Chapter Five
Valerie
“Hey, Val?”
I looked up from the mess of ribbons NJ was creating on the living room floor, finding Caleb standing at the foot of the stairs in the foyer.
For the last thirty minutes, I’d been trying—failing—to add the finishing touches to the final gifts to put under the tree, but my sweet girl had other plans.
Like pulling out every roll of ribbon from my assigned ribbon box and unraveling it.
Every.
Single.
One.
“Momma! Momma!” NJ squealed as she threw the ribbon all around her.
“Nice to see you,” I teased my stepson. “Finally.”
Caleb rubbed the back of his neck, a sheepish grin on his lips. He’d been asleep for the last sixteen hours. “Yeah, sorry,” he muttered, his voice deeper than I expected it to be, and my eyes nearly popped out of my head.
“Whoa, did your voice drop?” I asked, taking in his dark messy hair and his long, lanky body. He still looked like a boy but sounded like a man—like his father.
“Uh? Maybe? I don’t know.” He shrugged. “The twins said it could just happen.”
The—the twins?
Oh, let the ghosts of Christmases past, present, and future take me now.
“Please don’t tell me you’ve been talking about puberty with Lance and Lawson,” I practically groaned, running a hand through my hair as NJ threw more ribbons into the air.
Now he looked like he had actually seen one of the Christmas ghosts. “Yeah, um Val, I’m not telling you what me and the cowboys talk about. What happens in the bunkhouse stays in the bunkhouse. That’s what Lawson always says.”
That was a lie. What happened in the bunkhouse usually made its way to Abbie, who told Harmony, who told Diana, who told me.
Just like the whole Santa’s cookies with Destiny thing that went down last night.
But now that I knew Lawson and Lance were talking to my stepson about puberty?
His father was going to murder them before Mags could get the chance.
I could only imagine the vile things they were filling his innocent teenage—
I grimaced, shutting down those thoughts. “Okay, that’s enough of that. Thank you.”
The smirk on his face reminded me of his uncle, wild and cocky. “You seem grossed out.”
“How about you just talk to your father about those things? If you take life advice from the twins, you’ll end up in federal prison before you turn twenty-five.”
His head fell back as he busted out laughing, his voice going up and down and back up again. “They aren’t that bad.”
“No, sweetheart, they’re good people,” I assured him.
“Anyway, I just came down to ask you a question, Val,” he said, trying not to laugh.
My hesitation was comical. “A puberty question?”
His face twisted with humor. “Hell no.”
“Don’t say hell.”
“It’s a place.”
Fair. “Then, for NJ’s sake, don’t say it in front of her. Or on holidays.”
My stepson ran his fingers through his hair, his Adam’s apple bobbling as he looked out the window, watching the snowfall. The air around us shifted suddenly, and I made sure to turn more in his direction. Something was up.
“What is it, Caleb?”
His question, the sadness laced through his voice, made me flinch. “Do you really believe this Christmas will be different from all the others?”
It was no secret that my husband hated Christmas, and it broke my heart.
I knew why this season was hard for him, and trying to make him love something that brought him pain was the last thing I wanted to do.
I just wanted him to feel the joy and warmth this holiday was meant to bring us.
Hopefully, this dinner, with the entire family, would provide that for him.
As Caleb got older, he saw through his father’s act.
After several attempts to swallow the lump in my throat, I said, “I can’t make any promises, but I hope it will.”
He nodded and shifted his weight. “Do you think he’ll like my gift?”
I looked at the small gift chaotically wrapped in snowman wrapping paper under the tree. When I looked back at him, I flashed him a smile. “Without a doubt.”
NJ finally pulled her attention away from the ribbons and noticed her brother. “Bub, bub, bub, bub,” she chanted, clapping her hands and giving him her two-teeth smile.
That got the moody teenager to move.
When he was on the floor with us, he leaned back against the coffee table, pulling NJ and the ribbons closer to him. He plucked a red one off the floor and began twisting it between his fingers. “Growin’ up, Dad did his best to give me good Christmases. More than Mom ever tried.”
I looked down at my lap, knowing the history of Caleb’s mother, Cathy.
Truth be told, she was a deadbeat, just like Abbie’s mother.
She only cared about herself and left Caleb alone in that god-awful apartment several times.
Then, finally, Denver lost all patience with her and took full custody of Caleb.
When she teamed up with Moonie, all hell broke loose and she lost her life.
Now, years later, Caleb hardly ever mentioned her.
She’d caused him enough pain.
“I know he did.”
Caleb’s eyes, smoke gray like Denver’s, flicked up to meet mine. “Christmastime was never warm until you came around, and that’s not because Dad didn’t try.” Tears stung my eyes, but he wasn’t done. “It was because you made Dad’s life warm again.”
“Caleb,” I rasped, my bottom lip trembling.
He ruffled his sister’s hair as she gathered all the ribbon into her arms. “I don’t think I can ever repay you for that.”
“That’s not your job.”
“You make Dad happy, Val.” That was all he said before he changed the subject, asking about tomorrow. “So when is everyone coming over?”
“In the afternoon. We’ll have the morning to ourselves, and you can open your presents from Santa.”
He picked up the red ribbon again, shooting me a look. “Santa’s presents?”
I nodded, beaming at him.
An hour later, NJ was still playing with Caleb in the living room, and I’d migrated into the kitchen, going over the to-do list for tomorrow while Denver took a shower. My eyes scanned over the endless items on the list, over my rushed, messy handwriting, as a soft sigh left me.
The food had been bought.
Diana was bringing the remaining ribbon for the dining room tree.
Beau and Abbie were bringing said tree over in just a bit.
Mason was bringing the ham.
Harmony had been making desserts all day from her secret recipe stash—a.k.a. Jigs’s stolen recipes.
Mags was bringing what I hoped would be a good attitude.
The twins were just coming for the food.
Jigs was bringing the emotional support for all of us. He’d watched Denver and Mason grow up. He’d had a firsthand look at the pain they’d endured.
“Baby?”
My head shot up, and my stomach dropped.
Denver was leaning against the wall, arms folded over his chest, watching me with a cautious gaze.
It was a look I hadn’t seen from him in years.
Not since I was working for the pipeline with the sole purpose of getting him to sell Hallow Ranch.
I absolutely hated it. His hair was still wet from the shower and he’d donned a fresh outfit.
Faded jeans and a navy blue thermal, the color making his eyes appear more menacing.
“Wow, you got down here fast,” I noted, my heart pounding in my ears.
Those menacing eyes dropped down to the list by my hand. The silence stretched out longer than I’d planned. I had everything rehearsed in my head—which the girls thought was absolutely silly. Denver was my soulmate, and I could tell him anything. I had nothing to fear from him.
But I didn’t fear him.
I feared the pain this might cause him.
Swallowing the shards of glass in my throat, I called out his name. “Den?”
“My cowboys have been walking on eggshells around me all week,” he began, now studying the bright green Grinch pen in my hand. “When I walked into the barn this morning, silence chased out the conversation before my boots were on the ground floor.”
“I—”
“My little brother can hardly look me in the eye for longer than five seconds. Doesn’t want to be alone with me,” he continued.
I wanted to speak, to explain, but those eyes lifted up to meet mine, and his smoke was all around me then.
“I can practically smell the shame oozing off him, Valerie. You care to tell me why my brother is acting like that around me?”
I rose up to my full height, bracing both palms on the butcher block island. “I need to tell you something,” I said, butterflies swarming in my stomach.
He tilted his head back slightly, his eyes narrowing. “Better yet, let’s talk about how I’ve been home for over an hour, and you haven’t given me what I’m owed.”
A kiss.
Every day, without fail, even in the midst of my grief after losing my mom, I always kissed him when he came home. It was routine—no, a ritual—for me now.
“Well, I—”
“Whatever excuse is about to spill from those gorgeous lips will not suffice,” he said, his voice low.
“My wife gives me that mouth when I get home. No matter what.” He pushed off the wall, his arms falling to his sides.
“You can be completely overjoyed, sad, or even pissed at me for something stupid I did, but you have never not given your husband a kiss. So, I ask, what the fuck has my beautiful wife so entangled that she is scared to come near me?”
“Scared?” I shook my head. “I’m not scared.”
He quirked a brow. “The island is still between us, baby, and you look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
I mean, I have. Just not today.
Outside, I heard the familiar rumble of Beau’s old truck. I twisted my neck to see a flash of red coming up the hill out the kitchen sink window.
“Shit, I haven’t told you yet,” I hissed, feeling the panic. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. It was supposed to be a quiet, healing conversation.
“Told me what?”
My gaze was fixed on the snow now, my cheeks heating with frustration. This was all wrong. They were early.
“God dammit,” Den growled underneath his breath, charging around the island.