Cowboys Under The Mistletoe: Five Christmas Christian Romance Novellas

by Kristen Ethridge

  And now her stomach hurt even worse. Ernie was just trying to be a good hostess, and Mallory was messing it all up.

  “Not anymore,” she said slowly. “I get sick when I eat it.”

  Ernie looked puzzled. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know.”

  “I feel badly that you’ve gone to so much trouble on my behalf and I’m not able to enjoy it.” Once again, she felt the urge to cry. What was wrong with her?

  “I need to use the ladies. If you’ll excuse me?”

  Mallory dashed out of the kitchen, and down the hall to the bathroom she’d seen when she’d gone to the study with Nolan. Her stomach felt like it was eating itself now, eating her, reminding her of just why she never ate cream of broccoli soup.

  Just as she got to the door, however, she crashed into Nolan.

  “Where’s the fire?”

  Mallory could feel the tears burning the backs of her eyes. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

  He got out of her way, and shje went into the bathroom and slammed the door behind her.

  The urge to vomit had passed, but now her chest hurt so much, she could hardly breathe. What was wrong with her?

  She could hear Nolan in the hallway, talking to Ernie a low voice, but unlike when he had been talking to Donna, she couldn’t hear his words. Ernie was probably telling him about how she’d freaked out that she’d made her cream of broccoli soup. But he didn’t know. No one knew. And Mallory wasn’t sure she could speak the words, couldn’t let them out of the place inside her where they had been buried for six years.

  Ernie knocked at the door. “Are you all right?”

  “Yes. Just waiting for the nausea to pass. I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about me.”

  For the first time since she felt like she had to cry, Mallory almost wanted to, if only to find some relief from everything plaguing her. But she couldn’t. That was the real trouble. Despite all the reasons she had to cry, she’d never been able to.

  “I just wanted to make you a nice dinner like your mother did,” Ernie said, sounding like she, too, needed to cry.

  How many times was this going to happen over the holiday? She couldn’t ruin it for everyone. But for some reason, Ernie was insistent on reminding Mallory of the one thing she was determined to forget.

  Mallory opened the door. “I know, and I’m sorry. You and I are grieving my mother in different ways. Being reminded of her only makes my pain worse.”

  As she took a deep breath, she realized that both Donna and Nolan were also standing there. How could she make these three strangers understand?

  “I don’t eat cream of broccoli soup anymore because that’s what my mother was cooking the day…” Mallory hesitated. The words wouldn’t even form in her mind, so how could she say them?

  But she didn’t need to. Ernie’s eyes widened. “Oh my dear. I am so sorry. I had no idea…”

  Mallory shook her head. “Of course you didn’t. No one did. There are some details of tragedies that are private, remaining only to torment the ones left behind.”

  Ernie started crying, and Donna put her arms around her. But Mallory just stood there, feeling awkward and awful because she’d hurt this poor sweet woman with information she’d never intended to reveal.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, knowing those words did nothing to ease a person’s pain. How many people had told her they were sorry for everything that happened? And it had never done anything to make her feel better.

  “It’s not your fault,” Ernie said, dabbing at her eyes with her apron. “I forget what a heavy burden you carry. I only thought to remind you of happier times, but I’m doing a miserable job.”

  What was she supposed to say to that? Ernie meant well, and she didn’t understand that everything she was doing to help her was only making things worse. Mallory turned to Nolan.

  “I guess I am as bad as you thought I would be after all. I didn’t mean for Ernie to be hurt. I didn’t mean for anyone to be hurt. But I don’t want to ruin anyone’s holidays further.”

  She couldn’t read Nolan’s expression, and that was probably just as well. Because she wasn’t sure she could maintain her fragile hold on her emotions if she knew she’d hurt Nolan too.

  Donna came around and put her arms around Mallory, the way she’d done with Ernie. “You’re not bad, and you haven’t ruined anything. But clearly, you’ve been without the love of the family for far too long. From what I’ve gathered, you’ve spent Christmas alone every year since your parents died. And that isn’t happening anymore. You’re part of our family now, and that means you don’t get to do this alone anymore. Because we’re here with you.”

  No one had ever made her a part of their family before. Sometimes people from the office would invite her to spend a holiday with them, but it always felt like a pity invite. But something about Donna’s words was different.

  “I don’t understand,” Mallory said. “Why would you do that?”

  Giving her another squeeze, Donna said, “Do you know the story of Ruth from the Bible?”

  Mallory shook her head. Her father used to say that the Bible was a book of lies and they were forbidden from reading it. But sometimes, she thought she might have caught her mother in a moment of prayer, and she wished she could have spoken to her about it.

  “To make a long story short, when Ruth’s husband died, she adopted his family as her own, and loved them and cared for them even though she was under no obligation to do so. Because that’s what it means to love one another. And that’s what my faith in Christ asks of me.”

  Donna glanced over at Nolan, then looked back at Mallory. “Nolan tells me that you overheard him talking to me about how he was uncertain about you. But I could tell right away when I met you that what you really needed was our love and compassion.”

  What did that even mean? Mallory was a loving and compassionate person, even if most of the time she did it in a detached way.

  “I’m really sorry for what I said.” Nolan looked regretful. “I’m even sorrier that you overheard it. But mostly, I’m sorry for judging you so harshly.”

  She closed her eyes. None of this made any sense. And why should it, since none of this was in a framework she could understand. This is why she preferred math to emotions.

  “This is all very overwhelming for me,” she said, finally opening her eyes and looking at everyone. “I know I said I didn’t want to be any trouble, but I’d really like to be alone for a while. Could someone please show me to Ernie’s house so I can have some time to process all of this?”

  *

  Nolan didn’t know what to make of the fragile woman before him. It made him feel even more guilty for his earlier words about her.

  “I’ll take you,” he said. “We can leave your car here, and I’ll drive you in my truck. It won’t be any trouble, because I need to go feed the animals, and I’ll go right past.”

  The way she nodded made Nolan ache. Something in her was broken, and he wished he could fix it. But she wasn’t a truck or tractor or something else with parts he understood.

  “That may not be a good idea,” Ernie said. “I decorated the guest room with things to remind Mallory of her mother, and it seems I was mistaken to do so. It won’t take long to clean up, so maybe for now, Donna could give Mallory one of her guest rooms.”

  From talking to Donna about the Christmas plans, Nolan knew Donna didn’t really have a guest room to give up. Not with more guests arriving tomorrow.

  “Let’s not make Donna change her arrangements. Mallory can have my room,” Nolan said. “I’ll move to the guest room. It won’t take me long to grab what I need.”

  Mallory turned and looked at him like she actually saw him, rather than with the blank expression she’d had since coming out of the bathroom. “I don’t want to kick you out of your room.”

  “And miss my chance to sleep in the guest room? Ernie keeps that place special for guests, and I’ve never gotten to stay there before. When I was a boy, sleeping in t
hat room was my dream.”

  Ernie chuckled. “Who knew it would take all these years for you to finally find a way to finagle your way into that room?”

  Fortunately, those words seemed to perk Mallory up. “So I’d be making your lifelong dream come true?”

  She still didn’t sound like the woman he’d spent time within the study, but she sounded closer. And Nolan would take it.

  “Yes ma’am. It may not be manly of me to say so, but I have always wondered what it would be like to sleep on those flowered sheets.”

  Though Nolan knew that all sheets were the same, when he was a little boy, he had thought there was something magical about the pretty blue flowered sheets Ernie reserved for guests. Maybe the magic was in the power of making a hurting woman feel a little less like she was taking away from others. Of all the things he’d accused Mallory of, perhaps the biggest thing he’d been wrong about was how selfish he thought her.

  Mallory nodded slowly. “Then that sounds like a good plan to me. No offense, but I don’t think I would have an emotional attachment to anything in Nolan’s room. That’s what I need right now.”

  He went to her car and grabbed her bag out of the trunk. Then he loaded Mallory and her things into his truck and drove to the little cabin he and Ernie called home. She didn’t speak, just stared out the window at the scenery. Just when he wondered if he should be pointing out landmarks or acting as tour guide, she turned to him.

  “Thank you for making sure I had a safe space. And thank you for not feeling like you had to make small talk or entertain me on the drive. I know you don’t like me much, and I don’t blame you. But I find that I am liking you more and more because of your kindness to me and to my aunt. You have one more skill to add to the list of accomplishments. You’re a good person, Nolan, and that’s rare in this day and age.”

  He wasn’t sure what to say at what seemed to be too high praise. He was just doing what any decent human being would do, except that he hadn’t been very decent in the beginning.

  She seemed to sense his discomfort, because then she said, “But don’t worry, I don’t want to marry you, either. I wouldn’t compare you to fruitcake, but then again, I like fruitcake. However, you’re not at all what I have in mind for a husband. I’m certain we wouldn’t be compatible.”

  Though she had meant her words in a comforting way, he found them oddly insulting. What was so wrong with him that she had no interest in him? Once again, he wanted to kick himself for caring. She was right, they were completely incompatible. She might have been nicer to him than Meredith would have been over the books, but that still didn’t change that the two women were essentially the same. And he had absolutely no interest in Meredith.

  “I guess, since we both agreed that we’ll never be getting married, maybe we could figure out a way to be friends?”

  He smiled at her, but she gave him a strange look in return.

  “I don’t really have friends,” she said in a choked voice. “I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do.”

  What did she mean, she didn’t really have friends? Everyone had friends.

  “Who is in your cell phone? Who do you call?”

  Mallory shrugged. “The usual people. My bank, my doctor, that sort of thing. My old work numbers are still in there, but I suppose I should delete them.”

  “Who did you hang out with after work?”

  She shook her head slowly. “I was dating my boss, so it was just him. We didn’t want anyone to know. But I guess it wasn’t as much of a relationship as I thought it was. He announced his engagement to someone else the same day he announced he’d sold the company.”

  What kind of jerk would do that to a person? He looked over at Mallory, who seemed more resigned about the whole thing than sad.

  “What about your friends from college, or your childhood?”

  “My mom was my best friend,” she said quietly.

  Once again, Nolan felt like a jerk. But as he said a quick prayer, asking for the wisdom to say the right thing, he knew that none of this was his fault. Mallory had lost the one person she loved the most in the world, was closest to, and hadn’t found anyone else to be there for her. Her boyfriend should have done that, but clearly, he was the biggest jerk of all.

  Nolan reached out and took her hand. “Well, I’m going to be your friend. Donna is going to be your friend. And when her daughters get here, so will they. They’re the best kinds of friends to have, because they’re the ones who taught me all about friendship. You’re going to do just fine.”

  The eyes that looked over at him were so familiar, it almost took his breath away. They bore the expression of someone who wanted to hope but was terrified to do so. That was him fifteen years back when he’d first come to the ranch.

  “Do you know how I came to be here? How Bert and Ernie ended up taking me in?”

  Mallory shook her head.

  Nolan took a deep breath. “I was living in their old shed, stealing from them so I would have food. I’d run away from home because I was sick of my dad beating me and my mom. She wouldn’t leave, but I couldn’t take it anymore, so I did. I was fifteen years old, too young to be on my own, so Bert and Ernie asked me to stay. They talked to the authorities and made arrangements so I could stay.”

  “That’s good,” Mallory said, sounding almost like a completely different person. “My dad beat my mom, too.”

  Based on what Ernie had said of her estrangement from her sister, Nolan had a feeling that might have been the case. But now that he knew, he couldn’t help feeling for the woman sitting next to him. Ernie had made him go to counseling to deal with everything, but from the way Mallory seemed completely unable to cope with her grief, Nolan suspected she hadn’t.

  “She used to give me math problems,” she continued. “Mom said that I should focus on math so I didn’t have to worry about everything else. When Dad would come home drunk or angry, I would take my math book and go to my room so I could focus on that and not hear the shouting. That’s what Mom told me to do.”

  Her childlike voice made Nolan want to punch something.

  Then Mallory looked over at him, a vacant look in her eyes. “I had to stay late at the library for one of my college classes. When I came home, they were dead. He’d killed her, then he killed himself.”

  And her mother had been making broccoli cheese soup. No wonder Mallory couldn’t eat it anymore. And no wonder Ernie had fallen apart when Mallory said that’s what her mother had been making that day. The part he didn’t understand was why Ernie hadn’t told him that her brother-in-law had killed her sister. She and Bert had gone to the funeral, but hadn’t given Nolan any details, other than her sister was dead.

  Had they thought he wouldn’t understand?

  Nolan pulled over and took Mallory into his arms. “And you had no one to talk to,” he said, whispering in her ear. “You can talk to me.”

  She looked up at him, confused. “I had my math.”

  Chapter Four

  Nolan left Mallory sleeping in his bed. He’d held her for a while in the truck, telling her it was going to be all right, but she’d never cried. Several times, he’d thought she was on the verge of breaking down, but she never did.

  Finally, he’d brought her to the cabin, and when he showed her his room, she told him she was tired. Before he could say anything, she’d crawled into the bed and fallen asleep.

  He brought her bag in from the truck, and noticed a Sudoku book poking out of the top. Maybe it would give her comfort when she woke up. So he laid it next to her where she’d see it, and left her a note with his phone number. He’d have liked to do more, but the animals needed feeding, and it was getting late.

  His phone rang, and he saw Ernie’s number on the caller ID. What was he supposed to tell her?

  Once more, he prayed for the right words.

  “Hey Ernie.”

  “Is Mallory all settled in? Is she okay?”

  Nolan took a deep breath. This was a better
conversation for in person, but he wasn’t sure if he’d have a chance before Mallory woke up and talked to Ernie.

  “Mallory had a sort of breakdown on the ride,” he said slowly. “She told me about how her mother died.”

  The silence pained him.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” Nolan asked.

  “I was so ashamed,” Ernie said. “I blamed myself. She was finally going to leave him, but she was waiting until his next business trip. But then he got fired and he killed her the next day. I thought if only I’d worked harder to convince her to leave, maybe she wouldn’t have died.”

  “It’s not your fault.” They were the same words Ernie had told him when he lamented not being able to keep his father from beating his mother. But at least he hadn’t killed her.

  Ernie let out a long sigh. “I know that now. But it took a long time to accept.”

  “Did you know that math was what her mother had Mallory do so she didn’t witness all the beatings?”

  “It doesn’t surprise me.” Ernie made a noise. “Mallory was always an excitable, emotional child. Math calmed her down. So when Mallory needed comfort, her mother gave her math. It was amazing how one math problem could occupy her for so long.”

  Nolan closed his eyes as he thought about all of Mallory’s reactions. “I don’t think she knows how to handle emotions because she always used math to hide from them.”

  His own insight surprised him. But as he rolled the thought around in his head, it made a lot of sense. Had he made a mistake in leaving problems for her to do, rather than leaving her alone with her emotions?

  “Bill, her father, would get angry when Mallory got emotional. He’d hit Carol and tell her she needed to control Mallory. My poor girl.”

  “Do you think Susan could help her?” Nolan hadn’t seen his therapist in years, but he knew Ernie still stayed in touch with her.

  “I’ll give her a call. Are you coming to the house after you finish feeding the stock?”

  The dinner Ernie had been making had smelled wonderful. But after hearing why Mallory hated broccoli cheese soup, Nolan wasn’t sure he could eat it either.