Love To The Rescue

by Brenda Sinclair

  “Excellent idea, Constable Robertson. We’d miss you terribly if you couldn’t join us,” said Tiffany, wiping down the kitchen table.

  “Daddy, I’m ready,” announced Sarah stepping into the room while struggling into her sparkly ski jacket.

  “I promised Sarah we’d take Rover for an early evening walk around the neighborhood to wear off dinner.” Kevin helped his daughter into her coat. “Some of the husbands and kids are coming along. Care to join us?”

  “Are you nuts? These women have been on their feet all day setting tables and cooking up a storm. Now, you want them to go for a walk!” Leslie threw a dishtowel at his head. “We’re sitting down with a cup of Baileys-laced coffee or a hot cup of herbal tea and putting our feet up for at least an hour.”

  “Most definitely,” seconded Amy. “Enjoy your walk. You know where I keep the doggie poop bags and Rover’s leash. Go for it!”

  “Enjoy your drinks, ladies, you’ve earned them.” Kevin pecked Amy’s cheek. And then he whispered for her benefit only, “Thank you for making the holiday so special. I understand now how your stepfather felt all those years ago. See you later, beautiful.”

  “Thank you,” croaked Amy, her voice constricted with emotion.

  Kevin grinned, wickedly. “I’m just thankful you didn’t insist on that tradition of the guys doing the washing up.”

  “I forgot about that!”

  “I’m out of here.” Kevin raced for Rover’s leash and poop bag beside the back door.

  “Bye,” she called over her shoulder, grinning, and realizing she couldn’t love the guy any more than she did.

  ****

  Three days passed before Amy returned to earth from the holiday entertainment high she’d been on. Everyone had raved about the delicious meal and what a wonderful time they’d had, and she caught herself beaming with pride every time she thought about it. Her aunt and uncle stayed on a couple of extra days to visit with friends, but they’d headed home this morning, promising to return to share Christmas with her. For the first time in days, she hadn’t wanted to fall into bed tonight the second the dinner dishes were done, and she decided she’d totally recuperated from the Thanksgiving holidays.

  Kevin was working a night shift, Mrs. Harris was involved with her church ladies planning a Christmas fundraiser, and Amy had Sarah all to herself for the entire night. They’d baked oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, made homemade chicken noodle soup for dinner, and watched a Disney movie before Sarah’s bath. Amy turned down the covers, waiting for her little friend to finish dressing in her pajamas.

  “Did you brush your teeth?” she inquired.

  “Yes, I did, Amy,” mumbled Sarah.

  Amy couldn’t put her finger on the problem, but Sarah acted totally elated about spending time together one minute, and then sounded her old depressed self again a minute later. Amy had no idea what was going on, but something was definitely wrong.

  Sarah grabbed Buster, her favorite teddy bear, out of her suitcase and clambered onto the bed. She slid her body under the covers and plopped her head down on the pillow.

  “Okay, give.” Amy stood beside the bed. “What’s up?”

  “Nothin’,” whispered Sarah, avoiding Amy’s eyes.

  “You don’t sound very happy. Is it something you can share with me?” Amy settled alongside Sarah on the bed and propped her head on her arm. She met the child’s eyes. “We’re best friends, remember, and best friends tell each other everything. It’s a girl rule.”

  Sarah gaped. “Is it really a rule?”

  Amy smiled, knowing how important following the rules was to Sarah. “Yes, it is.”

  “I’m just sad sometimes when I think... When I think about you breaking up with Daddy.”

  “What?” Amy sat bolt upright. “I’m not breaking up with your daddy. Who told you that?”

  “Nobody. I...I don’t mean right now. Just...when you do...later on.”

  Amy couldn’t believe her ears. Sarah’s admission was the last thing she expected to hear. Where had the girl gotten such a crazy idea? Leaving Kevin was the furthest thing from her mind. In fact, she’d rethought the whole pain of losing everything business and she’d been fantasizing about receiving a diamond ring for Christmas. Although, she wouldn’t voice it aloud even to Leslie or Tiffany for fear of jinxing the whole idea. “Why on earth would you think I’d ever break up with your father?”

  “My friend, Jane, in Girl Guides?”

  “Cute red-head with more freckles than you can count?”

  “Yep.” Sarah twisted the bed sheet with her small fingers. “Jane’s daddy lived with his girlfriend. Jane liked her. She was really funny and made Jane laugh a lot, and she took Jane to Girl Guides and shopping.”

  “Okay, what happened?”

  “She moved out, and Jane doesn’t have a pretending mommy anymore.” Sarah sounded totally heartbroken for her friend.

  “That’s too bad,” said Amy, snuggling down beside Sarah again and wrapping her arm around her. “But that doesn’t mean your daddy and I will break up. We love each other very much. And we both love you to pieces. In fact...can I tell you a secret?”

  “Uh-huh,” answered Sarah, nodding her head.

  “I’ve been thinking that maybe we could be a family some day. Would you like that?” Amy held her breath waiting for Sarah’s answer. Had Sarah been hoping that someday her daddy would remarry, and Amy would become her mother? Was that the reason she was so upset that Jane’s mother substitute had moved on?

  Sarah popped up, “Yes, I’d love to be a family with you and Daddy. Then you’d be my mommy, for real.”

  “Yes, I would. And I’d love nothing more than to be your real mommy. You’re a very special little girl, and I love you so much, Sweet Pea.” Amy’s eyes misted with unshed tears.

  “If you love me, why are you crying?” asked Sarah, tilting her head, looking confused.

  “Big girls cry when they’re happy. It’s very confusing, especially for guys. But trust me it’s true.” Amy brushed away her unshed tears.

  “Daddy is going to marry you?” Sarah beamed.

  “Maybe, someday, when he’s ready. If he decides he wants to marry me he’ll give me a ring. We’ll be engaged for awhile, then we’ll get married, and I’ll become your mommy.” Amy hugged Sarah tightly. “And I would love nothing more than to be your mother!”

  “I hope Daddy decides he’s ready to marry you pretty soon.” Sarah peeked up at Amy, grinning.

  “Why is that?”

  “Because I’m ready now!”

  Amy laughed. “Well, I’m afraid it’s not up to us. The man does the asking, so I guess we just have to be patient and wait.”

  Sarah looked dejected and then grinned. “Okay.”

  “Now, you get to sleep,” ordered Amy, tucking the covers under Sarah’s chin. “I’m making scrambled eggs with a ketchup happy face for breakfast.”

  “Yippee!” Sarah grinned. “They’re my favorite.”

  “Don’t let Mrs. Harris hear you say that. I bet she thinks her happy face pancakes are your favorite,” teased Amy.

  “Those, too.” Sarah yawned and squeezed her stuffed bear.

  “Good night, Sweet Pea. I’ll see you in the morning.” Amy shut the lights off and slipped out of the bedroom, leaving the door slightly ajar as usual.

  For a moment, she just stood there watching the precious child she felt so blessed to have in her life. Amy realized promising herself to never fall in love again over Allan’s gravesite had been crazy. What had she been thinking? Certainly, he deserved her grief and a suitable length of time to mourn him. But to expect her to never love again? No, Allan would want her to move on, to find happiness again. Quite unexpectedly, it had happened. She’d never felt so happy in ages, and she loved Kevin and his daughter more than life itself. And she wanted them forever!

  Amy skipped down the back stairs, and her heart almost stopped when she walked into the kitchen. “My God, you scared me. I didn’t
realize you were in the house.”

  Kevin stood at the kitchen sink with a glass of milk in one hand, holding one of the chocolate chip cookies they’d baked in the other. He took another big bite and grinned like a kid who’d been caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

  “Sorry, beautiful, I just snuck home to kiss my little angel goodnight.” He downed the milk in three gulps and set the glass on the counter. “Man, these are good cookies. Is Sarah asleep yet?”

  “I doubt it. I just tucked her in.” Amy breathed a sigh of relief that he hadn’t arrived home a few minutes earlier and caught them discussing the possibility of becoming a family. He might feel that she was rushing his decision. Or worse yet, she was enlisting his daughter’s help in speeding up the whole process which certainly wasn’t her intention. He would propose in his own good time, and that was perfectly fine with her.

  “Great, I’ll just dash up and tuck her in before I head back to work.” Kevin kissed her lips and headed up the back stairs. “Talk to you later. I’ll just let myself out the front when I come down.”

  “Okay, be careful. Goodnight.” Amy headed into her office to spend a couple of hours writing before it was time to turn in for the night.

  *

  “Is there a little girl in here who requires a goodnight kiss?” Kevin crept into the darkened room.

  “Daddy!” shrieked Sarah, sitting up.

  Kevin clearly distinguished his little angel’s smiling face in the beam of light coming from the hallway. “Did you have fun with Amy today?”

  “Uh-huh. We baked cookies and cooked soup and watched a movie and...”

  “I snuck one of those cookies when I came in,” interrupted Kevin. He should be getting back to work already and he knew from experience his daughter’s stories could go on for ages. “They were delicious, but Daddy has to go. Not before I give my favorite daughter a kiss though.”

  “Daddy, I’m your only daughter,” said Sarah, giggling at the familiar joke they frequently shared.

  “That’s right. I forgot again.” Kevin kissed his daughter’s cheek with a loud smack and then brushed her forehead with his lips. “Sweet dreams, princess, and I’ll pick you up in the morning.”

  “Amy is making happy face scrambled eggs, Daddy. You don’t want to miss them.” Sarah spoke with conviction.

  “I’ll try my best, sweetie.” Kevin tucked her under the covers again. “Goodnight, baby girl.”

  “Goodnight, Daddy. Love you.”

  “Love you, too, honey.”

  Kevin tiptoed out of the room and then stood for a moment, watching his angel fall asleep. He’d arrived at Amy’s house a good fifteen minutes ago, let himself in with his key, and wandered upstairs in search of his two favorite girls. They’d been so deep in conversation they hadn’t heard his footsteps in the carpeted hallway.

  He’d overheard every word of their discussion.

  Kevin jogged down the carpeted stairs and discovered a small plate with three cookies on it sitting atop the entryway table. He grabbed the cookies and let himself out the front door. Amy knew him too darn well for his own good.

  He smiled as he glanced toward his patrol car, parked on Amy’s driveway. What better way to ensure his girls’ safety than to park a police car in front of the house for a few minutes. That could only help deter the criminal element.

  He hurried down the driveway, munching on a cookie, slid behind the wheel, and headed back to work. While he drove out of the residential area, he popped the second cookie into his mouth and let his mind wander back to Amy and Sarah’s discussion. He hadn’t realized Jane’s father had broken up with his live-in. They seemed like the ideal couple, and Kevin wouldn’t have been surprised to hear that they’d married finally. Maybe it just wasn’t to be. Or maybe one of them had cheated on the other. Or they’d simply grown apart. Any number of things could have derailed the relationship.

  Kevin sighed. Like Amy had admitted to Sarah, he, too, had considered the idea of forming a family with Amy someday. But he’d questioned whether he was ready for such a huge step. He’d only known Amy since the middle of April. Today was October 21st. He quickly did the math in his head.

  Six months?

  No, it had to be longer than six months.

  It felt like he’d known her for years. They shared so many common interests: sports, especially baseball and hockey, camping, hiking, his daughter. Amy loved Sarah so much. He couldn’t ask for a better mother for his daughter. Their hair was the same blond color and their eyes twinkled when something excited them. They resembled mother and daughter much more than Barbara and Sarah had.

  Barbara. Hell, he’d known his first wife for two years before he’d married her. And look how that turned out? Maybe it didn’t matter after all that he’d only known Amy for six months. He popped the last bite of cookie into his mouth.

  Maybe the heart just knew what the heart knew.

  Maybe he should slip a ring on her finger one of these days. A very special ring.

  ****

  Before Amy knew it, Halloween appeared on the horizon and she was acting like a kid again. She loved hosting an annual Halloween party on either the Friday or Saturday night closest to the big day. Unless of course, October 31st fell on a Friday or Saturday.

  Every year, the party almost planned itself. Costumes and creepy goodies were a must, and everyone brought a themed dish to share, which meant meatballs that appeared to be swimming in a sea of blood or a platter of veggies and dip decorated with plastic spiders. She’d seen it all. Amy wouldn’t allow Leslie in the door unless she brought her famous blood-red raspberry punch complete with floating grape eyeballs intended to gross out the other partygoers. The ‘bring your own booze’ rule applied, and she always awarded a prize to the person who brought the most outrageous dish.

  This year, she held the party on Saturday night, since Halloween fell in the middle of the week. As usual, it was a resounding success. Kevin dressed as a pirate—Johnny Depp, eat your heart out—and she’d dressed as a tavern wench. She’d never had so much fun in her life!

  But this year, Amy’s Halloween preparations included a special responsibility: making a costume for a certain extraordinary seven-year-old.

  Mrs. Harris was adept at needlework and volunteered to help. Sarah announced she wanted a doggie costume, and Amy suspected having Rover in her life influenced this decision. A dog costume it was.

  Amy and Mrs. Harris worked on their surprise creation for days while Sarah attended school. Neither of them admitted they’d even started on the costume. The calendar indicated today was October 30th, and Sarah arrived home from school simply frantic.

  “When are you going to start my costume?” pleaded Sarah, her voice an unusual whine.

  “Oh, is it almost Halloween?” Amy straightened up in her chair, sitting across the table from Mrs. Harris sipping tea. Mrs. Harris coughed to cover her laugh.

  “Amy, my school party is tomorrow,” lamented Sarah. “I’ve got to have my doggie costume by the morning. I’ll be the only kid in my class without a costume and...”

  Amy burst out laughing. “Well, you know, it’s the strangest thing. I’m certain I saw a doggie costume upstairs on your bed.”

  “I saw it, too,” added Mrs. Harris, grinning.

  “You did!” squealed Sarah. “You guys finished my costume?”

  She raced upstairs. An ear-piercing scream that might have rattled her bedroom window could be clearly heard. A minute later she skipped into the kitchen, holding the costume against her chest. “Oh, Amy, it’s beautiful!”

  “Thank Mrs. Harris, too. She did most of the sewing. I just purchased the pattern and the material and thread.”

  “Don’t listen to her, sweetness. Amy helped just as much as I did. Who do you think glued all those spots on that Dalmatian?”

  Sarah placed the costume on a kitchen chair and hugged first Mrs. Harris and then Amy. “Thank you so much. I can’t wait to show Daddy,” she gushed, beaming.

>   “Your daddy is working the night shift, so we showed it to him this afternoon,” said Amy. “He can’t wait to see you in it tomorrow night. He’s not working, and he’s going to take you trick or treating.”

  “Yay!” shouted Sarah, hopping from one foot to the other.

  Amy blinked back tears of happiness. Life just didn’t get any better than this. And she wondered if the ‘marriage proposal’ gods would be whispering a suggestion into Kevin’s ear in the near future.

  Chapter 16

  Amy MacArthur worked hard all year every year—writing several books, promotion, marketing, networking at conferences—but she always set aside the entire month of December for herself.

  On the morning of December first, she’d completed her final promotion and marketing obligations for her latest romance novel which had been released just in time for the holiday shoppers looking for the ideal gift for a mother, sister, or girlfriend. With no further appointments or deadlines to monopolize her time until after the New Year, she could concentrate on her Christmas preparations.

  Without a doubt, Amy loved the Christmas season, even all the planning involved. She spent the next twenty days shopping, wrapping gifts, sending cards and emails to friends, and cleaning her house from top to bottom. She’d spent this afternoon at Kevin’s house, helping Mrs. Harris wrap Christmas presents while Sarah attended school. Tonight, she finished the Christmas baking. Her freezer was filled with cookies, cakes, and casserole dishes for quick preparation during the holidays when her aunt and uncle returned and friends dropped by.

  With only five days until Santa’s arrival, Amy was ready. But that too-exhausted-to-sleep kind of tired overtook her a few minutes ago when she stuck a huge container of shortbread into her freezer.

  “That’s it. I’m done!” she announced to Rover who accompanied her upstairs to her bedroom. She bent down and ruffled his ears. “Now, we just have to wait and see what Santa brings you, big guy.”