A Weldon Family Christmas: A Southern Steam Novella (Weldon Brothers) Read Online Free PDF Page A

things good, the girl next door, the sister, the friend, the girlfriend, the wife, the mother.  The only taste of home that these men would have in many long months and sometimes, it was a man’s last.
     Emma didn’t have a chance to think about John Weldon again until late that night.  Even now, as she lay alone in her bed, she could still feel the electric shock of his gaze and the heated burn of his hand sliding against hers.  Touching his shoulder had made her stomach knot with angst and anticipation.  She knew it was daring and bordered on blurring the strict line of her personal moral code.  Not because she’d touched him, but because she hadn’t reached out to him solely because he was alone and in pain.  The man attracted her, and she’d wanted to know what he’d felt like.  She fell asleep and dreamed about crystal blue eyes that had persuaded her into a steamy affair, which ended with her being dismissed from the Red Cross.
    The next day their duties had them visiting the hospital and playing games with the semi-mobile wounded in the lunch-room.  She was in the middle of a checker game with a soldier from Kansas who’d lost his left leg.  He would be leaving tomorrow.  The Dear John letter he’d gotten the day before his platoon had been ambushed hadn’t helped the boy to recover.  At eighteen years to her twenty-two, he felt like a boy and she an older sister.
    “Okay, Patrick,” she said as she crowned one of his men and moved one of hers a square.  “Let’s go over your game plan again.  When you get home what are you going to focus on?”
    He moved his king.  “Rehab and music.”
    She angled another checker to protect her man.  “Is it going to be easy?”
    He shifted his king to the next square.  “No.”
    She frowned at the board then made her move.  “Then what will it be?”
    He retreated his king.  “Hard.”
    She jumped one of his men.  “Are you going to give up?”
    He doubled jumped her with his king.  “No.”
    She groaned, having not seen that move.  “Why?”
    He slid another man to be crowned and grinned.  “Because perseverance is its own success.”
    She crowned his man then reached over and took the soldier’s hand.  “I’ll be waiting for your letter and be the first in line to buy your album when it comes out.  You can do this.  Life threw you a curve ball, but you’re going to hit a home run, okay?”  Emma felt someone behind her and she knew it was John.
    “Miss Emma, I love you forever,” Patrick said, and kissed her hand in his enthusiasm.
    Emma patted the boy’s hand and freed hers.
    Patrick’s nurse came up.  “Time for rehab, kiddo.”
    “He’s pretty much won this game already,” Emma said with a laugh.
    “Yeah.  I’m ready to go knock it out of the park.”  The nurse wheeled Patrick away.
    John pulled up a chair and sat opposite her.  He had a heavy frown darkening his brow.  “You need to go home.”
    Emma felt as if he’d slapped her.  Her mouth dropped open.  She couldn't seem to stop her response, even though sarcasm wasn’t in her nature.  “Good afternoon, Miss Rollins.  It’s so nice to see you again.  How are you doing today?  You really make a difference in some of these soldiers’ lives.  You don’t know how much we appreciate that.  Why thank you, Lieutenant Weldon.  So nice to see you again as well.  Sorry, to have to rush off, but I’m due back and I’m already running late.” Her dream of him last night had been too real and his abrupt manner, had her even more flustered.  She had to get away.
    Seeing Maggie frowning at her from the door, Emma stood and made a beeline for her buddy.  She grabbed Maggie’s arm.  “Let’s go.”
    “We’ve another five minutes.”
    “I don’t.”  Emma left and Maggie followed.  Once they reached the street she started venting.  “That man has the manners of a bull in a china shop with the ass end of a mule to back him up.”
    Maggie burst