Christmas at the Castle

by Marion Lennox

  ‘Really?’

  ‘You pay pretty good wages,’ she managed. ‘Without diamonds.’ She fell silent again, thinking of the ring, thinking of the number of zeroes, thinking this whole situation was absurd. She hugged Scruffy—or Mac?—because he grounded her. He was her one real thing in this absurd situation.

  ‘Why did you bring it to Scotland?’ she asked at last.

  ‘My mother wanted it included in the sale and paid back to the estate. She took it because she knew it’d infuriate my father. She never wanted to make money from it.’

  ‘Well, you certainly won’t make money from it now. I...that was dumb. But it was your own fault,’ she said, fighting for a bit of spirit. ‘Fancy you giving it to me. What on earth will your mother think?’ Her voice faltered a little. ‘Will...will you need to tell her?’

  ‘Of course.’ He thought about it for a bit and then added: ‘Maybe she’ll make no complaint. She liked Delia.’

  ‘She liked...’

  ‘Delia was a housemaid during my mother’s time. I believe they were friends when my mother needed a friend. The decisions Delia made after my mother left...well, right or wrong, they’re past and she’s more than paying for them. As for the ring... It paid for itself tonight,’ he said softly. ‘Good one, Holly. How did you guess how much she needed it?’

  ‘You agree?’ she asked, stunned.

  ‘Of course I do. Here I was, waving it round as a bribe and all the time it had a true home waiting. It just took a Holly to find it. Do you know what, Holly McIntosh? You’re amazing.’

  ‘I am not,’ she said, astounded.

  ‘Don’t argue with your boss,’ he said and turned to look at her.

  They’d stopped at traffic lights, which was just as well, Holly thought numbly because somehow she met that look. And what followed was one long frisson of something so deep, so powerful, she had no hope of explaining it.

  For the look went on and on, as if neither could figure how to break the moment. Finally, tentatively, he reached across and tugged her forward. She found herself leaning into him, closer, closer...

  A car honked behind them, and then another. More. A cacophony, reminding them where they were and that the lights were green and they needed to move on.

  Angus gave a rueful laugh and tugged away.

  ‘Later,’ he said and Holly flinched as reality hit. She backed into her seat and tried to make her racing heart settle. What had just happened? What was she doing? Was she nuts?

  ‘No!’

  ‘No?’

  ‘I’m a pretend fiancée,’ she retorted. She held up her weird sauce-bottle ring. ‘I’m not a real one. Get over it.’

  ‘We’ll fix that in the morning,’ he said, glancing at the ring with a smile.

  ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, I’m over rings. This one’s fine. This engagement’s for the sake of the children and they helped make this one.’

  ‘You don’t want another diamond?’

  ‘This is the third engagement ring I’ve had,’ she reminded him. ‘And the last!’

  ‘For ever?’

  ‘You’d better believe it.’

  ‘Holly...’

  ‘No,’ she said severely. ‘No kissing. No touching. I’m wearing a sauce-bottle ring to remind me that this engagement is a farce. It is a farce, My Lord, and you’d better believe it.’

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  THE HOTEL WAS over-the-top, breathtakingly gorgeous. Holly sat in the front of Angus’s car and stared in awe.

  ‘I’ve heard of this place,’ she breathed. ‘I never dreamed...’

  ‘It’s as excellent as its name suggests,’ Angus said. ‘I stay here every time I come to London.’

  ‘Of course you do,’ Holly said and then looked doubtfully down at the dog. ‘Will they let Scruffy in?’

  ‘Stanley organised it,’ he said. ‘There won’t be a problem.’

  There wasn’t a problem. Or not much of a problem.

  ‘We’ve put you in the top floor suite,’ the manager told them; he seemed to have sidled from nowhere at their approach to the reception desk, smoothly replacing the girl on duty. ‘It has access to our rooftop garden for the wee dog.’ He glanced at the wee dog and his face stilled—clearly there were wee dogs and wee dogs and this one didn’t quite fit his idea of the sort that would fit this establishment.

  ‘Excellent,’ Angus said. ‘Two bedrooms?’

  ‘One.’ The manager frowned. ‘Your man did say accommodation for you and your...partner.’ He glanced down at Holly’s finger and his face froze still more.

  ‘But His Lordship doesn’t like sharing with my dog,’ Holly said. ‘He...he snores. And he smells. He can’t help it, but there it is.’

  The man gazed at Angus and his expression took a slight turn towards sympathy. It was clear he was wondering how His Lordship had become lumbered with such a crazy duo as Holly and Scruffy. And then he turned apologetic, truly regretful at having to lumber him still more.

  ‘I am sorry, sir,’ he said. ‘But we don’t have room to manoeuvre. Being the last shopping week before Christmas we’re fully booked. You have a one-bedroom suite on the top floor. There is a settee. If you like, we can make the settee up into a bed, but...’

  ‘Yes, please,’ Holly said and then at the man’s look, she tilted her chin. ‘I’m an old-fashioned bride,’ she said.

  ‘As you wish,’ the man said. ‘We’ll make it up for you, My Lord.’

  My Lord. Angus had used this hotel before, but only as Angus Stuart. Stanley had used his title, then. Angus felt his mouth tighten. He’d given orders: make the booking, a suite with two bedrooms, dog-friendly and don’t use my title.

  Stanley did what he wanted. Stanley had been doing what he wanted for years, he thought. This room was probably his payback for the blast he’d given him for the dog. Still, he was stuck with the man until the castle sold. He was stuck with his dishonesty and his prejudices and his innate dislike of Holly.

  But not here he wasn’t. Here he had a one-bedroom suite with the woman who was wearing his engagement ring, albeit a very odd engagement ring.

  Holly. She looked wonderful. She was wonderful. She was a colourful, warm, vibrant woman who’d just charmed his siblings and his suspicious stepmother.

  She was also instinctively retreating.

  ‘Don’t even think it,’ she muttered as they headed for the lifts.

  ‘What?’ He tried to sound innocent but he knew he’d failed. She glanced at him as if she could read him in neon letters and it was all he could do not to flinch.

  ‘You know very well, so don’t even think about thinking about it,’ she retorted. ‘One errant thought from you and I’m ringing Gran.’

  ‘A worse fate could befall no man.’

  ‘Are you sure you didn’t set this up as a one-bedroom?’

  ‘If I’d had nefarious plans I wouldn’t have ordered a suite,’ he retorted. ‘No settee. Though, come to think of it, I always order a suite.’

  ‘Of course you do.’

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with being rich.’

  ‘No?’ She swivelled to stare at him. ‘I wouldn’t know.’

  ‘And it’s not my fault you’re poor.’

  She bit her lip at that. They’d reached the bank of lifts. She stood, hugging Scruffy, waiting for the next lift to arrive. Biting her lip some more.

  ‘No,’ she said at last. ‘It might even be fun to be rich sometimes.’

  ‘Yet you gave the ring away.’ He reached out and touched Scruffy, rubbing the little dog behind his ears. He really wanted to reach out and touch Holly but he knew, he just knew, that there was no joy down that road. ‘You could have bought a small restaurant with that ring.’

  ‘Wow,’ she said, and then the lift ar
rived and they entered and she leaned against the back and hugged Scruffy and stared straight in front of her.

  ‘Wow,’ she said again, more slowly. And then, ‘I’m glad I gave it to her, then. Delia should have it.’

  ‘She should,’ he agreed gravely. ‘But it was a very generous gesture.’

  ‘It should have been made by you,’ she said. ‘Years ago.’

  ‘I didn’t think about it. I didn’t know Delia and I didn’t understand the situation. But if my mother had given it to Delia years ago, my father would have taken it back.’

  ‘I guess.’

  ‘So you’ve righted a wrong,’ he said. ‘Well done, you. But you’ve done yourself out of a restaurant. Maybe I could help...’

  ‘If you’re about to say: let’s not use the settee and I’ll buy you a restaurant, Scruffy and I are hightailing it out of here right now.’

  ‘Hey,’ he said. ‘I know you’re not that sort of girl.’

  ‘Are you that sort of...Lord?’

  ‘Buying myself village maidens? I don’t think I’ve had enough training,’ he retorted and grinned. She looked so cute and so defensive and so...Holly.

  But then the lift stopped. The doors swung open and they were in their suite and Holly fell silent. Very silent.

  It might only be a one-bedroom suite, but what a suite! Angus had stayed here before, but not like this. Stanley had obviously laid on the title, and maybe also stressed that money was no object, for it seemed they were in the penthouse. The living room was vast. The dining table could seat a dozen, and the windows circling them showed a three-sixty view all over London.

  ‘Oh, my...’ Holly popped Scruffy on the floor and did a slow tour, taking everything in. Everything.

  For some reason, Angus stayed by the door, watching the girl, watching her reaction.

  He was accustomed to luxury—he’d never needed to stay in anything less than a five-star hotel in his life—but Holly...

  ‘This is fantasy stuff,’ she breathed. She’d completed her tour and came back to him. ‘You have a dressing room that’s bigger than my apartment back in Sydney. You have a spa the size of a small swimming pool.’

  ‘We,’ he said faintly.

  ‘You,’ she snapped. ‘Scruffy—and yeah, I know, I should call him Mac but he still feels like Scruffy and he’s my security—Scruffy and I are going to haul one of these settees into a corner. Which one makes up into a bed, do you think? We’ll then pretend we’re peasants. Which, in fact, we are. Angus, your bed...it could take a dozen village maidens.’ She grinned suddenly, awe giving way to humour. ‘You can have ’em if you like,’ she said generously. ‘I’ll cook ’em breakfast. There’s a full kitchen!’

  ‘But I forgot to pack them,’ he said mournfully. ‘My village maidens.’ He gestured to his small valise. ‘Socks and jocks is all.’

  ‘And you wouldn’t even let the staff carry those up for you,’ she said reprovingly. ‘Have you no sense of dignity?’ She gazed round again and smiled back at him. ‘Very nice. Scruffy and I approve. Okay, we’re set. You have a bedroom bigger than a football field. Off you go and wallow, village maidens or not, and let Scruffy and I go to sleep.’

  ‘Your bed’s not made up yet.’

  ‘The manager said it will be. I’ll just...I don’t know... I’ll try and decide which window to look out of while I wait.’

  ‘You don’t want a spa?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Scared?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said repressively. ‘And so’s Scruffy.’

  ‘There’s no need to be,’ he said and then he hesitated.

  It was not much after nine. He knew she had a gorgeous dress—two gorgeous dresses—in her baggage. He’d watched as she’d chosen them. He could suggest they go downstairs, have a drink, listen to the band, maybe dance...

  He knew instinctively she’d refuse.

  ‘Scruffy could do with a walk,’ he said, but in answer she unflicked the lock to the nearest door and stepped outside. Here was a rooftop garden, complete with miniature lawn!

  ‘Problem solved.’

  ‘I didn’t mean a bathroom walk,’ he retorted. ‘I meant a proper walk. Besides, it’s freezing out there. Anything he managed would freeze mid-stream. I suggest we put on our big coats and go down to street level. The buildings block the wind. London’s full of Christmas. We could do the tourist rubber-necking thing—walk round with our mouths open.’

  ‘I could,’ she said and she suddenly sounded a trifle wistful. ‘I’ve never been to London.’

  ‘Then it’s compulsory,’ he said. ‘And now you even have some decent shoes. Coat. Scarf. Hat. Come.’

  She hesitated. She really didn’t trust him, he thought, and maybe he didn’t blame her. He wouldn’t trust a lord with his name, and Holly had been hurt before.

  He wanted to make that hurt better.

  The thought was so sudden and so powerful that it took him by surprise. He watched her hesitation and he thought...

  He didn’t know what he thought. Only that he was feeling something he’d never felt before. Something he’d never known he could feel.

  The urge to reach out and touch her was so huge it was almost overwhelming, yet somehow he held himself back.

  Head or heart? Since Louise, head was his mantra, yet here he was, forgetting.

  What was he thinking? It was way too soon, too sudden, too inappropriate.

  As stupid as falling for Louise?

  And thankfully Holly was no longer looking at him. The door had swung open and the bellboy was there with her luggage—courtesy of their shopping, her bags contained a whole lot more than his.

  ‘I bought a cashmere scarf,’ she said as the bellboy left, pouncing on it and hauling it from a shopping bag. Suddenly she sounded happy again. This was how Holly was meant to sound, he thought. Happy and laughing and carefree. ‘Or, rather, you bought it for me,’ she corrected herself. ‘I love it. Red and purple and bright, bright yellow. This is just the night to christen it. In honour of your scarf, Lord Angus, let’s go for a walk.’

  * * *

  The night was indeed cold. Scruffy wore his brand new tartan coat and his brand new lead. There’d been no snow here, or rain, so the pavements weren’t icy. Scruffy was certainly not objecting. He was a gamekeeper’s dog, he’d been cooped up all day and he practically pranced along before them.

  They weren’t the only ones who were out. This was one of London’s most popular tourist precincts. Many of the restaurants and shops along the riverfront were still open and there were lots like them, rubber-neckers, tourists taking in the Christmas feel of this great city.

  ‘It’s awesome,’ Holly whispered as she recognised her first landmark. A drunken party of revellers lurched towards them. Angus steered Holly aside and held her until they passed. They started walking again, but somehow Holly’s gloved hand stayed in his. He kept holding and she didn’t pull away.

  Surely it was an unconscious gesture for both of them, meant to keep them close in the crowds. She’d be a bit nervous, in unfamiliar territory. With the crowds around them, with Christmas lights, buskers, flashing window displays, he’d moved into protective mode and she’d simply accepted what surely must have come naturally.

  Surely no big deal, he thought, but the strange feeling around his heart was growing stranger. This was uncharted territory.

  This was a gesture of trust...

  ‘Say hello to the lion,’ Angus said and Holly stared at an incongruous lion standing sentry to Westminster Bridge. This was a magnificent lion, but...

  ‘Don’t look,’ Angus told Scruffy. ‘You needn’t think this is a London fashion. Victorian times called for Victorian measures. This is the Coade Lion and every man in London feels the tragedy that Victorian prudishness has made him sing falsetto.�
�

  Holly choked with laughter and he felt her relax still more. And the feeling around his heart grew...stranger.

  They were walking across the bridge now and Holly was silent, taking in the sights and sounds of night-time London. A double-decker bus swept by, one of the many carrying tourists around London. Maybe she’d like a ride.

  But then he thought...Christmas. The first time he’d ever come to London he’d walked in on evensong at Westminster Abbey and been blown away by its history and its beauty.

  He glanced at his watch. Eleven. There’d be no chance of getting into the Abbey at this hour.

  But still he veered towards it because the Abbey itself was enough to take a man’s breath away without even going in. As they got closer, as he steered woman and dog towards the entrance, he heard music wafting outwards. It was music to make a man hesitate.

  He glanced along the side wall and saw a uniformed security guard.

  ‘Any chance of going in?’ he asked and the man shook his head.

  ‘Choir practice, mate,’ he said amiably. ‘Not open to the public. Unless you’re associated with the choir.’

  ‘I’m about to make a donation to the choir,’ Angus said. ‘A sizeable one. You might mention it to the choir master if you would. And, of course, a tip to you because of Christmas.’

  Something slipped between the two men’s hands. The security guard glanced down and his eyes widened.

  ‘If you say no, then no it is, but I hope you won’t,’ Angus continued. ‘After all, it’s Christmas, the time of giving. I just need you to give me the opportunity to be generous.’

  * * *

  Which explained why, two minutes later, Holly was perched in an ancient pew, leaning against a vast stone pillar in the place where generations of Kings and Queens had been married and buried, where Londoners had worshipped for hundreds of years, and where now a choir of some of what must surely be the finest voices in England were practising Christmas hymns she’d learned as a child. The hymns were so familiar to her that suddenly, here, now, it was Christmas, it was Westminster Abbey and nothing else mattered in the world.