Finding Christmas

by Gail Gaymer Martin

  Benjamin captured her hand against his cheek and held it there, his eyes drawing her in. She felt breathless, startled by the depth of her feeling.

  Could this be real, or was it only her need for a friend? Benjamin—her friend, Greg’s friend, yet now so much more than that. She was ashamed of her thoughts. Benjamin had stepped in and given her company and concern at a time when she needed it, and now she was losing control. She’d become a teenager, imagining romance and wondering what it could mean.

  “How about some distraction?”

  Benjamin’s question surprised her, and she pulled her mind from her dilemma. “Distraction? What do you mean?”

  “I can’t bear to see you so depressed. I’ve told you over and over that you were opening yourself to all kinds of misery. I know you couldn’t stop yourself, but this is what I feared.”

  “I tried to stop. I kept telling myself I’d be devastated, but I couldn’t control it.” No more than she could control her feelings at this moment, looking into his eyes. His full lips looked soft in the dusky light ebbing through the window. Shadows deepened the lines in his face, giving him character and strength, like a man who’d lived through a war and came home a hero. Benjamin had become a hero in her eyes.

  Joanne witnessed his concern and forced herself to let go of the doldrums that weighed on her. “I’m ready. Distract me.”

  Her sudden outburst made him chuckle, and the sound surrounded her like a warm bath. A grin relaxed her tense face, and the feeling lightened her spirit. She wasn’t giving up. With God on her side, all things were possible. She just needed to believe it.

  Benjamin put the key into the ignition and the motor came to life. Immediately the heater’s air came through the vents and began to warm her. “Where are we going?”

  “First,” he said, glancing over his shoulder as he backed from the spot, “we’re going to buy a Christmas tree.”

  “Is it straight?”

  Joanne stood back and eyed the tree. Benjamin’s body stuck out below the branches as he turned the eye bolts on the tree stand. “It looks good.”

  He grunted with the last twist, then squirmed from beneath the limbs on his belly. When he’d cleared the boughs, Benjamin stood and brushed his hands on his pants.

  “I probably have sap all over me now. Can you see anything?”

  She studied his broad chest and lean waist. Her gaze drifted down his long legs to his loafers. “You look very good,” she said, amazed she had the nerve to speak her thoughts aloud.

  A frown flickered on his face, then it eased as he moved back to where she was standing. “It’s straight as a plumb line.”

  “Did you doubt me?”

  He looked as if he’d planned to make a comment and then stopped himself. “Where’s the Christmas music? We need carols.”

  She gestured toward her CD rack. “Look near the bottom and pick out something while I make hot chocolate.”

  Joanne watched him for a moment as he strode across the room and crouched beside the CD pillar. His good looks sent her pulse on a gallop, and she realized that by adding thoughtfulness, kindness, faithfulness and generosity to a set of broad shoulders and a mesmerizing smile Benjamin had unlocked her longing and had given her the urge to live again.

  She pulled her gaze away and hurried into the kitchen. Her feelings had blossomed with such speed that she felt lost as to how to handle them. Never would she want to scare Benjamin away with her overzealous behavior. She needed to calm herself and realize the feeling might stem from her needs.

  Joanne put on the teakettle and pulled out two mugs and the hot chocolate powder. She watched the flame beneath the pot as her thoughts flickered as brightly as the burner. She knew she’d always love Benjamin as her dearest friend, but the feelings that consumed her now were far from friendship. Her mind played games with her imagination. She had to get a grip.

  A shrill whistle signaled the water was hot. The sound blended with the music filling the air. Joanne made quick work of the cocoa, then carried the mugs into the living room.

  Benjamin had knelt near the fireplace and was adding a final log. Joanne crossed the room and set his mug on a nearby table.

  “I haven’t made a fire since—”

  “Hot chocolate, Christmas carols and a flickering fire. What could be better than that?”

  Her heart skipped.

  He struck a long match and bent to light the scented fire starter that she kept near the kindling. The cup of wax and straw glowed, and soon the small sticks burst into flame that caught in the large branches.

  Benjamin stood and set the package of matches back on the hearth. They stood side by side, listening to the instrumental carols of the Mannheim Steamrollers and the snap and pop of the blaze.

  “Pretty,” Joanne said, wanting her heartbeat to slow and her thinking to clear.

  “Not as pretty as you,” Benjamin murmured.

  His comment caught her, but she clamped her jaw without comment.

  After a moment, Benjamin stepped away. “We’d better get those lights strung, don’t you think?”

  “Tonight?”

  “Sure. Why do you think we set up the tree?”

  She hadn’t thought. Her mind had been tangled in the detective’s comments and her dizzying awareness of Benjamin. “Christmas is three weeks away.”

  “I believe in being prepared.”

  She knew it was a ploy to distract her, so instead of dissuading him, she agreed.

  A few minutes passed while they carried boxes down from the attic. When Joanne located the Christmas lights, she untangled the strings while he tested them. When they finished, they’d located five long strands that worked.

  Her on one side and Benjamin on the other, they passed the strings back and forth, looping them around the limbs while the rich pine scent wafted around them. His hand brushed hers each time, and a tingle rolled up her arm. Each pass renewed the sensation, and her emotions jogged through her limbs like a marathon runner.

  When the last strand was in place, Joanne stepped back and Benjamin secured the plug in the socket. The white lights danced across the limbs like stars. “It’s beautiful. Thank you.”

  He strode across the room and stood beside her again. The CD player shuffled, and Mel Torme’s smoky voice filled the room.

  Joanne struggled to keep her tears in check. The feeling of loss rippled through her, followed by a rich, sweet sensation.

  Benjamin rested his hand on her shoulder, conveying gentle heat. Her knees felt rubbery and a faint tremor shook her body. When she found the courage to look up, his eyes were fixed on her.

  She felt it coming, like a light illuminating a dark room—the feeling of coming home. His hand shifted from her shoulder and brushed along her neck to her cheek. The caress fluttered like the wings of a moth above a candle, translucent and airy.

  Shifting her weight, Joanne let her heart replace reason as Benjamin’s mouth neared hers. The touch caressed her lips with the gentleness of a breeze. She reveled in the exquisite feeling—strange yet familiar, urgent yet tender.

  She accepted the delight like a hungry bird, returning his kiss.

  Benjamin eased away, his hand still caressing the nape of her neck. Surprise brightened his eyes, then was replaced by something different. Perhaps guilt or sadness. “I’m sorry. I—”

  “It’s okay,” Joanne said, hoping to soothe. “We got caught up in the moment.”

  His gaze searched hers as his hand slipped down to her shoulder, almost as if he were holding her away. “I hadn’t expected that to happen.”

  She hadn’t, either, but it had happened, and she didn’t want to dismiss it. “Friends,” she said, captured by his darker look.

  “Always,” he whispered.

  Chapter Nine

  The morning sunlight stretched across the sand-hued carpet of Benjamin’s office. He swiveled his chair and gazed out the window offering a view of the Detroit River, and beyond it, Canada. He’d slept badly. J
oanne’s image clung to his thoughts and no tossing or turning would dispel the longing that wound through him. He’d kissed her, and it was too late to take it back.

  The memory of the kiss was like a wonderful dream. He’d controlled his yearning for too long, and last night, he’d lost control. Joanne had stood across the room, her face bright and smiling as she gazed at the Christmas tree. Her long golden hair had cascaded around her lovely face and spread across her shoulders like molten gold.

  Her beauty had swept over him like an avalanche, unexpected and unrestrained. Benjamin had always admired her lovely features—her large sultry eyes the color of a summer sky, a mouth that curved to a gentle smile, but greater still, her sweet nature, her love of life, her mothering skills, her joy of family. Those were the qualities that made her unique.

  And now he’d ruined it. Their relationship would be strained. He had seen it in her face. Her eyes had widened in surprise, and her comment had sent him to the depths. We got caught up in the moment, she’d said, as if she’d already dismissed what had happened.

  What could he do now?

  Benjamin struggled to focus on his work. His last assignment had left him empty—a business merger. Dry, dull facts, financial figures, clauses and addendums marched through his head. He shifted the file and opened the folder, then grabbed his small digital voice recorder and pressed the record button. He begun to spew out notes for the secretary.

  When his thoughts drifted, he hit the stop switch and leaned back again. He should have specialized in personal injury, or criminal defense—anything but contracts, arbitration and business litigation. Working with people rather than corporations would give him a greater sense of purpose. Though he was good at it, corporate law had been a mistake.

  Greg had worked with people. His cases had weighed on him and had taken a toll on his emotions at times, but when he’d finished a case, he knew he’d changed someone’s life, hopefully for the better. All Benjamin felt he’d done was solve a problem for a conglomerate.

  Mental images of Greg triggered a thought. Joanne’s phone calls seemed connected to Greg’s and Mandy’s deaths. Why? And as Joanne said, why now? After three years, what would cause a woman to ask questions about Mandy? Did she suspect Mandy was alive? What evidence did she have? Was it only speculation? And now Joanne had received those odd e-mails. He needed to know more.

  Joanne’s startling comment had struck him. Maybe she wasn’t in the car. That hadn’t made sense at the time, unless—

  She’d been taken out by someone. Her seat belt had been unlatched, Benjamin recalled. That fact had bothered Joanne. He’d wondered if Mandy knew how to unhook her belt. She had been a bright child, but she had also been well-behaved and had minded her parents. He didn’t believe the child would unlatch her seat belt.

  So where did that leave him? The impact had undone the buckle or someone had unlatched it. Perhaps Greg had reached over the seat to—No, that wasn’t possible. Greg’s belt had been fastened when the divers found him. He couldn’t have leaned over to release it.

  Another thought nudged itself free. Greg’s death had been deemed accidental, but what if…? Benjamin shook his head. He’d seen too many movies. He pushed the thought aside. Yet it hung on the fringes of his concentration. What if Greg’s death hadn’t been accidental? What if a case he’d been working on had set off a madman who wanted revenge?

  Foolish. He’d gotten as bad as Joanne with that kind of thinking. Anyway, if Greg had been worried or threatened, he would have mentioned it. Or maybe not. Benjamin had already moved to Seattle. Why would Greg spend valuable telephone time discussing a speculative fear? Greg had never exhibited fear. He’d charged into his cases like a man on a mission. Fearless.

  No. It couldn’t be.

  Benjamin longed to have the problem-solving ability of a detective. For now, he would wait. If Joanne received a more telling e-mail or if the woman called Joanne again, perhaps something would click. Once the cops had more to go on, they’d take action.

  Joanne leaned against the door frame and gazed at the Christmas lights strung on the tree. She and Benjamin had gotten no further the night before. Her heart skipped thinking of what had distracted them—the unexpected kiss that she’d accepted with every fiber of her being. The sensation had startled her, and now guilt rippled at the edges of her reasoning.

  Greg had been gone three years, and she’d remained faithful to the love they’d shared despite her anguish and pain. She’d leaned on no one but herself and, finally, on the Lord. But the sorrow had put a wedge between her and God. She had tried to trust and to be assured that all things happened for a purpose, but the loss seemed too great, the hurt too deep, the sorrow too overwhelming.

  Along with Greg and Mandy, she’d watched friends walk away. Her family acted tense when she visited and they never came to Grosse Pointe. This had caused her sorrow to turn to bitterness. Her heart had turned as cold as the December wind.

  Tears burned in her eyes now and the tree lights became prisms. The one joy she’d experienced these past few weeks had been Benjamin’s return, and now she feared the kiss would strain their relationship.

  He’d apologized, and she’d passed the beautiful experience off as a frivolous moment, a meaningless event. The kiss had been so far from meaningless that Joanne couldn’t even think after it happened. Her rash response knifed through her as the words left her lips. Why hadn’t she admitted she’d enjoyed the moment, that Benjamin had become her mainstay since he’d come back into her life and that she’d always admired him as a person and respected him as a dear friend.

  Didn’t friendship make the best base for romantic relationships?

  She brushed the tears from her eyes. Preparing a lonely dinner no longer appealed to her. Instead Joanne crossed the room, drawn by the heady scent of pine and the twinkle of the lights.

  Boxes beside the tree were filled with ornaments she’d normally have shoved back into the carton. Today she opened a lid and pulled out a clear ball with the manger inside. Looking closely at the loving scene, Joanne felt her heart twist in sorrow. “Round yon virgin, mother and child…” The Christmas story filled her mind. When Mary looked at her newborn Son, she knew the truth, but until she experienced it, Mary had no concept of the pain and grief her mother’s love would endure.

  Joanne could never compare herself to that kind of sorrow, but she had known the grief of losing a child, and now new hope had wiggled its way out from the hidden places in her mind.

  As she pulled out each ornament and gazed at it, her mind shifted from Mandy to Benjamin, a rapture of sweet and sorrowful thoughts, leaving her yearning for a distraction.

  As she hung a pink and gold angel on an upper branch, the telephone rang. She hoped the caller would be Benjamin, with something to take her mind off her heavy thoughts.

  But on reaching the phone, she glanced at the caller ID and her heart stopped. Blocked. She gathered courage, noting the time, then picked up and said hello.

  This time the silence lasted only moments. “I’m afraid for my life.”

  The statement nailed her to the floor.

  “Who are you?” Joanne asked, keeping her voice as steady as her pounding heart would allow.

  “That’s not important. I am positive your daughter is alive.”

  Your daughter is alive. The words caught her and wrapped with such strength around her chest, Joanne couldn’t breathe. Before she could speak, the woman continued.

  “I have to get away. All I need is enough money to get far away from here so he’ll never find me.”

  “Who? Get away from who?”

  “If you can give me the fifty-thousand dollars I need, I’ll tell you where to find your daughter.”

  “What?” Sobs ripped from Joanne’s chest. Mandy. Alive. Could it be? She’d sensed it. She’d felt it in her heart. She’d heard the whispers of her daughter’s cry. But—

  “I’m sorry,” the woman said. “I must do it this way for our safety
.”

  Her safety and who else’s? Did she mean Mandy? “How do I know you’re telling me the truth? I don’t know you. You’re a voice.” Her legs quaked and she grasped the wall to stay upright. Be strong, she told herself. Extortion. People will say anything.

  She gathered her courage. “I have no proof you truly know where my daughter is. Prove it to me, then talk to me about money.”

  “I don’t have much time. He’ll find me.”

  The line clicked and went dead.

  “Who are you?” Joanne cried, pressing the telephone against her ear as if the contact would keep the line open.

  A mechanical voice broke in. “If you are trying to make a call, please hang up and try again.”

  The telephone slipped from Joanne’s hand and bounced on the end of the cord like a yo-yo until it spiraled to a stop.

  Disbelief flooded her, drowning her reason and hope to the depths of despair. She knew she should call the detective. Her sensible mind told her it was the only thing to do, but her heart told her otherwise. The woman might tell her where to find Mandy, but if Joanne called the police, she might lose the chance forever.

  Fear rose in her as she grappled for logic.

  Ransom. Her daughter was worth more than all the money in the world, but what if the woman was lying? She should call the detective.

  Joanne stared at the dial pad, her finger poised over the buttons.

  Donna’s hand felt riveted to the receiver. Her palms were damp with perspiration, and she glanced through the telephone booth’s dirty windows, fearing she’d be traced. She always blocked the calls, but she knew that technology today could probably locate her anyway.

  At least she’d been smart enough to change phone booths. A chill ran through her from the winter wind that slid through the small structure’s gaps. Donna slid open the door and stepped into the bitter air. She eyed her watch and realized she’d better hurry to the neighbor’s for Connie. The woman never asked questions, and Connie didn’t, either, because she loved to visit the neighbor’s daughter.