6 Mountain Brothers for Christmas

“Mark, your vitals look really good,” the doctor said. “You’re much stronger at this stage than we thought you would be. But protocol still states you have to ride out a few more days in the hospital while we continue to monitor you.”

“Are you sure that’s necessary?” Kyra asked. “I mean, I’ll be watching him at the house. I think he’d rather be in his bed.”

“But if something were to happen, we’ve got a better chance of intervening and saving his life here instead of having to go fetch him on top of that mountain,” the doctor said. “I know this is hard, Kyra, but it’s better if he’s here. And if he goes a few more days without incident, then he’s free to go home.”

“Okay,” she said, sighing.

I knew Kyra was disappointed that he wouldn’t be home for Christmas. That was what she was hoping for, to take her father home and celebrate with him. I could see the hurt behind her eyes while Mark held her hand, so I decided to lean up and intervene a bit into their time.

“Kyra, look at me.”

Her face panned over to mine and I could tell Mark was listening intently.

“We’ll spend the holiday here in his room, okay?” I said. “You’re not gonna spend Christmas without your father. I’m not gonna allow it. If the doctor permits it, we can decorate and bring all the presents here if you want to.”

“Not a problem with me, although the decorations will have to be fake,” the doctor said. “No actual pine trees and the like. We need to keep a sterile environment.”

“Seriously, Chance?” she asked. “You guys would do that for us?”

“Kyra, we told you we were gonna be here. I gave you my word and my word is my bond.”

I could see the lopsided grin that started rising up on one of Mark’s cheeks and I knew I’d done right by his daughter.

And that thought thrummed my heart with excitement.

“Thank you so much,” Kyra said with tears in her eyes. “Really.”

“Anything to make this Christmas special,” I said.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE – ROWAN

We all sat around the table and set out a strategy as to how in the world we were going to execute Harper’s insane plan by tomorrow evening. It was already Christmas Eve and it was already past lunch time. And to top it all off, Chance called us from the hospital and said we were supposedly decorating Mark’s room for Christmas since he wasn’t going to have the chance to come home and spend Christmas with us here.

So naturally, I volunteered to go with Blake and Ethan to gather up Christmas decorations.

“Rowan.”

“Yeah, Harper?”

“Call me once you’re done talking to her,” he said. “We need that woman on board before we can move forward with anything.”

“I’m gonna try my best. But I’m just not—hold on. This is her.”

“We’ll wait for you in the car,” Blake said.

“I’m following on my bike,” Ethan said.

“Then I’ll wait for you in the car, Rowan,” Blake said.

“Just go,” I said. “I’ll be there in a second. Hello?”

“Is this Rowan Trent?”

“Hey there, Melinda,” I said. “How have you been?”

“Lonely, until you called,” she said.

“Listen, I was wanting to ask you a question.”