Once Upon a Christmas

Cassidy stopped so quickly, she nearly stumbled to the ground. “No way, Mom. Caleb is my friend, and he’s fun. Plus, he’s Matt’s brother.”

Matt McCreedy was the subject of many a conversation. He was the only one in Cassidy’s second grade who hadn’t been given best-friend status, and Maggie suspected Cassidy might be going through her first crush.

Now that Maggie had met Matt’s dad, she figured he and Matt were cut from the same cloth—rugged, sturdy denim. Caleb seemed to be cut from a different sort of cloth.

Which meant that Mr. Jared McCreedy didn’t understand his youngest son’s creative personality.

“We’ll talk about it later.” Maggie didn’t want to dwell on the plight of the misunderstood child.

She’d been one—an army brat with an errant mother and a father who was used to giving orders and having them followed with a “Yes, sir. Right away, sir.” Her dad was a man who tried hard, but one who definitely didn’t understand girls.

“Mom, you’ve got that look on your face again,” Cassidy complained. “Did I do something?”

“Yes, you did something. You got sent to the principal’s office for the second time, and I had to leave work to come deal with it. After taking most of last week off, I really needed to spend time in the shop.”

Cassidy suddenly was very involved in staring at a crack in the sidewalk.

Maggie wasn’t deterred. “School’s only been in session three months. Next week is December and if you don’t...” Her words tapered off as a black truck drove by. Actually, she was glad for the interruption. She’d been about to bring up consequences, such as not attending Christmas activity at the church this Friday night or even the school’s winter play and the possibility of Cassidy not appearing in it.

Don’t threaten unless you mean it.

“Look, Mom!”

Jared McCreedy sat tall and oh-so-serious-looking behind the wheel of the Ford diesel truck. His three sons, the oldest in the front, two more in the back, all looked at Maggie and Cassidy. Caleb waved. Except for Matt, none of the boys appeared as serious as their father.

Cassidy frowned. “They have a dog. His name is Captain Rex.”

Something Cassidy asked for quite often, usually after figuring out that there was no way her mother would even listen when asked for a horse or a baby brother.

“Yes, they have a dog.”

Cassidy’s letter to Santa—not mailed because it wasn’t finished—had a dog in it, second on the list, right after a pair of red boots. Cassidy wouldn’t be getting a dog. The McCreedys had something Maggie and Cassidy did not: a house and yard. Maggie thought of two more things the McCreedys had: horses and baby brothers.

And family. They had plenty of family. They hadn’t had to fly to New York to celebrate Thanksgiving with her disapproving mother-in-law—the only relative who cared even to invite them.

The McCreedys, Maggie knew, had roots that ran deep in Roanoke, Iowa. She hadn’t seen Solitaire Farm, their place, but she’d heard about it and could picture what it looked like.

Big white house with a huge porch, complete with a swing and a rocker or two. Long driveway, winding its way to the front door, cars parked, meaning a large family. A barn. Lots of green, green grass to run across and trees to climb. Room to breathe. Plenty of animals, especially horses and, of course, acres of corn and soybeans.

Except for the corn, soybeans and animals bigger than a dog, what Maggie imagined was pretty much a portrait of one of her goals: a real home for Cassidy.

Too bad this farm was owned by a man who reminded her of her late husband, Dan, thinking of his duty above all else. Because, if Jared McCreedy had been a different kind of man—softer, more jubilant and easygoing—maybe Maggie would have engaged in a little flirting.

What would it have hurt?

It had been a year.

Not a chance. Jared even looked like Maggie’s late husband: tall, thick dark brown hair, and almost black piercing eyes. Both men were capable of walking into a room and suddenly making the room seem small. There were a few differences. Dan wore fatigues while Jared wore jeans and a flannel shirt. Dan had to wear his hair at a precision cut while Jared’s was long enough to cover his ears. Dan was always clean-shaven. Jared had a five-o’clock shadow that made Maggie think about how good whiskers felt during a kiss.

Whoa.

Been there, done that, not a chance Maggie wanted to deal with a man so intent on being in control that he didn’t know how to have fun.

Or appreciate the concept of getting a lunch box to stick to the ceiling with the help of a little peanut butter. Maggie smiled when she pictured the abject horror on Jared’s face when he spotted the sticky lunch box. No, Jared McCreedy was not her ideal man. No sense of thinking about him at all.

Chapter Two

It had been a tough week thanks to Monday’s phone call from the principal. And now once again, thanks to a Friday phone call from Caleb’s teacher, Jared was standing in the hallway of Roanoke Elementary.

He checked his watch. He had at least a dozen things to do today, starting with figuring out—since he was here—what props were needed for the school’s Christmas program. The father who had been in charge was now working extra hours and Beth, the woman he was about to see, had asked Joel, her fiancе and Jared’s brother, to help.

Joel had a rodeo, so right now, Jared was it.

But that had nothing to do with his visit today. No, Beth had something to say about Caleb, his youngest, who was responsible for Jared standing in the school’s hallway at four in the afternoon on a working day.

Through a window in the door, he could see Beth sitting at a small table. Someone else’s mom had her back to the door. So, maybe Caleb wasn’t the only one in trouble. Both women seemed overly fascinated by some paperwork spread out on the small table.

He didn’t intend to let any more time pass doing nothing. He needed to gather his boys, find the teacher in charge of the program, talk shop and head home. There was still an hour or two of Iowa daylight, and he had things to do and was already behind. He opened the classroom door and stepped in.

“Jared.” Beth Armstrong—Miss Armstrong to his son, Beth to him—twisted in her seat, looking surprised.

Funny, she’d called his cell phone and left a message requesting this meeting.

Then she glanced at the large clock just over her desk. “Is it that time already?”

“That time and then some,” Jared said, finally figuring out who was sitting with Beth. Hmm, she didn’t have a child in Beth’s class. Had something else happened between Caleb and Cassidy?

His future sister-in-law didn’t even blink, just nonchalantly walked over to where Jared stood. “Sorry, I was looking at pictures of wedding dresses and time got away from me. You know Maggie, right?”

“Away from us,” Maggie Tate agreed as she closed magazines and reached for some loose pictures, “and, yes, we’ve met.”

When Jared didn’t respond, didn’t say that keeping him waiting was okay, Beth grinned. She was getting entirely too good at teasing him. He could blame the fact that she was about to become his sister-in-law, but truth was, he’d known her most of his life. This time, she simply told him something he already knew. “Patience is a virtue.”

“Whoever coined that phrase wasn’t a single father of three with a farm to run,” Jared retorted.

“And I didn’t realize that you were standing outside waiting for Beth.” Maggie finished loading the papers into a canvas bag and made her way to the door. Jared couldn’t help but think her small frame looked right at home in the five-year-old wonderland of kindergarten.

His mouth went dry, and the annoyance he felt at being kept waiting almost vanished.

Almost.

Then, the young woman, her eyes twinkling, spoke again. “Patience is a virtue, have it if you can. Seldom found in a woman. Never in a man.”

Beth clapped her hands, clearly pleased that someone else shared the same opinion.

All Jared could think was, great, another female with a proverb. The only sayings he knew by heart were the ones his father said, and they were more advice than quips. Jared’s personal favorite: always plow around a stump.

He doubted the women would appreciate his contribution.