A Town Called Christmas. Carrie Alexander

nodded. She remembered well. Some fathers kept their daughters’ boyfriends in line with threats. Her dad did it with endless storytelling until the boyfriend du jour went away out of sheer boredom.

      “What happened then, Grandpa?” Skip made a swooping gesture. “Did you fly through the air with the greatest of ease?”

      Charlie put his fists beneath his chin. His shoulders hunched. Georgie and Skip hunched with him. “I started down the hill. Picking up speed. The spectators were shouting. ‘Jump, Charlie, jump!’”

      Merry looked tenderly at Georgie, who was entranced, his eyes like glass marbles. Mike was doing the same. Their gazes intersected. They exchanged smiles and the heat flushed through her again, only this time she wasn’t thinking about Mike’s physique, but what a natural inclination to fatherhood he seemed to have. He was the type of man—strong, quietly confident, even heroic—that any woman would like to have as the father of her children.

      Hormones. Merry clutched the napkin in her lap. Even considering that Christmas was the season for miracles, she was getting carried away.

      “Snow was flying,” Charlie continued. “The boards rattled beneath my skis. One of them popped up beneath me as I hit the end of the ramp.”

      Georgie gasped.

      “I shoved off with all of my might, snapped my arms out and cranked the skis up to my chin as I leaned into the jump.” Charlie extended his arms and did an airplane maneuver over the crowded table. “I must have flown for a mile.” He winked at the grown-ups. “The spectators cheered. And then—” he focused on the boys “—I dropped out of the sky.”

      “Bam,” said Skip, slapping a fist into his palm.

      “I hit hard, you betcha. Nearly bit my tongue in half. One of my skis snapped like a twig and I went head over heels.” He drew circles through the air. “Cartwheels, I did. All the way across the landing zone.”

      “Were you hurt, Grandpa?”

      “Nope. A snowdrift saved me when I landed in it headfirst.” Charlie’s chest expanded. “I set the hill record on that very first jump and nobody ever did beat it.”

      Skip’s eyes narrowed with skepticism. “How far did you fly?”

      “Eh. The exact number’s in dispute because we didn’t have a tape measure. About…” Charlie inched his hands apart like a fisherman with a tall tale. “Forty feet. Give or take.”

      “Wow,” Georgie breathed.

      “More giving than taking, is what I’ve been told, my dear.” Grace rose. “Are we having second helpings? Thirds? No? Then, who wants to help me clear?”

      Both Mike and Merry started to get up, but Shannon shot to her feet, dragging Nicky with her. “We’ll do it. You sit down, Grammadear.” She handed her husband the meat platter and potato bowl and swept up several dinner plates, escaping through the swinging door between the dining room and kitchen.

      A short silence settled among those left at the table.

      Skip’s expression was solemn. “Mom and Dad want to kiss in the kitchen.”

      Merry pressed her lips together, but she caught Georgie’s eyes. They giggled.

      “Silly,” Grace said with a bemused smile.

      “I already caught Mom and Dad kissing on the staircase,” Skip informed them. “They didn’t even have the mistletoe.”

      Mike straightened. “There’s mistletoe?”

      “You rascal.” Charlie chuffed. “Look out, ladies! I know how these jet jocks operate.” He waved a finger at Mike. “Don’t even think about stealing a kiss from my pretty gal. You hear me, Grammadear? I’m giving orders. You’re to stay away from this one.”

      Grace’s eyes shined behind her bifocals. “Oh, Charlie.”

      “Uncle Mike can kiss Aunt Merry,” Georgie said.

      “No, he can’t,” Skip corrected. “Because—” “No one’s kissing me,” Merry interrupted. She laughed awkwardly. “I’ve sworn off mistletoe for the duration.”

      Mike studied her from across the table. “Got a boyfriend?”

      She gathered silverware. “No.”

      “She’s gonna be a single—”

      “Skip. That’s quite enough, young man,” Grace interrupted smoothly despite the high color in her cheeks. “You and Georgie take the rest of the plates into the kitchen, please.”

      “Knock first,” Charlie joked.

      Merry couldn’t bring herself to stand, not when Mike was looking at her so closely. Curiosity was written across his face. She’d begun to believe that he hadn’t noticed what seemed so obvious to her—obvious and slightly embarrassing. She was her mother’s daughter.

      “Woodstove needs stocking,” Charlie said with a harrumph. “Let’s go into the family room. We’ll get out those picture albums I mentioned.”

      “Sounds good,” Merry said, making a motion to rise. Any distraction sounded good.

      While Mike went to pull out her mother’s chair, Merry dropped her napkin and bustled about clearing the table before following the others toward the archway that opened to the family room.

      Mike glanced back at her over the tops of her parents’ heads, silently signaling for a wingman.

      She nodded, sympathetic to his plight. Although she’d rather head home, she couldn’t desert him, despite the likelihood that her brief fantasy of a Christmas romance was about to sputter and die like a neglected fire.

      “I’ll be along in a minute,” she said. In all my glory.

      She sighed. The warmth had been nice while it lasted.

      MIKE STOOD WITH Meredith in the enclosed entryway of the farmhouse. The walls were paneled in knotty pine, with what seemed like a hundred family pictures hung in random configurations above the rows of coat hooks. While he held Merry’s coat out for her, his gaze skipped through the annual class pictures, following her from white-blond pixie haircuts and toothless grins to poufy marshmallow hair with lots of lip gloss. Apparently, she’d had no awkward teenage phase—only clear skin and a shining smile.

      “Let me walk you home,” he said.

      She pulled her hair free of the collar. “You don’t have to. It’s only a quarter mile down the driveway, then a short turn off the highway.”

      “But it’s snowing. And dark.”

      “I can manage.”

      From the family room came the sounds of Charlie scraping ashes in the stove. A cabinet door closed and the lights went off in the kitchen. It was not even 9:00 p. m., but the Yorks were closing up the house for the night.

      On their way upstairs, Nicky and Shannon stopped to glance into the entryway. “Good,” he said. “You’re walking her home.”

      “Her?” Merry jammed the red knit hat down to the tips of her ears, which peeked through the strands of her hair. “She’s walking herself.”

      “Meredith, don’t be stubborn.”

      She looked at Nicky. Her lips twitched with a sassy retort left unsaid. From their many long talks aboard ship, Mike knew that the siblings had always been combative with each other, but it seemed that Merry wouldn’t argue tonight.

      “All right,” she conceded. “You win. He can walk me home.”

      “Take care of her like a brother,” Nicky said to Mike with a wink.

      Merry made an inarticulate sound of frustration. “Argh.” She was shaking her head and smiling at the same time, a gesture