Last Chance Christmas (Last Chance #5)(42)
Author: Hope Ramsay

“Yes, I know.”

Miriam smiled, but said nothing.

“Miriam, are you saying I should still be looking for a crusader?”

“So, you are looking? I’d heard that you’d taken off your wedding band. Good. Of course you should be looking for a crusader. Didn’t I tell you that years ago? And just remember that most crusaders come home disillusioned and maybe even a little cynical and scared. They need to be reminded of what the crusade was for in the first place. They need an anchor. That’s where you come in.” Something sparked in her eye, and Stone would have questioned her further if Doc Cooper hadn’t taken that moment to step onto the little stage at the end of the fellowship hall and get the Christmas play under way.

It was a little past six o’clock when Lark finally reached the town limits of Last Chance, South Carolina. The town looked practically picturesque in the deep winter night, lit up from end to end for Christmas Eve.

Palmetto Avenue seemed to have a little more traffic than usual. It sure looked like half the population was streaming into the parking lots of the four churches that dominated the main street. This must be the early crowd. There would probably be a real traffic jam just before midnight.

She turned onto Calhoun Street and drove past Stone’s house. The windows were dark. She drove a little farther down the block. The windows were dark at Ruby’s house, too.

Everyone was probably at church.

But which one?

Probably Christ Church—it was the biggest one in town and the one that Miriam, Hettie, and Lillian belonged to. She turned the car around.

Five minutes later, she hurried up the front walk of the church and opened the door to the sanctuary. The place was beautifully decorated with pine roping and poinsettias. But the place was practically empty.

“If you’re looking for the third-grade Christmas play, it’s being held in the fellowship hall,” said a little balding man who was sitting in the choir section. “If you’re here for the choir’s concert, you’re about an hour and a half early.”

Lark asked for directions to the fellowship hall, and a couple of minutes later she quietly entered the darkened room.

A little boy wearing a white shirt, clip-on tie, khakis, and sneakers stood to one side of a raised stage, reading from a paper. “And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night,” he read.

When his narration was finished, out from the wings came two shepherds herding three adorable sheep. One of the shepherds was Haley Rhodes, wearing a headdress and a painted-on beard. The sheep ran around the stage saying “baa baa” for a moment and finally settled to one side with Haley and the other shepherd beside them.

The narrator spoke again. “And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them…”

Out from the wings came a zaftig angel with a gold halo and cardboard wings. The minute she arrived, Haley made like she was afraid. The chubby angel spoke. “Fear not: for… um, uh… um…” She looked out at the audience like a deer in the headlights. The poor kid was terrified.

Haley raised her head. “Behold I bring you good tidings,” she whispered in a voice loud enough for everyone to hear. A few chuckles could be heard from the audience.

“Oh, yeah, I remember,” the angel said, “behold I bring you good tidings of… um… yeah, I got it… great joy, which shall be to all people.” She hesitated again, and Haley prompted.

“Oh, yeah… For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be… uh… a sign unto you; You shall find the baby wrapped in waddling clothes, lying in a manger.”

The chubby angel let go of a relieved sigh, and the narrator took over. “And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying—”

Three more little angels arrived on stage and said, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill toward men.”

The narrator continued. “And it came to pass, as the angels were gone away from them into heaven, the shepherds said one to another…”

The angels exited stage right. And Haley turned to the other shepherd and said in a booming voice, “Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us.”

The curtain behind the shepherds rose and there were Joseph and Mary with a manger, and a variety of adorable barn animals.

The narrator read the remainder of the Bible verses as the kids made a living tableau of the first Christmas.

Even Lark, jaded as she was, found herself smiling. She wasn’t a Christian and probably never would be, but the Christmas story was always uplifting, especially the part about peace on earth.

The kids got their applause and the house lights came up. She saw Stone almost immediately, as if her eyes were magically directed toward him. He stood up and Haley, still dressed in her shepherd’s costume, came barreling toward him. He bent and lifted her up, and gave her a big kiss on her cheek, heedless of the dark greasepaint there.

Lizzy stood next to him, dressed up for Christmas but looking vaguely bored. Stone’s family was there with him, too—his mother and father, his brothers and their wives. Only his sister was missing. She was celebrating Christmas in England this year.

Lark hesitated. She didn’t belong. What had she been thinking? Had she been thinking at all?

No. She’d been acting on pure emotion. She’d checked rationality at the door.

Stone looked up and their eyes met across the crowded room. He startled. And then he smiled and his shoulders relaxed.

He put Haley down and turned and headed in her direction. There was a smudge of black greasepaint on his nose. It made him look oddly adorable.

“I came back,” she whispered, when he stood before her.

“Why didn’t you call me? I’ve been worried about you. Aren’t you supposed to be flying to Africa tomorrow?”

She shook her head and looked up into his handsome face. A face she had been searching for all her life. The words she’d endlessly rehearsed during her frantic drive south suddenly clogged in her throat.

It didn’t seem to matter. It was like he knew what she wanted to say without her having to actually say it. He reached out and pulled her up into a kiss so hot she almost lost her mind. Something had changed in him. He wasn’t holding anything back anymore, and the kiss took her to a place she didn’t even know existed.

And when the kiss finally ended the parishioners started applauding. Not just his family, but half the town of Last Chance, South Carolina. There were even a few shouts of “bravo” from a couple of the members of the Christ Church Ladies’ Auxiliary.

Haley separated herself from the rest of the family and raced up to them. Stone let Lark go long enough to catch Haley and pull her up into his arms. Her brown eyes were lit up, and there was a big smile on her face.

“Miss Lark, you’re right about Santa.”

Lark laughed. “Yeah, maybe I was.”

“No, really. The angel is gone. She’s gone to Heaven. I’m sure Santa did it—and maybe he had some help from the angels. They definitely made it snow.”

“How do you know the angel is gone?” Stone asked, his voice just a little hushed and strange.

“I just do,” Haley said. “It’s the only thing I really wanted for Christmas.”

Stone turned toward Lark. “Will you come home with me and share Christmas? I don’t want you to go to Africa.”

Tears flooded her eyes. “I was coming back to tell you that I don’t want to go. Just like Pop, it seems that I’ve fallen in love right here in Last Chance.”

“You were? You have?”

She nodded, and the tears fell down her cheeks. She couldn’t say anything more. But it was okay because Stone knew what she meant. He didn’t need her words. He could read her like an open book.

He pulled her up into his arms, where she shared a little space with Haley. “I love you, too,” he whispered in her ear.

And that’s all she needed to know.