Evergreen Springs

“Me? No. Heavens, no. My mom always insisted on an artificial tree, though I think one year my dad bought a real one out at the tree lot south of town, just for the smell. How hard can it be, though?”

“Harder than you might think,” he answered. “It’s not just about cutting down the tree. We could be up there and back in a half hour, as long as we find the right one quickly. But then the whole thing always seems to turn into an all-day thing, with setting it in the stand so it’s straight, then finding the lights, checking them for dead bulbs, hanging them on the tree, finding the box in the attic that has the ornaments, then hanging those, too, just so.”

He shrugged. “With the new horses that have come in the last few weeks, I just haven’t had the time to spare.”

“I understand. But can I be blunt?”

He couldn’t help his wry response. “Judging from our short acquaintance, I’m going to go with yes.”

She made a face. “May I be blunt, then.”

This was the part where she was going to tell him what a terrible, neglectful father he was. Yeah. He knew all that.

“The children need a Christmas tree,” she said, confirming his suspicions. “This year, more than ever.”

“They told you about their mother?”

“Tricia told me last night. I’m so sorry.”

Did she think he mourned Sharla? He felt the loss only for his children’s sake. “Then you have to understand the way things are right now. Jazmyn and Ty are still grieving and lost, and they don’t want to be here with me right now. Whatever you might think, a Christmas tree is not going to be some secret healing balm to make us one big happy family.”

“It’s not about the tree,” she insisted. “It’s about the process of cutting it down with them, about helping them build new traditions while still providing the comfort of continuing with old ones.”

He wanted to tell her she was crazy but her words had the resonance of truth. He had to do something about Christmas for the children. Yeah, none of them was much in the mood for Christmas but they needed to go through the motions if they had any chance of returning to a place of normalcy and healing.

“Okay. I get your point. I need to make time, even though it’s tough. Fine. I’ll take them to cut a tree. I’ve got an hour or so before the vet is supposed to be here. We can do it in that time if we leave now. Maybe we can find time to decorate it tomorrow or Monday after school.”

She pursed her lips again, giving him a wild desire to lean down and nibble on them. What the hell was wrong with him? Didn’t he have enough on his plate right now without tossing in inappropriate lust for a curvy little doctor with kissable lips and a tiny smattering of freckles over her nose?

“I’ll tell you what. If you cut the tree down, I’ll stick around and decorate it with the kids. You won’t have to do anything. You can go back to your horses or your ranch accounts or whatever you need to do.”

He frowned. “Nobody told me we’ve become the Haven Point charity project for the month.”

“You can look at it that way and be all grumpy and suspicious. Or you can simply say thank you.”

She was right. He was being an ass. She was being more than nice and he was fighting it every step of the way.

“This whole needing-help gig is tough for a guy like me. I’m not real crazy about it.”

“I get it. They say the first step is the hardest.”

He couldn’t help himself. He chuckled. It wasn’t much of a laugh and sounded a little rusty to him, but she stared at him as if he’d just sprouted stick arms like the snowmen and started waltzing with one of them.

After a startled moment, she smiled, too, and he felt a sharp kick to his gut. Oh, she was lovely. In the sunlight, amid all the fresh snow, she looked as bright and pretty as a gleaming Christmas angel ornament.

Looking at her reminded him of the same feeling he had when he was doing morning chores and walked out of the barn to find a brilliant winter sunrise over the Redemptions—breathless, awed and a little humbled that he had been lucky enough to see it.

“Just think,” she said. “Give your kids an hour of your time right now and then you don’t have to think about the tree again until you take it down after Christmas, except for watering it.”