The Promise of Christmas

PRAISE FOR THE NOVELS OF TARA TAYLOR QUINN

“Quinn’s latest contemporary romance offers readers an irresistible combination of realistically complex characters and a nail-bitingly suspenseful plot. Powerful, passionate and poignant, Hidden is a deeply satisfying story.”

—Booklist

“Somebody’s Baby is an exceptional tale of real-life people, who are not perfect, feel heartache, make mistakes and have to find their inner strength…. Somebody’s Baby easily goes on my keeper shelf.”

—The Romance Reader Reviews

“Quinn explores relationships thoroughly, getting into the nooks and crannies, into the dark corners and secret cupboards. Her vividly drawn characters are sure to win readers’ hearts.”

—Romance Communications

“Quinn’s profound observations of human nature and her intimate understanding of values and prorities lend extraordinary psychological depth to all her work.”

—Wordweaving.com

“Quinn writes touching stories about real people that transcend plot type or genre.”

—All About Romance

Dear Reader,

Happy holidays! It’s been a while since I celebrated the season, my favorite time of year, with you all. I love the holiday season, the collective giving of thanks—a nation focused on being grateful, even if only for a moment. I love the season of giving, of receiving, of hope. We tend to be more openhearted this time of year, more open-minded as we look around us at the people who share our world, if not our lives. We tend to be more forgiving.

It is for this reason that I bring you this particular story now. Leslie Sanderson did not have a typical childhood. Oh, she lived on the right side of the tracks, did not want for anything materially. She had a family who loved her. She had opportunity and intelligence. She got good grades and stayed away from alcohol and drugs. And she suffered unspeakably in a way that many suffer, a way of which few speak. But this Christmas, at the age of thirty-one, Leslie chooses to speak. Trusting in the promise that the season has always represented to her, she makes the choice to live life fully, instead of allowing it to hold her hostage. I love Leslie. I love everything she stands for. I love her strength, her weakness, her willingness to get up each day and try again. And I love her jewelry! So much so that I own a number of identical pieces.

The Promise of Christmas is not a fable or a fairy tale. And yet, as I read it one final time, I felt as victorious as I ever did reading those stories of triumph. In this book, Leslie and Kip and their family find the promise that is real, not fantasy—the promise that love truly is strong enough to conquer all. Even the unseen demons that live inside.

From my heart to yours, Merry Christmas!

Tara Taylor Quinn

P.S. I love to hear from readers. You can reach me at P.O. Box 133584, Mesa, Arizona 85216, or through my Web site at www.tarataylorquinn.com.

The Promise of Christmas

Tara Taylor Quinn

For Pat Potter, who sat with me and talked about this very challenging book when she could have been at a Broadway play. I cherish your friendship. And for Paula Eykelhof, who didn’t even flinch when I pitched this special story to her over Chinese dinner after a day-long road trip. I cherish you, too.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

EPILOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

“LESLIE, THERE’S A Kip Webster here to see you.”

The Kip Webster? As in her older brother’s best friend Kip Webster?

“Did he say what he wants?”

Nancy Maple, Leslie’s secretary of five years, shook her head. “Just wanted me to tell you he’s here.” The older woman raised her brows, her way of asking the question that might seem too personal if she actually verbalized it.

“I knew him in high school,” Leslie said, keeping her explanation simple. “I haven’t seen or spoken to him since my college graduation, but I heard he’s a bigwig with Sporting International now.”

SI was the company that Leslie hoped would seal her partnership in one of the nation’s largest brokerage houses. As an investment counselor, she’d risen steadily up the ranks, due to her instincts as much as her analytical skills.

“You think he’s here about the rumor that SI’s going public?”

“What else could it be?” Leslie stood, resisting the urge to take a peek in the gilded antique mirror hanging beside her desk, to flatten the flyaway auburn curls. “I’ll see him,” she said, shoving papers back into their file. “Send him in.”

Nancy nodded. “By the way, great call on the South Seas deal. Congratulations!”

Leslie grinned, but said nothing. She’d gone against the firm’s senior partners on that one, and the payoff had been bigger than even she’d expected. Several of Tyler Investments’ clients were much richer today because of Leslie’s recommendation that they buy into a company that could’ve gone under but instead went public and skyrocketed overnight.

Damn, that felt good.

Her stomach didn’t feel so good right now, though. It couldn’t seem to decide whether to swarm with anxiety or give in to the weight of nausea.

With her secretary gone, she took a quick glance in the mirror, decided her curls were behaving themselves today, looking not bad against the shoulders of the navy suit she’d worn to work. And her lipstick was still on.

Kip Webster. Her one and only high school crush. She wasn’t ready. Juliet would disagree. Her therapist would say she could handle this. Without so much as a blip on her emotional monitor.

She reminded herself that Juliet was gifted, a miracle worker, really, as she waited for Kip’s knock. Juliet wouldn’t make a serious mistake like setting Leslie free if Leslie wasn’t ready.

So maybe she was having a relapse, if one had such things when it came to the afflictions of one’s past. Juliet had taught her how to shine a light on old shames and render them powerless, but right now she’d be happy if the ten years separating her and the darkness of her youth stretched into another fifty. Or eighty. That would put her at 110 and by then, surely, she’d be blessed with forgetfulness?

Her office door flew open and Kip was there, with the same dark hair that she’d always figured would be as curly as hers if he’d let it grow more than a quarter-inch. Same great shoulders in a tweed jacket she’d never seen before. Her overreaction to him was the same in Phoenix as it had always been in the Columbus, Ohio, suburb where they’d all grown up.

“God, Les, you look phenomenal.”

Same brown eyes that she’d always feared saw too much.

And just like that, ten years of sane and peaceful living disappeared as though they’d never been.

“You don’t have to sound so surprised by that,” she chuckled, trying desperately to find the quiet place inside herself that Juliet had helped her discover.

“I guess I am surprised. You…your…” His eyes scanned the short skirt of the tailored suit to her long legs. Those legs, not to mention the rest of her body, had brought her shame and embarrassment during her adolescence—feelings made worse by a promiscuous period in college. With a lot of help, mostly from books, she’d learned to feel pride in them—sometimes. Please, God, don’t let there be a run in my hose.

“Yes?” she asked, with a small grin that on another woman probably spoke of self-assurance and playfulness. On Leslie, it was a carefully learned response—all part of the game of “let’s pretend” that she’d devised when she’d reinvented herself.

“You grew up.”

“We all do, eventually.” She came around to the front of her desk. As she leaned against it, her jacket fell open to reveal just a bit of the snug red pullover she had on beneath it. She’d worn her blue-and-red Sorrelli jewelry today and the expensive Swarovski, Austrian crystal gave her confidence, reminded her that she was a woman who deserved to be happy and who wasn’t afraid to go after what she wanted.

She’d hot-flashed for days after buying her first piece of the designer jewelry. She’d gone back twice to return the beautiful pair of earrings, and each time had heard Juliet’s voice in the back of her head, reminding her that she was worthy.

Today, tucked away in the jewelry armoire in a corner of her large master suite at home, was Sorrelli jewelry in every color and style she could find.

“I’m sorry. Did you say something?” she asked. Kip had taken a step toward her, watching her, while she’d been busy searching for inner peace.

“I said you did it better than most.” He was coming closer.

She blinked and smiled wider to prevent herself from cracking into a million little pieces.

“Grew up, I mean.” He was right in front of her, his lips smiling. Close.

Aha. He was still making small talk. Meanwhile she’d started thinking about what it would be like to kiss him. How could she still be entertaining the thought, the fantasy, that had practically consumed her in high school?

“Yes, well…” She stood, slid away from him before he could touch her and practically jumped to a safe position behind her massive teak desk. “I’ve been known to get things right sometimes.”

All the time really, at least professionally. But then, professionally was the only way anyone knew her.

Except Juliet, of course—although, technically, even that relationship was professional.

Juliet, where are you when I need you?

“I know this is a surprise, my showing up like this,” Kip said, hands hanging down, crossed in front of him. “And I apologize for that—”

“No!” she said too quickly, eager to make up for the fact that she’d just turned away from him. “Don’t be sorry. I’m…glad to see you!” How she’d been able to speak in that tone, and to keep her smile, was beyond her.

“The thing is…I’m—” He stopped, his expression becoming almost morose as he glanced away, and Leslie’s smile faded.

“I’m assuming you’re here representing Sporting International.” Taking the offensive gave her strength. “And I want to assure you—and your owners—that…”

Leslie’s voice dried up in her throat as Kip turned back to her. “I’m not here on business, Les.” She didn’t recognize the low intensity in his voice. Kip had seldom been without a hint of teasing in his tone. With her, anyway.

He thrust his hands into the pockets of his slacks.

“What then?” Leslie picked up a random file from the corner of her desk. She didn’t want to know. No matter what it was, she didn’t want to know.

“I— There’s no easy way to…”

The file said Berkeley on it. Typed in all black caps on a yellow label. Nancy color-coded everything. Yellow for potential clients, blue for—

“Cal’s dead, Les.” Kip took his hands from his pockets and reached out to her. His eyes, for the second she couldn’t keep herself from meeting them, were moist and warm. Pulling her in. “There was—”

“No,” she said with all the authority her success had earned her. “I just spoke with him two days ago. He’s rock-climbing in the Rockies. I know, because he wanted to fly out here first, but I have a couple of big meetings this week, a New York turnaround, so there was no way I could…”

She repeated the usual excuse of business commitments with the regret she’d mastered over the years.

“There was an accident,” Kip said, coming around her desk. She felt his fingers through the sleeves of her jacket. He couldn’t touch her. She couldn’t let him. Didn’t he understand that?

She stood motionless, wondering about color codes. And coping.

“His foot slipped. It was trapped between two boulders. When he yanked to free himself he flew backward, somehow got tangled in his line…”

Yes? And? You don’t die…of entanglement. Cal wasn’t dead. He owed her something. She wasn’t sure what. But he couldn’t die without somehow making it up to her…

“He was already gone by the time they got to him,” Kip said. “They said it was pretty much instant.”

“He strangled himself?” she asked. A strange twist of justice? No! Leslie recoiled from her own thoughts. Her brother was one of the most caring men she’d ever known. For years he’d been the one she looked to for security.

“He hit his head.”

Oh. That could be serious. But dead?

“Les?” Kip’s grip on her arms tightened. He drew her closer. She didn’t want him to hold her, but rested her head on his chest for just a second anyway. So she could think. “I’m so sorry, honey.”

He was sorry for her. She couldn’t have that. Leslie nodded, gripping the front of his shirt with both hands. “I’m sorry you had to do this.” She found a way to speak. “He was your best friend. I know you’ve got to be in shock….”

His only reply was a single movement of the chin that rested on top of her head. And the brief sob that shook the body so close to hers. Leslie tried to stand outside herself and watch. As she searched frantically for the still, calm place that brought her peace, she felt a sympathy sob coming on. Just one. For Kip.

After that, she didn’t remember much.

“DEARLY BELOVED, we are gathered here this Thanksgiving Day to mourn the passing, celebrate the life of, and be thankful for having known Calhoun Olmstead Sanderson, a young man who…”

Dressed all in black, suit, shirt, tie, shoes, Kip stood between the two Sanderson women in a small corner of the barren and brown cemetery in Westerville, Ohio, warding off the chill. That gray November day God had been considerate enough to postpone the cold spell that would consume the state of Ohio for most of the next several months. It was a balmy forty-eight degrees. It could have been below freezing for all Kip noticed.

“…At the age of twelve young Calhoun lost his lawyer father in a drive-by shooting and from that point on took up the reins of man of the house, often voluntarily forgoing his own teenaged pleasures to serve the needs of his small family—mostly, at that time, babysitting his nine-year-old sister, Leslie…”

The jolt next to him was his cue. Kip slid an arm around the slender body of his best friend’s little sister. She’d broken down the night before at the viewing, and at the funeral home a couple of days before that, and when she’d walked by the room in her mother’s house that had been her brother’s when they’d all lived there together.

Cal had practically raised Leslie. She’d idolized him. Kip had expected her to take his death hard…

“…A scholar, a gifted football quarterback who gave up his shot at the NFL to follow in his father’s footsteps in the legal profession so he could be close at hand in the event that either his mother or sister needed him…”

Leslie slumped and Kip held her against him. She was crying quietly again, not making a sound as the tears poured down her cheeks. He swallowed, his throat thick.

Kip Webster had felt a lot of things for a lot of different women in his thirty-three years. He loved everything about women—their emotions, the combination of intelligence and intuition, the softness. His idea of heaven was being the only man among a universe of happy women. Not many men could handle such a feat—keeping that many of them happy. He was pretty confident he could.

Or he had been. Until four days ago, when Calhoun Sanderson’s little sister fell apart in his arms behind the very impressive desk of her very impressive office in the swankiest building in downtown Phoenix. He would help her. Handle whatever needed to be handled. He’d take care of everything. His friend would have wanted that.

Clara Sanderson’s best friend, Mary something-or-other, stood to the right of the casket and started to sing. “Oh, Lord my God, when I in awesome wonder, consider all the worlds thy hands have made…”

Needing both arms to take Leslie’s full weight, Kip pulled her up against him. It would all be over soon and she could get out of there. He’d carry her if he had to.

“…I see the stars, I hear the roaring thunder…”

He licked lips so dry they hurt. He couldn’t believe Cal was really gone. A loyal friend, attentive son, adoring older brother, he was one of the few men Kip truly respected. He’d been the reason Kip had made it to college; he’d cajoled Kip to go with him to the University of Michigan, to get out of the Columbus life of hard living, drinking too much, doing expensive drugs, drag racing—all things his father’s money had provided and his father’s neglect had allowed.

Cal had moved home to Columbus after graduation. Kip had stayed in Ann Arbor, got on with SI, and the rest was history.

“…When Christ shall come with shout of acclamation to take me home…”

Leslie’s head fell gently against his shoulder. Her body felt so unbelievably good. Familiar—though, other than a teasing punch on the shoulder, he couldn’t remember ever touching her before.

She felt…genuine. A safe harbor.

That seemed crazy when she couldn’t even stand on her own.

The minister said a few final words, and then it was time for Leslie and her mother to take one last walk by the casket, to leave their roses on the grave.

“Les?” He pulled away, glanced down at the face streaked with makeup and tears. She stared vacantly back at him—reminding him for one scary second of someone in a state of shock.

“It’s time,” he said softly.

She nodded. Kip supported her as she said her final goodbyes to her only sibling and then stumbled back to the car. She didn’t even seem to notice the people watching her, those judging her ability to cope, those offering love and support. She was lost someplace. On her own.

With a last glance back at the only real friend he’d ever had, Kip sent up a silent promise. He’d watch out for Leslie and Clara.

“WHO’S THAT OLD LADY, Nana?”

Ada King tightened her grip on the bony little shoulders of the five-year-old boy beside her. They stood at the back of the small crowd gathered at the Lakeview cemetery.

“That’s your daddy’s mama.”

“She doesn’t look mean.” Jonathan’s childish voice belied the wisdom in his tear-drenched eyes.

“She’s not mean, child.” Ada adjusted the little girl draped over her right shoulder. Kayla had fallen asleep shortly after they’d arrived. Ordinarily that would’ve been just fine, but at sixty-two Ada’s bones weren’t as able to withstand the two-year-old’s weight as they might have twenty-five years ago, when she’d been raising the children’s mother.

“But she won’t let me be up there with Daddy.”

Ada’s arm dropped from Jonathan’s shoulder. “Come, child,” she said, turning toward the sedan Calhoun Sanderson had bought for Abby right after she’d had Jonathan. Jonathan was too smart to be just five. And Ada was tired.

Too tired. The children needed someone with a body that didn’t ache every minute of every day, someone whose legs could still run and whose eyes could still see all the little things that tiny fingers reached for.

“She’s white.”

“Yes, child.”

“Like Daddy.”

“Yes, child.”

“Is she mad ’cause me and Kayla ain’t?”

Ada unlocked the car, transferred the sleeping girl to her car seat in the middle of the back. Kayla’s frizzy little braids were glued to the side of her head with sweat.

“Aren’t, child. Not ain’t.” She double-checked the safety latch across Kayla’s chest.

Jonathan stared at her as he climbed in to the front passenger seat. “You say ain’t.”

“I’m old.”

The skinny little black boy buckled his seat belt around the church slacks she’d laid out for him that morning and stared out the side window at his father’s grave.

Ada ached for a good long cry.

“THANK YOU ALL FOR COMING,” Attorney Jim Brackerfield stood at the door of the conference room in the downtown Columbus office that housed his firm. It was Friday morning. Leslie barely gave her brother’s partner a glance; she was more concerned with her mother’s comfort, with breathing calmly through the next few minutes. She could hardly believe only four days had passed since she’d been standing in her own office congratulating herself on a South Seas deal that now seemed far more distant than mere miles away—despite her daily calls to Nancy.

Kip pulled out chairs at the conference table for her and her mother. Smiling her thanks, Leslie smoothed the gray wool skirt beneath her and sat facing the north wall, the window of which looked out toward Ohio State University. Her alma mater.

“I would’ve been happy to come to the house,” Jim was saying to Clara.

“I know, Jim, and that means a lot. Thanks,” Clara said, her lips trembling. “But I needed to come here, to see his…the office without him in it….”

Leslie nodded, rubbed the crystals in her necklace, shades of blue and gray and black. She’d agreed with her mother’s decision to meet the attorney at his office.

While her mother and Jim, who knew each other well, talked about mutual acquaintances who’d been at the funeral the day before, Kip took the seat next to her. She hadn’t been surprised to hear that Cal had left something in his will for his closest friend.

His sports equipment, she’d bet.

She smiled at him a second time, glad he was there. She was doing much better today, now that the whole process of saying goodbye to Cal was behind them. Still, Kip’s presence was…a blessing.

Jim sat on the other side of the long table. He was older than her brother by at least ten years, his hair thinning and gray, but judging by his athletic frame, he’d shared her brother’s passion for sports.

“I…” He coughed, looked down at the papers in his hands, put on a pair of reading glasses. Took them off.

“Oh, hell.” He pushed the papers away. “Cal’s will is here. We can read it together or apart, whatever you prefer. But I know what it says, and there’s just no easy way to tell you—”

“None of us needs my brother’s money, Jim,” Leslie said, relying on her years of professional experience to put the other man at ease. “Even if he’s left it to…to historic car research, we’ll all support his choice.”

Clara patted Leslie’s thigh under the table, reaching for her daughter’s hand. “She’s right,” Clara added.

Kip nodded.

“He didn’t leave his assets—and they were considerable, by the way—to historic car research.”

Leslie waited, honestly unconcerned with anything but enduring this for her mother’s sake and getting out of there, as soon as she could. She’d used an antique gold clip to pull her hair back, but wished she’d let it hang free to curtain her face.

“He didn’t leave them to any of you, either.”

“Calhoun felt the weight of responsibility for all he’d been given,” Clara said softly. “He knew that neither Leslie nor I needed his money. It truly is fine, Jim. I’d just like to know who he chose to help….”

Let it be meaningful, Leslie thought. Please let his last grand gesture be full of heart and compassion.

Jim tapped the tips of his fingers together, glancing down again. His gaze, when it met each of theirs in turn, was grave.

“He left it to his children….”

Leslie’s skin chilled. Her fingers, sliding from her mother’s, were clammy.

“His…” Clara’s face was white, pasty-looking beneath makeup that no longer enhanced her skin, her lips thin and pinched.