Christmas in Hawthorn Bay

Though she knew it was completely selfish, she half hoped they would, too. It would make her life so much easier if Jack would just go back to Kansas City.

It wasn’t just that his arrival had set all the old emotions bubbling. She was a strong woman, and she could handle a little leftover yearning and angst. She had an old scar on her knee that hurt sometimes, too. She took an aspirin and went on with her life.

No, the serious issue was Colin. How long could she keep Jack from running into the boy? And once he saw him, once he saw an eleven-year-old kid with curly black hair and eyes the color she had always called Killian blue…

Nora wondered, sometimes, what Jack’s brother thought when he looked at Colin. At first she’d been afraid that he might tell Jack, but that fear had subsided little by little, as the years passed without incident. She always had her story ready, though. The whirlwind romance in Cornwall, the black-haired charmer who had broken her heart.

But no one had ever asked.

Still, if Jack saw Colin, how long would it be before he put the whole picture together? About five minutes?

And then what would he do?

Dear Reader,

I love Christmas so much it’s become a joke in my family. When I was six, my uncle came to our house and asked my dad incredulously, “Is Kathleen really out on the porch playing Christmas music?” It was July.

Maybe I began loving the season because my parents filled our living room with marvelous presents—life-size dolls, dollhouses with real electric lights and stuffed turtles and crocodiles the size of armchairs. But I still love it, even though I have to do the shopping myself, and the cooking, and the cleaning…and the dreaded opening of the bills in January.

Christmas has everything. It has lilting, emotional music—can anyone listen to Bing Crosby sing “O Holy Night” without tearing up? It has color—what’s more visually joyous than a whole neighborhood twinkling with lights? It has great food—when else can you stuff yourself, from the morning’s pumpkin muffins to the late-night reheated pecan pie, without feeling guilty? It has family, friends and time off from work. It has cherished rituals that wind like golden threads through our lives, connecting great-grandparents to the generations they’ll never see.

And it has that most beautiful of all things: Hope. At Christmas we believe in fresh starts, in second chances. In the promise of angels and the return of innocence. Christmas seemed like the perfect season for Nora Carson and Jack Killian to find each other again, after twelve long years apart. They have many problems to overcome—betrayals, broken hearts and terrible secrets. But the magic of Christmas, surely, is enough to overcome all that. I hope you enjoy their story.

And remember…there really is no law that says you can’t play carols in July!

Warmly,

Kathleen

Christmas in Hawthorn Bay

Kathleen O’Brien

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Four-time finalist for the Romance Writers of America’s RITA® Award, Kathleen is the author of more than twenty novels for Harlequin Books. After a short career as a television critic and feature writer, Kathleen traded in journalism for fiction—and the chance to be a stay-at-home mother. A native Floridian, she and her husband live just outside Orlando, only a few miles from their grown children.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER ONE

NORA CARSON HAD ALWAYS found it hard to say no to Maggie, even when she knew that her bullheaded best friend was being stupid. Though Nora, at nineteen, was only three months older than Maggie, the younger girl had a way of making Nora’s common sense sound pathetically boring.

And if making Nora feel like a fuddy-duddy didn’t work, Maggie had big sad eyes and a killer pout, a little-girl-lost look that turned Nora—and just about everyone else—straight to mush.

This late-autumn Saturday, Maggie’s nineteenth birthday, was no exception. Maggie, who was eight months pregnant, woke up with a hankering to go sailing. Nora knew it was a rotten idea, and so did Dr. Ethan Jacobs, the young obstetrician who had begun as Maggie’s doctor when they’d arrived in town three months ago—and ended up more like a love slave with a stethoscope.

But neither of them could resist Maggie in a Mood.

So here they were, halfway to nowhere, with the Maine coast receding as Ethan’s sails filled with crisp, clean wind. The cooler at their feet bulged with fried chicken, egg-salad sandwiches and bottled water. Ethan had caved in to Maggie’s pressure first, and admitted that he knew a tiny island Maggie would love. Just a couple of miles wide, it had everything, he said—a green forest, a cliff, a small white waterfall.

Best of all, it was completely uninhabited. The perfect place to make the world go away for an afternoon.

They’d been on Ethan’s tiny day sailer for almost an hour—the island was about ten miles offshore—when suddenly Maggie hopped up onto her cushioned seat and let out an exhilarated squeal.

“This is the best birthday ever! Oh, my God, I love this day!”

Nora, who was sitting at the back of the boat, couldn’t help smiling. Maggie’s spiky brown hair stood straight up in the wind, and her pregnant stomach looked as rounded and full of energetic purpose as the sails above her.

Maggie’s moods were always infectious. If she was depressed, everyone around her suffered. But if she was happy…

“And I love you!” Maggie climbed down and wrapped Nora in a bear hug. She turned to Ethan, who was angling the tiller, and, taking his face in her hands, covered his parted lips with a loud, smacking kiss. “And you, my dashing seafarer!”

Then she whirled away, and, with a contented sigh, leaned over to drag her fingers in the green current that rushed along the side of the boat.

Nora caught Ethan’s gaze. Behind his wire-rimmed glasses, he looked stunned, as if he’d never been this close to anything as dazzling as Maggie. The sails began to luff, as Ethan forgot to steer, but he corrected the mistake and shrugged sheepishly, his cheeks pink.

Just last night, he had confessed to Nora that he was in love with Maggie. When Ethan had finished rubbing Maggie’s feet, which had been sore after a long day waiting tables at the lobster shack, she had stumbled off to bed, leaving Nora and Ethan alone together.

He had flushed the entire time he spoke. He knew it was inappropriate, he said, given that Maggie was his patient, but he couldn’t help it. She’d made her way into his blood, and he was going to ask her to marry him.

What did Nora think? Would Maggie say yes?

Nora wasn’t sure. For all her childlike displays of emotion, Maggie kept her deepest truths in darkest secret. That’s how you knew something really mattered to her—the bubbling stream of chatter suddenly dried up to dust.

Though they’d been best friends since they’d eaten paste together in kindergarten, Nora had accepted that there were things she’d never learn, no matter how many times she asked.

Like where Maggie got that old-fashioned gold ring she wore on a chain around her neck.

Or who was the father of her baby.

“Land ahoy!” Maggie leaned way out this time, pointing east. “I see it!”

“Maggie,” Ethan said sharply, “don’t lean out so far! You could fall overboard!”

“Stop being such a worrywart.” Maggie cast a sour look at Ethan, then went back to dragging her hand in the water. “Even if I did fall over, I know how to swim.”

Nora gave Ethan a look, too. She tried to signal that bossing Maggie around was not a good idea. Maggie hated domineering, patriarchal men—probably because her father was one of the worst. Nora knew that Mr. Nicholson had hit Maggie, at least twice, and she often wondered what else might have happened that Maggie didn’t confide.

But Ethan wasn’t paying any attention to Nora. He was still watching Maggie, and his mouth was set in an anxious line. Nora looked over at her friend, too. Maggie had both hands on her belly, and her face was gripped in a sudden, strange tension.

“What is it?” Nora leaned forward. “Is something wrong?”

“I’m fine. Carry on.”

Ethan’s dark brows pulled together. “Are you having contractions?”

“I’m fine, sailor.” Maggie waved her hand nonchalantly, clearly trying to lighten the mood. Nora couldn’t blame her. Ethan did hover a bit. “Colin was just giving me one of his Morse code messages. You know, punch-punch-jab-poke. I think he said something about nappy turfday.”

Nora smiled. Maggie always called the baby Colin, though the ultrasound had been inconclusive as to sex. She’d decided it was a boy, and, as usual, the facts didn’t really concern her.

But Ethan wasn’t buying it. He reached out with a doctor’s instinctive authority and put his hand on Maggie’s stomach. “I don’t like it. You sure he’s not saying something about going into labor?”

Maggie stood up and moved beyond Ethan’s reach. “My Morse code is pretty rusty, but I think I could tell the difference between ‘Happy birthday, Mom,’ and ‘Look out, here I come!’”

“Could you?”

She glared at him. “Colin is fine. I said carry on.” It always frustrated her when the universe didn’t fall right in line with her plans. “Look, not only is this my birthday, but this may be the last completely free day I have for—oh, say eighteen years? So don’t you two go all smothery and cheat me out of it, okay?”

Ethan adjusted his glasses. “But in the third trimester—”

Maggie stood on the seat, stepped one foot up onto the gunwale and pointed her hands over her head in the classic diving position. “I’m going to that island,” she said, “if I have to swim the rest of the way.”

Ethan laughed nervously. “Get down, you dork. Do you want to slip?”

He wasn’t really concerned that she’d jump. But Nora knew Maggie better than he did. She glanced quickly toward the island, calculating the distance. Only about a hundred yards. Maggie could swim it. And, if he didn’t back off, she just might.

“Ethan, don’t piss me off.” Maggie wasn’t laughing. “You’re not my father.”

“No, I’m your doctor. I simply can’t allow you to take foolish risks—”

Nora groaned. Too bossy. He even sounded a little like Maggie’s father. Maggie despised her father.

She dove into the ocean with an emphatic splash.

Ethan lurched. “For God’s sake, Maggie!”

She ignored him, her arms cutting through the water with a brisk freestyle. Her feet churned up little green-white whirlpools, and soon she was moving faster than the boat.

“She’s a great swimmer,” Nora said when Ethan turned around to give her a horrified, open-mouthed stare. “At home, we swim all the time.”

“But she’s eight months pregnant! She has no idea how dangerous that is.”

He looked down at the water, and Nora knew he was thinking of diving in after Maggie.

“Bad idea,” she said. “You know how stubborn she is. She’ll fight you till you both drown.”

Though his adoration made him act silly sometimes, Ethan wasn’t stupid. He knew when he was outmaneuvered. Obviously the only thing they could do right now was stay close to Maggie, and get to the island as fast as possible.

He sat, wiped his water-speckled glasses on his shirt, and then grabbed hold of the tiller. It took several seconds, but he adjusted the sails until they caught the wind.

They were only a few yards behind Maggie, just a few feet to her left—Ethan was steering as close to the wind as he could, so that they wouldn’t separate much. Her small white face kept turning toward them every other stroke. Once, Nora could have sworn Maggie stuck out her tongue at them.

“Little brat,” Ethan murmured. But Nora saw that he was smiling—and, in spite of her annoyance with Maggie, she felt happy for her. How great to have someone love you so much they even found your flaws adorable.

Back in high school, Maggie’s edgy personality had scared off most of the guys. She’d had only one boyfriend, as far as Nora knew—a short, dumb fling with Mr. Jenkins, their senior biology teacher who shortly afterward had married the English lit teacher and had moved out of town. Nora assumed Mr. J. must be the father of the baby, though of course Maggie wouldn’t discuss it.

But perhaps Mr. Jenkins had been a sign. Maggie needed someone a little older, a lot wiser.

Yes. Nice, honest, loyal and unmarried Ethan would be good for Maggie.

If only she’d have him.

The wind had shifted, so Ethan had to tack. Maggie beat them to the beach by at least five minutes, and they were coming in several yards west of her.

All they could do was watch as she climbed out of the surf, little bits of foam clinging to her bare legs. She shook water from her ears and ran her fingers through her hair to spike it back up where it belonged. Finally, she assumed a pose of exaggerated boredom, as if they were taking forever.

And then, abruptly, she doubled over, gripping her stomach with both hands.

Ethan made a skeptical sound. “Faker,” he said. “I’m not falling for that one.”

Was it just a joke? If so, it wasn’t one bit funny—it was actually damned scary. Would Maggie really be such a jerk? Nora frowned and moved to the other side of the boat, hoping to make out the details of Maggie’s face.

But her chin was tucked down against her breastbone. Her shoulders were hunched, and her hands were still hanging onto her stomach, fingers widespread and curved, like stiff claws.

“No,” Nora said through suddenly cold lips. “No, she’s not faking. You know how she is. She never pretends to be weak. She always pretends to be strong.”

Ethan frowned. They had almost made land. A shrill cry reached them, knifing through the crisp autumn silence. It sounded like a gull, but it was Maggie.

“Oh, my God,” he said. His knuckles were stark white around the tiller.

As they watched, Maggie swayed from side to side, as if she were wrestling with something inside her. And then she sank to her knees in the sand.

The sailboat was only fifteen feet from shore. Without thinking, Nora jumped out and waded through the cold, chest-high water as fast as her trembling legs would take her. Behind her, she heard Ethan jump out, too.

Her feet were clumsy on the grainy sand, but she ran as fast as she could. She reached Maggie just as she toppled over onto her side, her hands still wrapped around her stomach.

“Honey, honey, what’s wrong?” Nora dropped to her knees beside the moaning girl. “Is it the baby? Is the baby coming?”

“I don’t know.” Maggie’s face was coated with sand. Her voice sounded high, half-strangled with either pain or fear. “Maybe, but…but it’s too soon. And it hurts. I think something’s wrong.”

“How exactly does it feel?”

Maggie turned her face toward the sand. “It hurts.”

“Did your water break?” It might be hard to tell, Nora thought, given that Maggie was soaking wet all over.

For the first time, Nora looked down at Maggie’s legs. They were streaming with pale, watery blood.

The comforting words Nora had been about to say died away. This wasn’t right. This wasn’t what she’d been told to expect. She’d been to the birthing classes, and it had all sounded so organized. Step one, step two, step three…

No one had said anything about pale, quivering legs laced in blood that grew a brighter red with every passing second.

She didn’t know what to do. But even if she had known, she wouldn’t have been able to do it. She was going to faint.

Why, why had she listened to Maggie? Why had they come out here, to the end of the world, all alone? And before that…why hadn’t she insisted that they go home to Hawthorn Bay and tell Maggie’s parents about the baby? Maggie should have delivered her baby in the little hospital by the bridge, with a dozen brave, experienced adults to see it through.

But Nora had never been able to make Maggie do anything. Maggie was the strong one, the defiant one—she didn’t care what anyone thought of her. She didn’t need anyone, she always said. Not even Nora.

And maybe she didn’t. Maybe she would have been just fine alone. But, though Nora was almost painfully homesick to be back in Hawthorn Bay, back in her own little yellow bedroom at Heron Hill, she hadn’t been able to leave Maggie behind.

Under all that defiance, there was something…something tragic and vulnerable about Maggie. Nora had decided to stay with her, at least until the baby was born.

After that they’d decide what to do next.

Ethan was still thigh-deep in the water, trudging toward them, pulling the small sailboat along by a tug line. Intellectually, Nora knew he was right to take the time—they couldn’t afford to let the boat drift away. No one knew where they were. Even Ethan’s father, who was also a doctor, just thought they were having a picnic in the park.

But emotionally she wanted him to just drop the line and race over here. He was one of the brave, experienced adults they needed. She was only a teenager, and she wasn’t ready for this.

Maggie had begun to weep. “It hurts,” she said again, and she reached out for Nora’s hand.

Ethan finally dragged the boat onto the sand. A couple of gulls landed near it, obviously hoping for dinner. Ethan reached into the cockpit and extracted their beach towels and his cell phone.

Oh, God, hurry.

He punched numbers into the phone as he ran toward them. He listened, then clicked off and started over.

It was like watching a mime. Even from this distance, Nora could read the significance of that wordless message. They had no phone signal. They were officially in the middle of nowhere.

And they were officially alone.

When he reached them, Nora focused on his eyes—she knew the truth would be there. She’d known him only a few months, but she had already learned that he was a terrible liar.

For just a second, when he saw the blood, his eyes went black. For that same second, so did Nora’s heart.

She felt an irrational spurt of fury toward him, as if by confirming her fears he had somehow betrayed Maggie. She turned resolutely away from his anguished gaze.

“You’re going to be okay, honey,” she said, but she heard the note of rising panic in her voice and wished she hadn’t spoken.

Maggie stared at her with wild eyes. “There shouldn’t be blood,” she said. “There shouldn’t be blood.”

Ethan touched Maggie’s shoulder gently. “We have to see what’s causing it. And we need to see what’s going on with the baby. I need to know if you’re dilated.”

Maggie moaned in response.

“Nora,” he said without looking at her. “Please get the water bottles out of the cooler.” He held out the phone. “And take this. I don’t think it’s going to work, but keep trying.”

She clutched the phone and started to run, her sodden tennis shoes squishing with every step, making mud of the sand. Though there were no bars on the cell phone’s display, indicating they had no service, her fingers kept hitting 911 over and over.

By the time she had gathered the little plastic bottles in her arms and run back to the others, she’d tried 911 a dozen times.

Nothing.

While she’d been gone, Ethan had somehow spread out the towels, arranged Maggie on them, and removed her shorts and shoes.

Nora didn’t look at anything below Maggie’s face. She couldn’t allow herself to see how much blood there was. She couldn’t even think about how the baby might be coming. Here, in this empty place. A full month too early…

She gave Ethan the water, and then she took her place at Maggie’s shoulder.

Maggie rolled her face toward Nora, and the whites of her eyes were so huge that for a minute she looked like a frightened colt.

“Ethan will take care of everything,” Nora said numbly as she took Maggie’s hand. She felt like the recording of a person, programmed to speak words she didn’t even understand, much less believe.

Maggie’s face was so white. Was that what happened when you lost too much blood? Nora wanted to ask Ethan, but she didn’t want Maggie to hear the answer.

She didn’t want to hear the answer, either.

Ethan had positioned himself between Maggie’s knees. He’d opened some of the water, and poured it onto a small towel. He must have been hurting her, because Maggie’s grip on Nora’s hand kept tightening, until she thought the bones might break.

“Ethan will fix it.” She realized she was speaking as much to Ethan as to Maggie, telling him that he had no choice, he had to make this right. “Ethan won’t let anything happen to you.”

“I don’t care about me,” Maggie said, shutting her eyes and squeezing her fingers again. “Just be sure the baby is all right, that’s all that matters.”

Nora nodded. “Yes. Of course the baby—both of you will be fine.”

“You’ve got to relax, Maggie.” Ethan shook his head. “I need you to relax so I can find out what’s going on.” He glanced at Nora, the consummate doctor now, all business and no emotion. “Talk to her,” he said.

About what? About the blood? About the cell phone that was no more useful than a lump of scrap metal? About the miles of ocean that stretched out all the way to the horizon?

Over by the boat, more gulls were arriving, screaming overhead and diving for crumbs, like vultures.

She swallowed, her mind casting about. “Did you ever tell Ethan why you call the baby Colin, Maggie? Did you ever tell him about Cornwall?”

Amazingly, she seemed to have hit on the right subject. Maggie seemed to be trying to smile. “We were happy in Cornwall,” she whispered.

“Yes.” Nora nodded. It had been a lovely summer—and it was, she thought, the only time she’d ever seen Maggie completely relax. It was the only time the underlying vulnerability had seemed to vanish.

“You tell him, Nora.” Maggie nudged her hand. “Tell Ethan about Colin.”

Ethan wasn’t listening, Nora knew, but it wouldn’t hurt to talk. It was a good memory, and it would at least distract Maggie for a minute or two.

“When we graduated last spring, my parents gave us a trip to England,” she began awkwardly. She smiled down at Maggie. “Four whole months abroad, just the two of us. We couldn’t believe our luck.”

Maggie shut her eyes. “And all thanks to Jack,” she said with a hint of her normal dry sarcasm.

Nora let that part go. Ethan didn’t need to hear about Jack Killian. But it was true—the trip had been partly to celebrate their high-school graduation, and partly, Nora’s parents hoped, to help Nora get over the broken heart handed her by Black Jack Killian.

“We liked London,” she went on. “But we really fell in love with Cornwall, didn’t we, Maggie?”

Maggie’s eyes were still shut, but she nodded, just a fraction of an inch, and she once again tried to smile. It had shocked Nora to see Maggie, whose punk sassiness seemed much better suited to the London club scene, bloom like an English rose among the brutal cliffs, stoic stone houses and secret, windswept gardens of Cornwall.

But from their first night in the West Country, which they’d spent in a tiny fishing village that echoed with the cries of cormorants and the strange, musical accents of the locals, Maggie had clearly been at home.