Keeping Christmas

by B. J Daniels

  Dixie didn’t correct her. “I never knew my father was ever in Idaho.” She’d heard her uncle Carl and Mason and Ace all talk about their adventures. Her father hadn’t always stayed in Texas, but he’d never said where he’d been. She thought she now knew why.

  Strange, though, that he’d never mentioned that was where he’d met her mother. Or that they’d had a son who died up there and then had Rebecca before moving back to Texas.

  All to hide the fact that he hadn’t married her yet?

  Is that why he’d flatly denied knowing the people in the photographs? She’d known he was lying, but she couldn’t understand how or why he would lie about his own son and daughter, no matter the situation.

  “There must have been something about my father that made her fall in love with him,” Dixie said.

  “Oh, he was smooth. Cocky and full of himself. Swept Elizabeth off her feet with all his grandiose plans. Did he ever make anything of himself?”

  “Not really,” Dixie said, and heard Chance chuckle where he leaned against the wall by the door.

  She glanced around the small apartment. “Is there any chance you have a photograph of my mother?”

  Glendora looked toward the back of the apartment, her expression vague. “I had some. Let me see if I can find them.” She pushed herself up from the couch and disappeared into the bedroom.

  Dixie looked over at Chance. She knew what he must be thinking. Why would anyone want to kill her over any of this? It made no sense. There was no mystery here. No deep, dark secret unless it was the fact that Rebecca had been born out of wedlock. Wouldn’t Rebecca have a fit if she knew.

  “Sounds like your father has a few secrets,” Chance said.

  She nodded, thinking this would explain why she’d had trouble finding out anything about her mother given that her mother’s real name apparently wasn’t Sarah, but Elizabeth Sarah Worth and she was born in Idaho—not Texas.

  Glendora returned with a rubber-banded shoe box. She set it on the coffee table in front of the couch. “There might be something in here. I’ve moved so much, a lot of things have been lost over the years.”

  Dixie slipped off the rubber band and lifted the lid on the shoe box as Glendora joined her on the couch again.

  The box was filled with black-and-white photos, the edges rough, the paper yellowed and curled.

  She looked up at Chance, then with trembling fingers reached into the box and began to go through the photos.

  Glendora couldn’t remember most of the names of the people in the snapshots. “It’s been too long,” she said.

  Dixie looked for a face that resembled her own, given that she’d been told she looked like her mother. The deeper she dug in the box, though, the more disappointed she became. Most of the photographs, it turned out, were from Glendora’s first husband’s family.

  “You’re so lucky to have a sister,” Glendora said. “I wished my sister and I could have stayed together.”

  Dixie nodded, feeling guilty since she and Rebecca had never been close even though they now lived only a few miles from each other. “Would you like me to send you some photographs? Rebecca has three children.”

  Glendora smiled, her eyes misty. “I would love that.”

  Dixie picked up a photograph of a cute little girl with long blond hair making a face at the camera.

  “That’s Amelia,” Glendora said, and reached for the photograph, smiling as she studied the girl’s face.

  “Amelia?”

  “Amelia Hardaway. She married the oldest McCarthy boy.” Glendora fell silent and Dixie could see that all this was tiring her. She quickly dug through the rest of the photographs, holding out little hope any of her mother had survived.

  Glendora was still clutching the photo of the little girl. “Amelia was your mother’s best friend. Those two…” she said, as if lost in the past. “They were inseparable.”

  Dixie could feel Chance’s gaze on her. “Is Amelia still around?”

  “I got a Christmas card. Was it this year or last?” She frowned as if trying to remember. “She didn’t get far from home. Still lives on the farm outside of Ashton. Or she did. I think she said her husband died.”

  Dixie turned one of the last photographs over and froze. It was of two young girls, one about eleven, the other in her late teens.

  Her heart took off in a gallop as she stared into the face of the younger girl. She felt Chance’s palm on her back and looked up, and realized she must have made a sound that brought him to the end of the couch next to her.

  She showed the snapshot to Glendora, not wanting to let go of it. “Is that you and my mother?”

  Glendora smiled and nodded, eyes misting over. “My baby sister.”

  Dixie quickly looked through the few remaining photographs, finding only one other one of her mother. In it, both girls were older. Glendora was standing next to a bus, a suitcase at her feet. Beside Glendora was her younger sister holding a baby and next to Dixie’s mother was a man wearing a fedora, his face in shadow and turned away from the camera as if he didn’t want his photo taken.

  “That was the day I left home,” Glendora said, leaning in to look at the snapshot. “My aunt took the photo of all of us. It was the last time I saw Elizabeth and Rebecca. Our aunt died a few years later, but Elizabeth didn’t come back for the funeral.”

  Dixie stared at the photo, running her finger over her mother’s face. There was definitely a resemblance between her and her mother at this age. She could understand now why sometimes she caught her father looking at her with such a sad expression.

  “Who is the man standing next to my mother?” Dixie asked.

  Glendora looked up at her in surprise. “Why that’s your father. He was a lot younger then, but that’s him, all right. Beauregard Bonner. Like I could ever forget that name.”

  Dixie stared at the man in the photo. It was definitely not Beauregard Bonner.

  Chapter Twelve

  Chance felt as shaken as Dixie looked as they left Glendora’s apartment. “You all right?” he asked once they were outside.

  Dixie nodded, seemingly afraid to trust her voice. He watched her breathe in the cold air, taking huge gulps.

  He knew that everything was finally starting to catch up with her. Saying nothing, he put his arm around her and pulled her close as they walked to the pickup. Beauregard was fogging up the window watching them. Tiny snowflakes glittered suspended in the air. Across the street, a gust of wind whirled snow across a yard, knocking over a huge plastic Santa Claus.

  Dixie had the two photographs gripped in her fingers. She protectively stuck them in her purse as he rushed to open her door and shoo Beauregard over.

  Chance saw her glance up at the fourth-floor window before she climbed in. He shut her door and ran around to his side, still trying to make sense of what Glendora had told them.

  As he slid behind the wheel, Dixie took the photographs from her purse and looked at them again. He started the truck, pretty sure he knew where they were headed next, but first he wanted something hot to drink and food wasn’t a bad idea, either.

  He found a café next to the old train depot. The lunch crowd had already cleared out so the place was practically empty. They took a booth at the back.

  “Food,” Dixie said as she sat.

  Chance laughed. “I should have known that would be the first word out of your mouth.”

  They ordered the lunch special. Dixie laid the photographs on the table as gently as if they were made of glass.

  “Who is he?” she asked, looking up at Chance, her eyes blank as if in shock.

  “Glendora could be wrong.”

  Clearly, Dixie didn’t believe that any more than he did. “That man, whoever he is, fathered a son who died, then Rebecca. That means that Rebecca is my half sister. We didn’t have the same father.” Dixie seemed blown away by that thought. “It would explain why we are so different.”

  He still didn’t know what to make of any of this.
“The obvious answer would be that Glendora is wrong about the man in the photograph. He could have just been a friend of the family.”

  “I might believe that if my father hadn’t tried so hard to talk me out of searching for the people in the photographs I found.”

  “Okay,” he said. “But then, where does your father fit in all of this?”

  “I don’t know and that’s what worries me,” she said, and glanced out at the darkening sky over Sheep Mountain. She reached into her bag and took out her cell phone. “There is only one way to find out.”

  “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Chance asked as she pulled on her coat and rose from the booth.

  “Are you kidding? At this point, I’m not sure anything is a good idea.” She waited as if needing his encouragement.

  “Maybe he’ll clear everything up.”

  She shook her head at him in wonder. “You slay me. Maybe he’ll call off whoever he’s hired to kill me and tell me the truth. Right.” She turned on her heel and headed for the door as she keyed in the number and put the phone to her ear.

  Chance watched her go, wishing he could spare her this conversation because no matter what Beauregard Bonner told his daughter, he had a bad feeling she wasn’t going to like it.

  DIXIE STEPPED just outside the café, leaning against the building out of the wind. A banner flapped loudly nearby. Snow blew past in swirling white gusts. She stared down the train tracks as the phone rang.

  “Hello?”

  Just the sound of her father’s voice stopped her cold. She felt tears burn her eyes. She flashed on Christmas mornings when she was a child and saw her father excitedly handing out presents.

  They always got way too much, but it was his delight at being able to give them everything they wanted that she thought about now. She couldn’t remember the last time they’d all had Christmas together and the thought filled her with sadness. Had she changed? Or her father?

  “Hello?” He sounded ready to hang up.

  She swallowed hard, the wind whistling past her. “It’s Dixie.”

  Silence. Then, “Are you all right?”

  “That’s hard to answer.”

  “Isn’t Chance there?”

  She smiled at that. “I haven’t given him the slip, if that’s what you’re asking. I need to ask you about my mother and this time I need you to be honest with me.”

  He made a sound, a groan, then she heard a chair creak as he sat down. “Dixie…”

  “I found my aunt Glendora. My mother’s sister. Aren’t you going to say anything?”

  “Your mother told me she was an only child,” he said, his voice soft, almost sad. “Her parents were deceased.”

  “I know about Rebecca.”

  “Dixie…” The sadness of that one word told her he wasn’t going to deny that Rebecca wasn’t his. “Dixie, come home so we can talk about this.”

  “We could have talked about it when I showed you the photographs I found in my mother’s jewelry box,” she snapped. “Instead you lied and said they didn’t even belong to our family and that you would get rid of them for me.”

  “I should have told you then, but I was so shocked to see that she’d kept photographs…” His voice broke. “I knew your mother had been in love with another man. The man abandoned her. She had a baby girl with him.”

  “She had two children with him. The first one, a boy, died when he was a few weeks old.”

  A strangled sound. “I didn’t know. She never told me.” He sounded heartbroken. Was it possible he was telling the truth?

  “If you had just been honest with me…”

  “I never wanted your sister to know. She was my daughter. I raised her from the time she was just a child. I loved her just as I loved you.” He sounded as if he was crying. “You’re my girls.”

  She felt the tug on her heartstrings so strong it made her legs weak. How could she believe he was trying to have her killed? He was her father. “Who was the man?”

  He blew his nose, cleared his throat. “I don’t know. Honestly. She never told me.”

  “You never asked about my sister’s father?”

  “I didn’t want to know. He’d abandoned Sarah when she’d needed him the most. What kind of man does that?”

  What kind of man does anything to keep the past from surfacing? “Dad—” her voice broke “—how far would you go to keep me from finding out the truth?”

  “Dixie, what are you talking about?”

  “Someone is trying to kill me and now that you’re trying to get into politics…”

  “Dixie, you can’t believe that I—”

  “I saw the men who grabbed me. One of them works for you.”

  Beauregard Bonner let out a curse. “Dixie, if that’s true, tell me who he is. I’ll get to the bottom of this—”

  “I don’t know his name. But I’ve seen him at Bonner Unlimited. He might have been one of the security guards at the main desk.”

  “And you decided because of that, he was working for me?” her father demanded, sounding angry and hurt. “Damn it, Dixie, he might have been fired and just wanted to get even with me. I don’t personally hire any of those men and you know it.”

  “What matters is that the men were after my research on the family. I heard them when they were ransacking my house looking for my journal.”

  “Dixie, I don’t know what’s going on, but you’re scaring me. Please. Come home so I can keep you safe here. The jet will be there tomorrow. Meet me there. Please.”

  She made a swipe at her tears as she glanced back into the café. The waitress was putting her order on the table. “I have to go.”

  “Tell me you’ll be at the plane. You know I’d move heaven and earth to keep you safe, don’t you?”

  “That why you hired Chance?” she asked.

  “I knew I could trust him. He won’t let anything happen to you.”

  She closed her eyes. “This other man that my mother was in love with…he called himself Beauregard Bonner.”

  “What? It wasn’t me. You have to believe me.”

  “I do believe you. It might be the only thing I believe that you’ve told me. I saw an old photograph of the man. It wasn’t you. I have to go.” She snapped off the phone, her hand trembling. Tears burned her eyes. She stood, huddled against the wind, afraid to let herself believe her father. Afraid he’d do more than disappoint her.

  BEAUREGARD HAD JUST HUNG up when he realized he wasn’t alone. He spun around, half expecting it would be his worthless son-in-law. He was only partially relieved to see that it was Mason.

  “What? First I find you in my office when I’m not here and now you just walk in without knocking,” Beau snapped.

  Mason held up both hands. “The door was open. Since when do I have to knock anyway?” He stepped in, closing the door behind him. “Tell me what’s happened that has you biting my head off?”

  Beau leaned back in his chair, feeling more exhausted than he’d ever been before. “I’m sorry. I just got a call from Dixie. She found some photographs in her mother’s jewelry box and has been trying to find the people in the snapshots.”

  Mason took a chair. “Snapshots?”

  “Sarah had a sister, apparently.”

  Mason looked surprised. “I thought you said she was an only child.”

  “Apparently not.”

  “Is Dixie sure about this? I mean, why wouldn’t Sarah have told you?”

  Beau shook his head. “There is a lot Sarah didn’t tell me. She had another child with the man. A son who died.”

  “This is what Dixie’s been doing? Why would she drag all this up knowing how much it hurts you?” Mason was on his feet, pacing the floor.

  “I should have told her when I saw the photographs from Sarah’s jewelry box. If I had been honest with her—”

  “Like that would have stopped Dixie.” Mason shook his head irritably. “This is all Carl’s fault. He had to give her that damned jewelry box…”

&nb
sp; “Carl couldn’t have known the photographs were in it. They were hidden under the velvet lining, Dixie said. They’d been there for years.”

  Mason swung around. “Didn’t Carl know? Damn it, Beau, he resents the hell out of you. He’s not even your real brother.”

  Beauregard felt as if he’d been touched with a live wire. The shock ricocheted through him, taking his breath. “I never want to hear you say that again. Do you hear me?” He was on his feet. “Carl is my brother. I don’t give a damn if the old man denied it. He’s my brother. Just as Rebecca and Dixie are sisters.”

  Mason raised a brow. “That’s what you’re really afraid Dixie’s going to find out, isn’t it? You feel guilty because the old man left everything to you. Didn’t leave a cent to his first son. You got rich. And Carl…well, Carl gets a free ride. Not quite the same as being the son his father loved though, is it?”

  Beau could feel his blood pressure soaring. “I won’t hear another word about this. Especially from a man who doesn’t even know who his father was.”

  Mason looked stunned and Beau instantly regretted his words. “I’m sorry.”

  Mason waved the apology away. “You’re upset. I understand that. I just hate to see you get hurt any worse, Beau.” He stepped to the bar and poured them both a drink. Mason had a knack for calming him down. “I didn’t mean to set you off, but damn it, Beau, you have to know what’s at stake here.”

  Oh hell, yes, he knew. He’d known since the day his father died and left him what Earle Bonner thought was nothing but a worthless Texas farm with a dirty flea-ridden shack on it.

  “Don’t you think Carl suspects you knew about the oil before the old man died?” Mason asked quietly as he handed him a drink and took his own to a chair. “Hell, I’ve always had the feeling he’s been waiting for the day he could even the score with not just you, but me, as well.”

  “Carl has nothing to do with this,” Beau said as he cradled the drink in his hands without taking a sip. He’d been drinking too much lately. He had to slow down, get his head clear.

  “You remember the story of Cain and Abel from that summer at Bible school?” Mason asked. “Carl has always been jealous of you. You think that doesn’t eat away at a man over the years. Your old man denied Carl’s parentage and treated him like the bastard he was while you could do nothing wrong. If Carl saw a chance to even the score, you telling me he wouldn’t take advantage of it?”