A Gansett Island Christmas #4
“Off to the Cantrells,” Ned said, directing the team with the assistance of Ashleigh and now Thomas, too.
He tried not to notice that the storm seemed to be intensifying.
They were so close. He couldn’t quit now.
Fifteen arduous minutes later, they pulled into Janey’s driveway.
“Hurry,” Ned said to Big Mac. “It’s getting worse. ”
“I’m hurrying.”
Janey let out a scream of delight when she saw the sleigh. “Joe! Look! Oh my God! This is fabulous!” She carried baby Vivienne while Joe brought P.J. They wore backpacks and had bags of gifts hanging from their arms.
“Cantrells get the prize for most ready to roll,” Ned said when they were loaded up.
“Janey was so excited to hear you were coming, I practically had to sit on her to keep her inside until you got here,” Joe said.
“She even got Mr. Davis next door to agree to come over and check on the menagerie a couple of times. Oh, and Luke called to say thanks for the offer, but they’re staying home. ”
“Good thing cuz I don’t think we coulda gotten there.” Ned directed the sleigh toward the White House. “Off we go!”
“This might be the craziest thing we’ve ever done,” Maddie said.
“If this is the craziest thing you’ve ever done,” Big Mac said, “you kids need to get out more.”
“No shit,” Ned muttered.
“Don’t encourage her Dad,” Mac said. “She’s wild enough for me as she is.”
It took twenty minutes, but they finally pulled up to the open gate at Big Mac’s house. With two babies on board, Ned had become more anxious with every passing minute, but they’d done it. They’d gotten them all.
He and Big Mac helped everyone inside and went back with Mac and Joe to grab the bags.
“Can we stow the team in the barn?” Ned asked Big Mac.
“Yep. Let’s do it.”
They went back out into the storm to detach the horses from their harnesses and put them up in the barn-shaped garage that also doubled as a workshop. They filled buckets with oats and water, rubbed down the horses and covered them with dry blankets.
“Will they be okay out here?” Big Mac asked.
“Royal says they’re low maintenance and will be fine as long as they’re outta the elements and have food and water.” Ned petted their long snouts. “Ya boys did good work. Ya saved Christmas.”
“With a little help from our good friend Ned,” Big Mac added.
“They did the hard part.” Ned spotted the camping supplies piled in the corner of the garage. “We oughta grab the air mattresses and sleeping bags. I have a feeling we’re gonna need ‘em tonight.”
“Good thinking.”
Carrying sleeping bags and deflated air mattresses, the two men made their way through waist-high drifts to the back door. Inside, they stashed their cargo, kicked off their boots and shed layers of heavy wet outerwear.
Big Mac opened the door to the kitchen, and the roar of voices, laughter, screaming babies and Christmas music greeted them. “Now that,” he said, grinning at his best friend, “is more like it.”
“Merry Christmas, good buddy.” Ned raised his hand for a high five.
Big Mac returned the high five and then hugged him. “Best Christmas present anyone ever got me.”
“Can you tell me what the hell we’re doing in this madhouse?” Quinn asked Mallory, amused by the antics of Thomas, Ashleigh and Hailey, whose excitement bordered on mania.
“We’re enjoying my second Christmas with my new family.”
“Is that what we’re doing?” His eyes went wide when Ashleigh jumped on Thomas’s back and took him down into a heap.
They landed with a thump and promptly cracked up laughing.
Quinn released a deep breath. “I keep thinking I should’ve brought my medical bag.”
Mallory laughed at him. “Didn’t you grow up in a big family?”
“I did, but my big family is nowhere near as crazy as yours.”
“Isn’t it wonderful?” Mallory had been devastated to realize Christmas would be canceled due to the weather and elated to get the call about Ned coming with the sleigh.
“Wonderful. Hmmm, okay. If you say so.”
“We don’t have to stay if you don’t want to.”
“I’m just teasing you, sweetheart. I know how badly you wanted to be right here in the middle of this madness.”
“I really did. I know we were having a nice quiet day, but I had so many of those before I knew my family.”
“It’s fine. I promise.”
“So you’ll be okay if I go help Linda in the kitchen?”
“I’ll be fine. The guys are watching football in the den. I’ll go in there where it’s safe.”
Mallory kissed him. “This is the best Christmas of my life.”
“Because you have your family. I get it.”
“Not just because of them, but because I have you, too.”
“Every day is like Christmas since I met you.”
“That’s very sweet of you to say, but thankfully not every day is as loud as Christmas with the McCarthys.”
“Very true. Not sure I could handle that.”
“At least they have a doctor and a nurse in residence, just in case.”
“Let’s hope they don’t need our professional expertise today.”
He’d no sooner said the words, when Ashleigh and Thomas rolled across the floor, taking out Hailey, who bumped her forehead on the coffee table.
“Spoke too soon.” Mallory scooped up her niece and held her tight as she howled. “Get some ice,” she told Maddie who came running when she heard her daughter crying.
“Mac!” Maddie called. “Talk to your son about roughhousing.”
Mac, who had baby Mac in his arms, said, “I love how he’s my son when he’s misbehaving and her son when he’s charming.”
“Move it,” Maddie said to her husband, taking Hailey from Mallory. “My poor baby. Did your brother knock you down?”
Hailey, who had a knot forming on her forehead and a quivering chin, nodded.
“A little ice will make that boo-boo go away,” Mallory told her, kissing her cheek.
“Auntie Mallory knows these things,” Maddie told Hailey. “She’s a nurse.”
Maddie went to sit with Hailey and the ice pack while Mallory joined Linda, Stephanie, Abby, Grace and Francine in the kitchen.
“What can I do to help?”
“How are you with a potato peeler?” Steph asked.
“That’s my holiday specialty,” Mallory replied. She took the potato peeler from Steph and eyed the ten-pound bag. “Where’s Janey?”
“Upstairs nursing Viv,” Grace said.
“I can’t believe we’re all here and carrying on as if there’s not a huge storm going on outside,” Abby said. “Our house was freezing!”
“Ours, too,” Mallory said. “We were bundled under ten blankets, and I was still cold.”
“Good old Ned,” Linda said. “Leave it to him to find a way to save Christmas.”
“Crazy old fool,” Francine muttered, eyes brimming with affection for her husband.
“Your crazy old fool saved the day,” Linda said.
“Yes, he did,” Francine said, shaking her head. “He never ceases to surprise me.”
“He’s the best of us all,” Linda declared.
“He sure is,” Steph said. “Did anyone hear from Laura and the others?”
“Frank, Betsy, Shane, Katie, Sarah, Charlie, Kevin, Chelsea and the boys all stayed at the Surf last night with Laura and Owen and the kids,” Linda said. “Big Mac talked to them earlier, and they’re hunkered down with a generator.”
“I’m glad they can all be together,” Grace said. “Did you talk to Charlie?” she asked Stephanie.
“We had Christmas Eve with him and Sarah,” Steph said of her stepfather. “After so many years apart on Christmas, we’ll take what we can get.”
Tiffany came into the kitchen holding Adeline. “I got a text from Blaine in all capital letters with multiple exclamation points that said, ‘ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME?!?!!!!,’ when I told him where we are and how we got here. I said it was all Ned’s fault.”
The others laughed at that.
“Poor Blaine out serving the community, thinking his family is safe at home,” Linda said. “And you’re actually cavorting in the snow with babies.”
“He was worried about us being home alone in the storm,” Tiffany said, “so at least we’re not home alone anymore.”
“There is that,” Maddie said, smiling at her sister’s reasoning.
Tiffany was an expert at manipulating her alpha husband who was slavishly devoted to her.
“How late does he have to work?” Francine asked.
“Not too much longer. He’s mostly making sure people heeded his advice to stay home.”
“Everyone did except his wife and her family,” Grace said, giggling.
“I’m going to hear about this,” Tiffany said.
“Ya think?” Francine asked, laughing.
“Ohhh, maybe he’ll spank me for disobeying him,” Tiffany said, shivering.
“Good lord,” Francine said as the others howled with laughter. “I have no idea where she came from.”
They opened presents, drank eggnog, sang Christmas songs and took turns going out into the cold for more firewood. Babies were passed from one set of arms to another, and the volume remained just below deafening.
Big Mac couldn’t remember a better Christmas.
Dinner for twenty-five—counting Blaine, if he made it—took some doing, but under Linda and Francine’s oversight, they had a ten-pound beef tenderloin with all the fixings on the table by two o’clock.
Big Mac sat at the head of the table and took in the faces that surrounded him—Linda, who made it all happen.
Mac, Maddie, Thomas, Hailey and baby Mac.
Mallory and Quinn. Grant and Stephanie. Adam and Abby.
Evan and Grace. Janey, Joe, P.J. and baby Vivienne.
Ned, Francine, Tiffany, Ashleigh and Adeline.
When he thought back to his wedding day, now forty-one years ago, Big Mac never could’ve imagined what would come of his life with Linda.
She reached for his hand under the table and they shared a smile. “Unbelievable, isn’t it?”
“Best Christmas ever. Look at them—everyone has the one they love most by their side.”
“Except Tiffany, but hopefully he’ll be here soon.”
“He’ll be here the minute he can get free,” Big Mac said. “Wild horses couldn’t keep him away from his wife and girls.”
“Wild horses brought his wife and girls through the snow to grandmother’s house,” Linda said in a sing-song voice.
“That they did. Ned to the rescue.”
“Best friend we ever had.”
“He sure is.”