would understand if she needed to spend more time with her dying sister.
“It’s not fair,” Brody said, battling tears. “Christmas is Mama’s favorite holiday.”
Caleb’s throat seized. He understood the kid’s pain, felt it deep in his own soul. He had to blink several times to keep memories of another Christmas at bay, his mother’s last. “I’m sorry to hear she’s growing worse.”
The boy kicked at the snow, sending white puffs circling around his foot. “Aunt Betsy is sitting with her now, reading to her.”
“Tell me about the mouse.”
The kid shrugged. “I thought it would make everyone laugh. I didn’t mean to scare the girls or Miss Kate.”
“But you did.”
“I know and I’m really sorry.”
Caleb’s throat seized again, painfully. Brody didn’t have a lot of family. He had only his mother and his aunt Betsy, who worked as Caleb’s housekeeper during the day and was due to marry Reverend Wainwright in a month. What would happen to the boy when his mother died? Surely, his aunt and her new husband would take him in.
But what if they didn’t?
“Is Miss Ellie going to kick me out of the play?”
Like most boys his age, Brody was concerned with the immediate future, not months down the road. “Not my call. You’ll have to ask her.”
“But I’m playing Joseph.”
“Then you better get back inside and speak with Miss Ellie.”
“Yes, sir.” Shoulders squared, Brody hurried up the steps.
Caleb ambled into the building behind him. Graciousness itself, Ellie welcomed the boy with a smile and a clasp on his shoulder. She whispered something to him that made him laugh. The boy nodded vigorously before rejoining his group.
Ellie’s mother had been equally kind to Caleb during his darkest days. For one brief moment, he let the memories come, let them remind him why he was so determined to establish a stable home for his daughters.
Left to raise themselves, Caleb and his brothers gained a well-deserved reputation as wild and out of control, primarily due to the flagrant lack of adult supervision.
Thanks to his friendship with Everett, Caleb soon began spending more time at the Wainwrights’ house than his own. He’d seen firsthand the difference a loving mother brought to a household. She brought a gentleness of spirit and a warmth that no single man could ever hope to achieve on his own.
Now, with his mind poised somewhere between past and present, he watched Ellie sit on the ground and the twins lean in against her, snuggling close.
He felt it again, the ping, followed by a surge of longing for something so far out of reach he couldn’t put a name to it. He waited a beat, struggling with an onslaught of emotion and possibilities. Suddenly, the future became a clear, distinct picture in his mind.
Caleb knew what he had to do. If all went as planned, his family would be complete by Christmas.
After the pandemonium over the mouse incident died down and order was once again restored, the rest of play practice went smoothly.
Ellie would like to think the children’s obedience was due solely to her skills as a teacher, but she knew better. Caleb’s watchful presence from the back of the church was a powerful inducement for good behavior, as was the glint of his nickel-plated badge.
Despite her best efforts to ignore him, Ellie’s gaze continually wandered to where Caleb stood with his shoulder propped against the back wall. Each time she glanced in his direction, her breath caught in her throat. He looked so handsome, so impressive bathed in the afternoon sunlight that streamed in from the long skinny window on his left.
Each time their eyes met, the muscles in her stomach tightened and Ellie had to force herself to remain calm, to act normal, nonchalant.
A nearly impossible feat.
She was far too aware of Caleb in every fiber of her being, aware of his strength, of his reliable masculinity. It would be all too easy to imagine him as her husband, all too easy to dream of evenings sitting by a toasty fire with their children, the twins plus at least three more. And—
Stop right there, warned her better judgment.
She could not—would not—allow herself to view Caleb in any role other than friend, not even in the privacy of her own mind.
She forced her gaze back to the children in her group and caught two of them poking at one another. Shoving would soon follow. Were they the only ones growing antsy? Ellie took a fast assessment of the entire room and immediately noted the telltale signs of boredom in shifting feet, wandering gazes and general inattentiveness.
With the idea of preempting the inevitable, she called an end to rehearsal. “We’ll pick up where we left off next Monday afternoon, same place, same time.”
A mass rush to gather coats and gloves accompanied this announcement. Goodbyes were tossed between the children. Feet pounded toward the exit. Soon, the only people left in the church besides Ellie were Kate, Brody, Caleb and his daughters.
After a none-too-subtle nudge from Caleb, Brody apologized once again to Ellie and Kate. “I’m sorry for bringing a dead mouse into the church.”
Although Ellie had already forgiven the boy, she did so again.
Kate wasn’t so quick to excuse Brody’s behavior. “Your shenanigans certainly got my blood pumping, and I don’t mean that in a good way.”
Brody sheepishly repeated his apology, then added, “I didn’t mean to scare you, Miss Kate.”
“Apology accepted. However,” she said, ruffling the boy’s hair with a little more force than necessary, “you will leave all rodents and other critters outside where they belong. Are we clear on this?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
The incident now settled between them, the boy gallantly offered to walk Kate back to her shop and she graciously accepted.
Then there were four.
Hannah and Grace crowded around Ellie, asking if she needed someone to walk her home, too, and maybe they could do it, with their father’s assistance, of course.
Ellie’s first response was a rush of longing, the kind of achy wistfulness she didn’t dare allow to take hold.
She was already dangerously enamored with Caleb’s daughters. More time spent in their company would only make it harder to watch another woman eventually become their mother.
“While I certainly appreciate the offer, there’s no need. I live right next door.”
“Nevertheless,” Caleb interjected before his daughters could respond. “The girls and I would very much like to escort you home.”
Something about the set of his shoulders, the look in his eyes—a sort of decisiveness she didn’t know quite how to interpret—made Ellie’s blood vibrate with nerves. “But my house is out of your way.”
“Not that far.”
He was right, of course. Caleb and his daughters lived on the other side of the street, barely a half block to the north. Ellie could see his front door from her father’s porch. She really had no reason to resist the kind offer.
Yet, resist she did.
Her inner conflict was so intense, so tangled with tempered hope, that heat surged into her face.
“It’s settled,” Caleb declared, taking advantage of her silence. “While you gather