A Little Country Christmas - Carolyn Brown Page 0,29
Christmas shopping done yet?” he asked.
“Nope,” Landon said. “Do you?”
“Not yet,” Hud said. “Have you made up your mind to stay on at Longhorn?”
“Yep,” Landon repeated. “But I’m not telling anyone just yet.”
He’d spent time with Hud and his wife, Rose, as well as with Tag and his wife, Nikki, but he didn’t know them as well as he did the folks from Longhorn Canyon. He was aware that Tag and Hud were Emily’s younger twin brothers, but something told him that morning that Hud wasn’t there to talk about Christmas.
“I may be stickin’ my nose in where it don’t belong, but how are things between you and Dixie?” Hud asked. “Rose and Claire were talkin’ last night about how they’ve never seen her so happy.”
Landon removed his hat and raked his fingers through his hair, and then he chuckled. “Y’all have bets going, don’t you? And you’re out here getting some inside information, right?”
“Busted!” Hud laughed out loud. “So you’re not staying.”
“Every one of you will have to wait to find out. I will tell you this much. I’m moving into the cabin until summer, and then I’ll make a decision,” Landon told him.
“If that girl loves you as much as you love her, staying a few more months will be the best Christmas present you could ever give her.”
“I didn’t say I loved her,” Landon protested.
“Some things you don’t have to say,” Hud chuckled. “It’s written all over your face every time you say her name.”
* * *
On Monday Dixie worked on making a quilt square with a string of lights while Sally played with the ornaments that she had taken off the lower limbs of the Christmas tree, but the squirrel had only gotten dirty looks.
Dixie needed one more quilt square to complete the quilt, and she wasn’t quite sure what to make. Then she remembered she hadn’t made one to commemorate the church program they’d attended the day before. She found a scrap of fabric that was printed with Christmas trees and cut one of those out and laid it on a red square. When she had finished stitching around the edges of the tree, she carefully drew a rocking chair on a piece of paper. The first two attempts didn’t work, but the third was the charm. She didn’t realize how much intricate work would be involved until she pinned the rocking chair to the square.
“He’s worth it,” she muttered.
She had finished sewing the squares together with alternating red and green squares by quitting time that afternoon. She fluffed it out in front of Sally and asked, “What do you think, baby girl?”
“Doggie.” She pointed at the puppy square.
“That’s right, and you’ve learned a new word. You are such a smart girl.” Dixie dropped the quilt top on one of the rocking chairs and bent to hug Sally. “You’re going to grow up to be something amazing.”
Sally stuffed the puppy ornament in her mouth and grinned around it.
“Or maybe you’ll be a comedian.” Dixie giggled and hugged her again. “Whatever you are, I want you to be self-confident and happy.”
When Dixie heard a truck door slam outside, she grabbed the quilt, raced to the back room, and hid it in an empty box. She grabbed her coat and Sally’s from the bedroom on the way back up the hall and then answered the door.
“Sorry about making you wait. I was in the bedroom getting our coats,” she said when she opened the door.
“No problem,” Landon said. “I’ll help get Sally ready.” He talked as he put the baby’s coat on her. “We’re going to see all the pretty lights. They aren’t nearly as pretty as you or your mama, but they’ll make you smile, and then we’ll go out for pizza and ice cream.”
“Ice keam.” Sally clapped her hands.
“And we’ll clean her up together, right?” Dixie smiled up at him.
“Yes, ma’am. You ever hear that song by Blake Shelton called ‘I’ll Name the Dogs’?”
“Of course I’ve heard it. Blake is one of my favorites,” she said.
Landon grinned. “Well, you know how he says that you can name the babies, and he’ll name the dogs? I figure I’ll take out splinters if you’ll clean up ice cream messes.”
“Think we could write a country song like that?” Dixie asked.
“I bet we could,” he chuckled.
“We make a pretty good team, don’t we?” She picked up her purse and the diaper bag.
“We sure do,” he answered. “Have you ever been to a festival of lights?”