed his little family, as they’d watched the girls speed down the hill on their sled. The compassion in her eyes as she’d leaned over an injured dog.