An Angel for Christmas

by Heather Graham

  “Yes, we’ve made it,” Gabe said, coming up so that he stood next to Luke DeFeo, and giving him a smile.

  “Not really, not yet,” DeFeo said.

  Then Bobby wasn’t really sure what happened. He didn’t know if DeFeo went after Gabe, or if Gabe went after DeFeo, or even if one of them had slipped on a patch of black ice, which knocked them over the embankment together.

  Either way, they were sliding away fast.

  “Hey!” he shouted to the others.

  Shayne, of course, had seen what had happened and was already racing up to Bobby; Bobby started down through the snow and brush for the men. They were still rolling, snapping branches and twigs off dead brush as they sped along. He began to run, leaping over obstacles, aware that Shayne was right behind him.

  “Hey, stop!” he yelled at the two men.

  They were fighting in desperate, awkward moves, since they both had their hands cuffed or tied. DeFeo got his arms around Gabe’s neck, and Bobby shouted again, seeing the man’s face begin to turn red. But Gabe was surprisingly agile and strong, throwing himself forward so that DeFeo was thrown over his head and sent into the brush again. When DeFeo would have risen and charged, he was stopped by the loud sound of a bullet blasting into the air.

  “Stop it! Now!” Morwenna, as fierce as a lioness, was standing up on the embankment, the shotgun in her hand. But even as she spoke, Gabe was at DeFeo’s side; he wasn’t attacking him. He was giving him a hand to get to his feet.

  As he neared the two of them, he heard them talking.

  “Great! Give me a hand, huh? Oh, how saintly of you,” DeFeo said.

  “You’ve got on borrowed togs,” Gabe said. “You want to be careful with them.”

  That sounded odd. Maybe he’d heard him wrong. Maybe he was just speaking lightly. But why get into a fight with a guy that might have killed one of them and worry about togs. Clothing?

  “Come on, you two,” Bobby said, determined to sound as fierce as his sister looked, standing on the embankment. “Let’s go. The tavern is just ahead.”

  To his amazement, they both listened to him. Gabe led the way. Luke DeFeo followed.

  “Still need the cops,” DeFeo murmured.

  Gabe ignored him. Bobby waited, following as the two men headed back up to the road.

  “What the hell was that?” Morwenna demanded when everyone reached the road.

  “Hey, we fell,” DeFeo said. He looked at Gabe.

  “But you, you…”

  “That’s the tavern, right in front of us?” he said.

  Morwenna looked at him. “That’s the tavern.”

  “They still have electricity. Maybe they’ll have internet service, or working phones,” Gabe said.

  “Maybe they will, and maybe they won’t,” DeFeo said. “You haven’t won anything yet, you know.”

  “Ah,” Gabe said, “but my glass is always half-full.”

  Morwenna could have kissed the ground when they finally walked into the tavern. Whether she was right or not, she didn’t know—but the responsibility for deciding which man was telling the truth had, at the least, been expanded. Once they walked through the door, she saw her parents’ old friend, Mac Scott, behind the bar.

  As long as she could remember, Mac had been behind the bar. He owned Scott’s, which was a small legend, in a way. To anyone who lived in the area, or visited the remote mountain area with any frequency, Mac Scott’s place was the place.

  It was the only place.

  Nestled in a little valley in the heights, it lay on the outskirts of what might optimistically be called a village. It was next to a shop that sold cold-weather gear and hiking and climbing equipment, and down and across the single street from the church, and across from the gas station–slash–convenience store that accommodated the area. A rangers’ station was down another level, and the little area served all those who kept homes, part-time or year-round, in the mid area of the Virginia Blue Ridge peaks.

  “Morwenna! Morwenna MacDougal!” Mac called from behind the bar. He was a big, tall man, a mountain man whose ancestors had been in the region for years.

  He still looked like a massive highlander.

  “Mac, hey,” she said.

  “Is the family with you?” Mac asked.

  “Right behind me.”

  “You’re early. What, did Stacy cook turkey for breakfast?” Mac asked.

  Stacy shook her head, hurrying over to the bar as the others filed in behind her. “Mac, we have a problem. Do you have a working phone, or internet—or any way to contact anyone? We had a stranger hurt out by us—”

  “Wow. Was Shayne there then? Thank God that boy is a doctor,” Mac said. He frowned, and she realized that he was looking over her shoulder and seeing Gabe and Luke DeFeo being ushered in—the one with his hands tied, and the other in cuffs.

  He looked back at Stacy, arching a black shaggy brow. “Shayne’s got some bedside manner,” he said quietly.

  “Very funny. The first guy, Gabe, the lighter-haired one, said that he was a cop, and he’d gone down in a skirmish with a con. The second guy came and said that he was the cop, and the first guy was the con, and we have no way of knowing who is telling the truth,” Morwenna explained. “Neither has ID.”

  “Well, hell,” Mac said.

  “You—that booth,” her father told Gabe. “And you, DeFeo—you in that booth over there.”

  Mac looked at Morwenna again. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  “Mac, does it look like I’m joking?” Morwenna asked.

  Genevieve ran over to join her at the bar, crawling up on a stood to smile at Mac and reach out for him. In Genevieve’s six-year-old world, she realized, nothing precluded a hug from an old friend.

  Mac reached over the bar, and Genevieve hugged him. Mac was her “big bear,” she always said.

  “Hey, there, little missy,” Mac said. “Merry Christmas.”

  Frowning, he looked at Morwenna.

  “So, can you help?” she asked.

  “Morwenna, I’m sorry—my cable has been out forever. I’ve still got electricity, and I was counting my blessings for that! But I can’t get anything on television except for the local channels. And I haven’t been able to call out on the bar phone or on my cell since yesterday morning. Once that snow started coming in yesterday, everything went wacko.”

  Morwenna frowned, looking toward the back booth. “Who else is here?” She craned her neck, trying to see who might be sitting in the high-backed booths.

  “The Williamsons and their two boys—do you know them? Brian Williamson’s folks owned his house, just like your mom’s folks owned your house on up the mountain,” Mac said. He was talking to Morwenna again, but looking over at the booths—and Mike MacDougal, with his shotgun.

  “Have they been stuck here?” Morwenna asked. “Snowbound, I mean?”

  “No,” Mac said. “They walked up, the same way you all came down.”

  As they spoke, of course, the Williamson family noted that there were newcomers at the tavern; Brian Williamson, plumber by day, banjo player upon occasion, rose and walked across the tavern to the booths, frowning as he saw Mike MacDougal with a shotgun.

  “Mike, Merry Christmas, and what the hell?” he demanded.

  Morwenna watched as her father went through the explanation. “You don’t happen to have a working phone on you, do you?” Mike asked Brian.

  “No, Mary and I were just talking about that—phones and internet, kaput! The boys were playing pool until a few minutes ago.” He looked from one stranger to the next as he spoke. He added firmly, “But you’ve done well to bring them down here. Now you’ve got Mac and me and the boys—they’re fifteen and seventeen—to make sure that neither of these fellows causes any mischief.”

  “I’m an officer,” Luke said, “an officer of the law, and if anyone in this place had any sense, you’d all realize it. If you help these people keep me incarcerated and that con gets away, I promise you that you’ll hav
e hell to pay as well!”

  Gabe lowered his head, shaking it, and then looked up at Brian Williamson, and across the pool table and the bar at Mac. “He’s a liar. And the MacDougal family knows that I’m not out to hurt any of them.”

  Mac leaned across the bar. “Who the hell knows which one of you is a liar? Mike, what can I get you to drink? Don’t you worry none. You have help around you now to keep an eye on those men.”

  Morwenna frowned, realizing that the TV was running.

  “Mac—you have television. So…how?”

  “Yeah, the cable is down, but I jimmied the old antenna. We’re getting some local stuff,” Mac said. “It comes and goes. Some static, some show. Well, now, you had a long walk down here in the cold. What can I get everyone?”

  “Hot chocolate!” Genevieve said, not in the least shy about asking her “big bear” for anything.

  “Yeah, sure, thanks,” Connor said.

  “I’d love a beer,” Mike said, still watching both men as he approached the bar.

  “Yeah,” Shayne said huskily.

  “Not me. I’ll have a nice Irish coffee,” Stacy said, approaching the bar as well.

  “Mac, do you have any turkey? My tummy is rumbling,” Genevieve said.

  “Mac, you’re getting a lot of orders here. If I may, I’ll come on back and help,” Morwenna told him.

  He was well equipped for the clientele he got during the winter season; he had a steamer that made hot chocolate, and it was easy to use. Morwenna figured all the kids were going to want hot chocolate, so she went ahead and made cups for the Williamson boys, too. When she set them on the counter, Bobby was there to take them out for her. Mac was pouring draft beers, and her father was seated on a bar stool then, watching the two men in the booths. Stacy sat by her husband, pulling her granddaughter onto her lap.

  “Think Mac does have turkey?” she asked hopefully.

  “Mac, got turkey?” Morwenna asked.

  “Yes, I got turkey,” Mac said. “And I’ll just get you situated with drinks, and go on back and get you some food, too,” he assured her.

  “What about them?” Morwenna asked, looking at her father and indicating the men in the booths. Brian Williamson and his wife, Mary, were watching the two strangers.

  “I could go for a beer,” Gabe said.

  “Give them both a beer. What the hell. Looks like we’re all in a fix here,” Mike said.

  Morwenna poured the drafts for their prisoners, and then walked around to the tables. She set one down in front of Luke DeFeo first, and then one in front of Gabe. As she did so, DeFeo said, “Look! The picture’s back on the television. Turn it up, please, someone. Maybe the news will come on and show that Gabe Lange is a wanted man.”

  He was right; the TV set suddenly went from static to a picture. They had just missed a news report, but the picture was suddenly clear, and an attractive young anchorwoman was seated at a desk with a similarly attractive young man.

  “Happy holidays to our viewers across the world,” the woman said.

  Morwenna found herself slipping in to sit at the booth across from Gabe, staring up at the screen.

  She was startled when Gabe’s hand fell on hers. “Remember what I told you before,” he said quietly.

  “What? Told me about what?”

  “About you,” he said. “You should never just settle. You should never spend your life living out someone else’s love, career or goals. The best is out there—the best of everything that will really make you happy. And you will find the way, and the right people in the world. Don’t become a hamster on a wheel.”

  She shook her head, irritated. There was actually something on the television, and she wanted to see the familiar sight of people far away moving across a big flat-screen television. It was sad to realize, but TV was a norm in the average life, even when one wasn’t exactly watching it.

  And maybe the powers that be would break in with a news bulletin!

  “People of all faiths and creeds now partake in our American holiday season, which, to everyone, becomes a time of spending their days in either family bonding—”

  “Or not!” the man at her side interrupted jokingly.

  His co-anchor laughed as she looked at him.

  “Yes, and some take off for exotic locations,” the woman said. “With that in mind, we’ve had our reporters around the globe bring us a short video on Christmas—around the globe!” she said.

  The screen flashed to a scene at the Vatican where throngs, in their Christmas best, stood in Saint Peter’s Square as the pope spoke. The anchorman narrated over the visual clips.

  “Isn’t it beautiful at the Vatican? For some, it’s the holiest of holy days! The scene is familiar at Westminster Abbey in London.” The scene switched to England; there was snow on the ground outside the abbey, and it looked like a postcard. Christmas lights fell upon gargoyles and angels, and Morwenna could almost hear Big Ben chiming in the background.

  “In areas of the South, we have a different kind of music going on,” the young anchorwoman said, and the television screen portrayed a church with far more simple decor; plain pews and a minister directing a choir; for a moment, the music was beautiful and a chorus sang gospel renditions of very old carols.

  “Now, it’s fun time, too,” the anchorwoman said, and they switched to a scene of a couple at a ski resort, the man laughing as the woman nearly fell, uneasy on her skis; she grabbed on to him, and they exchanged a long kiss.

  “And, if cold isn’t your thing, there are the beaches of Mexico!”

  Morwenna looked over at Gabe. His head was down, as if he knew what she was going to see before she saw it.

  He seemed to be concentrating.

  She frowned, and glanced back at the television.

  For a moment, static broke up the picture.

  Then the screen straightened.

  What was the size and population of Mexico? Morwenna wondered. The country was certainly fairly large, and the population was well over a hundred million. There must have been hundreds of thousands of tourists besides, and yet…

  There he was on the screen. Alex. Tall, hand some, perfect corporate-America Alex, tanned and well-muscled, looking like a cover model. He was running down the beach in bathing trunks, chasing after…

  Yes. Yes, it was Double-D Debbie Richards from Accounting.

  And the camera stayed focused on the pair as the sparkling water of the Gulf of Mexico flew up around them in a crystal spray, as Alex caught up with a laughing Debbie, encircled her waist with his arms and crashed with her into the surf.

  The screen changed as the newscasters brought their audience to Australia, and then onward to Jerusalem.

  Morwenna didn’t really see any more of the pictures dancing before her eyes.

  She felt Gabe’s hand on hers again. She met his eyes.

  “You’re not surprised,” he told her quietly. “And more than that, you’re not brokenhearted. You’ve known that you’ve been playing a role, and it came to you fairly easily. Morwenna, don’t let what you saw eat at you. You’re due to have much more in life. Much more that is real.”

  She heard his words; they were nice words. She still felt frozen, as she hadn’t once in all the fierce cold that had surrounded them in winter’s white chill.

  She was barely aware of Gabe’s hand on hers.

  No matter what he said, it hurt. Seeing Alex up there… She had just said goodbye to him yesterday morning.

  Bobby slid into the booth next to her. She was suddenly aware of the world around her again. She could see her mother, still entertaining Genevieve at the bar. Her father was sitting at the bar having a conversation with Brian and Mary Williamson while keeping an eagle eye on the two booths. Shayne had walked back to where Sam and Adam Williamson were playing an electronic game with Connor.

  “What’s the matter?” he asked her.

  “What?” she asked, looking at him.

  “You’ve turned white.” He stared at
Gabe, his eyes narrowing, as if he suspected that Gabe had said something that had disturbed his sister.

  Yes, that’s exactly what he thought.

  “What did you do?” he demanded of Gabe.

  Somehow, those fierce, protective words from her cheerful, guitar-playing baby brother brought a flush of warmth into her system again.

  “He didn’t do or say anything,” Morwenna said.

  “Then…are you sick? Are you all right?” He set the back of his hand on her forehead.

  “I’m fine,” she assured him.

  He glanced at the television.

  “Oh!” he said softly. “You’re wishing you were in Mexico.” He squeezed her arm. “I’m sorry, sis. I guess it’s hard to think that you could be lying out on the beach, or splashing in the water—instead of trying to figure out if we have a cop and thief or a cop and a homicidal murderer on our hands.”

  “I wasn’t after a murderer,” Gabe said quietly.

  “And I wasn’t wishing that I was anywhere else,” Morwenna said. She looked at her brother, and a smile came to her lips. “Really,” she said, and she realized it was the truth. In their day-to-day lives, her brothers were so far away. And they were busy. And it was easy to forget that while she worried about her brothers and their lives, she forgot sometimes just what they meant to her.

  And what she meant to them.

  “It’s okay. I’m okay, really. It was just the TV.”

  Bobby’s eyes widened suddenly as he stared at her.

  “Oh!” he said.

  “What?”

  “Mexico, oh, my God! We haven’t had a television, and we have it for two minutes…was that Alex on the screen? With that girl?”

  Double-D Debbie from Accounting.

  She didn’t say it out loud.

  “Oh, Wenna, I’m so sorry,” Bobby said.

  “It’s okay, really. It’s okay,” she said.

  He looked at Gabe. “You knew. How the hell did you know?”

  Before Gabe could answer, they were all startled by a different voice coming through the speakers. “We are interrupting your local programming for a news bulletin. Be on the lookout for—”