A Merry Little Christmas

by Catherine Palmer

  “This situation wouldn’t be against the rules?”

  “Your guest cottage is a separate dwelling.” She turned her shoulder on him and started strolling after the group. “Mr. Maddox, you really won’t need to have much interaction with the family if you’d prefer to keep a distance. If I were you, though, I would welcome the opportunity to introduce my sons to another culture.”

  “If you were me, you’d know how hard it is to raise kids without taking on a whole extra family. How many children do you have, Dr. Crane?”

  “Please call me Lara. I’m single, but I spent the best two years of my life working for a hunger relief agency in Sudan. It changed my whole perspective.”

  “Maybe so, but you can’t possibly understand my situation.” Jeremiah accompanied Lara as she rounded the corner of the garage and headed down a path leading to the cottage. “I’ve had sole custody of my sons for the past ten years, and it hasn’t been easy.”

  “Peter Muraya would understand that kind of challenge. The Murayas have been trying to raise their children on two different continents and with a very limited income. Peter is not from a wealthy family in Kenya. His father was able to pay school fees only for his oldest son. Peter has four younger brothers and two sisters. So he is the focus of his parents’ dreams and hopes. He was able to get academic scholarships and grants to pay for his schooling, but he also holds down a job as a janitor at Reynolds. In Kenya, Tabitha crocheted bedspreads for a women’s cooperative. She was able to be home with her children and work at the same time. But here, her visa won’t allow her to have a job.”

  “Wait a minute. You’re telling me that a Ph.D. candidate in civil engineering is working as a janitor?” Jeremiah found it hard to imagine. “And supporting a family of five?”

  “The Murayas will do whatever it takes to succeed,” she said. “It would be helpful, Mr. Maddox, if you could keep the rent low.”

  “But I haven’t agreed to this. I need to think it over.” The baby in his arms began to wriggle. He looked down in time to see the bright brown eyes fill with tears as the little mouth scrunched into an unhappy frown. Jeremiah knew from experience that an ear-piercing scream was about to be loosed. He held Tobias toward Lara.

  “Here, you take him. He’s not happy.”

  “Jiggle him,” she shot back. “I need to make sure the cottage is suitable.”

  She stepped through the guesthouse door just as Tobias Muraya began to howl. Great, Jeremiah thought. A board meeting. Two teenagers. A wet, crying baby. An unexpected family. And a puppy.

  This was not going to happen.

  While checking the miniblinds for safety features, Lara peeked through the window at Jeremiah Maddox. He was holding Tobias at an awkward angle while the baby waved his tiny arms and bawled, volume increasing by the second.

  She watched with amusement. Such a smart, sophisticated, handsome man. And so superior in his views. I can’t have a dog on the property. My landscaping was just redone this summer. Well, la-di-dah. Welcome to the real world, Mr. Jeremiah Maddox.

  Tabitha Muraya had scampered out the front door the moment she heard her baby’s cries. Now she was lifting Tobias into her arms, balancing him over her shoulder, patting his back, rearranging the blue blanket. She spoke briefly to Jeremiah before hurrying back into the cottage. He stood in silence, then hung his head and rubbed the back of his neck.

  Lara had to give the man credit for raising two fine young men. Daniel and Benjamin clearly had a heart for helping others, and they were getting a huge kick out of playing tag with Wisdom and Justice. This cottage would be perfect for the Murayas. It was clean, dry and roomy enough for the family to manage beautifully. Peter could continue his studies in a much better atmosphere, and his older sons wouldn’t even have to change schools.

  Outside, Jeremiah let out a deep breath and looked up into the sky. She wondered if he was praying and hoped so. It would be a shame if a man who had so much going for him kept it all to himself. Lara had learned the hard way that following Christ meant taking on a servant attitude, and she wondered why that was so hard for some people to understand.

  God had given Jeremiah a great opportunity to help the Muraya family, she thought as she watched him start toward the cottage. As he stepped through the door, she let the blind fall back into place and gave the couch a pat. Solid. Top-quality furniture, a fully equipped kitchen, two large bedrooms and a bath with a jetted tub. This was considerably better than her own cramped little bungalow.

  Jeremiah crossed the room, took Lara’s arm and began to lead her away from the hubbub of the running kids and the fussy baby. As he moved, he lowered his head so it was near her ear and spoke in a muted voice. “Listen, I can’t do this. It’s a worthy cause, and I’ll contribute financially to your program. But I just can’t have a family of five living in my backyard.”

  Lara halted and looked into his face. Seeking privacy, Jeremiah had propelled her into an alcove with a bay window that faced the yard and the pool. He stood less than a foot away from her, his presence dominating the small space. It was appropriate and quiet for them to speak there, and yet for some reason, Lara felt totally thrown off balance. Suddenly she couldn’t remember the last time she’d been so close to a man. For what felt like ten years, it was all she could think about. This man in his starched white shirt. His dark hair and blue eyes. A trace of cologne mixed with perspiration from playing basketball with his boys. His warm hand on her arm, cupping her elbow, fingers pressing against her skin.

  She tried to breathe and couldn’t get the air to go down. Biting her lower lip, she fought for control. Okay, this was ridiculous. She had just broken off a short-term relationship with a man she’d met at church, and they had certainly been this near each other. She regularly shook hands with her foreign students and sometimes met with them alone in her office. It wasn’t as though she had isolated herself from the male gender.

  “Did you hear what I said?” Jeremiah asked. His voice rumbled from somewhere down in his chest. “I don’t believe I can do the family justice.”

  “Justice,” she managed, “is five years old. He needs a home. You have an extra house.”

  “And I have two kids of my own to look after. Listen, Dr. Crane…Lara…teenagers run around here all the time. They’re in and out of the driveway, the house, the backyard, the pool. I can’t be responsible for protecting these folks. The legal ramifications are immense. It’s just not wise.”

  “Wisdom is seven.” She was breathing again, her blood pumping and fire flowing back into her chest. “Tobias is five months old. You have room for them. You cannot say no.”

  “Yes, I can. This is my guest cottage. It’s reserved for my visitors. People stay here sometimes.”

  “So put your visitors up in your house. I doubt you and your two sons take up every square inch of that monster across the yard.”

  “Monster?” He leaned closer, his face coming within an inch of hers. “I designed that house. I built that house. That is my house.”

  “My house, my visitors, my backyard, my landscaping, my guest cottage. Are those things really important to you, Mr. Maddox?” She set her hands on her hips. “Can you just tell me what matters most in your life?”

  “That should be obvious. My sons are more important to me than anything else. I’ve spent my adult life taking care of them and raising them to be decent, productive young men.”

  “And you’ve succeeded so well that they want to reach out and help others. It wouldn’t matter to Daniel and Benjamin if you stashed the odd guest or two in your house so the Murayas could live here.”

  “I don’t have odd guests. I have normal guests and normal kids. And I don’t intend to raise my sons in any kind of unpredictable, potentially troublesome atmosphere. With a situation like this, who knows what could happen?” He glanced out of the alcove as Wisdom went tearing by, Daniel in hot pursuit. “These people are from another country, another culture. I don’t know how to handle them. I don’t h
ave time to deal with problems that might crop up.”

  “These people are a wonderful family who have been coping with very difficult circumstances. People are people, Mr. Maddox, no matter where they come from. Some are kindhearted, warm, generous and godly. Others are cold, selfish and mean-spirited. The Murayas would fall into the first category.”

  “And I suppose you think I rank with the cruel despots of the world?”

  “You’re not showing much heart.”

  “I don’t have much heart, okay?” He turned away, staring out the window. When he spoke again, his voice was stilted. “I love my sons. Ten years ago almost to the day, their mother walked out on us. I won’t do anything—” he turned to her “—anything that might hurt them. I have built a family. A home. A world that is safe and right for those boys. Things are as whole as they can be for two kids without a mother. You have to understand. I won’t take risks with that. It’s too precious to me.”

  Lara could hear the pain in his words. She reached out and laid her hand on his arm. “Jeremiah, your sons are almost grown, and you’ve done well. But Daniel and Benjamin are getting ready to step out into a world beyond the one you’ve created for them. It’s a place you can’t control. It’s huge and needy and filled with risk. They want to see that world, and the Murayas are part of it. Give this experience to your boys. Give a home to this family. It will be all right. I promise.”

  When he looked back at her, Lara could see that her arguments had prevailed. But something in his eyes kept her from feeling victorious.

  “I have an important meeting tomorrow morning,” he said. “My firm is designing the renovation of a factory in St. Louis. I’ll be out of town off and on until next summer, and I can’t keep tabs on all this. So, you will. You’ll come here twice a week to check on the Murayas. You’ll make sure they’re doing well. And you’ll see that my property is cared for, and my sons are having a good experience. Otherwise, the family is gone.”

  Lara’s mouth dropped open. “Twice a week? I can’t do that! Do you realize how many students I supervise? I have an entire program to manage, and I can’t possibly—”

  “You promised. You said it would be all right, and I’m holding you to that. Twice a week. Send me an e-mail update each time you check on the family. Agree to these conditions, and the rent is free. Peter can pay the utilities.” He started to step out of the alcove.

  She caught his arm. “You are the most controlling, self-absorbed—”

  “Trying to weasel out of your promise, Lara?” He swung around, blue eyes blazing. “Because I don’t deal well with people who break their vows.”

  “I’m not your wife. Get over it.”

  “Do we have a deal or not?”

  She pursed her lips, biting back the words on the tip of her tongue. “Fine. Twice a week. And you need to ask the Murayas for a damage deposit and make them pay a nominal rent. People do best when they earn their way. I can think of only one freebie that was ever worth having.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Read your Bible,” she muttered, shouldering past him out of the alcove. “Peter, Tabitha? Mr. Maddox and I have reached an agreement. You can move in this weekend.”

  If Lara Crane was a Christian, she was the prickliest one Jeremiah had ever met. Also, definitely the cutest. He wished he could stop thinking about the way her green eyes had sparked when she told him to get over it. As he drove home from his office in downtown Springfield that Friday evening, he pondered her words once again.

  He had thought he was over it.

  In the ten years since his wife left, Jeremiah had refocused his life. He had analyzed where he went wrong, and he had made every effort to correct his obvious failings. During his marriage, he had been extremely self-centered—choosing golf, his work, his old college buddies, over spending time with his family. He hadn’t helped his wife much with the boys. He had argued against her desire to start a home-based business selling toys online. He had resented the hours she spent on the computer, but he preferred watching television to talking with her. Certainly he hadn’t been interested in listening to every detail of her life at the end of a long day. She bored him, and he made little effort to conceal it.

  Now he was a different man, Jeremiah told himself. Everything he did was for his sons. He listened to their ideas. Answered their questions. Went to their sporting events and school programs. Made dinner for them almost every night. He had stopped playing golf except on business trips, and he went on as few of those as possible. He made an all-out effort to take part in things that mattered to Daniel and Benjamin.

  As he pulled into the garage, Jeremiah noted that once again both boys’ cars were in place. Odd for a Friday night, but he welcomed the thought of a house full of kids. He would be gone most of the following day. Electing to avoid the arrival of his new tenants, Jeremiah had scheduled an outing to an antiques mall and teahouse with a woman he had been dating for a few months. Melissa was a lovely lady, an interior designer. Like him, she was divorced with nearly grown kids. They had met on a job and found they enjoyed each other’s company. Though he hadn’t seen her so regularly that she would believe his intentions were serious, he looked forward to their time together. He had promised himself he would not remarry, at least until the boys were grown, and his relationships reflected that.

  At the same time, Jeremiah thought he was pretty good with women. He knew how to be kind and generous and even romantic. He rarely dwelled on his ex-wife in conversation, and he considered himself a truly reformed man. A gentleman, if that wasn’t overstating it. After all, he was going to look at antiques and drink tea the next day—and if that didn’t say something about how he had changed, he wasn’t sure what would.

  Climbing out of his car, Jeremiah heard the shout of a child as the garage door came down. The Muraya family wasn’t supposed to move in until the following morning, and his plan to spend the day with Melissa would conveniently remove him from that whole event. The cry outside hadn’t sounded like a teenager, though, and Jeremiah crossed to the back door. As he pulled back a curtain that covered the window, he spotted them.

  Two small children raced around in circles in the yard. One of the ugliest mutts Jeremiah had ever seen ran after them, barking its fool head off. And two teenage boys tossed a football back and forth over the kids’ heads as they all trampled the recently seeded lawn.

  A pang of trepidation shooting through his chest, Jeremiah glanced at the guest cottage. Through the front doorway stepped a woman with a shock of strawberry blonde curls. She spotted the kids and broke into a big grin.

  “No,” he said out loud. “No, no, no. Not this. Not her.”

  Even though he had ordered Lara Crane to visit the Murayas twice a week, Jeremiah had planned to be far from home when she showed up. He didn’t want to see those snapping green eyes. He didn’t want to hear her challenges and accusations. What he wanted was to stop thinking about her. But here she was again. Walking right toward him in a pair of jeans, a Reynolds University sweatshirt and a baseball cap—and looking positively fetching.

  “Run, Wisdom!” she sang out. “You can catch the ball! Get in front of him!”

  How could a grown woman—one whom he knew to be as prickly and stiff as a cactus—look so soft and sweet all of a sudden? As she clapped her hands together and jumped up and down on her tiptoes, Jeremiah realized she was downright striking. Her golden-red hair bounced around her shoulders. Her laugh echoed through oak trees still shedding the last of their leaves in the yard. Smaller than he remembered, today she looked like a college girl, and Jeremiah wondered if he had misjudged her age. On the other hand, she was Dr. Lara Crane, director of a university program. She couldn’t be that much younger than he.

  Reaching for the doorknob, Jeremiah caught himself. He couldn’t go out there. He didn’t want to see her. Didn’t want any part of this whole tenant-landlord thing. This was for his sons, and he planned to stay as detached as he could.

  Lara
cheered and applauded wildly as Justice caught a ball that Daniel had purposely thrown short. Then Peter and Tabitha walked out of the guest cottage and studied their sons for a moment. The three adults headed toward a rusty station wagon with two mattresses protruding from the back end. Grabbing one of them, they began to wrestle the lumpy thing out onto the driveway.

  “Whoa! Hold on, there!” Jeremiah called, pushing through the garage’s back door and out into the yard. “There are good mattresses inside. The guest cottage already has enough beds for everyone.”

  The three beside the old car paused and turned to stare. As Peter recognized Jeremiah, his smile widened. “Mr. Maddox, you have come home at last! Good evening, sir.”

  “Good evening, sir,” Tabitha echoed.

  Jeremiah noted a solid round bundle tied onto the petite woman’s back. Her burden rested inside a large cloth with a traditional African design, knotted over one shoulder. Wondering if this were some treasured family possession, he leaned closer. Two bright brown eyes peered at him over the edge of the fabric. Definitely a treasured possession. It was Tobias.

  “Good evening, Mr. and Mrs. Muraya,” Jeremiah said. He pushed his hands into his pockets to keep from touching the baby’s small head with its soft curls. “Dr. Crane, we have plenty of beds. I ordered a crib for Tobias. The furniture store was supposed to deliver it and set it up two days ago.”

  “I noticed that. Thank you.” Lara’s green eyes were soft. “But Peter and Tabitha told me they would prefer to use their own things. These two mattresses are all the furniture they own, and they’re concerned about keeping the house in good shape. We’ve moved your newer mattresses into the guest garage.”

  “But I’m renting the house furnished.” He couldn’t fathom it. Why take off good mattresses and replace them with junk? “I expect the beds and all the furniture to be used.”