Upon a Midnight Clear

  Tears as clear as glass and big as pearls welled in her eyes and rolled down her cheeks.

  "Quinn, I never stopped loving you. Never. Not for a day" He gathered her into his arms, and her sobs broke his heart. "I thought that maybe you had gotten cold feet about leaving with me… that you were afraid to take that chance."

  "Never, Cale. I was never afraid to love you."

  "Even now?"

  "Especially now."

  He lifted her off her feet, and with one hand, grabbed a comforter from the sofa and spread it on the floor in front of the fireplace. Gently resting her on the blanket, he lay down beside her and wordlessly began to kiss the tears from her face. Soon there were no tears left to be kissed away, and his lips began a descent the length of her throat to the place where her collarbone met the buttons of the old thermal shirt, which one by one, she opened to lay bare the skin beneath, inviting him to feast on her flesh the way she had dreamed he might have done. Moaning through slightly parted lips, she offered more, and then more of herself to the heat of his mouth, crying out softly as his hands and seeking lips found those places that had so ached for his touch for so very long.

  Reality being ever so much more wonderful than fantasy, she pulled the shirt over her head, and removed his own, needing desperately to feel his skin against hers. She felt her bones begin to melt away, the resultant liquid, thick and hot and bright, seeming to spread through her like lava. Wordlessly they moved together, caught up in the rhythms of an ancient dance, until he filled her as completely as she needed him to, and the sweet power of their dreams engulfed them both and dragged them down into the magical heart of the night.

  * * *

  Chapter Ten

  For the first time in years, Cale slept like a baby. Waking to find Quinn curled up next to him had brought him to tears, proving that the wonders of the night had not been a dream after all. He kissed her shoulders to awaken her just as the sun rose through the trees to spread the first early arms of light into the cabin, and she rolled into his open arms, urging him to love her into the new day. He had needed no encouragement.

  "Cale." She spoke into his chest, where her head had fallen, her neck being too languid, refusing to hold up its weight.

  "What, sweetheart?" he whispered into the cloud of auburn curls that rested just below his chin.

  "I think we should get up." She tried to stir, as if to be the one to make the first move, but found she could not. Her bones, it would appear, had been stolen while she slept, making it difficult for her to rise.

  "Why?"

  "Because your sons will be up soon," she said. "We should not be lying here, wrapped in little more than each other."

  "Ummm," Cale replied.

  "I take it that means you agree."

  Forcing her body into action, she sat up and searched for her shirt and sweatpants amidst the rumpled blankets, which at some point had made their way from the sofa onto the floor. Finding her shirt, she pulled it over her head, then realizing he was watching her, asked, "What?"

  "I can't believe you're here with me. After all these years of loving you, of missing you, I can't believe you're really here."

  "Twelve years too late…" she said wryly.

  "Better late than never," he told her. "It's a miracle."

  "A Christmas miracle." She smiled.

  "Not many people get the second chance that we've been given, Quinn," he said softly.

  "Do you really think it could be the same?" Her fingertips played with the dark hairs on his chest.

  "No," he told her. "Better. It will be much better."

  "What do we do now?" she asked.

  "What we should have done before"—he drew her down to kiss her mouth—"only this time, we don't need your parents' permission."

  "'You want to elope?"

  "Actually, I think maybe we could plan on something a little more elaborate than the sitting room of the local justice of the peace." He ran his hands slowly up and down her arms. "Maybe something with all the Hollisters in attendance."

  Quinn let that sink in for a moment before asking, "You still want to marry me?"

  "I never stopped wanting to marry you. Not for a day. I never loved anyone but you, Quinn. I don't want to lose you again."

  She smiled and cradled his head against her chest "I never loved anyone but you, either. I thought I would die when—"

  A crash from the back of the cabin jolted them both.

  "Guess we'd better get moving," she sighed.

  "Want to toss a coin to see who makes breakfast today?" he asked as he pulled on his sweatpants and stood up.

  "Ah, would that be a choice between my perfect pancakes and your 'gloppy' eggs?"

  "She's not back seventy-two hours and already she's making'fun of my cooking."

  "Shall we ask your sons which they would prefer?" Quinn batted her eyelashes innocently.

  "You do breakfast. I'll"—he paused as a second crash followed the first—"just see what the boys are doing."

  "Quinn, why'd you sleep on the floor?" Evan stood by the kitchen door and pointed to the tangle of forgotten blankets in front of the fireplace.

  Without turning around, Quinn replied from in front of the stove, "It was warmer by the fire."

  "Good save," Cale murmured, reaching around her to grab a slice of buttered toast off the plate.

  "What does that mean?" Eric plopped himself into one of the wooden chairs. " 'Good save'?"

  "It means eat your breakfast." Cale buttered the pancakes on first one, then the other of his sons' plates.

  "It looks like it's cleared up a lot." Quinn looked out the window and squinted, the sun playing off the snow nearly blinding her. "But the report on the radio warned of another storm."

  "Gee, too bad," Cale deadpanned. "I guess you'll be stuck here for a while."

  "I should call home." She looked at the clock. It was ten o'clock in the morning. "It's Christmas Eve, Cale. I have to be home for Christmas."

  "I understand," he said without looking at her.

  Quinn started to speak, then apparently thought better of it. She disappeared into the living room, and he could hear her voice, though he could not make out what she was saying. The thought of her leaving made his hands shake and his head pound, so fearful was he of losing her again. The hole he had carried around inside him for the past twelve years, the one that had only so recently begun to mend, began to open again. Stitch by painful stitch.

  "My brother Trevor is going to drive up on the tractor," she told him happily as she sat at the table and sipped at her coffee.

  "Is he going to take you away?" Evan asked.

  "He's going to plow a road so that I can drive down the mountain to our ranch."

  "You're going to leave?" Eric's bottom lip began to quiver unexpectedly.

  "Well, actually, I thought I'd take you all with me." She looked into Cale's eyes. Under the table, her foot, soft in its wool sock, followed the length of his leg to his knee and back again. "Since there is another big storm coming. And since my mother is all prepared for the holiday." She turned to the boys and added, "And since your Aunt Val is already there with perhaps something special for her two favorite boys."

  "Would Santa be able to find us there?" Eric asked, worried that a last-minute change of address might confuse the jolly old elf.

  "Absolutely." She grinned at Cale. Her mother had told her that Val arrived the night before with all the presents for the boys that Cale had bought and mailed for Val to bring with her. "What do you say, Cale? A wonderful Christmas is waiting, just a mile down the mountain."

  "Maybe for some. But me, I had my Christmas," he told her softly. "And it was wonderful. Every bit as wonderful as I dreamed it would be."

  "Come home with me, Cale." She reached across the table to rub his face gently with the back of her hand. "Let me have it all this year. Let me share it all with you and the boys."

  Two little pairs of eyes met across the table. What was going on? Dad was
acting like one of those guys on the soap operas that the nanny used to watch, and Quinn was looking all melty.

  Yuck.

  On the other hand, she had made cookies and a tree and was going to put their names in a book. That stuff should count for something.

  As much as Cale wished to keep her to himself for a few more days, he could not deny the light in Quinn's eyes as she described the scene that would greet them at the High Meadow Ranch. She wanted, at long last, to share him with her family, to share the holiday with all of those she loved. She deserved to have it all. And it would be wonderful to see her family again, to bask in the glow of that large and happy group, to see her parents and to introduce his sons to the man they knew only as a legend. To see Sky again, and to spend the holiday with Valerie for the first time in years.

  "Well, then, shall we pack up some clothes for the boys and me before we dig out your car?" He stood up and took her hand, drawing her out of her seat to hold her to him. "I suspect this will be but the first of many Christmases we will spend together at the Hollister hacienda. I'm ready, if you are."

  She rocked against him, filled with the wonder of all the miracles that had somehow found their way into her life over the past few days. True Christmas miracles, of a certainty.

  "What about our tree?" Eric wailed as left the cabin.

  "It will be waiting for us when we come back," Quinn assured him.

  "Will you come back with us?" Evan queried Quinn.

  "Of course, I’ll come back with you. You think I'm going to let you eat all those Christmas cookies by yourselves?" She ruffled his hair as she closed the front door, telling him, "Go get your hat. It's cold out here."

  Pulling the wool hat down over his ears, Evan turned solemnly to look at his brother.

  Finally, Eric said, "Is she going to be, like, you know"—he looked up at Cale, gesturing awkwardly with his hands—"like our mother?"

  "There's a good possibility that we might let her do that" Cale knelt down to face his sons. "What do you think?"

  The boys looked at each other for a long moment.

  "She does make pretty good breakfasts," Eric said.

  "And she knows how to make paper chains." Evan nodded.

  "It might be okay," Eric told Cale.

  "I hear the tractor." Quinn stuck her head back inside the cabin and looked at the three McKenzies, huddled together conspiratorially. "What are you guys up to?"

  "Nothing," the three replied in unison.

  "Uh-oh." Quinn rolled her eyes. "What have I gotten myself into?"

  It was midafternoon by the time the Land Rover made it down the mountain past snow-gilded trees that sparkled in the sun and fence posts that leaned wearily into the heavy drifts. A trail of smoke fled the massive stone chimney and thinned as it reached the sky; even as they followed the plowed path, the warmth of the High Meadow Ranch reached out toward them with arms filled with love. Quinn bit her bottom lip anticipating the joy of reunion with her sisters and the glow that seemed to surround the family home this time of the year.

  From the big kitchen window, Catherine studied the caravan of tractor and Land Rover as it played follow the leader down the narrow, newly plowed road. She sighed heavily. Who would have thought that after all these years, Cale McKenzie would be back?

  Anxiously, she watched the Land Rover pull into the yard and stop. From the passenger side, the man emerged. He looked taller, leaner than she had remembered, but the face with its boyish smile had barely changed at all. He always was a handsome thing, Catherine recalled. Handsome enough to have had a string of girls back in high school, had he wanted them, though she knew he had only wanted one.

  A tide of maternal guilt washed over Catherine, and a kink of uncertainty pricked her conscience. She had never really known just what exactly had caused her daughter's breakup with Cale that summer so long ago. To be sure, Catherine had made gentle inquiries, but Quinn had chosen to respond in vague, one-word answers that had told Catherine nothing. All Catherine had known was that Quinn had not been the same since the day Cale had left Larkspur for Baltimore.

  Had Catherine known how heavily Quinn would carry the burden of heartbreak for so many years, would she have been so quick back then to brush off her daughter's declaration of undying love? And more importantly, how badly bruised was Quinn from having been forced to spend the last few days in the company of the man who had broken her heart, but had never been replaced in her life?

  Merciful heaven, why did he have to come back, after all these years?

  Quinn opened her door and slid from behind the driver's seat to jump into the hard-crusted snow just as Sky and her father fled the house from the side door to greet the newcomers. The three men greeted each other tentatively at first, but in a heartbeat Hap had embraced Cale and a fine reunion was in progress. At least that went well, Catherine thought, nodding, knowing how proud Hap was of his famous protegé.

  Cale rounded the side of the vehicle to where Quinn appeared to be fussing with something in the backseat. The way he touched the small of Quinn's back, the familiarity of the simple gesture, and the manner in which Quinn had turned to look up at him, squinting into the sun but grinning happily, gave Catherine cause for thought. Good grief, one would think that they… that they…

  Could it be… ?

  Catherine peered out the window, looking more closely at her daughter's face, seeking her eyes. With Quinn, it had always been in her eyes.

  And yes, there it was. That same look of love, of trust, of total devotion she had worn twelve years ago. The glow, the sparkle that came from within.

  Oh dear.

  Catherine sat down on a stool near the window, tears of regret forming in her eyes. Quinn must have loved him immensely for it to have lasted, untouched, all this time. Catherine sighed heavily. Do parents ever really know if the decisions they make for their children are, after all, the right ones? And if called upon to make the same decision for a seventeen-year-old daughter again, would her answer be different?

  Probably not, she told herself.

  Feeling slightly redeemed, Catherine rose to go to the door to welcome her daughter home, when two little figures out in the snow caught her eye. She leaned closer to the window to get a better look. Of course. Val had said that Cale had two little boys.

  Catherine watched the two little bundled fellows chase each other toward the house and smiled as one tripped the other, who fell flat into the snow. Weighted down by what must have felt like pounds of clothing, the one in the snow flailed about while the other, laughing, tried to help him up. Soon both boys were rolling in the snow. Catherine laughed out loud. How many times had she watched her own sons frolic just so?

  Maybe Trevor could go out to the barn to look for the old sleds he and Sky used to have. These little ones were just about the right age for them.

  The front door opened and Catherine reached the hallway in time to see young Lilly greet the two tousled, snow-covered little boys with freckles on their faces and mischief in their eyes.

  Maybe Cole's coming back wasn't so bad, she mused.

  "Hi. We've been waiting for you to get here." Lilly pushed the door open wide.

  "Who are you?" one of the little snow-boys asked.

  "I'm Lilly. And I'm making a gingerbread village with my grandma. Want to help make little houses?"

  "Do we get to eat them?"

  "Of course not," Lilly replied as if the boy was daft. "It's for the village. To go in the dining room. Come see…"

  Snowy boots made snowy prints from the front door to the kitchen. Not for the first time, Catherine remembered. And, God willing, not for the last…

  "Mom," Quinn called from the doorway, "I'm home. Come see who's joined us for Christmas…"

  It had been a gala Christmas Eve, the best ever, to Quinn's way of thinking, with all of the people she loved most gathered under the sturdy roof of the old ranch house. As always, there had been tons of wonderful things to eat and drink, games to play an
d songs to sing, old memories to share and new memories to be made. At eight o'clock, they all crowded around the fireplace in the great room, the merry chatter subsiding as Catherine rang the little silver bell that had served the purpose since the year the twins were born and every Christmas Eve since.

  "Loved ones," a beaming Catherine addressed her family, "it is time for the reading. Schuyler won the toss this year." She handed her son the worn copy of "The Night Before Christmas."

  Standing at one end of the room, his back against the stone hearth, Sky began to read the words they all knew by heart.

  Quinn settled back in the armchair near the window and counted her many blessings in the faces that surrounded her in the comfortable room. Her eyes danced from one to the other.

  It was certainly turning out to be a Christmas filled with surprises, a Christmas she would never forget.

  I can't wait to see Mom's and Dad's faces when they open their gift. Quinn smiled at the thought of her parents, stretched out on the clean soft sands of St. Thomas, with palm trees behind them and a perfect pastel blue sea open to the horizon.

  Across the room, Aunt Sarah, hard of hearing but unwilling to admit it, leaned forward to catch every one of Sky's words. Her daughter Selena had whispered to Quinn and Sunny that she and her siblings had bought their mother a ring set with the birthstones of her children, all of whom were present and accounted for. Selena's brother, Christian, had announced his engagement that night to his longtime girlfriend, and their sister, Alexa, announced that she was carrying twins.

  From one sibling to the next, Quinn's loving eyes trailed around the room. CeCe, who with her twin brother, Trevor, never seemed to age. Gorgeous dark-haired Sunny, with her beautiful little Lilly, the pride of the Hollister clan. Liza, looking surprisingly sophisticated. Ruggedly handsome Sky, blushing as he looked up to meet the eyes of the very elegant Valerie McKenzie from across the room.

  And, miracle of miracles, there was Cale, who sat on the big square ottoman in front of her chair, his back to her, his sons sitting uncharacteristically still on the rag rug at his feet. Even they seemed to belong, to have been absorbed into the welcoming warmth of the family. She touched his back, and without turning around he leaned back into her, and she rested her forehead on the small of his back. How wonderful to have him here, to share this night with him. It was all so right.