Home for Christmas (Willow Park #5) Read Online Free PDF Page B

in there for a long time.
You don’t have to stop, though.”
    “I’m done.”
    She felt nervous again—and kind of foolish—as she went back
to sit in a chair. In a few minutes, he walked out with wet hair, wearing a
pair of blue pajamas.
    He’d never worn pajamas before. He’d always slept in his
underwear. He’d often paraded around totally naked, and it felt significant
that he’d changed clothes in the bathroom, where she couldn’t see his body.
    But she reminded herself not to blow things out of
proportion. This was just the first evening they were really together. She’d
been silly to think they could have an intimate meal, a long cozy chat, and
then a passionate interlude in bed.
    That wasn’t going to happen. Not yet. They would get there
soon enough.
    “Did you want to get anything to eat now?” she asked. It was
almost nine o’clock, and her stomach was gurgling with hunger.
    “No. I’m not hungry. You can get something, if you want.”
    “That’s okay. What did you—what did you want to do?”
    “I’m tired. I think I’ll just to bed, if that’s all right
with you.”
    She nodded mutely.
    “I know it’s early. You don’t have to come to bed with me,
if you don’t want.” Mark went to the bed and pulled down the covers on the
right side, where he’d always slept.
    She almost choked at the suggestion that she do something
else, leaving her husband on their first night together. “I’m tired too. Going
to bed sounds good to me.”
    She went to wash her face, brush her teeth, and change into
a pair of pajamas. She’d been planning to wear a pretty nightgown, but she’d
quickly revised that plan, on seeing Mark’s mood.
    When she crawled into bed with him, he was staring up at the
ceiling.
    “Did you want to watch TV or talk or something?” she asked,
rolling over on her side to face him. She desperately wanted to touch him, to
have him hold her in his arms, but he seemed so prickly and standoffish that
she didn’t think it was a good idea to make a move.
    “I think I’d just like…quiet, if that’s okay with you.”
    “Of course, it’s okay.” It sounded like her voice was
starting to wobble, so she paused to get control of herself before she added,
“We can just go to sleep.”
    “Thank you. Good night.”
    Sophie turned out the last light in the room, and it was
completely dark. And completely silent.
    Her husband was right beside her, but she felt completely
alone.
    She wanted the television on. It had been a long time since
she’d gone to sleep without it. She wanted to talk to Mark about the last two years—hear
about what he’d faced, tell him about her life now. She wanted to kiss him
again, to laugh with him, even to cry with him.
    She didn’t like the dark or the silence, and she was still
starving, so it was a long time before she went to sleep.
    She tried to pray to God for help, for strength, for the
wisdom to know how to act, how to love Mark, how to be what he needed, how to
help him return to the man he’d been. But she’d been praying for Mark’s return
now forever, and God had given her that.
    Asking for his gift to be better than it was felt like she
was throwing the answered prayer back in God’s face.

Three
     
    After sleeping alone for so long,
Sophie woke up in a panic as she realized there was someone else in her bed.
    She felt an intense surge of fear—quickening her pulse and
her breath—before she remembered that the other person was Mark.
    He was home. He was with her now. They were together again.
    At least, they were supposed to be.
    As her adrenalin surge faded, she felt shaky and weak. Maybe
it was the aftermath of her physical response to the fear, or maybe it was the
fact that she hadn’t eaten since lunch the previous day. Either way, she was
suddenly cold and trembling, so she automatically moved nearer to Mark.
    She’d gotten in the habit of doing that after they married.
He always rolled away from her as he slept, so