A Chesapeake Shores Christmas by Sherryl Woods Read Free Book Online

and sent them off for naps when Kevin appeared. Apparently he was taking over for his wife while she dealt with settling the boys upstairs in the apartment where she’d lived before marrying Kevin. She’d kept it so the kids could be cared for close by while she worked in the store.
    “So, Dad, what’s going on between you and Connor?” Kevin asked point-blank, studying him intently.
    “Who says there’s anything going on?” Mick replied defensively. “You saw the way he stormed out of the house. He’s not happy about your mother and me remarrying.”
    “I know that, but when I spoke to him the other day and suggested he come down and go fishing today, he mumbled some kind of ridiculous excuse that didn’t make a bit of sense. I reminded him I needed his help to get the boat ready for the lighted boat parade the first weekend in December, and he blew that off, too.”
    “Maybe he’s busy,” Mick suggested. “He’s working hard to make partner at the law firm, and he probably spends a lot of his spare time with that woman he’s been seeing.”
    Kevin looked surprised. “You know about Heather?”
    Mick brightened. “Is that her name?”
    Kevin frowned at him. “You were just taking a stab in the dark, weren’t you, you sneaky old man? You had no idea he was dating anyone.”
    “He’s a good-looking, successful young man. I never thought he was living the life of a monk.”
    “But you didn’t know about any specific woman,” Kevin persisted.
    “Nope,” Mick confirmed with a satisfied grin. “So, how serious is it?”
    “Ask Connor.” Kevin’s expression turned sly. “Or aren’t the two of you speaking?”
    “Now who’s resorting to guesswork?”
    “I wouldn’t need to, if either one of you would give me a straight answer. Dad, if marrying Mom is going to come between you and Connor, maybe you should rethink it.”
    “You’d have me put my life on hold because any one of you can’t be an adult and accept that I know exactly what I’m doing?” Mick asked incredulously.
    “Look, Mom and I are getting along okay now, but I’ve had time to reconcile the perspective I used to have with the realities of what actually happened back then,” Kevin said, his tone reasonable. “Connor’s not had enough time, plus he’s even more hardheaded than you or I on our bad days. Why not have a spring wedding? Mom can walk along the pathway that’s lined with all those lilies of the valley she planted. It’ll be beautiful.”
    “I am not waiting until spring just so your brother can make peace with this. If he knows he has that kind of power over the two of us, he’ll find some other way to force us to postpone that date. Years could go by while he manipulates the situation. In case you haven’t noticed, neither your mother or I are getting any younger.”
    “I wouldn’t suggest you use Mom’s advancing age as an excuse for pressing ahead with a New Year’s Eve wedding,” Kevin said with a grin.
    Mick scowled at him. “Of course not. Do you think I’m crazy?”
    “Sometimes you do say things without thinking through the consequences,” Kevin said. “Something tells me that’s what happened with Connor.” He studied Mick intently. “Is that it, Dad? Did you back him into a corner?”
    “We’ll work it out,” Mick said. “That’s what O’Briens do. We work things out.”
    “Unless those things you’re talking about happen to be between you and Uncle Jeff or you and Uncle Thomas,” Kevin said knowingly. “How many years have the three of you been at odds? The only thing you and Thomas have managed to agree on is that Shanna and I belong together.”
    “Whole different story,” Mick insisted. He heard the bell over the store’s front door ring, spotted Daisy Monroe coming inside with her pet poodle clutched in her arms and seized on the excuse. “You have a customer. Take care of her. I’m going home.”
    The whole conversation with Kevin had left him more disgruntled than