A Creed Country Christmas Read Online Free PDF

floor stung the soles of her bare feet, and thesingle window, though large, was opaque with curlicues and crystals of ice. A silvery glow indicated that the moon had come out from behind the snow-burdened clouds—perhaps the storm had stopped.
    Juliana paced, making no sound, until the room began to warm up, and then fumbled in the pocket of her cloak for Clay’s crumpled letter. Back at the mercantile, she’d been too overwrought to finish the missive. Now, wakeful in the house of a charitable stranger—but a stranger nevertheless—she smoothed the page with the flat of one hand, hungry for a word of kind affection.
    Not wanting to light a lamp, lest she awaken the children resting so soundly in the feather bed, Juliana knelt near the fire, opened the stove door again and read by the flickering flames inside, welcoming the warmth.
    Her gaze skimmed over the first few lines—she could have recited those from memory—and took in the rest.
    You will be twenty-six years old on your next birthday, Juliana, and you are still unmarried. Nora and I are, of course, greatly concerned for your welfare, not to mention your reputation ….
    Juliana had to stop herself by the summoning of inner forces from wadding the letter up again, casting it straight into the fire.
    Clay had accepted the fact, he continued, in his usual brisk fashion, that his sister had consigned herself to a life of lonely and wasteful spinsterhood. She was creating a scandal, he maintained, by living away from home and family. What kind of example, he wondered, was she setting for Clara, her little niece?
    He closed with what amounted to a command that she return to Denver and “live with modesty and circumspection” in her brother’s home, where she belonged.
    But there was no expression of fondness.
    The letter was signed Regards, C. Mitchell .
    “‘C. Mitchell,’” Juliana whispered on a shaky breath. “Not ‘Clay.’ Not ‘Your brother.’ ‘C. Mitchell.’”
    With that, she folded the single page carefully, held it for a moment, and then tossed it into the stove. Watched, the heat drying her eyeballs until they burned, as orange flames curled the vellum, nibbled darkly at the edges and corners, and then consumed the last forlorn tatters of Juliana’s hopes. There would be no reconciliation between her and Clay, no restoration of their old childhood camaraderie.
    As much as she had loved the brother she remembered from long ago, as much as she loved him still, for surely he was still in there somewhere behind that rigid facade, she could not go home. Oh, she would have enjoyed getting to know little Clara and her brother, Simon. She had always been fond of Nora, a good-hearted if flighty woman who accepted her husband’s absolute authority without apparent qualms. But Clay would treat her, Juliana, like a poor relation, doling out pennies for a packet of pins, lecturing and dictating her every move, staring her down if she dared to venture an opinion at the supper table.
    No. She definitely could not go home, not under such circumstances. It would be the ultimate—and final—defeat, and the slow death of her spirit.
    “Missy?” The lisp was Daisy’s; the child could not say Juliana’s whole name, and always addressed her thus. “Missy, are you there?”
    “I’m here, sweetheart,” Juliana confirmed quietly, closing the stove door and getting back to her feet. “I’m here.”
    The assurance was enough for Daisy; she turned onto her side, settled in with a tiny murmur of relief and sank into sleep again.
    Even with the fire going, the room was still cold enough to numb Juliana’s bones.
    Having no other choice, she climbed back into bed and pulled the top sheet and faded quilts up to her chin, giving a little shiver.
    Billy-Moses stirred beside her, took a new hold on her nightgown.
    Daisy snuggled close, too.
    Juliana stared up at the ceiling, watching the shadows dance, her heart and mind crowded with children again. At some