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She wouldn’t say what she wanted to LeDoux. She wouldn’t ruin this event for everyone, especially Kyle.
Melanie took a deep breath. “I’d like to thank everyone for coming and remembering Mike. Kyle and I appreciate your support.” Her voice was quivering, and she swept her red mittens across her cheeks to wipe away her tears. “Thank you so much. Merry Christmas!”
The mayor guided the three of them to a redribboned pillar. On the pillar was a metal button that, she assumed, would light the tree.
Melanie positioned Kyle between herself and Samuel LeDoux.
As the Hawk’s Lake High School marching band struck up “O Christmas Tree,” Marylou Lang from the Adirondack Sentinel approached the bandstand, gesturing for the three of them to pose with the mayor for a picture. Then she wanted more pictures of Melanie, Kyle and Sam with their hands poised above the light switch.
“Closer.” Marylou waved her hand as she looked through her camera. “No. That won’t do. Closer. Melanie, take your mittens off and all of you put your hands on top of one another’s on the button.”
Kyle’s hand already hovered over the button. Melanie yanked her mitten off, pasted a smile on her face, and placed her hand over Kyle’s.
Her heart did a little flip as LeDoux’s warm hand closed over hers. He was too close. His aftershave drifted around her, a light cloud of spice and pine. Her mouth suddenly went dry. She didn’t want to feel the warmth of his hand, and she didn’t want to see his frosty breath mingle with hers.
She wanted him out of Hawk’s Lake.
Take the picture, Marylou.
In the background, the village counted down.
“Four…three…two…one…”
“Wow!” Kyle shouted as they all clamped down on the switch. Hundreds of bright colored lights illuminated the huge Douglas fir as the crowd cheered.
All Melanie could think of was getting away from there. Away from her thoughts. Away from Sam LeDoux, and this awareness of him that she couldn’t tamp into submission.
Melanie slipped her hand back into her mitten. In less than five seconds, shewas down the steps of the bandstand and heading for her car with her son in tow.
“Mrs. Bennett, please wait!”
It was LeDoux. Oh, why couldn’t he have stayed in Canada?
“Mom! Wait! I have to talk to Santa!”
It was finally Kyle’s voice that penetrated the red haze in her mind. What was she doing?
She hunkered down in front of Kyle. His eyes were wide and his nose red from the cold. “Okay, honey. We’ll go and see Santa.”
He relaxed and she stood up. Walking toward them was her brother Brian, looking puzzled. Sam LeDoux had stopped beside her, still too close for comfort.
“I was wondering why you were leaving so quickly when Santa’s coming to town,” Brian said to her. Turning toward LeDoux, Brian held out his hand. “Good to see you again, Sam.”
“Same here, Brian.”
They shook hands, and Brian looked from Melanie to Sam and back again. Brian must have noticed the tension between them, because he gave a slight smile.
She could handle LeDoux herself, darn it. Besides, after they’d all worked with him last year, her whole family sang his praises, Brian included, so they weren’t likely to agree with her feelings. She’d just keep silent and let her negative thoughts churn inside her.
Grand marshal or not, she wanted him gone. He was a reminder of her past, when she just wanted to focus on the future.
She smiled at Kyle. “Sweetie, how about if Uncle Brian takes you for some cocoa and cookies at the gingerbread tent? Then we’ll get in line to see Santa.” She turned to her brother. “Would you mind?”
“Not at all.”
“Cool,” said Kyle. Brian led him away, leaving Melanie alone with LeDoux.
Suddenly, she wanted to run as far away as her clunky boots would take her. He was too big, too real, making her think of him in ways she didn’t want to.
“Could we talk for a minute?” he asked.
Her voice shook. “I’m sorry, Mr. LeDoux, I’d rather not.”
“But I—”
“No. There isn’t anything for us to talk about, and it’s been quite an emotional night already.” The words hung in the air between them like icicles. “Goodbye, Mr. LeDoux.”
Chapter Two
“Wait! Mrs. Bennett…Melanie.” Sam jogged after her. He didn’t want to scare her. She already looked at him as if he carried some contagious disease.
She turned toward him, fire in her eyes. Her blond hair did a soft dance in the winter breeze. Her cheeks had a flush of color, either from the cold or from anger—most likely both.
The evening had started out so nicely when they’d first met, he’d seen the interest in her eyes, and he had felt the same awareness of her. Then the interest faded when she’d heard his name.
Sam knew darn well that everyone in Hawk’s Lake thought he was a hero—except Melanie Bennett. Well, he didn’t think so, either. He wanted to forget the past just as badly as she did.
But the only way he could forget the past—and himself—was to discuss it, and she didn’t want to do that.
“I’d like to somehow start over with you,” Sam said.
“Unless you can turn back the clock, that’s not possible. Just enjoy being Hawk’s Lake’s hero.”
He shook his head. “I’m not a hero. I was only doing my job.”
“Well, you didn’t do it very well, did you?”
Her words—and the pain in her voice—pierced his heart. Sam wished she’d at least let him apologize, let him explain. But how could he do that without casting a shadow over the memory of her husband?
Damn the timing of that ice storm. Another place, another time, and Sam would never have known that the Bennetts even existed. He would have simply answered the call from the Red Cross and hopped on a plane, ready for action.
Instead, last year he had flown in for the christening of Cal Lippert’s son, so he was already in tiny Hawk’s Lake in the middle of the Adirondack Mountains when the Red Cross called. As it turned out, he was in the perfect place to help.
That ice storm had changed his life forever.
Melanie glanced toward the crowded gingerbread tent as Sam fought the urge to grab her hand and escort her to some private place where she could yell at him until she was exhausted.
There wasn’t anything that she could say to him that he hadn’t already told himself.
But if it was all out in the open, maybe then he could find some peace.
He tried again. “Would you mind if we went somewhere private to talk?”
“My son wants to see Santa.” She turned and walked away without a goodbye.
He didn’t try to stop her this time.
With a sigh, he tried to focus on the moment, on the sights and sounds of the celebration around him. But all too soon the memories would surface again, knotting his stomach, and he’d question his judgment once again.
He couldn’t direct a crew or manage an operation when he couldn’t trust his instincts. It was too dangerous. Not for him, but for the volunteers—brave men and women who trusted him, who put their lives into his hands.
Hands that now shook with hesitation and indecision.
If he was honest with himself, Sam didn’t know what he could accomplish by talking to Melanie. Maybe he wanted her forgiveness for his damn stupid mistake so he could function as a manager again.
Maybe then he’d get the peace he craved.
Sam felt like a fraud. When he had received the invitation a month ago, he’d phoned his old hockey buddy Cal Lippert and insisted that he had no right to light the Hawk’s Lake Christmas tree, or to be their grand marshal for the three weeks of the Snow Festival.
“The hell you don’t, Sam,” Cal had said. “The whole town was grateful that the best emergency relief manager in the Red Cross was right here when that storm hit. We’d probably still be trying to bail out if it wasn’t for you.”
“A man died, Cal. I should have told Mike Bennett to get out of that tree earlier. Matter of fact, I never should have let him get up there in the first place.”
“Things happen.”
“Not on my watch.”
“Yes, Sam, even on your watch. No one blames you.”
Cal wouldn’t take no for an answer, so here he was in Hawk’s Lake. Again.
But returning to Hawk’s Lakewas a good opportunity to meet Melanie, apologize, and make sure that she and Kyle were doing okay after losing Mike.
Last year, he hadn’t had the opportunity. He’d been in the hospital recovering from hypothermia. After he was discharged and wanted to call on her, her father, Ed, had told him that Melanie had suffered a concussion along with some amnesia and that her doctor had told everyone to wait for her memory to return before discussing the traumatic events.
But he’d had to leave soon after and never did get to see her or Kyle. Other disasters—fires, floods—had beckoned.
Sam leaned against a thick maple tree and watched Melanie and Kyle in the line waiting for Santa. They seemed like they were doing okay, considering everything. They were smiling and laughing at a man dressed in a reindeer costume juggling candy canes. The juggler lost more than he could keep in the air and eventually resorted to just handing them out.
Older children wearing angel costumes over their snowsuits were passing out cookies and ribbon candy.
Hawk’s Lake was a wonderful place. It reminded Sam of the small Canadian town where he’d grown up. On the north shore of Lake Ontario, Lenore had once been a quiet, beautiful town where everyone knew everyone else.
But everything changed—even little Lenore.
“Enjoying yourself?”
Sam took the cup of coffee that Cal handed him, grateful that his friend seemed content to make small talk. As soon as he drained the last drop, a tiny, curly-haired girl dressed as an angel appeared to take his cup and offer him some cookies. He chose a frosted one in the shape of a Christmas tree and bit the star off the top.
“Delicious,” he told the little girl. “Thank you, angel.”
“Great family event,” Cal said, taking a cookie in the shape of a bell.
“The kids are enjoying themselves,” Sam added.
Cal nodded. “The new Santa House adds a nice touch to the village square this year,” boasted the proud mayor, gesturing at all the people standing in line to visit Santa.
Sam nodded to the leggy blonde in a tight red sweater and skimpy red skirt with white fur trim who was hovering close to Santa. “I think Mrs. Claus is adding the best touch.”
The two of them laughed, and it felt good to relax and just enjoy the night. Later, after Cal left to join the crowd at the gingerbread tent, Sam’s attention turned back toward Melanie, standing in line with her son waiting to see Santa. Right now, She was smiling, but the tightness at the corners of her mouth indicated to him that she was trying too hard. Only when she was talking to her son did she seem truly happy.
Doug Stanley, the owner of the Pine Tree Motel where Sam had booked a room, had told him that Melanie was beginning to receive national attention for her antique car restoration business and was “no slouch” as a mechanic, either. Doug said she could tell what was wrong with a car just by listening to it run. And if it wasn’t running, she could tell you why not in five minutes flat.
Now that was talent, and very rare in a woman, but Sam could already see that she was no ordinary woman, and a great mother, too.
Little Kyle was lucky to grow up in a place like this. A place where his grandfather stood nearby, eyes shimmering with love for his grandson. A place where a little boy could hear his mother laugh as he lobbed snowballs at her.
Maybe it would make up for the fact that Kyle didn’t have a father.
A familiar heaviness tightened Sam’s chest. It was his fault that Kyle didn’t have a father.
Sam moved closer to Santa’s House when he noticed that Kyle was next in line and couldn’t help overhear his conversation.
“Ho, ho, ho,” Santa said. “What’s your name, young man?”
“Kyle. Kyle Bennett.” The child threw a leg over Santa’s and pulled himself into the big man’s lap.
He looked so small and innocent, and Sam was glad that Kyle still believed in Santa Claus and the magic of Christmas.
“And what would you like for Christmas, Kyle?” Santa asked.
“I want my daddy back.”
A sudden hush descended over the crowd. Santa didn’t move, but Melanie took her son’s hand and held it. Everyone waited to see what would happen next.
Kyle’s words were a sucker punch to Sam’s gut. He couldn’t take in enough air, could barely think.
The boy pulled on the fur trim of Santa’s collar. “Santa? Did you hear me?”
Santa glanced at Melanie.
“That’s not possible, sweetie.” Melanie cupped Kyle’s cheek. “We talked about this before. Daddy is in heaven and—”
“I know, but I want him to come back.”
“But you know that can’t be,” Melanie said softly. “Won’t you tell Santa what toy you’d like for Christmas?”
Santa rubbed Kyle’s back. “Santa knows that your father is in heaven watching out for you. He can see what a fine boy you are.”
