Coming Home For Christmas. RaeAnne Thayne

paused outside her apartment door, desperate to be alone—to breathe, to think, to recover—but also well aware she needed to convince her friends not to call local law enforcement on her behalf. They were so concerned about her, she wouldn’t put it past either of them.

      “Look, I know you’re...worried about me. I am grateful for that. More grateful than I can say.”

      She reached for their hands, these two women who had taken her into their generous hearts and befriended her. She had lied to them. She had deceived them about her identity, about her past, about everything.

      It was yet one more thing to feel guilty about, though small compared to all she had done to her family.

      “I’m sorry, but I don’t have time to explain everything. I can tell you only that I made a...a terrible mistake once, many years ago. I thought I was doing the right thing at the time but...nothing turned out the way I planned. Now my...my husband needs me to go with him so that I can begin to try to make amends. I have to, for his sake and for our...for our children.”

      Rosa and Melissa gazed at her, wearing identical expressions of concern. “Are you certain this man, he means you no harm?” Rosa asked, her Spanish accent more pronounced than usual.

      She was not certain of anything right now, except that. Despite his fury, Luke wouldn’t hurt her. She knew that without one fiber of doubt.

      “I will be fine. Thank you both for worrying about me. I should only be gone a...a few days. When I return, I can tell you...everything. All the things I should have said a long time ago. But now I really do have to go and pack a bag.”

      She could see the worry in their frowns. Rosa looked as if she wanted to argue more. She might be small, but she was fierce. Elizabeth had long sensed that Rosa herself had walked a dark and difficult road, though her friend never talked about it. Elizabeth had never pried. How could she, when she had so many secrets she couldn’t share?

      Melissa reached out and hugged her first. “If you’re sure—and you seem as if you are—I don’t know what else we can do but wish you luck.”

      “Thank you.” Her throat was tight with a complex mix of emotions as she returned the hug.

      Rosa hugged her next. “Be careful, my dear.”

      “Of course.”

      “You have our numbers,” Rosa said. “If you are at all worried about anything, you call us. Right away. No matter what, one of us will come to get you.”

      Those emotions threatened to spill over. “I will. Thank you. Thank you both.”

      “Now. What can we do to help you pack?” Rosa asked.

      Everyone deserved friends like these, people to count on during life’s inevitable storms. She had once had similar friends back in Haven Point and had turned her back on everyone who tried to help her.

      She would not make that mistake again.

      “I have a suitcase in my room, already...half filled. Can you find that while I...grab my medicine?”

      “You got it.”

      She deliberately focused her attention on the tasks required to pack, not on the panic that made her feel light-headed.

      After all this time, she was going back to Haven Point. As herself, this time, not as the woman she had become seven years ago when she walked away.

       Chapter Two

      She didn’t take an hour to pack. She already had most of her travel things ready, preparing for the trip she had planned to take in a few days to Haven Point.

      By now, she had a routine whenever she returned to the area. She stayed in the nearby community of Shelter Springs at the same hotel every time, an inexpensive, impersonal chain affair just off the highway to Boise.

      The hotel was on the bus route to Haven Point, which made it easier for her to get to the neighboring town. She ate the continental breakfast offered by the hotel early enough to avoid most business travelers and either made her own lunch in her hotel room with cold cuts or cups of soup or chose the same busy fast-food restaurants where no one would pay any attention to her.

      When her visit was done, she loaded up her bag, caught the shuttle back to the airport and flew home.

      Alone, as always.

      The system was elaborate and clunky, designed specifically so that she did not run the risk of bumping into someone who might have known her back then.

      She probably stressed unnecessarily. Who would recognize her? She wasn’t the same person. She did not look the same and certainly did not feel the same. All that she had survived had changed her in fundamental ways.

      She carefully packed her medicine and the collapsible cane she hated but sometimes needed, then grabbed chargers for her electronic devices, the things she always tended to leave behind.

      After one last check of the packing list she kept on her phone for her frequent trips, she zipped the suitcase, then sat on the edge of the bed.

      While she had something to do, her attention focused on preparing to leave, she could shove down the wild turmoil of her emotions at seeing her husband again. Now that her bag was packed, she felt them pressing in on her again, a mixture of apprehension and fear blended with an undeniable relief.

      He couldn’t possibly believe her but she had planned to tell him her identity when she returned to Haven Point next week. It was time to come forward. Beyond time. She could no longer hide from the past.

      She sat for several moments longer, breathing in and breathing out, trying to find whatever small measure of peace she could in this creaky, quirky old house. Finally, she released one more heavy breath, then rose unsteadily from the bed, extended the handle on her rolling suitcase and walked out the door of her apartment, locking it behind her.

      She wasn’t at all surprised to find Rosa and Melissa waiting for her in the small furnished landing outside of her apartment. Melissa’s daughter, Skye, and Rosa’s dog, Fiona, a beautiful Irish setter, waited, too. Her own little makeshift family.

      “Are you sure about this?” Melissa asked, her tone as worried as her expression. “I have to tell you, I don’t think you should just take off with some man we’ve never seen before—someone who just shows up out of the blue and expects you to drop everything and leave town with him.”

      She wasn’t surprised at their objections. For some reason, Melissa and Rosa thought it was their job to take care of her, whether that was helping her with her laundry, giving her rides to the grocery store or taking her to doctor appointments.

      She had found no small degree of comfort from their concern, but she needed to stand on her own.

      “I have to. Please don’t worry. I’ll be fine.”

      “Will you be back for Christmas?” Skye asked, worry knitting lines across the girl’s forehead.

      Her heart ached but she managed to muster a smile for the girl. “I should only be gone a few days. Maybe a week.”

      “You promised you would help me put out carrots for the reindeer on Christmas Eve.”

      “I won’t forget, sweetheart.”

      She had done her best to steel her emotions against Skye, to protect herself from the hurt of seeing this girl growing up happy and strong under her mother’s loving care.

      Her own daughter was only a few years older than Skye. For the past seven years, Cassie and her brother had been without their mother. Elizabeth knew she couldn’t make it right, all the hurt she had caused by her disastrous decisions, but she could at least give Luke and their children a little closure.

      “I’ll be back before you