A Cowboy Christmas. Линда Гуднайт

gazes met, and Kristen experienced that disconcerting flutter again. “If not, I’ll give you a call.”

      “Okay. Thanks.” He closed the door and stepped back, watching as she took off. When she glanced in her mirror, he still stood there, wind stirring his brown hair, his olive flannel shirt plastered against his body. He looked incredibly alone.

      Like she’d felt the day James had left.

      Eyes were the windows to the soul, and Caleb Girard’s said he was sick with fear and sadness. Anger, too. As a nurse, she recognized the normal progression of emotions in life-and-death situations. As a woman who’d once adored him, she ached for his aloneness and despair.

      There had to be more they could do to procure a kidney for Greg. Thousands died every year waiting for a transplant. She hadn’t told this gruesome statistic to Caleb or Greg. Hope was essential. Greg had it. Caleb was struggling.

      After a stop at the Refuge Home Health office, Kristen visited one more patient, who needed an IV infusion, before calling it a day. That done, she stopped at her childhood home. Dad wasn’t yet home from his real estate office, but Mom was. After twenty-six years of working alongside Dad, Evie Andrews was semiretired, showing homes only when she wanted to.

      A honey blonde carrying a few extra pounds, Evie greeted Kristen with a hug. “There you are. Staying for dinner, I hope. I have lemon chicken in the oven.”

      “One of my favorites, as you well know.”

      Mom offered a guilty shoulder shrug. “Funny how that worked out.”

      Grinning, Kristen limped through the tidy living room where she’d grown up, past Mom’s perfectly decorated, lit Christmas tree, to the island separating the living area from the kitchen. She climbed onto a bar stool and propped her boot on the rung of another.

      “Your leg doing okay now that you’re working again?”

      “It’s tired at the end of the day, but I’m not having any pain to speak of.”

      “Which you wouldn’t speak of even if you were in agony.” Mom moved around the island to the stove. “Cup of tea?”

      “Sounds wonderful. But I can make it.” Kristen started to rise.

      “Sit. Let me pretend you still need me.”

      “Oh, Mama, I’ll always need you.”

      Her mother set the kettle to heat. “Still haven’t heard from Dr. Dudley?”

      An ache pulsed in Kristen’s chest. “I thought he’d call by now, wanting to make up.”

      “But he hasn’t?”

      “Not even a text to inquire about the fractured fibula.”

      “I know he’s a busy physician, but common courtesy demands at least a phone call.” Evie opened a cabinet. “Maybe he’s not as great as we thought.”

      Maybe he wasn’t.

      She’d thought she was in love with him. Wanted to be in love. Biology didn’t wait forever, and she wanted children, though she hadn’t mentioned kids to James. Not yet anyway. She’d assumed he’d feel the same. After his behavior at the ski lodge, and his cold silence since, she wasn’t sure of anything.

      Her mom slid a steaming cup of Earl Grey in front of her. “How’s Greg Girard doing?”

      Cup at her lips, Kristen blinked at her mother. “How did you know I was at his ranch today?”

      “Sugar, this is Refuge, not Denver. Remember how you and your brothers used to get so aggravated because Dad and I knew what you’d been up to before you could tell us.”

      “That was annoying. Like the time I was nominated for homecoming queen. I was so excited to tell you.”

      “But Shawna Rich told us first.”

      “I’m still mad at her about that.”

      They both laughed, knowing she joked. She and Shawna remained close friends.

      “So, how is Greg?” Evie leaned both elbows on the island.

      Kristen shook her head. “Patient confidentiality, Mom.”

      Her mom made a face. “Which doesn’t mean beans in Refuge. Greg’s in our discipleship class at church. We know he’s in kidney failure. Everyone does. As soon as he received the diagnosis, he called your dad, asking for the class to pray.”

      There were few secrets in Refuge, especially when someone was ill. “Greg is upbeat, as usual, trying to be positive, but frankly, he needs a miracle.”

      “Someone somewhere has to be a donor match.”

      “Finding that person is the problem.” She didn’t go into the sad statistics. She was a woman of science, but she and her family were also people of faith. “Sometimes it’s hard to trust that God will do whatever’s best, even if His idea of ‘best’ is not what we hoped.”

      “I know, sweetie. I know. I feel as bad for Caleb as I do Greg. Maybe worse. Greg is the only family he has. We know where Greg is going if he loses this battle, but Caleb will be lost without his anchor.”

      “He seems scared and worried, though he wouldn’t ever admit as much. Cowboy tough, all the way. But he’s trying hard to take care of his dad.”

      “He was always a good boy under that nobody’s-gonna-hurt-me-again reserve. I liked him. And if my memory serves, you liked him, too. You were always tagging around after your brothers whenever they brought Caleb home.”

      Kristen rolled her eyes upward. “Was I really that obvious?”

      “Uh-huh. Starry-eyed teenage crushes, we all go through them.”

      Caleb had probably thought she was a silly goose. But they were grown-ups now and teenage crushes had given way to more meaningful relationships. She wondered why Caleb wasn’t married.

      “You know what’s sad?” Lifting the boot, she swiveled the bar stool toward the lit Christmas tree. “There wasn’t one sign of Christmas in that house.”

      “I guess Greg’s not up to it.”

      “Maybe they don’t decorate, being single guys and all. But that’s sad to me.”

      “Some don’t. It bothers you because you’re a Christmas-cookie kind of girl with all the trimmings.” Evie dipped her tea bag up and down in the cup. “Which reminds me. Want to come over next week and bake pumpkin bread for the neighbors? It’ll be like old times, when you were in high school and we baked for your teachers.”

      “And the fire department and police officers.” She set her tea on the speckled gray granite. “I loved doing that. Refuge has such a great community.”

      Refuge was a great community, filled with caring people.

      An idea popped into Kristen’s head. One she couldn’t wait to share with Caleb.

      * * *

      Caleb thought she was the cutest female buzz saw he’d ever seen. Being a cautious man, he kept the thought to himself. He grinned a little, though, when Kristen plopped onto a kitchen chair, pen and paper in hand, black boot sticking straight out, and declared her plan to find a kidney for Pops.

      She’d already hooked Pops to R2-D2, forcing both men to watch, listen and repeat every step. Kristen was a good teacher, but an exacting one. He appreciated that even if it surprised him. Do it. Do it right. Pops’s life depended on it.

      “Help me make a list.” She tapped the pen against her chin.

      “A list of what? People who might donate?” Rip ambled in from Pops’s room and stood beside Caleb’s chair, quiet and polite. He appreciated that in a dog, a horse, too.

      “Civic groups, churches and, yes, specific people