A Soldier's Christmas

A Soldier’s
Christmas

 
Copyright © 2015 Lexi Buchanan

All rights
reserved. With the exception of quotes used in reviews, this book may not be
reproduced or used in whole or in part by any means existing without written
permission from the author.

Published by
HFCA Publishing House

http://www.lexibuchanan.com

Editor:
Sirena Van Schaik

Editor:
Nadine Winningham

BETA
Readers: Emma Clifton, Sonya Covert,
Lynne
Garlick

This book is a written act of
fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the
writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed
as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or
organizations is entirely coincidental.

ISBN-13: 978-0-9933238-4-3

Bad Boy Rockers

Sizzle

Spicy

Sultry

Savor

Sinful

McKenzie Brothers

Seduce

The Wedding (Novella)

Rapture

Delight

Entice

Cherished

A McKenzie Christmas
(Novella)

De La Fuente Family (McKenzie Spinoff)

Love in Montana

Love in Purgatory (2016)

Jackson Hole

From This Moment

When we
Meet

New Beginning (2016)

Holiday Season

Kissing Under the Mistletoe

A Soldier’s Christmas

Lawful

Gia 0.5 (Novella)

Rose and Jacob

One Dance (Novella)

Educate Me (Novella)

28 Days ~ a romantic
suspense (coming 2016)

He was dying. He had to be. Nothing good could
hurt the way that Logan’s head did, or the way his body did for that matter.
Then, as he turned over in bed, it all came rushing back to him.

Last night he’d been out with some of the
guys from his unit before they headed home for the holidays. All the married or
attached ones had made their way home to reunite with their wives or
girlfriends. One of his buddies had invited him to tag along and meet his
family, but Logan hadn’t accepted. He knew how important this leave was since
he’d been deployed as long as his friend had been. The last thing Logan had
wanted to do was be a third wheel. Though, perhaps if he’d accepted, he
wouldn’t have felt like shit now.

Groaning, Logan rolled onto his back and
caught his breath as it hissed between his teeth. Unmoving for a few minutes,
he peeled an eye open and caught sight of the bottle of water and painkillers
he’d had the sense to leave on his night table before he’d passed out cold.

With the one eye still closed, he grabbed
the water and painkillers, and managed to get them down without gagging.

He was an idiot. At thirty-seven, he should
be old enough to know not to over do it, but not being in the spirit for
Christmas, he’d decided to drown his heartache in a bottle of
Jack
. It had felt good at the time; he
just wished that he’d remembered how he’d felt the last time he’d drowned his
sorrows in a bottle.

He needed to get cleaned up because lying
in his own sweat, which was mingled with stale beer, Jack, and cigarette smoke,
made his stomach roll.

With another groan, he crawled out of bed
and staggered into the bathroom. He relieved his bladder first before he
scratched his balls—they ached just like his heart did.

A heavy sigh and ten minutes later, he was
back in the bedroom with a towel around his hips looking for his kitbag.

He’d checked into a small, pay-by-the-hour
hotel near the base last night. He’d dumped his belongings inside before he’d
headed out to meet everyone at the bar. A stupid thing to do the minute he was
back on U.S. soil, but it was done and his only consolation was that his
friends were probably suffering as much as he was.

He did feel marginally better after the
shower, but the throb in his head hurt tenfold as he bent to grab his kitbag,
which was propped up next to the dresser.

One day he’d have somewhere to actually
call home. Most people, at least, had a town or state that they’d call their
home, but he didn’t even have that. He always did a
short
term
rental when he was stateside, and then he’d let the rental go when
he was deployed. It worked for him. But after this last deployment, he wanted
something permanent.

Upending his bag on the bed, he watched
everything tumble out...the last to fall was a bundle of letters. The letters had
become his most valued possession, which was why they were at the
bottom—no chance of them falling out.

He dropped his ass to the bed and picked the
letters up, a slight shake to his hand. He turned the bundle over in his hands,
and smoothed a finger over the return address, which was written in
her
handwriting.

 
Every time he thought of
Emma
his heart thudded loudly in his
chest. For two years she had written to him, but there had been silence for the
last six months, which hurt. It hurt a lot to think that she just stopped
without even a letter to tell him there’d be no more. Her letters had been the
only thing to keep him going. They’d given him hope, and made him long for her
to be the woman that he returned to.

She’d admitted to him that he knew
everything about her, even her biggest secret that not even her family knew.
Her words didn’t just give him hope, they made him feel loved as though he had
to go on and stay safe because she was waiting for him back in the States.
Which was why he’d been devastated when no more letters arrived from her.

It was like a claw in the gut not knowing
why she’d suddenly stopped writing. He’d continued to send letters to Emma, and
hoped that he’d get a response. But there had been nothing.

How would she react if he turned up in her
town in Vermont? He’d lost his Christmas spirit somewhere along the way, but
maybe, he would find it again if he had Emma to share it with. Would she be
happy to see him? What if she was married with two-point-five kids that she’d
forgotten to tell him about? He knew that he wouldn’t be able to settle until
he knew the reason for her silence; he only hoped it wasn’t because something
had happened to her. That wasn’t an option he wanted to think of.

The more he thought about it, the more the
idea took root in his head. She probably wouldn’t recognize him from the
photograph that he’d sent her two years ago. He looked so different, and the
only resemblance now was his eyes. Should he follow his heart, and go and get his
girl?

His indecision didn’t help his headache, or
perhaps the alcohol still played havoc with his body—either way he felt
like shit.

With a sigh, he finally rooted through his
belongings for underwear and jeans. It was more difficult finding a clean
shirt, but he found one that had more creases in it than the bed sheets. It
would have to do until he could get some laundry done.

He felt lighter with the decision made to
spend Christmas in Vermont, and he only hoped he wasn’t heading toward an even bigger
disappointment.

Where had her Christmas spirit gone? Usually
the winter months were Emma’s favorite season, this year was different though.
No matter how hard she tried, her heart felt heavy.

She had no enthusiasm for anything, and
regardless of what her sister, Bree, suggested, she just had no interest. Take
what she was doing for instance, hanging decorations up around the family room,
anyone would feel the Christmas spirit, especially with the carols playing on
the radio, but she felt miserable. All she wanted to do was escape to her bedroom,
and stay locked away until the New Year and every last ornament was packed away
out of sight.

“Emma, please snap out of it. You have me
worried,” Bree said, breaking into her thoughts.

Emma sighed and dropped onto the sofa
beside her sister. “I’ve never been so out of sorts before. It’s as though
something’s happened but I don’t know what.” All her confusion and loneliness
welded together and her eyes stung from tears. She leaned her head on her
sister’s shoulder. “I’m going crazy, Bree.”

“Oh, sis.” Bree took her hand. “It’s about
your soldier, isn’t it?”

The whole family knew how upset she was
that he’d stopped writing to her. One minute, letter after letter had arrived,
sometimes three or four at a time, and the next minute, there had been
nothing—for the past six months, nothing. It hurt her to think that
something might have happened to him. In fact, she worried on a daily basis—thoughts
of him were there when she woke and when she went to sleep. Why would he
suddenly stop writing to her? She hadn’t written anything bad in her letters, certainly
nothing to make him angry enough to stop all communication, so she could only
think the worst. He must have been injured or even worse.

She wiped a tear from her cheek and faced
her sister. “I miss him, Bree. I know we’ve never met, but he knows everything
about me, even things that I’ve never told anyone.” Emma shrugged. “I opened my
heart to him and I felt like my best friend died when he stopped writing. I
still do. I pray every day that he’s okay, and that nothing has happened to
him. But it’s killing me that I don’t know the reason why?”

Bree squeezed her hand, and tentatively
asked, “Do you think that perhaps you relied too much on your soldier, and
forgot about the people who are real and present in your life?”

Emma frowned and stared at Bree. “What are
you saying? That my preoccupation with Logan was what ended my relationship
with Seth?”

Bree wouldn’t meet her gaze and pretended
to be distracted with her bulging stomach. Pregnancy suited her sister, but
Emma couldn’t decide whether or not to be angry with her.

Emma admitted, “Logan, in the time I’ve
known him, came to mean the world to me. My friendship with him had nothing to
do with Seth walking away. My relationship with Seth started as mutual
attraction,
but,
I became bored with him. We didn’t
share any interests and everything always had to be his way. There was no give.
When he received the job offer, I urged him to accept it. It was a relief when
he did.” She frowned. The only relief she received from Logan was when she’d
receive another letter confirming that he was safe...and that was six long
months ago.

The clunk of pots drew their attention
toward the kitchen, and there stood their mother. “I thought you were both decorating
in here?” She carried a tray with cake and refreshments—afternoon tea, as
her mom liked to call it. Her mom often said it was enough to cheer anyone up. The
English tradition had started after her parents had arrived home from a
vacation to England—a few years ago now.

“Emma was.”

Their mom glanced at Emma after she took in
the half done room. “What’s really going on?”

“I’ve had enough of talking.” Emma leaned
her head back against the top of the sofa and closed her eyes. She felt close
to tears and wished that she’d done what she’d talked about doing for the past
twelve months...moved out. She’d have the privacy that she craved, and wouldn’t
have someone who always wanted to know what she was thinking, what she was
doing.

They were her family, so of course they
were concerned for her, but it was constant and she’d started to hate it. Even
when she locked herself in her bedroom, she didn’t have privacy. They’d just
knock until she opened the door and let them invade her space.

She knew what she had to do, and she also
knew that it wouldn’t go down well. Her family thought she only had income from
her part-time job at Elizabeth’s Emporium to live off, but she didn’t. Only one
other person knew how she
actually
made her living, and he appeared to have disappeared from the face of the
earth.

“Emma, honey. You’re old enough to know
better than to moon around after a boy.”

Emma rolled her eyes and glanced at her
mom. “Are you serious? A boy? Mom?” She glanced at Bree before she focused on
her mom again. “He isn’t a boy. He’s thirty-seven, so I’d call him a man…a
soldier. I know you don’t understand the connection we have…had, but it was
there and I miss him. It hurts not knowing what went wrong between us, or if
he’s been injured or worse. I just want to know. It’s unfinished, and that’s
why I haven’t been able to settle.” Emma stood. “I’ve tried one last time to
make contact with him. If that doesn’t work then I’ll have to accept that it’s
over, or if it comes back to me, I’ll have to accept that he might no longer be
alive.” Emma let the tears on her lashes fall because it truly broke her heart
to think of the latter.

Her mom stood and took a step toward her,
her eyes filled with concern, but Emma stepped back, out of reach. She didn’t
want comfort, or rather she did, but it wasn’t her mom she wanted it from.

“What do you mean that you’ve tried one
last time?” her mom asked.

Emma wiped at the tears with a Kleenex. “I
mailed him a care package two weeks ago.”

Her mom frowned. “I didn’t know that.”

“I got it together and mailed it while I was
in Boston.” Emma backed out of the room. “I’ll tidy up soon.” She waved her
hands around to indicate the living room.

“Don’t worry. Bree and I will finish putting
everything up.”

“Thank you.” Emma offered a small smile,
and headed for the stairs.

Her heart was as heavy as her feet on the
stairs as she wondered if Logan would receive the box that she’d sent. She
didn’t know why she’d suddenly gotten the urge to get everything together while
she was in Boston, but once the idea was in her head, it became something that
she had to do. The lady at the post office told her it might not arrive until
after the holidays, with him being overseas, and Emma was good with that as
long as he received it.

She sighed. Her family loved her, but they
also made her feel stupid for longing after a man she’d never met. She knew
that he occupied her thoughts, perhaps more than he should, but she just
couldn’t help it. In a way, she felt like she’d given him a little bit of her
heart with every letter they’d exchanged. More than anything, she wanted to
believe that he’d returned the sentiment.