by Fern Michaels; Marie Bostwick; Janna McMahan; Rosalind Noonan
Chapter 1
In the fourth month of her pregnancy and thrilled by the peapod swelling in her abdomen, Kendra Erickson Loomis packed her leotards away in a drawer and bought several two-sizes-too-large sweaters to wear over black maternity tights when she was teaching at the dance studio. After enduring weeks of morning sickness, Kendra was overjoyed that she was feeling better and finally looked pregnant.
When Andy came home from the church that evening, Kendra made him sit down on the sofa and watch as she modeled her new maternity wear.
“What do you think?” she asked, turning in a slow circle. “Don’t I look the very picture of maternal bliss?”
“You absolutely do,” Andy affirmed.
Unlike Kendra, Andy had traveled down the road of parenthood once before, when fourteen-year-old Thea was born. Having been through the emotional ups-and-downs of pregnancy with his first wife, the wife who had deserted them when Thea was just four, Andy knew that Kendra’s pride in her thickening waistline would wane in the coming months. But right now she was happy and nothing on earth pleased Andy Loomis more than that.
“You’re gorgeous,” he said.
As happened so frequently now, Kendra’s eyes glistened with unexpected tears. “Do you think so honestly? Or are you just saying that?”
Andy’s handsome face adopted a slightly offended expression. “Kendra, are you accusing me of dishonesty?” he asked, straightening his shoulders as though to underscore the unquestionable uprightness of his character. “I’m a minister! Would I lie to you?”
“Well…I guess not,” Kendra said. She ran her hands over her stomach, pulling the fabric of her sweater tight under her little belly to show it off.
“Oh, Andy! I’m so excited! I can’t believe this is really happening! Growing up in Ohio, I had only two dreams: to be a dancer and to get married and have children. After so many years alone I’d just about given up. Falling in love, marrying you, and getting to be Thea’s mom was the most wonderful thing…” Kendra sniffed.
“No one could ask for more than I already have and now…this! Andy! We’re having a baby!”
“We are. In five more months. January fifteenth.”
“Five months! That sounds like forever. I wonder if I can wait that long?”
“I don’t see as you have much choice in the matter. Believe me, it’s coming a lot faster than you think. Actually, I wanted to talk to you about that. Well, not exactly about that—about the Christmas pageant. With the baby coming so soon after Christmas, don’t you think you ought to hand the directing job over to someone else?”
“Someone else? No way! How can you even suggest that? The Christmas pageant is the whole reason we met in the first place!”
What Kendra said was absolutely true.
When she came to Maple Grove three years before, it was the church Christmas pageant that brought her. At the time, she was a Radio City Music Hall Rockette, the iconic chorus line known for its intricate precision dance numbers, gorgeous costumes, and perfectly executed “eye-high” kicks. Every Christmas, for four shows a day, thousands of theatergoers lined up outside New York’s Radio City Music Hall, waiting to see the Rockettes perform in the world-famous Christmas Spectacular. Kendra was a ten-year veteran of the show. If she hadn’t slipped and broken her ankle during rehearsal, she might have continued on that path, living alone in New York and spending every Christmas season dancing at Radio City, and wowing the audiences who crowded the Music Hall to see the Christmas Spectacular, but never entering into the spirit of the holiday herself or even stopping to consider what Christmas was really about.
But Providence had other plans for Kendra.
After Kendra broke her ankle one of the other Rockettes, a nineteen-year-old rookie named Stacey, newly arrived from Vermont, made a few calls home and got Kendra a job directing the Maple Grove Community Church Christmas pageant.
It was supposed to be a temporary job, something to pay the bills until Kendra’s foot healed and she could return to New York. She never counted on liking Maple Grove so much and she certainly never planned to fall in love with Stacey’s brother, Andy, pastor of the church, but that’s exactly what happened.
“You can’t expect me to let someone else direct,” Kendra insisted. “That show is my baby!”
Andy got up from the sofa, stood in front of his wife, and laid his hand gently on her stomach. “No, Kendra. This is your baby. Our baby. And it’s going to be born just a couple of weeks after Christmas. I know how much you want to direct the pageant again and I know that no one can do it as well as you, but…so late in the pregnancy?
“Think, Kendra. Think about how exhausted you were last year. It took you weeks to recover. And that was before the dance studio had really started to take off. You’re busier now than ever before. Nine months pregnant—how do you think you’ll be able to direct the show and teach full-time at the studio?”
Kendra was silent, not wanting to concede Andy’s point, but realizing that he was probably right.
Before Kendra took over as director, the audience for the annual Christmas pageant was small and getting smaller every year. But Kendra’s fresh vision had breathed new life into the show, transforming it from a tired old holiday chestnut into a magical and inspiring production.
Come December twenty-third, the Maple Grove Community Church Christmas Pageant was the hottest ticket for miles. People loved the pageant, but few understood how much work went into coordinating and directing such a huge production, especially with a cast that was made up entirely of local teenagers. The kids worked hard, but they were still kids. Sometimes Kendra felt more like she was herding cats than directing actors. Andy had a point. In her condition, so late in the pregnancy, could she possibly handle directing the show? Could the baby?
Andy tucked a finger under her chin and tilted Kendra’s face up so she would look him in the eye. “Face it, sweetie. You’re a victim of your own success.”
Kendra sighed. “I guess you’re right. Have I ever told you that I hate it when you’re right?”
“You may have mentioned it once or twice.” Andy smiled. “Cheer up. It’s just for one year.”
“I know.”
“And just think! Before too long you’ll have one more little dancer to join the chorus line.”
“What makes you think the baby will grow up to be a dancer?”
“With her pedigree? Are you kidding? I expect her to be born wearing tap shoes and tights.”
“And what if it’s a boy?”
Andy shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. Boy or girl, the kid’s born to dance. After all, this baby has Rockettes on both sides of the family tree: you, plus my sister, Stacey.”
Andy grinned and laid his hand on Kendra’s stomach for a moment, then rocked backward as if stunned by the strength of his unborn child’s kick. “Whoa! Did you feel that? What did I tell you? Dancing already.”
A smile tugged at the corners of Kendra’s lips. “Andy, right now the baby is only about five inches long. You can’t feel a thing in there. I only started to feel it move last week, this little gurgling shift inside me, more like gas bubbles than anything else. In fact, it probably was gas bubbles.”
“Well, call it whatever you want, but I felt kicking. I’m telling you, Kendra, our baby is in there right now, doing a double-time step.”
Kendra laughed. “All right. You win. I am officially cheered up.”
“Good,” Andy said. “That’s one problem solved, now we’ve just got to figure out who will direct the show. That’ll be harder.
“Before you took over, expectations for the Christmas pageant were so low that I just had to find a warm body. If Stacey hadn’t called from New York to say that one of her Rockette friends had broken her ankle and needed a job, I probably would have asked Marty Kemper to direct it. But now that you’ve raised the bar so high…”
Andy ran his thumb and forefinger down the ridge of his jawline, thinking. “On the other hand…maybe Marty wou
ldn’t be so bad…”
“Marty Kemper!” Kendra shouted. “Are you out of your mind?”
Marty was a nice guy who owned an auto body shop in town and fancied himself something of an actor. And though Marty was an artist with a metalworking hammer and a spray-paint gun, taking dents out of cars was the extent of his talent. Still, that didn’t stop him from trying out for and occasionally landing small parts in community theater productions where he delivered his lines with overly dramatic grimaces and gestures in a loud, slightly squeaky voice that set Kendra’s teeth on edge.
“Over my dead body are you letting Marty get his hands on my production! Andy Loomis, I will deliver this baby backstage during intermission before I’ll let that happen! I mean it!”
Andy laughed and held up his hands, giving way in the face of Kendra’s ire. “Okay, okay. I guess Marty’s just going to have to stick to hammering dents out of Subarus. But who do you think can take over for you?”
Kendra didn’t hesitate before answering. “Darla Benton.”
“Darla Benton? Your former arch nemesis—that Darla Benton?”
“Don’t exaggerate,” Kendra said dismissively. “Darla was never my arch nemesis. We just had a few artistic differences, that’s all.”
Andy raised his eyebrows. “A few artistic differences? Funny. That’s not how I remember it.”
Mrs. Benton was the widow of Jake Benton who had written the script for the original pageant and had directed it for thirty years. As far as Darla was concerned, her late husband’s play, a version of the Christmas story told entirely in rhyming couplets, was absolutely perfect. She didn’t want it altered by so much as a comma. So when Kendra came to Maple Grove and scrapped the entire script in favor of something she felt was more “entertaining,” basically leaving out the entire story of the Nativity, Mrs. Benton was livid and determined to see Kendra fired.
And she might have succeeded had not Kendra, faced with the choice of either making up with Darla or having the show cancelled completely, added a second act that put Jake Benton’s words to music and focused entirely on the real Christmas story, the Nativity. And that one decision, more than anything, accounted for the show’s success.
Without the second act, Kendra’s show had been exactly what she’d set out to make it—entertaining. With the second act the play became something much more powerful, a story that reflected the beauty, wonder, and true meaning of Christmas to everyone who saw it, Kendra included.
While sitting in the darkened church-turned-theater, watching little Thea, as a humbled and awestruck Mary, sing about the miracle of Christmas, Kendra felt an unfamiliar stirring in her soul. The flame of her faith was ignited that night and Kendra’s life was changed forever.
And she wasn’t the only one. The revised Christmas pageant so delighted Darla that she became Kendra’s biggest supporter. Not only did she enlist the help of the Quilting Bees, the church quilt circle of which Darla was definitely the Queen Bee, to help sew beautiful costumes for the performers, but she appointed herself Kendra’s assistant director. At first, Kendra hadn’t been exactly thrilled at the prospect of having an eighty-year-old assistant, but Darla had proven herself energetic, helpful, and incredibly supportive. Despite their age difference, Kendra and Darla were now fast friends.
“Kendra, are you sure?” Andy asked. “Darla just celebrated her eighty-second birthday. Do you think she’s up to it?”
“Absolutely. Darla’s got more energy than anybody I know. She can run me into the ground most days. She understands the show. After all, she’s been working alongside me for the last three years. She’ll be a great director.”
But Andy still wasn’t convinced.
“Are you sure you don’t want someone younger? Maybe we could find another Rockette who’s on injured reserve. Of course,” he mused, “you can’t count on finding a Rockette with a broken ankle every day of the week. But maybe…”
Andy narrowed his eyes, feigning deep concentration. “If Stacey ‘accidentally’ spilled some water on the floor of the rehearsal space. You know, a thing like that might just make a girl slip and fall and then…”
“Andy!” Kendra slapped her husband playfully on the arm. “I will not have you involving your sister in one of your nefarious schemes. There will be no new Rockettes coming to Maple Grove—especially no newer and younger Rockettes. You’re just going to have to live with the one you have, even if she is old, and worn out, and simply enormous with child.”
“I can live with that. Come here.” Andy smiled and reached for his wife, pulling her into his embrace. “Can I tell you something, Mrs. Loomis? You’re the only Rockette I’ll ever want—the only woman for me, for now and forever. Got that?”
“I’m not sure. Would you mind repeating that?”
But Andy ignored her request, pulling her even closer, putting his warm lips on hers and letting the sweetness of his kisses speak for him.
Chapter 2
The week before Thanksgiving, Kendra looked very different than she had twelve weeks previously. Her formerly two-sizes-too-large sweaters barely fit her now. The purple yarn stitches stretched tight to accommodate the basketball bulge of Kendra’s belly, looking completely at odds with her still slender legs in their black tights.
Gazing into the studio mirror as she led her advanced beginner tap class through the last chorus of “Rock Around the Clock,” Kendra decided she looked like an enormous dancing grape clinging to a withered black stem.
Like a Fruit of the Loom commercial gone horribly wrong, she thought as she peered into the mirror before observing that, once again, Nora Casey had turned left when the rest of the girls had turned right, bumping into Jena Lukens.
“Nora!” Jena shouted, stomping her tap shoe. “Knock it off!”
“Sorry,” Nora mumbled. Her face turned red.
“You’re so clumsy!”
“Jena, that’s enough of that,” Kendra said, raising her voice to be heard over the clatter of the eight little pairs of feet that were still tapping out the time step. “Catch up. Both of you. Shuffle, hop, step, step, fa-lap, step. Come on, everybody. Here comes the swing step. Are you ready?”
Jena glared at Nora a moment longer before resuming the dance, pasting an insincere smile on her face, putting her arms out in front of her, and flipping her wrists up and down in perfect time to the music while her feet flawlessly tapped out the steps of the dance. With her easy grace, Jena was a sharp contrast to Nora who hesitated several moments, trying to recapture the beat before rejoining the dance. When she did she moved stiffly with her head held at a downward angle and her eyes glued to the feet of the girl in front of her, shuffling uncertainly through the steps, a heartbeat behind the rest of the girls.
Normally, Kendra would have stopped the music and had them all start again, so Nora wouldn’t get into the habit of falling behind, but she just didn’t have the energy. She was so tired.
It was a good thing that she’d taken Andy’s advice and handed the directorship of the Christmas pageant over to Darla. The way she was feeling now, there was no way she’d have been able to get through a full rehearsal schedule and teach classes at the studio. Three months ago, she’d been filled with boundless energy and now? It was all she could do to lead the ten little tappers through “Rock Around the Clock.”
Not for the first time, Kendra thought about how much had changed in the last three months.
Now she truly was enormous with child. And while she was still excited about the upcoming birth, she was worried about…well, almost everything. Nothing seemed as simple and clear-cut as it had been when she and Andy stood kissing in the living room, filled with love and gratitude for each other and for the new baby that would soon join their family.
It seemed to Kendra that the bigger her belly got, the more distant Andy had become. Being a pastor wasn’t easy; Kendra knew that. Andy had to be a manager, diplomat, teacher, speaker, and nursemaid, as well as a spiritual guide to his flock. He had to be
available to them twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Kendra had known from the first that being a pastor’s wife meant sharing her husband with half the town and being understanding when emergencies called him away, often at the oddest hours. With the church membership growing, it was unusual for the Loomis family to go more than three nights running without the phone ringing in the middle of the night, summoning Andy to the bedside of some seriously ill church member. Sometimes, after one of these late night summonses, he was able to return home and grab a short nap before going to work, but more often than not he went directly from the hospital to the church. Kendra didn’t know how he was able to function on so little sleep and, to make matters worse, recently the board of deacons had scheduled a lot of night meetings. That, in combination with the usual evening programs at the church, meant that Andy rarely ate with the family anymore.
Kendra and Thea ate their dinner together, often in silence. What had become of the sweet little girl with the blond braids and ready smile? The girl who had captured Kendra’s heart three years ago? Everything changed when Thea started high school. At fourteen, Thea was in the full bloom of adolescence, giddy and silly one moment, moody and brooding the next. Kendra knew that these teenage mood swings were normal. She remembered being that way herself at that age. Even so, Kendra found it hard to understand how her relationship with Thea had changed so much and so quickly.
Having barely known a mother’s love, Thea had eagerly welcomed Kendra to the family, proudly introducing Kendra to everyone she met as her mom, never using the word stepmother. That suited Kendra just fine. She loved Thea as her own child. So much so that, when she discovered she was pregnant, Kendra had been a little worried, wondering if she could ever love another child as much as she loved Thea. And as badly as she was behaving, Kendra still loved her.
But she missed the closeness and cozy talks they used to have. Now, the moment she finished eating, Thea mumbled a request to be excused and then went to her bedroom, rarely emerging until the next morning. Kendra did the dishes with only Wendell, the tawny and white cat she’d brought with her from New York, to keep her company. The greedy feline wound around her ankles while she worked, waiting for Kendra to toss a few table scraps his way. After the kitchen was clean, Kendra sat on the family room sofa with Wendell curled up beside her and watched television until bedtime, not bothering to build a fire because it seemed like a waste if there was no one to share it with.