A Daddy for Christmas

A narrow door to the left of the bed led to a small bathroom complete with thick, white towels and a claw-foot tub.

Gage looked around and groaned, running his hands through his hair.

Well…Here he was. Home sweet home—at least until the roads cleared.

He sat down in an oak rocker in front of the stove.

You’re blaming what happened to Honey on me?

Elbows on his knees, resting his chin on cold, fisted hands, Gage willed Jess’s question from his weary brain.

Honestly? Yeah, maybe a small part of him did blame her. Why was she—like his sister—so damned stubborn to ask for help? How many times could Marnie have turned to him? Leaned on him for support? Instead, she’d insisted on handling the mess he’d put her in all by herself.

Impossible. That’s what women were.

He’d headed up here with the express intention of making sense of his life, and here he was, more confused than ever.

Leaning forward, he grabbed the poker from a stand of fireplace tools. His fingers were so numb, the flame’s heat stung. He jabbed at the crackling pile of logs and glowing coals. Just his luck that he’d apparently jumped from one emotion-packed fire into another.

A knock sounded at the door.

“Come in,” he called out, voice wary.

The older of Jess’s girls stumbled in with the cold.

“Your mom know where you are?” he asked.

“She’s taking a nap.”

“So that’d be no?”

“No, what?” she asked, standing there, dripping water all over the floor.

Frowning, Gage turned his attention from her back to the fire. “What brings you all the way out here?”

“This is my house,” she said, wagging a pink, briefcase-size box that had Barbie emblazoned across the front. “Me and my dolls live here—not you.”

A glance over his shoulder showed a determined set to her jaw and eyes so squinty it was a wonder the kid’s freckles weren’t glowing. “Trust me, Tater Tot, I’ll be gone before you know it.”

“Good.” After tossing her dripping pink case onto his bed, she crossed her arms.

“Well? Is there something else I can help you with?”

“You’re in my way.”

“Of what?”

“That’s where I set up my ranch.” She pointed to the fieldstone stove surround. “My dolls camp by the fire.”

“Don’t you think it’s a little hot right now?”

Lips pursed, she rolled her eyes.

Flipping open the latch on her box, out came piles of doll clothes and hats and tiny shoes that’d be hell on his back if she inadvertently left one behind. “My dolls are Sooners. We learned in school that’s what the prairie people were who got their land first before the land rush started.”

“Wasn’t that cheating?” Gage couldn’t resist asking.

His question earned him a scowl. “If you’d’ve come here, even when the land rush officially started, they probably wouldn’t have let you stay.”

“Fair enough,” he said over his shoulder. “Seeing how I’m a Texan, I wouldn’t have wanted any smelly old Oklahoma land.”

“Hey,” she said, bristling, “our state’s not smelly.”

“Duh. I was making a joke. You’re a kid. I thought you knew how to laugh?”

“I do. But only with people I like.”

“Oh.” Well, she put him in his place. What would it take to get a brokenhearted tadpole like this girl to laugh again?

“It’s a good thing my dolls are prairie people, ’cause they don’t have a house or furniture.”

“Don’t you at least have a covered wagon for them to stay in when it rains?”

“Nah. But that’d be really cool.”

The bunkhouse door opened, ushering in a powerful cold wind and one more munchkin. “There you are,” the girl said to her sister. Gage knew their names, but had forgotten which one was which.

“Who’s Ashley and who’s Lexie?”

“I’m Lexie and I’m oldest,” said the tall one with hornet-mean eyes.

“I’m Ashley and I’m smarter,” said Shorty. The kid helped herself—sneakers and dinosaur-themed raincoat dripping—to bouncing on his bed. “Did you know the biggest dinosaur egg ever found was as big as a football?”

“You’re sooooooo dumb,” Lexie said.

“You’re dumb,” said Dino Girl.

“You’re dumber.”

“You’re dumbest!”

“You’re dumb to infinity!” Chin high, Lexie wore a victor’s snide smile. “I win.”

Gage stood. “I don’t mean to get in the way of this deep conversation, but would y’all mind taking this somewhere else? I could really use a nap, and, Ashley, you’re dripping all over my bed.”

“Thought you were leaving?” Lexie asked, her fury back on him. “I want to play with my dolls.”

Sighing, Gage squeezed his eyes closed for just a sec, praying that when he opened them, the munchkins would be gone.