Single Dad in Her Stocking

by Alison Roberts

  Not being at work meant that Max would have plenty of time to remember the way his mother had made the house come alive at Christmas time. He could go shopping—online, if necessary—to find gifts he could wrap up to go under the tree. He could ask Maggie to do a bit of Christmas baking so that the house would be filled with those delicious aromas he had a faint memory of. He could go up into the dusty attics of this house and drag out those dozens of boxes that contained miles of fairy lights and candles and every kind of decoration you could imagine.

  Max looked down at the baby in his arms. He touched her cheek with his forefinger with the softest stroke.

  ‘That’s what I’m going to do,’ he told Alice. ‘For your big brother and sister. For my dad. For Emma. And don’t worry, we’ll take lots of photos so that it won’t matter that you’re not old enough to remember your first Christmas and it might be a good thing. This will be kind of a practice run and we’ll be really good at it by the time you are old enough to remember.’

  He got slowly to his feet, so as not to wake Alice, and carried her upstairs to her cot. It felt good that she was comforted enough to sleep again. It felt good to pass the door of the room not so far from his where he knew Emma would be tucked up in her bed and possibly also asleep.

  And it felt really good that he had a mission for the next few days that might help Emma. And his father. Max had always worked hard and played hard. This mission was neither work nor play but the effort he was going to put into it was going to be a hundred and one per cent.

  Because it mattered to everybody in this house and Max wanted to protect them all and give them the gift of joy. It might be focused only on one special day for now but it was a beginning and he was determined to make it the best one possible. For everyone, including Emma.

  Maybe—given what he’d learned about her today—especially for Emma.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  LOOPING HER STETHOSCOPE around her neck as she walked into the emergency department of the Royal early the next morning, Emma’s steps slowed and almost stopped. Okay, it was Christmas Eve tomorrow, but what the heck were so many people doing in here wearing Santa suits? There had to be about ten of them—a sea of red and white in the cubicle area for injured or ill patients that weren’t serious enough to need to be in one of the resuscitation rooms.

  Senior nurse Miriam was trying to keep a straight face. ‘Seems like it was rather a good Christmas party,’ she told Emma. ‘There were too many people dancing on the table and a leg broke.’

  Emma’s eyebrows rose. ‘A table leg or a person’s leg?’

  Miriam’s smile escaped. ‘The table, but there is a guy with an ankle injury, a woman with a possibly fractured wrist and quite a few bumps and bruises. The others are their partners or colleagues so we couldn’t tell them to go away.’

  ‘Who needs to be seen first?’

  ‘Ankle Santa, I think. He’s the boss. He’s also rather drunk so he might be injured more than he realises.’

  The middle-aged man was still wearing his red hat with white fur trim. Having glanced at the chart on the end of his bed that told her his vital signs were all within normal limits, Emma introduced herself and then asked how he was feeling.

  ‘Never better,’ he told her. ‘It was the best party ever. Gonna need a new table in the boardroom, though.’

  Several Santas, including one that called from the next cubicle, seemed to be in agreement that it had been a memorable party.

  ‘It must have been good,’ Emma agreed, ‘if it went on till nearly dawn.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t think it’s finished yet.’ A woman wearing a red dress with white trimming and a headband with a small red hat in the middle was holding her arm cradled against her chest, which suggested she was the patient with the wrist injury. ‘There was a new case of prosecco being opened when our taxis arrived to bring us here.’

  ‘Hmm...’ Emma was already assessing the ankle injury of the man lying on the bed. It was certainly swollen enough to be either a serious sprain or a fracture but his toes were a good colour and she could feel a peripheral pulse on the top of the foot. ‘Can you try and wriggle your toes for me, please?’

  She watched the movement and heard the groan that told her it was causing pain but Emma was not quite as focused as she would normally have been. It wasn’t just being surrounded by an unusual number of people dressed like Father Christmas who were all inebriated to some extent. It was more the mention of the Italian bubbly they’d been drinking, in combination with knowing that it had been a Christmas party. Because it immediately made her think of that particular party. That particular kiss.

  The kiss that had very nearly happened again last night.

  How much she had wanted it to happen had been the reason she’d left Max to cope alone with feeding Alice and why she’d slipped out of the house early this morning before anyone else was up. Things were complicated enough in the Cunningham household without letting a sexual attraction get out of hand. Emma wanted to help weld the new family of James, Max and the children together but, at some point in her almost sleepless night, she had decided that even the casual type of relationship that Max Cunningham was famous for would only be a distraction from what he needed to be focused on—the children—so her mission needed to be to keep him on task. If that wasn’t exactly what she wanted, she was prepared to deal with it for the sake of everybody else involved.

  She needed to keep herself on task as well.

  ‘Have you ever injured this ankle before?’

  ‘Nope. Mind you, I’ve never done the floss dance before, either.’

  ‘You were really good at it.’ A much younger Santa poked his head around the curtain. ‘I’m still trying to figure it out.’ He straightened his arms and held them out, staring at them as if he was trying to decide which one to move.

  ‘Move your hips first,’ someone called. ‘Get the rhythm.’

  ‘Uh-uh...’ The firm voice belonged to Miriam. ‘No dancing in here, folks. If you’re well enough to dance, you need to go out to the waiting room. We’ve got sick people in here.’ She tilted her head in Emma’s direction. ‘You need any help, Dr Moretti?’

  Emma shook her head. ‘But call me if anything major comes in.’

  ‘I’m major,’ her patient told her. ‘Don’t leave me, darlin’.’

  ‘Do you have any medical conditions I should be aware of? Heart disease or high blood pressure? Diabetes or lung problems?’

  ‘Nah. I’m as fit as a fiddle. Or I will be. I’ve asked Santa for a gym subscription this year. In fact, I think I asked several Santas.’

  A ripple of laughter came from adjoining cubicles. ‘Wasn’t me,’ someone called.

  ‘I don’t remember being asked,’ someone else shouted. ‘But I can’t remember much at all right now, come to think of it.’

  Emma was examining the ankle more closely. She put her hand under the foot near the toes. ‘Can you push your foot against my hand, please?’ She shifted her hand to the top of the foot next. ‘Pull up against it, now?’

  ‘Ouch.’

  ‘I don’t think it’s broken,’ Emma told him a short time later. ‘But we’ll send you off for an X-ray just to be on the safe side.’

  The woman with the wrist injury was also sent to X-ray, but the other injuries were deemed minor and the crowd of red and white patients gradually dispersed, some beginning to complain of headaches and feeling rather unwell.

  ‘Christmas parties,’ Miriam muttered, shaking her head. ‘More trouble than they’re worth most of the time.’

  ‘Mmm.’ Emma needed to stop thinking about Christmas parties.

  About Max and being thoroughly kissed by him.

  Her next patient, coming in by ambulance already intubated and being ventilated after what appeared to be a serious stroke, was more than enough to give Emma complete focus on her job and that con
tinued for the rest of her shift, with one case after another that required rapid assessment and treatment to stabilise them. There was an elderly man with septic shock, a drug overdose, pulmonary embolism, two heart attacks and a ten-year-old child with a severe asthma attack who needed transferring to the intensive care unit for close monitoring when she was finally out of immediate danger.

  Emma was still thinking about that last case as she drove back to Upper Barnsley. The child’s mother had burst into tears when told that the worst seemed to be over.

  ‘She’d just been writing a reminder list for Father Christmas,’ she sobbed. ‘And I was feeling so smug because I’ve already got everything hidden away but...but I’ve just had an hour to wonder what it would have been like if they’d never been unwrapped...’

  Those gifts would get unwrapped and that made it a good note on which to have finished her day. It had also reminded Emma that Max had asked her to find out what Ben and Tilly might have asked to receive for a special Christmas gift. Maybe when she got home she could help them write a list to put up the chimney. She was all ready to suggest this to Max the minute she walked through the door, but she didn’t get a chance to say anything.

  ‘Come with me.’ It looked as if he’d been waiting for her to get home. ‘We haven’t got long.’

  He grabbed Emma by the hand and started to head upstairs. Towards the bedrooms? Emma thought about tugging her hand free and trying to find out what was going on, but the warmth of Max’s hand around hers and the determination of his forward movement was irresistible and all Emma could actually think about was that she’d probably go anywhere with this man if he wanted her to—even to a totally unknown destination. It was exciting. Thrilling, even. Especially the feeling of his skin against hers as they hurried upstairs. Her resolution to stay away from any intimate involvement with him seemed to be fading rapidly as the heat and feeling of strength in the hand holding hers made her curl her fingers tighter to make sure the connection wouldn’t be lost.

  They went past the bedrooms, into another hallway Emma hadn’t seen before, with old portraits hanging on the walls, and then up a smaller staircase.

  ‘The servants’ quarters were up here long before my family moved in,’ Max told her. ‘It’s where we used to hide when we were kids, Andy and me.’

  ‘Is that what we’re doing? Playing hide and seek with Ben and Tilly?’

  ‘No.’ They were up the small staircase now and leaving footprints on dust-covered floorboards. ‘They’re in the kitchen with Maggie and her daughter Ruth. Ruth’s just gone on maternity leave from her job as an infant school teacher and she’s brilliant with the kids. They’re icing Christmas cookies at the moment. Alice is asleep. Dad’s out on a house call. It’s the first chance I’ve had all day to do this.’ He stopped to peer up yet another staircase that was steep and narrow enough to be more like a ladder. Then he grinned at Emma. ‘The main attic’s up here,’ he added, letting go of her hand as he started to climb. ‘And there should be enough Christmas decorations to sink a battleship, if they haven’t been eaten by mice or something. I need some help getting them downstairs but I didn’t want Ben trying to get up and down these stairs. And I didn’t want Dad to know what I was doing because he would have tried to stop me. He won’t like it but if we can start putting them up I figured he would see how much fun it is for the kids and...and...’

  ‘He won’t want to disappoint them.’ Emma nodded as she followed Max up the narrow stairs. ‘A bit of emotional blackmail, huh? Well, it certainly worked on me.’

  ‘What? When?’ Max sounded appalled.

  ‘When you reminded me about telling the children I’d show them how to make stars. Or getting them to remind me...’

  ‘Oh...’ Max disappeared through the hole in the ceiling and then turned to offer his hand to help Emma as she reached the final stairs. Having been holding it so recently, it felt completely natural to take it again, allowing him to pull her into the attic space. He was still smiling as he tugged her forward.

  ‘Do you forgive me?’ he asked. ‘For emotionally blackmailing you?’

  ‘It was for a good cause.’ Emma realised that if she kept that forward momentum going she would end up bumping into Max’s body. He’d probably put his hands on her shoulders to steady her and it might very well be an opportunity to pick up where they’d left off last night. To step back into that ‘pre-kiss’ moment if she wanted to.

  She did want to. Very much. But, at the same time, it was making her nervous. Emma put the brakes on that forward movement unconsciously and, for a heartbeat, she stood completely still. She was now aware of the faint light coming from dormer windows in this highest level of the house. It was crowded with boxes and furniture and any amount of objects and it smelled musty and secretive. Even without kissing Max, it was still exciting because she’d never been in a real, storybook kind of attic before and they were here together and...and, well...

  It was fun. And how long was it since Emma had done anything just for the sheer enjoyment of it?

  ‘Look...there’s one.’ Max let go of Emma’s hand to open a box. ‘It’s the fake greenery,’ he exclaimed, moments later. ‘I remember that Mum used to wind it through the bannister posts on the main stairs. And this one...’ He pulled open another box. ‘It’s fairy lights. We need fairy lights on our tree, don’t we?’

  ‘Absolutely.’ Emma was reaching for another box on the stack. This one was full of objects wrapped in tissue paper. ‘Decorations,’ she exclaimed. ‘Oh, look...it’s fruit. Little silver and gold apples and pears. And red cherries.’

  ‘Don’t open them yet.’ Max caught her hand as she delved further into the box. ‘Let’s take them downstairs and the kids can help us.’

  The touch of his hand, yet again, was more than enough to stop Emma. Turning her head, she found she was just as close to Max as they’d been last night beside the Christmas tree when she had been sure they would have ended up kissing if Alice’s cry hadn’t interrupted the moment. There was no baby’s cry happening right now and they were possibly in the most secret part of this huge old house but, as Emma’s gaze locked with Max’s, she knew that they weren’t about to steal a kiss. It felt as if they were making a kind of silent pact in this moment. That this was about the children and they were equal partners on the same team. Which was pretty much the conclusion Emma had reached last night, however tempting it might be to explore this unexpected revival of a seemingly mutual attraction between herself and Max. And it would appear that Max had decided the same thing.

  She shouldn’t be disappointed, Emma told herself firmly. She wasn’t. Not really...

  If she told herself that often enough, maybe she would actually believe it.

  * * *

  Oh, man...

  He wanted to kiss Emma so much. Had she noticed that he couldn’t seem to stop himself touching her? She’d been perfectly capable of climbing those stairs or getting up into the attic all by herself and here he was, holding her hand again, under the pretext of stopping her unwrapping any more decorations.

  And the way she was looking at him. As if she wanted him to kiss her?

  Well, he couldn’t and that was all there was to it. Giving in to the temptation was the way the old Max would have responded. The one who was happy to play with any number of beautiful women. To love them and leave them and give himself a reputation that he was, finally, rather ashamed of. He had far more important responsibilities now and, besides, he respected Emma far too much to think that she might be happy to indulge in a casual affair.

  She seemed perfectly happy to play Christmas decorations with him, however. Together, they ferried box after box downstairs and, as Max had been hoping, Ben and Tilly were so excited about what was inside all the boxes that they were almost unrecognisable compared to the silent, scared children who’d been sitting on the couch in the drawing room only a few evenings ago.


  Maggie and her pregnant daughter Ruth were staying on to help—as curious as the children about what was being unearthed from decades of storage. Alice lay, still sleeping, in her pram near the couch as they spread out the boxes and opened them all.

  ‘Look at these cute bunches of bells.’ Ruth held up a trio of tiny golden bells, tied together with a loop of red ribbon.

  ‘They went on the doors,’ Max told her. ‘So they would jingle every time someone went in or out of a room. And that really big wreath? That’s for the front door.’

  ‘There are so many candles.’ Maggie had opened another box. ‘And what’s this? A tablecloth? And Christmas serviettes?’

  ‘I don’t think we’ll need them,’ Max said. ‘I’m not sure I’d know where to start making a Christmas dinner.’

  Maggie and her daughter shared a glance. ‘Perhaps we could help,’ she said. ‘It was only going to be me and Ruth at our house and we’ve got a turkey that’s far too big for just the two of us. We could come here and do dinner for everybody if you like.’

  ‘What do you think, Ben?’ Max asked. ‘Are there rules about Christmas dinner?’

  Ben nodded. ‘Pigs in blankets,’ he said. ‘And red jelly for pudding.’

  Maggie laughed. ‘I think we could manage that.’ She looked at Emma. ‘You’ll be here for dinner, I hope?’

  ‘It sounds great,’ Emma said. ‘I’m covering a night shift on Christmas Eve so I’ll definitely be back in time for dinner.’

  Max wound a long string of fairy lights all over the tree in the drawing room but told Ben and Tilly to stand back while he plugged them in and turned the switch on. ‘I’m not quite sure what’s going to happen,’ he told them. ‘These lights haven’t been used for a very long time.’