Christmas.
Not a day for nerves.
A day for hope, for renewal, for promises and for joy.
But Harper was nervous. She eyed herself in the mirror and wondered if she should have worn the black dress instead of the blue one. Both were new. Both had been purchased before she’d made the trip to North Carolina.
Before they’d made the trip.
Logan had invited her entire family—a family that had grown threefold in the past month. Not just her and Picasso anymore. Gabe and Maggie. Camden, Hannah and Amelia. Even Adeline had come, because she was part of the new family that had been built, and no one wanted to leave her behind.
“You look beautiful, Aunt Harper,” Amelia said quietly from the doorway of the room.
“So do you, sweetie,” Harper said, motioning for her to enter. “I love your dress.”
“Mom made it for me.” She lifted the hem of a pretty red dress and turned so that the fabric swirled around her. “Maggie and Gabe bought me another one, but I like this better. So I told them I’d wear that to school the first day after break.”
“I think that’s a wonderful idea,” Harper said, giving her niece a gentle hug.
Despite all the trauma she’d been through, Amelia seemed to be adjusting well. Probably because Maggie and Gabe had been married by a justice of the peace and relocated to Pennsylvania. Neither wanted to tear Amelia out of the arms of the couple who had loved her for four years. They’d moved into a house down the street from Camden and Hannah, and they were working on building a family that included both sets of parents.
It was tough, but for the sake of Amelia, all the adults were trying, and they all seemed happy.
Watching Gabe and Maggie make decisions together had shown Harper what love could be if both people were willing to compromise, to sacrifice, to listen and learn. Camden and Hannah seemed to be just as connected to each other.
It gave her hope that maybe that kind of love was just around the corner, that maybe what she felt when she was with Logan would last.
Logan...
Just thinking about him made her pulse jump and her cheeks warm.
Coming to North Carolina with him was part of a fragile new beginning that they both wanted.
She’d told him that she’d given him a piece of her heart. The truth was, he had much more of her heart than that. He had every part of it. One day, she’d tell him that. Maybe today. Their first Christmas together.
“You look scared,” Amelia said, cocking her head to the side, the gesture so like one of Lydia’s that Harper’s heart ached.
“You look like Lydia,” she said, because both sets of parents had agreed that talking about what had happened was the key to healing.
“And like you,” Amelia responded. “I’m glad. You’re very pretty, and you love art. Just like me.”
“I didn’t realize you were an artist.”
“Not yet,” Amelia said solemnly. “But one day I will be. I have something for you. My very first pot. Gabe bought me a potter’s wheel a couple of weeks ago, and I threw a bowl. I had to try like a million times before I got it right.”
“A potter’s wheel, huh? That’s a nice gift,” she said as Amelia tugged her out of the room and down the wide hallway of the farmhouse that Logan had grown up in. It looked like him—steady and sturdy and strong.
“He’s trying to buy my affection. That’s what my friends at school say.”
“Do you believe that?” Harper asked, biting back a harsh response. Gabe had a lot of faults, but he was doing everything he could to give Amelia a wonderful, stable environment to grow up in.
“At first,” Amelia said matter-of-factly, “I did. Then I told Mom that I thought buying someone’s affection was stupid, and that I kind of thought Gabe was stupid for trying to do it. She set me to right.”
The words coming out of Amelia’s mouth made Harper smile. “That sounds just like something your mother would say.”
“It is. She likes Gabe and Maggie. She says they’re good people, and they want what’s best for me. She also says that Gabe isn’t buying my affection. He’s making up for lost time.”
“I think that’s true,” Harper said, stepping into a room decorated in yellows and blues. Amelia’s things were spread out on the bed, her clothes tossed on the floor.
“I guess I think it’s true, too,” Amelia said, digging into her suitcase. “Dad says that God has a plan for everything and a time for everything, and I think that’s right. I think Mom and Dad really needed me, and all the bad things that happened put me right in their arms. And, you know,” she said, pulling something out of the suitcase, “I needed them, too. They’ve taught me a lot of stuff that I don’t think Gabe could have, and now we’re all together, and that’s cool. Not everyone has two sets of parents.”
“You’re a smart girl, Amelia.”
“Maybe,” Amelia responded, pulling tissue paper off the thing she was holding to reveal a small clay bowl, the shape just a little lopsided, the colors like a winter storm—grays and whites with hints of blue.
She handed it to Harper.
“I made it for you.”
Harper felt the smooth finish, studied the swirling colors. She turned it over, saw that the bottom was painted crisp white, a small red heart in the center.
“This is beautiful,” Harper said, and she meant every word of it.
“Mom says I have talent. I don’t care about that. I just care about making things that are like what’s in my head. This is about us.”
“You and your family?”
“Me and you. We’re like those colors—kind of whipping around sometimes, wondering where we fit. If we just stop and think about it, though, we realize the truth.” She took the bowl, turned it so the heart was showing. “Where we fit is in the hearts of the people who love us.”
“That is one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever heard,” Harper said, her eyes burning with tears she didn’t want to shed. Not in front of her niece.
“Then, I guess you haven’t heard a whole lot of beautiful things,” Amelia said with a grin. “Anyway, I was going to wrap it and put it under the tree, but you looked nervous, and I wanted you to know things are going to be okay.” She handed the bowl back. “I better go downstairs. Adeline is making pancakes, and all those loud kids will eat them before I get any if I don’t hurry.”
Amelia flounced out of the room and left Harper standing with the bowl in her hand and tears in her eyes.
She sniffed them away, stepped into the hall and ended up in Logan’s arms.
Exactly the place she most wanted to be.
She looked up into his familiar face, his gorgeous dark blue eyes.
He was everything she hadn’t thought she needed, everything she’d given up wanting. Everything she’d once prayed that she would have. When she looked at him, Daniel didn’t exist; her mother’s and sister’s terrible track records with men didn’t exist. When she looked at him all that existed was the two of them and what they could be together if they were willing to try.
“Wow!” he said. “You look amazing.”
“Thank you,” she responded, her heart doing a giant flip as she met his eyes. “So do you.”
“I couldn’t let my brothers dress better than me,” he responded, tugging at the hem of his black suit jacket. It fit him like a glove, the sky blue dress shirt he’d paired it with perfect.
“It doesn’t matter what any of your brothers wear, you’ll still be the wardrobe winner to me,” she said, and he smiled.
“You always make me feel as if I can conquer the world, Harper. You know that?”
“It’s just clothes,” she said with a smile, smoothing his lapel. “Of course, you probably could conquer the world. With HEART backing you, I don’t think there’s anything you can’t do.”
“Including getting married and raising a family,” he murmured, offering a gentle kiss. “I’ve been thinking about that a lot.”
“About getting married and raising a family?” Her pulse jumped at the thought, hope and exhilaration coursing through her blood. She could imagine having children, making Christmas traditions that would be passed on for generations, reading books to tiny kids and listening to their laughter while they played. She could also imagine being Logan’s wife, standing beside him through the good and bad and everything in between.
She could imagine so much more than she’d ever thought would be possible.
All because of Logan.
“I never wanted either of those things until I met you, Harper. Too much responsibility. Too many obligations. With you, though? Those things are like the BB gun I wanted for Christmas when I was ten—something I long for, something I never stop thinking about.”
It was her turn to laugh. “You were in Nepal rescuing a missionary team last week, so something tells me marriage and a family weren’t the only things you were thinking about.”
“Even when I was in Nepal, you were always on my mind, and you’re the only reason I want either of those things,” he responded, tucking a strand of hair behind her ears and frowning. “You’ve been crying.”
“Not really.”
He raised an eyebrow.
“Okay,” she admitted. “A little.”
“Thinking about your sister?” he asked gently.
“Thinking about how wonderfully things turned out. Despite all the hard times and the challenges and the sorrow. Amelia is in a really good place, and that makes me happy.”
“How about you, Harper? Are you in a really good place?” he asked, his hands sliding up her waist, smoothing over her arms, settling on her shoulders. Her breath caught, and she knew what she had to say, what she had to tell him.
All the nerves flew away as she looked into his eyes and all the fear and anxiety disappeared.
“Do you remember when I gave you a piece of my heart?” she asked, and he smiled.
“How could I forget? I carried it with me to Nepal and thought about it every time I got lonely.”
That made her smile. He made her smile.
“The thing is,” she said, holding up the bowl Amelia had made, “I’ve been drifting for a long time, trying to figure out where I belong. For a while, I thought I belonged in my cabin, making my pottery and avoiding the world, but I was wrong.”
“Were you?” he said, his fingers threading through her hair, his eyes dark and filled with everything she had longed for.
“Yes.”
“Have you discovered where you do belong?” he asked, his lips brushing hers, the sweetness of that one touch settling deep into her soul.
“Anywhere you are,” she responded. “I love you, Logan. Not with a piece of my heart. With all of it.”
“I love you, too,” he said. “For now and always.”
He kissed her again, sealing their love, sealing a promise of a future together, and then he took her hand and led her down the stairs into the loud and wonderful embrace of their families.
* * * * *