AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She rested her head back on his shoulder and let her eyes fall closed. She would walk away from this when the snow was gone.
It was the only way to protect herself from repeating her parents’ mistakes. But she was here now. And so was Rufus and they both knew what this was. So, she was going to soak this up, and absorb enough comfort from his body as he would give her.
‘Mmm,’ she murmured. ‘Is that roast potatoes I can smell?’
‘And here I thought it was my body making you feel better. You’re only in this for the food.’
‘In my defence,’ she said, opening her eyes and turning her head so that she could see his face, ‘the food is spectacularly good.’
He grinned. ‘And the rest?’
‘Satisfactory, so far,’ she said with a smirk.
And then before she knew what was happening, she was on her back, the sheepskin rug tickling the back of her neck as Rufus loomed over her. She hooked her ankle around his as a shiver of anticipation shot through her body.
‘Satisfactory,’ he repeated, his face deadpan as he lowered to his elbows, pressing the breath from her chest—as if she even cared about breathing just now.
‘Sounds like I need more practice,’ he said, his lips brushing her temple, her ear, her jaw.
‘You’re going to burn the potatoes,’ she said, biting her lip to stifle a moan. The only thing that felt better than what Rufus was doing right now was winding him up while he did it. But then his mouth was on hers and there were much better things to do with her tongue than talk.
* * *
‘They’re crunchy.’
‘You say crunchy, I say burnt.’
‘They’re crunchy, and I don’t regret a minute that they were in the oven.’
She smiled. ‘Good. I should hope not.’ She tipped the potatoes out into a serving dish, and snapped a few shots for Lara.
‘Do you think we made enough?’ she asked with an ironically raised eyebrow at the banquet laid out before them.
‘So I don’t know how to cook for two. It’s fine. There’s lots of space in the freezer. Are you done with that? Do you think we’re going to get to eat any of it while it’s still hot?’
‘I’m nearly done,’ she said, pouring gravy on the two full plates she’d staged with silverware and glasses on a table in front of the kitchen window, where they could take advantage of the natural light. And once the photo shoot was done, Rufus whipped a couple of hot plates from the Aga and carried them through to the dining room, which had been too dark for the camera, but was the perfect backdrop to an intimate dinner that they had barely wanted to dress for. Rufus had laid one place at the head of the table, and the other just to one side. The centrepiece had been pulled over between them, so that their little corner of the grand dining room was every bit as cosy as any table for two.
She slid into the seat beside Rufus and reached for the wine bottle, pouring them both a generous measure of the rich, delicious burgundy that they had opened the night before.
‘Are you feeling better?’ he asked as she tucked into the roast turkey.
‘Yes, much better, thank you. I didn’t expect to feel sad today. I thought I felt like that because I was forced to spend it with my parents.’
‘But it turns out you were sad anyway.’ He reached for her hand and squeezed. ‘And that’s okay. You miss your sister. The way your family used to be. The way your life used to be.’
‘Yes. I think you’re right. Just like you do,’ she answered and waited for his automatic denial. But instead he frowned, a crease appearing between his brows.
‘Yes. Like me, I suppose,’ he said. ‘We have that in common. Lives that could be simplified by the existence of a time machine.’
‘I’m not sure that a time machine ever simplified anything. But I wish I could have Charlotte back. Failing that, I need to find a way to be happy without her. I can’t go on hiding from the problems in my family for ever.’ He squeezed her hand, and her heart swelled a little at the unspoken support, and had to remind herself that its presence was only temporary. She couldn’t rely on him to make her Christmases bearable, because thi
s time next year he would be long gone. No, she was going to have to figure that one out by herself.
She pulled her hand from him, shaking herself into the present. ‘Come on,’ she said, picking up her cutlery. It would be criminal to let this food go cold. They chatted as they ate, and she felt the sadness fade. The warmth and cheer that she and Rufus had found here gradually pushing out the darker parts of her heart, making room for something else. Someone else. He wasn’t going to stay there. She knew that. They both knew that. But it made her wonder. When this was all over, was she going to let those parts of her creep back to how they had been before? Or was she going to keep pushing against those thoughts and feelings that made her unhappy and see if she could replace them with something new? It didn’t have to be Rufus. She didn’t want it to be a man. She’d seen what had happened to her parents when they had given too much of their hearts to another person for safe keeping and found them inadequate to the task. But she could fill it with her. She could look at the hurts that she had absorbed from her parents and decide whether she wanted those parts of her past making decisions for her.
Or she could embrace Christmas the way that she and Charlotte had when they were children and decide unequivocally for herself that joy in the Christmas season was going to be her gift to herself this year.
She smiled as she reached for one of the crackers on the table and held it out to Rufus.
