She’d cleaned up, her dark hair in rolls around her face, her skin porcelain and white, her lips…
He looked away before his desire could betray him.
Eviscerated.
Except, she didn’t appear eviscerated as she tugged off her gloves and set them on the table. “Where’s Dottie?”
“We don’t know. We just arrived. We thought she might be with you.”
“She’s not with me.” She stood there, her hands on her hips, her mouth in a perfect bud of consternation. “But she should be. So, gentlemen, I’m going to unload these groceries, and then we’re going to go find her.”
They were?
She turned and carried the bag to the counter. Gordy was staring at him. Raised an eyebrow.
“What do you want me to do?”
Gordy shook his head. “Practice what you preach. Finally.”
Jake glared at him, but he drew in a breath. “Violet, can I talk to you?”
She was adding cream and a ham to the icebox. She looked up at him. “No. I need to talk to you.” Then, while his heart stopped inside him, she closed the door and stepped up to him. He stilled as she touched her hand to his cheek. “Thank you, Jake.”
Thank you?
She must have read the question in his eyes. “The fact is, you cared about me, and I see that now. I know you weren’t trying to deceive me as much as make sure I wasn’t alone.”
He caught her hand. “You weren’t alone, Violet. I thought of you every day. In my mind, I saw you in your uniform, changing a tire, greasy and getting no respect from the men you worked with and I—I wanted to be there. I wanted to round on those jerks in Berlin and tell them just what you’d given up. How you were there to serve your country, just like they were. I wanted to be there in the kitchen when you came home to an empty house, welcoming you, and hold your hand when you hiked out to your father’s graveside. I wanted to track down Johnny and wring his neck for taking your watch, and I wanted to tell every man in Frost that only a beautiful woman—inside and out—could have the courage to do what you did.”
She blinked, looked away. “I didn’t know that.”
“I couldn’t tell you without telling you that Alex had died, and I knew you were already grieving your father. But that’s no excuse. At the least, I should have been honest with you three days ago. But you looked at me like I might be a real hero. Someone like Alex, and I wanted to be that.” He stepped away from her. “I did serve in the war, Violet, but I was not in the infantry. I was a chaplain. I’m still a chaplain. I didn’t fire a weapon, I just did a lot of ducking.”
She frowned at him. “Are you kidding me? I met the chaplains. They went in right beside the troops. They were shelled in the trenches, strafed by German P-47s. And they did it to offer hope and light to the soldiers. The chaplains fight with the Word of God at their side. It doesn’t make them less heroic, but more.”
His chest tightened. He turned away.
“That wound on your chest. You got that fighting for your country.” She stepped up to him. “You’re a hero in my book.”
Her words only burned inside him, however. “No, Vi, I’m not. I had a nervous breakdown in the field. I…” He closed his eyes, seeing it all again. “I survived my wounds and asked to go back, but although my body was healed, my soul wasn’t. I’ll never forget, we were rolling into Dieuze and I came upon this hole in the ground. There was a young woman in there with her baby. The woman was a skeleton, dirty, her body so thin I thought it might crumble. She’d been living in this hole—there was a makeshift fire, and a blanket, an old piece of wood pulled over the top. She held up her baby to me—she wanted to give it to me. But it was gray, and already dead. I stood there, overwhelmed by the horror of it all. The men who lost their legs and arms, their souls shattered. The ones who called out to me, repenting even as they died. The others who went down cursing. I tried to offer hope and words of faith…but as I looked at this woman, it seemed so empty. I was helpless.” He opened his eyes, wiped his hand across his wet cheek. “I just woke up one day and couldn’t move from my bunk. They had to send in medics.” He stared at his hand. “They sent me on a medical separation to Minneapolis. It took me four months to recover.” He shook his head. “I’m a disgrace to the chaplaincy.”
“Oh Jake, that’s such a lie.” She pressed her hand on his cheek, warm, soft. “Everyone feared losing themselves in the war. There were days when I was so afraid, I could barely get out of my bunk, we were behind enemy lines in one of the most fortified compounds in Europe. But I saw refugees every day—a twelve-year-old girl with her arm blown off, toddlers dressed in rags and starving. Mothers leaving their babies on the side of the road, dead. I wanted to lose my mind too. It didn’t make me weak. It made me human. And it made you understand the defeats of others.”
Her voice softened. “Do you seriously think that Arnie would have lived without your calm thinking? Or that Gordy would be alive and agonizing over how to propose if you hadn’t made him believe he could? Or that I would be back here, with food, trying to figure out how to cook if you hadn’t believed in me? You might not have served us communion, but you served grace and hope and life and healing. You’re a chaplain at heart, the hands and feet of Jesus.”
The hands and feet of Jesus. He drew in her words, longed for them to touch him. “You said I eviscerated you.”
Oh, could he sound any more pitiful?
“You did. But you also put me back together.” She looked away from him, a blush pressing her cheeks. “You read my letters.”
He swallowed. “I know, and I wish I could say I’m sorry for reading your mail. I am sorry for hurting you. But you have no idea what they meant to me. I received the package of Alex’s belongings, with your letters while I was in Minneapolis, recovering.” He met her eyes then. “Your voice healed me.”
“And your postcards gave me strength.” She caught his hand. “You know me, Jake. The real me, not Storm House me. You know my fears and mistakes…and I guess that’s the point. You know me…and you’re still here.”
Thank you, Gordy, for needing a ride to Dottie’s.
Jake squeezed her hand. “I’m still here.”
“And Alex is not.”
Jake didn’t understand her words. “He’s not?”
“He’s not. And I’m not sure he ever would have been. We were just friends, even if I hoped for more.” She shook her head. “But I was never Alex’s girl. Not when I was really in love with you.”
Oh.
Oh.
“I forgive you, Jake,” she said.
He couldn’t help himself. “Violet.” He leaned down, cupped his hand behind her neck, and kissed her. She tasted of coffee and smelled fresh, as if she’d showered, and made him feel like he’d spent a week in a foxhole. But she molded herself into his arms as if she didn’t care, so he kissed her like she belonged there.
Had always belonged there.
Violet. He knew he didn’t deserve this.
But that’s what grace was about.
“Oh, for cryin’ in the sink.” Jake looked up, and Gordy stood at the door, shaking his head. “Some guys have all the luck.”
Violet smirked, turned away.
Gordy brushed past them, into the mudroom.
“Where are you going?”
“To find Dottie. It’s time she and I had a little conversation of our own.”
“Don’t forget the ring!”
Violet looked at Jake. “He’s got a ring?”
“Yeah, and you’re right—he’s going to propose if he doesn’t keel over first. Listen, old guy, you can’t go traipsing out there. The doc said to take it easy.”
“What, you going to tote me to town again with the horse and sleigh?”
“If I have to.”
Gordy stared at him. “My truck won’t start.”
Jake smiled. “Good thing for you, we have a mechanic in the house.”
She drew in a breath. Glanced at Jake.
“I’m talking about you there, Sergeant. I don’t know the first thing about vehicles.”
She smiled. “I need to find Dottie too. I have to give her this.” She pulled a letter from her pocket. “You’re not going to believe what I found.” She smiled up at Jake with those beautiful eyes. “God brought us a Christmas miracle after all.”
She handed the letter to Jake as she pulled on her coat.
Jake stared at it. The envelope was addressed to
Dottie Morgan, Frost, Minnesota.
“Where did you get this?”
Violet pulled out her mittens, her eyes shining. “I found it in the packet of mail you gave me. I think it must have been on Alex when he died. He was probably waiting to send it stateside.”
“Why would he have it?”
“I told you. I introduced them at Fort Meade. They were in the same company. They must have become friends.”
“What is it?” Gordy asked, pulling on his fur hat.
Violet took the letter and handed it to Gordy. “It’s Nelson’s last letter home.”
* * * * *
“Gone? What do you mean he’s gone?”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Morgan. Mr. Lindholm’s not with us anymore.”
Dottie stared at the young, pretty nurse and wanted to reach across the desk and slap her. No.
No…
She walked away, gulping in her breath as she reached for a bench, lowered herself onto it.
No. This wasn’t right. She pressed her hand to her chest. No, God couldn’t do this to her. Not again. She closed her eyes.
In her memory, she saw the car drive up her driveway. Saw the Lutheran pastor and the uniformed soldiers exit. She’d stood at the kitchen window and wanted to refuse them.
No.
The two representatives from the military and her long-time pastor sat in her kitchen on a sunny spring day, the violets blooming outside her window, a lazy wind playing with the eyelet curtains, and destroyed her world.
No.
Gordy couldn’t be gone.
She curled her hands in her lap. Because if he was…
Because if he was, then she would stand at his grave and tell him the truth. That she still loved him. That she’d shared the best part of herself with him—Nelson. That they’d been a family, of sorts.
It hadn’t been enough. But it had been more than she deserved.
She pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes. But, no, she couldn’t say good-bye—not—
“Mrs. Morgan, are you okay?”
She looked up. Christine Flemming stood over her, looking prim in her nurse’s uniform, her blond hair pulled back. Dottie remembered when the nurse checked out all the Nancy Drew mysteries in the library.
“I… No, I’m not. I—I came to see Gordon Lindholm.”
“He’s not here anymore.”
“I…” She closed her eyes. “Thank you, Christine.”
But Christine stepped closer. “You don’t understand. Mr. Lindholm left the hospital over two hours ago. He’s fine.”
He’s fine? “But last night—”
“He had an angina attack. My father brought him in and treated him. He spent the night and we discharged him today. We told him to go home and rest.”
Oh, the old coot! Dottie got up. “Yes. Well. Fine. Thank you, Christine.”
“Merry Christmas, Mrs. Morgan.”
Merry Christmas, indeed. Oh, what a fool she’d become. Here she’d conjured up a happy ending for them that he clearly didn’t share.
Gordon had checked out and returned home. Without a word to the cranky woman across the marsh, pining away the night hours, worried sick for his health.
She should go dunk her head in the creek, slap some sense back into herself.
Dottie strode by the nurses’ desk. Stopped. “One should be aware of the syntax of their words before they use them,” she snapped at the nurse. “Merry Christmas.”
She stormed out of the building, her breath hot against the crisp air. Now she had to ski home, with nothing waiting but her disgusting canned ham casserole.
Merry Christmas, indeed.
Dottie gritted her jaw against the rush of heat into her eyes. Well, perhaps the whole thing had been a sort of dream. A story stirred up by an old, desperate woman.
All she had left was her soggy, misshapen mitten.
She snapped on her skis, heading down Main Street. The sidewalks weren’t yet plowed, and she skated on top of the snow, working up a sweat.
She’d go home, take down that wretched tree, toss it out into the backyard. Maybe take an ax and chop up the remainder that blocked her driveway. She’d call Frank and get him to tow Violet’s car from her yard.
By tonight, she’d have her house cleaned up, everything back to normal.
Storm House, indeed.
The remnant blizzard wind chapped her cheeks as she passed the town hall, with the display of Christmas books in the library window, its dark mournful eyes following her. She skied past the grocery store parking lot then the pharmacy, with Santa in the window, and the bank’s display of a Christmas wonderland. Miller’s Café was dark today—no lonely souls eating alone in the tan vinyl booths. She passed the jewelry store, averting her eyes, and stopped to rest at the corner of First and St. Olafson.
A glittering of light caught her eye. Probably the sun, now dropping in the afternoon sky, turning the pallor of the horizon to purple and red. She looked up, staring at the tree at the end of the street.
Was she imagining it, or had someone lit her star?
Perhaps the electricity had been restored?
She frowned, stood, skied closer.
But no, the rest of the tree lights remained dark.
And then she heard it. The rumble of a generator thrumming against the crisp air. She skied out past Main Street, toward the park, and that’s when she saw them.
Gordy, Jake, and Violet. They stood, staring up at the tree, their hands in their pockets, stamping their feet.
Her storm family.
No. But she couldn’t stop the rush of warmth. It seeped through her, into her pores, her once brittle bones, turning her spirit inside out.
Her storm family had turned on her light.
Violet saw her first. “Dottie! We were just on our way to the hospital. Well, actually, we were on our way before, and then we saw the star and I thought maybe the generator could help light it.” She lifted her shoulder. “It’ll be pretty when the sun goes down.”
“It’s pretty now,” Dottie said. Her gaze fell on the way Jake held Violet’s mittened hand. And how Violet glowed.
She glanced up at Jake, at his crooked grin, the twinkle in his blue eyes, and smiled. Well done, Jake.