A Stone Creek Christmas

“When will you make another movie?” someone else wanted to know.

Still another person shoved a microphone into Brad’s face; he pushed it away with a practiced motion of one arm. “We’re here to break ground for an animal shelter,” he said, and only the set of his jaw gave away the annoyance he felt. He beckoned to Olivia, then to Tanner, after glancing around to locate him.

Then, with consummate showmanship, Brad drove the shovel hard into the partially frozen ground. Tossed the dirt dangerously close to one reporter’s shoes.

Olivia thought of the finished structure, and what it would mean to so many stray and unwanted dogs, cats and other critters, and her heart soared. That was the moment the project truly became real to her.

It was really going to happen.

There were more pictures taken after that, and Brad gave several very brief interviews, carefully steering each one away from himself and stressing the plight of animals. When one reporter asked if it wouldn’t be better to build shelters for homeless people, rather than dogs and cats, Brad responded that compassion ought to begin at the simplest level, with the helpless, voiceless ones, and grow from there.

Olivia would have hugged her big brother in that moment if she’d been able to get close enough.

“Hot cider and cookies at my place,” Ashley told her and Melissa. She was already heading for her funny-looking hybrid car, gleaming bright yellow in the wintry sunshine. “We need to plan what we’re taking to Brad and Meg’s for Thanksgiving dinner.”

“I have to get back to work,” Melissa said crisply. “Cook something and I’ll pay you back.” With that, she made for her spiffy red sports car without so much as a backward glance.

Olivia had rounds to make herself, though none of them were emergencies, and she had some appointments at the clinic scheduled for that afternoon, but when she saw the expression of disappointment on Ashley’s face, she stayed behind. “I’ll change clothes at your house,” she said, and got into the Suburban to follow her sister back through town. Ginger had elected to stay home that day, claiming her arthritis was bothering her, and it felt odd to be alone in the rig.

Ashley’s home was a large white Victorian house on the opposite side of Stone Creek, near the little stream with the same name. There was a white picket fence and plenty of gingerbread woodwork on the façade, and an ornate but tasteful sign stood in the snowy yard, bearing the words “Mountain View Bed-and-Breakfast” in elegant golden script. “Ashley O’Ballivan, Proprietor.”

In summer, the yard burgeoned with colorful flowers.

But winter had officially come to the high country, and the blooming lilacs, peonies and English roses were just a memory. The day after Thanksgiving, the Christmas lights would go up outside, as though by the waving of an unseen wand, and a huge wreath would grace the leaded-glass door, making the house look like a giant greeting card.

Olivia felt a little sad, looking at that grand house. It was the off-season, and guests would be few and far between. Ashley would rattle around in there alone like a bean in the bottom of a bucket.

She needed a husband and children.

Or at least a cat.

“Brad was spectacular, wasn’t he?” Ashley asked, bustling around her big, fragrant kitchen to heat up the spiced cider and set out a plate of exquisitely decorated cookies.

Olivia, just coming out of the powder room, where she’d changed into her regulation jeans, flannel shirt and boots, helped herself to a paper bag from the decoupaged wooden paper-bag dispenser beside the back door and stuffed the pantsuit into it. “Brad was—Brad,” she said. “He loves being in the limelight.”

Ashley went still and frowned, oddly defensive. “His heart’s in the right place,” she replied.

Olivia went to Ashley and touched her arm. She’d removed the patchwork jacket, hanging it neatly on a gleaming brass peg by the front door as they came in, and her loose-fitting beige cashmere turtleneck made Olivia feel like a thrift-store refugee by comparison.

“I wasn’t criticizing Brad, Ash,” she said quietly. “It’s beyond generous of him to build the shelter. We need one, and we’re lucky he’s willing to help out.”

Ashley relaxed a little and offered a tentative smile. Looked around at her kitchen, which would have made a great set for some show on the Food Channel. “He bought this house for me, you know,” she said as the cider began to simmer in its shiny pot on the stove.

Olivia nodded. “And it looks fabulous,” she replied. “Like always.”

“You are planning to show up for Thanksgiving dinner out at the ranch, aren’t you?”

“Why wouldn’t I?” Olivia asked, even as her stomach knotted. Who had invented holidays, anyway? Everything came to a screeching stop whenever there was a red-letter day on the calendar—everything except the need and sorrow that seemed to fill the world.

“I know you don’t like family holidays,” Ashley said, pouring steaming cider into a copper serving pot and then into translucent china teacups waiting in the center of the round antique table. Olivia would have dumped it straight from the kettle, and probably spilled it all over the table and floor in the process.

She just wasn’t domestic. All those genes had gone to Ashley.

Her sister’s eyes went big and round and serious. “Last year you made some excuse about a cow needing an appendectomy and ducked out before I could serve the pumpkin pie.”

Olivia sighed. Ashley had worked hard to prepare the previous year’s Thanksgiving dinner, gathering recipes for weeks ahead of time, experimenting like a chemist in search of a cure, and looked forward to hosting a houseful of congenial relatives.

“Do cows even have appendixes?” Ashley asked.

Olivia laughed, drew back a chair at the table and sat down. “That cider smells fabulous,” she said, in order to change the subject. “And the cookies are works of art, almost too pretty to eat. Martha Stewart would be so proud.”

Ashley joined her at the table, but she still looked troubled. “Why do you hate holidays, Olivia?” she persisted.

“I don’t hate holidays,” Olivia said. “It’s just that all that sentimentality—”

“You miss Big John and Mom,” Ashley broke in quietly. “Why don’t you just admit it?”

“We all miss Big John,” Olivia admitted. “As for Mom—well, she’s been gone a long time, Ash. A really long time. It’s not a matter of missing her, exactly.”

“Don’t you ever wonder where she went after she left Stone Creek, if she’s happy and healthy—if she remarried and had more children?”

“I try not to,” Olivia said honestly.

“You have abandonment issues,” Ashley accused.

Olivia sighed and sipped from her cup of cider. The stuff was delicious, like everything her sister cooked up.

Ashley’s Botticelli face brightened; she’d made another of her mercurial shifts from pensive to hopeful. “Suppose we found her?” she asked on a breath. “Mom, I mean—”

“Found her?” Olivia echoed, oddly alarmed.

“There are all these search engines online,” Ashley enthused. “I was over at the library yesterday afternoon, and I searched Google for Mom’s name.”

Oh. My. God, Olivia thought, feeling the color drain out of her face.

“You used a computer?”

Ashley nodded. “I’m thinking of getting one. Setting up a Web site to bring in more business for the B and B.”

Things were changing, Olivia realized. And she hated it when things changed. Why couldn’t people leave well enough alone?

“There are more Delia O’Ballivans out there than you would ever guess,” Ashley rushed on. “One of them must be Mom.”

“Ash, Mom could be dead by now. Or going by a different name…”

Ashley looked offended. “You sound like Brad and Melissa. Brad just clams up whenever I ask him about Mom—he remembers her better, since he’s older. ‘Leave it alone’ is all he ever says. And Melissa thinks she’s probably a crack addict or a hooker or something.” She let out a long, shaky breath. “I thought you missed Mom as much as I do. I really did.”

Although Brad had never admitted it, Olivia suspected he knew more about their mother than he was telling. If he wanted Ashley and the rest of them to let the proverbial sleeping dogs lie, he probably had a good reason. Not that the decision was only his to make.