Huckleberry Christmas (24 page)

He put up both hands as if stopping traffic. “Wait, wait. Use your flowers.” With a patient grin, he slipped one from her bouquet. “I am in trouble because . . . ?” He popped the head off the flower and tossed it out into the snow.

She huffed in exasperation. “You’re in trouble because you bought me a sewing machine.”

His blue eyes danced as he selected another flower. “The sewing machine is beautiful, but you can’t keep it because . . . ?” He decapitated that flower too.

She watched as the poor flower head fell to the ground. “Because it cost too much and . . . and nobody should get such a big gift at Christmas.”

Before she could move the flowers out of his reach, he snatched another one from her hand and plucked all its petals off. They fell onto the porch like snowflakes. His grin got wider. “I’ve milked cows for twenty years so that when the time came I could buy the woman I love a sewing machine, and she obviously can’t see how bad I want to give it to her because . . . ?”

“I don’t deserve it.”

“The woman who stays up all night sewing dresses so she can care for her son doesn’t think she deserves a new sewing machine because . . . ?” Another poor flower lost its head.

Beth giggled. “Stop this, right now. You are ruining a perfectly good bouquet of sunflowers.”

“I’m doing all the work here,” he said. “There’s plenty of flowers left for you to smash.”

He tried to grab another flower. Beth stretched her arm away from him so he couldn’t reach them. He pressed in on her, and she moved backwards until the porch railing stopped her progress. They laughed like children.

She held the flowers close to her face and let the petals tickle her cheek. “Okay, okay. I’ll keep the sewing machine.”

She probably could have counted his teeth, he grinned so wide.

“But only because I’d rather not see another sunflower die needlessly.”

Crushing the bouquet between them, Tyler took the opportunity to wrap his arms around her and kiss her tenderly on the lips. She had no choice but to kiss back. He was too irresistible.

One kiss left her breathless. “This isn’t fair,” Beth said. “You caught me in a moment of weakness.”

His mouth was a whisper away from hers. “I’ve never seen you in a moment of weakness.”

“You’re seeing it now.”

“What weakness is that?”

With the bouquet in one hand, she slid her arms around his neck. “The weakness that I’m so out of my head in love with you that I am not thinking straight.” She used her kiss as an exclamation point.

He closed his eyes and smiled. “Hmm. I hope you have that problem for a very long time.”

“For as long as I live, Lord willing.”

Smiling jubilantly, he bent his head and kissed her again. Beth wished she could bottle this feeling and preserve it always.

“Denki for the sewing machine. It is truly a wonderful-gute gift.”

“My pleasure.”

Strains of “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing” wafted from the house. The door opened, and Dawdi stuck his head out. It was the second time he’d caught them kissing, and he seemed as unruffled as ever. “Merry Christmas,” he said.

“Merry Christmas, Dawdi.”

Dawdi looked to the inside of the house. “He’s been asking for his mamm.”

A tennis ball flew out the door and bounced off the porch, followed by Toby with another ball held tightly in his fist. “Mommy,” he said.

Dawdi disappeared into the house and shut the door behind him. He’d probably seen enough kissing to last him a lifetime.

Tyler hefted Toby in one arm and put the other arm around Beth in a three-way hug. He kissed Toby on the cheek. “My darling family.” He brought his lips down on Beth’s and kissed her until she heard angels sing.

She felt something brush against her cheek. Toby had managed to pull a sunflower from her bouquet, and he was tapping it against her cheek. “No, no,” he said.

Beth covered her mouth to stifle her giggle. “You’re in for it now, Tyler, from both of us.”

Tyler eyed Toby in surprise, took his arm from around Beth, and buried half his face in his hand. “Oh, no.”

Three days after Christmas, the sale seekers still flocked to the stores hunting for goodies. A perfect day to haunt parking lots looking for license plates.

Tyler sat in the backseat of the car with his arm firmly around Beth. He’d been through a lot to get her to agree to marry him. He wasn’t about to let go. Felty sat in the front with Max, the driver, where he could have a better view of every car they passed.

“I hear if you go to Yellowstone, in one hour you will see every license plate in the country,” Max said, as he steered the car down another row in the parking lot of the Mayfair Mall in Milwaukee. Tyler and Felty had decided that Green Bay wasn’t a big enough place in which to find the five rare and elusive plates Felty needed to win his game. So Mammi had agreed to care for Toby for the day so they could come all the way to Milwaukee. With only three days left to find license plates, it was an emergency.

“Next year, we should plan a trip to Yellowstone,” Felty said gripping his pen and notebook like a detective working on a case.

“Only two left to find, Dawdi,” Beth said, grinning and squeezing Tyler’s hand. It was gute Felty was looking so hard, because Tyler had been too fascinated by the beautiful woman sitting next to him to care much about license plates, even on this special trip to Milwaukee.

They had already found two of the four plates Felty needed to complete his collection. Delaware drove by them on the highway between Oshkosh and Fond Du Lac, and Hawaii sat in the parking lot of Wal-Mart on West Hope Avenue. Nevada and Rhode Island were proving difficult.

“Denki again for paying for the driver to get us down here yet,” Felty said.

Tyler shrugged. “You sacrificed finding your plates so I could fetch Beth from Indiana. It’s the least I could do.” He planted a kiss on Beth’s cheek. “I wouldn’t have my Beth if it wasn’t for you.”

“Thank Annie-banannie for that. I try to stay out of the goings-on at our house. But I know you’re glad for the opportunity to make googly eyes at my great-granddaughter today.”

“Very glad,” Tyler said.

Max checked his rearview mirror. “I think we’ve looked at every car in this parking lot. I’m not seeing Nevada or Rhode Island.”

“We’ve been to every mall and McDonald’s in the city,” Beth said. “Where else can we look?”

“Let’s drive to California.” Tyler scooted closer to his fiancée. “More time for cuddling.”

Beth giggled and nudged him away slightly. “Behave yourself.”

“I have an idea,” Max said, pulling the car back onto the main intersection. “There is another place we might find a lot of plates.”

Even with heavy traffic, it only took them ten minutes to get there. “Children’s Hospital,” Felty read. “Oh, those poor little kids who have to be in a hospital at Christmastime.”

They drove through the Children’s Hospital parking lots and then around all the medical center lots. Tyler pulled his undivided attention from Beth long enough to help look. They only needed two more, for goodness sake. They found another Hawaii and four Floridas, but no Rhode Island or Nevada.

After half an hour, they decided it would be best to look elsewhere.

“Let’s try over there one more time,” Felty said. He tapped his forehead. “I have a sense about these things.”

Max maneuvered the car down another row and slowly drove between cars. Felty called out as if he’d been struck by lightning. “There they are!”

It was good the car was crawling, because Max slammed on his brakes. Beth would have gone right through the windshield otherwise.

Felty unbuckled his seat belt and leaped out of the car like a twenty-year-old. The others followed. He rested his hands on his hips and stared at two cars parked right next to each other.

Rhode Island
and
Nevada
.

“If that’s not a miracle, I don’t know what is,” Max said.

Tyler could think of a few, like the woman standing next to him, the miracle of love and laughter that had flowed into his life because of her.

But the license plates were good too.

Savoring the moment, Felty meticulously wrote them down in his notebook and then closed it with finality. “A Christmas to remember,” he said, smiling as if he would erupt into laughter at any moment. He clapped his hands together. “Now, if you will help me, I need to get a box out of the trunk.”

Raising his eyebrows, Max unlatched the trunk, and Tyler opened it and pulled out a cardboard box. “What’s in here?”

“Annie-banannie insisted I bring these today, just in case. That woman is smarter than all the presidents of the world put together.”

Felty opened the box. Inside, along with an impressive assortment of potholders, were four beautiful little baby blankets.

“Knitted by Anna?” Tyler asked.

Beth grinned. “With an extra dose of love.”

Felty was already halfway across the parking lot. He turned back to look at them. “Well, don’t just stand there. Let’s go do some good.” He sang as he marched away. “
Each day I’ll do a golden deed, by helping those who are in need.
”

Please turn the page for an exciting sneak peek of
Jennifer Beckstrand’s next
Matchmakers of Huckleberry Hill romance,
HUCKLEBERRY SPRING
,
coming in February 2014!

 

Felty’s eyes did not stray from his newspaper as Anna Helmuth laid a four-inch stack of brochures on the table next to his recliner.

“Take your pick, Felty,” Anna said sweetly, plopping herself into her rocker and taking up her knitting. “What kind of surgery would you like to get?”

“Hmmm,” Felty said, not paying attention as he perused the death notices.

“Sometimes you squint. Maybe you’d like to get Lasik.”

Felty lowered
The Budget
so he could spy his wife over the top of it. “What are you saying, Annie-banannie? You think I squint?”

Rocking back and forth, Anna inclined her head towards the thick stack of papers without missing a beat in her knitting. “It’s that purple brochure on the top. I don’t know. You might be too old for Lasik.”

“I’m only eighty-four—not too old for anything.” The newspaper crunched as Felty set it in his lap. He stared curiously at Anna’s potpourri of brightly colored brochures. “What is Lasik, and why do you have a brochure about it?”

“I already told you, dear. You need to pick what kind of surgery you want. Lasik is just one of many choices.”

“Do I need surgery?”

“Of course you do, dear. Spring is the busiest time of the year on a farm, and I need you laid up and unable to work for at least a month.”

Felty took off his glasses and cleaned them with his handkerchief as if this would help him decipher what Anna was talking about. “You want me laid up for the spring work?”

“You’re squinting, dear. You need Lasik.”

“What will become of the chickens?”

Anna lifted her eyebrows, pursed her lips, and nodded as a gesture of reassurance. “I’ve got it all worked out. Our grandson Ben will take over the farm while you’re indisposed. And look after the chickens.”

Felty furrowed his brow as if someone had taken a plow to his forehead. “You’re not still scheming to get Ben and Emma Nelson back together, are you? It’s a lost cause, Banannie. A lost cause.”

“Lost causes are my specialty,” Anna insisted, as her fingers and knitting needles seemed to meld together in a blur of fuzzy pink yarn. “Ben and Emma belong together, and if anybody can make it happen, we can. We’ve never missed yet.”

“It would take a miracle to get Emma to set foot on Huckleberry Hill ever again.”

“Leave that to me. I have a few tricks up my sleeve.”

Felty frowned as if he’d already lost this debate. “But Ben lives in Florida. What young man in his right mind would trade Florida for Wisconsin?”

“Ben would, if he knew his
dawdi
needed him. If he knew the farm would fall to pieces without his help.”

“Ben’s got twenty cousins living in Bonduel who could help with the garden and the animals. He’d wonder why we couldn’t use one of the other grandchildren.”

Anna’s ball of yarn tumbled off her lap. “Don’t you worry. I’ll see to it that all of the other grandchildren are excessively busy on their own farms.”

“And how will you see to that?”

“Now Felty. They all want Ben to come home. If I tell them my plan, the cousins will be perfectly happy to neglect their grandparents. Ben has such a tender heart. He’ll come back when he knows we need him desperately, especially when you’re going to be feeling so poorly.”

Felty leaned back in his recliner and raised his arms in surrender. “I’m feeling worse already.”

“That’s the spirit!”

ZEBRA BOOKS are published by

 

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New York, NY 10018

 

Copyright © 2014 by Jennifer Beckstrand

 

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If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the Publisher and neither the Author nor the Publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

 

 

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ISBN: 978-1-4201-3360-8

First Electronic Edition: October 2014
eISBN-13: 978-1-4201-3361-5
eISBN-10: 1-4201-3361-6