Snowflakes Over Manhattan
— Chapter 2 —
Wood-Fire Night
HER MOVEMENTS QUIET, Elizabeth opened the door of the washroom that led into the small but comfortable room they were lodging in for their stay. Her face was still damp with the lingering traces of her nightly cleansing and the room's air cooled the surface of her skin as it brushed across the dampness.
She stood there for a moment, taking in the image before her. Absently, her hands drew her wrapper together in front of her, the midnight-blue silk and lace soft under her fingertips. She cocooned herself in the fabrics as a hum of warmth curled through her at the sight she so tenderly watched.
Her husband and infant daughter were both sound asleep on the too-small bed that had been the best that Mrs. Shemanski — Allie's kindly Ukrainian landlady — could offer them. The span of Nathan's shoulders took up much of the mattress.
Holly was a bitty dot against her father, so small in relation to his figure. Folded atop him, her soft flannel sleepgown was a splash of pink against the cotton-covered musculature of his broad chest. Her knees were tucked up under her little bottom, which jutted up into the air; her hands curved daintily under one round cheek, flushed with sleep where it lay against her father's heartbeat.
Nathan's hands, so tanned against the fuzzy, girlish-pink of Holly's gown, grasped her securely even in slumber, anchoring her perch atop him. A thick blanket of grey wool lay haphazardly draped over his legs.
Clad in a soft white undershirt, all six-foot-three of him sprawled exhaustedly across the narrow mattress, the confines of which were barely able to contain his brawny frame. His face was relaxed in sleep; strong jaw gentling, chest rising and falling with each breath.
Within Elizabeth, a rush of tenderness ached its way up from stomach to heart at the sight.
Pulled by an invisible force, she padded softly to the bed, the long hem of her wrapper brushing across the tops of her bare feet. The floorboards were cool against the soles of her feet despite the generous fire in the tiny wood stove tucked into a corner of the room. In the opposite corner, glimmering dimly by the muted light of the stove, an elegant evening gown hung from a hanger, its ends spilling onto the floor. Beside it hung its male counterpart: black and white formal attire for a masculine figure.
Moving gingerly, Elizabeth lowered herself to the edge of the bed, not wanting to wake her slumbering family. The mattress dipped under her weight. She froze.
Her husband's eyes cracked open. His lips turned up slightly. He opened an arm to her and she slipped into it, curling herself into the warm wall of his chest. Her head found a home on his shoulder, and as it did, her long, chestnut-glossed brunette hair slipped unbound and soundless onto his torso, shining with soft luster in the low glow from the oil lamps that flickered on the wall, flanking the headboard of the bed.
His arm curled around her waist, hand resting widely across her stomach. For a breath, she tensed, fighting the urge to pull away from his hand, not wanting him to feel the soft excess still left on her stomach after this pregnancy. But, gentle and protective and full of unconditional acceptance, his hand moved, rubbing her stomach in the tiniest of slow circles.
Her muscles sighed in response and she let go, relaxing against him.
He tilted his head to look down at her, his eyes gravely serious and very blue. His hand slipped to her face, where he dragged a calloused thumb along the length of her jaw, then cupped her cheek.
"You have never been more beautiful to me," he whispered with slow gravity. His fingers, laying against her cheek, were still. "My Elizabeth."
The raw truth of it was in his eyes. Emotion gathered in Elizabeth's throat. She swallowed hard, feeling the birth of hot tears sting at her eyes.
Nathan.
Then, fiercely, Mine.
How did he always know what fears had gathered in her?
A thought, wayward, stubborn, flashed through her. "Another daughter—" was all she got out before Nathan, with a firm shake of his head against the pillow, briefly removed his hand from her cheek to press her lips together with a gentle thumb, silencing her, before again pillowing his hand around the curve of her face.
Silently, she turned her cheek into it, brushing back and forth like a cat, loving the rasp of his callouses against her softness.
"Every child we cooperated with God in creating, every one of our babies you brought into this word has been a joy beyond what I ever imagined in my life. I was born to be the father of our daughters and I love our new girl" — he exhaled and it wasn't quite steady somehow — "fiercely, and I cannot imagine nor do I want any other life or any other child but her. Holly is a miracle. Our miracle with God."
His arm muscles tensed as he glanced at the bundle of babyhood sleeping on him, drawing her closer yet, if that were possible.
"The gift of new life is always miraculous, but our Holly, Elizabeth. . . she's extra miraculous." His voice was soft in the room, silent save for the muted crackle and pop of logs burning in the stove. "Ten years of hoping, we'd almost given up, then out of nowhere, this miracle, our Holly. She even comes into the world a month and a half before her time and thrives anyway; miracle."
Oh, Nathan. Elizabeth thought her heart might burst from yearning, from gratitude, from love for this man. Winter had come early to Hope Valley and so had little Miss Holly Grant. Over a month premature, terrifying all who loved her, but in her tiny body was the spirit of a fighter.
Elizabeth didn't know where this sudden anxiety about having naught but daughters was coming from — it had never been an issue before; not with her, and not in their marriage — but Nathan was putting it to rest with every whispered word from his mouth.
He wasn't finished.
"I'm so profoundly grateful and humbled that this world has another Thatcher-Grant female in it," he whispered huskily, and Elizabeth's heart turned over in a slow-tumbling free fall through her chest cavity. And with that sentence, any lingering unease that they had not had any sons was erased. Tears burned when he opened his mouth to finish even more gravely, "And I'm doubly humbled, doubly grateful that God let me be her father."
She was undone. The whisper of pure love lodged in her throat burst from her lips; water breaking over a dam.
She stretched her neck and, holding his face in both hands, she kissed him, very, very softly, telling him without words how treasured he was to her, how treasured he made her feel. Her tears were salty on their lips. She could not speak.
Against his face, her fingertips trembled, ever so slightly.
She pulled back and, gently, tipped her forehead into his. His hand slipped around the back of her head, fingers sliding into the thick hair at the base of her skull, her anchor as they breathed together, eyes fixed on the other, speaking without saying a word in the silence, their foreheads a connecting point of warmth between them. When she broke the silence, her words were a mere breath above a whisper.
"I'll never stop thanking God that He brought you into my life to be my husband" — reaching up, she laced her fingers through his where he held Holly, feeling the soft rise and fall of her tiny back under their joined hands — "and to be the father of our daughters."
He lifted their clasped hands, and brought the back of her palm to his lips, a silent response in his eyes.
Holly started in her sleep, one leg twitching as her lips began to purse. Nathan and Elizabeth's eyes met in guilty levity. "Whoops," Nathan whispered and hastily replaced their hands on her back. The baby settled immediately, breathing evenly through her lips, parted sweetly in sleep.
"It was a good day," Elizabeth whispered at length, her voice humming with drowsy contentment.
"Very."
"Allie looks wonderful."
"She certainly does that." His fatherly tone sounded fulfilled. "She has such womanly confidence to her now. I love to see it."
"Same here. And it felt so good to hug her again."
His hum of agreement vibrated through his chest.
"Such a place, Nathan. . . I've never seen the like. Why, every continent in the world must be here. And there's such a sense of movement to everything. I never felt so buoyed by the energy of a place before. It's infectious."
He laughed under his breath. "You certainly carried that energy over into telling Samantha and Leah all about the city earlier when you called to let them know we'd arrived safe and sound. I'm not sure they got a word in edgewise."
"Did so," she mumbled sleepily. "Lillian will tell you. She heard."
"You two," he chuckled. "Thick as thieves. Is she feeling well still? No sign of delivery yet?"
"Uh-uh." Her head made a barely discernible motion of denial. Her lids fought to stay open. "She's fine. Baby's not due for four weeks."
"I know. Just checking." Nathan's cheek leaned into Elizabeth's temple and her eyes closed at the sweetness of it. "Sleep, my darling," he whispered, pressing a good-night kiss to her forehead.
And so she did.