Alison Roberts - Single Dad In Her Stocking / A Puppy And A Christmas Proposal

She chose to sit on the couch beside the other children, not wanting to take over the chair Max had been using. Or maybe she thought it might comfort the infant in her arms to be near her brother and sister. She settled Alice into the crook of her arm and offered her the nipple of the bottle, sliding it into her mouth that was opening for a new wail. Surprised eyes stared up at her and then, mercifully, that little mouth closed over the teat and Alice began sucking vigorously.

In the sudden silence that fell, Emma was aware that the older children were still watching. Max’s father had turned to peer at her from behind the wing of his chair and even the dog had wriggled forwards far enough to see what was happening beyond the safety of being beneath his master’s chair. She could hear the fire behind its screen, crackling softly in this new silence, and then she could hear Max coming back into the room. Or maybe she could feel the change in the atmosphere as he entered—that kind of electricity that charismatic people radiated.

‘That was the builder,’ he said. ‘They’ve fixed the leak in the apartment above mine but it’s going to be a big job to get things fixed and cleaned up. It certainly won’t be happening before Christmas.’

James Cunningham grunted. ‘Can’t say I’m surprised. It’s hard enough to get tradesmen in a hurry at the best of times.’

Max sat down in the other wing chair, his gaze fixed on Alice. ‘You always did make it look easy,’ he murmured. ‘You’re just a natural, aren’t you, Emma?’

Emma said nothing. She couldn’t say anything. Not with that damned lump that had just formed in her throat. Breathe, she told herself. You only need to breathe.

The silence returned and then Max sounded like he was making an effort to break it.

‘Is that your special Christmas tree, Ben?’

Emma glanced sideways to see Ben nod solemnly. ‘You’ve got to have a Christmas tree,’ he told his uncle. ‘It’s a rule.’

‘Oh?’

Emma could understand the note in Max’s voice—as if he was wondering what other ‘rules’ Ben might be holding as sacrosanct.

Ben nodded again. ‘That’s how Father Christmas knows where to leave the presents. It should go near the chimney.’

Emma lifted her gaze to look around the huge room they were in. She wondered what this little boy might think of those paintings in their ornate frames, the ornaments on sideboards and the baby grand piano in the corner. Was he used to this kind of house or was it making this an even more frightening experience for him?

But Ben was sounding worried rather than frightened when he spoke again.

‘Where’s your Christmas tree, Grandpa?’

This time, the silence in the room was filled with a tension that made a knot start to form in Emma’s stomach. There was level upon level of misery here that she could feel as if it was her own. Some of it was her own but she had learned long ago how to shut that away and it was actually quite empowering to find she could hold and feed baby Alice without falling apart in any visible manner. Looking down, she met the fixed gaze of those dark baby eyes on her own and could be confident that all was well in this tiny human’s life for the moment, at least, as she sucked down the rest of her milk. It wasn’t the case for anyone else in this room, was it?

Emma looked at the children beside her on the couch. The little boy was still staring at his grandfather, waiting for an answer to his question about the missing Christmas tree. The little girl seemed to sense Emma’s gaze and returned it with such a solemn one of her own that, if her arms weren’t full of baby Alice and her bottle, she would have instinctively wanted to gather this child to her as closely as she could to give her a big hug. James was stroking an imaginary beard as if it might help him find an answer and Max…

Well, Max was looking at her .

As if he knew that she knew why Christmas hadn’t been celebrated in this house for probably decades and why a simple child’s question was creating such tension. As if he had no idea how to defuse it and as if he was trusting her to help in the same way that she had managed to conquer the difficulty he had faced in getting the baby fed.

Just for a heartbeat, Emma could see something she was quite sure she’d never seen before in Max Cunningham’s eyes. Bewilderment, almost. The look of someone who’d lost something very important and had absolutely no idea where to start looking for it. There was something sad in that gaze as well and that made her realise he must know exactly how his nephew must be feeling right now and that could be what was making it so hard for him to find the right thing to say. A tragic history had repeated itself and a small boy had lost his mum just before Christmas.

The squeeze on Emma’s heart was so tight it was painful. Painful enough to set off alarm bells that suggested a potential breach in any protective walls that needed maintaining but she had to ignore that for the moment. She was an adult and she had had plenty of time to develop coping mechanisms she could tap into a bit later. Doing something to try and make these children look and sound a little less sad was far more urgent.

‘Sometimes,’ she told Ben, quietly, ‘things happen that can get in the way of remembering rules. I’m sure your Uncle Max or your Grandpa will know where to find a Christmas tree.’

James leaned forward to pick up a poker and prod the fire, making a grumbling sound that could have been disapproving but Max was nodding as if this was, indeed, the solution.

‘A real one,’ he said. ‘We can go and look in the woods tomorrow, Ben. You can choose a branch and I’ll cut it off. Or, if we can’t find one, we can drive into town and buy one.’

‘How old are you, Ben?’ Emma asked.

‘Six.’

‘That’s old enough to make decorations for the tree, then. Like silver stars. I can show you how to do that.’ She offered a smile. ‘My name’s Emma.’

The little girl was wriggling closer. ‘I’m four,’ she whispered, ‘and I like stars…’

‘You can help too, sweetheart,’ Emma promised. She just had to hope there would be a supply of cardboard and silver foil somewhere in the house.

‘That’s Matilda,’ Max said. ‘But she likes to be called Tilly.’ He was smiling at Emma.

And it was such a genuine smile… Nothing like the charm-loaded curl of his lips with that mischievous edge that had always won him so much attention from women. This time, that automatic hint of flirting that Emma had remembered so clearly was completely absent and it changed his face. It made him look a little older. Softer—as if he was perfectly capable of providing the care and commitment these children were going to need so badly even if he used to say it was the last thing he ever wanted to do.

Alice had finished her bottle and felt sleepy and relaxed. Emma shifted her to an upright position and began to rub her back. Seconds later, the loud burp broke both the new silence and quite a lot of the tension in the room.

‘I’m hungry,’ Ben said.

Emma caught the slightly panicked glance that was exchanged between the two Cunningham men.

‘Maggie’s left a pie in the oven,’ Max told his father. ‘And chips.’

‘I like chips.’ Ben slid off the couch. He stood there, waiting for one of the grown-ups to move as well.

But, for a long moment, nobody did and Emma could understand why. This was it, wasn’t it? The first step into a life that was never going to be the same again for either of these men and it was huge and daunting and they’d been thrown into the deep end. None of it was Emma’s responsibility, of course, but the people who were going to suffer if it turned into a disaster were only children and these children had suffered enough, hadn’t they?