The fog of desire that blunted her senses abruptly vanished and her mind sharpened with the meaning of his words. “Love? How can you love me? We just met. I don’t even know you.”
“I don’t know you either, but I still want to marry you.” The slight smile on his lips didn’t touch the smoldering depths of his eyes. “And you’re wrong, you know.”
“Wrong?” She couldn’t seem to catch her breath.
He nodded. “I do know you. I’ve known you forever.”
“Forever? That’s ridiculous.” He was standing way too close. That’s why she couldn’t breathe. It had nothing to do with the passion in his eyes. Nothing to do with the fervent tone of his words. Nothing to do with how her body seemed to fit so perfectly with his own. She tried to pull away but he held her tight.
“I knew the moment I saw you across the room, we were meant for each other. It was the strongest sensation I’ve ever felt. Like being hit by a bolt of lightning. We’re soul mates, Katie.” His words rang with quiet conviction. “I know it as surely as I’ve ever known anything in my life; you’re my destiny. My fate.”
Fate?
She laughed weakly. “Fate? Now that’s a good line. You are a romantic.”
A frown furrowed his forehead and he shook her gently. “Don’t laugh at me and don’t take this lightly.”
“You don’t know what you’re saying.” Irrational, unexplained panic threatened within her.
“I know exactly what I’m saying.”
“Michael.” She struggled to find the right words. “You’re caught up in the emotion of the moment. You’re going off to fight for your country. You’re just—”
“Don’t treat me like I’m some green seventeen-year-old whose voice has just changed.” Anger flashed in his eyes. “I’m an adult. Twenty-two years old. College educated. For crissakes, Katie, I’m a damned officer. I know what I want when I see it.”
“You don’t know anything.” She jerked out of his grasp. “We’re in the middle of a war. This is no time to make commitments or promises or anything else. Besides, you have no idea what happens to the women whose husbands are off who knows where facing who knows what.”
She shook her head angrily. “I watch them, Michael, and I refuse to become one of them.”
“Katie.” Frustration simmered in his voice.
“No, Michael.” She shook her head firmly, refusing to give in. It was too important, and too permanent, and too darn frightening. “I will not spend the next year or two years or ten years waiting for you to come home. Or for you to be killed. I will not cringe every time there’s a knock on the door. I will not listen to the radio with my heart in my throat. And I will not bury someone I love again.”
“It’s because of your brother, isn’t it?” he said gently.
“Harry?” Immediately the tall, sandy-haired big brother with the laughing eyes and teasing smile flashed through her mind. The thought hadn’t occurred to her before, but Michael was right: Harry played a big role in her fears. “I guess so.”
“Tell me.” His tone was colored with compassion.
She shrugged impatiently. “There’s not much to tell. Harry wanted to fly and see the world. He ended up in Hawaii. It seemed like the perfect assignment. Two days before he died we got a letter from him all about parties on the beach and learning to surf.”
Michael eyed her intently. “It must have come as quite a shock.”
A sharper, bitter laugh broke from her. “It came as a shock to the whole country. I was just a little more personally involved, that’s all.”
“I have no intention of dying in any damn war.”
She shook her head. “Harry had no intention of dying either.”
Their gazes locked for a long moment and silence fell between them. A myriad of expressions chased across his face: frustration, doubt, and finally determination.
He pulled her back into his arms. “You haven’t said the one thing, the only thing, I’ll accept as a legitimate excuse for being turned down.”
“What?” she snapped.
He raised a brow at the sharp tone and lowered his head to hers. His voice was low and intense. “You haven’t said you don’t love me.”
“Michael, I—”
His lips claimed hers, stifling any possible protest. A rational, indignant voice, a voice of sanity, a voice of sheer terror screamed inside her head.
You don’t love him! You can’t love him! Not here! Not now!
But right here and right now, she was in his arms and her treacherous body betrayed her. For a split second she resisted, then her guard crumbled. Instinctively she leaned into his embrace as if to forge the separate into the whole, the two into the one. Her breath mixed and mingled with his as if the very air that provided life was incomplete unless shared. Heat pounded through her veins in a rhythm that ebbed and flowed with the throb of his lips crushed to hers.
He groaned and pulled his mouth away to feather kisses down to the hollow of her throat. “I knew it, Katie. You do love me.”
“No, Michael.” Her words were little more than a sigh.
Yes, Michael.
She couldn’t answer, couldn’t find the words, couldn’t focus on anything beyond the glory of his lips on flesh heated with newfound passion.
“I saw a sign down the street.” His voice rumbled against her neck. “A justice of the peace. Next door to a little inn.”
“Judge Thomas.” She struggled for sanity, struggled to remain coherent, struggled to ignore the intoxicating sensation of his hands splayed across her back, pressing her tighter until the clothing separating them seemed nonexistent and the flame of his passion arched between them.
“Marry me.” His voice was rough with emotion, heavy with need, and the words shot through her with an icy force that jerked her back to reason.
“No.” The word was a sob, wrung from deep inside her as if pulled by force or by necessity or by fear. “No.”
A shudder of regret, a sigh of resignation shivered through him and he held her firmly, her cheek cradled on his chest. His broad shoulders sagged slightly as if he had finally accepted her rejection.
“Will you wait for me then, Katie?”
“Forever,” she whispered.
He tilted her chin up and her gaze meshed with his. He brushed the flat of his thumb over her bottom lip and tossed her a sad smile that clutched at a place in her heart. “You know, if you’d marry me I’d have something to come back for.”
“You’ll have something to come back for,” she said staunchly, steadfast in her belief that this was the right thing to do. “I promise.”
“And I promise too, Katie.” His eyes burned with conviction. “I will come back to you.”
“I’ll be right here.” She mustered a smile that quivered in spite of her resolve to show nothing but confidence and conviction. “Waiting.”
“Okay.” He heaved a heavy sigh. “That’ll have to do, I guess.”
“I guess,” she echoed.
They stared at each other for a second or an eternity. There was so much she wanted to say to him, so much she needed to say. But the words didn’t come.
The overhead lights flashed on in the main hall, signaling the end of the evening.
“I have to go,” he said simply.
“I know.” He took her hand and they walked into the rapidly emptying main room, blinking in the bright light after the dim recesses of the corridor.
Her throat tightened and she bit her lip to hold back tears. “I’ll walk you out.”
“No.” He shook his head. “That’s okay. I’d rather…” He laughed awkwardly and ran his fingers through his hair. “I don’t know what to say.”
She pulled a deep breath. “Me neither.”
He turned to leave, then swiveled back and yanked her into his arms. His dark eyes bored into hers with a fervor that crept into her soul. “You haven’t said it, Katie. You haven’t told me.”
“Told you what?” Frantically she s
earched her mind. “I said I’ll wait for you.”
“No.” He shook his head and stared. “You never said you loved me. Do you, Katie, do you love me?”
Love?
“I—” The word shivered through her, shadowed with indecision and doubt. Was this love? Could she admit the truth to him? Or more, to herself.
“Lieutenant?” an impatient masculine voice called.
“Coming.” Michael threw the answer over his shoulder, then swiftly brushed his lips across her forehead. “Write to me.”
She swallowed the lump in her throat and nodded.
His gaze lingered on her for a last second. Then abruptly he twisted and strode toward the door.
“Michael,” she whispered.
Across the room, he hesitated beside the Christmas tree. His hand snapped out and plucked a glass ball from the fir. He swiveled to face her.
“Katie,” he called, “you do need a present.”
With an easy underhand pitch, he threw the ornament into the air. It swung high in a long, slow arch, catching and reflecting the light like a Christmas star. She cupped her hands together and held them out before her. The ball landed with a gentle plop in the center of her outstretched palms as if guided by unerring instinct or pure emotion.
Michael tossed her a quick wave and the crooked grin that had already branded a spot on her heart.
“I’ll be seeing you, Katie.” Even from across the room she could see the smoldering pledge in his eyes, and she read his lips more than heard his words. It was enough. “I promise.”
He joined the throng of uniforms swirling through the open door, and she lost sight of him. At once she wanted to run across the room, into the night and back into his arms. She wanted to hear his laughter and bask in the sparkle of his eyes. She wanted to feel the warmth of his body beside hers, as his wife, as his love.
But she couldn’t seem to move. Her feet, her mind resisted the urgent cries of her heart. Her shoulders slumped with the realization: she was a coward, plain and simple. Too afraid of the possibility of loss and pain to recognize the greatest gift a man could offer a woman, at Christmas or any other time.
The door slammed shut and at once the noise in the room quieted to a gentle murmur. The only ones left were the hostesses and the chaperons and the odd assortment of males who made up the makeshift band. Only women and children and old men. It was the same in any war.
She was right not to marry him, not to commit her life, her heart to him. She’d write, of course, and she’d wait and she’d pray for his safe return.
Would a ring on her finger make it any harder?
She sucked her breath in sharply and clasped a hand over her mouth. How could she have been so blind? What a complete idiot she was! Married or not, she was in the same boat as Pamela Gillum. But worse, much, much worse. Pamela at least had her husband’s name and her memories.
Katie stared down at the delicate ornament in her hand as if it were a crystal ball that held the true meaning of life. But the revelation of some truths come too late. She’d sent Michael away with nothing beyond a simple promise to wait. She hadn’t even told him she loved him, when everything inside her proclaimed the truth. Improbable and unrealistic and downright insane, it was still the truth.
She loved him.
And he was gone.
She fought a rising sense of panic. It will be okay. He’ll come back. He has to come back.
He promised.
She wrote to him on Christmas morning. And the next day and the day after that. A flurry of letters winged their way across the ocean bearing a flood of emotion. She poured her heart and soul into every word, every line, every page. She wrote of her hopes and dreams for after the war, for the future, their future together. She wrote of love.
And she waited.
Katie returned to school with her mother’s promise to forward all mail. She checked her box every day, sometimes twice. Nothing.
Weeks turned to months without word. Anticipation faded and doubt gnawed at the back of her mind like a voracious rodent. Were Michael’s words just routine lines after all? Were they merely quick and easy lies designed to play on the wonder of a single night and the threat of mortality? Did he really mean everything he said? Did he mean anything he said?
I do know you. I’ve known you forever.
No. She refused to believe, even for a moment, that the tone of his words, the touch of his hand, the look in his eye was anything less than what she knew, deep inside some secret place in her soul, to be real. And right.
Faith kept her strong, hope kept her going, and love kept her alive. She would hear from him. He would come back to her.
He promised.
It was a frigid winter day when she found the bulky Manila envelope stuffed in her mailbox. She yanked it out with fingers numbed from the cold and icy tendrils gripping her heart. Her hands trembled as she struggled to tear the packet open. Her letters to Michael tumbled out, drifting to the ground. Amidst them fluttered a single, official-looking page.
Dear Miss Bedford,
I must apologize for the unforgivable delay in contacting you. Unfortunately, your correspondence with Lt. O’Connor was apparently held up and not discovered until recently. Your letters were not among his personal effects.
I regret to inform you Lt. O’Connor was killed in a training accident shortly after his arrival in England. I didn’t know him well but he seemed like a fine young man. Please accept my condolences.
Sincerely,
Capt. Benjamin Gray
Pain speared through her with an intensity that ripped away her breath and stopped her heart and froze her soul. Her legs buckled beneath her and she sank to her knees. She could neither accept the straightforward words nor ignore them. For a long moment she huddled, numbed, as if by avoiding any movement herself she could somehow halt the world in its orbit, turn back the clock, deny what couldn’t be denied. One line from the Captain’s letter pounded in her head over and over in a refrain of accusation.
Your letters were not among his personal effects.
Michael never received her letters. He never knew how much she regretted her decision not to marry him. He never knew of her ardent, written vows to spend the rest of her life with him.
He never knew she loved him.
Like a dam swept aside by rampaging waters her defenses shattered. Great racking sobs shook through her and she wept for what was lost and what would never be. She cried for the love of a man gained in one night, destined to last a lifetime, now lasting no time at all. And her tears failed to wash away the one unrelenting truth of war and death and even life itself.
Promises can’t always be kept….
…promises.
Katherine stared at the aged box in her hand. Even now, fifty-four years later, the pain was as fresh and sharp as it had been on that cold, cold winter day. Somehow she’d always ignored it before. She rarely thought about Michael, relegating him to the dim reaches of her mind the same way she’d stored the hat-box and her memories in the back shadows of the closet. Occasionally a twinge of sorrow would tug at her heart. But only occasionally and always on Christmas Eve.
She had put him firmly in the past and gone on with her life. She finished school and fled to sunny California where the flowers bloomed even at Christmas and no one ever worried about icy roads. She got a good job and managed to hang on to it even when the war ended and the men came home. Every bit of passion within her went into her work, her career.
Every now and then she’d long for the magic she tasted so briefly on that one Christmas Eve. She married, twice, both marriages disastrous, both mercifully short. She never even glimpsed what she’d shared with Michael on a single evening in another lifetime.
Crazy old woman.
Disgust and anger surged through her. She ripped open the frail box and rolled what was left of the corsage onto her hand. Hard and dark and shriveled, it bore only the vaguest resemblance to what it had once been.
&n
bsp; Just like me.
She gazed at the floral remains as if mesmerized. There was little of Katie left in Katherine. And no one to blame but herself. Her life would have been so very different had she, just that once, listened to her heart instead of her head.
You’ve lived your life. Made your choices. You can’t go back.
Maybe she really had snapped. Maybe all the lonely years had finally sent her over the edge. It was insane to place all one’s hopes and dreams and prayers on a promise muttered by a man in a red suit more than half a century ago. Or an odd quirk of lighting that changed the look in the eye of a department store Santa.
Her hand closed around the withered flower and she squeezed her fist tight. Better to crush this delusion, and all the bittersweet memories, right now and simply blow the dust away and face up to reality.
She opened her hand and her heart thudded in her chest. Blood roared in her ears and the room spun around her. She stared in stark disbelief.
In the center of her palm, the gardenia was as fresh and whole and sweet as the day Michael had pinned it on her sweater.
She couldn’t seem to catch her breath. Her eyes blurred. The world around her faded. Only the stark white of the flower shimmered in her vision. It gleamed like a Christmas star or a wedding gown or a…snowflake.
“…Katie.”
Snowflakes flurried against the glass, incandescent fireflies flitting through a blue-black night.
“Katie Bedford, would you please stop staring out the window and take this?” Mary Ann Hanson held up a hand-blown glass ball and glared with obvious irritation.
“Snow.” Katherine gasped the word. “It’s really snow!”
“Of course it’s snow,” Mary Ann said sharply. “Goodness, Katie, it’s been snowing off and on for days.”
Katherine couldn’t pull her gaze away from the window. “It’s beautiful.”
Mary Ann’s tone softened. “It is pretty, all right. Just like a Christmas card.”
“A Christmas card,” Katherine echoed. “I’d forgotten how perfect snow was for Christmas”—she sucked in her breath sharply—“Eve. It’s Christmas Eve!”
A Magical Christmas Present Page 20
