Jingle Bell Baby. Kate Little

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СКАЧАТЬ window Jessie could see the snow outside still falling.

      In an hour or two, Christmas would be here, Jessie thought. As she rocked Daisy and hummed a lullaby, she thought back to the Christmas-morning rituals of her childhood. No matter how early she woke up, Aunt Claire had always gotten up just a little before her and there was a big mug of hot cocoa and a slice of her aunt’s special cinnamon Christmas bread waiting at her place. And even though the bread and cocoa were delicious, Jessie couldn’t sit still at the table long enough to eat them. With her mug and dish in hand, she’d dash into the living room and start unwrapping her presents as Aunt Claire looked on.

      Jessie missed her aunt especially on the holiday. She could only dimly remember her parents, who died in a car accident when she was four years old. Claire, her father’s older sister, had taken her in.

      Claire had never married or had children of her own, and though she was well into middle age when Jessie arrived in her life, she was a wonderful, devoted parent. She had showered Jessie with love and had been there for her, to celebrate her successes and support her over the rough spots.

      Not that there had been all that many rough spots, Jessie conceded. She’d just hit one great big one, on Christmas Day five years ago; a major pothole on the road of life that had spun her life around like a crash car in a demolition derby.

      She was to marry Sam Kincaid, the boy she’d grown up with, the first boy she’d ever kissed, had ever flirted with, danced with, had ever made promises and plans with. But when the time had come for their marriage ceremony to begin, Jessie had waited at the church, dressed in her white satin gown, as her family and friends looked on. Even now she remembered thinking how lucky it was that the veil had been pulled over her face, concealing her distraught expression as she’d waited. And waited. And waited.

      Finally the minister had taken her aside. Some flowers had been delivered for her. He’d led her to his office and had given her the bouquet. A letter had been attached, from Sam. It’d been full of regrets and apologies. But still, Sam didn’t want to marry her. It wouldn’t be fair, he’d explained, since he had fallen in love with someone else. That someone else being a woman who was willing and even eager to make a life in the city—in Boston, or maybe even New York. While he knew that Jessie would never willingly leave Hope Springs.

      I am sorry for the pain I have caused you, Jessie, he’d written, but I know someday you will look back and see that it has all turned out for the best.

      Well, five years to the day had passed and still that elusive “someday” had not arrived. Jessie wondered if it ever would. Oh, she had quickly learned that there was indeed life after Sam. She’d picked up her skirts and plowed on, as Aunt Claire would say, and had never wasted a moment feeling sorry for herself.

      The time had passed. People finally stopped talking about her “disappointment.” Year to year, her life changed. Aunt Claire decided she’d had enough New England winters for one lifetime and had retired to Arizona. She left Jessie the café and enough money to buy her own home.

      In the past five years, Jessie had done her fair share of dating, yet she had never fallen in love again. Did you only get one chance for love and happiness? she sometimes wondered. Had her chance been used up on Sam Kincaid?

      Maybe she was waiting in vain for something that didn’t exist. Maybe she should just marry the next nice, acceptable man that came her way. Was there even such a thing as true love? She believed she had felt it for Sam and yet, their marriage had been so…expected. Expected by their parents and friends—by the whole town, actually. Thinking back, she couldn’t even recall if Sam had actually proposed to her. Had she and Sam really loved each other—or were the feelings they shared more a mixture of familiarity, friendship and adolescent hormones?

      Perhaps the only deep regret she had now about missing out on marriage was the fact that she wanted a baby—a baby just like sweet little Daisy, who was cuddled against her and not far from sleep.

      Jessie glanced at the presents under her tree that her aunt and friends had sent her. The best gift of all this Christmas was Daisy, she realized, looking down again at the bundle in her arms. Daisy had finally fallen asleep, her head nestled against Jessie’s breast. Jessie stared down at her in wonder. She knew now what it was to hold an angel in her arms.

      If only I could keep her, she thought. Keep her forever.

      Daisy shifted in her sleep and Jessie wondered if she should get up and settle Daisy comfortably in her basket. But then she decided not to risk waking her so soon after she’d fallen asleep. Jessie closed her tired eyes and kept rocking.

      

      Thump. Thump. Thump.

      Jessie opened her eyes. Someone was banging on the door. She started to get up and her sleep-muddled mind wondered for a second why she had fallen asleep in the rocker. Her body ached—especially her arms—and she realized in a flash that the strange weight in her arms was a sleeping baby.

      Jessie’s eyes fully opened and it all came back to her. She had fallen asleep in the rocker with Daisy. She wondered what time it was. The living room was dark, but not nighttime dark. She glanced out the window and realized that the snow was still falling.

      The thumping had stopped for a moment, but now started again in earnest. Daisy was squirming, but not quite awake. Jessie got up from the chair with the sleepy baby cuddled against her shoulder.

      Jessie trudged to the door and pulled it open. She felt a knot instantly clench up in her stomach.

      “Looks like I woke you,” Clint Bradshaw greeted her.

      She hadn’t been able to guess who was banging on her door. But he was the last person she’d expected to see. Was he here to take Daisy after all? So early?

      “I guess you did.” Jessie lifted a hand to her sleeptousled hair. She couldn’t imagine what she looked like. She didn’t want to know. “We—uh, had a late night,” she said. She pulled the door open wider and stepped aside. He came inside, his big body instantly filling up the small foyer and creating an uncomfortable sense of intimacy between them.

      He stared down at her. “How’s the baby?”

      “Oh, she’s fine.” Jessie looked at the drowsy baby, then back up at Clint. “Still a little sleepy, I guess.”

      “Did she cry much last night?”

      “A little,” Jessie replied. “I guess she missed her mother.”

      Jessie could now recall falling asleep with Daisy in the chair the first time. Daisy waking, getting fed and changed and having another crying spell a few hours after that and Jessie ending up right back in the chair with her sometime right before dawn, only to fall asleep again.

      “Yes, I guess so,” he answered, nodding.

      Enough of the small talk, Sheriff, she wanted to say. It’s really not your style anyway.

      “Have you come to take her?” Jessie forced herself to ask him.

      He removed his hat and gloves. His expression showed no emotion. “Tired of her already?”

      “No—no, not at all. She’s not a bit of trouble,” Jessie protested, some part of her mind registering that in some sense, her words weren’t entirely true. The baby had been heaps of trouble and had kept her running all night long. But she wouldn’t СКАЧАТЬ