A Proposal for Christmas: State Secrets / The Five Days Of Christmas. Lindsay McKenna

Craig had nearly been caught in Los Angeles. How could the FBI have known where he would be if not for David’s seeing the address on that letter she’d mailed? And that night, that shattering night when they had almost made love, David had said, “I can help you, Holly. If you’ll just allow yourself to trust me. I swear I can help you.”

      He knew; she was sure he knew. And as far as Holly was concerned, that was reason enough not to see him again. Ever.

      Except that she needed him, wanted him. Perhaps, though she couldn’t often bring herself to examine the possibility rationally, she was even beginning to love David Goddard.

      On Friday night, Skyler called to ask her out for dinner and a movie. Holly refused, pleading a headache, and went to bed early, setting the answering machine because Skyler had a tendency to be persistent. The telephone rang twice during the night, and a sleepless Holly timed the calls at eleven thirty-five and twelve-ten.

      The next morning was one of those springlike days that sometimes creep into winter. Though there were still ragged patches of snow on the ground, the sun was bright and the sky was a painfully keen shade of blue.

      The weather did much to bring Holly out of her doldrums, and to make up for some of the stresses of the past week, she suggested to a rather wan and distraught Toby that they take his airplane to Manito Park and fly it.

      “I’m going to the Ice Capades this afternoon,” Toby reminded his aunt, running his spoon glumly through the dish of oatmeal before him. “My whole class is going.”

      “I remember,” Holly said softly. It hurt, this restraint between herself and Toby. It was a sad, pulsing ache. “You’ll be back in plenty of time, I promise.”

      Toby brightened. “Okay,” he chirped. “Let’s hurry up with breakfast and go!”

      His ebullience made Holly laugh, easing the bereft feeling inside her. “Let’s do that. Be sure to wear your mittens because it’s cold.”

      Toby nodded. As he passed Holly’s desk, his oatmeal gleefully abandoned on the trestle table, he stopped. “Mom, there’s messages on the machine. The light is flashing.”

      Holly glanced uneasily toward the telephone. Between Craig and Skyler, it was getting so that she didn’t like to answer the thing at all. It wasn’t likely that David had left those messages, she told herself, and she was in no mood to hear a lecture from Skyler or a lot of pathos from Craig. “I’ll listen later. Right now, I’m in the mood to fly your Cessna.”

      “Me, too!” Toby agreed, and he was off again, in search of the warmer clothes he would need for a morning in the park.

      Perhaps too conscientious for her own good, Holly went to the answering machine and frowned down at the little red light blinking so industriously, her finger poised over the “play” button. What if the calls had been from Craig and he was in terrible trouble? What if—

      She stopped herself, sighed and drew back her hand. It could wait. Whatever it was, it could just wait. Any kind of hassle at this moment would be too much.

      The park was sunny, and in places patches of green-brown grass dappled the grubby snow. There were lots of children around, their laughter ringing in the ice-cold air, and a goodly number of parents, too.

      “I wish I’d brought my sled,” Toby said wistfully, watching as some of the children pushed and pulled each other on Flyers and plastic saucers.

      Something twisted inside Holly as she watched her nephew; despite all his friends at school, he was a lonely child, often feeling separate from the others. Alone. While Holly’s own childhood had been far from ideal, she had had Craig. Toby had no one near his own age.

      The little boy squinted up at her, a grin forming on his face, and the toy Cessna seemed huge in his small hands. “You thinkin’ about my dad?” he asked directly.

      Holly was stunned. Lately it seemed as though she went around with all her thoughts written on her forehead, so clearly did people read them. “How did you know that?”

      Small shoulders, hidden beneath the weight of a down-filled snowsuit, moved in a shrug. “You get a sad look on your face when you think about Dad.”

      “We were very close once,” Holly admitted distractedly, having to look away for a moment because of the tears that stung her eyes.

      “Dad’s a bad man, isn’t he?” Toby probed seriously, his mittened hands working awkwardly with the airplane.

      Holly shook her head so suddenly and so hard that her neck ached—as did her heart. “No, Toby. Your dad isn’t really a bad man, though he has done some bad things. He’s sick, Toby, and pretty confused.”

      “He doesn’t want me.”

      Holly knelt in the snow, which crackled beneath the worn knees of her oldest jeans, and clasped Toby by the shoulders. “It isn’t that way at all, Toby. Your dad loves you. But when people have the kind of troubles he does, they just don’t seem to have room in their lives for other things and other people.”

      Toby’s face was scrunched up in the battle against unmanly emotion. “I liked Mr. Goddard a lot. How come he didn’t come back? Does he have problems, too, like Dad?”

      Holly closed her eyes for a moment and drew a deep breath. “No, Toby. I don’t think he has the kind of problems that your dad has. As for why he didn’t come back—”

      “He was a fool,” put in a deep, masculine voice.

      Holly and Toby looked up simultaneously, squinting against the dazzling winter sun, to see David standing over them. He wore a dark blue ski jacket and jeans, a contrite expression on his face and held his own model airplane in his hands.

      “Hi!” Toby whooped, overjoyed.

      While Holly was glad enough to see David herself, glad enough to shout, in fact, she was a little injured by Toby’s enthusiasm toward the man. It was as though a hopeless day had just been saved at the last, cliff-hanging second. And there were all her misgivings, too...

      “Truce,” he said gruffly, extending one hand to Holly, the plane tucked under his opposite elbow now. “Please?”

      Holly swallowed. It was sheer, foolhardy madness to get further involved with this man and she knew it, but she couldn’t quite bring herself to refuse what she knew he was offering. “Truce,” she croaked out, after what seemed like a long time.

      Eyes of an impossibly dark blue swept over her so swiftly that she could almost believe it hadn’t happened, and then they shifted to Toby. “Hi, slugger. Ready to fly?”

      Toby was literally beaming. Again Holly found his obvious fondness for David Goddard unsettling. What would happen when David went away? What if he did something that would hurt Craig and thus Toby, too?

      “I’m ready!” came the exuberant answer.

      David proved to be a lousy pilot, always dropping his hand controls or sending his somewhat odd-looking model airplane plunging into bushes, but Holly was too amused to chalk this up as another reason to be suspicious of him. After all, he’d only said he owned a model plane, not that he was proficient at flying one.

      In any case, David’s ineptitude only seemed to endear him further to Toby, who patiently demonstrated again and again how to handle the craft properly. Holly stood back and watched, full of mingled dread and tender inclinations. She was glad, even relieved, when Toby offered her a turn with his airplane, for that gave her something to think about besides David Goddard and all the wonderful, terrible things that could come of allowing him into her life.

      As the small airplane glided and dipped and roared overhead in a perfect circle, following the commands Holly gave it with her handset, Toby and David both applauded. Privately, she was surprised that she hadn’t sent the thing crashing into a tree; her fingers wouldn’t stop shaking.

      Finally the morning ended; it was time to take Toby home, give him lunch and let him have a few quiet minutes