Page 6 of Truly, Madly Viking

With a smile, she stepped back into the hall, then peered around the doorjamb to see them leaning out their bedroom window, gazing at an especially bright, flickering star. Their young, nine-year-old voices carried a breathy tone of wistful belief in the magic of the constellations as they repeated the old nursery rhyme.

Was I ever that innocent? Did I ever believe in miracles?

Shimmying their tummies back on the windowsill, they stood and adjusted their respective nightshirts—Suzy's a shocking pink image of Ricky Martin, and Beth's a rendition of Keiko, the killer whale—no less an idol to her than her sister's rock star du jour. Aside from their opposite personalities and interests, the girls were identical twins, both flashing brand-new shiny braces on their teeth and both sporting long mops of naturally curly hair, which was braided for sleep now into single tails down to their shoulder blades. They'd inherited their bad bites and honey blond locks from a father they'd never met—Judd Haskell.

Maggie's hair was coal black and straight as a pin... and thanks to a recent hair adventure gone awry, G.

I. Jane short. But they did have her cornflower blue eyes.

"My wish was that Mom would finally find a husband," Suzy confessed to her sister. They still hadn't noticed her standing in the hallway. Beth nodded gravely. "Mine, too."

Maggie cringed. Not again!

"I am not spending one more Christmas at Grandpa Haskell's farm, I'll tell you that," Suzy declared vehemently. "All he does is give us sermons on how bad it is here in the city, and how we should come live with him and Grandma. As if! And no disrespect or nothin', but I'm tired of all those stories about our dad before he died in that skydiving accident. What was a doctor doing skydiving anyhow? You'd think he was a saint the way Grandpa talks. 'If your father was alive, this...' Or, 'If your father was alive, that...'

Sheesh!"

"If he was so wonderful," Beth pointed out, "how come he never married our mom?"

"Right," Suzy agreed.

Maggie barely stifled a gasp. How did they know that Judd had refused to marry her when he found out she was pregnant? Having a wife and family never would have fit into his high-risk, free-as-a-bird lifestyle. She prayed God they were unaware of an additional fact: that he'd wanted her to get an abortion. No, there was no way they could find that out. She'd never told anyone. Soon after that horrible meeting, Judd had died, the result of one of his never-ending adventures.

"And Grandma is no different," Suzy went on. "She keeps harping on single mothers, as if it's Mom's fault she had to raise us alone."

"I know," Beth said with a groan. "Last time, Grandma was quoting statistics she heard on some TV

commercial about how daughters who are raised without a father often don't finish high school, and lots and lots of them get pregnant before they're sixteen."

Beth and Suzy exchanged a look at that last bit of information. "Gross!" they both exclaimed at the same time. Boys weren't even of interest to them yet, let alone sex or anything leading to babies.

"But, you know," Beth offered thoughtfully, "I betcha we could make Mom search for a dad a little harder if she believed all that stuff. She keeps saying school is so important."

"And I betcha we could stay home this Christmas if there were a dad in the house," Suzy added.

"Yep, a dad wouldn't let them badger Mom into giving in. He'd tell them"—here Beth's voice dropped into a low, masculine tone—" 'Sorry, folks, but the gifts can't come for Christmas this year. We're a family now, and we need our girls to stay home for a family Christmas. My girls have gotta help me go out into the forest and chop down a tree. Maybe we'll even chop us a load of firewood to bring back in the pickup truck.'"

"That would be so perfect," Beth commented, "especially if there was snow. A dad, a real tree, a fire with our stockings hanging on the mantel, and snow!"

The audible sighs that followed were poignant with dreaminess.

As distressed as Maggie was over this wistful conversation, she had to smile. There were no forests in their neighborhood. An artificial tree had done them nicely for nine years now. They had no fireplace for that truckload of wood or the stockings. Nor was her driveway big enough for her Volvo and a truck. As for snow in Galveston for Christmas... Forget it!

Despite her half smile, she felt like weeping.

"Mom keeps saying she's happy the way things are," Suzy complained.

I am. I am. Oh, it gets lonely on occasion, but let's face it: I'm thirty-two years old, and I'm not about to give up my hard-earned independence at this late date. It's taken me too long to get where I am now. Besides, I gave up on the Prince Charming dream a long time ago. If only my two munchkins would give up on the perfect-dad dream.

"But I'm not happy, you know. Not one bit."

"Me neither," Beth agreed.

Maggie's heart went out to her two precious daughters. There was a hole in their lives without a father.

She knew that. But sometimes no father was better than a bad father. And Judd would have been a terrible father, no doubt about it.

Besides, she'd done a dam good job playing mommy and daddy to them, and raising herself up by the bootstraps as well to the point where she could now proudly proclaim herself Dr. Margaret McBride, psychologist.