A Soldier for Christmas (17 page)

Mitch. Her life had been just fine until he’d first walked into the bookstore. From that moment, her life had changed. She hadn’t realized it, but coming to know him and fall in love with him had filled a place in her soul she hadn’t known was empty. A place that had never been filled before.

It was empty now, like her life. How had he come to mean so much to her? Mitch had become a part of her day. She hadn’t realized all the time she’d spent thinking about him, or finding fun things to tell him in e-mails, or looking forward to checking her inbox and seeing his name there.

Every time she’d turned on the TV, she’d checked the news channels. When she saw the reports and footage of the devastation left by car bombings, or reports of the latest military conflict far from home, she knew that Mitch was out there with his men and his weapons and his skills doing his best to protect freedom.

And his gift…the image of his words were etched in her mind. He wanted the job of watching over her.

How had it come to this? How had she let it?

Forget his strength and tenderness. Forget the joy he’d brought to her life. Forget the emotional connection he’d made to her heart.

Forgetting wasn’t so easy. Longing filled her, an unstoppable love for Mitch. With every breath she took, it was as if more love filled her up. More affection for him. She couldn’t stop it. She wasn’t strong enough to stop it.

Take this love for him from my heart, Lord. Please.

There was no answer. Just the one in her heart growing stronger and more true. Right along with the dreams she knew better than to let herself start believing.

In the purposeful activity of the staging area, Mitch shivered in the open air, despite the adrenaline kicking through his veins. He was packed and good to go, except for this one last thing. Impatient, he waited for the satellite phone to connect.

So far away, the line began to ring in Kelly’s apartment. He counted the rings above the drone of the prepping helicopters. Two. Three. Four.

C’mon, Kelly, pick up. Gritting his teeth, he waited, his heart dark and empty. Four rings. Five.

He bowed his head.
Please let her answer, Lord. I’m out of time here.

Six rings. Then an electronic beep. He hung on, he needed to talk to her. He needed this fixed before he went out. Then he heard it, her voice. Her sweet soft voice.

“Please leave a message,” was all she said. The gentle sound was like a guiding light in a dark storm, and eased some of the pain down deep.

He scrubbed his hand over his face. Leaving a message was the last thing he wanted. “Kelly, if you’re there. Pick up.”

Nothing. He knew she was there. Rent down to the soul, he did the only thing left. He told her the truth.

“I’m headed out on a pretty serious mission. I don’t know when I’ll be back. I just…want to know what I did wrong.”

He waited,
feeling
her on the other end, listening to him. He knew what the losses she had suffered could do to a person. He was guilty of some of that himself—closing your heart off and staying distant to keep from getting too close and feeling too much. It was easier.

But it was no way to live. Maybe God had led him to Kelly, because she needed more.

And, Mitch was man enough to admit, he needed more, too.

He cleared the raw emotion from his throat. “You are an awesome blessing in my life, and I—” Love you more than I thought possible, he didn’t say, he held back the truth, the frightening truth because he could feel her rejection ready to fall like a thrown grenade.

“Don’t forget me.” It was all he could say before his throat closed. He loved her. No matter what. And that love, even if she could not return it, remained, not fading, and not budging.

I’ll be back, he promised as he handed back the phone, grabbed his MP-5, ready to roll.

Lord, please keep her heart open to me,
he prayed. But a cold fear began to gnaw at him. What if there was no way to fix this? What if it was too late?

His future stretched out before him without her, without light. Like the sun going down on his life.

Safe in the warmth of her apartment, Kelly turned away from the answering machine, pressed her face in her hands and fought the bleak, heartbreaking grief. The last hope within her had died.

Letting him go wasn’t easy. It
was
the best thing. The safest decision for them both.

But it didn’t feel that way. Neither determination, nor distance, nor her own fears could halt the love she felt for him. She feared nothing could.

At least it was over, she thought with relief. She had her path in life, and Mitch had his.

I
t was Christmas Eve, and Kelly was thankful she had volunteered to work at the bookstore until closing. It kept her from thinking, and since her thoughts always wandered to Mitch, it was a good thing to keep busy. It was easier to ignore her shattered heart that way.

As she carefully removed the porcelain figurine from the front window display she had a perfect view of the dark parking lot as an SUV pulled off the street and maneuvered through the snow.

Although the snowfall obscured all but the headlights from her sight, the vehicle parked right in front, beneath the filtered glow of the tall security lights. The driver’s door open and a booted foot hit the ground. Her pulse jerked to a stop.

That was a military boot, just like Mitch wore. No, it can’t be him. She froze, the warmth of the store, the caroling of the sound systems, the frantic bustle of last-minute shoppers faded into nothing.

There was only the sight of the soldier dressed in camouflage climbing from his vehicle. One look at his wide shoulders and joy speared through her soul.

Mitch. The cry came from the deepest part of her being. In the exact same split second her eyes registered that the man wasn’t as tall or as powerfully muscled, and, as he cut through the light crossing in front of the vehicle, he wasn’t Mitch.

Disappointment left her arctic cold. The pain of it left her light-headed, but she could not look away from the soldier, who opened the passenger door and helped a woman from the front seat.

Kelly could only stare, captivated, by the sight of the soldier and his wife as they gazed into one another’s eyes for a brief moment—a moment that seemed to stretch timelessly—before he turned to lift a baby in a carrier from the back seat. The loving family was straight out of her most secret dreams.

It was like looking at what might have been, what could have been.

What still might be, her heart whispered so strongly.

It can never be, she thought firmly. Hadn’t she put all her foolish wishes to rest?

The couple approached the front door, and the soldier released his wife’s hand to open it for her. They smiled loving, quiet smiles to one another, clearly bonded in love.

Broken pieces of her dreams were all around her, but she managed to smile at the couple who entered the store and walked past her, hands linked, talking low and warmly to one another.

See how I don’t want that at all? She thought as she took a sheet of bubble wrap and carefully covered the exquisite shepherd with it. Okay, she was just saying that to protect herself. To try to make it true. It was basic psychology. You simply couldn’t lose anyone you loved truly, if you refused to love anyone that much.

By the time she’d boxed the figurine, wrapped it and added the purchase to Opal Finch’s charge account, Katherine was ringing up the soldier and his wife, who had purchased a blown-glass angel, a last-minute gift.

It took all her strength, but she couldn’t stop a great sense of loss from wrapping around her. Wasn’t she supposed to be forgetting Mitch? Moving on with her life? She’d prayed and prayed for God to take this love from her heart, but it remained, stubborn and strong no matter what she did to try to get rid of it.

She delivered the gift to Opal, waiting in the reading area where refreshments and Christmas cookies were set out on red-clothed tables. Opal glanced up from chatting with her daughter, and her smile shone warmly. “You are a lifesaver, dear girl. I was at my wit’s end when I learned Margie’s mother-in-law was coming to town after all.”

“I’m glad I could help.” Kelly handed the bagged package to Opal’s youngest daughter, a lovely middle-aged woman with Opal’s same smile and gracious manner. “If there’s anything else you need, you just let me know. I hope you both have a Merry Christmas.”

“I wish you Merry Christmas, too, dear.” Opal looked lovely and content as she sipped from her cup of holiday blend tea. “Margie and I have done all our running for the day, and it’s a comfort to sit right here and enjoy the decorations. Will I see you at the candlelight service tonight?”

Kelly fetched the teapot, still hot in its cozy, and removed the insulated cover. She leaned to fill Opal’s cup. “I’ll be there.”

“Wonderful. Why, you’ll just have to meet my new great-grandbaby. She’s just three weeks old, but good as an angel. You make sure and come find us.”

“I promise,” she vowed as she filled Margie’s cup.

If Kelly was given a wish to be fulfilled by the angels on this cold Christmas Eve night, it would be to have a life like Opal’s. To be content in her golden years with family she took joy in, and a life behind her in which each and every day had been filled with love, as would all her days to come. Loving Mitch, of course.

Too bad she wasn’t the kind of girl who believed in wishes and dreams.

Although how she wanted to.

“Kelly, did you read from your devotional this morning?” Opal asked over the rim of her teacup. “‘With the Lord, nothing is impossible.’”

Kelly replaced the teapot on the table. How did she answer that? Some thing
were
impossible, she knew that for certain. “I did read the passage.”

“I’m holding out hope for you.” Opal’s eyes twinkled. “It’s the season for miracles, you know.”

“I know, and there’s more to life than studying. I can’t argue with that.” Mitch. Why did she think of him and miracles in the same breath?

The store’s frantic Christmas Eve rush had thinned ten minutes before closing time. As she pitched in to help Katherine catch up on the gift-wrapping at the front counter, she tried to get her thoughts in the right place. No more thinking of Mitch. End of story.

As she folded and taped the last corner of Mr. Brisbane’s gift, Katherine surprised her by withdrawing a small package from her blazer pocket, wrapped in simple gold tissue paper. “I know we’re exchanging presents when you come over to dinner tomorrow, but I want you to have this. It will look perfect on your Christmas tree.”

Kelly studied the small gift that fitted in the palm of her hand. “Thanks, Katherine. Should I open it now?”

“No, this is definitely something you should open alone. Why don’t you do that now? Go. I wanted to let you go earlier, paid of course, as a treat, but who knew we were going to be so busy?”

“I have no one waiting for me at home. I can stay and help you close.”

“I’m not doing anything but unplugging the coffeepot, counting down the tills and setting the alarm. That’s it. So, go on.” Katherine took the gift from Kelly’s hand, snapped a gift bag open and dropped it in, and clipped around the long counter. “Go home, Kelly. Merry Christmas.”

“Merry Christmas, Katherine.” She so loved working for the McKaslins. There was no way she would ever feel lonely in her life, not when she had the blessing of truly nice people in it. There was little to do but to wave good-bye to Opal and her daughter, grab her coat and backpack and trudge out the back door.

Snow fell in a thick veil, scouring her as she fought her way to her car. Her poor ten-year-old sedan was buried in snow, and by the time she’d swept off the windows and scraped the crusty layer of ice off the glass, her curiosity was getting the best of her. What had Katherine given her?

Huddled in her cold seat, with the defrosters on high fighting at the foggy windshield, she folded back the tissue paper and there, in a bed of gold, lit by the glow of the dash lights, was a small tin soldier. An ornament for her tree.

Her heart broke into a million pieces, and how could that be? It was already broken. Tears struggled to the surface, no matter how hard she blinked to stop them.

I love him so much, she thought, not knowing if she was wishing or, more, if she were praying. She’d lost too many people she’d loved. That was her life, it was not going to change. It was impossible. Right?

Mitch was an elite soldier. Talk about a risky profession. And it wasn’t only the fear of him being killed in combat, but the fact that he belonged in California, and that she was safer with him far away.

This
was the path God had made for her, and she clung to it with everything she had. It felt as if the ground was crumbling beneath her feet and she was holding on to a fraying rope. Watching it unravel. Watching it snap.

Knowing she about to fall.

With the Lord, nothing is impossible.
The text seemed to follow her as she put her car in gear and navigated through the storm. Or was it the fear in her own heart? She tried to banish memories of the lost little girl she’d been, stubbornly clinging to the hope for the happy endings, like those she read in books.

She fought against the memories as she negotiated the icy city, but the images of Christmases past rose up, unbidden and unwanted. The Christmas Eves her mom had come home horribly drunk or high, and the Christmas Eves when she hadn’t come home at all.

As a little girl, Kelly would sit in the living room of whatever apartment they’d been in that year, with no glow from a Christmas tree and no presents, and wish on the brightest star in the sky, which she’d thought was the real Christmas Star, for her mom to get well. For a place to belong. To grow up like the princess in the fairy tales and find true love, a good handsome prince—just like Mitch—and a happily ever after.

Even now, there was Mitch. In her thoughts. In her heart. In her soul. Snow fell harder as she eased down the street in front of her apartment building. If she saw a tan Jeep covered with snow along the curb, it had to be her imagination. She pulled into the nearly vacant lot—most students had fled campus for home—and shut off the car.

Snow tapped in big determined flakes, blanketing her windshield. She glanced at the ornament, cloaked in night shadows, and felt the truth bubble to the surface. She still felt like that little girl, deep at heart, alone in the dark, afraid of being alone forever. The little girl feared she wasn’t good enough to love. And if something good happened to her, then it wouldn’t last.

Now she was an adult with the same fears, fears she’d never faced, and never overcome. Maybe pushing everything down wasn’t the best way to deal with them, she knew, but it didn’t matter now.

Tucking her heart away, she zipped the soldier ornament into her backpack and stepped out into the freezing storm. The snow tapped loudly, filling the eerie emptiness of the parking lot. Her thoughts drifted to Mitch, always to Mitch. Where was he on this holy night? Was he cold or warm? In hostile territory or home with his family? He’d come back from his last mission safely, right?

Wherever he was, she wished him warm, safe thoughts. She would always love him, no matter what, no matter how far away and how separate their paths in life.

A hunched shadow emerged from around the corner of the building, barely visible through the haze of snowfall.

Alarm coiled through her even before she recognized the woman’s voice, the sound from her past, the sound of her fears.

“K-Kelly, my sweet baby? Is that you?” Her mother’s thin hair sticking out beneath a worn-looking knitted hat was gray, and her face was marked by time and hard wear. She had that false look of caring on her face.

Kelly took a step back, fighting down the shame and the hurt roiling up out of the shadows of memories. She caught a faint scent of cheap whiskey. Of course her mom was drinking. She knew her mother would never change, and that meant the woman had come for sympathy and to try to steal something to support her other habits. It was the past that hurt so much, the memories and the betrayal. “You have to go back to the shelter, Mom. It’s not that far.”

“But I come all this way. In the cold. Just to see my baby girl.”

“No, Mom. You know you’re supposed to keep away from me.” She felt the weight of the past like an open wound, bleeding and raw. “The court says you have to.”

“But I’m clean.” She swayed as she limped along the snowy walkway. “I brought you a present. Are you gonna let me come in?”

“I don’t want something you stole.” The rank scent of cheap alcohol on the wind was stronger, bringing up memories that cut straight to her spirit. “I’m sorry. You have to go now. Go back where you belong.”

“That is no way to treat your mother. What is wrong with you? No wonder you’re all alone. You think you’re so high and mighty, but go ahead. All that praying won’t change the truth. You’re still the same down deep.”

She knew that her mom was drunk and mean, but logic didn’t rule the heart. Nor did fears nurtured by a lifetime of being alone. Kelly took another step back, whipped her cell phone out of her pocket. “Mom, you aren’t supposed to leave the shelter, I’m sure. So, if you’ll be nice, I’ll call a cab and pay the fare for you. Or I can call the police. It’s up to you.”

“Why, you no good little—”

Before her mother could fly at her, a tall, powerfully shouldered man materialized soundlessly out of the shadows. Coming through the thickly falling snow and shadows, he caught Dora Logan by the upper arm, subduing her. “You heard Kelly. You need to get to a shelter, or you’ll be dealing with the cops.”

Mitch. His baritone boomed with authority. He radiated honorable strength. That attractive capable masculinity. Just like that, he was in her life again. Towering before her, looking like her best and brightest wish, too good to be true. Sweet longing welled up through her soul.

As her mother left, sputtering curse words that faded as she melted into the darkness, Mitch remained, invincible, at her side. For an instant, she felt as if it was summer again, with sunshine on her face and Mitch’s presence like a steady light in her heart.

But then she realized he had to have heard her mom’s words. Every last one of them. The damage was done. Her head hung, and in the endless stretch of silence between her and Mitch, she couldn’t think of a single thing to say to make this better, to erase the echo of her mother’s words. Or the truth of them.

She heard the icy flakes tap against her hood as she stumbled toward the steps. Her throat was one giant knot of misery she couldn’t speak past, not even to thank him. For, in saving her, he’d learned the terrible truth of who she was and where she came from.