“Merry Christmas, my angel! Is your brother there?”
“Merry Christmas, Mom,” Morgan said.
“Morgan! Darling! You’re finally here; I was starting to think you’d fallen off the face of the Earth!”
He chuckled awkwardly. “Sorry.”
“Why didn’t youcallme?”
“Everything was running late,” he apologized.
“Plus, he had to go and get my Christmas present,” Katie added with a grin. “You’re not going to believe it, Mom. Morgan got me a car!”
There was a long moment of silence, and then— “Well, aren’t you special.” Their mother sounded almost … disappointed. “I suppose that means you’re not gettingmethe car I wanted for Christmas, darling. After I asked you months ago.”
Aaand here it came, the ever-present accusation that Morgan was a bad son for not giving his mother the world wrapped up in a bow. “But I understand,” she went on in a slightly tragic tone of voice. “It’s not like you’ve bothered to visit me for the past three years for more than a day at a time; why go out of your way to remember a little thing like a Christmas present?”
“Mom,” Katie cut in before Morgan could say anything, “a new car isn’t alittlepresent.”
“Exactly! And yet he managed to getyouone, didn’t he? Mmm, I see which way the wind is blowing.”
“Mom—”
“But never mind,” she said blithely. “I don’t need anything except my children for Christmas. You’re going to love Kevin, darling; he’s so smart, and he has the best ideas for his app. I want you to promise to sit down and listen to his proposal, all right? And you might not have been nice tomefor Christmas,but I’ve definitely been nice toyou.” She giggled. “I’ve got a big surprise planned for you tomorrow. Ooh, you’re going to love it!”
That sounded ominous. “What kind of surprise?” Morgan asked warily.
“The kind I can’t talk about, silly. All right, then, see you tomorrow! Not a second later than noon, you hear?” She ended the call before they could say anything else.
They stared at each other for a second before Katie topped off her glass. “Like I was saying, maybe we should have come to you.”
Morgan frowned. “How long has she been so … pushy?”
Katie scoffed. “You have to ask? Ever since the sale of NovaChem. I think Mom expected to have a lot more say in how you spent your money.”
“Why would she think that?”
“Because she’s a narcissist who makes everything about herself,” his sister replied tiredly. “God, the things she said during my divorce, you’d think she was the one leaving Nathan and not me. And she blamed me for it too! Said I needed to be more understanding of his needs, that I couldn’t raise a kid without a father figure around …”
Morgan put down his wineglass and opened his arms, and Katie stepped into his hug a moment later. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t know it was so bad; why didn’t you tell me?”
“You’ve already done as much as you could,” Katie insisted. “You paid for a great lawyer, who made sure I could keep the house instead of having to sell it. I’ve got full custody too. I’ve got everything I want, just … the getting was a little rough at times. But you were so busy, you and Bentley were having your own issues, and the writing was on the wall with the company, and … it’s fine.”
It wasn’t fine, but he wasn’t going to make a big deal out of it if she didn’t want him to. He squeezed her once more, then let goand carefully didn’t notice her wiping her eyes before she picked up her wine again. “Now tell me more about Ty,” Katie said.
They talked for hours—about the island, Ty’s research, the diner, and his shoulder. They talked about Nicki’s teacher and classmates, her best friend, Kinleigh, and how much she loved tennis, and by the time they finally went to sleep, it was actually Christmas Day. Morgan had a quick shower before collapsing into the comfortable bed, exhausted from travel. He fell asleep fast, but it was hard to settle for long. He’d gotten too used to being held at night.
Nicki woke him up with shrieks of, “It’s Christmas morning, and Santa came, come see, come see!” way too early, but Katie met him with a wry smile and a huge cup of coffee at the bottom of the stairs.
“Come on,Santa,” she said, leading the way to the living room where, sure enough, Nicki had found the presents Morgan had left for her. She got a new racket, a cute tennis outfit, and a gift certificate for a dune buggy ride whenever she and her mom came to the coast to see him.
“A dune buggy? Cool! Mom, we have to go right now!”
Nicki laughed and hugged her eager daughter. “Maybe when it’s a little warmer, huh?”
“I can wear a jacket!”
Morgan got the first three books in a new series by an author he used to read all the time as well as a tin of homemade Christmas cookies that had been decorated with great enthusiasm. “You can share them with Ty,” Katie said with a smirk.
