Holly and Snowflakes Pt. 01

Authors note: This is my third story in my Hot Tails in Oak Hills series; the first two are The Reunion and Claiming Emily. I wanted to do something different, so this one is a lot longer. It's divided into three parts. I hope all of you enjoy my next installment. Merry Christmas. GEV

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Holly, Snowflakes and a Christmas Angel

December 24th

Gabriel Michael Grigori hated the holidays, especially Christmas. It wasn't the hustle and bustle that got to him, he could handle that in stride, it was everything else about the time of year, the joy, the merriment, the time spent with family and friends, which got to him the most. Because it was exactly five years ago to the day that his world came crashing down around him.

He had been thirty-five at the time and living in Portland, married to his high school sweetheart with a nine-year old girl that was the spitting image of her mother with big brown eyes and shiny brown curls. Everything was perfect. He had a good job as a police officer with the city and was already moving up in the ranks, his wife worked out of their small two-bedroom apartment so she could stay at home with their daughter, and they were finally on their way to having enough money saved for their dream house in the suburbs with the picket fence and large back yard. He had volunteered to work Christmas Eve because it paid double time, the extra money was going towards the new house, and he was out on patrol when his daughter called, wanting to have a cup of hot chocolate with him before she went to bed. Gabe's partner laughed, said he completely understood, and they headed towards the coffee shop where they were going to meet his wife and daughter.

A call for a robbery in progress had come in and since they were the closest, they were the first to respond with a second car on the way but the severe weather that had the city locked down with heavy snow and ice had caused them to get there a little too late, the thieves fleeing the scene in a hailstorm of bullets when they heard the sirens of the approaching cars. Gabe and his partner went in pursuit while the other two officers responded to the scene. It wasn't until after they had the suspects in custody, and they had returned to the scene of the robbery, when Gabe had been informed that his wife and daughter were two of the innocent bystanders on the sidewalk at the time of the shooting and had been rushed to the hospital with life-threatening injuries.

Gabe had spent the next twelve hours at the hospital, pacing the floor of the surgery waiting room, praying for his wife and daughter, his heart heavy with fear when the trauma surgeon finally appeared to give him the prognosis, but the outcome was bleak. His daughter had died on the table and his wife had been moved to intensive care under the careful watch of the nurses as she fought for her own life after losing a lot of blood, part of her liver and her spleen. He cried for several hours, sitting at her bedside and when she finally regained consciousness around eleven o'clock Christmas evening, when she weakly asked where her daughter was, he told her and she took one long, hard look at him, told him to get out and that she never wanted to see him again, turning her head on the pillow and closing her eyes as she started sobbing. He left the hospital, only to return the next day and she still told him the same thing. He begged and pleaded, tried to reason with her but she wasn't having any of his excuses, he was the reason their daughter was dead, and she was lying in a hospital bed in severe pain.

The third time he went to see her; she kicked him out permanently, telling the nurses he wasn't welcome in her room anymore. So, after that final rejection, he never bothered going back to see her and a week later he received divorce papers from her attorney. She had blamed him for everything and no matter how much he tried to make peace with her, there was no way she would ever forgive him for not being home that night like he should have been, because if he had stayed home, their daughter's life wouldn't have been taken so early all because she wanted to have a cup of hot cocoa with her daddy before she went to bed while he kept everyone in the city safe. He signed the papers without argument and a month later he left Portland a broken and disheartened man.

He settled in Oak Hills, a small town two hours south of Portland, bought a house that had never been finished by the previous owners and spent his free time working on his new residence to keep his mind occupied, but the death of his daughter still haunted him. He had applied for the recently vacated position as corporal on the town's police department, signing on with them a week after moving. The town had a much lower crime rate than the city and when he was on duty, he mainly patrolled the town, wrote a few traffic violations and responded to emergency calls, which mainly consisted of traffic accidents and bar fights, unlike the homicides and armed robberies that occurred in the larger city on a weekly basis.

After a year he started to settle into the small-town life, finding out that it was a lot less stressful than the big city and he was starting to relax more, starting to move on with his life, but never really thought about dating anyone again. But still, whenever the holidays rolled around, he did everything he could to block those nights out of his mind, which usually meant working all day long and well into the night, whether it be in the weight room he had in his spare room or out on patrol, keeping the residents of the small town safe because God knows he couldn't keep his own family safe that night. And now five years had passed; he had received a promotion, was forty and still alone.

And it was Christmas Eve yet again.

Gabe shifted the bulk of his muscular six-foot one-inch frame in the driver's seat of his solid black Ford Explorer police interceptor and reached up, rubbing his tired eyes. His day had started off fine, no serious calls, no fender-benders despite the rush of the holiday, so he just patrolled the town, did several welfare checks on some of the elderly residents that were still recovering from the last heavy rainstorm a few months ago, stopped to shoot a few hoops with a couple boys that were playing in the youth center's side lot and then parked in the empty lot of the insurance office where he had an unobstructed view of the intersection to the interstate. He typed up his reports in his laptop while he watched traffic, chatted for a while with the other officer that was on duty and munched on the trail mix he had stashed in the SUV. He looked at his watch. It was almost five o'clock.

He had been on shift for the past ten hours and still had two more to go before he could go back to the station to print out and file his daily reports with the clerk before going home to his empty, lonely house. He needed caffeine if he was expected to make it through the rest of his shift, so he shifted the vehicle into gear and pulled into the twenty-four-hour coffee stand a few minutes before they closed for the holiday and ordered a large caramel mocha with an extra shot of espresso, tipping the barista five dollars as she handed him his coffee with a smile and told him to have a safe evening. He took the coffee from her, returning her smile and took a cautionary sip as he pulled away from the drive-up window, deciding to kill the next two hours with one last patrol of the town and possibly the outskirts.

He put the cup in the holder between the seats and pulled back onto the main road, looking off into the distance. The gray skies were starting to turn dark and the biting cold of the winter night would soon be closing in. The forecast had called for a light snowfall and since he had been living in the small town, he had concluded that when the weather service predicted snow on the valley floor, that didn't include Winema Valley. Rain, yes. Freezing temperatures, yes. Snow, highly unlikely. And never anything as severe as what he had to deal with when he lived in Portland with the wind whipping in through the gorge and weeks of harsh snow and hazardous ice.

He turned left at the stop sign and drove through the town, turning up the heater to take the chill off the night. Traffic would be picking up soon as people got off work early for Christmas Eve and started to head home and he needed to be extra alert on the last leg of his patrol, because even if he dreaded the happiest time of the year, there was an entire town that didn't and it was his duty to make sure that there were no accidents so everyone could have a wonderful and merry holiday even if he locked himself inside his house for the rest of the night and all of the next day.

Gabe turned on the windshield wipers as the first scattering of snowflakes started to flutter down from the dark sky; the weather service prediction had been accurate for once and the falling snow couldn't have started at a better time. All the businesses except for the two all-night gas stations and the twenty-four-hour convenience store that was owned by foreigners that didn't celebrate the holiday were closed for the rest of the night and all day tomorrow, leaving the town silent and secure as the snowflakes started to fall, blanketing the ground with a light dusting of pristine snow. His patrol was just about over, and he started to head back towards the station to sit down in the warmth of the building so he could print out his reports for the day when he caught sight of the flashing hazard lights coming from a vehicle stranded next to the on-ramp that led to the southbound entrance of the interstate.

He quickly turned an illegal U-turn in the middle of the intersection, flipped on the red and blues atop the roof of the Explorer and rolled up behind the red Jeep Compass, turning on the truck's side mounted spotlight, illuminating the light snow falling in the night. He spied the very shapely, female legs encased in green leggings and knee-high black leather boots that were visible beneath the bottom edge of the cream-colored parka that the woman was wearing as she stood under the protection of the open rear gate, obviously looking for something in the back, the smaller SUV sitting a little lower on the passenger side. She was either stuck in the mud that had yet to dry out from the last rainstorm or she had a flat tire. He shifted the utility into park, reached for his navy-blue departmental baseball cap on the passenger seat and pulled it down over his short cropped blond hair, pushing open the door and climbing out, the snow on the asphalt crunching under his booted feet.

He turned the collar of his jacket up against the falling snow and tugged the waistband back down over his waist, leaving his holstered pistol free. He tugged the zipper down on his jacket far enough to reach inside and pull his flashlight from its holder on his vest, turning it on and tugging the zipper back up against the bite of the cold air. He shined the light along the driver's side of her vehicle, peeking inside the open rear hatch to see if there were any more occupants inside. She was alone. "Is everything okay, ma'am," he asked as he approached her, his smooth, deep voice carrying into the night.

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Holly Noelle Winters stepped outside onto the sidewalk, the cold air quickly enveloping her as she locked the front doors of her full-service beauty salon shortly after four o'clock in the afternoon, her last client leaving just a half hour ago, a biting gust of wind catching a long lock of ginger hair and blowing it across her face. She had been booked all week with last minute appointments for colors and styles, a few sets and blow outs, all her regular ladies that were getting primped, preened and pampered for parties and family functions.

She had quickly tidied up the shop that sat along the main street, the huge paned window looking out onto the road and the city park on the other side of the street before she left for the holiday, opening the shop back up two days after Christmas. She had to be at the hospital in Riverton by seven-thirty, so she still had time to go home, shower and change her clothes, refusing to let the winter storm stop her. She stepped off the edge of the sidewalk, waiting for the solid black police SUV to pass by before she walked up the side of her red Jeep Compass and slid in behind the wheel, starting up the engine and letting it warm up before she pulled away from the curb and drove around the block to head home to her apartment that sat along the main street east of town.

She unlocked the door to her second story apartment and shucked off her cream-colored parka and tossed it over the back of the loveseat as she walked to her bathroom, stripping off her clothes as she went. She took a quick shower and blow-dried her hair until it was just slightly damp and padded naked out into her bedroom in her bare feet, rummaging through her lingerie drawer until she found a lacy red bra and matching thong, slipping into them. She never really understood why she bought the fancy undies, it wasn't like anyone ever saw her in them, but they made her feel pretty and that was good enough for her.

She had left the elf costume that she was going to wear to the hospital hanging on the back of her door and she took it off the hanger, pulling on the green leggings and then the matching green dress, fastening the wide black belt around her narrow waist, the scoop neckline, hem of the short full skirt and ends of the long sleeves all trimmed in white faux fur. She had been wearing the same costume for the past ten years when she went to the children's wing of the hospital to deliver presents, her dad dressing up as Santa to help her hand out the gifts. She had made a promise to herself when she was seventeen that she would do her best to bring a smile to the faces of the sick kids who had to spend Christmas Eve confined to a hospital bed because she knew all too well how depressing it was to be stuck in the hospital on what should be the merriest day of the year.

She had been diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor when she was five years old and had been in and out of various children's hospitals from Portland to Los Angeles ever since her parents decided they wouldn't take no for an answer. There had to be something that could be done to save their daughter's life, and when they finally found a surgeon that would perform the risky surgery, they went through with it, hoping to give their child the life that she deserved. Even though she had to undergo two more surgeries and several rounds of chemo and radiation before she was ten, she survived and still baffled the experts in their respective fields because they had informed her parents that she would be lucky if she lived to see her seventh birthday. And when she turned seventeen, she was still cancer free.

Even though she was left with several scars, the most noticeable followed her hairline on the right side of her head from her temple to the nape of her neck, they were all a constant reminder that she shouldn't be alive, but skilled surgeons had made sure she lived to see her next birthday and everyone after that. Hers just happened to fall on the worst day out of the year, Christmas, and this year she would be turning twenty-eight.

She sat down in the padded chair in front of her vanity mirror and pulled her damp hair away from her face with a jaw clip, reaching for the silicone elf ears she had laid out on the stand earlier, carefully applying them with adhesive. While the glue dried, she meticulously applied her make-up, using gold and red glitter eyeshadow that made her bright bottle green eyes even brighter, painted red and white striped candies and swirls high on the tops of her cheekbones and dusted her cheeks with silver glitter. She dusted more glitter across her chest and the tops of her breasts, her pale skin sparkling in the light coming from her vanity mirror.

She smiled at her reflection as she painted her lips a bright shade of red and unclipped the clip from her hair, styling her ginger locks until they laid in soft curls around her shoulders and down to the middle of her back, the tips of her pointed ears sticking three inches out of her hair, which she highlighted with a little glitter. She put on her green and white faux fur trimmed elf hat, took one last look at herself in the mirror and got up from the vanity. She pulled on her black knee-high leather boots, zipping them up; she would change into her elf shoes when she got to the hospital, and hefted the oversized red bag loaded down with wrapped presents from her closet. She pulled her parka back on, tugging up the zipper and smoothed her hand down the front flap, securing the Velcro over the zipper before donning her fur lined cream colored leather gloves and picked up the velveteen bag, hefting it over her shoulder.

When she stepped out of the stairwell of her apartment building, she swore at the snowflakes that were falling softly from the dark sky, kissing her skin and melting on her hair as she hurried to her Jeep, stowing the bag in the cargo area before sliding in behind the wheel. There wasn't supposed to be any snow this year, but how often was the weatherman correct in predicting these sorts of things. There was no way she was going to let a little or a lot of snow stop her from her yearly tradition, there were twelve sick kids in the children's ward that she couldn't disappoint and three nurses that knew she was coming, and she wasn't going to let any of them down. She started up her car, turned on the four-wheel drive and adjusted the dial for snow before she backed out of her reserved slot, pulling out onto the main road, slowly driving through town.

It was after six and almost all the businesses in Oak Hills were closed for the rest of the night and all day tomorrow, the streetlights illuminating the snowflakes as they fluttered down under the beam of light to softly land on the sidewalk. There were barely any cars on the road and the traffic lights cooperated in her favor, staying green as she drove down the slushy road towards the other end of town that was peacefully quiet in the darkness of the evening and she flipped on her turn signal, easing into the turning lane as she maneuvered onto the road that was also the interstate southbound entrance and exit ramps. She pressed her foot down on the accelerator and started to make a right turn onto the freeway on-ramp when she felt the front of the car bounce over something quickly followed by a loud bang, the front of her car pulling sharply to the right as her front tire blew. "Shit," Holly swore, easing the Jeep over to the side of the road and turning on her hazard lights. A flat tire was the last thing she needed.

Holly leaned over and popped the glovebox open, taking out the flashlight she kept in there and climbed out of her Jeep, shutting the door. She turned up the collar of her parka against the falling snow and turned on the light as she walked around the front of the car, the snow crunching under her boots. She was careful to stay on the asphalt; the ground had yet to dry out from the last rainstorm the area had two months ago, and she shined the beam of light at the front tire, swearing again as the light caught something metallic wedged into the side of her tire. What ever the object was that she had run over was not only sharp enough to puncture her tire but also imbed itself into the thick rubber. She wasn't going anywhere now.

She walked back around the driver's side of her Compass to the rear and popped the latch on the cargo door, ducking under the protective cover as it rose. She hefted the bag of packages over the rear seat and tossed the blanket aside, unscrewing the plastic knob and lifting the cover to her spare tire housing. She drew in a deep breath and let it back out, staring down into the empty round hold where her spare should have been. Her dad must have taken it out without her knowledge when he borrowed her car three months ago to put new tires on it for her. Great, just freakin' great, Holly thought, no damn spare tire. She dropped the cover back down on the hold and screwed the fastener back into place.