A Tale of Two Christmas Letters

by Cathy Gillen Thacker

  That was it. The last straw. Doing what he had wanted to do from the first moment he had laid eyes on her this evening, he wrapped his arms around her and brought her close enough to feel the wild beating of her heart.

  “Damn it, Bess. Don’t you get it?” he growled, finally losing all patience. “Pity is the last thing I’m feeling.” Bending down, his lips hovering right above hers, he admitted softly, “Regret maybe, for waiting this long...”

  And he wasn’t waiting any longer. He fused his lips to hers, knowing she was everything he could ever want in a woman, and in that instant, he felt their desire for each other confirmed in an undeniably electric way. Though he hadn’t meant to do anything other than prove his point, as he heard her first gasp of surprise that swiftly turned into a soft moan of surrender, he knew this kiss...their friendship...was going somewhere. Somewhere good.

  * * *

  Bess had known it was a mistake to throw down the gauntlet with Jack, just as it had been a mistake to let him come in when she was already so overwrought. She should be concentrating on what she needed and had always wanted—a husband and family of her own—instead of succumbing to the pent-up lust she’d been feeling for quite some time.

  But she couldn’t help it. There was just something so dangerously exciting about Jack’s kiss. She reveled in the hard demand of his mouth on hers, the masterful way he held her. She had never been kissed like this, with such fierce possessiveness. Had never felt such need or want welling up inside her. He was so sexy. So masculine. So deliberate and determined. And she knew if she let him continue kissing her, she would have to admit that she had always had a thing for him.

  And if she did that, they’d likely end up making love. Which would be fine, more than fine actually, if he could ever really care about her, the way she knew she had the potential to care about him. Unfortunately, there was only room in Jack’s heart for one woman: his late wife.

  With effort, she broke off the kiss and pushed him away.

  He stepped back.

  She was breathing hard, tingling all over and perversely longing for more. So much more. And that could not happen.

  Forcing herself to be realistic, she said, “That was a mistake.”

  A complex array of emotions crossed his handsome face. “Bess...”

  Her heart in turmoil, she stalked to the door and opened it wide. “You really have to go. Now, Jack.”

  He gave her a long, measuring look. Then, with a curt nod, he did as she asked.

  Chapter Four

  The last person Bess expected to see on her doorstep the following day was Jack with a tray of pastries and two coffees in hand. Wishing she had done more than wash her face and brush her teeth and put on her painting clothes, which this morning were an old denim work shirt and the same ripped jeans she’d had on the day before, she went to greet him.

  He, too, was dressed in old clothes. Worn jeans, running shoes with a rip in them, and funnily enough, an old denim work shirt, too.

  Jack spoke first. “I thought you’d be out Black Friday shopping.”

  And yet here he was, with a scrumptious-looking breakfast for two. With as much equanimity as she could muster, Bess reminded him, “Those sales started weeks ago.”

  For a long, telling moment, he remained motionless, seeming not even to breathe. He definitely wasn’t backing down. He nodded. “True.”

  Not ready to forgive him for tempting her with what they both knew they could never have—and walk away unscathed, anyway—she remained in the doorway, arms folded. “So what’s up?” she asked, not sure whether she wanted to smack him or haul him close and kiss him all over again. She may not come to her senses and stop this time.

  He leaned in a little more. “I want to apologize.”

  Like groveling would help, now that she knew just how good he tasted and how big and strong and right he felt pressed up against her.

  She paused an uncomfortable length of time. “For?”

  Looking like he, too, wanted to say the hell with talking, take her in his arms and kiss her passionately, he drawled, “You’re not going to make this easy on me, are you, darlin’?”

  “Nope.”

  He looked her up and down, as if considering his options as carefully as she had been. “You going to invite me in?”

  Her pulse racing, she lifted her shoulder in a careless shrug. “Depends on that apology.”

  He exhaled. “Okay.” Something dangerous glittering in his eyes, he said, “I shouldn’t have kissed you.”

  Bess noted with mixed feelings that he wasn’t saying he would never do it again.

  Seeming to realize he was getting nowhere fast, Jack said, “Not like that, anyway.”

  Like you wanted to take my breath away? Guess what, Doc—you did.

  “You mean...passionately?”

  He winced. “To prove a point.”

  Grimacing, Bess said, “Can’t argue with you there.” She noticed that her neighbors to her left, a kindly elderly couple who had taken it upon themselves to watch over her, had suddenly come out to take the cornucopia off their front door and hang up a wreath. The simple chore was taking an inordinate amount of time. Wondering how much they’d seen or could potentially overhear, and deciding she and Jack didn’t need to put on the kind of fireworks that would compel the happily married couple to intervene on her behalf, or worse, play matchmaker, she moved aside to usher Jack in and shut the door behind them.

  He walked over to the dining table, set down his offering and took off his coat. Then turned back to her, his expression as genuine and honest as his low tone. “I’m not sorry I did.”

  Of course he wasn’t, Bess thought, even more aggrieved, because it wasn’t his heart that would end up broken.

  “Well, there we do differ, Doc,” Bess said, lifting her chin. “Because it can’t ever happen again.”

  * * *

  Jack knew he’d screwed up, giving in to his temper. Acting on desire in the heat of the moment. But he hadn’t expected her to hold a grudge that would continue to keep them apart, for more than a few hours, anyway. “Why do you say that?” he asked.

  Bess got out plates, silverware and napkins. She brought them over to the table. “Because it could ruin our friendship.”

  Her pronouncement struck a chord. He thought about a life without Bess in it. How lonely it would feel. He sat down opposite her. “I wouldn’t want that.”

  She took the top off her coffee cup and sipped her vanilla latte. “Then we’re in agreement?” She studied him over the rim of the cup. “We’re not going to kiss again.”

  To his disappointment, Jack saw there was no convincing her otherwise. For now, anyway.

  He removed the lid on his own coffee. “Yes.” The best way to get their relationship back on track was to spend time together, platonically, and build on that. “And to make it up to you,” he said, “I’m prepared to help you paint.”

  She cut into her cherry cheese Danish. “You don’t have to do that.”

  He bit into a pumpkin scone, swallowed, then inclined his head. “Actually, I think I probably do.”

  Slowly, recognition dawned. “Don’t tell me. You’ve got another favor to ask of me, the one you intended to hit me with last night?”

  He sat back in his chair, wondering what it would be like to have breakfast with her like this every morning. “You got it.”

  Bess surveyed him as they ate.

  She’d swept her hair loosely into a clip on the back of her head, tendrils escaped around her cheeks, down the nape of her neck. The subtle makeup she usually wore was absent. Her freshly scrubbed face looked younger and more vulnerable, her lips bare and soft, and he longed to explore the silky texture.

  Oblivious to the effect she had on him, she batted her lashes at him mischievously and asked, “Does this have anything to do with Chri
stmas?”

  He mimed a blow to his heart. “You are psychic,” he teased.

  “When it comes to you, maybe I’m just experienced,” she bantered.

  Still sitting kitty-corner from her at the table, he watched her take another bite of pastry. Actually, she wasn’t nearly as experienced with him as she thought. Otherwise, she’d have known he’d been lusting after her for two years now. He’d just been too wary of taking advantage of her vulnerability to act on it. Especially since he knew he no longer had the romantic idealism in him that would allow him to believe in happily-ever-after the way she did—with all her heart and soul.

  Still hungry, he tried a chocolate croissant.

  Bess helped herself to an apple, oatmeal and walnut breakfast cookie. “So, is Santa coming to your house this year instead of your parents’ ranch?”

  “He is.”

  Warmth flowed through him at the look of open admiration in her beautiful green eyes. The feeling intensified as she leaned forward in a drift of lavender perfume to nudge the back of his hand with her elbow. “Good for you.”

  He hoped so. He still wasn’t entirely sure he could pull off Christmas on his own. At least not with the panache Gayle had. He didn’t want to let down his kids.

  “What about the puppy?” she persisted, her teeth raking her lower lip.

  Wishing he actually could kiss her again without battle erupting, Jack admitted, “Santa’s apparently bringing one, too, that is just like the puppies they met at Winfield Retrievers. Only definitely not one of those.”

  “Except it will be,” Bess concluded.

  “Yes.” He carefully met her gaze. “Which is where we come to the problem. Those puppies are going to be ready to be picked up on December 19. And Betty is adamant they go to their new residence at precisely eight weeks.”

  Bess set her empty cup down. “Which is going to be an entire week too early for your purposes.”

  “Yes.”

  Another thoughtful pause. “Betty knows your situation?”

  “She is willing to make a slight exception by letting me pick up our pup and temporarily house her elsewhere. Provided, of course, I keep our new puppy close by and personally bond with her every day until she comes home on Christmas morning.”

  Bess’s delicate brow furrowed. Rising gracefully, she began to clear the table. “How are you planning to do that?”

  Here came the tough part. Jack left the remaining pastries in the bakery box and carried them to the kitchen. He stood next to her at the kitchen sink. “I was hoping you might agree to keep both puppies here for a week. I know you’ve already planned to take two weeks of vacation to help acclimate yours. And I only have the week between Christmas and New Year’s off.”

  It was hard to tell what she was thinking. He added hastily, “I’d help out with both pups, of course. We just wouldn’t be able to let the girls know they were here.”

  Slowly, Bess got the same blissed-out look on her face she’d had when picking out her puppy. “Sure.”

  This had been almost too easy. He studied her, wondering all the while if he was taking advantage, which was the last thing he wanted. “You really don’t mind?”

  Her smile spread. She bent over to put their plates in the dishwasher, the hem of her shirt riding up her shapely thighs as she did so. “No, not at all. Maybe the two pups will keep each other entertained, while they get used to doing without their mother and the other littermates.”

  He lounged against the counter, watching her, unable to do anything else to help. “Thank you.” He heaved a big sigh of relief.

  “What are friends for?” she retorted. “I am curious, however.” She tipped her face up to his, in much the same way she had before he had kissed her last night. “What are you going to do about Chloe’s present?”

  Jack’s gut tightened. “The only thing I can. Convince her to want something else other than a real live baby brother.”

  * * *

  Bess’s heart went out to Jack. The death of his wife just three days after the birth of his youngest child had sent him reeling.

  Knowing, however, that they had to get a move on if she wanted to get her living room finished, she handed him a paint roller. Then she knelt to pour more light gray paint into the pan, enough for the both of them to use. “I don’t suppose there’s any way to explain to a three-year-old that you can’t just order up a son the way you do a new toy.” She supposed he had already tried, to no avail.

  “Or even a healthy, easy pregnancy,” Jack replied gruffly.

  Bess froze. This was the first time he had ever talked about this with her. “Gayle’s last two pregnancies were exceptionally difficult,” she recalled, walking off to get a trim brush.

  He began spreading paint on the wall. “If it had been up to me, she never would have gotten pregnant a third time.”

  This she hadn’t known. Edging the walls, she asked carefully, “What do you mean?”

  Jack moved the roller up and down with smooth, rhythmic strokes. “When Gayle was diagnosed with placenta previa—”

  Which carried the risk of severe bleeding during pregnancy and delivery, Bess knew.

  “—during her second pregnancy and put on bedrest, I wanted to go ahead and get a vasectomy, so we would never have to worry about her getting pregnant again.”

  “She didn’t agree?”

  He shrugged, the fabric of his faded shirt molding to his broad shoulders and muscular chest. “She wanted me to keep our options open, in case something went wrong with either the birth or the pregnancy. So we’d have another chance at having a second child.”

  That sounded like Gayle, who had been a stellar physician in her own right. Complications alone would not have scared her. “So you passed on the procedure,” Bess guessed. She noted he hadn’t yet shaved. The stubble on his jaw gave him a rugged, sexy look.

  “Then.” He moved back to the tray, to replenish the paint on his roller.

  “And that changed...?”

  His mouth took on a hard, uncompromising line. “When she accidentally got pregnant with Chloe a few months after giving birth to Nicole, I just went ahead and did it.”

  That, too, sounded like Jack, not wanting to take any more chances with the health of the woman who had been the love of his life. She moved close enough to see the heat in his eyes. “How did Gayle feel about that?”

  Suddenly, Jack appeared as if he had the weight of the world on his shoulders. “She was furious. And when she found out we were having another daughter, instead of the son she was convinced I had to have, she was even more upset with me.”

  “Aside from the gender issue...” A nonissue, as far as Bess was concerned. A healthy baby of either sex was the goal. “...you can’t really blame her for being angry about the vasectomy, Jack. That was a decision the two of you should have made together.”

  “Except she never would have made it,” he pointed out.

  True. Still... Bess watched him wipe the edge of the roller to prevent it from splattering paint. “Did she ever forgive you?”

  Jack’s gaze turned brooding. “Not really. Although her anger lessened when she was diagnosed with placenta abruption with her third pregnancy.”

  An even more difficult complication to weather, Beth knew, because it put the life of both baby and mother at tremendous risk.

  “She had to go on bedrest a second time, when we already had a six-month-old and a two-and-a-half-year-old to care for.” He stopped, shook his head.

  “It must have been hard for you.”

  He rubbed at the back of his neck with his free hand. “The bane of being in the medical profession. You know all too well everything that can go wrong.”

  “Except it didn’t seem to affect Gayle,” Bess recalled.

  “I don’t know if it was the fact she was an ob-gyn and thought she could mana
ge her own situation as effectively as she cared for any of her patients, or if it was just denial.”

  “Because she didn’t want to really consider the risks,” she guessed.

  Jack painted another section of wall. “She never doubted that Chloe would be born on time and healthy.”

  “And she was.” Bess recalled the giddy relief of those first few happy days. Followed by almost unspeakable tragedy.

  “Right.” Jack swallowed. He set the roller in the tray. “It wasn’t Chloe’s life, it was Gayle’s life that was put in jeopardy with post-birth hemorrhaging. And then when she survived that...” His voice trailed off. He was unable to go on. Eyes filling, he turned away.

  Her heart going out to him, Bess set down her brush. She approached him gently, sympathizing, “It had to have been awful for you, arriving at the hospital to take her and the baby home, only to find out she’d suffered a pulmonary embolism just minutes before.”

  Face ashen, he nodded.

  “It wasn’t your fault, Jack,” she said fiercely.

  Before she could hug him, he moved away. Shoulders tense, he retorted, “Yeah, Bess, it was. Because if I’d just had the vasectomy when I first wanted to, Gayle never would have become pregnant a third time, and she never would have died.”

  Jack’s heartrending confession resonated with her. She knew he had been haunted by his wife’s death. She just hadn’t known the specific reasons why.

  Now she did. And while it was a relief, the new information was also a burden. It left her with so many more questions. Just like the one he’d asked her, the week before, after reading her two Christmas letters.

  She approached him once again, putting a comforting hand on his forearm and guiding him around to face her.

  “Is this why you don’t date?” Because you blame yourself? “Because you don’t want to let anyone else down?” Or was it deeper than that? She stepped even closer. Pressed, even more softly, “Or is it because once you’ve had the best, you don’t ever want to settle for second?”