Page 74 of Texas Splendor
Austin shook his head. “Not a song. Only two words. Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle bells. Over and over. All the way here.”
“The children are so excited—” she began.
“Yeah. They sounded like a heard of stampeding wild horses when Cameron walked in.”
She placed her hand over his heart. “Even if they hadn’t come, this Christmas seems difficult for you.”
“The last Christmas I had here …” His voice trailed off as he shook his head. “It was so different. Dee had just lost the baby. Rawley had been living here for a couple of weeks, but he was still afraid.” He grazed his knuckles over her cheek and smiled. “The only niece I had was Maggie. It truly was a silent night. I have a feeling tonight will be anything but quiet.”
“My family died shortly after Christmas. I haven’t celebrated Christmas in the years since.”
He wrapped his arms around her and pressed his cheek to the top of her head. “Ah, Loree, I’m so sorry. I haven’t given any thought to what this time of year must mean to you.”
She tilted her head back and met his gaze. “It’s wonderful to have children around, snitching the candies and shaking presents.” Taking his hand, she placed it on her swollen stomach. “I’m glad to be here.”
“Ah, Sugar, I’m—” The movement beneath his hand halted his words. He gave his wife a warm slow smile. “Lord, I love it when he does that.”
His knees creaked as he hunkered down and placed his cheek against Loree’s stomach. She intertwined her fingers through his hair, and he realized that contentment existed in the smallest of moments. Suddenly it didn’t matter that he had never before celebrated Christmas with over half the people in his brother’s house.
What mattered was that he would be sharing the day with Loree and with a child that was not yet born.
“Uncle Austin!” Maggie staggered to a stop right after she rounded the corner of the stall. Her eyes turned into two big circles of green. “Can I listen?” She didn’t wait for an answer but hurried over, two burlap sacks clutched in one hand, and pressed her ear against Loree’s stomach. Austin glanced up to see Loree’s startled expression.
Maggie drew her brows together. “It don’t sound like a girl,” she announced.
“I reckon you’d be the one to know,” Austin said.
Maggie nodded her head enthusiastically, her blond curls bouncing. “Ma always lets me and Pa listen. Pa even talks to the baby before it’s born!”
“I don’t believe that,” Austin told her.
She jerked her head up and down. “He does so. I ‘member when he talked to me before I was born. He told me he loved me better than anything.” She thrust a burlap sack into his hand. “We need to get the reindeer hay put out. Come on!”
She raced out of the barn. Austin slowly unfolded his body and took his wife’s hand, escorting her outside.
“I cannot picture Houston making a fool of himself and talking to his wife’s belly,” Austin said.
“He was talking to the baby.”
Austin snapped his head around. “You say that like you think the baby could hear him.”
Loree shrugged. “Maybe. I don’t know.”
He glanced down at his wife’s rounded stomach. He’d feel silly talking to it. He met her gaze. “I’ll just wait until he’s born.”
He closed his fingers more firmly around hers as they approached the house. Giggling children were digging into burlap sacks and tossing hay over the yard, the veranda, and each other.
“Is there a trick to this?” he asked as he neared Dallas.
“Don’t put it in the hands of a three-year-old,” Dallas warned as he waited patiently while Faith carefully picked a single piece of straw from the pile he held in his hand. She bent down and placed it on the ground. Then she meticulously sifted through the straw in his hand, searching for another piece to her liking.
Austin cleared his throat. “You’ll be here all night.”
“Yep, and this ain’t the worst part. We gotta remember where they put all the damn hay so we can pick it up in the morning before they wake up.” He lifted a brow. “So they’ll think the dadgum reindeer ate it.”
Austin knelt beside his niece. She stilled, the straw pressed between her tiny forefinger and thumb, her brown eyes huge. He smiled broadly. “You want to put out my hay for the reindeer, too?”
She bobbed her head, took his sack, and held it up to her father. Dallas scowled and ground out his warning through his clenched teeth, “You just wait until next year.”
