Christmas Wishes...Special Delivery Read Online Free PDF

and that eventually the words would come of their own accord. But the longer I waited—the more time that passed—the harder it became. Then I was offered a scholarship to grad school and an internship at the law firm in Jacksonville. I figured it was best to just leave and find my future.”
    “You had a future here—a family who loved you—” Something in her eyes…a slight softening…told him it was more than family who’d loved him. Did she still care for him? Could she possibly, after the way he’d treated her? “But you gave it up in your quest to save the world.”
    “Somebody has to save it.”
    “Maybe so. But even if you prosecute every case in the world, bring every crime to justice—it won’t bring back your mother…or my father. It won’t change what happened, Riley. I wish it would. I wish I could roll back time, rewind and do things over again—take it all back. Most of all, I wish you weren’t so…angry.”
    “I’m not angry.” Yet, the truth of her words seared a hole through his heart. He struggled to quench the inferno as she poured two cups of coffee from the sputtering carafe, handed one to him. She’d dislodged a chink from his armor, a brick from the fortress of his resolve to leave the past where it belonged—firmly in the past. Now, he felt off balance, lost as if he’d just turned onto an unmarked road and plowed through potholes. He’d meant to talk to her, to tie up loose ends and move on, nothing more. But the longing in his heart failed to come to terms with the logic in his head. It made him edgy, irritable. “I’m simply a realist.”
    “Then why did you come back?” Her eyes narrowed into ice-blue bullets. “Why are you here, in my kitchen—”
    “Gran’s kitchen. My kitchen.”
    “OK, if it makes you feel better to point that out…”
    “Who’s the father?” The words slipped out before he could lasso them, so he plunged forward with abandon. “Rosie’s father? Where is he? How’d you—”
    “She’s my niece, Riley.” Kaylee pressed a hip into the counter as she grasped the mug in one hand, her gaze a mirror of his blazing heart. “Cody is her father.”
    “Cody…your older brother?”
    “That’s right.”
    “But how…why?”
    “It’s a long story—one I don’t wish to drag into the open at this moment, and especially not with you.” Kaylee’s eyes pooled with tears as she drew a sip of coffee and regret was a sudden, hot stab to Riley’s heart. “Suffice it to say that Cody doesn’t want to be tied down, as he so bluntly terms it, with Rosie and neither does his girlfriend—make that his ex-girlfriend, now. They tried to make it work, but Cody’s drifted for years, since the accident. He can’t seem to find his place, his niche.”
    “How long…since when?”
    “Rosie’s been with me almost a year. Cody dropped her off one night, said he had some things to work out and asked me to keep her for a few days. The days turned into a week, then a month, a summer. Rosie started kindergarten and by then I knew Cody had no intention of returning for her. Oh, he calls from time to time, but Rosie and I haven’t seen him since last February.”
    “Wow…oh…”
    “Jumped to conclusions there, didn’t you?” Kaylee shook her head as her chin rose in a gesture of defiance. “Did you really think—”
    “I guess I did. It was wrong and I’m sorry.”
    “Are you? Truly?”
    “Yes.”
    “Well, then…” She set her mug on the counter with a sigh and switched on the oven light to check the rolls. “Ruth has been an angel…so good to us. I couldn’t have made it, financially speaking, without her help, and, as you’ve pointed out, her house.”
    “No child support? No help from Cody?”
    “None, and I’m OK with that. We’re doing just fine, Riley.” Kaylee took a pot holder from the counter and drew the pan from the oven. Heat wafted, chasing the chill from the room. The aroma of cinnamon was rich enough to slice.