Chapter 1
Chapter 1
“ A nd that’s why…” Cameron Ridge caught sight of his wife and broke off mid-sentence. She skirted by the conference room, tossed him a smile, and disappeared into his office.
“Did he have a stroke?” Blue whispered in an aside to Babs.
“I think he had a Maggie sighting,” Babs returned. “It’s been happening a lot lately, since their last trip to Texas. They’re acting weird.”
“Maybe they’re getting us a pony for Christmas,” Blue whispered.
“You know I can hear you,” Ridge said, ripping his attention away from Maggie and back to the meeting. Babs and Blue regarded him with matching angelic expressions. “As I was saying…” he had no idea what he was saying. The sight of his wife had wiped everything away. “Uh,” he shuffled his notes.
Blue raised his hand. “I think you were about to tell us we’re all getting raises.”
“No, I wasn’t,” Ridge said.
“Pretty sure you were,” Blue argued.
Ridge pinched the bridge of his nose. “No, I was about to say something much worse, actually. We’re going to be working Christmas.”
The room went still and silent as five pairs of eyes stared back at him.
“Don’t look at me like that, it’s not my decision,” Ridge said. “But hear me out and I think you might approve. It’s on location, at a resort, and it’s a soft enough op that spouses are invited as cover. And LuAnn, Ellen, Babs, I’ll only need one of you. Flip a coin or I’ll decide.” He glanced toward his office again, his mind and heart already there. “That’s it. Let me know if you have questions.” He gathered his things and practically dashed out of the conference room and to his office.
Maggie sat in the chair across from his desk, hands folded placidly in her lap, not nearly as exuberant as he thought she’d be. Heart hammering now, he took his seat behind his desk and faced her. “Well?”
“The appointment was fine,” she said, her tone even and measured.
“Just fine?”
“Good, I mean, I got these.” She reached into her purse and withdrew a string of ultrasound pictures, the first pictures of the baby, his baby, their baby. Ridge reached for them with shaky fingers. She sat in his lap and rested her head on his shoulder.
“What am I looking at here?” he asked. He wasn’t sure what to expect, but the black and white images looked nothing like a baby.
“There, that’s him. Or her. Apparently we can find that out at week twenty,” she said.
“It’s so tiny,” he said, measuring his words. He didn’t want to have the wrong reaction and disappoint her, but he’d been hoping the pictures would make it seem more real. So far the only proof of life had been Maggie’s enduring nausea and exhaustion.
“Looks like a gummy bear,” Maggie replied. “Hmm, I wonder if gummy bears would taste good.” She had been searching fruitlessly for something, anything to eat. When she pressed her hand to her stomach with a grimace, he thought gummy bears wouldn’t make the list. He pressed his hand over hers, feeling for he knew not what. Her stomach felt the same, but it was real, it was happening. They had pictures now.
“I wish I could have been there,” he said. The beauty of working together was being able to spend all their time together. The drawback was that it was difficult for both of them to take time off, especially because they hadn’t told anyone outside their immediate family about the baby.
“One more thing,” Maggie said. She reached for her phone, pushed a button, and an insistent little thrum filled the office.
“Is that…?” Cam began but felt too awed to finish the sentence.
“Your baby’s heartbeat? Yes.”
“Oh, wow.” They played it four times and Maggie tucked her phone away.
“I do have some bad news.” He tensed, and she hastened to continue. “Not about the baby, really everything is fine. It’s about my brother.”
Cam tensed again. “What’s wrong with Johnny?” He loved Maggie’s older brother, and the feeling was mutual.
“Not that one. The other one.”
He tensed again, in a different way. “Oh. What’s up with Darren?” Her younger brother was in a league all his own. While Johnny felt like his own brother, he had never warmed to Darren.
She sat up and began preemptively soothing him by running her hands over him, never a good sign. “Mom and Dad are taking Johnny to visit his pen pal in Oregon for Christmas, leaving Darren alone.”
“Okay,” Ridge drawled.
“So, um, Darren called. He doesn’t want to be alone for Christmas, and, um, he’s coming here.”
He blinked at her, trying hard once again to say the right thing. And then he remembered he already had an out. “Honey, I would love to spend Christmas with your brother, but we’re going away, remember?”
She smiled. “You can’t lie to me, Cameron Ridge. You would not love to spend Christmas with my brother, and there’s plenty of room at the resort for Darren.”
“But we’re going to be working,” he said, sounding like a whiny teenager. He couldn’t seem to help it, though. Darren was so…and it was their last Christmas together before the baby came. He wanted Maggie to himself. Selfish, yes, but he had never claimed to be otherwise where his wife was concerned.
“Amelia will be there, too. She’ll help keep him entertained,” Maggie said, soothing him with her palms again.
“Right, Amelia and Darren together are more toxic than North and South Korea,” he said, not that he blamed Amelia in that scenario. Darren was…different from everyone else in the Eldridge clan.
“You know Darren doesn’t do subtlety well. If you really don’t want him to come, I won’t be able to drop hints and hope he’ll take them. I’ll have to call and tell him specifically he’s not allowed to visit for Christmas.” She bit her lip, staring pensively up at him. She would do it, he knew, if he made a stink about it. But she would feel terrible. By extension, so would he.
“No, it’s going to be fine. Besides, we’ll be working and the entire team will be together. What’s the worst that could happen?”
Later, he would regret asking the question.