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“You know he’s never brought a woman home for Christmas before, right?” This came from one of Lance’s cousins’ wives, Sara Beth.
“He seems to be head over heels about you,” another said. “Told us you two work together and recently became an item.”
“We want the full scoop,” one of his dad’s sisters added.
“Um, well, sounds like you already know the full scoop,” McKenzie began slowly. She didn’t want to give Lance’s family the wrong idea. “We have been friends since I returned to Coopersville after finishing my residency.”
“So you’re from Coopersville originally? Your family is still there?”
“My mother is. My dad lives here in Lewisburg.”
His mother’s eyes lit up with excitement. “We might know him. What’s his name?”
She hoped they didn’t know him. Okay, so he was a highly successful lawyer, but personally? Her father was a mess. A horrible, womanizing, cheating mess. If Lance’s mother knew him, it probably meant he’d hit on her. Not the impression McKenzie wanted Lance’s mother to have of her.
Avoiding the question, she said instead, “I don’t have any brothers or sisters but, like Lance, I do have a few cousins.” Nice enough people but they rarely all got together. Really, the only time McKenzie saw them was when one of them was sick and was seen at the clinic. “My parents divorced when I was four and I never quite got past that.”
She only added the last part so Lance’s family would hopefully move on past the subject of her parents. Definitely not because she wanted to talk about her parents’ divorce. She never talked about that. At least, not the nitty-gritty details that had led up to her world falling apart.
“Poor thing,” Lance’s mother sympathized. “Divorce is hard at any age.”
“Amen,” another of Lance’s aunts said. “Lance’s Uncle Gerry is my second husband. The first and I were like gasoline and fire, always explosive.”
The conversation continued while they cleaned up the remainder of the dishes and food, jumping from one subject to another but never back to McKenzie’s parents. She liked Lance’s noisy, warm family.
“Well, we’re just so happy you’re here, McKenzie. It’s about time that boy found someone to pull him out of the past.”
McKenzie glanced toward the aunt who’d spoken up. Her confusion must have shown because the women looked back and forth at each other as if trying to decide how much more to say.
Sara Beth gave McKenzie an empathetic look. “I guess he never told you about Shelby?”
Who was Shelby and what had she meant to Lance?
“No.”
The woman winced as if she wished she could erase having mentioned the woman’s name. “Shelby was Lance’s first love.”
Was. An ominous foreboding took hold of McKenzie.
“What happened?”
“She died.” This came from Sara Beth. Every pair of eyes in the room was trained on McKenzie to gauge her reaction, triggering the usual reaction to being stared at that she always had.
Lance’s first love had died and he’d never breathed a word.
“Enough talk about the past and anything but how wonderful it is to have McKenzie with us,” Lance’s mother dried her hands on a towel and pulled McKenzie over to the counter for another of her tight, all-encompassing hugs. “Truly, we are grateful that you are in my son’s life. He is a special man with a big heart and you are a fortunate young woman.”
“Yes,” McKenzie agreed, stunned at the thought someone Lance had loved had died. Was he still in love with Shelby? How had the woman died? How long ago? “Yes, he is a special man.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“YOU SURE ABOUT THIS?” McKenzie asked the man stretching out beside her. He wore dark running pants that emphasized his calf and thigh muscles and a bright-colored long-sleeved running shirt that outlined a chest McKenzie had taken great pleasure in exploring the night before as they’d lain in bed and “rung in” the New Year.
Lance glanced at her and grinned. “I’ll be waiting for you at the finish line.”
She hoped so. She hoped Lance hadn’t been teasing about being a runner. He was in great shape, had phenomenal endurance, but she’d still never known him to run. But the truth was he hadn’t stayed the whole night at her place ever, so he could do the same as her and run in the early morning before work. They had sex, often lay in bed talking and touching lightly afterward, then he went home. Just as he had the night before. She hadn’t asked him to stay. He hadn’t asked to. Just, each night, whenever he got ready to go, he kissed her good-night and left.
Truth was, she’d have let him stay Christmas night after they’d got back from his parents’. He’d insisted on following her back to her place. Despite the late hour, he’d come in, held her close, then left. She hadn’t wanted him to go. She’d have let him stay every night since. He just hadn’t wanted to. Or, if he had wanted to, he’d chosen to go home anyway.
