‘Umm.’ Crap, where was he going with this now? ‘You’re very neat, organised. Just what we need to counter our over exuberance.’
‘Are you saying I’m boring?’
He could feel the blood drain from his face. God, this woman tied him up in knots. He was supposed to be the one skilled with words, with the art of persuasion, but when it came to Gabby he became whatever the verbal equivalent of fingers and thumbs was. ‘Hell, no. I’m saying …’ He paused, drew in a breath. ‘I’m saying—’
‘Please help us,’ Zoe interrupted, bouncing up and down. ‘I want a pretty tree. Owen’s rubbish at stuff like that.’ She pointed to her wonky pigtails. ‘He can’t even put my hair in plaits properly.’
As a big smile spread across Gabby’s gorgeous face, Owen had to fight the urge to lift Zoe into his arms and hug her for putting it there. ‘If you want a pretty tree, I’m your woman.’
Zoe beamed. ‘Don’t go away. I’ll get the things from the car.’
When she’d disappeared, Owen’s mind raced with which of the gazillion words he’d rehearsed, he should say first.
‘Did you put her up to this?’
Gabby’s question rocked him back. ‘No. Of course not.’ What did she think he was, a manipulator of young girls? But then he remembered the chat he’d had with Zoe when she’d wanted to know why her mum had asked if looking after her was okay with his girlfriend. ‘I might have told her I’d promised to go on holiday with my girlfriend and now she wasn’t talking to me.’
Gabby’s eyes flashed. ‘You made me out to be the bad guy?’
The hope that had bloomed so eagerly when he’d first noticed her in his back garden, shrivelled a little. ‘Of course I didn’t.’ His eyes sought hers. ‘I’d like to think there was no bad guy in this scenario. Just an unfortunate set of circumstances.’
Her expression told him the jury was very much still out on that. Thankfully Zoe chose that moment to dart back into the room, bringing with her a rush of cold air and a buzz of boundless enthusiasm.
‘I’ve got everything.’ She dumped the bags she’d been carrying onto the floor in front of them. ‘Can we start now? What goes on first? Mum says you should always do the lights first, so you don’t knock the decorations off when you twist the lights round the tree. Shall we do that? Put on the lights?’
Owen saw a small smile cross Gabby’s face and his heart lifted. ‘First we need to saw a bit off the bottom of the tree and put it in the stand.’ He might be rubbish at making a tree look pretty, but at least he knew how to make it stable. ‘Otherwise you’ll have a wobbly tree and everything will fall off.’
As he grasped the tree, Owen glanced over Zoe’s shoulder, noticing Hilda and his dad still talking away, Hilda looking twenty years younger. He had a sudden flashback to his parents’ thirtieth wedding anniversary. To where he’d watched from the back of the hall, a gangling, awkward twenty-year-old, as his dad had effortlessly twirled his mum around the dance floor.
He shouldn’t be surprised to see Hilda looking so enthralled, he realised. The old man had charm. He’d just forgotten how to use it since his mum had died. He looked again at Hilda. Though she was nothing like his mum, she’d had a tough life, and for the last few years, so had his dad. If they could make each other happy, he wasn’t going to stand in anybody’s way.
‘Owen,’ Zoe huffed, hands on her hips. ‘We haven’t got all day. It’s Christmas Eve tomorrow.’
Shaking himself, he touched his forelock. ‘Sorry, ma’am. I’ll get to it right away.’ It earnt him a giggle out of Zoe. And a smile from the gorgeous dark-haired woman he needed to persuade to give him another chance.
She was the one, he acknowledged as he sawed off the stump before wrestling the tree into the stand. It had taken him thirty-two years, and a reasonable amount of sampling, but he’d finally found a woman he wanted to build a future with. To dance with at their thirtieth wedding anniversary.
He simply needed to convince her that’s what she wanted too. It didn’t have to be next week. Or next year, he reassured himself as he wriggled under the tree to tighten the screws on the tree holder. But he had to do it.
Happy with his plan, he went to straighten up, forgetting he was beneath thick branches covered in spikey needles.
‘Ouch.’
Rubbing his head, he shuffled inelegantly backwards before scrambling to his feet.
‘Did you have fun down there?’
Gabby looked amused, though he wondered quite how amused she’d be if she knew what he’d been thinking. ‘Great, thanks.’ He held her gaze. ‘Nothing I like better than a fumble under the tree.’
She raised her eyes to the ceiling, though the flush on her neck reassured him she might not like him right now, but she wasn’t immune, either.
Zoe dived into the carrier bags. ‘Lights now. We have to put all of them on, ’cos then it will look all twinkly at night time.’
As they weaved the lights around the tree, and loaded it with baubles, Owen caught Gabby watching him and Zoe but her expression gave him no clue what she was thinking.
‘No, no not there.’ Zoe tugged off the red bauble he’d just hung. ‘You can’t put red next to pink. Duh. It needs to go over here.’
‘What’s wrong with red and pink together? I like both colours.’ He flashed a smile at Gabby. ‘Especially red. I have a real fondness for red.’ She shook her head at him, but her lips twitched. Feeling he was on a roll, he nudged Zoe. ‘I forgot to give you today’s joke. Why can’t Christmas trees sew?’
‘I don’t know,’ she said slowly, angling her head.
‘They always drop their needles.’
Zoe put her hands to her face in dramatic fashion. ‘OMG, that’s bad.’
‘I agree.’ Gabby reached for a silver bauble, placing it next to the red one and receiving no rebuke from Zoe. ‘If you’re going to tell Christmas jokes, they have to better than that. Where do you—’
‘Oh no.’ Owen put a hand over Gabby’s mouth, feeling a jolt of desire as his palm brushed her soft lips. ‘Zoe is restricted to one joke a day. Otherwise she risks laughing so much she pops.’
Zoe pouted. ‘That’s not fair. I want to hear Gabby’s joke. It has to be betterer than yours.’
‘Better than mine,’ he corrected. ‘And that is highly unlikely.’ Reluctantly he took his hand away from Gabby’s mouth. ‘But if you want to risk popping, go ahead.’
Zoe nodded rigorously, looking wide-eyed at Gabby.
Owen whispered to Gabby. ‘Go on then, hotshot. No pressure.’
She gave him a cool look. ‘Zoe, where do you find reindeer?’
Zoe frowned, pursing her lips. ‘I don’t know.’
‘It depends where you left them.’
Zoe doubled over with laughter. ‘That’s way better than Owen’s.’
‘It’s not even clever,’ he retorted, pretending to be miffed. ‘But as Gabby’s clearly better at decorating trees and telling jokes, I’ll leave you both to it.’
He walked away to the sound of more laughter, the noise curling around his heart and tugging hard.
Chapter Twenty-One
Owen walked slowly towards Hilda and his dad, keen to observe them from a distance before Hilda changed into his PA.
And bam, there it was. The moment she caught sight of him, she straightened and looked at her watch.
‘Hilda, thanks so much for helping out today. I hope Dad hasn’t bored you too much.’
‘Not at all.’ She shot to her feet, all starchy and professional again. ‘But heavens, I should go. I didn’t intend to stay this long. I’ve got so much still to do.’
‘Hey, relax.’ He took in a breath, and tried to do the same. ‘It’s nearly Christmas. Nobody is expected to work. Besides, you’ve been doing your boss a huge favour.’ The smile he gave her almost cracked her face. Almost. Yet when she was talking to his dad, she seemed to smile most of the time.
‘What are your plans for Christmas?’ he asked as he walked with her towards t
he front door. ‘Taking it easy, I hope.’
‘I’m afraid I see Christmas as all a bit of a fuss about nothing. I shall be at home.’
‘By yourself?’
The gaze that had been holding his, shifted towards the door. ‘I’m often by myself at home. That’s what comes of living alone. I can assure you I’m quite used to it, and quite happy.’
She didn’t look happy. Aside from the few times he’d witnessed her with his dad. A thought struck him. ‘How did you know to put Clarissa’s cage outside earlier? You looked like a real pro at catching budgies.’
‘I used to keep them. But then the man I … was seeing didn’t like them, so that was the end of that.’
‘You don’t strike me as a woman who’d allow a man to dictate how she lived her life.’
‘I wouldn’t now, but back then …’ Her expression turned sombre. ‘I was young and impressionable. He was older and, to my naïve mind, rather impressive.’
He studied her for a moment before deciding to go with his gut. ‘You can tell me it’s none of my business, but this man … was he your old boss?’ The shock that flew across her face gave him his answer. ‘I’m not judging,’ he added quietly.
She stared down at her hands, swallowing a few times before finally meeting his eyes. ‘I didn’t realise he was married in the beginning.’
‘How old were you?’
‘Twenty. It was my second job. By the time I realised I wasn’t his girlfriend but his mistress, it was too late. I was in love, with all the foolishness that brings. Of course I should have left. Moved away. Instead I stayed with him until he retired.’ She paused, drawing in a breath. ‘After which he moved with his wife to Spain.’
‘Christ, Hilda, I’m sorry.’
‘No need to be. It was entirely my fault.’
He opened his mouth to argue – the man in a position of power, seducing his secretary half his age, was the one at fault – but then he saw how uncomfortable she looked. ‘Well, your budgie keeping skills certainly came in useful today. Dad would have been lost without Clarissa.’
Her face relaxed a little. ‘I was glad to help.’
‘She’s the only female he’s really spoken to since Mum died.’ He smiled into Hilda’s eyes. ‘Until recently.’
Her eyes darted away but it was the tinge of pink in her cheeks that confirmed it. She really did have a thing for his dad. ‘You know, if you fancy some company on Christmas Day, you’d be very welcome here. Dad’s staying and though he’s great with Zoe, I’m sure he’d welcome some conversation from someone nearer his own age.’ Because she looked both flustered and agitated, he added. ‘No need to answer now. Just pop round if you feel like it. We’ll eat around one o’clock and I’ve bought a turkey big enough to feed the entire sales division.’ When she glanced up in horror, he laughed. ‘Don’t worry, you’re the only one with an invite.’
She had one foot out of the door when she glanced back at him. ‘I hope you’ll also extend an invitation to marketing.’
Stunned, he watched her march towards her car. And found he was now the one blushing.
It had been a long time since Gabby had decorated a tree. As a child she’d decorated a few with the nanny, in the days before boarding school, and later one or two with her mother, when she’d been home in time.
She’d never displayed the same innocent enthusiasm that Zoe was showing.
‘You seem to be an expert at this,’ she remarked as Zoe moved yet another pair of clashing baubles.
‘Mum taught me. We have this tree that lives in the loft and Mum brings it down every Christmas. She used to only let me put silver and purple baubles on ’cos then it matched the room, but now it’s been painted – the room, not the tree.’ She grinned, flashing a pair of cute dimples. ‘I guess next year we’ll have to buy green baubles.’ With a nod of satisfaction, she took a step back. ‘Will Mum and Simon have a tree where they’re staying?’
Gabby had zero experience of children, other than once being one. Was this Zoe admitting she missed her mum? Or just her chatting? ‘You’ll be able to ask her when she phones you, I suspect.’
Guilt niggled as she thought of her own mum. She’d told her she’d be popping out to deliver the jacket. That had been two hours ago. Then again, maybe it was about time her mother was left waiting for her to turn up. Wondering if she ever would.
Zoe flipped back her wonky pigtails. ‘I bet it won’t look nearly as good as this one.’ Her smile was full of pride, and joy. Nope, she wasn’t missing her mum. At least not yet.
‘I bet you’re right. You chose a good tree.’
‘Owen chose the tree. I picked out a small one but he said as it was our first Christmas together for ages, we should have a big tree. And a big turkey.’ She giggled. ‘He said big everything except the sprouts.’
Gabby wondered at the bond she’d seen between them. If she remembered correctly, Owen had said he’d ended his relationship with Stella four years ago, and he’d lived with her for four years before that. It meant Zoe probably couldn’t remember a time when she hadn’t known Owen. God, so many questions she wanted to ask, but they would have to wait. She could hardly quiz Zoe.
Dimly Gabby heard the front door close. A few seconds later Owen appeared, hands casually in his pockets, a pensive expression on his handsome face.
No, she scolded herself. Don’t think how gorgeous he looks in his faded jeans and casual hoodie – how perfect he’d be to model an Abercrombie range targeted at the over thirties.
Think of the holiday he promised you and failed to deliver on.
‘That looks great, ladies.’ His gave Zoe’s pigtails an affectionate tug before his eyes landed on hers.
Don’t think how adorable he is with Zoe.
‘I’d thank you, but it was mainly Zoe’s doing.’ She kept her expression neutral, her eyes steady on his. ‘As my work here is done, I need to get going. My mother will wonder where I am.’
‘She’s staying with you?’
‘Yes.’ The conversation with her mother still whirled round her head. Did she believe what she’d said? And if she did, was she really going to allow her back into her life?
She watched as Owen pointed Zoe towards his father. ‘Take what’s left of the decorations over to my dad and get him to help you decide where to put them.’
As she trooped off, Owen’s gaze found hers again. ‘How is your mum?’
‘Fine.’
He heaved out a sigh, jamming his hands in his jeans pocket. ‘Is that all I’m going to get now? This is me you’re talking to, Gabby. Not a work colleague. Not a distant relative.’
Hurt lurked deep in his eyes, hurt and an edge of frustration. Suddenly she felt ashamed of her recent behaviour. All he’d done was try to help a lovely young girl, one he was clearly very attached to, have a great Christmas. Sure, it had meant letting her down, but wasn’t that better than disappointing sweet little Zoe?
‘Gabby?’
‘Sorry, I just don’t want to talk about my mother right now.’ She sucked in a breath, let it out slowly. ‘But she is fine. There are no problems between us.’
Restlessly he tugged a hand through his hair, clearly still upset. ‘Yet there are problems between us, and I don’t like it.’ He clasped her shoulders, eyes blazing down into hers. ‘I’ll repeat it as many times as you want to hear it. I’m sorry I had to cancel on you. More sorry than you can ever imagine. It was absolutely the last thing I wanted to do.’
God, the sincerity in his voice. Those earnest blue eyes. ‘I believe you.’
His chest rose and fell, the grip of his hands loosening. ‘That’s a good start.’
She took a deliberate step back and he flinched but she needed distance to say the next words. ‘It’s me who should be apologising. When you said you couldn’t go, I was upset and I said some things that were unfair. I realise now when you told me you couldn’t let her down, you didn’t mean your ex, you meant Zoe.’ She nodded over to where Zoe was skipping
round the room, shoving tinsel on every surface she could find. ‘I can see how much she means to you.’
His eyes followed hers, and his expression turned soft. No, she realised, besotted. ‘Yeah.’ He gave an uncharacteristically awkward shrug. ‘I know it sounds daft, but she’s like my daughter. She wasn’t even two when I started living with Stella. I was the one who read her bedtime stories. Who taught her how to catch, and to kick a ball. I helped her with homework, picked her up from school when Stella couldn’t make it.’ His jaw clenched. ‘For four years I did everything a father would do.’
His voice sounded raw and instinctively she reached to squeeze his arm, even as a ripple of unease ran through her. Heaven help her, this man was ready to have a family. How could she possibly be the right woman for him?
‘How often do you see her now?’
His eyes fell to where her hand still rested on his arm, and he covered it with his. ‘Not nearly enough. Stella had this mad idea that if Zoe saw me she wouldn’t bond with her new man, Simon. But we spoke before she went on holiday and I think she’s realised she was wrong.’ He stared directly into her eyes. ‘I plan on seeing Zoe a lot more next year.’
Was it a warning? The unease sharpened, and Gabby snatched her arm away. How could she be ready for this, when she couldn’t handle something as simple as a change in holiday plans without blowing it out of all proportion? ‘I need to go home.’
Ignoring the leave-me-alone vibes that must have been pulsing off her, he rested a palm against her cheek. ‘I want us to get back to where we were.’
She nodded rigorously, too rigorously, knowing she needed to get away before she started to panic and say something stupid. Something that might turn him away completely. ‘Me too.’ It was the one thing she knew for certain. ‘I just need time to think. To … reassess.’
His thumb gently stroked her skin. ‘Are you still going on holiday tomorrow?’
‘I’m packed.’ It wasn’t an answer. They both knew it.
‘Well, if you change your mind and decide to stay, we’d love you to spend Christmas Day here, with us.’ A family Christmas. Could she even do that? Slowly her chest began to constrict, leaving her feeling suffocated. ‘And if your mother is still with you, obviously she’d be welcome, too.’
A Little Christmas Charm Page 16
