WESTERN CHRISTMAS PROPOSALS

by Various

  He’d never known his gut to be so wrong about a person.

  For himself, he could bear the pain—he’d lost love before.

  Tonight he would grieve. But tomorrow, for the sake of his children, he would laugh, look forward to Santa’s visit.

  They would have a joyous day.

  “Hell’s damn business.” Bowing his head to the table, he closed his gritty-feeling eyelids.

  Fingers brushed his shoulder.

  He spun about on the seat.

  “What are you doing up, Grannie Em?”

  She shrugged. Her donated robe was too big and hung from her shoulders.

  “The older you get, the less time you have. You don’t want to spend it in bed.”

  “I’m sorry about your ring.” He watched while Grannie Em walked to the other side of the table and sat down. “Why didn’t you just ask for it in the beginning?”

  “We thought you were a thief. Since we had plans to ruin you, we couldn’t ask.”

  “You planned to ruin me?”

  “Only your reputation, dear.” Grannie patted his hand comfortingly. “One doesn’t just let criminals go free without facing justice. The world would be a sorry place if that were the case. I’m sure you of all people understand.”

  “Can’t say that I understand anything about this.” He eased his hand out from under Grannie Em’s, jabbed his fingers through his hair. “I was in love with your granddaughter.”

  “You still are.”

  She was right, of course. It would be a long, painful time before he quit loving Belle Annie Key.

  “I’d best get back to my sweet girl. She’s cried her eyes out six times over.”

  “I’m sorry.” The thought of Belle in pain cut him.

  “If she’d listened to my advice, you’d be celebrating your engagement.”

  “What advice?”

  “Find the ring and keep mum about it. That way I’d have my property and you would believe you misplaced it. Belle Annie would have the love of a good man.”

  “She doesn’t believe I’m a good man. She came here to ruin me. Don’t forget that.”

  “You can hardly hold that against her. She just didn’t have it in her to deceive you.”

  “It’s why she came here.” Had the smiles, the kisses, all been a lie? Worse, a means to an end? “Why would you advise her to be deceitful?”

  “It was the one way to have us both.” Grannie sighed. “Since you’ve sold my ring, she will lose us both.”

  “What? Why?”

  “Without the ring, I’ll die.”

  “Are you ill?” What the blazes did the ring have to do with it?

  “Fit as a fiddle—at the moment.” Roy felt as if he’d fallen into a pit, unable to judge up from down. “My husband has decreed from the Great Beyond that I will wear the ring on Christmas or meet him at the Pearly Gates.”

  “You believe this?”

  “Of course. You don’t go a lifetime with a man and not know his voice. It’s because the ring is magic that I need it.”

  “Magic ring?” This conversation made no sense.

  “Charmed more than magical. On Christmas, it brings folks together who might pass each other by on their own.”

  “I wonder if it would work for me and Belle.”

  “Oh, I don’t think so. The pair of you get on quite well on your own. The only magic you need is what is already between you.”

  True; while Belle’s betrayal had cut him, it had not killed his love for her.

  “The only reason she agreed to help me rescue my ring is because she doesn’t want me to die tomorrow.” She covered his hand with her delicate fingers. “I know you are feeling betrayed, but understand that for Belle, it came to a choice of loving you or watching me die. I told her I think she made the wrong decision. With or without the ring, I don’t have many more years. The two of you have your whole lives.”

  “Grannie, your life is as precious as anyone’s. The length of what’s left doesn’t make one more important than another.”

  “Burtrum, did you hear that? You are making a mess of things.”

  Grannie cocked her head to one side, as though listening to a voice he could not hear.

  “He says that if he didn’t send us after the ring, Belle Annie would never have met you.”

  Some old folks became addled, hearing and seeing things that did not exist. Grannie Em was not addled.

  “What can I do?” Not likely a single damn thing.

  “Do you believe in Christmas miracles, Roy?”

  “Yes, yes I do.”

  “I say we pray for one.”

  * * *

  At first, Roy had been relieved that Beulah accepted his invitation for coffee at the bakery.

  But now his palms were sweating, his stomach in knots. It seemed no matter how much money he offered for Grannie’s ring, she refused.

  “It’s a pretty thing and I want it,” she stated. “I purchased it fairly from Ben and I am keeping it.”

  “I made a mistake when I sold it. It belonged to Em Key.”

  There was only one way to make this miserable situation right. That was to get Beulah to sell the ring.

  After speaking to Grannie last night, he’d understood why Belle had deceived him.

  Putting her grandmother first, at the cost of her own happiness—it made him love her all the more.

  Not that it mattered unless he got that ring back.

  His family’s future hung on convincing a stubborn woman to sell the ring.

  “Beulah,” he said—no, he begged, giving her the most beguiling smile he knew to give. “Grannie Key believes that if she doesn’t have the ring, she will die—tomorrow.”

  “That’s silly.” Beulah glanced at the ring on her finger, frowning. “I don’t believe it.”

  “Well, she believes it. She thinks there’s some kind of enchantment involved.”

  All of a sudden Beulah gasped, shook her head and clutched the ring to her heart. “No. I purchased it and I will keep it, no matter what you offer. It is charmed. I feel it.”

  Looking pale, she scraped her chair back, stood and left him alone at the table.

  He watched her hurry away, taking his future with her.

  * * *

  “Thank you,” Belle said, then tucked the train tickets she had just purchased into her coat pocket.

  “We’re plum sorry to see you leave us so soon,” the man at the ticket booth said. “Are you sure you don’t want to wait until after the New Year?”

  “I’m sure.”

  She pulled her coat tighter against the rising wind. Leaving on Christmas Day was the last thing she wanted, but that was exactly what she was going to do.

  She had wrongly judged Roy and there was no way of going back from it. If remorse and tears could make it better, she would have paid for her crime a hundred times over, but regret changed nothing.

  Roy’s heart was broken by her own hand and there was no way to heal it other than by going away. Let time and distance do what she could not.

  Besides, if Grannie Em was going to pass on as she predicted, it would not be in front of the Garner children.

  So far, this morning, Belle had been able to avoid seeing Roy. If she could manage it, she would avoid seeing him forever. To look in his eyes and see the affection, the love he used to have for her, gone—well, she didn’t think she could bear it, especially knowing that it was all her fault.

  Coming down the stairs of the platform, she glanced at the sky. It wasn’t snowing yet, but it would be by tomorrow. Christmas Day was sure to be magical, and tragic.

  It would take all her power of will to make sure the children knew nothing of the situation. As soon as she got home�
��no, not home but to Roy’s house—her smile would be bright and she would set to making them a Christmas Eve meal.

  She would help the little ones string a popcorn garland for the tree. They would sing songs and tell stories about Santa.

  They would not pay for her mistake.

  The price she was paying for that would be buried under Christmas cheer.

  The wind at her back was icy. She hurried along the boardwalk, then slowed as she passed the bakery. The scene through the front window was warm and inviting with folks gathered at tables, munching on sweets and sipping warm drinks.

  Perhaps she should buy some peppermint sticks for the children to suck on while they waited for Santa.

  She had her hand on the doorknob but drew it back as quickly as if it had been a hot coal.

  Through the glass in the door she spotted Roy sitting at a table near the back.

  He wasn’t alone. Beulah Banks sat across from him. The spinster’s eyes were gazing at him softly, affectionately, but she shook her head at whatever he was saying.

  Roy shot her an engaging smile. Beulah stopped shaking her head but she frowned—blushed and frowned.

  It was a very good thing that Belle was leaving tomorrow, even before the pageant was finished. She could hardly begrudge Roy courting a woman who would certainly be honest in every way, but it would break her heart to witness it.

  By the time she stepped into Roy’s parlor, her tears were dry. Too bad her eyes were as red as holly berries.

  The children, busy with convincing Delanie that Santa was indeed real, didn’t seem to notice.

  Grannie did. She pushed up out of her chair and came to fold her in a hug.

  It took everything she had not to break down in front of the young Garners.

  In the unlikely event that her grandmother did die tomorrow, how would she cope? She would have no one in the world to love and it was all her own doing.

  She should have done the honest thing the moment she and Grannie stepped off the train. She ought to have demanded the ring on the spot.

  But she had been set on serving justice, too. To an innocent man, as it turned out.

  Now she would spend the rest of her life paying the price for that blunder.

  * * *

  “You really see’d Santa?” Delanie asked while sitting on Belle’s lap and gazing at the Christmas tree.

  “I did.” In fact, she was drawing on the spirit of the jolly old man at this very moment. How else was she to make it through this horrid, wonderful evening?

  “I’m gonna stay up all night so I can see him, too.”

  “That’s not so easy as it seems, since he waits until you are asleep.”

  “How did you see him, then?”

  “My cat woke me up. I heard an odd noise. When I crept down the stairs, there was Santa putting the prettiest doll in the whole wide world into my stocking.”

  Delanie’s eyes grew as round as peppermint candies. “Did he see you?”

  “He turned with a wink.”

  “I want a cat in my stocking,” Jack declared.

  She glanced at the green-striped hosiery hanging on the mantel. When she did, her gaze collided with Roy’s.

  All day Grannie had been whispering in her ear about Christmas changing hearts, about forgiveness.

  She believed that. Hadn’t the whole purpose of Christmas been about forgiving a wayward world?

  But if absolution was in Roy’s heart, it didn’t show. His gaze at her was...unreadable.

  “If Santa’s going to come, you children need to go upstairs and get to sleep,” he announced.

  “I can’t sleep unless Belle tucks me in.” Jack plopped down beside her on the couch. Without thinking, she stroked his curly hair, kissed the top of his head.

  Roy smiled but she wondered if even the children were fooled by the gesture.

  She dropped her hand from Jack’s head. Acting happy for the sake of the holiday was one thing, but expressing her love for the children was another.

  With her tickets purchased and her bags packed, to demonstrate affection was inexcusable. In the end it would only cause them pain.

  “You all head up to bed. Miss Belle will be up in a minute.”

  He didn’t refuse the request—she supposed it was for their sake more than hers.

  “I’m going to keep my eyes open all night.” Jack bounded up the stairs two at a time. “If Jacob Peabody saw Santa, I’m going to see him, too.”

  “Miss Belle and I will be up shortly.” Roy sat down on the couch not close, exactly, but closer than she would have expected.

  “The kitten will be a great surprise,” she murmured.

  It was a ridiculous thing to say when there was so much heartache between them, but if she didn’t say something the tension would burst the room wide-open.

  “We need to talk.”

  No—she could not. She’d been deceitful. Even in loving him, she had not seriously considered the fact that he might be an innocent man.

  Why was that? Love for Grannie would explain why she had deluded him in the first place. Still, at any time after the night they had skated on the pond, she might have asked for the ring.

  She was quite simply a coward—a deceitful and horrible woman.

  Roy would never forgive her, of that she had no doubt.

  She stood up, putting distance between them. “Grannie and I will be gone before the pageant ends.”

  “Hell’s business,” she heard him mutter as she dashed up the stairs.

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Who would have believed that they had it in them to behave so well?” Belle said.

  To her surprise, Jim and Horace, who had recently come to blows, stood elbow to elbow toasting the season with mugs of mulled wine. Not only did they smile at each other, but also at the rest of the people gathered around the candlelit Christmas tree.

  Belle didn’t think she was mistaken about the tree casting a magical glow over them.

  “They must be afraid that Santa is going to throw them in jail,” Grannie declared.

  Belle swallowed hard, trying not to dwell on the handsome sheriff—on how she would have joyfully married him had she not been a two-faced wretch.

  She looked hard at her grandmother’s face, watching for signs of distress. So far she showed no indication of withering.

  As soon as she knew the pageant would remain peaceful, she would take her grandmother and board the train.

  It wouldn’t be long. The joy of the season was clearly overruling recent grudges.

  Arms linked, the citizens of Pinoakmont sang the two agreed-upon Christmas carols, then three more. They prayed together, giving thanks for the blessings of last year, then for guidance and safety for the new.

  Side by side the lamb and the goat munched hay in quiet camaraderie. The doll in the manger looked peaceful, wrapped in pink and blue.

  Standing beside the wide church doors, breathing in the scent of cinnamon and pine, hearing the voices of neighbors chatting, laughing, the very last thing Belle wanted to do was flee.

  Pinoakmont, with all its strife and cheer, might have been her home. She and Grannie would have been happy here.

  Childish laughter brought her back to the reality of the here and now. A dozen children chased each other about the hall, some with cookie crumbs on their mouths, some with candy canes between their lips.

  Delanie, Lorraine, Jack and Robbie would haunt her heart forever. If only she—

  “Where did Santa get to? He was here a moment ago.” Grannie craned her neck, glancing about. “Oh, there! He’s just come back in and gone straight to Beulah Banks. Imagine that.”

  She didn’t want to imagine that. It was further proof that he was finished with her—as
well he should be.

  Beulah was a woman he could trust. She was who she was. There were no secrets lurking behind Beulah’s eyes.

  And right now her eyes looked softly at Roy, blinking and troubled. Santa-Roy appeared to be pleading with her, his charming smile trying to win her over.

  Beulah shook her head, twisted her long slender fingers together.

  What could be wrong with the woman? She wanted Roy and he was now courting her.

  Belle felt as if her heart had been cut in half. Had he quit loving her so quickly—so completely?

  But then, he had loved the woman he thought she was, not the one she really was. He would get over her much sooner than she would him—if she ever did.

  “Are you going to let that woman snatch him right out from under you, Belle Annie?”

  “Yes, and I wish him the best.”

  “You do not! That’s nonsense and you know it.”

  “After what I did, I owe it to him to wish him the best.” Just not with Beulah, not when she had to witness the budding romance under her very nose. Not when she feared the woman would drill the Garner children like little marching soldiers. “Besides, we’re boarding the train in a few minutes.”

  Try as she might, she could not stop staring at Roy and Beulah. She ought to be happy for the woman. The poor thing had faced a life of spinsterhood.

  Now her future looked bright as a new penny. Belle did not begrudge her the life that she herself had thrown away.

  Well, that was a lie! She did begrudge it. She ought to at least be honest about something.

  With supreme Christmas goodwill, she forced her mind to genuinely wish Beulah the best.

  It would be easier if Roy was not looking at Beulah with such intensity.

  Holiday goodwill be dashed! If honesty was to be her guiding star from now on, and it was, she hated the fact that it was the spinster feeling the warmth of attention.

  Beulah wiped a tear from her eye. That was odd. But no doubt it was a tear of joy.

  “Come on, Grannie Em. It’s time to catch the train.”

  “Don’t be a fool, Belle Annie. Fight for your man.”

  “He’s no longer my man.”