A Husband In Her Stocking. Christine Pacheco

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ her.

      He was merely passing through town, not intending to stay. His life lay elsewhere, much as he hated that fact. So far his search for answers had revealed only one thing—you were who you were.

      No escape.

      Exerting the iron control for which he was famous, he tamped down the flare of wanting and picked up the ladle.

      “Don’t scoop any from the bottom.”

      He paused.

      “The bottom part is burned.” She gave a little shrug. “I got carried away with my work. Forgot about dinner.”

      Judging by her size, she forgot often. She needed a keeper, Kyle realized. But he couldn’t fill that role.

      He envied the man who would.

      Taking stew from the pan, he filled her bowl, then his.

      She met his eyes, and for a few seconds, silence shrouded the empty house. Did she feel it, too, this tug that was as undeniable as it was real?

      And what the hell were they supposed to do?

      She raised a spoon to her lips and sipped. Kyle’s gut tightened. Desperate to distract himself, he followed suit. He allowed that first bite to linger, enjoying the flavor. Realizing he was close to a sigh, he swallowed. “My grandmother used to make stew like this.”

      Wistful sadness dropped her tone. “I never knew my grandmother.”

      “I’m sorry,” he said sincerely. His grandmother had been the single bright spot in a bleak childhood. He didn’t remember his mother—he was too young when she died. His father had thrown himself into building the business Kyle’s grandfather had started. Precious little time had been left over for either Kyle or his older sister, Pamela.

      Yet Grandma Aggie had tried to fill all the voids. She’d given them birthdays and holidays, given them love and hope.

      Meghan broke off a piece of her bread, then fed it to a vigilant Snowflake.

      Kyle had a sudden insight into his own lonely life-style. No one cared if he came home at night. No one noticed.

      It didn’t matter. Never had. Maybe never would.

      Ruthlessly shoving aside the sober feelings, Kyle said, “This is a fabulous farmhouse.” His skilled eye had noted the solid construction, along with the repairs the house cried out for.

      Yet there was something else... He drummed his fingers on the table. Something bothered him about the farmhouse, as if it were lacking a detail just beyond the obvious. Try as he might, Kyle couldn’t put his finger on the missing element.

      “I fell in love with the house the first time I saw it.”

      “How long have you been here?”

      She set down her spoon. He’d done it again, pushed past the impersonal to the personal. He stopped his motions and waited for her response. When he’d given up, convinced she’d change the subject, she said, “Three years.”

      “You’ve lived out here all alone for three years?”

      “Well, not alone, I have Snowflake—”

      “And a shotgun,” he added.

      That brought a slight smile. He relished the victory. “Do you ever get lonely, Meghan?”

      “I enjoy my own company,” she hedged.

      Why did it matter to him, anyway? In less than a day, he would climb on the back of the Beast and continue home to Chicago. Meghan would be a comfortable memory, one that would fade once the routine set back in.

      A lie.

      He’d told himself a lie. Meghan Carroll wasn’t a woman easily forgotten.

      After dinner, while she straightened up, he washed the dishes, as promised. Suds foamed everywhere, since he didn’t have a clue how long he should have squirted the liquid under the running water. To her credit, she didn’t say a word.

      “Shall we finish our coffee in the living room?” she offered.

      Grateful for an excuse to exit the kitchen before she assigned him another task he wasn’t up to, he agreed. While he attempted to wash the white bubbles down the drain, she topped their coffee.

      He thought he caught a mischievous glint in her eyes but, since she didn’t say anything, dismissed it as a trick of the lighting.

      Snowflake curled up on a rug, and Meghan took the high-backed chair near the crackling fireplace. Kyle tossed another piece of wood on the fire, poked at the still-burning log, then closed the safety grate.

      He stood, looking at the blowing snow through the ice-encrusted window. Wind whipped flakes against the pane, making him shiver. Yet a cozy fire licked at dried timber. Outside was frightful, but inside, was so...

      That’s when he realized it.

      What was missing.

      Christmas.

      No sign of Christmas—not a single one—existed anywhere in the old farmhouse.

      By this time of year, only four days before Christmas, his grandmother would have pestered Granddad into cutting a tree. Evergreen arrangements would adorn each end table, and garlands would hang from every possible place.

      Pinecones would dangle from the mantel, tied together with red velvet. Presents, wrapped in every color imaginable, would have been artfully placed beneath the tree’s bottom branches, at least two packages bearing tags lettered with Kyle’s name.

      Even though Grandma Aggie had passed away, Christmas still meant a lot to him. It meant a chance to be with Pam, Mark and their kids, and its absence here felt completely wrong.

      Tucking a hand in a front pocket of his jeans, he turned back to face her. “Meghan?”

      She looked at him over the rim of the coffee cup, steam rising to bathe her face. Although she didn’t say anything, hazel eyes questioned him.

      “You don’t have a Christmas tree.”

      The fireplace crackled. Snowflake lifted a paw and placed it across his head.

      Softly, she said, “I don’t see the point anymore.”

      “Don’t see...?”

      She raised her shoulders defensively. “I live out here alone.”

      Even his empty apartment had an artificial tree, which the housekeeper had dragged from a box after Thanksgiving. “So?”

      “Christmas is just another day.”

      “Is it?” he asked. “What about the meaning of Christmas—family, caring, sharing?”

      “What about it, Kyle?” She placed her coffee cup on a coaster СКАЧАТЬ