by C F Dunn
Hailing from a family where the production of food had been ritualized to something resembling a military operation overlaid with an almost religious mysticism, to me the Lynes were a revelation. Everyone joined in and, out of the seemingly chaotic process, produced order amid much laughter and jostling, jibes and wet tea towels that were used more for flicking unsuspecting victims than for drying anything. By the end of the process, I became adept at darting between the flying elbows and comments to retrieve a plate or glass, drying it and giving it to whoever was putting things away at the time. Chaos it might have been, but it made it all so much more fun.
“Is it normally like this?” I asked Matthew as the family began to disperse to their different homes.
He wiped a bunch of soapsuds off my cheek. “Yes, although that was pretty tame. Wait until Joel arrives tomorrow – that’ll liven things up a bit. Doesn’t your family do this sort of thing?”
“You’ve met them! The most interesting thing that I can remember happening recently was Flora’s Barbie getting stuck in the gravy.”
“Point taken; you had a deprived childhood for which we must endeavour to make amends.”
My mind boggled, especially as he had that look on his face that suggested he was scheming. “It wasn’t that deprived,” I said, backing away from him.
“Indeed,” he said, eyes glinting, “but there’s always room for improvement.” He glanced around the empty kitchen. “Now, which will it be tonight, your bed or mine?” He picked me up before I could respond and flung me over his shoulder, my hair falling out of its loose plait and swinging as he spun around and headed for the door.
“Matthew! Propriety please!” I gasped, although all I could do was hang on to his sweater.
“I reckon I have the best view in the house,” he said, patting my behind. I squeaked, kicking my legs in token gesture of protest.
“This one’s not bad either,” I pointed out, laughing. His strong legs carrying me easily, we were already halfway up the stairs, my protests undermined by fits of giggles, when he suddenly stopped, his head whipping up.
“What’s the matter?” I tried to look around, but he slid me off his shoulder, guiding my feet to the broad steps. He listened intently. I could hear nothing. “What is it?”
He put his finger to his lips, eyebrows pulled together in concentration. Just as suddenly, he took my hand. “Come on, let’s go.” As we reached the landing, a door on the left opened and Henry came out with his head down, a look of concerned displeasure on his face. He looked up as he heard our footsteps. He said nothing as he came towards us but gave a slight nod of his head as he passed to go downstairs.
“I’ll see you in the morning, Henry,” Matthew said, as if in answer.
“Goodnight,” his son replied.
“That was Maggie’s room,” I prompted, as my bedroom door shut with a reassuringly solid click.
“Yes, it was.” He walked over to the fire and began placing logs in the raised grate. “Your room or mine?” he asked, without offering any further information. I took the hint.
“Yours needs to look more lived in,” I suggested.
“True, but yours is warmer. How about yours tonight, mine tomorrow?”
I pursed my lips and tried to look as if it were a really hard decision until he tickled me around my waist and I writhed to escape. “OK, OK, you win, but give me half an hour’s head start.”
He squinted unnecessarily at his watch. “Twenty-nine minutes and forty-six seconds and counting. Forty-five, forty-four, forty-three, forty… what are you waiting for?”
I waved him towards the door, laughing. “For you to leave. Go – now – shoo.”
“I know what’s missing.” I spluttered around my toothbrush, coming out of the bathroom to speak to Matthew, who lay, ankles crossed and fully clothed on my bed, waiting for me to finish. He had given me exactly the half hour in which to shower and get ready for bed. He had his hands behind his head as he contemplated the ceiling. “What’s that?” He turned to regard me, a smile hovering around his lips as he took in the toothbrush I brandished like a conductor’s baton.
I retreated to the bathroom to rinse the mouthful of toothpaste. I returned to the doorway, brush still in hand. “Christmas decorations. Why don’t you have any? You don’t have anything against them, do you, any religious objections, or anything like that? Without them, it makes the house look sort of… forlorn.”
Light from the bedside lamp glinted off the face of his watch as he adjusted his position on the bed. “Does it? I hadn’t thought about it. I don’t have any reservations about having them, and certainly not religious ones. There didn’t seem to be much point before now – not just with me here – and this year… well, it might surprise you to learn I’ve been preoccupied.” He slipped off the bed and sauntered over, running the palm of his hand down the length of my hair and then the long revers of my dressing gown. “Can’t think why that might be… mm, you have toothpaste just… there…” I tried to lick at the remnants at the same moment he used the side of his thumb to wipe the corner of my mouth, and my tongue brushed inadvertently against his skin. Our eyes met, an unspoken current running between us. “It’s being very resistant.” He leaned down slowly, eyes locked, mesmerizing, and drew the tip of his tongue in a line along my bottom lip, lingering at the corner. My lips burned as I stretched towards him, feeling his mouth smile beneath mine at my response.
“That’s better,” he murmured. “I’ve been waiting to do this all day.”
I breathed him in, my cheek against his. “Do what – exactly?”
“Be alone with you in my own home, in our own time, no interruptions.” His voice became low and gruff and laden, and the room swam out of focus. His mouth travelled under my jaw and down my neck, sending goosebumps along my arms and across the top of my shoulders.
“Almost alone,” I managed to remind him as my breaths shallowed and shortened, and my heart battered against my ribs. And then it didn’t matter anyway because he picked me up and took me to my bed and showed no sign of stopping, and I didn’t care because this is what I wanted and had wanted for so long that it hurt to remember.
But it was wrong.
“No, Matthew, no. Please, don’t…” I twisted my head away and tried to push him from me but, encased in his arms, I had no room to break away – although every corpuscle of my body yearned to be with him. “Matthew – no, this is wrong!” His arms opened abruptly. I wriggled out from under him, curling my legs up tight on the far edge of the bed, and pulling my dressing gown around me. He looked bewildered, his honey hair dishevelled, his blue eyes wild. “You wouldn’t forgive yourself,” I whispered.
He ran his hand slowly across his eyes and down his face, then rolled over and sat with his back to me for what seemed like an age. “You’re right, of course,” he said, at last. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t put you in such a position. That was stupid, no – selfish – of me. It’s just that sometimes…” he shook his head, “… sometimes it feels so right – we feel so right – that I forget. God forgive me, but I do forget, Emma.” He turned and looked at me so despondently that it was all I could do to resist throwing my arms around him. I grabbed a plump pillow and hugged it instead.
“Don’t be sorry for me, I’ll survive. And you’re not being selfish, and if you are, then so am I, so don’t go and do a guilt trip on me. Although,” I said ruefully, “I think we both deserve medals for our restraint.”
He managed a half-hearted smile. “As I said, that was selfish of me…”
“But utterly tantalizing,” I interrupted, clasping the pillow more firmly and burying the lower part of my face in it so that all he could see were my eyes peeping out over the top.
He leaned over and stroked my bare feet, which I hadn’t realized were wiggling feverishly. “So I see.” He kissed my toes and my skin warmed at his touch. He drew the counterpane resolutely but regretfully over them. “I think we’d better think pure thoughts for a while. So
you would like some Christmas decorations, would you?”
“Can I ask one thing first, before we change the subject?”
“What’s that?”
“Do your family think we are sleeping together as in not sleeping together, if you see what I mean?” I flushed, embarrassing myself with my ridiculous ambiguity.
He held back a laugh. “Well, I think I do. Let me see… I haven’t said anything directly other than to Henry, and he won’t have said anything to the others – except perhaps to Pat – so I would have to say that the rest of the family have probably drawn their own conclusions. Why, does it matter what other people think?”
I gazed at him over the pillow, thinking it through. “Normally, I would have said not, because it is our business and our consciences, but I wonder if it does matter to them, or to some of them at least, especially Maggie and perhaps Ellie. It’s not a usual situation as it is.”
His brow puckered. “Are you saying I should tell them?”
I cringed at the thought, my toes curling correspondingly under the covers. “No! Well… blow it, I don’t know, Matthew, but you know as well as I do that where there is room for doubt and speculation people fill it with all sorts of nonsense and, sometimes, it’s better to give them the information straight rather than let them make it up – or let it fester.” I shook my head slowly. “I don’t envy you this one.”
He stared blankly at the floor. “I’m not sure what’s for the best. I’ll think about it. Now, decorations.”
I welcomed the change of topic. “I wasn’t asking, so much as saying the house looks a bit bleak without them.”
He smiled. “But you would like them all the same?”
“Can we – please? It would make it more Christmassy. Just a few; we don’t need to go over the top.”
He patted my feet beneath the counterpane. “I think we can do something. In the meantime, you need your sleep, and I need a distraction.” He rose from the bed and I felt my face fall as he made for the door.
“You’re not leaving, are you?”
He stopped and looked back. “I won’t leave you. I’m just going to get a book. I’ll return in a minute.” And he smiled his half-smile, thin with restraint and thick with longing.
CHAPTER
2
Christmas Eve
By the time I woke next morning, Matthew had changed, and the dark blue sweater contrasting with his full, fair hair did nothing to reduce the memories of the night before that had dogged my sleep. He saw me awake and watching, and drew the curtains back to reveal a sun-laden sky, before coming over and kissing my forehead. “Good morning. Sleep well?”
I grunted and he grinned, making me wonder what he knew that I didn’t. “How about breakfast first, then decorations?” he suggested, looking immensely cheerful, and infecting me with his good humour.
Once I had showered and dressed, we walked downstairs and through to the kitchen holding hands.
“It won’t upset anyone having decorations up, will it?”
Matthew filled the kettle. “No, not at all. Why should it?”
I took the teapot from the cupboard. “It won’t be seen as muscling in on Ellen’s territory, or anything like that?”
He put down the bread he had taken from the larder, regarding me with that earnest look he adopted when he wanted to get something important across to me. “Emma, you have to remember that Ellen has never lived here, and that only Henry and Maggie remember Christmases when we were all together. As much as I respect Ellen, this is my home and I choose who lives here and what happens within these walls.” At a slight disturbance in the air, he raised his head and his tone changed, becoming resolute. I puzzled at the alteration, but he held my eyes steadily with his, as he continued. “While you are my guest here, you treat my home as your own. I will expect you to receive the respect and acceptance of all my family, irrespective of any misgivings anyone might have. As far as I am concerned, I have made my choice and the rest of my family will have to abide by it.” He released me from his rigid gaze and looked over my shoulder. “Good morning, Maggie.”
My back stiffened, feeling her rancour before I turned around to see it, and mentally shook my head out of the stupor in which his voice had left me. Given the conversation of the evening before, I guessed that Matthew had thought about our discussion, and had come to a decision. “Maggie, this is Dr D’Eresby. Emma, this is my granddaughter, Margaret.” I turned resignedly to greet her, my nerves in knots. A tall, handsome woman of an indeterminate age stared down at me, her beauty masculine, her manner haughty. “Maggie…” Matthew’s voice held a threat in it.
The sharp line her mouth formed made a mockery of her greeting. “Dr D’Eresby, you are welcome.” Blow, you could have fooled me – her tone dripped acid. I did a rough calculation and guessed that she must be fifty or thereabouts.
“Dr Lynes,” I replied equally coolly. We kept our hands to ourselves. She regarded me with intensely blue, intelligent eyes – as blue as Matthew’s – but without any hint of his warmth or humour. Her platinum hair had been cut short and inflexible around her square jaw, but her eyebrows made dark, harsh lines across her brow. I sensed no softness in her, no forgiving nature. She might have the unreal beauty of a Lynes, but it lay shrouded in a soul of concrete and steel.
With a grace that belied the rigidity of her manner, she went over to a cupboard and took out a mug. I thought about making tea, but Maggie was brewing coffee with her back to us and I decided my tea could wait.
Matthew ignored her. “Joel should be home today,” he said to no one in particular. “You’ll remember me mentioning him, Emma?”
“Yes, of course, it’ll be good to meet him.” Joel would need to have horns and a tail to outdo the evils Maggie exuded towards me at the moment.
She finished making coffee that smelled as noxious as her manner, and left the kitchen without giving me another glance. My shoulders relaxed. Matthew leaned his knuckles on the kitchen table. “Well, that went better than I expected.”
“It did! What on earth did you expect?”
“Not that,” he dodged, coming around to where I stood at the end of the table. “What I said wasn’t just for Maggie’s benefit, Emma, I meant it. You treat this house as your home. You go where you want and do what you want, and don’t be intimidated by anyone.” His eyes glanced to where Maggie had been moments before.
“Thank you,” I mumbled. Then more strongly: “I’ll get my tea now, in that case.”
He chortled and slid the toast out of the toaster before I heard it pop.
“This wasn’t what I had in mind for you.” Matthew surveyed the kitchen table and its multicoloured contents.
“But it has to be done and I don’t mind in the least bit; it makes me feel useful. Have a knife.” He took the vegetable knife from me and proceeded to chop the potatoes I had peeled into neat, even chunks before I had picked up the next one. He looked expectantly at me. “Don’t be so impatient. I can’t work at your pace. Here, peel some potatoes or go and entertain yourself for a bit.”
He picked up the knife again and started to take thin parings off the rough-skinned potatoes faster than I could blink. “You really know how to make a girl feel inadequate, don’t you?” I said. He smiled to himself as he reached out for another. “Matthew, Pat and I were talking yesterday…”
“Uh-oh.”
“Wait, it’s not that bad. Pat said that she goes to church on Christmas morning, and I wondered whether you do. I mean, it’s not something we have talked about much, is it? You did say grace yesterday – I haven’t heard that version before, by the way – and I just wondered where you stand religiously, given your… unique… viewpoint.”
A slow smile had crept across his face as he listened to me struggle to outline what I knew could be a potentially explosive subject. He tossed another potato on the pile and then retrieved it as a second thought and dissected it expertly. “How long have you been wanting to ask me that?”
/> “Since this morni…”
He fixed me with one of his interrogative looks. “Emma, I know you better than that.”
I pouted. “Oh, all right, then. Since I read the journal in Stamford.”
“Ah.”
“Well, it must have been an issue for you in the seventeenth century, so I wanted to know how it influences you now.”
“Hence the question about Christmas decorations?”
“Well, perhaps, ye-es.”
“I would say that’s a definite yes.”
I flicked a potato paring at him. He moved and it passed inoffensively, landing on the floor.
“So…?” I pushed.
“So… yes, my faith is very important to me, it always has been. And that wasn’t just because of when I was born, either. My father was a deeply religious man, not dogmatic in the sense he didn’t impose his belief on me – or the household servants, for that matter – but he led by example. I think that’s why he found the war so difficult: it left no room to manoeuvre for those who had a less well-defined faith, and it forced them to take sides when they hadn’t yet fully understood the implications of it. I think it was why what happened to me all but broke him.”
The half-peeled potato sat forgotten in my hand, browning by stages in the air.
“Why? Because he didn’t understand what had happened to you? Did it make him question his faith?”
“No, not at all. You would have thought so, wouldn’t you? But then neither of us knew that I would persist, as you so aptly put it, so I don’t know how he would have coped with that. He was convinced salvation can be secured by all, and that included me, and he continued to believe in me despite everything, and long past when I had ceased to believe in myself. What shook him more than anything was how quickly people we had known for years – who had known my grandparents – turned against us. He never understood how fickle people can be…”
