Christmas Wishes

by Sue Moorcroft

  ‘Because, Albin, I prefer to hear your explanation right here.’ Hannah’s voice gained a splash of acid. ‘Let’s talk about why you stated this shop was unprofitable and that you were going to obliterate it in favour of some sleazy club. Instead, here you are …’ her voice dropped to a velvety hiss ‘… selling stock you haven’t paid for.’

  Nico kept moving closer, studying a stand of scarves. They’d been folded and wound with precision but he would have paid a lot more attention to colour. Angling so he could see the man posed haughtily behind the counter, the woman pale and silent at his side, he unwound first a black scarf then a red one and left them out untidily. He might not have existed as far as Albin and Julia were concerned. They were totally focused on Hannah.

  ‘You are by nature impatient,’ Albin began condescendingly.

  ‘Bullshit,’ Hannah snapped. ‘Why is the shop still open and why are you selling my stock?’

  Suddenly, Albin’s attitude changed. He tilted his head and shrank like a puppy who knows he’s done wrong but also knows he’s cute. ‘I fell on hard times—’

  ‘BullSHIT!’ Hannah howled, slapping her hands on the glass counter with a force that shook a display of purses. ‘All you ever fell in was a pile of money! What is going on?’

  Albin dropped the act, tilting his nose up in a way that looked much more his natural style. ‘To acknowledge that we meant something to each other once I’ll tell you this much. The club was a fabrication designed to encourage you to leave and I never thought it would work so well. I suppose it wouldn’t have if you hadn’t been needed back in the UK but, believe me, Hannah, I was always going to get you out. You built your business on what I provided.’ He gave an elaborate shrug.

  ‘And … and your sex life?’ Hannah stammered. ‘Was all that sex-with-strangers stuff fabricated to make me want to get away from you?’

  Nico winced at the shock and distress in her voice. Albin gave another shrug but amusement flickered over his face.

  ‘You’ve been playing a game with me over the money you owe me, too, haven’t you?’ Hannah breathed, as if everything was so obvious to her now that she was cursing herself for a fool. Nico could imagine the hurt on her face. She seemed physically to be caving in, head and shoulders drooping. ‘I see your point about building my business while I lived with you,’ she muttered in a tiny voice, though it was a damned sight more than Nico saw. He messed up more scarves in irritation. Hannah went on, her voice filled with uncertainty. ‘But why are you running the shop? Why not just sell the lease?’

  Albin scoffed, the way people did when they were stating the obvious and waiting for the other party to catch on. ‘Erm … Julia wanted the shop? It’s a profitable business. I … call in on my lunch hour sometimes. We were about to put up the closed sign for half an hour when you arrived.’ He smirked meaningfully and Julia smiled up at him like a spaniel: pretty, glossy and adoring. They couldn’t have said, ‘We’re having an affair and Albin comes here for lunchtime quickies’ more clearly if they’d posted a notice in the window.

  Hannah’s head turned towards Julia. Julia’s smile fell away as if whatever she saw in Hannah’s expression killed her amusement stone dead. ‘I see.’ Contempt filtered into Hannah’s voice. ‘Julia’s taken my place. Don’t give up your own apartment, Julia, because it leaves you with nothing when he turns on you. Read your future in my past.’

  When Julia looked up at Albin this time her expression was less certain.

  Hannah turned back to her ex. ‘You’re still working as a fund manager, Albin?’ she asked slowly, as if yet to make sense of everything.

  Nico saw Albin roll his eyes. ‘Obviously.’ He seemed to feel no remorse for the manner in which he’d switched from one of the women before him to the other. He might even be pleased that he’d come out of it so well.

  Hannah took a step away from the counter. ‘You’re not going to pay me out until you’re good and ready, are you? Even if it’s unfair and I need the money? Even though it’s what you agreed?’

  ‘I’ll probably get round to it,’ Albin said carelessly.

  Hannah finally turned away and Nico saw her eyes were diamond hard. She joined him at the scarf stand saying to him sweetly, ‘So it will have to be your lawyer friend.’

  It didn’t take a genius to play along. ‘Sure, we’ll go to his office now.’ Nico essayed a sharky smile. ‘A trader in such a sensitive area as stocks, bonds and securities is excruciatingly vulnerable to legal action. My friend loves the opportunity to bring down arseholes who think themselves above the law and he owes me a favour.’ He didn’t look Albin’s way, pleased by the make-believe scenario he was spinning as fast as he could talk. It was more fun than creating bedtime tales of unicorns and princesses for Josie.

  Julia gave a horrified gasp at the same time as Hannah said, ‘You’re brilliant.’

  ‘Not as brilliant as him.’ Nico was enjoying the frozen, incredulous silence from Albin. ‘He’s savage. Made his name trashing the reputation of others.’ He held out his hand and Hannah took it as they turned for the door.

  Albin unfroze. ‘Who is this? Who are you?’ he demanded furiously. ‘What are you talking about?’

  Nico turned back and gazed at him. ‘I think you heard.’

  He opened the shop door unhurriedly, stepping back to allow Hannah through first. ‘Hungry yet?’ he asked, as if they’d already forgotten about Albin and his manipulative, unpleasant games.

  Hannah answered, ‘Maybe,’ just as Albin yelled, ‘Wait!’

  They paused and looked back.

  Ugly anger rang in his voice. ‘You fucking piece of shit,’ he seethed at Hannah. ‘Have your fucking money and get out of my life.’ He worked at his phone screen with bad-tempered swipes. ‘Done!’ he snapped.

  Hannah turned away, smiling into the wintry air as she fibbed happily. ‘We’re around a while so visiting Nico’s friend in a few days will be no hardship if the international transfer doesn’t come through. Merry Christmas.’

  Albin called a word after her that made Nico drop Hannah’s hand and spin around but she snatched at his arm. ‘Don’t. That’s what he wants. It’s his last roll of the dice to see if he can get you on an assault charge. Leaving him to stew impotently on loser status is much the sweetest revenge.’

  Nico could do no more than seethe silently as he let Hannah draw him up the street.

  It wasn’t until they got around the corner that she let herself pause, white in comparison with the colourful buildings of Stortorget. ‘Phew. That was horrible. He’s an ugly customer when he doesn’t get his own way.’

  Nico enveloped her in his arms, aware of her curves through the down-filled layers of their coats. ‘He’s a shit.’

  ‘I don’t care so much about that.’ She laid her head on his shoulder. ‘But my beautiful shop! It’s been taken from me and forever tainted.’ Then she added fiercely, ‘Whatever life holds for me next, it will be something that’s completely under my control.’

  They joined the others in the tea shop, though the encounter with Albin had left Nico with a bad taste rather than an appetite. Then it was time to retrieve their bags and take the train home. The girls both slept on the journey. As the snow-coated scenery flashed past the window, Nico linked fingers with Hannah beneath the table. He thought he’d been discreet until Carina hugged him in the station car park before getting into her own car, whispering, ‘She’s a good girl. I hope she makes you happy.’

  Nico hugged her back and murmured, ‘So far, so good.’ Then he took a refreshed Josie to visit his dad in hospital as Hannah professed herself happy to be dropped off to put Maria to bed.

  Lars was beginning to look more of a normal colour now. He beamed, hair sticking out untidily. ‘Out of hospital tomorrow. Then I’ll have to behave myself, under your mother’s nose again.’

  Nico laughed. ‘One of these days, Dad, you’ll have to explain your relationship to me.’

  Lars beamed harder. ‘When I understand it
myself.’

  Eventually, Nico drove Josie home and she got into her unicorn onesie to cuddle up on the sofa between him and Hannah and play a game on her iPad. He was far too early to tell Josie about the change between him and Hannah but he watched the warmth of their interaction with pleasure. ‘Come on,’ he murmured when Josie’s eyelids began to close, sliding her slight body into his arms. ‘I’ll carry you to bed.’

  Josie giggled. ‘I’m not a baby!’ But she snuggled into him as if she were Maria. ‘Stockholm was awesome,’ she told him sleepily as he kissed her goodnight.

  ‘It really was,’ he agreed.

  Later, he carried Hannah to bed, too.

  The rest of the Swedish trip passed in a blur.

  Nico turned up at the hospital to fetch Lars and was surprised to find Mattias already there. ‘Hej,’ he said. ‘I thought I was moving Dad into Mum’s spare room.’

  Mattias shrugged a shoulder. ‘I got a couple of hours off work.’

  Nico had little to do but watch medical staff swishing around and listen to the noises of the ward while Mattias packed Lars’s things. Then Lars drew the curtains around his bed to dress. ‘Dad staying with Mum,’ Nico tried, rather than stand in silence. ‘Makes you wonder what the divorce was about.’

  Mattias suddenly swung on him, eyes blazing, voice a hoarse whisper. ‘It was about your ice hockey career, which came to nothing anyway! Dad got the offer and you, golden balls, had to go off with him to the UK.’

  Nico was hurt but it was definitely time he had things out with his little brother. ‘You think he wouldn’t have accepted the UK job if I’d stayed here with you? I might as well accuse you of keeping Mum from me because you were so ridiculously good at school she wouldn’t move you.’

  Mattias reared back in shock. ‘Everything goes right for you,’ he snapped, but with less conviction.

  Nico laughed harshly, just about holding on to his temper. ‘Like not making it in ice hockey because I didn’t have a strong enough stomach? Like my wife cheating on me and getting pregnant so my marriage ended and I became a single parent? Like Loren using Maria as a weapon to jerk my chain?’

  Mattias hissed furiously, ‘A weapon? You already had a beautiful daughter and then you got a spare child arrive on your doorstep! And now you’re having an extended holiday in the country.’

  A slow, deep breath. Nico murmured, ‘I’m attached to Maria now but I was pissed off to start with. She’s a tiny kid with big issues and it was made hard for me to refuse her a home. As it happens, downshifting has been good but it was a surrender to the shit life threw at me, not a chance to take a long holiday. I was frantic. I had to give up a good job and moving to the country made it financially possible.’

  Voices rose and fell around the ward, curious glances telling Nico that the furiously muttered argument wasn’t going unnoticed. Beneath the curtain he saw Lars place his shoes on the floor and step into them. Mattias frowned. ‘You’ve moved? It’s not a holiday? But when Loren’s better won’t it be tricky with her living in Islington and you in Cambridgeshire?’

  The clatter of a trolley and a nurse saying something bracing to a patient receded in Nico’s ears. Sweat popped on his brow. ‘Shit,’ he muttered. ‘How has this not occurred to me?’ Had he made a terrible mistake uprooting Josie? Term ended tomorrow and he hadn’t heard that she had a place at Middledip Primary. What if she had to go to school in Bettsbrough and be the odd one out again? People were always praising him for his parenting but at that moment he felt as if he shouldn’t be in charge of a garden gnome. ‘Shit,’ he repeated bleakly.

  Awkwardly, hesitantly, Mattias patted his shoulder. ‘I didn’t mean to bring up something bad. Felicia and I are upset at the moment.’ He swallowed before adding, ‘We can’t have children. We’ve just found out we’re sort of allergic to each other. I suppose I thought Maria had gone your way, as everything does. I’m sorry,’ he added belatedly, his voice as bleak as Nico’s.

  Nico stared at Mattias, his mind refusing to supply the comforting words that he wanted to offer. So he put his arms around the brother he sometimes hardly knew and gave him a long, long hug.

  ‘Don’t tell Mum and Dad,’ Mattias choked against Nico’s shoulder.

  It was a phrase siblings said to each other all the time but it was so long since Nico had heard it that he had to swallow a lump in his throat. ‘No, I won’t. It’s up to you and Felicia how and when you tell people. I’m incredibly sorry.’

  Then Lars began to draw the curtain back and they broke apart. Mattias said, ‘You might as well take Dad. I’ll go back to work.’ He stuck out his hand to Nico. ‘Have a good trip home tomorrow.’ It made Nico hope that they’d reached a better understanding.

  While Lars rested after lunch the girls baked with Carina, Maria spending a lot of time squidging one piece of dough but Josie lapping up all the stirring and rolling. Nico watched, heart aching. The sisters were getting closer and closer. He’d been so wrapped up in solving the immediate problem he hadn’t thought of the long game. He couldn’t believe he’d been so stupid.

  He mooched out of the kitchen and collapsed on the sofa in the next room, mind whirling.

  Hannah followed him out. ‘Are you ill?’ she whispered, her face creased with concern.

  He shook his head, holding out his arms. ‘Just realised that when Loren gets well, the girls won’t be living a ten-minute walk away from each other. They’re going to be wrenched apart.’

  ‘Oh.’ Her arms tightened around him. ‘I hadn’t thought of it.’

  Josie burst in wearing an apron that wrapped right around her like a dress. ‘When we go to the rink, Farmor’s going to stay with Farfar and cook pork with mushrooms for dinner. It’s our Swedish Christmas tonight, isn’t it?’

  ‘You’re right,’ said Nico, summoning a smile that Josie was taking no notice that he was hugging Hannah. Each night they’d spent together they’d been careful to be back in their own beds well before the children woke up because there were certain scenarios you eased kids into carefully. Josie might not ask after Loren very often but was bound to be unsettled by the realisation that Nico had found somebody new. ‘After Farmor’s special dinner we’re going to exchange our Swedish family gifts. We’ll go soon so Farfar can rest. Your saffron buns will have baked ready for when he wakes.’

  They had fun at the rink, of course they did, though Nico’s heart felt like a rock in his chest as he watched the girls together. Maria wore double-blade trainers over her snow boots because she was too small for proper skates. Josie had had enough practice to stay upright and cross over at corners but Nico resolved to enrol her for a course of lessons at home so she could have more fun on these winter holidays in Sweden. Hannah skated well, after learning as a teen and then living in Sweden. She took Maria, holding on to a push-along reindeer, while he taught Josie to pick up speed and confidence. Then it was time to go to Carina’s, his heart still heavy as he fetched his gaily wrapped family gifts from the case for Josie and Maria to give out – though they were much more interested in ripping the shiny wrapping paper from the pretty clothes and dolls their grandparents gifted to them with scant respect for the lovely ribbons that had no doubt been tied with care. Carina had found time to buy for Maria and Nico felt a stab of love for the mother who wasn’t differentiating between the two children.

  At least he received an email from Middledip Primary School offering Josie a place when school reopened in January and directing him to where he could buy school polo shirts, sweatshirts and a PE top. Josie just grinned when he told her and he supposed that she hadn’t thought there would be any other result.

  Carina took him aside before they left for their temporary home in Lars’s house. ‘Maria’s a lovely little girl,’ she said, patting his arm through his thick fleece top.

  He gave her a hug. ‘I told you I wouldn’t bring an imp into your house. Thanks for treating her so well. I know you were worried about me bringing her.’

  Carina smiled pa
infully. ‘Not for my sake, Nico. For yours. I could see you making a place for her in your heart as well as in your family. I grieve for your heartache when she goes back.’

  A lump rose to his throat. ‘I know. I worry about how Josie’s going to take it too. But how could we guard our hearts against her?’

  Carina laughed. ‘Impossible. She’s adorable.’

  Nico got one more night sleeping with Hannah before they rose early and drove back to the airport. They returned the rental car and moved on to the airport building, where festive decorations were decidedly low-key. Josie and Maria began a game with the toys they had in their backpacks.

  Nico was turning his mind back to mundane matters like the Christmas presents he’d ordered ready to pick up from Argos on Monday and the Tesco groceries that should arrive first thing tomorrow, the nineteenth, and thinking unenthusiastically of Christmas lunch. Cooking a roast dinner was a trial for him. Thank goodness for ready-made Yorkshire puddings. A pleasant thought struck him and he turned to look at Hannah. Her hair was pulled up on top of her head and he wanted to nuzzle the downy hairs in the nape of her neck. ‘What are you and Nan doing for Christmas lunch? Maybe we can join forces?’

  She gave him a dazzling smile. ‘All being together would be great … unless Nan has plans with Brett, of course.’

  Then her phone rang and she regarded the screen with one eyebrow up in her hairline. ‘Christopher Carlysle?’ She couldn’t have sounded more astonished if Santa himself had rung.

  ‘I won’t beat about the bush,’ Nico heard the clipped voice say because Hannah leaned in so he could listen. ‘I’m ringing to ask you to oversee the Christmas Opening. I’m afraid my son’s vanished again. Tenants are up in arms and Cassie’s hardly speaking to me. Says I was bloody awful to you and you should tell me to get knotted. But I’m hoping you won’t,’ he added humbly.

  Hannah closed her eyes. ‘You were incredibly rude.’

  ‘I was.’

  ‘You were a bulldozer.’