Chapter 17
WARREN
“Two blankets should be enough, right?” I ask Mara. “One for your lap and one to go around your shoulders. Or maybe I should get a third to cover both you and Emmaline. We need to be getting on the road.” It’s cold out and snowing some, but luckily there’s been no more storms of white.
“Are you sure we have to go?” She paces in front of the fireplace, the wrinkle between her eyebrows a stark contrast to the lack of any in the pretty lavender dress that’s beginning to fill out most marvelously in all the right places now that she’s been eating the proper amount of food for the last two months.
She still needs more weight on her, but this is a good start.
“It won’t be rude of us to show up to your parents’ house for dinner without helping to prepare it? ”
All her frenzied pacing is enough to make my head spin like a top, so I rest one hand on the mantel and wait for her next pass.
Three steps to the right.
Turn.
Four steps to the left…
Then she’s trapped as my other arm locks in place around her.
Just where she should be.
“Not this year,” I say with a wink. “You and I get a pass, you know.”
“Why?”
My words are a bit muffled as I drag my lips over her jawline and up to her ear.
“Because we’re newlyweds and busy in the marriage bed.
A husband doesn’t have time to worry about paltry things such as helping with food and the like when he’s making love to his wife and drinking up all the sweetness between her legs. ”
“Warren Shay!” She shoves against my chest, but I don’t budge.
“You can sound scandalized all you want, but it’s the truth.
” I stop her protest with my mouth, and by the time it’s over, her cheeks are flushed and my pants are a bit tighter than before.
“It’ll be okay, Mara. It’ll just be my parents, Jed, and Dove.
Maybe my friend Dalton. We’ll eat, and then we’ll all decorate the Christmas tree.
The sun won’t even begin to reach the horizon before we’re back at home. ”
“You’ve talked about Dalton before. Is he a good man?”
I cross my heart. “One of the best. I’d never let him around you or Emmaline otherwise.”
“And you just have the one brother?”
“Nah, there’s two more older than me and Jed.
Ephraim and Gentry. But they moved out east with their own families a few years back.
” I sure do miss all those adorable heathenish rapscallions they call their children, but now I have my own wife and child to dote on.
“So it’ll just be him and the ones from my family you’ve already met. ”
Mara’s brow furrows as she mulls everything over. “I’ve never celebrated Christmas before. The Overstreets said it was sacrilegious to put such gaudy nonsense on a tree, and afterwards…well…” She blows out a breath.
Never celebrated Christmas? My poor little wife. I can’t wait to give her the gift I’ve been working on in the barn. I force an easy smile. “We’ll have your first Christmas with me, then. You can pick a tree from out back tomorrow and I’ll haul it in so we can decorate.”
“But I don’t even have anything to give you as a gift.”
I steal a taste of her sweet lips as they press together in consternation. “Having you and Little Bit here’s gift enough for me. It’ll still be fun to decorate. Don’t you want her growing up with fun traditions?”
“Of course I do,” she says with a quiet sigh. “I want her to have all the things I didn’t have growing up. And that…that means getting to know your family so she can be part of it.”
“They’re not just my family. They’re yours now, too.
You’re already part of it and have been from the moment you were mine.
Believe me, they’ve been wanting to know you better, too.
Both of you.” I free her from the cage of my arms and wait until she steps out to add, “And when we get back, you can sit on my face as a reward for being so brave.”
This time her feigned protest does nothing to hide the hitch in her breathing or the way her thighs cinch tighter as I reach down and adjust myself.
It’s been five days since I had my first taste of her, and every time since then, I learn more and more of what brings her the most pleasure.
Mine can come later. Mara deserves to have every bit of my attention focused solely on her.
Her gaze lingers on the buttons lining the front of my pants. Who am I kidding? It’d be just as much of a reward for me as it is for her. Maybe even more. I step meaningfully towards her. “On second thought, I reckon they won’t miss us too much if we’re a couple minutes late.”
Mara plants a hand firmly to my chest. “No, you need to get the wagon hitched. We can’t be late to my first Christmas dinner.”
A good husband listens to his wife, so I acquiesce.
But not without stealing another kiss.
Pop booms out the blessing, but instead of being thankful for the food, my reverence is reserved for my wife and child.
If I’d have been told last year that I’d be a married man and papa before the next twelve months had passed, I’d have said someone better quit pulling my leg before they lose a hand.
But Mara and Emmaline are here now, and I intend to fill the rest of their Christmases with family and laughter.
Someone kicks me beneath the table. Dalton’s eyes are closed in prayer, and I know it wouldn’t be Pop or the other women, so that leaves Jed.
“Bow your head,” he mouths with a smirk. I kick him back and drop my head to hide my grin as he grimaces and shifts in his seat. Serves him right that he can’t rub his shin with Dalton and Dove holding his hands for the blessing.
Pop finishes with, “For this family and the bounty Thou hast blest us with, we thank Thee, Father. Amen.”
Mara’s eyes weren’t closed either, and her slim hand stays latched onto mine as a round of amens echoes around the table.
I made sure to sit her between me and Momma so she’d feel safer.
“There’s plenty to go around,” I quietly tell her beneath the chatter that starts up around us. “Is there anything you don’t want?”
Her eyes skitter over the spiced goose and down the array of roasted potatoes, parsnips, and acorn squash, but I don’t think she really sees it. “No, I’m sure everything is delicious.”
Even leaning in close, it’s a strain to hear her. My poor little wife. She’s being so brave, but with the way she reluctantly releases my fingers from her stranglehold only to use Emmaline as a shield, I might have to feed her myself. Not that I’d mind, of course.
I chance a peek as I fill her plate. To someone who doesn’t know her, the flat expression might come off as unfriendly.
But not to me. I see the slight tremble to those lips I kissed earlier and the furrow in her brow as she pats our baby’s back.
Stiff as her shoulders are now, they’re still a tad bit more relaxed than when we arrived.
No doubt because of the way my momma and sister-in-law pulled her into a hug the minute her foot crossed the threshold and then fussed over Emmaline.
Who gave a very gummy smile, by the way. If only her mother could be so at ease.
My mouth brushes against the softness of her ear.
“Don’t worry if you don’t like something.
Just tap my knee or scoot it to my side and I’ll eat it for you.
” An inkling of dread forms as a cursed memory comes to mind.
“Except for maybe the cherry pie if Jed made it. Last time he got the salt and sugar mixed up and we all pert near choked to death.” Her wan smile grows stronger, like a flower that’s almost ready to bloom. “That’s my girl.”
Dove—who’s definitely showing in the family way with my newest niece or nephew—pulls her right on in with some conversation as I fix my own plate.
I thank my lucky stars that my brother Jed found her and brought her home.
Quiet little Dove who never said a word for so many years until he finally pulled one from her.
‘Course, if I’d been bought in marriage by a big ole lug like Jed, I probably wouldn’t want to talk for a while either.
Even Dalton, normally annoyingly boisterous, picks up on Mara’s body language and tones himself down. I catch his eye and nod in gratitude.
“Mara, dear,” my mother says with a bright smile, “I picked up the most gorgeous shade of red velvet from the general store the other day, and I told Cornelius that it would be absolutely darling on Emmaline. Didn’t I, Cornelius?”
Poised with fork in hand, Pop pauses long enough to smile fondly. “That you did.”
“It’s been too long since I made any dresses—goodness, the last one was for our great-niece Victoria, wasn’t it, Cornelius?
” But my mother doesn’t truly expect an answer, because she barely gives him any time to answer before plowing forward.
“It’s one week until the festival, and I’m bound and determined for our granddaughter to be the most beautiful baby there. ”
I don’t know who stiffens more quickly, me or my wife.
“Festival?” Mara’s fork clinks, and the mask that took weeks for her to drop appears again, shrouding her thoughts in an instant.
Damn it. “For Christmas.” She doesn’t flinch when I wrap an arm around her shoulders. “But it’s okay, we can stay home if you want. No one’s gonna be sending a posse after us if we don’t attend.”
“You don’t want to go? It’s always…” Momma’s cheeriness from before dims at my pained look. Yeah, now she’s getting it, and judging by the troubled expressions everyone else tries to hide, so do they. Nothing good happened for Mara at the last event where lots of people gathered in one place.
But then my family does what Shays do best—circle the wagons when one of our own is in need of protection.
“We’ll have our own Christmas festival.” The abrupt announcement comes from Jed.
“Here at the house,” Dalton adds in before clearing his throat. He’s not been around Mara much yet, but her pain clearly affects him. “It’ll be just like the ones when us young’uns were smaller.”