Christmas Shorts 2020 Read online

  “Maybe she’s someone who worked for the logging camp,” I suggested. “A bookkeeper or something.”

  “Look at those shoes,” Frannie said. “And her clothes in general. Very high end. This woman wasn’t a bookkeeper.”

  “Maybe she was a madam,” Doc tried. “I seem to recall reading that some of the women who got into that particular field early on did quite well.”

  “Maybe,” Frannie admitted. “But I’m not getting that vibe.”

  “Maybe a relative,” I said. “The Collins family was very wealthy, even before they migrated to the United States and opened the logging camp.”

  “She could be a relative,” Frannie agreed. “Perhaps a cousin. Maybe even a sister. Do you know if Jeremiah had a sister?”

  I frowned. “I really don’t know. I guess that might be something to add to our list of items to research.”

  “It seems sort of odd that if someone as high profile as Jeremiah’s sister had lived in the area, we wouldn’t have found photos of her before this,” Doc said. “We’ve been working on this for months.”

  “Just because she was here at the time the photo was taken doesn’t mean she lived here,” I pointed out. “She might have only stopped by for a short visit, which is when the photo was taken. It’s entirely possible she moved on rather quickly.” I looked at the photo again. “I have to say that a logging camp doesn’t seem to be the sort of place a woman like this would enjoy.”

  “Of course, if she was only here for a short visit, and this photo is the only proof of that visit, I don’t see how we’re going to figure out who she is,” Grandpa pointed out.

  “True, but I guess it won’t hurt to look.” I glanced at my watch. “I only have an hour today. I have a doctor’s appointment at three, and then I told Ashley I’d pick her and the other girls up at the theater right when the movie lets out. Is there anything important we need to go over?”

  “I found the employee records from the first few years the logging camp was open,” Frannie said. “I didn’t recognize many of the names, but there were a few surnames I want to follow up on.”

  “Do you think any of those long-ago residents might be related to folks currently living in the area?” I asked.

  “I think a few might be, although I suppose it’s a longshot to think that Victoria Fitzpatrick down at the five and dime is in any way related to Timothy Fitzpatrick, who worked at the logging camp in the late eighteen hundreds. Still, it never hurts to ask.”

  “Phillip Pennywild told me that his family is originally from Cornwall,” Doc said. “There’s a Barret Pennywild on the list of men who worked at the logging camp.”

  “Tracking down everyone with the same surname as the men who worked at the logging camp will take forever,” I said.

  “True, but I seem to remember Phillip mentioning that his grandfather moved to the area when he was a young man.”

  “Okay,” I said to Doc. “You go ahead and talk to him, and Frannie can talk to Victoria. I was overseeing the Christmas tree delivery in the courtyard when I received the copies of the town records I put a request in for.” The original records were destroyed in the explosion, but I’d found out that the state had copies of the most significant paperwork. Unfortunately, it was too old to be digitized, so I had to wait for it to be copied and sent. “I haven’t had a chance to look at everything yet, but I plan to do so tonight.”

  “Maybe we should work on what we have and meet again tomorrow,” Frannie suggested.

  “Kyle will be back tomorrow evening, and I have a lunch date with Jenna tomorrow afternoon, but I’m free for lunch the following day. If that works for everyone, we can meet around noon. My treat,” I added.

  After everyone agreed to the time and place for our next meeting, I said my goodbyes and hurried off for my doctor’s appointment, which I hoped would be completed by the time I needed to pick the girls up.

  “Pregnant?” I gasped.

  The doctor held up my chart. “It looks that way.”

  “But how?”

  He raised a brow.

  “I know how.” I blushed. “What I mean is how can I be pregnant when we’ve been using birth control?”

  The doctor shrugged. “These things happen sometimes. Am I sensing that this pregnancy could be a problem?”

  “No,” I said quickly. “It’s not a problem. It’s just unexpected.” I felt like I might pass out, so I took several deep breaths. “Kyle and I talked about waiting to decide whether or not to have children of our own.” I looked the man in the eye. “You know that I’m raising my two half-sisters.”

  He nodded. “Yes, I know.” He looked concerned, which I guessed I understood. I’m sure most women were thrilled to find out they were expecting.

  “It’s fine,” I said, letting the idea sink in. “I’m sure everything will be fine.” I put my hand on my still very flat stomach as I tried to convince myself that was true. “I know Kyle would like a child. It’s really me who feels less certain.” I moved my hand over my stomach in a circular motion. “Do you know what I’m having? A boy or a girl?”

  “It’s too early to know the sex quite yet, but we can do an ultrasound at a future appointment to take care of that. If you’d like to hear the heartbeat, we can do that today.”

  I smiled and nodded. “I’d like that.”

  The doctor had me lay back. He had a machine that could pick up a baby’s heartbeat. The machine had an extra stethoscope, so we could both listen. When I heard the noise that sounded more like a whoosh, I couldn’t help but smile. “That’s it? That’s my baby?”

  The doctor nodded. “That’s your baby.”

  I was sorry that Kyle wasn’t here. He was going to love this. “Can I bring my husband in to hear this? He’s out of town today, but maybe later in the week?”

  “I think we can arrange that. Just call the nurse and set it up. And before you leave today, I’m going to have my nurse set you up with some literature. I’ll see you back here in a month.”

  I thanked the doctor and then hurried off to pick the girls up. I didn’t want them to have to wait. Once I had them in the car, they asked to spend the night at Jenna’s, so I headed in that direction.

  “So, how was the movie?” I asked, trying to sound completely normal and not at all like my world had just been turned upside down.

  “It was good,” Ashley said.

  “Molly from school was there,” Gracie informed me. “Her mom dropped her off, and they had her baby sister, Ella, with them. She sure is cute.”

  “She is a very cute baby,” I agreed. “I guess Ella must be about two months old now.”

  Gracie shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess. Molly told me that this is going to be a special Christmas with a new baby sister in the house. She talked about the red dress her mom made for Ella for services on Christmas Eve, but she didn’t mention how old she is.”

  “Maybe we’ll see them at church, and we can ask Molly’s mom,” I suggested.

  “Molly is excited about being a big sister,” Gracie added. “Now that you and Kyle are married, do you think I might be a big sister someday?”

  I almost choked on my own saliva. “Maybe. I guess we’ll have to wait and see.” There was no way I was telling anyone about the baby before I told Kyle, and I really wanted to tell him in person, so it was going to have to wait.

  “Babies are noisy,” Ashley jumped in.

  “So noisy,” Kristi agreed. “It seems like my brothers never stop crying.”

  I happened to know that the twins were very content babies who rarely cried, but I supposed that when you weren’t used to having a baby in the house, even a little bit of crying seemed like a lot. The girls continued to talk about the pros and cons of having a baby in the house as I drove them across town. Personally, I was too nervous to say anything, so I just listened. Initially, I’d planned to take the girls inside and chat with Jenna when I dropped them off, but I knew there was no way I’d be able to keep my secret from my
best friend. I really did want Kyle to be the first to know, so I made up an excuse about expecting a call and dropped them in the driveway. Once they were safely in the house, I headed home and promptly threw up.

  Later that evening, I sat on the bed that Kyle and I usually shared. My dog, Echo, and Kyle’s dog, Trooper, were lying on the floor next to our bed, while my cat, Cuervo, was sitting on the extra pillow where Kyle usually slept. Grandpa had gone out for dinner with Doc, and Dad and Rosalie had gone out for a meal and then to a play this evening, so the house was a lot quieter than it usually was. At this particular moment, I was happy to have the solitude.

  Not wanting to obsess about the baby until I got a bit more used to the idea, I worked on the scrapbook as I’d planned to do by sorting through the photos, old documents, public records, and artfully drawn timelines I’d been gathering. At the time I came up with the gift idea, it had seemed the perfect solution to the question of what to get the man who was rich enough to buy anything he wanted for himself since Kyle knew very little about the grandfather who’d deserted him until the end of his life when he came to the decision to leave him the majority of his extensive estate. I’d started putting copies of some of the birth and death records I’d received today into plastic sleeves when my cell phone rang.

  “Hey, Frannie, what’s up?”

  “I think I may have found the woman in the photo.”

  I sat up straighter. “Really? Who is it?”

  “I think, as we suggested earlier, it might be Jeremiah’s sister, Jasmine Collins Luxenberg. I did some digging around after we met this afternoon and found out that Jasmine came to the area after Jeremiah had established the logging camp, and the town had grown up somewhat. As we also theorized, Jasmine was not a fan of mud and trees, so she decided to set off on her own. I guess she headed to the South Shore and opened the first casino in the area currently known as the town of Indulgence.”

  “The first casino?” I paused to think about it. “Jeremiah’s sister founded the Lux Casino?”

  “I’m pretty sure she did. Jasmine is long dead, of course, but I spoke to a woman who lives in Indulgence and claims to be Jasmine’s great-great-niece. I told her about your project, and she’s willing to meet with you if you’d like.”

  “I would like that.” Even though I had made lunch plans with Jenna, Kyle would be home tomorrow, so tomorrow would be the best time for me to meet with Jasmine’s great-great-niece. “Do you have the woman’s phone number?”

  “I do. Her name is Tiffany, and she’s expecting you to call.”

  “Thanks, Frannie. You’re the best. I’ll call her right now.”

  If Tiffany was descended from Jasmine, and Kyle was descended from Jeremiah, then maybe I could give him something even better than a scrapbook for Christmas. Maybe, I could give him cousins. They would be very distant cousins, to be sure, but cousins nonetheless. Of course, once he found out about the baby, none of this would really matter. If I knew Kyle and I did, I was certain that he’d consider a baby to be the best gift of all.

  The following day dawned bright and sunny, although a storm was expected to blow in later in the day. On most days of the week, the Jensen/Donovan family generally gets together for breakfast. Grandpa usually comes by early to make a feast worthy of a king, while the girls get ready for school, and Kyle and I prepare for whatever task we’ve planned for the day. Dad and Rosalie usually come by just as Grandpa gets the meal on the table, and the entire family shares a meal and catches up before going off in our own directions.

  The family generally meets for the evening meal as well, but not quite as religiously since we all have different schedules, and getting together as a group isn’t always possible.

  This morning, however, Kyle was out of town, and the girls were still at Jenna’s house, so I’d texted both Grandpa and my dad to let them know that I would miss the family breakfast too. I wanted to have time to drive to Indulgence, which was about an hour and a half away, meet with Tiffany, and then get back to Serenity before Kyle got home. I also wanted to avoid everyone in my family, so I wouldn’t accidentally let my secret slip out before I could tell Kyle that, despite my hesitation, it looked like nature had found a way, and he was going to be a father.

  Tiffany lived in a large home perched right on the shore of Paradise Lake. She’d been expecting me since we’d arranged a time to meet the previous day, so she had coffee and muffins ready and waiting in the sunroom. It was a gorgeous winter day. There was plenty of fresh snow to provide atmosphere, but plenty of sunshine as well to deliver warmth and cheerfulness.

  “Thank you for meeting with me,” I said as soon as I was seated on a wicker sofa.

  “It’s my pleasure. I’m intrigued by the idea that I might have relatives living just across the lake that I never knew about.”

  “You didn’t know about Kyle?”

  She shook her head. “I’d heard that Zachary died, but I didn’t realize the man he left the house to was a blood relation. To be perfectly honest, I’d never even met Zachary. By the time I was born, he was already an old recluse who didn’t have time for things such as relatives.”

  “He lived a difficult life, and he was hard to get to know. The two of us were friends, however, so if you’re interested, I can tell you about him.”

  “I might just take you up on that. For today, however, I understand you’re here about Jasmine.”

  I nodded. “Some friends and I are putting together a scrapbook for Kyle for Christmas. It’s a family history of sorts. We found this photo.” I handed the woman the photo of Jeremiah and the beautiful woman. “At first, we didn’t know who the woman was, but our librarian did some research and thinks the woman in the photo was Jeremiah’s sister.”

  Tiffany nodded. “Yes, this is Jasmine.” She smiled. “Talk about a woman ahead of her time. She was a feisty one who was determined to live by her own rules. The story I’ve been told was that Jeremiah brought Jasmine here to Nevada to be a companion of sorts for his wife, who was lonely living in the isolated logging camp. Of course, once Jasmine arrived and had a look around, she quickly decided that life at the logging camp wasn’t for her, so she came to the South Shore, which had been developed as a summertime resort area for folks who wanted to come up to the lake from Sacramento. She saw the potential of the mostly undeveloped area and built herself a casino. Of course, once word got out about the casino, rich folks from as far away as San Francisco began to make the journey to the lake for the summer months. Fancy homes sprung up, and other businesses settled in to support the casino. Over time, the town of Indulgence sprang up, and by the mid-nineteen hundreds, folks began living here year-round.”

  “So Jasmine is responsible for Indulgence being founded in much the same way as Jeremiah’s logging camp allowed Serenity to grow up.”

  “Basically.”

  “I assume that at some point, Jasmine married and had children.”

  She nodded. “Jasmine married a man named Grover Luxenberg when she was a young woman, but he died before she even came to this area. Later, after the casino was built and doing well, she married a man named Sonny Silverman. She never took his name since she was well known as Jasmine Luxenberg by then, but they did have two sons and two daughters. Each of the four children married and had children, and so on. Some of the cousins moved away, while others stayed. I guess there are maybe six families currently living in the area who are directly descended from Jasmine, including my own.”

  “I’m sure Kyle would love to meet everyone at some point. I’m afraid that Jeremiah’s side of the family has died off with the exception of Kyle, who didn’t even know he was related to the Collins family until after Zachary died.”

  “I’d be happy to arrange a family reunion after the holidays. And I’m anxious to meet your young man. I’ve heard good things about the man who inherited Zachary’s estate. I would have reached out sooner if I’d known there was a family relationship. Honestly, I figured that Zachary left his estate to
one of his employees or maybe someone in the community.”

  “I understand. Zachary wasn’t one to share, and he wasn’t the sort to seek out relationships even if they were blood relationships.”

  By the time I got back to the resort, Kyle was just pulling into the drive. When I saw his car in the drive, I turned around and headed to the parking area to greet him.

  “How was your trip?” I asked after wrapping my arms around his neck and giving him a very long kiss.

  “It was productive. I think we’re back on track to open in the fall. But I missed you.”

  “I missed you too.” I kissed him again. “And I’m so glad you’re home.”

  He nodded. “Trust me when I tell you that I’m even happier about my being home than you are. It’s been a long couple of days and a night settled in by the fire sounds just about perfect.”

  I cringed.

  “I’m sensing a problem.”

  “I told the girls we could go into town to look at the windows tonight. They want to have pizza at Rob’s as well.”

  He smiled, seeming to make a mental adjustment before brushing a snowflake from my shoulder. “Pizza and holiday windows sound perfect.” He looked up into the sky. “I’m afraid our sunny day has turned into a snowy day, however, so maybe we should do the windows first and then eat just in case the storm comes in harder as the evening progresses.”

  I stood on my tiptoes and kissed Kyle again. “I like that plan.”

  “Did the tree for the memorial get delivered?” he asked as we walked hand in hand from where I’d met him at his car toward the house.

  “It was delivered yesterday, and I had the crew decorate it. It turned out really good. I can’t wait to show it to you.”

  “I’m excited to see it. The moment I saw that tree in the forest, I knew that it would be the perfect tree to stand as a memorial for those we lost.”

  “It really is a perfect tree. I think it means a lot to everyone. The whole thing — the tree, the memorial courtyard, the new town offices, and the upcoming opening of the school — means a lot. Zachary would be so proud of you. He’d be proud of what you’d done with the assets he left you, and he’d be proud of the man you’ve become.”