Everyone gaped at him—his father and Grace, Sawyer and his wife. Hell, even the kids were staring at him like he’d gone crazy for back-talking The Admiral.

“Nothing,” he decided to reply.

“He said he wants to be happy like you and dad, Grandpa!” Eve, Sawyer’s precocious daughter, chirped.

“Are you saying that not one of the women you’ve dated—women from good families—made you happy?” The Admiral asked with a consternated frown. “Tell me, son, is this about those strange Christmas cards Grace found in your nightstand from a supposed secret admirer?”

Josh stilled. Then cut his eyes at Grace, who’d claimed she was bored and begged him to let her pick up his place last month, even though he preferred to do his own housekeeping.

Apparently, she’d used the opportunity to do some snooping for his father.

Josh didn’t trust easily after what he’d seen in both that desert and civilian life. So Grace’s betrayal hit hard.

“Ooh! Uncle Josh got secret ’mirerer!” Eve sing-songed—then she had to ask her brother, Trevor, “What’s a secret ’mirerer?”

“A secret admirer is when someone you don’t know likes you,” Trevor answered in a tone that managed to be teacherly and gossipy at the same time.

Then they both oohed together.

Grace looked away guiltily as Sawyer shushed his children.

His father just tightened his jaw and demanded, “Care to explain this to me, Joshua Greenlee Grant?”

How could he answer that question without sounding crazy?

He couldn’t tell his family that he’d never wanted any of the women he’d dated in real life as much as he wanted the secret one who sent him a card every Christmas?

So, he sunk into silence as his father lectured him about duty and legacy. Then he returned to his office in D.C. for the first two weeks of December and resumed his life of being a good soldier—at least, career-wise.

His father was right. He needed to settle down before he hit his forties. Yet, not two minutes after walking into his administrative suite at his assigned House Office Building, he told his assistant, “If a Christmas Card with no return address shows up—”

“I know, I know, bring it to you straight away,” Vickie answered before he could finish. “Same as every year I’ve been working for you.”

The card came just a couple of days before the House recessed for the holidays.

And something inside his chest loosened when Vickie set it on his desk. Every other day of the year was mud he’d had to trudge through to reach this moment, he realized as he went outside to read his secret admirer’s words.

The cold December wind bit into his skin, but a warm, tender feeling settled over him as he pulled her card out of the envelope.

Dearest Josh,