The Asheville Christmas Tradition (Carolina Christmas #4)

7. Noelle

When Noelle pulled up to the ranch house, she took a moment in the driveway to drink in the place she now called home. Draped with Christmas lights, dusted in snow, and silhouetted against the sunset on the mountains, she certainly couldn’t think of a prettier place to live.

Knowing that the man she loved and the stepdaughter who’d stolen her heart were inside waiting for her just made it all better.

She climbed out and grabbed her bag—an inexpensive one she’d taken to carrying after someone in the gallery had a made a comment about her New York designer purse.

Then she let out a big enough sigh that she could see her breath in the chilly mountain air.

The fact was, she’d come a long way since her New York days, since she had Sotheby’s on her business card, Louis Vuitton on her shoulder, and limos as her mode of transport. And it had been such a good journey.

Until a year or so ago, she’d come home to an empty Manhattan high-rise, pour a glass of wine, and think about the success of her day as an art dealer.

Some might say how the mighty had fallen…or that she didn’t belong here.

And they’d be wrong, since she’d never been more at home.

As she opened the front door, she looked past the entryway to a den lit by a TV and the golden glow of a Christmas tree that Cassie had insisted they put up and decorate the day after Thanksgiving. She heard a little girl’s giggle over the TV and smelled the delicious aroma of Jace’s spectacular red sauce simmering on the stove.

The whole moment just infused happiness in her heart.

“Oh, Daddy! Miss Noelle’s here!”

Miss Noelle, not Mommy. Okay, that didn’t infuse her with happiness, but the sound of Cassie’s voice always did.

The little girl came darting out, arms extended, followed by Jace wearing jeans, a dark T-shirt, and a heart-melting smile.

“I’m sorry I’m late,” she said, taking the hug Cassie offered first. “Christmas traffic in town is crazy.”

“It’s fine.” Jace’s hug was strong, warm, and accompanied by a kiss. “We’re watching Elf .”

“Without me?” Noelle laughed. “Let me change and I’ll be right with you.”

Cassie danced around, then looked up at Jace as Noelle took off for their room on the other side of the house.

“Can I ask her now?” she asked in a whisper loud enough to be heard down the hall.

“Give her a chance to breathe, Cass. I told you—talk to her over dinner.”

Noelle stepped into the main bedroom as a frown pulled. Ask her…about calling Noelle Mommy?

She squeezed her eyes shut, hoping that’s what their little girl wanted.

But Cassie didn’t ask anything, lost in the hilarious holiday film that made them laugh and wipe happy tears. When it was over, they headed into the kitchen, where the red sauce was ready. Noelle made a salad while Jace boiled the pasta, and Cassie flitted around the room repeating her favorite jokes from the movie.

Whatever she wanted to ask, it was either forgotten or she was being uncharacteristically patient.

Noelle was neither. All she wanted to do was scoop that child into the air and say, “Yes! Please call me Mommy!” But that didn’t happen.

They sat at the table together, held hands, and closed their eyes as Jace led them in a prayer before they ate. The words were starting to hit Noelle’s heart, though she still didn’t have the rock-solid faith that quietly guided her husband. She was closer every day, that was for sure.

“Hand me your plate, Cass,” Noelle said. “I’ll fill it up for you with extra sauce, just how you like it.”

Cassie did, but her gaze was on Jace, a question in her eyes. “Now, Daddy?” she whispered. “Can I ask now?”

Noelle looked from one to the other, surprised by the quiver of joy the whole conversation gave her. “You can ask me anything, Cass, and the answer is probably going to be yes.”

“Really?” She practically climbed out of her seat. “Okay, then.”

“At least let Noelle have a bite before you descend,” Jace muttered.

Cassie frowned. “Descend? I don’t know what that means.”

“It means…” He threw a look at Noelle. “She can be relentless, so brace yourself.”

Setting down her fork, Noelle leaned back, curiosity winning over dinner, somehow knowing this couldn’t be the way he’d act if Cassie wanted to call her Mommy. For one thing, Jace knew what it meant to her. For another…this was just weird.

“I’m braced. What is it, Cass?”

Cassie slurped up a long spaghetti strand and gave a red sauce-enhanced grin. “It’s about the tree lighting.”

“The…wow.” The thud of disappointment surprised her. “Didn’t see that coming.”

Cassie practically crawled out of her chair. “I have ideas !” She dragged out the word, accompanied by a gesture so sweeping she nearly knocked over her water. Jace easily snagged the wobbling glass before it fell.

“What are your ideas, Cass?” she asked.

“Well, you might want me on your committee,” she said with far too much seriousness for an eight-year-old.

“I would but…” Noelle leaned in to whisper, “They aren’t exactly an adventurous or forward-thinking group.”

“Ahem— Edna —ahem,” Jace fake coughed.

“Ahem, no kidding,” Noelle agreed. “I can’t even change the lights.”

“But my ideas are wonderful!” Cassie exclaimed, on her knees now, visibly aching to hold their attention.

“Talk to me, baby,” Noelle said, putting a gentle hand on her arm to guide her safely to a seat. “I promise you I am adventurous and forward thinking.”

“Okay,” she said, settling in to be serious. “First, the entertainment.” She put her hand on her chest with a noisy thud. “Me.”

“You?”

“You saw me last year at the church play,” she replied, eyes wide. “Everyone said, ‘My, that kid has a set of pipes.’”

Noelle almost choked on her next bite, but somehow managed to swallow. “You did sing like an angel.”

“Which I was not,” she reminded both of them. “I was an ugly sheep.”

“Because you gave the angel part to another little girl,” Jace said, smiling at the memory. “I was so proud of you, Cass.”

She waved off the dad pride with a casual flick of her wrist.

“But this year, I do want to be an angel, or at least the soloist. And maybe I can be lifted to the top of the tree with that same contraption they used at the play. Then I could float over everyone and sing!”

Her whole face lit with the idea and it took everything Noelle had not to burst out laughing or throw both arms around her.

“ Oookay ,” she said instead. “Well, I don’t know about a contraption—there has to be insurance liabilities for that—but there is a small riser for speakers and the officiant of the lighting ceremony, which, at the moment, is me. So, thank you for your ideas, Cass. The committee will take them under consideration.”

“That’s not all,” Cassie announced excitedly. “How about…an animal parade? And not just any animals, but the ones from here and Daddy’s best patients—the healthy ones, of course—and…and…and…”

They both stared at her, mesmerized and waiting.

“They are dressed as elves!” she announced, dead serious and so proud of her idea, she was bursting.

“Oh. Elves?” Noelle looked at Jace, who could barely hide his mirth.

“Elves,” he confirmed. “Goats, sheep, and the occasional farm dog all decked out as elves.”

“Right?” Cassie exclaimed, their amusement lost on her. “What’s Christmas without an elf? Animal elves? How super-duper would that be?”

“So…super-duper,” Noelle agreed. “Like you, Cass.”

Again, she swiped away the love, far too invested to give up. “And guess what else?” she asked. “Just guess.”

“I…can’t,” Noelle admitted. “You tell me.”

She stood now, next to Noelle. “Wish cards!”

“Wish…”

“Everyone gets a card and writes down their Christmas wish,” she said. “Then they put them on the tree!”

“Does someone…make the wishes come true?” Noelle asked, the question probably far too pragmatic for this child.

“Someone could make them come true,” Cassie replied, clearly not having thought that one all the way through. “Or not. Not every wish is granted, you know.”

“Prayers,” Jace corrected. “Not wishes.”

“But wouldn’t it be fun?” Cassie pressed.

The truth was, she didn’t actually hate these ideas—except the flying contraption. Edna, however, would weep at the animal elves, unsanctioned by Gil the Ghost.

“All of those ideas are fun,” Noelle said, glancing at Jace, who was obviously loving this exchange. “I just have to tell you that the whole thing about the tree lighting is…tradition. Everything has to be the same every year or?—”

“Well, that’s a dumb tradition,” Cassie said, giving perfect childlike clarity to exactly what Noelle thought.

“Cassie,” Jace reprimanded softly. “We don’t say things are dumb and stupid. You know that.”

“But can’t traditions get better every year?” Cassie asked.

“You, child, are too brilliant and mature for your own good,” Noelle observed. “But we do have to respect them and the people who make the traditions happen. However, if you want to have an elf parade right here at the ranch?—”

“Glow sticks!” she exclaimed, talking right over Noelle.

“Glow sticks?”

“You know, the long glowy necklaces that you wear and wave and they come in all different colors.”

Jace made a face, shaking his head. “That stuff inside them is suspect, if you ask me.”

“But just think about it,” Cassie said, still bright with her own enthusiasm. “Everyone waves sticks at the same time, maybe before the tree is really lit, and, you know…while I’m singing in the air.”

Noelle let out a sigh and gave her a big smile. “I love all your ideas, Cass.”

“Can we do them?” she begged. “Any of them? Since you’re the boss of the whole thing?”

“I’m not really,” she said. “I don’t make the final decisions, sadly. But I promise you, I will suggest some of these things to the committee.”

Cassie finally settled down, satisfied with her stellar pitch.

“I do like the wish cards,” Noelle added. “I’ll run them by the group.”

“Well, I think I should sing,” Cassie said as she rolled up a long strand of spaghetti. “Since my mom is running the whole thing.”

Her…mom? Noelle waited for more, but Cassie was downright breathless after her heartfelt presentation.

Later, as they cleaned up, Cassie slipped out to finish her final chores with the animals.

“Did you really love those ideas?” Jace asked when they were alone.

“I really love that child,” she replied, pressing next to him at the sink. “She’s the most extraordinary little thing.”

He chuckled, looking out the kitchen window toward the light by the barn. “She is that. And she won’t be crushed if nothing happens, but she had to plant the seed.”

“Who knows?” Noelle said on a shrug. “Edna might like something. And I need an excuse to go see that woman and smooth things over with her. Cassie deserves something for her creative thinking. Starting with a bath,” she added as she caught a glimpse of Cassie hugging her favorite goat, Sprinkles.

But Jace was looking at his phone, his broad shoulders dropping. “Tom Bertram’s brand-new mare is struggling,” he said. “She has a respiratory illness and isn’t responding to the meds. I have to get over there and monitor Goldie, maybe give her a stronger shot. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry you’re going to drop everything and save a horse?” She looked up at him, knowing he had to see the love in her eyes because she felt it so strongly in her heart. “Get over there, Dr. Fleming, and do your large animal vet thing. Just don’t bring Goldie back dressed as an elf.”

He laughed and kissed her lightly. “What are you going to do while I’m gone?”

“Be a mom,” she said, unable to hide the smile. “I will make sure our daughter is bathed, brushed, and read a wonderful book before she goes to sleep.”

With a soft grunt, he pulled her closer. “What did I do to deserve you?”

“Oh, please. I could ask the same thing.” She got on her toes and gave him the kiss she could see that he wanted more than his next breath.

“You are a wonderful mother, Noelle.”

She tried not to let her disappointment show, but she didn’t hide anything from this man.

“I wish she’d call me Mommy,” she admitted. “And I also wish…” She touched her stomach and smiled. “Guess I should be filling out some wish cards of my own.”

“Prayers,” he corrected in the same kind tone he used with Cassie. “We say prayers and sometimes they are answered the way we want, and sometimes they’re answered the way God wants.”

She smiled. “Well, Cassie didn’t pray for her ideas. She asked me because she thinks I’m in control.”

“And are you?”’

She laughed and tapped his chin. “I try.”

When bath time ended, and Cassie’s long wet hair was brushed, dried, and braided, the two of them propped on the bed for the nightly reading of The Very Hungry Goat .

“Don’t you ever get tired of this one?” Noelle asked as she flipped open a book she now knew by heart. “And aren’t you outgrowing it?”

Looking up at Noelle, Cassie’s face grew serious. “I read it every night. It’s tradition.”

That made her laugh. “I thought you said some traditions should change.”

She tapped the book. “Not this one. But I would like to sing at that tree lighting. I dream about it.”

Noelle’s heart folded. “I will work on that, Cass. I promise.”

“We can make my singing every year a new tradition.”

“I love that idea. Did you know there’s a song about tradition? It’s from a famous play called Fiddler on the Roof .” She sat straighter and cleared her throat before belting out, “Tradition!” and raising a hand like the lead on stage.

Cassie giggled and imitated her. “Tradition!” Somehow, she hit the note and held it longer than Noelle.

“You are a really great singer, Cass.”

“I know,” she said with that guileless lack of humility that children had. As if she suddenly realized it wasn’t right to be prideful, she pointed to Noelle. “And you are a really great…”

Noelle held her breath for a second but when Cassie didn’t finish, she whispered, “Art gallery owner?”

“Yeah, that.” But Cassie’s eyes told her everything and she knew that the little girl wanted to say, “Mom,” but either couldn’t or wouldn’t. She still wasn’t sure which.

Cassie knew Noelle’s parents had died when she was a teenager, but it wasn’t a subject they’d discussed at length. She and Jace both felt it was too much for her to handle at her age, especially having lost her own mother. They didn’t want her to live in some kind of fear that “mothers die,” and she was just imaginative enough to go there.

“Well, I think this goat is still hungry. Why don’t you read it to me?” Noelle asked, leaning back and closing her eyes as Cassie started to recite as much as read.

As she listened, Noelle thought…some mothers do die. Hers did. Cassie’s did. And wanting this little girl to use some arbitrary three-letter word didn’t change that. She wasn’t kidding when she said all that mattered was their love.

Somehow, she would prove that to Cassie and to herself.

She knew exactly where to start…with a slight change in “tradition.”

If only Edna Covington would let her.