Finding Christmas Read Online Free

Fitzgerald. He was gorgeous. Tall, with dark hair and electric blue eyes, he possessed a combination of self-confidence and humility. It was very attractive, but she couldn’t imagine him being interested in her. He was an athlete—able-bodied—and she was anything but.
    Thinking about him made her ache. Not for the man, specifically, but for what he represented. She remembered all too well how rejection felt after the crash. How she’d always planned for marriage and children in the future, but had to kiss those plans good-bye.
    *     *     *
    “So, I hear you’re going to the Bensons’ for Thanksgiving?” Ethan Hayes was one of Will’s best friends. A transplant in town, teaching was his second career—a dream he’d had since he was a kid. Once he finished making a killing in hedge funds, he went back to school to do what he wanted. He’d been at Holly Point High School for five years teaching math, so the only Benson he knew was Matt. “I would kill to be at the table with those women. I wonder if lightning bolts would come out of the sky if I had impure thoughts about any of the Marys.”
    The Marys . It’s what people jokingly called Maggie, Claire, and Grace Benson. The three sisters were all named Mary—Mary Margaret, Mary Claire and Mary Grace. No doubt, the Irish-Catholic was strong in this family.
    “You really are a douche. Have you considered growing up?”
    “Are you kidding? Have you looked at them? If their dad didn’t have a gun, I’d have a run at one of them,” Ethan shot back.
    Forget Jim, he figured Maggie could handle whatever came at her. And based on the glimpses of her personality he’d been privy to at the football game, he figured she was not to be messed with.
    “How are we friends?” Will retorted. “You have the brain of an adolescent boy. Knock it off.”
    Ethan shrugged and walked around the classroom. “There’s a lot of chatter about the older one, Maggie. She’s been to hell and back. Wow.”
    That she had been, but Will didn’t want to talk about it. Somehow, it felt wrong, like an invasion of her privacy. Last year during basketball season, Matt had been completely distracted by his sister’s condition. The kid had confided in Will about the crash, and that his sister was in bad shape after a skin graft had gone bad.
    Just knowing that made him feel protective of her. It also made him feel guilty. Maggie didn’t know he’d listened to Matt every day for weeks. She didn’t know how much he knew about her, her life, or her injuries. And she especially didn’t know how much her family was hurting when she cut them off. “I’m sure she’d love knowing she was the topic of gossip.”
    “I’m just sayin’. But it’s not gossip. It’s all very complimentary.”
    “Maybe so, but she almost died in service to her country. She shouldn’t be coming up in conversation.”
    That shut Ethan up.
    “Look, just show a little respect, okay?” Will was all too aware of what it felt like to be talked about. When he started teaching at Holly Point, the town knew who he was, knew his history, and knew about the injury that destroyed his basketball career. He was the topic of a lot of speculation and gossip, and he wasn’t going to do the same to Maggie.
    She’d been very sweet and funny during the game, asking him a lot of questions about himself, and getting the low down on her brother, who had grown up, literally and figuratively, while she’d been away. Maggie wanted to know everything—about Matt’s friends, his habits, how he got along with his teachers, and if he had a girlfriend.
    Will chuckled, pitying the girl who would have to face the Marys.
    But he really liked Maggie, and was looking forward to spending Thanksgiving with her family. It sounded like madness, with relatives driving in from all over Long Island, but he hadn’t had a big, crazy holiday in ages.
    That he’d be able to get to know Maggie better was a bonus.
    The first bell rang