Longing for a Cowboy Christmas

by Leigh Greenwood

  Author’s Note

  This Christmas story stems from my novel, Paradise Valley (Sourcebooks, 2013). I wrote Paradise Valley with no outline and no plan of what would happen in the story or how it would end. I simply sat down and started the book with Maggie alone on the Wyoming plains, digging a grave for her husband, who’d been murdered by outlaws. I hope you will read Paradise Valley and learn how the beautiful love story of Maggie and Sage Lightfoot began, and what they went through before ending up devoted to each other by the end of the book.

  Because Paradise Valley ended with Maggie carrying a baby whose father was unknown, I felt my readers deserved to know what happened with that baby. That in turn led to writing this Christmas story and finding a “Christmas miracle” ending for Sage and Maggie.

  As of the publication of Christmas in Paradise, I have been writing thirty-six years, with sixty-nine books in print. Visit my website (rosannebittner.com) to learn about more books to come and for my latest news! I am also on Facebook, Goodreads, Twitter, and Instagram, and I have a blog at rosannebittner.blogspot.com.

  Merry Christmas—every Christmas—to my readers!

  One

  Texas Panhandle

  November 1880

  A brutal north wind howled and swirled down the side of the canyon into the town of Hope’s Crossing as if determined to crush the smallest sign of holiday cheer.

  The storm seemed to take special aim at Rebel Avery’s little sod house. Inside, Rebel pulled her shawl closer, huddling in the soft, woolen folds. Chewing on her bottom lip, she shoved the curtain aside to peer out. No snow yet.

  No one was moving in the town that barely boasted sixty residents, give or take a few. They’d probably all hunkered down to ride out the November squall that had swooped upon them with little warning. School had been dismissed early, so her children, Jenny and Ely, were safe and warm with her.

  A sniffle diverted her attention to another matter, this one of greater worry. Rebel went for another wet cloth to replace the one already in use. She took the bloody one from Ely’s nose and gently pressed the clean one into place and sat down next to him.

  “What did you and Billy Truman fight about this time? Mr. Denver said he’s had enough, and so have I.” The schoolmaster had mentioned taking drastic measures if the boys didn’t settle their differences. Whatever that meant, it sounded ominous. Maybe kick Ely and Billy out of school?

  Ely shoved back a hank of sandy hair and gave an angry huff. “He called me a dummard and said I don’t have the brains God gave an ant. He’s right. I cain’t cipher, cain’t hardly read, cain’t do anything.”

  “Well, you’re not stupid.” Rebel lifted his drooping chin with a finger. “Some things may come harder for you, but you’ll get them with work. I promise. We’ll do it together.”

  She pushed back her chair and started to rise.

  “Billy called me and Jenny throwaways,” Ely said softly, sniffling. “Said we don’t have no ma or pa, and nobody wants us.”

  The words stung Rebel, and she could only imagine what they did to a sensitive nine-year-old like Ely. She was tempted to go have a talk with Billy’s mother, but Martha Truman was in no shape for that, huge as she was with another baby—her eleventh child. All to date were rambunctious boys called the Truman Ten and were known to strike terror into not only children, but adults.

  Rebel sat slowly, her anger rising. “I want you. And I’m not giving you up.”

  Four-year-old Jenny rose from the rug where she was playing with her rag doll. She propped one elbow on the table edge. “I want you, too, Ely. Billy is so mean.”

  “Stay out of this, Jenny.” Ely jerked the wet cloth from his nose. “This is my fight.”

  “Ely! Be nice to your sister. Neither of you needs to fight.” Rebel wished she knew the source of all this anger. Ely had been slow to trust and open up—understandable given where they’d been—but things were escalating instead of fading and had spilled over to Jenny.

  “Sorry.” Ely glanced up with a glum face. “That wasn’t all Billy said, Miss Rebel.”

  Jenny crawled into Rebel’s lap and snuggled close. Rebel took Ely’s hand. “Tell me everything. It helps to get it out.”

  The boy stared into the flames of the small fireplace. The fire cracked and popped in the quiet.

  Finally, he shifted his gaze back to Rebel. His voice trembled. “Billy said Mr. Travis is a no-account killer, and the judge might hang him. They won’t, will they?”

  Fear shredded the last of Rebel’s calm. “No, honey.”

  But she wasn’t so sure. A bounty hunter had ridden into the town seven months ago and captured Travis Lassiter. Rebel had only gotten one letter from him in all this time. Travis had spoken of his love for her and the children but said to put him out of their lives and go on. Months without another letter made her fear that he was dead.

  How could she stop wishing for the arms of the man she loved?

  She cried herself to sleep each night, thinking of their plans to marry. Travis had seemed eager to help raise Jenny and Ely after the town founder, Clay Colby and his wife Tally, had rescued them along with a group of women from the Creedmore Lunatic Asylum, and now here she was, a single mother for the foreseeable future.

  Like most of the men in Hope’s Crossing, Travis was an outlaw. Actually, Rebel had been told the town was a hideout before Clay, Travis, and the other men stopped their criminal enterprises and decided to become respectable. She hadn’t asked what Travis had done in the past.

  His hope for the future was what interested her.

  He was a fine man with a good heart, and she didn’t care what anyone said.

  Billy Truman had poked Ely with the sharpest stick he could find and dug around in the boy’s already fertile ground of insecurity. The wind battered the house like Billy’s fists had battered Ely. There was little justice in the world for small children who had no one but a former saloon girl to care for them.

  “I know what we should do,” Rebel declared. “Let’s bake some tea cookies. And while we do, I’ll tell you about my favorite Christmas.”

  “I like cookies.” Jenny patted Rebel’s face. “What’s Christmas?”

  The question stunned Rebel. It seemed inconceivable that the girl wouldn’t know the magic of Christmas. But then, she and Ely had been locked away for two years where no holidays existed, inside the walls of Creedmore Lunatic Asylum.

  “It’s the happiest time of the whole year, and it’ll be here in a little over four weeks.” Rebel struggled to put on a happy face for the siblings when she felt anything but.

  “I don’t believe in Christmas!” Ely scooted back his chair and stalked to the ladder that led to the tiny loft where he slept.

  Rebel sighed, her heart heavy, wishing she knew how to soothe him. But she didn’t know any magic words to make him forget the darkness he and his sister had endured. She couldn’t even put happiness in her own heart, so why did she think she could fix Ely?

  They needed something, anything, to lift their sagging spirits.

  With Jenny’s eager help, Rebel stirred up the cookie dough and told the girl of the time when she’d lived with her parents in Missouri—the year she learned about Advent and the calendar that marked off the special days leading up to it.

  The time before she’d learned the darkness inside one man’s heart.

  She’d been seven then and safe from the evil of the world.

  “My mother would start baking three weeks beforehand, and the house would smell like cinnamon and nutmeg. We’d hang a pretty wreath of pine boughs on the door, and my father would butcher a hog for Christmas Day. Excitement filled the air, and I’d pray to get a new doll. My brothers would hope for a new sled or skates.” Rebel rolled out the cookie dough and let memories of home sweep her away. “On Christmas Eve, Father would chop down a tree, and we’d have such fu
n decorating it.”

  “Can we have a tree?” Jenny asked.

  The question jarred Rebel. She’d given no thought to a tree. Even if she had, where would she get one? Trees were scarce in this part of Texas. But she didn’t hesitate. “Yes, we’ll have a tree.” Of some sort. Even if she had to decorate a tumbleweed.

  An image of a homemade wooden ornament with the name Abigail carved into it flashed into her head. Rebel’s chest squeezed. Abigail Marie Quinn didn’t fit inside dingy, smoke-filled saloons and back rooms.

  Remembering the holiday awakened such a longing inside Rebel that she could scarcely stand it. Oh, to go back to that innocent time!

  The small treats each day.

  The Advent candle they lit each Sunday before Christmas.

  The excitement of making gifts and hiding them under the tree.

  She angrily dashed away her tears. There was no going back. Those days were dead, gone, and buried. Best to not think about them.

  Jenny patted her arm. “Why are you sad?”

  Rebel forced a smile. “I’m sad that our cookies can’t feed all the children. But we’re going to enjoy these, and maybe next time we can bake more. Now let’s get them in the oven.”

  While the cookies baked, Jenny went off to play with her doll, and Rebel’s thoughts turned back to Travis. Oh, to feel his strength, his arms around her, his lips on hers!

  After all her years working in saloons, she didn’t have much to offer any man, but Travis never saw her as less. He said he’d be proud to take her just as she was. You couldn’t ask any more from a man than that.

  The relentless wind battered the small sod house harder and drew Rebel’s concern. She’d seen it blow like this before but not in the winter. She prayed it would stop soon.

  A sudden gust hurled something against the window, shattering it, and glass flew inside. Rebel jumped and gave a loud cry. Jenny screamed and hurtled from her bed. Rebel glanced around for a piece of wood to cover the window but saw nothing that would work.

  Ely appeared at her elbow, staring at the glass. “What are we going to do?”

  Good question. She put her arm around Jenny, who clung to her dress as helplessness washed over her. For a moment Rebel wanted to throw up her hands and scream. But she couldn’t afford to give in to desperation.

  She straightened her shoulders and grabbed a wool coat and scarf. “I don’t exactly know, Ely.” She’d have to figure it out.

  Afraid the cookies would burn, she tried to pull them from the oven, but in her haste, dropped the pan on the floor. She was drowning in problems.

  Sucking in a bracing breath to keep from bursting into tears in front of the children, she bent and scooped the hot dough back onto the pan. “I’m going out to try to fix the window. Both of you stay inside where it’s warm.” She pulled on a pair of gloves.

  “I can help.” Ely opened the door for her.

  “Not this time. Please, I don’t want to argue. Stay inside.”

  The wind pushed her back, but Rebel gathered her strength and moved into the storm, pulling the door shut behind her. It was all she could do to stay upright.

  Outside, she noticed Clay Colby walking toward her, his dog Bullet at his side. She yelled into the gale, but there was no way he could hear over the storm.

  As he got closer, she got his attention. “My window broke. Can you help me?”

  “Sure. I’ll have to go for some wood,” he yelled over the wind. “Go back inside.”

  When he and the dog returned, she hurried out to hold the piece in place while Clay hammered and soon had the broken pane covered. Bullet and Scout, a hound that belonged to the Bowdres, scampered around them, drawing a smile. Oh, to be so carefree.

  “Thank you, Clay. I don’t know what I would’ve done.”

  “Don’t mention it. In this town, we all help each other.” Clay smiled and patted her shoulder. “You’re not alone, Rebel.”

  Then why did it feel that way? “Care to come inside for a cup of coffee?”

  “No, thanks. I was on my way to meet the stage. It’s late. Come on, Bullet! Let’s go.”

  They said goodbye, and Rebel returned to the warmth of the house.

  Jenny came running, her sobs cutting into Rebel. “What’s wrong?”

  “My dolly’s broken. Everything’s broken.” She thrust her doll’s arm into Rebel’s hand and ran crying to her bed.

  Something had to be done to lift their spirits. To lose one of their own so abruptly with hardly a word since had plunged them into despair, leaving everyone wondering who would be next. A posse of lawmen could swoop in at any time. Christmas should be full of hope and optimism, not this cloud of worry. The memories of past Christmases gave Rebel an idea. She pulled her coat back around herself and retied her woolen scarf. “I won’t be long. Stay inside and, Ely, watch your sister.”

  Rebel fought the wind all the way to the Bowdre house.

  Nora opened the door, wiping her hands on her apron. “Rebel, come inside before you freeze to death.”

  “Thank you. This storm’s something. It broke one of my windows.” Rebel untied her scarf. “Clay put a piece of wood over it for now. But everything is wrong.”

  “What do you mean—everything?” Nora led her into the small parlor.

  “Ely has all this anger inside. He fought with Billy Truman again today. Came home with a bloody nose.” Rebel sighed and sank into a chair. “And Jenny’s doll’s arm came off, and she sobbed that everything was broken. It does seem to be the case. Then the pan of cookies I was baking ended up on the floor.”

  The beauty and warmth of the home surrounded her. Nora was a mail-order bride and had come to marry Jack Bowdre seven months ago. She was a plump, no-nonsense woman who jumped in with both feet to make the house a home—from the pretty rose wallpaper to the pictures of the surrounding landscape to the artful curtains on the windows. No sod here. This home was made of wood.

  “Some days are like that.” The teakettle whistled, and Nora rose. “How about a nice cup of tea? That will make everything better.”

  “That sounds lovely.”

  Nora left the room and soon returned with a tray laden with tea, cups, and little cookies. They sat with steaming cups in front of the fire while baby Willow, a child the couple had found next to her dead mother and taken in, crawled around them. Rebel liked the woman who sat across from her and her boundless love for not only Willow, but also a nine-year-old orphan named Sawyer whom Nora and Jack had rescued from a mean outlaw. The woman had the kind of strength Rebel wished for. Nothing seemed to get her friend down. Not even snakes scared her. She’d picked one up that had curled on her husband’s chest while he was unconscious. If not for that, he’d have died. The curvy, blond-haired woman had courage in spades.

  Rebel eyed the cookies. “Would you mind if I take one of these to the children?”

  “Not at all. Take three or four apiece,” Nora urged. “I’ll wrap them up when we’re done.”

  “Thanks.” Rebel took a sip of tea. “I have an idea, and I want to see what you think of it.”

  “If it’s a way to dispel this gloom and make everyone get along, I’m all for it.”

  “I want to have an Advent calendar—only the whole town will be the calendar.”

  Two

  “Oh, yes! I always loved the cheer Advent added to my holidays when I was a child.” Nora’s brown eyes twinkled. “Tell me more.”

  “We’ll have to somehow fashion a large calendar with a little door on each day.” Rebel took a sip of tea, her mind whirling.

  Nora bit into a cookie. “We’ll make it out of sturdy wood so this infernal wind won’t blow it over. Yes, that would be best.”

  Baby Willow tugged on Rebel’s skirt and she picked her up, closing her arms around the child, inhaling the sweet scent. With effort, she brought her thoughts
back to her plan. “Inside each little door will be a name for the person who has treats that day. The children will go to that house.”

  “Yes! Yes! And on each Sunday leading up to Christmas, we’ll light one of the four Advent candles.”

  “Great idea. I wonder if Skeet Malloy will make us a holder. That blacksmith can make anything. When this storm passes, I’ll ask him. We can get candles from the mercantile.” Rebel carefully untangled black strands of her hair from Willow’s little hand. “We’ll get the children involved. I know, maybe we’ll have them draw for a chance to be the one who lights the candle in church each Sunday.”

  “If they fight or misbehave, they’ll have their name removed.” Nora reached for the teapot. “More, Rebel?”

  “Yes, thank you.” Rebel moved her cup closer. “Unless I miss my guess, this will teach them to get along better, and I think it’ll fill the town with the Christmas spirit.”

  “Absolutely.”

  They sipped their tea and discussed the finer details. The more Rebel thought about the idea, the more excited she got. In a way, this would re-create her old Christmases before her life turned dark and ugly.

  “Have you seen Martha Truman lately?” Nora asked. “I swear, if that woman gets any bigger, I think she might pop.”

  “I’m rooting for a girl for her this time.” Nora sighed. “She has to break the cycle somehow. Ten boys is enough. And boys don’t help their mother like girls do. Lord knows, she can use all the help she can get with Sid gone so much.”

  “The other day, Martha confided that she’ll just cry if she has another boy.” Rebel could understand that. She was ready to cry at the drop of a hat anyway.

  “It seems like Sid should find a different job besides driving the stagecoach. He needs to be home to corral those rambunctious boys.”

  “I agree.” Rebel’s thoughts turned back to Ely’s most recent trouble. “Nora, I don’t know what to do about Ely. He has all this anger inside, and it seems to get more explosive each day. He thinks Travis hung the moon, and when Billy called Travis a no-account, it sent him over the edge.”