Chapter one
SCOTT
Fourteen Years Later
Maria had been in the barn all afternoon with the farrier trying to get all seven of the horses taken care of before winter. Just before I pulled the meatloaf out of the oven, I caught sight of her shaking hands with Joe as he gathered his tools and packed his truck.
It didn’t matter how many years we had been together, I still hated watching another man touch her; even an innocent handshake from a guy I knew. In the beginning, it had taken all my willpower to not punch every guy who talked to her in the face. Over the years, my faith and trust grew, and I knew I had nothing to worry about. My Maria was nothing like my first wife, Crystal.
“Dad, are you still staring at Mom?” Ashton snuck up behind me, catching me off-guard.
“Jesus, son.” I wheeled around to face him, eyes wide. “Stop creepin’ up on people.” He smiled, quite pleased with himself. “And no, I wasn’t staring. I just happened to glance out the window and she was there.”
He chuckled, turning around and grabbing one of the rolls from the basket on the island. “Sure. Keep telling yourself that, Dad.”
The front door whooshed open and before I could yell at Ash, Maria said, “Don’t even think about eating that, young man. Dad’s cooked dinner and you can wait until it’s all ready.”
“But, I’m hungry,” Ash whined like a child, placing the dinner roll back where he got it from as I closed the oven, setting the pan of meatloaf on the stovetop. The whole house smelled of cumin seasoned beef, sautéed onions, and bell peppers.
Her eyes fell on me and she smiled sweetly, toeing off her shoes. “How much longer ‘til dinner, honey?”
“Ten minutes. I gotta put the ketchup stuff on and then put it back in for a few minutes.” I looked at my youngest son. “You won’t starve before then.”
“I might,” he challenged.
“Doubt it, bro,” Cooper shouted from the living room, where he watched television with his feet up on the coffee table. He had spent the day at the house even though he had a small apartment in town that he rented. The first deployment was the hardest; not seeing him across the dinner table or hearing how his day had been. I was grateful for any time we got with him between missions and training.
Ashton scowled across the room at his older brother. “Who asked you?”
“Boys,” Maria warned, cutting her eyes at them as she padded over to me. “Hey, you.” She leaned up on her toes and tugged the front of my shirt, capturing my lips with hers.
“Hey, yourself,” I mumbled against her lush lips. “Keep kissing me like that and the kids will be on their own for dinner.”
Maria kissed me again, slipping a hand between us and running her hand down the front of my bulging zipper. “Don’t tempt me.”
“Gross,” Ash said, retreating from the dinner table to his bedroom.
“You guys need to get a room,” Cooper advised, his nose wrinkled.
“Hey, you two, knock it off. We might be older than you, but we aren’t dead.” I walked Maria backwards until she was pressed against the refrigerator, kissing her the whole way.
Cooper leapt off the couch, leaving Maggie, his wife, asleep on the opposite end. “I’m going to the barn.”
Maggie and Cooper started dating in high school and got engaged before his first deployment. I was a little concerned when he told me she would stay here and not be living with him on base. They had their reasons, but it didn’t make sense to me. Much of what Maggie did didn’t make sense to me.
* * *
Six days before Christmas, all the boys were home, and the house was full of family and friends. Storm had come home from North Carolina, where he worked as an apprentice to a blacksmith near Raleigh, and planned to stay two weeks.
Cooper was on leave from his latest deployment with the U.S. Army and he and Maggie had stopped over. They had been here more than at their own place, but I suspected that was to placate his mom. Maria both hated and loved the fact that Cooper had enlisted. I choose to focus on his dedication to his country rather than the danger he put himself in.
Ashton had just come in from the barn with his best friend, Kinsley. Those two were typically found together. She lived on the other side of the street down just a ways and was the closest thing to a daughter we had. Since they were old enough to talk, Kins and Ash had been thick as thieves. I couldn’t believe it was their senior year of high school. They had grown up so fast.
“Is everyone staying for dinner?” Maria stood in the dining room between the kitchen and the living room. Over the years, I had tried to open the floor plan up, so we could all be together, but not be cramped.
The front door opened between the living room and dining room, with the kitchen in the back behind the dining room. I had hoped to gut and remodel the kitchen next. The hall to the right led to the boys’ bedrooms and a shared bathroom. In the opposite direction, the addition I had completed a few years prior. Maria and I had a master bedroom with a full bathroom, small walk-in closet, and a sitting room where she could read.
“I’m going home. My parents are leaving for their cruise tomorrow, so Mom wanted me to have dinner with them,” Kinsley said from the refrigerator, where Ash handed her a bottle of water.
“Where are they going again?” I asked, picking up my pack of cigarettes from the counter.
“Two weeks in the Caribbean. I can’t remember exactly,” she tapped her index finger on her lips, “but I think it’s the Bahamas, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands.”
“Sounds like heaven.” Maria smiled. “Please tell Liv that I want to see pictures.”
Olivia and Phillip Allen lived down the street and weren’t only neighbors but also close friends. When they bought the property, and built their house years ago, I worried they would be pains in the ass based on the fancy house they built. I hate to admit it, but I judged the book based on the cover. They turned out to be amazing neighbors.
“Ooh,” Maggie chimed in, patting Cooper’s shoulder. “I think we need a vacation, don’t you, Cooper? We should go on a cruise like that.”
I tried hard not to roll my eyes. I always did my best to keep my opinions to myself when it came to my sons’ love lives, telling myself they would go through tons of girlfriends. Maggie and Coop had been together almost four years and from day one she rubbed me the wrong way. When he told me that he had proposed, I did my best to be happy for him because he was happy, but that didn’t mean that I didn’t warn him about getting married so young.
Cooper groaned, crossing his arms over his chest. “Mags, I just got home. All I wanna do is relax with you and my family, not traipse all over the globe like I’ve been doing for the last year.”
That was as close to us knowing where he had been or what he had been doing as we would probably ever get. Recruited directly out of boot camp, Cooper worked his ass off to become a Green Beret. I had never been so proud in all my life as I was the day he called and told me he would be in Special Forces.
The worst day of my life had been when he came home from his first tour. I found him curled up in the shower, shaking and sobbing. He never wanted to talk about it after that day but that was when I had a newfound respect for what he had been through; the things he had seen and done.
Maria turned from the sink where she was washing her hands. “I agree with Coop; my boy needs to decompress where he’s comfortable. And where I can cook for him.”
“I’m still staying at my place, Mom.”
“I know.”
If it were up to Maria, he would be staying here, but he has his own life and his own place with his wife.
An hour later, we sat around the long farmhouse table, that had been in this house since my father was a boy, and had a big family dinner. It felt like old times, including the bickering.
After dinner, I slipped on my tan cotton duck jacket and stepped out front on the porch and sat down in my mother’s rocking chair to smoke. Maria hated that I smoked. I had tried several times to quit, but each time I ended up smoking again. Storm followed me out and sat down in the rocking chair next to me. The night air had a frosty bite to it that wasn’t there earlier. The temperature had dropped quickly after the sun had set.
“So,” I said, sipping my beer, flicking my cigarette into the grass, “whatcha got planned for tonight?”
Looking out at the empty pasture, he lifted his bottle of beer to his lips, taking a swig, then rested it on his thigh. “I don’t know, maybe go down to Howard’s and meet up with Andrew and the guys. He called earlier and said they’d be there tonight.”
“Cool, sounds good. Remember, if you drink too much-”
Storm groaned, turned his head to look at me. “I know, Dad. Call you or Mom.”
“Actually, I was gonna tell you to call one of your brothers. Mom and I will be-”
Storm leapt out of the chair like it had bit him. “Jesus, Dad, don’t finish that sentence.”
I laughed so hard, I started coughing. “You kids act like we’re eighty years old. Married people still have sex.”
“Enough. I’m out.” Storm hopped down the three front steps and walked quickly to his silver pickup truck. “Night, Dad.”
“Later, son,” I called back, still chuckling. I finished my beer and wondered how quickly I could get Maria out of the kitchen and naked in bed. After all these years, she still got me hard without even trying.
I stood, walked to the front door, pulled the screen door back, pushing the front door open. The aroma of rosemary and garlic still hung in the air from the potatoes Maria had cooked.
“Hey, boys,” I looked to Cooper and Ashton, “you’re on kitchen duty.”
Maria looked over her shoulder at me from the sink full of bubbles. “Babe, I’m fine. I’m almost done.”
Narrowing my eyes at the boys, they jumped off the couch, where they were watching a football game and dashed into the kitchen. Much like I expected, Maggie stayed put. “We got it, Mom.”
My boots landed quickly across the foot as I walked toward her. My arm snaked around her waist as she dried her hands, pulling her to me. “We have plans.”
Blushing, she rose up on her toes to whisper against my lips. “Oh, we do, do we? And what’s that?”
“Don’t you worry, you’ll find out.” As she turned to leave the room, my hand landed soundly across her ass, causing her to yelp and move quicker.
My woman, my boys, damn my life was better than I ever imagined it could be.
This story continues on in One Last Snowy Christmas by AF Crowell available now!