His Holiday Heart Read online

  “No, I just can’t believe it.” Tears filled her eyes. “But you said—”

  “I know what I said. I used to be a man who was a whole lot more sensible. Now look at me. Kneeling in the snow. Proposing. Blowing an entire certificate of deposit on an engagement ring.”

  “What will people think?” Happy tears spilled down her cheeks. “You might lose your edge.”

  “I’m not worried about that.” He climbed to his feet and wiped those tears from her cheeks. He was captivated by her. With the snowflakes sparkling in her hair like rare jewels, she made him believe in love. She had changed his world. Yep, it was all her fault, and he thanked her for it. “What I’m worried about is spending my whole life without you. I trust you, Lucy. I believe in you. I need you. My world has no meaning unless you love me.”

  “I do love you, Spence.” More tears. He kissed them away, tenderly, lovingly, just like her Christmas wish come true.

  “But you said you can’t give me what I want. That you didn’t have heart enough.”

  “Your love changed my heart, Lucy.”

  She could see that was true. “Your love has changed mine, too.”

  Sweetness filled her. Joy brimmed over. Her dreams became whole, her soul buoyant with hope. Spence did look changed. There was no more scowl, no more bark, no more bite. He towered over her, more handsome for his open heart. Stalwart, he looked every inch of a man a woman could trust with all her most precious dreams.

  Wishes bubbled to the surface: quiet, unspoken hopes for a future with Spence. She saw a lasting, deep true love and children of their own. She dreamed of a long lifetime of little moments spent with her husband, laughing and talking and experiencing life together.

  “Yes, Spence, I would love to marry you. How does a Valentine’s Day wedding sound?”

  “Perfect.”

  He sounded like a man who believed in love and happily ever afters. He looked like a man who was deeply, endlessly, hopelessly in love with her. She knew, because that was how she felt. Her dreams were coming true. “Do you know what? This is a happy ending.”

  “I’ve changed my mind. I like fairy-tale endings.” His kiss was tender perfection and full of love without end.

  Epilogue

  December, three years later.

  Gran’s kitchen was warm from all three ovens baking away and fragrant with the delicious scents of vanilla and gingerbread and sugar icing. Lucy breathed in the amazing aroma, one that had come to remind her of the best the Christmas season had to offer.

  “And then the moose refused to get out of our driveway. He beat his head against the side of the truck until Spence threw food out the window.” She recounted the morning’s adventure as she carefully braided together strips of plain and red-dyed cookie dough. “I don’t know if M&Ms are good for a moose, but he was satisfied. He moved over enough so that Spence could navigate around him.”

  “I’m glad, because we wouldn’t want a moose blockade to keep you from our annual cookie bake-a-thon.” Ava stopped squeezing her pastry cone to glance across the room where her daughter, Sierra, was playing with Aubrey’s daughter, Lily. The toddlers were busy pushing chunky plastic trucks around on the floor.

  “No!” Johnny, Katherine’s boy, stood with his hands on his hips, frowning. Apparently the girls did not play trucks to his satisfaction. He grabbed a dump truck and dropped to his knees to show them how it was done.

  A baby’s cry came from upstairs.

  “Looks like Madeline is up from her nap.” Katherine shone like the new mother she was—for the second time. She set down the sprinkles, her attention riveted to the stairs. “Spence is up there alone with the babies. Do you think he can handle more than one at a time?”

  “Are you kidding? He’s excellent at multitasking.” Lucy did her best not to sigh. Her opinion of her husband was very high. They had been married just shy of three years. Every day that had passed had been nothing short of magnificent. How could it be anything less? Spence’s love, tender and stalwart, made her life ideal.

  “You look like a very happy woman.” Gran looked up from one of two mixers on the counter and reached for the almond flavoring. “I had my doubts he would ever wise up enough to propose to you.”

  “He’s the best.” Lucy gave the braided strands a curve at the top and voilà—a candy cane cookie. She eased it onto the baking sheet. “Even more, he’s a fabulous father.”

  “We’re all very proud of him,” Aubrey spoke up from the far end of the counter, where she was adding decorative touches to a cookie tray of Santa Clauses. She was glowing in her fifth month of pregnancy. “I’m grateful he found you, Lucy. Your love changed him.”

  “Oh, maybe. I think God was the one who helped him change, but one thing is for sure. He now carries Christmas in his heart every day.” She braided another candy cane, thinking of her beloved husband. He was her rock, her shelter, her bliss.

  “We can’t call him Ebenezer anymore.” Rebecca, in her ninth month, could barely reach the bowl of crushed candy canes set back on the counter.

  “He’s gotten so mellow. We can’t tease him about anything.” Ava made a face, adorable as always. “I’m totally bummed.”

  “I’m sure the tradition will carry on,” Dorrie spoke up as she scraped creamed butter and powdered sugar from the blender’s beaters with a spatula. “It’s all part of the circle of life. Little Johnny looks like a Spencer in the making.”

  “He does have Spence’s scowl,” Katherine agreed with a laugh as she carried the full sheet of cookies to the stack of ovens. “I’m sure Madeline will have many enjoyable hours in the years to come teasing her very serious big brother.”

  They all turned to consider the little boy, naturally in charge. He was a cutie enjoying the role of bossing his younger cousins around.

  The back door opened and a Dalmatian burst into the kitchen, nails clicking on the floor, nose in the air sniffing as if in rapture.

  “Mom!” Tyler trudged into the room heading straight for Danielle, his brown hair tousled, his face reddened from playing in the snow. Madison, with snow caught in adorable brown curls, tapped in his wake. “Mom! We’re awwwwful hungry. Lucky’s awful hungry, too.”

  Lucky barked in hearty agreement.

  Danielle looked helplessly at the three little ones huddling around her and handed down some warm gingerbread men. “All right. You may each have just one, but you’ll spoil your dinner.”

  Lucky barked, his happy tail beating against the cabinets.

  “Thanks, Mom!” The kids said in unison and raced off to the living room.

  Jonas, bringing up the rear, closed the back door, smiling in that easygoing way of his. Healed from his injuries, he looked as strong as ever. In his arms was their toddler, Mary. A cloud of fine baby curls framed her cherub’s face.

  “Cookie!” she demanded with the sweetest smile.

  Danielle complied with a kiss to her daughter’s cheek.

  “Don’t I get one?” Jonas asked, and his chuckle was lost by the commotion of a toddler’s shoes thumping into the room. Lauren’s little girl, Maya, wandered in, hugging her stuffed bunny. She pointed at the counter, babbling excitedly, her father two paces behind her.

  “The men need more cookies.” Caleb might have been speaking to the kitchen full of women but his gaze pinned to Lauren, who was manning the ovens. The look they shared was of pure love. True love flourished in this family. “Watching football is hard work.”

  “We wouldn’t want you all to waste away.” Lauren fetched a plate from the cabinets. “I’ll load this up and bring it out to you all.”

  “As long as you bring it in person so I can kiss the cook.” Caleb scooped his daughter into his arms and carried her back into the living room. Her happy squeals filled the house like Christmas joy.

  A squeak of the stairs had Lucy turning toward the hallway. As always, every part of her spirit and every piece of her soul yearned for Spence. He rounded the corner cradling two babies, one
in each arm.

  “I brought Daniel down, too,” Spence spoke first to Ava and then to Katherine. “Madeline wanted to stay with her big sister.”

  “She adores Hayden.” Katherine beamed as she reached toward the cabinets. “I’m going to take a plate of cookies upstairs. It’s wonderful having Hayden home on college break. I miss her terribly when she’s gone, so I have to spoil her.”

  The family’s chatter continued, but it was all background noise as Spence ambled over. He handed Daniel over to Ava, which left him holding their son—their precious Seth.

  “How are my two handsome men doing?” Lucy abandoned the cookie making to give her son a kiss on his chubby cheek.

  “The two of us are just about perfect.”

  “Just about?”

  “Only one thing could make it better.” These days when Spence smiled, it was full-fledged and with all his heart. He was a man who had become the best of who he could be. The store, which his parents had deeded to him, was flourishing, and he had learned not to work such long hours. He had sold his house to Chad and Rebecca and enjoyed living in the country with all that snow to plow and shovel in the winter. Every year, he dressed up in the Santa suit for the hospital kids. He was a dream, and he made her life a dream come true.

  “I know what that one thing is.” She went up on tiptoe and kissed her husband. Sweetness filled her, as it always did. Bliss left her as if floating in the air.

  “Now my life is perfect.” Spence leaned his forehead to hers, a tender connection. The bond between them was flawless.

  “Mine, too.” It was simply the truth. She had the life she had always dreamed of. She had true love, a comfortable home, a job she loved, a wonderful extended family and a beautiful baby she adored beyond measure. God had given her so many blessings, and she thanked Him every day.

  “I love you so much.” She laid her hand on Spence’s jaw, incandescent.

  “Not as much as I love you.” He leaned in for another kiss, cradling their son between them. “Not as much as I will love you tomorrow. Every day, I will love you more.”

  “No, I will love you more.”

  They smiled together. How she adored this man, her husband. He made her happy beyond imagining. He made every day feel like Christmas.

  “It’s starting to snow,” Rebecca called out.

  They turned together to look out the big picture windows of Gran’s old-fashioned kitchen. Tiny, delicate flakes tumbled from a white sky, falling across the wintry world and over the house, as if blessing them all with God’s perfect grace.

  Dear Reader,

  Thank you so much for choosing His Holiday Heart, the final book in the third McKaslin series. I hope you enjoyed reading Spence and Lucy’s story as much as I did writing it. After getting to know Spence over the course of the other books, it was a challenge finding the right woman for him. I needed someone who would not be easily run off by his gruffness and yet someone tender enough to understand him. I hope you enjoy reading how Lucy captures Spence’s lonely heart, and that his search to live a life of kindness and love speaks to your heart, as well.

  Please drop by my Web page at www.jillianhart.net for extras on Spence’s story and a peek at the next McKaslin series.

  Blessings and Merry Christmas.

  QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

  What are your first impressions of Spence? When he makes sure Lucy has a place to stay for the night, what does this say about his character?

  What are your first impressions of Lucy’s character? How would you describe her? What are her weaknesses and her strengths?

  What are the ways that Spence protects his heart? How does he isolate himself from others and from life?

  What is Lucy’s opinion of Spence? How does it change as she comes to know his family and him?

  How does Spence’s view of Lucy change through the story?

  How is God’s leading evident in the story?

  What role does Project Santa play in Lucy’s life? How does it change Spence’s?

  What makes Lucy the right one for Spence? What role does her past experience play? How does her view of him change?

  How are the themes of family incorporated into this story? The values of Christmas?

  How does the story handle the themes of forgiveness and second chances? Discuss your experiences with both.

  Spence’s miserly heart becomes a holiday heart. What happens to force him to change? What does he realize?

  What makes Spence take the risk of offering his heart to Lucy?

  ISBN: 978-1-4268-2461-6

  HIS HOLIDAY HEART

  Copyright © 2008 by Jill Strickler

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the editorial office, Steeple Hill Books, 233 Broadway, New York, NY 10279 U.S.A.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  This edition published by arrangement with Steeple Hill Books.

  ® and TM are trademarks of Steeple Hill Books, used under license. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Trade Marks Office and in other countries.

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