Coming Home for Christmas by Carla Kelly Page B

together what remained of their medical stores, leaving most of them with the two Franciscans along with more instructions. He took one last ward walk through the refectory, assessing his Indians. Two were still no-hopers, but he felt sanguine about the rest.
    Touched to his very soul, Thomas knelt, as Father Boscana directed, and let the priest pray his thanks to God and make the sign of the cross on his forehead with his thumb.
    â€œI’ll return in a few weeks,” he said, when he was on his feet again, blessed for his work and amply paid.
    â€œBring your wife, too,” the priest said.
    As if he would ever travel anywhere without her again. Laura kissed him when he was seated beside her in the vessel’s gunwales and whispered in his ear. “I love you. You know I am going to be seasick soon.”
    He smiled and nodded. She was.
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    The fishing vessel only took them halfway down the coast to Mission San Luis Rey, a mission Thomaswas familiar with from a measles epidemic last year. “The fish are running and I cannot waste my time with you,” the pescador said. He was apologetic, but he was adamant.
    He was even thoughtful. As he helped Thomas over the rail and handed him his medical bag, he gestured him closer, his eyes lively with good humor.
    â€œ Señor, this mission appears to be standing. The fathers at the mission will provide you and your wife with a fine room for the night. The walls are quite thick.”
    Thomas blushed and looked away, then shook the fisherman’s hand. “Gracias,” he said simply.
    It was a fine little room with thick walls. The bed was narrow, and Father Peyri apologized to them both. “If you wish, your wife can sleep in an adjoining cell,” he said. He patted Thomas’s arm. “And we will be honored to furnish you with horses for your return to San Diego tomorrow.” The priest looked at Laura. “We can do no less. Your husband aided us monumentally last year, when so many suffered from measles.”
    â€œHe is good that way,” she replied. “And, no, we do not need an extra room. Is there a bath? We worked so hard at San Juan Capistrano.”
    There was a bath house and Laura used it first, coming back to their room with her hair damp, but in its usual braid, her shawl over her nightgown, her feet bare. By the time he had finished, she was already in bed, the nightgown spread across the foot of it. He hadn’t been aware that she had freckles on her breasts.
    Neither of them wasted a moment worrying about the narrowness of the bed, probably intended for priestly travelers from one mission to another. She had a fewpractical questions, which he answered while he was caressing her breasts and then her trim waist, then lower. He had made a clinical observation a few years ago that Spanish women were nicely rounded—far more so than Scottish women. Laura was no exception, despite that air of fragility she had discarded forever the night that neither of them had slept.
    He was gentle, but he knew she was ready. And practical, anchoring her legs around him so he couldn’t fall off the narrow bed, no matter how strenuous their exertions, once she got into the rhythm and hang of lovemaking. Her breath was rapid and tender in his ear as she told him of her love again and showed him, with no qualms, no restraint, no fears about the future.
    She protested when he left her body, tucking herself close out of more than necessity. Father Peyri had kindly left them a pile of blankets. When reason triumphed again, Thomas spread out those blankets and she unmade the little bed and added them to create a larger bed on the floor.
    â€œMuch, much better,” she said, when they were still tight together, but without the fear of falling.
    The room was dark and he was post-coitally drowsy, but he enjoyed her usual conversation in the dark, particularly as it was punctuated this time with a low moan when he decided to