Holiday Homecoming

“That’s the idea.” He winked, put the Jeep in gear and eased down the accelerator. The tires slid, dug in and propelled them forward. “I’ve got a cell phone if you want to call home. Your folks are probably up worrying.”

Was that nice or what? Ryan definitely had done a lot of changing. “Thanks, but I tried with mine. I couldn’t get through. The storm.”

“Ah.” He concentrated on navigating through the whiteout conditions.

She didn’t say anything more. If she couldn’t make out the road in front of him, how could he? But he was somehow, driving with a steady confidence that made her take a closer look at the man Ryan Sanders had grown up to be.

A volunteer in the Peace Corps. A doctor. He was a man of contradictions. He still had that “I’m trouble” grin and the stubble on his jaw made him look rugged and outdoorsy. Mom was always mentioning Mary’s son on her weekly calls, but Kristin had dismissed him along with all the other eligible men Mom talked about.

Poor Mom, who was never going to give up hope for another wedding to plan. What was it Mom had said about Ryan? Kristin couldn’t remember. She automatically deleted any talk of men and marriage and how Mr. Right would come along one day.

There was no such thing as Mr. Right! How could Mom be in an unhappy marriage and be so blind to the truth?

Maybe it was how she made it through the day. Troubled, Kristin tried to turn her thoughts away from painful things. Stuff she tried not to think about, but going home only made it impossible to ignore. The hole in her family that remained—Allison. The missing face no one mentioned. The place at the table where a chair used to sit. The oldest sister who’d been alive and beautiful, and whom Kristin had loved with all her heart.

The years passed, her parents had slipped into a resigned distant marriage, her sisters had gone on to make homes and marriages of their own, but some things would never be the same. If there was something Allison’s death had taught her, it was that nothing lasted. Nothing. Not family, not love, not life.

Ryan broke the silence that had fallen between them. “Hey, are you hungry? There’s a drive-through that’s open. It’s the only one I’ve seen so far. If we don’t stop, it might be our last chance to eat until daybreak.”

“I’m starving. I definitely want to stop.”

“Looks like only the drive-through is open.” He braked in the parking lot to study the front doors. “Hope you don’t mind eating in here.”

“I’m not picky.”

“Me, either.” He slid to the order board, where the whiteout had blocked out half the menu. “I have no idea if you can see to order anything.”

“It’s no problem. There’s one of these near my town house. I know the menu by heart.”

“Me, too.” Why that surprised him, Ryan didn’t know. It made perfect sense she would eat at restaurants. He just didn’t picture her as the fast-food kind of girl.

A mumbling teenager who sounded unenthusiastic about his job took their orders. After waiting at the window while the winds kicked up, blowing the snow sideways, they were handed two sacks of piping-hot food. Ryan crept through the blizzard to park safely beneath the glow of a streetlight.

“Not that any of the light is reaching us,” Kristin commented with a wink as she unpacked the first bag.

Ryan flicked on the overhead lamp. “It’s weird. I haven’t seen snow since I went skiing winter vacation of my senior year in college. And it was on the slopes, not falling.”

“I bet it never snows in Phoenix.”

“Once, but it was just a skiff. The entire city shut down. It was incredible. Had that same amount fallen back home, no one would have blinked twice. I’ve sure missed real winters.”

Wind buffeted the driver’s side of the vehicle, and the gust of snow cloaked them entirely from the nighttime world. Kristin shivered with excitement. She loved a good winter storm. “It looks like you’re getting your wish. A full-fledged blizzard in the making!”

“Yeah, I’m one lucky guy.”

His crooked grin could devastate a less stalwart woman. Kristin gave thanks that she was a dedicated and sworn single gal who had full immunity to a man’s hundred-watt charisma. Because if she wasn’t, she’d be caught hook, line and sinker.

He probably charmed all the women in the Southwest with that grin, she thought as she clasped her hands together in prayer. She didn’t dare glance in Ryan’s direction to see if he’d bowed his head. She had grace to say, and she was going to say it.

But Ryan’s melted-chocolate baritone broke in before she could begin. “Dear Father, thank you for watching over us. For bringing us together on this night when we had hoped to be with family but found ourselves alone. Please watch over us on our journey north. In your name.”

“Amen,” they said together.

The whir of the heater and the fury of the storm filled the silence between them. Kristin unclasped her hands and didn’t dare to look at the man beside her. Paper crackled as Ryan dug through the closest sack. The crisp scent of hot greasy Tater Tots filled the air. The overhead dome lamp spotlighted the center console where Ryan was popping the tops off the little plastic salsa containers.

Why was her heart beating as if she’d just finished a ten-kilometer run? Kristin grabbed a straw, ripped off the paper wrapping, stabbed it into her soda and sipped hard. She’d never seen this side of Ryan Sanders before. She could remember him at church through their growing-up years, slumped on the pew next to his mother, staring off into space with the supremely bored look he’d perfected.

That boy had turned into a sincere man of faith? She never would have guessed the troublesome boy she remembered would have become so serious. Where had the real Ryan gone? Not that there was anything wrong with the man he’d turned out to be—not on the surface, anyway.

But what about deep inside? The parts of a person that were harder to discover? That was the real question. And it was why Kristin refused to date. Why she would never marry anyone.

Because you never knew what a person was really like, until it was too late.

“I think this is yours. Extra sour cream.” He held out the wrapped taco in his big, capable hands.

Healing hands, Kristin realized, and they looked it. Powerful but circumspect. “Th-thanks.”

The food was piping hot, but she hardly noticed as she unwrapped the chicken taco. Ryan was consuming his beef taco with great gusto. He stopped to nudge the container of hot sauce her way.

“No, too much for me.”

“I say, the hotter the better. I can have all of this?”

“Go for it.”

“Awesome.” He dumped an extreme amount of blistering sauce on his giant soft-shell taco and gave a moan of satisfaction after he took a bite and chewed. “Not nearly hot enough. I like melt-the-lid-off-the-jar hot.”

“There’s the Ryan I remember.”

“Hey, I grew up. But I really haven’t changed all that much. Down deep. I’m still a country boy at heart.”

A country boy? There was nothing obviously country in the polished, well-dressed man seated beside her. He looked as if he’d walked straight off the pages of a magazine. “You’ve been away from home for what, more than a dozen years?”

“Thirteen, nearly fourteen. What I can’t picture is you living in a big city. Why didn’t you marry your high-school sweetheart and buy a house near your folks?”

“Because I didn’t have a high-school sweetheart.” His innocent question took her back to places best left forgotten.

“Why not?”

His question was an innocent one—he didn’t know what he was doing to her by asking. The steel around her heart snapped tight into place, blocking out all the painful memories of that time in her life. When her older beloved sister had left home packed for a church retreat and bubbling with excitement, never to return again.

Kristin’s entire world changed that day. Nothing had ever been the same.

But Ryan had left the valley for greater things by then. With a football scholarship in hand and a free ride to an out-of-state university, he’d probably only heard about the small-plane crash that had taken several lives at the time. His mom had probably mentioned it to him on the phone when it happened, but it had only been a newsworthy item to him.

That day years ago had tipped her world on its side and showed her the truth. You could surround yourself with family and friends, make a marriage, a home and a family, go to church and pray faithfully, but it couldn’t protect a person. Not even God seemed to be able to do that.

The truth was too personal. She’d tried to talk about it before, but no one seemed to understand. Pastor Bill from her hometown church had been wonderful and understanding, but his well-meant advice had been useless. Why did God want to take Allison from them? She’d been beloved by everyone who knew her, and as an older sister, she’d been awesome. She was beautiful and kind, generous and selfless and smart. Anytime Kristin had needed her, her oldest sister had been there, no questions asked.