Page 85 of The Forever Christmas Tree

Wendy kills people for a living. Yeah, bad people, and, yeah, someone has to do it. But she actually pulls a trigger and shoots human beings, when required.

And she puts herself in harm’s way. Deliberately.

Wendy was one of those nutcase Navy SEAL types you see on TV, faces blackened, wearing camouflage, running in a low crouch with weapons ready as they rescued embassy kidnapees in some Middle Eastern place with a name like KissAssAstan or Nigerian girls being held by Boko-Loco-Fucking-Haram. Wendy was not the same girl she’d been twelve years ago. Not even close. How could he not have seen that? He’d deluded himself into thinking she was the same Wendy, only twelve years older.

A Christmas tree farmer and Lady Rambo?

Yeah, right.

Ethan wasn’t Catholic, but he often attended various events at Our Lady by the Sea. Tonight, he’d sought a little peace after a chaotic day with Cassie. Once she was in bed, asleep, exhausted after being on her feet way too long, he’d slipped out. His grandmother had been asleep, as well.

Even though he’d expected Wendy, who’d been raised Catholic—he wasn’t sure if she still was—to be at Midnight Mass, he’d had no intention of approaching her tonight. Now, he definitely would not.

Time for Ethan to get on with the rest of his life. Without Wendy. She had her life, he had his.

He slipped out of church and went home.

The next morning, Cassie was up soon after dawn, waking Ethan and her nana to come open the many presents Santa had left under the tree. If she still believed in the jolly old fellow, this would probably be the last year that she did. So, Ethan and his grandmother put up with the “charade.”

Cassie was one of those wonderful children who oohed and aahed over every gift, even the most mundane, like days-of-the-week underpants or a set of Sharpie pens. By ten o’clock, following a breakfast of French toast with maple syrup and sausages and orange juice, she had already set up her new iPad Mini, and was in the process of making a bead bracelet. But it became obvious that her flushed face was due to more than excitement. She had a low-grade fever and she could barely walk for the pain in her hip.

He and Nana soon had Cassie tucked into her new mermaid Snuggie blanket on the sofa, watching a Charlie Brown Christmas special on the television. They’d dosed her with over-the-counter pain pills and muscle relaxers.

“Do you think we should call the doctor?” his grandmother asked.

He shook his head. “Not yet. I think her overexertions of the past week have caught up with her.”

“I agree.”

“Cassie and I won’t be attending church at St. Andrew’s with you this morning,” he told his grandmother.

“Cassie is going to be devastated not to play in the children’s bell choir performance.”

“I think she feels wonky enough to know she’s not up to it.”

“Too bad, after all those practices.”

He shrugged. It wasn’t the first time they’d had to cancel plans because of Cassie’s condition. “And that open house afterward at the Pattersons’ is out of the question, too. You go and give our regrets. I’ll stay with her, and if she gets any worse, I’ll contact that new doctor.”

“Are you sure you don’t want to go? I could come back after church and stay with Cassie?”

“No. It’s better this way.”

She narrowed her eyes at him, waiting for more.

He declined to explain himself.

A short time later, his grandmother came up to him where he was sitting beside the fire, reading the latest edition of The Bell, a cup of coffee on the side table beside him, Cassie fast asleep on the couch. She was wearing the new blue coat he’d bought for her.

“You look beautiful,” he said, and she did. Her long salt-and-pepper hair was pulled off her face with a headband, hanging loose, showing off her mostly unlined skin, making her look way younger than her seventy-two years. The blue of her eyes seemed to be even bluer against the palette of the pale blue coat.

His grandmother did a little spin to show off the coat, then leaned down to hug him. “I love you, Ethan.”

“I know that, Nana. I love you, too.”

“I wish . . .” Her voice got choked up, before she cleared it. “I wish you could be as happy as your grandfather and I were.”

“I know that, too, Nana,” he replied. “But you have to realize that what you two had was rare. Not many people ever have that.”