Holiday Wishes (19 page)

“It doesn’t work like that, pal. People aren’t broken toys or old houses. Santa didn’t send her, she moved here for a job.”

“He did too send her.” With surprising dignity, Zack pushed off his father’s lap. “Maybe you don’t want her, but we do.”

His sons walked up the stairs, a united front that closed him out. Mac was left with emptiness in the pit of his stomach and the smell of burned cocoa.

Chapter 10

She should get out of town for a few days, Nell thought. Go somewhere. Go anywhere. There was nothing more pathetic than sitting alone on Christmas Eve and watching other people bustle along the street outside your window.

She’d turned down every holiday party invitation, made excuses that sounded hollow even to her. She was brooding, she admitted, and it was entirely unlike her. But then again, she’d never had a broken heart to nurse before.

With Bob it had been wounded pride. And that had healed itself with embarrassing speed.

Now she was left with bleeding emotions at the time of year when love was most important.

She missed him. Oh, she hated to know that she missed him. That slow, hesitant smile, the quiet voice, the gentleness of him. In New York, at least, she could have lost herself in the crowds, in the rush. But here, everywhere she looked was another reminder.

Go somewhere, Nell. Just get in the car and drive.

She ached to see the children. Wondered if they’d taken their sleds out in the fresh snow that had fallen yesterday. Were they counting the hours until Christmas, plotting to stay awake until they heard reindeer on the roof?

She had presents for them, wrapped and under her tree. She’d send them via Kim or Mira, she thought, and was miserable all over again because she wouldn’t see their faces as they tore off the wrappings.

They’re not your children, she reminded herself. On that point Mac had always been clear. Sharing himself had been difficult enough. Sharing his children had stopped him dead.

She would go away, she decided, and forced herself to move. She would pack a bag, toss it in the car and drive until she felt like stopping. She’d take a couple of days. Hell, she’d take a week. She couldn’t bear to stay here alone through the holidays.

For the next ten minutes, she tossed things into a suitcase without any plan or sense of order. Now that the decision was made, she only wanted to move quickly. She closed the lid on the suitcase, carried it into the living room and started for her coat.

The knock on her door had her clenching her teeth. If one more well-meaning neighbor stopped by to wish her Merry Christmas and invite her to dinner, she was going to scream.

She opened the door and felt the fresh wound stab through her. “Well, Macauley . . . Out wishing your tenants happy holidays?”

“Can I come in?”

“Why?”

“Nell.” There was a wealth of patience in the word. “Please, let me come in.”

“Fine, you own the place.” She turned her back on him. “Sorry, I haven’t any wassail, and I’m very low on good cheer.”

“I need to talk to you.” He’d been trying to find the right way and the right words for days.

“Really? Excuse me if I don’t welcome it. The last time you needed to talk to me is still firmly etched in my mind.”

“I didn’t mean to make you cry.”

“I cry easily. You should see me after a greeting-card commercial on TV.” She couldn’t keep up the snide comments, and she gave in, asking the question that was uppermost in her mind. “How are the kids?”

“Barely speaking to me.” At her blank look, he gestured toward the couch. “Will you sit down? This is kind of a complicated story.”

“I’ll stand. I don’t have a lot of time, actually. I was just leaving.”

His gaze followed hers and landed on the suitcase. His mouth tightened. “Well, it didn’t take long.”

“What didn’t?”

“I guess you took them up on that offer to teach back in New York.”

“Word does travel. No, I didn’t take them up. I like my job here, I like the people here, and I intend to stay. I’m just going on a holiday.”

“You’re going on a holiday at five o’clock on Christmas Eve?”

“I can come and go as I please. No, don’t take off your coat,” she snapped. Tears were threatening. “Just say your piece and get out. I still pay the rent here. On second thought, just leave now. Damn it, you’re not going to make me cry again.”

“The boys think Santa sent you.”

“Excuse me?”

As the first tear spilled over, he moved to her, brushed it away with his thumb. “Don’t cry, Nell. I hate knowing I made you cry.”

“Don’t touch me.” She whirled away and fumbled a tissue out of the box.

He was discovering exactly how it felt to be sliced in two. “I’m sorry.” Slowly he lowered his hand to his side. “I know how you must feel about me now.”

“You don’t know the half of it.” She blew her nose, struggled for control. “What’s this about the boys and Santa?”

“They wrote a letter back in the fall, not long before they met you. They decided they wanted a mom for Christmas. Not
a
mom,” Mac explained as she turned back to stare at him. “
The
mom. They keep correcting me on that one. They had pretty specific ideas about what they wanted. She was supposed to have yellow hair and smile a lot, like kids and dogs and bake cookies. They wanted bikes, too, but that was sort of an afterthought. All they really wanted was the mom.”

“Oh.” She did sit now, lowering herself onto the arm of the sofa. “That explains a couple of things.” Steadying herself, she looked back at him. “Put you in quite a spot, didn’t it? I know you love them, Mac, but starting a relationship with me to try to please your children takes things beyond parental devotion.”

“I didn’t know. Damn it, do you think I’d play with their feelings, or yours, that way?”

“Not theirs,” she said hollowly. “Certainly not theirs.” He remembered how delicate she had seemed when they made love. There was more fragility now. No roses in her cheeks, he saw with a pang of distress. No light in her eyes. “I know what it’s like to be hurt, Nell. I never would have hurt you deliberately. They didn’t tell me about the letter until the night . . . You weren’t the only one I made cry that night. I tried to explain that Santa doesn’t work that way, but they’ve got it fixed in their heads that he sent you.”

“I’ll talk to them if you want me to.”

“I don’t deserve—”

“Not for you,” she said. “For them.”

He nodded, accepting. “I wondered how it would make you feel to know they wished for you.”

“Don’t push me, Mac.”

He couldn’t help it, and he kept his eyes on hers as he moved closer. “They wished for you for me, too. That’s why they didn’t tell me. You were our Christmas present.” He reached down, touched her hair. “How does that make you feel?”

“How do you think I feel?” She batted his hand away and rose to face the window. “It hurts. I fell in love with the three of you almost from the first glance, and it hurts. Go away, leave me alone.”

Somehow a fist had crept into his chest and was squeezing at his heart. “I thought you’d go away. I thought you’d leave, us alone. I wouldn’t let myself believe you cared enough to stay.”

“Then you were an idiot,” she mumbled.

“I was clumsy.” He watched the tiny lights on her tree shining in her hair and gave up any thought of saving himself. “All right, I was an idiot. The worst kind, because I kept hiding from what you might feel, from what I felt. I didn’t fall in love with you right away. At least I didn’t know it. Not until the night of the concert. I wanted to tell you. I didn’t know how to tell you. Then I heard something about the New York offer and it was the perfect excuse to push you out. I thought I was protecting the kids from getting hurt.” No, he wouldn’t use them, he thought in disgust. Not even to get her back. “That was only part of it. I was protecting myself. I couldn’t control the way I felt about you. It scared me.”

“Now’s no different from then, Mac.”

“It could be different.” He took a chance and laid his hands on her shoulders, turned her to face him. “It took my own sons to show me that sometimes you’ve just got to wish. Don’t leave me, Nell. Don’t leave us.”

“I was never going anywhere.”

“Forgive me.” She started to turn her head away, but he cupped her cheek, held it gently. “Please. Maybe I can’t fix this, but give me a chance to try. I need you in my life. We need you.”

There was such patience in his voice, such quiet strength in the hand on her face. Even as she looked at him, her heart began to heal. “I love you. All of you. I can’t help it.”

Relief and gratitude flavored the kiss as he touched his lips to hers. “I love you. I don’t want to help it.” Drawing her close, he cradled her head on his shoulder. “It’s just been the three of us for so long, I didn’t know how to make room. I think I’m figuring it out.” He eased her away again and reached into his coat pocket. “I bought you a present.”

“Mac.” Still staggered from the roller-coaster emotions, she rubbed her hands over her damp cheeks. “It isn’t Christmas yet.”

“Close enough. I think if you’d open it now, I’d stop having all this tightness in my chest.”

“All right.” She dashed another tear aside. “We’ll consider it a peace offering, then. I may even decide to . . .” She trailed off when the box was open in her hand. A ring, the traditional single diamond crowning a gold band.

“Marry me, Nell,” he said quietly. “Be the mom.”

She raised dazzled eyes to his. “You move awfully quickly for someone who always seems to take his time.”

“Christmas Eve.” He watched her face as he took the ring out of the box. “It seemed like the night to push my luck.”

“It was a good choice.” Smiling, she held out her hand. “A very good choice.” When the ring was on her finger, she lifted her hand to his cheek. “When?”

He should have known it would be simple. With her, it would always be simple. “New Year’s Eve’s only a week away. It would be a good start to a new year. A new life.”

“Yes.”

“Will you come home with me tonight? I left the kids at Mira’s. We could pick them up, and you’d spend Christmas where you belong.” Before she could answer, he smiled and kissed her hand. “You’re already packed.”

“So I am. It must be magic.”

“I’m beginning to believe it.” He framed her face with his hands, lowered his mouth for a long, lingering kiss. “Maybe I didn’t wish for you, but you’re all I want for Christmas, Nell.”

He rubbed his cheek over her hair, looked out at the colored lights gleaming on the houses below. “Did you hear something?” he murmured.

“Mmm . . .” She held him close, smiled. “Sleigh bells.”

Keep reading for a special excerpt from the newest novel by J.D. Robb

CALCULATED IN DEATH

Available February 2013 in hardcover from G.P. Putnam’s Sons

A killer wind hurled bitter November air, toothy little knives to gnaw at the bones. She’d forgotten her gloves, but that was just as well as she’d have ruined yet another overpriced pair once she’d sealed up.

For now, Lieutenant Eve Dallas stuck her frozen hands in the warm pockets of her coat and looked down at death.

The woman lay at the bottom of the short stairway leading down to what appeared to be a lower-level apartment. From the angle of the head, Eve didn’t need the medical examiner to tell her the neck was broken.

Eve judged her as middle forties. Not wearing a coat, Eve mused, though the vicious wind wouldn’t trouble her now. Dressed for business—suit jacket, turtleneck, pants, good boots with low heels. Probably fashionable, but Eve would leave that call to her partner when Detective Peabody arrived on scene.

No jewelry, at least not visible. Not even a wrist unit.

No handbag, no briefcase or file bag.

No litter, no graffiti in the stairwell. Nothing but the body, slumped against the wall.

At length she turned to the uniformed officer who’d responded to the 911. “What’s the story?”

“The call came in at two-twelve. My partner and I were only two blocks away, hitting a twenty-four/seven. We arrived at two-fourteen. The owner of the unit, Bradley Whitestone, and an Alva Moonie were on the sidewalk. Whitestone stated they hadn’t entered the unit, which is being rehabbed—and is unoccupied. They found the body when he brought Moonie to see the apartment.”

“At two in the morning.”

“Yes, sir. They stated they’d been out this evening, dinner, then a bar. They’d had a few, Lieutenant.”

“Okay.”

“My partner has them in the car.”

“I’ll talk to them later.”

“We determined the victim was deceased. No ID on her. No bag, no jewelry, no coat. Pretty clear her neck’s broken. Visually, there’s some other marks on her—bruised cheek, split lip. Looks like a mugging gone south. But . . .” The uniform flushed slightly. “It doesn’t feel like it.”

Interested, Eve gave a go-ahead nod. “Because?”

“It sure wasn’t a snatch and run, figuring the coat. That takes a little time. And if she fell or got pushed down the stairs, why is she over against the side there instead of at the bottom of the steps? Out of sight from the sidewalk. It feels more like a dump. Sir.”

“Are you angling for a slot in Homicide, Officer Turney?”

“No disrespect intended, Lieutenant.”

“None taken. She could’ve taken a bad fall down the steps, landed wrong, broke her neck. Mugger goes down after her, hauls her over out of sight, takes the coat, and the rest.”

“Yes, sir.”

“It doesn’t feel like it. But we need more than how it feels. Stand by, Officer. Detective Peabody’s on route.” As she spoke, Eve opened her field kit, took out her Seal-It.

She coated her hands, her boots as she surveyed the area.

This sector of New York’s East Side held quiet—at least at this hour. Most apartment windows and storefronts were dark, businesses closed, even the bars. There would be some after-hours establishments still rolling, but not close enough for witnesses.

They’d do a canvass, but odds were slim someone would pop out who’d seen what happened here. Add in the bitter cold, as 2060 seemed determined to go out clinging with its icy fingers, and most people would be tucked up inside, in the warm.