Zeke stared at the shoreline, not blinking, almost zombie-like. “We did this, you know.”
Tanner nodded grimly. “Yeah, we were more interested in being the winner than creating a harmonious Christmas Eve for our families.”
“How fucked up is that?” Isaac sighed and rubbed his eyes, feeling the weary weight of this entire screwed-up family on his shoulders. He’d always thought he could handle anything life threw at him, and had, until now. This was a mess he didn’t know how to fix or where to start.
“If something happens to her, it’s on us,” Zeke said.
Tanner and Isaac nodded agreement.
“Feeling sorry for ourselves isn’t going to find her,” Tanner said. He set his jaw in grim determination.
Isaac had to agree. They would find her. They had to. They’d endured too many shitty Christmas Eves. This would not be one of them. He swore to it. “Let’s expand our search area.”
“I’m going to help,” Paisley spoke from behind them.
“Me, too,” said Avery.
“One of you needs to stay here with the kids.”
“I will,” Emma volunteered. “I’ll keep them busy. They can help me finish the pies.”
“Good idea.” Tanner leaned over and kissed her cheek. He’d been worrying about her pregnancy and hovering like Isaac had never seen before.
“Let’s do it then.” Isaac laid out their next plan of attack to continue down the gravel road both directions and knock on all the neighbors’ doors. Someone might know something or have seen something. Isaac and Avery would scour the beach. If they were lucky, Sadie was sipping hot chocolate in front of a warm fire at a nearby house right now.
A drop of rain plopped on his head. God wasn’t going to make this easy on them. They were probably still doing penance for being selfish dickheads earlier.
With a goodbye wave, Tanner strode down the road calling for Sadie. Zeke and Paisley went the opposite direction toward the paved county road.
Calling for his boxer, Hal, Isaac grabbed Avery’s hand, and they took the steep stairs to the rocky shore below. Hal slipped past them and bounded down the stairs. Isaac should’ve left him behind. The dog never came when he was called, and he didn’t need a lost dog on top of everything else, but Hal loved Sadie, and there was a chance he might be able to locate her before they could.
“You must be pissed at me,” Isaac said when the silence became too much.
“Let’s just find her. That’s all that matters now.”
“I promise I’ll change, Avery. I won’t let my brothers bait me into another argument.”
“Why don’t you work on being a good example instead of being in competition? Your brothers look up to you.”
He stopped on one of the stairs, pulling her to a halt next to him. “They do not.” He was incredulous. What made her say that? His two younger brothers barely concealed their animosity toward him. They tolerated each other for the respective females in the family. Sure, they loved him. Hell, they were blood, and they’d all grown up in the same abusive, dysfunctional household. Yet what they’d gone through and the resentment they felt toward him couldn’t disappear in a few months. It’d take years before he was truly forgiven for abandoning both of them. He’d escaped their tyrannical father the first chance he got and never looked back, leaving his brothers to cope without him.
He wasn’t that scared kid anymore, and neither were they. They’d grown and matured and learned to love again thanks to their wives. Without them, Isaac wasn’t sure where they’d be.
Hal ran ahead of them, nose to the ground, as if he knew exactly what he was doing, though Isaac had little faith in the dog. Even though Hal did have a soft spot for Sadie, he’d never been particularly good at finding his dog dish, let alone a lost girl in the rain. Regardless, his presence couldn’t hurt.
* * * *
Sadie woke up to find stuff had changed. The water had risen enough that when the waves hit the shoreline, the salt water splashed on her feet. She pulled them up closer. They were frozen, and she wasn’t sure she could get them to move enough to get her out of here.
The water came closer with each crash against the shore. Water did that. It went in and out. Zeke had told her about it. They called it tides.
Zeke and Aunt Paisley wanted her to call them Mom and Dad. They told her that she’d use Zeke’s last name now. Sophie, Brayden, and she were their kids now, and no one could take them away. She wasn’t sure they were right, but she hoped so. She wanted them to be her mommy and daddy.
She started to cry. She missed them. She wanted to go back, even if they did yell. She was cold and wet and scared. Pulling herself onto her knees, she crawled onto a bigger rock to get away from the water and looked up at the steep bank. She was a good climber. She could climb way up the big tree in the backyard at home, but the bank loomed in the darkness, thick with trees and bushes and looking really scary.
Sadie was so cold. She’d try to climb the bank in a little while. Maybe after one more nap, she’d have the energy. She curled into a little ball, trying to get warm. Her teeth were chattering, and she started crying. She cried a long time until she couldn’t cry anymore.
Then she felt something. She lifted her head, looking around. Two fuzzy, glowing ladies gazed at her with fond smiles. The glow from their bodies warmed her. They didn’t talk; they held out their hands to her. She blinked a few times. She wasn’t sure who they were. Their images were too blurry and glowed and flickered like candles. She held her hand out to them.
The angels were going to take her home.
* * * *
Avery and Isaac called for Sadie, their shouts drowned out by the whipping wind and pelting rain. Hal slogged along beside them, tail tucked between his legs and feet shuffling. He hated rain. Every once in a while, he’d give each of them a withering glare, blaming them for being out on a night like this.
Isaac was getting discouraged, and he hated the feeling. He never gave up. No matter how tough things were, he’d kept trying. He would keep trying now for Sadie.
They would find her.
As if by a miracle, the rain stopped, though the menacing clouds promised it wouldn’t be long. The moon peeked out from a hole in the clouds, illuminating the muddy road littered with puddles.
“Thank you, God.” Isaac, who wasn’t particularly religious, looked to the sky in acknowledgement of the minor marvel.
Avery clutched his hand with her cold one and stopped. Isaac stopped beside her. She cupped her hands to her mouth and called out, “Sadie! Sadie! Sadie!”
They barely breathed as they listened for a response, but all they heard was water dripping off the trees onto the soaked ground.
Hal’s head shot up. He sniffed the air, his ears perked, and he was on instant alert.
Isaac exchanged a glance with Avery. Hal had never been interested in much outside of his food dish, but he’d taken a liking to sweet Sadie. Hal cocked his head and listened.
“Do you hear something, boy?” Isaac asked. Hope snuck into his voice, and he squeezed Avery’s hand. Hal pinned Isaac with a fuck-you glare and growled. He always growled at Isaac. They had a love- hate relationship that worked for them. The boxer refocused his attention in the same direction as before. Then he did something very un-Hal-like. He whined. Hal never whined. He growled. He barked. He snarled. But he did not whine. Isaac and he were alike in that manner.
“He hears something,” Avery said. Isaac could tell she was trying not to get her hopes up, but Hal did have superior hearing compared to them.
“He damn well does. As much as I hate putting my faith in that animal, we don’t have many other options.”
With one final whimper, Hal launched himself down the road, nose to the ground. His head came up once, and he barked. He swerved off the road and dived into the brush and down the steep bank. Running behind him, Avery and Isaac braked to a halt at the edge of the steep bank almost impassible with thick brush and twisted madrona trees.
/>
Seeing no choice, Isaac put his head down and pushed through the brush. Avery was hot on his heels as he cleared the way. His heart pounded hard in his chest, not just from exertion, but from fear. They could hear Hal farther down the bank, crashing through the brush and barking. His barks became more frequent.
“That damn dog better not be chasing a rabbit,” Isaac growled as he picked his way through the brush, hanging on to limbs here and there to keep from sliding down the wet bank. He could see the moonlight glistening off the water below. They were almost to the narrow beach that ran in front of several houses in the neighborhood. In fact, not too far from here, there was a set of steps leading down to the water, but they had to do it the hard way.
“Isaac. Stop for a minute.”
Isaac stopped and frowned at her. Avery called again for Sadie.
“Listen.” She called for Sadie again. Isaac heard a very faint sound, but he was certain it was Sadie.
Unmindful of the brush slapping against his face, he half ran, half slid the rest of the way down the bank. Avery followed a second later. There, on a rocky beach, huddled near the bank, was Sadie hugging Hal tightly to her. She glanced up and the tears on her face were illuminated by the moon.
* * * *
Hal was getting a nice, juicy bone tonight, even if it meant wasting one of the T-bones on the dog.
Avery ran to Sadie and hugged her. Isaac stood nearby. Hal’s accusing stare was followed by a guttural growl. The dog blamed him for all this, and the dog might be right.
“Are you okay, honey?” Avery asked as she ran her hands over the little girl’s body to make sure nothing was broken.
“I was cold, but the angels warmed me up.”
“Angels?” Isaac frowned and furrowed his brow. He started to step closer, but Hal’s snarl meant business. That damn dog. He had to go. Yet, deep down, Isaac knew he deserved Hal’s anger, and the mongrel would still get that bone.
Avery’s eyes met Isaac’s over Sadie’s shoulder. She didn’t understand the angel part, either, but they were going with it.
“Let’s get you home.” Sadie was too big for Avery to carry, so Isaac stepped forward. This time Hal let him, while eyeing him suspiciously.
Isaac bent down and picked her up. Sadie wrapped her arms around his neck and said, “You won’t yell anymore, will you?”
“No, I won’t. I promise.”
“When men yell, they make people disappear.”
Isaac cringed and swallowed back a huge lump in his throat. “No one is disappearing. I promise you.”
“Okay.”
Avery touched his arm and smiled at him, instead of giving him the glare he deserved. Sometimes he so did not deserve her, any more than his brothers deserved their women. The Wolfe brothers had been assholes to each other from the moment they’d walked in the door this morning. He hated the realization they were their father’s sons, and as of right now, that stopped if he had anything to do with it.
They would be better men than their father ever was.
Chapter 6—Family
An hour later, the power was still out. Sadie was in clean, dry clothes and wrapped in a blanket next to the fire and sleeping soundly in Zeke’s arms. Brayden and Sophie were curled up on the couch and yawning. Hal lay in a cover, noisily gnawing on a bone and growling at any adult who glanced in his direction. Everyone else was gathered around the blazing fire, sipping hot chocolate and not saying much.
Isaac drew in a deep breath and moved to stand in front of the fireplace. The rest of his family gazed up at him with puzzled expressions. Oddly, he didn’t see any animosity in his brothers’ eyes, only weary contentment. They’d averted a disaster, and they would be stronger for it.
“I’d like to apologize to each and every one of you for my childish behavior, especially to my brothers.”
Isaac’s brothers both opened their mouths to protest, but Isaac silenced them with an upheld hand. To their credit, they didn’t push him like they would’ve even a few hours ago.
“Blake, my former teammate and the owner of this home, lost his entire family on this very day six years ago when their floatplane crashed on a stormy night similar to this one. They were on their way to celebrate Christmas in this house like they had every year since their children were young. Blake can never get them back. They’re gone forever.” Isaac paused and wiped his eyes with his sweater sleeve. Normally, he’d be appalled at crying in front of everyone, but they were his family. If he couldn’t show real emotion to them, who could he show it to?
Avery moved beside him and put her arm around his waist. He smiled down at her, cleared his throat, and continued. He wasn’t the world’s best speaker, but he hoped he could express his thoughts well enough.
“Sadie said angels kept her safe while we were looking for her. Nice angels. They left when we showed up. You guys know I don’t believe in stuff like that, but I think they were angels. Maybe our mother and our sister. Maybe Blake’s family. We’ll never know who her guardian angels were, but I do know angels kept Sadie safe from a rising tide and from the cold.”
No one said a word, so Isaac continued.
“I’d like to think our mom is up there in heaven right now, smiling down on us and damned proud her three sons rose above the worst adversity life could throw at them and became productive, kind members of society.”
Zeke and Tanner nodded, wiping their own eyes on their sleeves, while their wives clutched their hands.
“We lost each other for a long time, but now we can do something Blake never can. We can find each other and make good memories. We were raised to be competitive. It was pounded into our heads from birth. If we weren’t winners, we were losers. Being a loser was worse than being dog sh—” Isaac paused as he noticed three pairs of young eyes watching him intently, as Sadie was now awake. “Dog poop. We aren’t those guys anymore. In a family, a real family, there aren’t any winners or losers. There’s just love.” That last word came out choked.
Zeke and Tanner stood, as if on some silent cue, and walked to Isaac. They had a three-way bro hug, which left Isaac a little off-balance yet filled with joy. When they finally separated, they gazed at each other for a long time. Isaac felt the shift and knew they did, too. They were family. They didn’t need to compete to prove their worth. They just needed to be themselves.
“Am I going to get a pony for Christmas?” Sadie interrupted their sappy reunion.
Paisley laughed and gave her a hug. “Yes, honey, but you’ll have to wait until we get back home, then we’ll pick one out for you.”
“We will?” Zeke frowned.
“Yes, we will.” Her glare was pointed and determined.
“I guess we will.” Zeke laughed, and his brothers joined in.
“I’m hungry. What’s for dinner?” Brayden asked with all the innocence of a child, the incident all but forgotten and replaced by his growling stomach. The adults exchanged glances. In the excitement of Sadie’s disappearance, they’d forgotten all about food.
“Uh, hamburgers.” Emma’s tone was apologetic, but the kids clapped enthusiastically.
“Hamburgers? A new Wolfe family Christmas Eve tradition,” Zeke joked.
“Next year it’ll be at my house, and we’ll serve prime rib,” Tanner said.
Isaac opened his mouth to argue but snapped it shut when he saw the look on Avery’s face.
Avery, Emma, and Paisley stared down the men, who cringed slightly upon realizing they’d almost been sucked into competing again.
“Hamburgers, it is. A new tradition.” Isaac clapped a hand on his brothers’ shoulders, and Avery took a quick picture with her cell phone camera. They were brothers, and they’d figure this thing out if it took the rest of their lives. He gazed into each brother’s eyes and saw the unshed tears there and smiled. They smiled back.
“Let’s eat,” Isaac announced and took a seat at the table beside his brothers, letting little Sadie sit at the head of the table, which was where she belo
nged because she’d given them the real gift of Christmas.
The gift of love.
~ THE END ~
If you’d like to read more about the Wolfe Brothers and my other Seattle Sports teams, check out my Game On in Seattle Collection. All the books in this series can be read as standalones, though your reading pleasure will probably be increased by reading them in order. The books listed below feature the Wolfe brothers.
Melting Ice (Isaac and Avery)
Blindsided (Tanner and Emma)
Bottom of the Ninth (Zeke and Paisley)
~ ~ ~ ~
Thank you for spending time in my world. I hope you enjoyed reading this book. If you did, please help other readers discover this book by leaving a review.
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Complete Booklist
The following Jami Davenport titles are available in digital and many are available as trade paperbacks. These books can be read as standalones.
Gone Missing Investigations
Gone Missing
Evergreen Nights Series
Save the Last Dance
Who’s Been Sleeping in My Bed?
The Gift Horse
A Wolfe Brothers Christmas Page 3