Christmas in Hawthorn Bay. Kathleen O'Brien

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СКАЧАТЬ one hand on the wet sand. “Is it true? Is the baby coming?”

      He nodded. “She’s already seven centimeters.” He gazed down at Maggie. “You must have been having contractions all morning, you little fool.”

      Maggie shifted her head on the beach towel, grimacing. “Just twinges. Braxton-Hicks, I thought.”

      Nora knew what that meant. When she’d agreed to stay in Maine with Maggie until the baby was born, she’d agreed to be her labor coach. Braxton-Hicks. False labour. Not uncommon in the weeks prior to delivery.

      Maggie looked at Nora, as if she needed absolution for the sin of such dangerous foolishness. “Honestly, I didn’t think— Everyone says it takes so long the first time—”

      “Well, it’s not going to take long for you.” Ethan sounded tense. “We have to get you back on the boat. Even if the baby is born there, we have to do it.”

      Nora twitched her brows together, silently asking the question. Why? Why did they have to take such a risk? Surely it was safer here, where they at least had solid ground under their feet. Why go?

      For answer, Ethan simply held up his hand. It was covered in blood, from fingertip to wrist, like a red rubber glove.

      Nora felt the beach tilt. She thought for a minute she might pass out. It wasn’t just the baby coming early, then. Maggie was in real trouble. She was losing too much blood.

      Maggie must have seen Ethan’s hand, too, though they both thought her eyes had been closed. Her whole body clenched, and then once again she reached for Nora’s fingers.

      “Nora. Listen to me. If anything happens, I want you to take the baby.”

      Nora pulled back instinctively, as if the words had burned her. Her heart was beating triple time, and her flesh felt cold.

      “Don’t talk like that, Megs,” she said. She forced a teasing note into her voice. “It’s absurd. I know you love melodrama, but this isn’t the time. You need to focus on your breathing.”

      “Not yet.” Maggie’s gaze bore into hers. “If it’s absurd, we’ll all have a good laugh about it later. But just in case. I want you to promise me that you’ll take the baby.”

      Ethan was wrapping the towels around her. He must have done something that hurt. Maggie cried out, and her legs stiffened.

      “I’m sorry,” he whispered. Nora saw a bead of sweat make its way down his hairline and mingle with a smear of blood on his cheek.

      “Promise me, Nora.”

      “Okay,” Nora said as she began to shiver. “Okay, Maggie, I promise. Now please. Focus.”

      “And you must never let my parents know. About Colin. They can’t have him. My father—”

      Maggie bent over again, making a sound like a small animal.

      Ethan cleared his throat. “Nora, you have to help me carry her.”

      When had Ethan stood up? Nora felt confused. This was a nightmare, where things happened in confusing, nonsequential jerks. But she had her part to play in the nightmare, too, so she struggled to her feet, though she no could longer feel them or trust that they were rigid enough to carry her own weight, let alone a bleeding woman and an unborn baby.

      Maggie was so light, though, frighteningly light, as if part of her had bled away into the beach. They tried not to jostle her, but once or twice she seemed to pass out, then come back to consciousness with a groan.

      Ethan cradled her in his arms while Nora made a pallet out of blood-soaked beach towels on the floor of the cockpit. As they placed her on it, Maggie seemed to rally a little. With one hand that, though it shook, seemed surprisingly strong, she pulled off the chain that held the mysterious gold ring.

      She held it out to Nora.

      “For you,” she said. Her voice seemed slurred. “For Colin.”

      Nora took it, and her first tear fell.

      Colin Trenwith.

      Once a pirate, twice a father, now at rest with his Lord.

      While Ethan towed the boat out to deeper water, Nora chanted the epitaph silently, over and over, like a prayer.

      And then, with the words still circling through her mind, like a slender chain wrapping its fractured pieces together, Nora watched Ethan climb into the little boat, and the three of them set sail for home.

       CHAPTER TWO

      Eleven years later

      MOTHERHOOD, NORA CARSON decided as she retreated to the kitchen, leaving her eleven-year-old son pouting in the living room, was not for the faint of heart.

      Nora had three jobs—mayor of Hawthorn Bay, co-owner of Heron Hill Preserves and mom to Colin Trenwith Carson.

      Of the three, being Colin’s mom was by far the toughest.

      At least it was this week. Last week, when the Hawthorn Bay City Council had been sued by a recently fired male secretary claiming sexual discrimination, mayor had been at the top of Nora’s tough list.

      Luckily, Nora had kept some of the secretary’s letters, all of which began Deer Sir. She produced them at her deposition, explaining that she didn’t give a hoot whether their secretaries were male, female or Martian, as long as they could spell.

      The lawyers withdrew the suit the next day.

      Now if only she could make this problem with Colin go away as easily. But she had a sinking feeling that it was going to prove much thornier.

      She put the blackberries and pectin on to boil—she had orders piled up through next Easter, so she couldn’t afford a full day off. She read the letter from Colin’s teacher while she stirred.

      Cheating.

      Fighting.

      Completely unrepentant.

      These weren’t words she ordinarily heard in connection with Colin. He wasn’t perfect, not by a long shot. He was a mischievous rascal and too smart for his own good. But he wasn’t bad.

      This time, though—

      “Nora, thank heaven you’re home!” Stacy Holtsinger knocked on the back door and opened it at the same time. She was practically family, after eight years as business partner and best friend, and she didn’t bother with ceremony much anymore.

      Nora folded the letter and slid it into the pocket of the World’s Greatest Mom apron Colin had given her for her birthday. “Where else would I be, with all these orders to fill? Out dancing?”

      Stacy, a tall brunette with a chunky pair of tortoiseshell glasses that she alternately used as a headband, a pointer or a chew toy, but never as glasses, went straight to the refrigerator and got herself a bottled water. She wanted to lose ten pounds by Christmas and was convinced she could flood them out on a tidal wave of H₂O.

      Nora СКАЧАТЬ