A Holiday to Remember (8 page)

Juliet screamed. Then she fell.

The girls in the library were sitting forward, literally on the edge of their seats. When Chris didn’t say anything else, their eyes widened.

“Is that it?” Beth demanded. “Is that where he killed her?”

“You can’t quit now,” Monique told him. “Just keep talking.”

Chris shrugged. “I said I’d keep it short.”

“Well, that’s too short,” Yolanda stated. “Don’t leave us hanging in midair.”

He glanced at Jayne, who seemed as mesmerized as the rest.

“Well, okay….”

Chase managed to be under Juliet when she fell, but he wouldn’t have said he caught her. They both went down hard on the rocky ground, with him on the bottom.

“Oh, God, Chase, are you okay?” She got to her knees beside him, put her hands on his shoulder and shook him. “Please say you’re not dead.”

He groaned and opened his eyes. “I would be, if I had a broken spine and you shook me like that. Let go.” Lying still for a few seconds, he located the source of the pain throbbing through him. “My shoulder. It’s killing me.”

“Is it broken?”

“Maybe. I don’t know.” He tried to move his arm and almost passed out. “I can’t climb anymore. We’ve got to go back.”

“Rest for a little while first. Have some water.” Juliet slipped off her backpack, then froze. “I forgot. The water’s in your pack.”

He rolled his eyes. “Great. Just great. You’ll have to take it off. No—don’t drag the straps over my shoulders. Unclip them instead.” Even that simple process made his shoulder
scream, but he survived. They each drank a bottle of water and ate a candy bar. Then, with Chase dragging his backpack, they started down the trail.

At the steep portion, he swallowed hard. “This…is gonna be tough.”

Juliet wiped tears off her cheeks. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to get you hurt. What can I do? How can I help?”

He couldn’t stand it when she cried, because it didn’t happen often. “Well, I could climb on your back,” he suggested, “and you could carry me down to the station.”

That made her laugh. “And then I’d make up a story about how I wanted to turn back, but you kept on climbing and then fell and hurt your shoulder, so I’d be the hero who got you to safety again.”

“You probably would.”

“I definitely would.” She looked down the path again. “Are you gonna make it?”

Before he could answer, the clouds opened up. Buckets of rain dumped onto their side of the mountain, right on their heads. The wind lashed around them and thunder rolled, as if it was the end of the world.

Soaked to the skin, his teeth chattering and his arm numb, Chase couldn’t think for a minute. Then he remembered. “In my bag. A plastic sheet. We can sit under it.”

Juliet found the sheet and they held it over their heads as they sat with their backs against a small pine tree.

“How long do you think it will last?” she asked. There were goose bumps on every inch of her bare skin.

“No telling.” He was watching water rush down the trail as if it were Niagara Falls. They were stuck till the storm passed. Even then, he wasn’t sure he could make the climb one-handed.

After a while, Juliet remembered her sweater and tugged it on. She pulled out Chase’s sweatshirt and laid it across his chest, with the arms around his neck and hanging down in back.

Then she scooted in close to his uninjured side. “I’ll put my arm like this,” she said, sliding it behind his waist. “Think you’ll be warm enough?”

That one move took care of the problem. “I’m fine.”

Chase thought he’d gotten used to her in shorts this summer, but the tank top added to the shorts packed a mighty punch. He propped his right foot against the ground, keeping his knee bent, just in case he couldn’t get his attention on something besides the press of Juliet’s chest against him.

Meanwhile, the longest thunderstorm in Blue Ridge Mountain history raged on.

After a few minutes, Juliet stirred. “My legs are cold. Would you mind if I tucked my knees under yours?”

This time, Chase didn’t hide his groan. “Are you trying to kill me?”

She stared at him. “What?”

He blew out a breath. “Juliet…” The words wouldn’t come. “Never mind.”

She scooted her knees under his raised one, tucking her thighs up against his butt. And then, of course, she put her head on his shoulder.

“That’s nice,” she purred.

Behind his closed lids, Chase rolled his eyes.
Nice. Right.

They sat for a long time, waiting for the rain to stop. Chase fell asleep with his head against the tree trunk. When he opened his eyes again, the rain had slowed from a deluge to a shower.

But the sun had set behind the mountains. There was no way they were leaving this place tonight.

Taking a deep breath, he decided he didn’t care. They’d be warm enough under the sheet, especially together like this. He moved his head a little and realized he’d shifted slightly, resting his cheek on top of Juliet’s head. He chuckled.

She turned her face to his. “What are you laughing at?”

“I was thinking it’s a good thing the rain washed those spikes out of your hair. My cheek would have had holes in it.”

She smiled, her pouty mouth like a curve of raspberry sauce in her pale face. Chase loved raspberries. So he bent his head far enough to kiss her.

The world could have ended there and he wouldn’t have cared. Kissing Juliet was the best thing that had ever happened in his life, or ever would happen. The big hole inside of him, the crater carved by years of listening to his parents curse each other and him, healed over in that moment. He was whole again, and free. Anything he wanted to do was possible.

All because Juliet kissed him.

Chris stopped there. He didn’t trust himself to say anything else. He’d never shared this memory, not even with Juliet. She’d always been a little skittish, he realized, to hear how he felt about that first kiss. He’d never been quite sure of her, even when he held her in his arms.

For a long time, the only sound in the library was the crackle and pop of the logs in the fireplace. As much as he wanted to look at Jayne, he didn’t dare. He could only hope the force of his feelings was somehow shaking the foundation of hers.

Not surprisingly, she was the first person to move. Without a sound, she rose from her corner of the couch and left the
library. Chris expected to hear the noise of banging pans and clattering dishes. But the silence stretched for another moment.

Then the girls began moving, whispering, sharing their responses to the story with each other. They didn’t approach Chris and he didn’t intrude. Right now, they all needed the distance. As did he.

He didn’t look for Jayne, either, even when he realized she wasn’t in the kitchen. She’d gone somewhere to hide. Her office, maybe, or the women’s bathroom.

Good. That meant he’d stirred something inside of her—memories, hopefully. Emotions. Passions.

God knew, she’d already done the same for him.

J
AYNE PROPPED HER HANDS
on the sink in the bathroom attached to her office and let her head hang from her shoulders. Without heat, the tiled space felt like a refrigerator. The cold water she’d splashed on her face and hands and wrists would start to crystallize any moment now.

She welcomed the icy burn on her red, overheated face. What was wrong with her? How could she get so wrapped up in the story that she’d forgotten where she was, even who she was? Sitting in the midst of her students, the children she should be taking care of, she’d lost all sense of herself to become a crazy, undisciplined teenager.

That, she knew, had never happened. She’d been a good girl, her grandmother had told her, a straight-A student who babysat in the afternoons and taught Sunday school to fourth graders. Never, ever had she run wild with some boy in the mountains, staying out all night, letting him kiss her. Jayne Thomas wouldn’t do that.

But Jayne Thomas had let Chris Hammond kiss her. He’d put his hands on her skin. She had touched him, too. And that
was the real problem. Somehow she’d confused those moments the other night with the story he’d told today, and her reactions had gotten tangled, twined together. He’d probably done it deliberately, thinking he could seduce her again, using his words as a kind of verbal foreplay.

What made her angry was that it had worked. At that moment, he could have taken anything she had to give.

But not anymore. Jayne straightened her back, grabbed a brush out of the vanity drawer and dragged it through her hair, then twisted the ponytail holder ruthlessly tight. Leaving the last chill droplets on her face, she picked up her flashlight and made her way back to the hallway. There she took a deep breath and squared her shoulders.

After dinner, she’d get the girls into their bedrolls early. With any luck, they wouldn’t need another episode of the Chase and Juliet soap opera tonight. If worse came to worst, Jayne would sit in the farthest corner and read a book on her own. She didn’t have to listen to Chris Hammond. She didn’t have to kiss him.

And she certainly didn’t have to fall in love with him.

Chris kept Haley company while Jayne supervised the rest of the girls in constructing a chicken-and-rice dinner cooked on the fire.

Conversation lagged until they’d all eased the worst of their hunger pangs. Even then, the mood at the table stayed somber, in part because Jayne made none of her usual efforts to stimulate a discussion. She sat quiet and withdrawn as he and the girls finished up their first helpings and passed the serving bowl around for seconds.

Selena emptied her glass of milk, set it down with a thud, then looked at her headmistress. “Ms. Thomas, about Christmas…”

Jayne jumped, but rallied quickly. “I think we’ve covered that already, Selena.”

“Well, but we’ve been talking about it today. And we have a plan.”

“A plan?”

“Most of us want some kind of decorations,” Beth said, leaning forward to speak around Yolanda.

“Not me.” Yolanda waved a hand, dismissing the idea. “I’m not having any part of this.” But then she let her arm drop. “I won’t get in the way. And I won’t stay in my room,” she said, when Jayne started to speak. “I can deal.”

The headmistress did not look reassured. “Still, I think—”

“You haven’t heard the plan.” Monique received a stern look from Jayne for the interruption, and ducked her head. “I’m sorry. But we’d really like to have a celebration, do some decorating, maybe have some cookies and a special dinner. But we don’t intend to impose any one way of believing on anybody.”

Jayne propped her chin in her hand. “What is it you want to do?”

The details poured out. During the cleanup, while Yolanda washed dishes so the sound of running water would drown out the voices, the girls explained their plans and added embellishments.

“You’ll help, won’t you, Mr. Hammond?” Haley had been exempted from cleanup and was sitting beside Chris as he finished his coffee. “We need someone to do the sawing.”

“That’s up to Ms. Thomas.” He tipped the rim of his mug toward Jayne, who remained at the other end of the table, contrary to her habit of helping the girls straighten up. “She has the final say.”

“I think…” She squeezed her eyes closed for a moment, then opened them and gripped her own mug more tightly. “Since you all are so excited and pleased with your ideas, and since Yolanda feels she can deal with whatever you’re planning, I don’t think it would be fair of me to stand in the way. Certainly, we can have a holiday celebration.”

“With decorations?” Selena clasped the dish she was drying against her chest. “And everything?”

“As long as nothing in the house is damaged. And you’ll need to be careful about where you do your sawing.” Finally, a small smile curved her lips. “The groundskeeper won’t be happy if you cut down one of his prize evergreens.”

“We won’t!” The happy chatter continued as the students went to their rooms to change for bed.

Chris took a sip of coffee as he studied Jayne at the other end of the table. “They seem to have reached a reasonable compromise on their own.”

“Yes, I guess they have.”

“You’re not happy about it?”

“I’m quite pleased that they could work together and make a decision that benefits nearly everyone.”

“Except Yolanda.”

“Yes.”

“And you.”

She looked up from her coffee mug. “That’s…I don’t know what you mean.”

“You don’t want a celebration of any kind.”

She shrugged. “I’ll survive.”

“What do you have against Christmas?”

“Nothing.”

“Did your grandmother beat you on Christmas Day?”

“Of course not.”

“Did she go to church?”

“Y-yes, we attended services for Christmas.”

“Have you been since she died?”

Her gaze sharpened. “How did you know she was dead?”

Big mistake. “You mentioned it.”

“I didn’t.”

“How else would I get that information? I can’t do any Internet research. I can’t get to town to ask questions.”

Judging by her frown, Jayne obviously didn’t want to let go of her suspicions. “I simply don’t enjoy the holiday, okay? I don’t have family left to celebrate with and I’m usually at school with students. The religious significance of Christmas
has been buried under commercialism and diluted by political correctness. Could you please just accept my reasons and move on?”

She stood abruptly and went to the sink. Chris didn’t respond until she’d washed, dried and put away her mug. Then he got to his feet.

“I don’t think I can do that.” He walked toward her. “There are too many unanswered questions about you, Jayne Thomas. I need to know the truth.”

“You can’t handle the truth,” she growled, imitating a well-known movie line delivered by a famous actor. But her grin faded quickly. “You won’t
accept
the truth, Chris. You think there’s some big mystery about me, but there’s not. I’m just plain Jayne Thomas.”

She had tilted her chin to look up at him. Chris set his fingertips on the column of her throat. “Jayne, maybe. Plain…not a chance.” As he slid his hand around to cup the nape of her neck, he lowered his head to take her mouth with a kiss.

Jayne whimpered and pushed against his shoulder. “The girls,” she whispered.

“We’ll hear them.” He hoped so, at least. But the way the feel of her took over him, he could stay lost in her lips, in her scent and taste and touch, for hours. Forever.

He put his arm around her and she yielded, pressing her body against his, spreading her warm hands over his chest. Her lush mouth was a wonder in itself, more experienced than last night, more experimental, as if she’d been thinking about kissing and the variations she wanted to try. Chris was happy to provide her with the opportunity to practice.

One minute, he and Jayne stood as if melded together, tongues mating, hands against flesh, breaths heated and fast. In the next instant, she was leaning into the refrigerator, intent
on rearranging…whatever. Chris planted himself at the window with his back to the room, plunging his fists into his pockets for good measure as the gaggle of girls returned.

“The sky is clouding up.” He had to clear his throat twice to make his voice work. “We might get more snow tonight.”

Haley came to stand beside him, peering into the darkness. “It will have to stop by morning. We need to get a Yule log.”

“So you’ve decided to call this celebration Yule?”

“YuleChristakkah,” Sarah said, joining them.

“Or maybe HanYuleMas,” Beth added, grinning.

“ChrisHanYule?” Selena suggested.

Monique put her hands on her hips. “Want to add some Kwanzaa to that word?” But she wasn’t really mad.

Their good spirits persisted even when Jayne suggested an early bedtime in the library. Chris listened with a smile as the girls gently teased each other.

Only Jayne seemed removed from the communion. She sat in the farthest corner from the fire, pretending to read the book in her lap. Chris, keeping watch, didn’t see her turn a single page.

What was she thinking? Did that frown on her face, the line between her brows, pertain to the present or the past?

As the chatter died away, Haley turned to face the fireplace. “Can we get some more of the story now? Did Chase and Juliet get rescued? Or did they die together on the mountain?”

Chris looked over at Jayne, who gave him a nod. “They didn’t die. When Chase didn’t show up for dinner, Charlie was concerned, of course, as was Juliet’s grandmother. And since she was actually a very smart lady, she had already figured out where Juliet spent her days, and who to call when Juliet didn’t come home.

“By the next morning, the whole town was up in the state
park, looking for the lost teenagers. Not more than two hours passed before the rescue squad found them.”

“And they both got yelled at.” Selena settled into her pillows. “I would have been grounded forever.”

“Yes, they got yelled at. And grounded. But they saw each other again before school started. And when Christmas came, when the next summer arrived, Chase and Juliet didn’t worry so much about seeking adventure in the mountains.

“They’d discovered, you see, that the real source of all the excitement, all the magic in the world, was the time they spent together. Alone.”

In summing up this chapter of his story, Chris allowed his voice to drone. One by one the girls dropped off to sleep, until only he and Jayne were left awake in the room.

Even she, he realized when he stopped, had surrendered. Her head rested against the broad wing of the armchair and she snored softly, her mouth open.

Watching her, Chris chuckled. He’d have to remember to warn her, when they slept together, that he snored, too.

J
AYNE JERKED AWAKE,
gasping for breath. Across the dark library the giant fireplace glowed with orange light. The heat fell far short of where she sat, however, and her fingers and feet were stiff with cold. Even her face felt frozen. When she touched her cheeks, she gathered tears. Her chin dripped with them.

She hadn’t yet taken to carrying her grandmother’s handkerchiefs in her pockets, so she pulled up the hem of her knit shirt to wipe her face and nose. What in the world had she been dreaming? Why would she wake up crying and afraid?

As hard as she tried, she couldn’t recall the dream, or the least suspicion of what had scared her. The blank wall was there, as impenetrable as ever.

She got out of the chair, wincing as her cold feet took her weight. Hobbling to the door, she stopped to count the bodies on the floor and realized one girl was absent. Her heart jumped into her throat, but she choked back the urge to worry. None of them could get into much trouble with three feet of snow outside.

“Make that four,” she commented to herself as she stood once again at the kitchen window. Chris’s prediction of more snow had been quite accurate. Huge flakes were falling through the black night. Tomorrow, all the footprints they’d made would be filled with fresh powder.

“Wonderful.” Jayne sipped from the mug of juice she’d poured for herself. “Just wonderful.”

“Ms. Thomas?” She jumped as a voice spoke from the kitchen doorway. “Sorry—I didn’t mean to scare you.” Neither of them had bothered to carry a flashlight, but Jayne could always distinguish Yolanda’s smoky voice and Louisiana accent.

“That’s okay. I forgot someone else was up.” Jayne went to the counter for a napkin to blot juice from her sweater. “Trouble sleeping?”

“A little. Can I have some milk?”

“Sure.” Jayne poured a glass and they sat down across the table from one another. “What’s bothering you?”

“Besides more snow?”

“You don’t like snow?”

Yolanda shrugged. “I liked it the first day. Now it’s starting to wear on my nerves.”

“I understand. I don’t like snow at all.”

“And now…well, never mind.”

Jayne risked a guess. “The decorations?”

“Yeah.” She cleared her throat. “I mean, yes, ma’am. I don’t look forward to having the place all jazzed up.”

“I understood there wouldn’t be any Nativity scenes.”

“I know. But that’s the whole reason for Christmas, right? This baby was born and everybody’s supposed to be joyful…”

Jayne couldn’t see clearly in the darkness, but she could hear the tears in Yolanda’s voice. “Does Christmas make you think of your babies?”

A sob was the only answer. Jayne walked around the table and sat next to the teen, putting her arm around the shaking body and gently pressing the wet face against her shoulder.

“I’m sorry,” Yolanda gasped, between crying jags.

“You have nothing to be sorry for.”

“I killed my babies. How could I do that?”

“You were eleven the first time and thirteen the second. That’s too young to be a mother.” Jayne lightly stroked Yolanda’s soft, short curls. “You couldn’t give either of them the home and family a baby needs.”

“I could’ve let somebody else adopt them.”

She didn’t argue with that conclusion. “You can’t suffer over this forever. You have to forgive yourself.”

“Would they forgive me? My two babies?”

This time, the answer came easily. “Yes, I believe they would.” She shifted to gaze into Yolanda’s face. “What you have to do now is live the rest of your life in a way that shows how much you care. We all make mistakes. Our responsibility is to become better, wiser people because of those mistakes. It’s when we don’t learn and improve that our flaws and errors can be held against us.”

“It’s so hard.”

Jayne nodded. “But you’re strong. You can do anything you set your mind and heart on.”

They sat silent in the dark until Yolanda yawned. “Maybe I can get some sleep now. It’s warmer in there, anyway. I’m freezing to death.”

“Me, too.” They put their mug and glass in the sink and walked together to the library.

The girl turned at the door. “You’re terrific,” she whispered, leaning over to kiss Jayne’s cheek. “Hawkridge and you are the best things that ever happened to me.”

Smiling, Jayne returned the hug. “Go get warm. I’m going to curl up on the couch with my blanket.”

Despite the warmth of the fire and the heavy blanket, oblivion didn’t come as easily as she’d hoped. Her mind seemed to be full of echoes, fragments of voices and noises she didn’t know or understand. When at last she did fall asleep, the echoes followed, chasing her through forests and across snow-covered fields, driving her into freezing cold rivers and down briar-covered hills until at last she ran straight into that familiar blank wall.

The shock jolted her awake. She sat up, eyes wide, heart pounding. Twice more she settled herself into a doze, but the shards of dreams continued to trouble her. Each time, the collision with that wall brought about an abrupt, fearful awakening. Finally, Jayne lay motionless and sleepless on the couch, staring at the dwindling fire and waiting for dawn to arrive.

As a result, she wasn’t in a good mood when the girls awoke a couple of hours later. Irritated by their busy chatter about the decorations they had planned, she said almost nothing during yet another breakfast of cereal and milk.

“You okay, Ms. Thomas?” Monique sat down next to her. “You’re looking a little pale.”

“I’m fine.” She used her willpower to produce a cheerful smile. “I’m just thinking about the first breakfast I’ll make when the electricity comes on again—fried eggs, bacon, grits and biscuits. All piping hot.”