Page 24 of All I Want For Christmas

And Lindsey sat across the table, her chin propped on her hand, just watching her three guys. The look on her face was one of the most beautiful things Matt had ever seen and he wished, as he often did, that he could somehow have a photograph of that moment.

After they finished, Matt spent five minutes convincing Jay to take payment for breakfast while the other man insisted that he wanted to cover the tab in thanks for Matt’s service. They finally settled on a fifty-percent discount. Matt knew that people really did want to do those kinds of things for soldiers to show their appreciation and that it was important to let them do it once in a while. Once he got his family out onto the sidewalk, he pulled Lindsey up against his side, needing to touch her. She slid her hand under his jacket, wrapped her arm around him, her fingertips on the bare skin just above the waistband of his jeans.

Damn. He wanted to spend the entire day with the boys. He also wanted to spend the entire day in bed with Lindsey. He didn’t have enough time.

He squelched that thought, splayed a hand on her hip, intending to keep her against him as much as possible, and said to the boys, “Okay, so we’ve got a lot to do. We’re going to hit Christmas Fest first.”

“What’s Christmas Fest?” Liam asked.

“Have you been before?” Matt asked Lindsey.

“We were going to go last year with the support group but Aidan got an ear infection.”

Matt nodded. “You are going to love it. We get to go ice skating, have a snow ball fight, go on rides, have hot chocolate. All kinds of stuff. They have ice slides and we can get into a giant snow globe to get our picture taken.”

Christmas Fest was an annual event at the convention center that combined just about everything awesome about the Christmas season into one gigantic space. There were carnival rides, games, crafts, food and drink, and, of course, a chance to visit with Santa.

“Ice skating?” Liam said, eyes wide. “I’ve never done that before.”

“I’ll help you,” Matt promised. “It will be fun.”

“And rides?” Aidan asked. “Iloverides.”

“Me too, buddy. This is going to be great.”

Lindsey gave a contented little sigh. That Matt wanted to hear over and over again. He knew that making their boys happy would make her happy, but he also wanted to give her some amazing memories of this holiday. In the few hours he had.

He shook that off and kept his smile big and steady. “Then we’re going to go have a Reveillon dinner and we’ll go look at the lights and trees in City Park after dark.”

The boys were nodding excitedly, but Liam asked, “What’s a Reve—” That was as far as he got into the word before he couldn’t remember it.

Matt put a hand on his head. He loved the idea of being able to show the boys some of the best holiday traditions and teach them something new. He wasn’t here often enough to do that. “I’ll tell you about it while we walk down to get the car.”

They started in that direction and Matt told the boys all about the tradition of Reveillon dinners after midnight Mass on Christmas Eve when everyone went home and wined and dined until dawn.

“It was a Creole tradition,” he said. “But over time, people just stopped doing it. They started having other traditions. Then, when I was a kid, some of the restaurants in the city started it up again. They started having special holiday menus around this time of year and my grandmother would take the wholefamily out to her favorite place, Vacherie Restaurant, for a family Reveillon dinner. It was always one of my favorite things to do. The pecan pie there is amazing. Better than your grandma’s. But don’t tell her I said that.” He gave the boys a wink and they both grinned at being included in on a secret.

He glanced at Lindsey. She smiled up at him. “Your dad took me to that restaurant for a Reveillon dinner and asked me to marry him the Christmas after we met.”

The boys knew their parents had met around Christmas time and they loved the story of the Running of the Santas. Of course, Lindsey and Matt left out the “skimpy” and “shots of peppermint schnapps” parts of the story, but they told them about how fun the race had been and how they’d sat in the park and talked for hours and how they knew that same night they were going to fall in love.

But up until now the boys had either been too young, or Matt hadn’t been home, to go to a family Reveillon dinner.

This year that changed.

“And I’ve invited your grandma and grandpa to dinner with us,” Matt said of his parents. He’d called his mom that morning and after she got past her own “I can’t believe you’re home!” and a few tears, she’d happily agreed to dinner.

Of course, she’d also launched into a list of things she wanted to do and places she wanted to take them all while Matt was home. He hadn’t had the heart to tell her his time was extremely limited and there was no way he would be at Aunt Kristin’s for brunch or at Mike and Anne’s for New Year’s Eve.

He was going to focus on making some great memories now and then deal with the bad news and goodbyes…later.

“They’ll probably go with us to look at the lights and then we’re going to go home and watch a movie on the couch with popcorn and hot chocolate.”

“We can make snowmen bathtubs!” Liam said.

“Yay!” Aidan exclaimed.

“Okay.” He didn’t know what that meant, but he was up for anything that excited the boys right now. “Andthen,” Matt added with a big grin. “You’re going to get my Christmas present from me tomorrow.”

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