Their Christmas To Remember

“It’s not the same,” Jenna grumbled. “They do those shots from far away. They don’t get up close and look way up at the top. One time, I even crawled below the barrier rails and almost got to the tree before they caught me.”

The tree could be leverage to get her to eat.

Sometimes she still thought like the criminals who’d raised her, and even if this was a con that was being used for good, that pang of self-disgust still stabbed cold into the back of her neck for the briefest of moments. Before she used that leverage anyway.

“What if I took my phone to Rockefeller Center and went to the base of the tree, and live streamed it for you to watch, right from the thick of things? You could tell me what you wanted to see, and I’d go film that.”

Jenna finally looked at her, and a little zing of triumph negated that lance of less positive feelings about herself.

“You would?” Voice so hopeful, but her expression shouted worry this was just something else she couldn’t have. “Would you bring me a peppermint hot cocoa and a snickerdoodle from the cookie shop?”

Got her.

“I absolutely would do that for you. Would you do something for me if I did?”

“What?”

“Eat some lunch?” Angel phrased it like a question and pretended even to herself that she’d had no ulterior motive for visiting the little patient, that she’d have come and visited anyway because it was the kind thing to do. That was what good people did, and it was something she was working on. Might always be working on. “I’ll tell them to bring up something good. You eat it, and I’ll live stream the tree lighting and bring you goodies afterward.”

Jenna looked for a moment as if she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, but then smiled so wide Angel could ignore the regret she should feel for her terrible adulting skills. “I will!”

She did better in her daily life and in her practice, but Jenna was special. And Angel knew a whole lot about disappointment and deprivation, which colored her actions. She might not be able to cure Jenna today, but she could make today better.

Angel rounded the bed to fetch the laptop, and they took a moment to link to her social media account, then checked the schedule for the tree ceremony.

“Lasses.” A deep, deliciously resonant voice came from the open door behind her, announcing the arrival of the brain-scrambling Scotsman.

He did that on purpose, she was just sure of it—the man’s brogue got thicker when he wanted to pour on the charm, as he apparently now did.

She was yet another weak creature who responded. Oh, she tried not to like it, and usually failed. Like right now, she failed completely to control her smile reflex. No matter how hard she willed softness and relaxation into her cheeks, they fired anyway. The best she could do was try to twist it into a rueful grimace as she made room for the surgeon.

“Jenna, my love, I’m hearing rumors you’re no’ eatin’.” Dr. Wolfe McKeag hit the Rs in his speech so hard they seemed to keep on rolling even after he’d moved on to lavish his attention on other words. Did he do that with his family? Dr. Lyons McKeag, his brother, worked in the ER with Angel, and he seemed to have become much more acclimatized to the sound of American vowels. And Rs.

However Wolfe McKeag liked to live his life, it wasn’t her business. But how strange it must be to be so proud of where he came from that he’d play it up instead of hiding it completely. To not live in perpetual fear of being found out if anyone got close... She’d told one person and lost her first job. The possibility that he’d tell someone here and get her fired again always sat in the back of her mind.

Angel couldn’t imagine life without that edge. Being so comfortable with herself, her past. Even a decade after removing herself entirely from the place and the people of her early life, all that came to mind when she actively tried not to think back was the lone pair of pants she’d had to wear one year.

What kind of demented designer even made camouflage-patterned corduroy? Certainly not one who had ever worn camouflage in a practical sense. Not even the stealthiest hunter could sneak up on a deer if every step announced their arrival. Not that she’d been able to shoot the deer that time she’d tried to help her father hunt when the larder ran bare.

And none of that had any bearing on her day, or the evening’s tasks ahead of her. McKeag could stay here and sweet-talk Jenna all he liked, but Angel had already solved the problem. She might not have had to if she’d waited—even a twelve-year-old couldn’t help but cave when McKeag came cooing.

Shooting the kid a surreptitious smile, she made her way toward the door, greeting him in passing. “Dr. McKeag.”

“Dr. Conley,” he returned, and she chanced a glance to find his pale blue eyes fixed on her. Just for a second. Just long enough to awaken the bitey critters in her belly. Some people had butterflies, Angel had things with teeth. And they roused so infrequently she’d have sworn they’d died off long ago, except for McKeag.

“Dr. Wolfe, I’m going to eat. Dr. Angel is going to get me peppermint cocoa and snickerdoodles.”

Kid made it sound as if that was the food she’d agreed to eat...

“Dr. Angel?” he repeated.

And the bitey belly critters escaped her middle and went instead to biting and sending goosebumps down her arms. The soft hair stood on end, like an ineffective porcupine.

He really needed to never say her first name again. Ever.

“She’s my Angel,” Jenna said, and that was enough to bring Angel’s smile back just as she ducked out of the room and into the safe, antiseptic solace of an empty corridor, where she could breathe.

Body betrayals were something she’d not miss about New York City, or about Sutcliffe. She rather preferred being cadaver-like from the neck down. It was safe. No primordial body signals to contend with meant she could devote her whole body to the list of actual, important problems she managed. Like finding a dietitian and sweet-talking her into a late lunch for Jenna.

And sorting out how to sweet-talk the dietitian before she got down there because, as well as she could read people, she lacked any skills in sweet talk.

* * *

The heavy door swung closed behind Conley, the force of the swing shoving the air and producing a wave of her scent that hit Wolfe dead on. Fruity, and something else. Not a perfume, he didn’t think. Or maybe it was. There was something soft about it. Sweet. Made him think of the first breath of spring on the breeze after a long, cold winter.

A perfumer would make a killing with that scent.

Her bare skin probably smelled even better. Everywhere. Something he’d have to be satisfied imagining—Wolfe had only a few rules, and not dating a coworker sat at the top. After a childhood drowning in the scandals of his parents, he hadn’t followed his older brother across the Atlantic just to invite more drama once he got settled. Not into his life, and especially not at work. Conley was a nonstarter. No matter how fantastic she smelled. No matter how delightfully freckled her skin.

“Dr. Wolfe?”

Jenna’s voice broke through the wrong direction his thoughts had taken, reminding him where he was and what he was supposed to be about. With a patient, preparing to cajole her into eating. He should be joking. Not focused on the sexy-sweet wake left behind the departing southern belle with her long Es and gentle cadence.

“I think I’ve got bad breath,” he said, snapping back into the appropriate mindset as he turned back to face the young girl.

She grinned at him, her cheeks still dimpling no matter how badly her body was failing her. No matter what he’d been told, her spirit still sparkled through the veil of the sickness draped over her. “Why do you think that?”

“She left very quickly, your Angel, didn’t she? And right after I got here.” He lifted one brow, his best Sherlock Holmes impression.

Someone had charted a mountain, but whatever had been wrong with the girl had been a molehill. She seemed in her normal Jenna–high spirits.

He didn’t mention that Conley always left quickly when he was around—that would mean he noticed. Or cared. Maybe she did that when anyone was around. He enjoyed light-hearted chatter with everyone, but, during the year since she’d arrived, he could count on one hand the number of times he’d seen Conley around anyone outside patient consultations and their irregularly scheduled department meetings for Pediatrics, which shouldn’t matter to him either.

“She’s in a hurry because she’s going to the tree lighting tonight.”

“Ah, Christmas. Gets earlier every year, doesn’t it?” Earlier and more obnoxious, but Wolfe knew better than to try and explain his feelings on the holiday to a child, especially one who needed to look forward to the magic he’d heard it held but couldn’t quite remember feeling. Inadequate small-talk about the holiday was the best he could do.

She argued, though with less energy. “No, it takes forever to get here.”

The tree was just the official, publicly agreed as acceptable kick-off to the Lousy Season. Stores had begun pushing Christmas about the same time they began pushing Halloween. Which was when he stopped going to stores and wouldn’t really resume until February. The explosion of tinsel and fairy lights that covered the city? Harder to avoid.

It was on his lips to tell her that time moved faster the older you got, but it sounded like a promise he’d love to make but couldn’t. “Are you waiting for Santa?”

“No.” She rolled her eyes at him and then looked at him far too closely. “Why don’t you like the tree?”

He must’ve made a face...

“It’s just a big tree,” he answered, adding, “and it’s cold out there.”