Coming Home for Christmas

by Marie Ferrarella

  Had he been standing by the front window, waiting for her? Or was this just a coincidence? Mrs. Manetti had told her that according to her real estate agent friend, Maizie Sommers, the owner of this house was extremely eager to sell it and everything inside.

  But somehow, until this moment, she hadn’t made the connection. She knew Keith had moved away but assumed that his mother had, too.

  Because of what Mrs. Manetti had said, she should have realized this was still the O’Connell house. She supposed it was the story that threw her. Mrs. Sommers had said the seller had grown up here, which meant it was his childhood home. If anyone had told her that her parents’ house was being sold, she would have been upset, not indifferent. And if she were forced to pack up whatever belongings she wanted to take with her, she would have had to hire a large moving van, not carelessly ask to have it all sold off to strangers.

  But then, not everyone was as sentimental or attached to things as she was. And, she supposed, in a way there was a cloud over this house. Maybe that was what Keith had been thinking when he said he wanted everything sold.

  The moment she looked up at Keith, that old queasy-stomach feeling came over her. She had to fight to keep it in check. This was business, Kenzie reminded herself. Her smile increased its wattage. Partially it was the saleswoman in her, and partially it was just the woman in her responding to the man.

  He had only gotten better looking.

  It figured. Was he married?

  It had been ten years since she’d seen him. Of course he’d gotten married.

  Hadn’t he?

  Kenzie dealt with a great many people in her line of work, and she was accustomed to all types crossing her path. As far as looks went, Keith, with his chiseled features, somber expression and sad green eyes, was definitely in the top 3 percent. She allowed her well-organized mind to wander just a little bit.

  She had to admit that if Marcy or Marilyn had wanted to set her up with someone who resembled Keith, she probably wouldn’t have turned the offer down, principles or no principles.

  The next moment, Kenzie sternly upbraided herself for allowing her mind to wander this far off course, even for a split second. Even if it was Keith.

  Grow up, Kenzie.

  This was definitely not how she conducted business. It didn’t matter if this was Keith, just as it didn’t matter if she was dealing with a man who looked like Prince Charming or resembled a diseased frog. The only thing that mattered was whether or not she could help him sell the possessions inside his house. She could if those items were in decent condition or, barring that, if they were unique and interesting.

  And even if that wasn’t the case, she could offer suggestions on the measures he needed to take to make some money on the items.

  All these thoughts went racing through her head in far less time than it took for an outsider to actually review what had happened.

  Showtime, Kenzie thought. She was ready. She liked to think of herself as always ready.

  She handed him her card. “Mr. O’Connell?” she asked, her throat feeling remarkably dry as she formally said his name. She waited for him to recognize her.

  Green eyes went up and down the length of her, taking measure of her. Her breath backed up in her lungs.

  “Yes?” Keith answered. There was absolutely no recognition in his eyes.

  Banking down her disappointment—reminding herself that she had done a lot of transforming since she’d been in high school—Kenzie forced a smile to her lips and extended her hand to him. “Mrs. Sommers called to tell me that you were looking for someone to help you find a new home for your things.”

  The woman standing in front of him with the thousand-watt smile seemed far too youthful to be handling anything with the word estate in it. He felt as if he had just accidentally wandered into a children’s story time. The underage woman made it sound as if his mother’s things were animated with lives of their own.

  Which was beyond ridiculous.

  A distant, formless memory hovered about his brain, teasing it, but when he tried to capture it, to nail it down, it eluded him.

  The woman on his doorstep reminded him of someone.

  Who?

  He pushed the thought aside.

  “Technically, they’re not my things,” he informed her. “I don’t care if they find a home or not. I just need to get them out of the house. Mrs. Sommers seems to think the house will show much better—and sell better—if there are no distracting pieces of furniture scattered throughout the house, cluttering it up.”

  Kenzie nodded, hurt that there was no recognition in his eyes when he spoke to her. Reminding herself that she looked quite a bit different now didn’t help.

  Give it time, Kenzie.

  “Okay,” she said gamely to him once she was inside the front door. “Why don’t you show me around so I can see what I’ve got to work with?”

  He hadn’t been into all the rooms since he’d returned home himself. More specifically, he hadn’t seen most of the rooms since he’d left home ten years ago.

  Even when he’d returned yesterday, he’d deliberately remained downstairs, sleeping on the living room sofa. When he’d woken up after a less than restful night, he’d ventured only as far as the kitchen to make himself some breakfast.

  As for the rest of the house—his room, Amy’s, his mother’s bedroom, the bonus room they used for a TV room—he hadn’t gone into any of it. And he wanted to keep it that way until he felt up to viewing the other rooms—if that time came.

  But saying anything of the kind to this woman felt far too personal.

  Keith supposed he could just beg off, or murmur some noncommittal excuse that accomplished the same thing. But he had a feeling this woman wasn’t the type to accept no for an answer, at least not without a really good reason.

  To be fair, he decided to make one attempt at accommodating her while maintaining the balance he was searching for.

  “You can just find your own way through the house. I don’t mind if you poke around,” he added, thinking she probably wanted a chance to review what might sell and what just needed to be carted away.

  The smile was lightning fast as she attempted to coax him into accompanying her. “I’m bound to have questions,” she told him. When he made no response, thinking she’d take the hint, she just continued. “If you come along as my guide, it’ll go faster that way. I promise.” Turning on her heel, she led the way to the staircase.

  He was really beginning to regret this.

  Chapter Three

  Walking ahead of him, Kenzie had just managed to climb up one step on the staircase when melodic chimes announced that there was someone on the other side of the front door.

  Keith looked from the door back to the woman standing just ahead of him. He was hard-pressed to say which bothered him more—going upstairs with the woman he was still trying to place, or dealing with what had to be a prospective buyer. He wanted the house emptied almost as much as he wanted it sold. He just didn’t want to be the one dealing with either firsthand.

  Looking at his expression, Kenzie could almost read his mind. It occurred to her that for a relatively uncommunicative man, Keith didn’t keep his thoughts all that well hidden.

  “It’s too soon for a prospective buyer to be turning up on your doorstep, and even if there was one this fast, he or she would be coming in with Mrs. Sommers. They wouldn’t be here on their own, ringing your doorbell—I’m assuming you gave her a set of keys.”

  How had he forgotten that? Though he hated to admit it, even to himself, all of this had shaken him up more than he thought it would.

  “Yes, I did,” he answered.

  As if on cue, the doorbell rang again, sounding a little more demanding this time around, if that was actually possible.

  Kenzi
e withdrew from the first step, facing him squarely, toe-to-toe. “I can get that for you if you’d like,” she offered.

  “No, thanks. I can answer it myself,” he retorted stiffly, then glanced at her expectantly.

  It took her a second, but again, she seemed to sense what he was thinking. “Why don’t I just start the tour without you?” she offered.

  His grunt told her that she’d guessed right again. “That sounds good.”

  Having no other recourse, Kenzie turned back around and went up the stairs. It was only after she had reached the landing and the doorbell had rung for a third time that she heard any sort of movement on the floor below. Keith was finally opening his front door.

  Kenzie shook her head. She remembered a far different Keith. While not exactly gregarious, he’d been popular and friendly. What had happened to him in the past ten years to change him into this stoic, distant man she’d met today?

  Putting Keith out of her mind, she scanned the small bedroom she’d entered. Amy’s room. Judging by the soft decor, the pastel accent colors and the white eyelet comforter on the four-poster double bed, the bedroom had not been touched since the girl had died.

  Amy had been a very pretty, popular teenage girl, Kenzie recalled, looking at the photographs tacked onto the cork bulletin board above the small desk. The montage included some shots from her childhood, but for the most part, it depicted her high school years. There was even, Kenzie realized as she drew closer, a picture of Amy and her. Her heart ached a little as she looked at it. It had been taken at one of the baseball games they’d attended at school. She could remember standing next to Amy when someone had snapped it.

  The next moment, another photograph caught her eye, and Kenzie paused to examine it. Amy had her arms around Keith, who appeared to be teasing her.

  That was the Keith she remembered. A wave of nostalgia hit her. The man she’d left downstairs seemed to be light-years away from the teenager in the photograph she was looking at.

  He was decidedly happier in the picture, Kenzie thought. He had laughter in his eyes. The man answering the door downstairs didn’t appear as if he actually knew how to smile.

  Kenzie swiftly took account of the closet and the other items in the room. Although the bedroom had apparently been cleaned on a regular basis, nothing had been touched or moved. It had been preserved like a shrine to Amy’s memory. She guessed that had been Amy’s mother’s doing, because unless she’d read him incorrectly, Keith was definitely reluctant to come up here.

  Had he been here since Amy’s death? The thought saddened her that maybe he hadn’t. Taking it a step further, she began to think that quite possibly he hadn’t even been back to the house in all this time, which meant that he and his mother had been estranged at the time of her death.

  Her first impulse was to run downstairs and throw her arms around him, saying how sorry she was. Of course, since he didn’t seem to remember her, that would only spook him. She’d approach this more subtly, she decided—but she did intend to get to the bottom of this and find the answers to her questions. If nothing else, she owed it to Amy to see to it that Keith made peace with whatever demons were haunting him.

  Kenzie went through the other two upstairs bedrooms as quickly as she could. After doing this job for a number of years, she’d developed an eye for what could sell and what would be passed over. Since Keith had told her he wanted to get rid of everything, she inventoried the clothes and furnishings, placing everything into two categories: what would sell and what would ultimately have to be disposed of in some other fashion.

  When she was finished, Kenzie made her way downstairs quietly. She was just in time to hear the person—an older woman—who had rung the doorbell tell Keith, “I could drive you over to the funeral home if you’d like.”

  Keith guided the woman in his mother’s foyer toward the door. He’d been polite, letting her elaborate on how she felt when she’d let herself into the house and found his mother unconscious on the floor, but he didn’t know how much longer he could maintain his facade. He didn’t want details. Details would only reel him in, and he wanted to remain distant.

  It was time to send the woman on her way.

  “No, I know where it is. Thanks, anyway, Mrs. Anderson.”

  Peggy Anderson lingered in the doorway. “It’s just not going to be the same without your mother living next door to me,” she told him sadly. “Your mother had a way of lighting up everyone’s life the second she came in contact with them.”

  “So I’ve heard,” Keith replied, an extremely tight, polite smile underscoring the words.

  Observing him, Kenzie could see that he was holding himself in check. Keith was probably afraid that if he allowed his guard to go down, he’d fall apart.

  Sympathy flooded through her.

  It intensified as she drew closer.

  Ushering Mrs. Anderson out of the house, Keith closed the door firmly behind the talkative woman. He stood there for a moment, looking at the closed door, his entire body a testimony to rigidly controlled grief.

  Or so it seemed to Kenzie.

  There were men who wanted only to be left alone when they were dealing with their darkest hour. However, she had never learned how to accommodate them, because everything within her cried out to offer a grieving person as much comfort as she could render.

  And besides, this was Keith. There was no way she could stand on ceremony.

  Coming up behind him, she placed her hand on his rigid shoulder, trying to convey her availability to comfort him in his grief. She said with a great deal of sincerity, “I’m so sorry.”

  Keith almost jumped when he felt her hand on his shoulder. He’d forgotten all about her. How long had she been standing there? She was supposed to be upstairs, taking inventory, not down here, eavesdropping.

  He swung around to look at her. “You can’t sell any of it?” Keith asked, assuming that her apology referred to the things she’d found in the upstairs bedrooms.

  “What?” It took Kenzie a minute to untangle his reaction. And then she understood. They were talking about two entirely different things.

  “Oh, no, I’m not apologizing about anything that has to do with your estate. I just wanted to tell you how very sorry I am about your loss.” And then Kenzie frowned, shaking her head. “The words are trite,” she was quick to admit, “but that doesn’t make the sentiment any less genuine.”

  “I’m sure it is,” he said crisply, cutting the young woman off in case she had more to say on the subject.

  This whole thing was much too private, and he didn’t want to talk about it. However, he could see that she felt she had to say something. He shrugged away any obligation she might have thought she had in this case.

  “Everyone’s got to die sometime, right?” He needed to get out—and he actually did have somewhere else to be. “I have to leave for a while. Go on with your tour. Let me know if you think you can sell these things and what they might go for.”

  “Absolutely,” she promised, then asked, “Where are you going?”

  He wasn’t prepared to be questioned, so he didn’t have a lie on tap. Which was how the simple truth wound up coming out. “I’ve got to go see about making funeral arrangements.”

  Now there was something she’d find oppressive if she had to face it on her own. “Are you going alone?”

  Again, she’d caught him off guard. And there was that weird feeling again, as if he knew her from somewhere. But that wasn’t possible, was it?

  Either way, Keith thought that was an odd question for her to be asking him. “Yes. Why do you ask?”

  “I just thought you might want some company. You know, someone to talk to. This isn’t exactly a run-of-the-mill errand you’re about to undertake,” she pointed out.

  He turned the tables on her by saying, “If you need to
talk to me, we can meet later.”

  With that, and a mumbled “See you later,” he walked out before Kenzie had a chance to say that she thought he was the one who needed to talk, not her.

  Instead of going back to her work—she had yet to inventory the first floor—Kenzie went to the front window, moved aside the curtain and stood in silence as Keith walked down the driveway to his car.

  Here was someone who was either oblivious to, or more likely in denial about, the extent of his own grief.

  Watching him, Kenzie made up her mind.

  * * *

  There were too many damn questions to answer, Keith thought wearily half an hour later.

  Mrs. Anderson had told him that, per his mother’s wishes, upon her death, Dorothy O’Connell wanted to be laid out at Morrison & Sons Funeral Home. He’d assumed from this information that all the paperwork had been taken care of.

  He’d assumed wrong.

  He supposed he could have just taken the easy way out, called the funeral director to ask about the costs and then assured the man that the check would be in the next day’s mail. To be honest, Keith still wasn’t entirely sure what he was doing here. It all seemed rather perverse and against what he’d always felt his role would be after his mother’s final breath had been taken.

  This process wasn’t supposed to matter to him, but it did.

  He supposed that somewhere—very deep inside—was still a sliver of the kid he had once been. The kid who had gotten along with his mother and had wanted nothing more than to take care of her and his sister. He’d wanted to be the man of the family.

  He must have been all of ten or eleven years old at the time.

  Before the age of reason, Keith silently added.

  “I can write up a full accounting,” Abe Morrison Sr. was telling him.

  The funeral director looked exactly the way Keith would have expected the man to look. Tall, thin, somber, with a touch of gray at his temples and a soft voice, as if he knew that speaking above a certain decibel level would be intruding on the next-of-kin’s grief.