Sleigh Bells in Valentine Valley by Emma Cane Page A

Thanksgiving dinner with your ex-wife, your sister should be, too.”
    Tony shrugged. “I guess a girlfriend bond is even more sacred. Break it and . . .” He ran a finger across his neck.
    With a chuckle, Mario said, “You’re a good boy, Tony. All these years, you’ve never made it hard for Ethan to be with his mom.”
    â€œAnd she’s done the same for me, remember. And I like the Fenellis. They’re a great family.” After the divorce, he’d thought he’d lose them as his second family, but that hadn’t happened. He was still like another son to Tom and Christina, and eventually, even Kate’s brothers had recovered enough from their defensiveness to treat him as they always had. Obviously Jim, being the eldest, was still keeping an eye on his little sister.
    How they found places to sit for all of their guests, Tony never knew. He ended up on the couch with a tray table in front of him, along with a lot of cousins. Ethan had invited him to a table, but he hadn’t wanted to make waves with Kate there. To his surprise, even she avoided the main table and was sitting cross-legged on a pillow near the big fireplace, her plate in her lap, Barney waiting patiently beside her. The dog knew a sucker when he saw one. More than once, Tony found himself glancing at her, at ease in a loose sweater, skinny jeans, and polka-dotted socks, a scarf looped around her neck. She looked happy and carefree, chatting with her brother’s wife, but he knew how good she was at disguising her feelings—she was a lawyer after all, and a good one.
    A toddler crawled into her lap, almost upsetting her plate, but she positively beamed her happiness, bringing him up onto her knee and blowing kisses deep into his neck until he giggled.
    The flash of memory caught him by surprise, and he suddenly saw a much younger Kate in their tiny apartment, bent over her school books, as always. About to leave for his bartending job, he hadn’t been able to get Ethan to bed on time. The little boy had been crying when Kate had picked him up. Though she’d obviously felt frustrated, the look on her face had been just as happy, just as full of love as he saw now. Long-ago Kate had looked at him over Ethan’s head, her expression one of sorrow and worry. He’d known that they couldn’t go on much longer the way they were.
    After dinner, Ethan invited him to play Xbox with him and Kate on the basement TV; Tony almost turned them down. He knew it was their thing, and the thought of all those educational puzzles and mazes didn’t exactly interest him, but he didn’t want to disappoint his son. To his surprise, Kate and Ethan were playing Diablo, and she was killing demons from hell like a pro. She was almost at the kid’s level, and Tony couldn’t hide his shock.
    She eyed him, her amusement tinged with triumph. “You knew we played Xbox together.”
    â€œYeah, but I thought . . . I don’t know.”
    Kate elbowed her son. “Guess you didn’t want to confess to your dad how often I kicked your butt.”
    Ethan winced. “Mom, come on,” he said in a low voice, looking around at his amused cousins.
    â€œOh, sorry,” she said, taken aback, but not exactly upset.
    Violent video games, Tony mused. Should he play the offended parent? Naw, the kid was thirteen.
    She’d changed a little bit, he realized, then kicked himself for imagining she’d stayed the same for nine years. Her life wasn’t all about school and studying, as it had seemed during their marriage. Kate was a different person, who could let loose with silly games or tell off her bosses instead of toeing the company line.
    And suddenly he realized he had to be very careful. He wasn’t going to get caught up in her again, not after everything that had happened, everything she’d done to ruin their marriage—to hurt him. He wasn’t going to become friends