The Christmas Marriage Mission

by Helen Brooks

  There had been no inflexion in his voice to make her suspect he wasn’t speaking generally, but she knew he was referring to his own mother. She swallowed hard. ‘No, I guess not,’ she said quietly before glancing round the drawing room and purposely making her voice light as she said, ‘Do you know, I think the whole of the downstairs of my cottage would fit into this one room. You must be able to give some wild parties here.’

  ‘Frenzied,’ he agreed with a sexy grin, which made her breathing decidedly disjointed. ‘Fancy coming to one?’

  ‘When?’

  ‘We could start right now, if you like. Two can party just fine.’

  ‘That wasn’t the sort of party I was referring to,’ she reproved him firmly.

  ‘Pity. They’re by far the best kind.’

  He slanted a wicked look at her under half-closed lids, which was so hammed up Kay just had to laugh, even as she thought, He’s like a chameleon, this man, with more personalities than I’ve had hot dinners.

  ‘So, what do you normally do for relaxation?’ he asked lazily, his eyes moving from the burnished curls tumbling about her shoulders, over creamy smooth skin before becoming fixed on her mouth.

  Relaxation? Was that the few brief minutes between giving a hundred and ten per cent to her job, the twins, her mother and a hundred and one things besides? Moments that occurred rarely and usually when she was so tired all she wanted was a hot bath and an early night? Kay smiled coolly, pretending not to notice the way his eyes were stroking her mouth. ‘This and that,’ she said airily.

  ‘Leonora said you don’t go out nearly enough.’

  She’d have a word with her mother when she got home! ‘Really?’ It was frosty.

  ‘In fact she said you don’t go out at all,’ he said silkily.

  ‘I told you before, I haven’t got the time or the desire for romance,’ she said, much too quickly.

  ‘But the odd evening with a girlfriend at the cinema or the theatre isn’t romance and you don’t even do that,’ he pointed out gently. ‘All work and no play…’

  Kay glared at him. How dared he lecture her on what she should do and what she shouldn’t! What business was it of his anyway? ‘Being a mother as well as the sole breadwinner does carry certain responsibilities,’ she said starchily. ‘Not that you’d know anything about that, of course. We can’t all please ourselves and burn the candles at both ends.’

  ‘You don’t even get a light near the wick,’ he said relentlessly, ‘and it’s really very bad for you, Kay. You owe it to the twins to be a well-balanced and rounded person.’

  She couldn’t believe her ears. ‘You…you hypocrite!’ To use little children in emotional blackmail.

  ‘That’s a harsh word,’ he said sorrowfully, rising to his feet and placing his empty glass on the mantelpiece before walking over to her. ‘Come here,’ he said very softly, stopping just in front of her chair and holding out his hand to pull her up.

  Her panicky heartbeat caused her breathing to become quick and shallow but she managed to sound reasonably firm when she said, ‘No.’

  He bent down, taking her half-full glass from her nerveless fingers and placing it on a small table at the side of the chair. She stared up at him, her eyes deep brown pools. He was going to kiss her again and it was only in this very instant that she admitted to herself how much she wanted him to. Nevertheless she made no movement when he held out his hand again.

  ‘Kay,’ he said, his tone steady but carrying the thread of warm amusement that made his voice sexier than ever, ‘I’m only going to take you in to dinner.’

  CHAPTER FIVE

  ‘HOW did it go?’

  Kay had hoped her mother would be asleep, considering it was one in the morning, but the moment she had gingerly opened the bedroom door Leonora’s bedside lamp had been switched on. She glanced at the older woman as she walked across to her own bed, half amused and half exasperated by the bright anticipation in her mother’s eyes.

  ‘Okay.’ She had undressed and washed in the bathroom where she’d had the foresight to leave her nightie before she went out, so now she slid under the covers, deliberately turning her face to the wall as she said, ‘Goodnight.’

  ‘Goodnight?’ It was a low whisper in view of the twins asleep in the bedroom next door, but none the less intense because of it. ‘Is that all you’re going to say?’

  ‘Mum, I’ve got to be up at six in the morning and my work schedule is manic. I’ve had a nice evening and now I’m home. All right?’ Kay waited but the bedside lamp remained on. She pulled her pillow over her head with a low groan.

  ‘Just one thing.’ Her mother’s voice was a subtle mixture of bribery and entreaty.

  ‘What?’ Kay didn’t take the pillow away, her voice muffled.

  ‘Are you seeing him again?’

  The sixty-four dollar question. She wrinkled her face against it under the soft down, taking a deep breath before she said, ‘No.’

  ‘Why?’ It was anguished.

  ‘Because he didn’t ask me, and that’s two things,’ Kay pointed out. ‘Goodnight, Mum.’

  She knew the effort it must have taken for her mother to say nothing more than a subdued, ‘Goodnight, dear’ as she switched off the lamp, but for the life of her Kay couldn’t hold a post-mortem about the evening out loud. However, as she lay there in the darkness her mind was dissecting every moment from the second he had arrived to pick her up.

  It had been a wonderful dinner. As she progressed to the meal her eyes opened in the blackness. And Mitchell had been an amusing and fascinating companion—as she was sure he had set out to be. She forced herself to lie still, aware her mother was still awake, but every nerve in her body was jangling as she recalled how he’d looked, what he’d said, the way he’d made her laugh in spite of her determination not to be charmed.

  Each of the five courses—served by a smiling and courteous Henry—had been more delicious than the one before it, and the pièce de résistance in the form of a torrone mousse with oranges and strawberries had been the most spectacular dessert she had ever seen and tasted. She could see it now, decorated with a curl of chocolate, slices of strawberry and oranges, torrone and crystallised orange rind, and hear Mitchell’s deep voice saying, ‘Your eyes are as round as a child’s in a candy store,’ his tone soft and almost—her mind hesitated on the word—tender.

  Oh… She turned over cautiously, colour flooding into her cheeks much the same as it had earlier.

  They had lingered over coffee and brandy, talking about all sorts of things, and she’d had to keep reminding herself that this was Mitchell Grey, enemy, because it had been…what? She stared into the darkness. Great. Wonderful. Magical.

  When he had called the taxi she’d known it was because he had been drinking, but at the back of her mind she’d thought he would make the most of the opportunity too. Right up until the minute she’d climbed into the back seat with him she’d told herself she wasn’t going to let him kiss her again, but the second he’d reached for her she had melted against him like…like the flipping torrone mousse! Her hands clenched as she willed herself not to toss and turn.

  She was an idiot, an absolute idiot, she belaboured herself miserably, her frustration at her own weakness compounded tenfold by the fact he hadn’t asked to see her again.

  The trouble was he was so good at the seduction game. The warm, masculine scent of him as he’d held her, his clean, warm skin and firm lips… She let herself drift into the recollection, her pulse quickening. He had kissed her as though he were delicately sampling something very sweet and costly at first, their lips touching and drawing apart, touching and drawing apart as he’d tentatively tasted and stroked her mouth into eager submission. When his kiss had gathered force she had been there with him every inch of the way, enchanted by the desire he’d been calling forth with consummate ease.

  The caress of his mouth had become sensual, his lips and tongue invoking ripples of sensation into every nerve and sinew in her body, d
rawing her on to a place she had never been before. The shadowed darkness had enclosed them in their own little world of touch and taste and smell and he had pulled her into him so she’d been half lying across him, his mouth doing wonderful things to the sensitive flesh of her ears, her throat, the soft, silky skin over her collar-bone above the cashmere jumper.

  She had known her control had been paper-thin and she didn’t doubt he’d picked up the signs her body had been giving, so why hadn’t he tried for more intimacy? Desire had dampened her skin and brought a throbbing ache in the core of her, but he had done no more than kiss and caress her. Of course they had been in the back of the taxi, but he hadn’t so much as brushed her breasts on top of her clothes. Not that she wanted him to, of course, she lied vehemently. And she definitely did not want to see him again either, so it was just as well he hadn’t suggested it. They had parted on relatively good terms—her skin burnt as she recalled the last lingering caress just before the taxi had drawn up outside Ivy Cottage—so that was a civilised ending to what had not been a civilised day in parts. One hand moved to her knees, which were tight and sore.

  And now she had to get some sleep. She breathed slowly and deeply, consciously shutting off her whirling thoughts as she employed a technique she’d perfected during the last caustic months with Perry and the ensuing aftermath. It took longer than usual but eventually she fell into a deep and dreamless slumber, curled under the duvet like a small, solitary animal.

  The next morning bedlam reigned, as it so often did in the mad rush to get the twins dressed, fed and ready for school and herself out of the house by eight o’clock, but when Peter pipped his horn outside the cottage gate Kay was ready.

  ‘Hi.’ Her brother’s greeting was distracted but that wasn’t unusual; he’d never been much good in the mornings. Kay welcomed this today, it meant he’d probably forgotten all about her lunch with Mitchell the previous day and so she needn’t go into the whole wretched story. She normally rode to work on her motorbike and Peter and Tom had a van each, but the bike had needed an overhaul and so she was picking it up at the garage near the office first thing.

  ‘Hi yourself.’ She settled herself into the seat beside him. She was already dressed in her leathers and intended to go straight to the first job from the garage. ‘I’m out all day but there are a couple of breaks for both you and Tom in the schedule; make sure you check the answer machine as soon as you get back to the office, won’t you? And of course any new deliveries you can fit in today take on, and don’t forget to write everything down.’

  ‘Sure thing, boss.’ Peter spared her a fleeting grin before pulling away into the traffic.

  ‘We’re going to have to get someone in to man the phone if nothing else,’ Kay mused out loud as the van sped along. ‘With all the work we’ve got I’m rarely in the office these days, and it would be great for someone to be in charge in there and do some of the day-to-day paperwork. I’m so behind with it.’

  Peter nodded. ‘Talking of all the work we’ve got, how did your meeting with Mitchell Grey go?’ he asked casually. Too casually.

  Kay stared at him. ‘Mum phoned you,’ she said flatly.

  ‘Well, not exactly, it was more… Yes, she did,’ he admitted wryly, keeping his eyes on the traffic ahead.

  She might have known! There were times when she felt she was living her life in a goldfish bowl. ‘So? What exactly did she say?’ She tried, and failed, to keep the annoyance out of her voice.

  ‘Just that the lunch hadn’t gone too well—something about you having jumped out of a window,’ Peter said, as though such an occurrence were perfectly normal—and that he’d turned up at the house and you were seeing him last night.’

  ‘That about sums it up,’ Kay said shortly.

  ‘Any business coming our way from him?’ It was hopeful.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Right.’

  The rest of the journey to the garage was conducted in silence.

  By the time Kay drew up outside Ivy Cottage at six in the evening she was bone-tired. The day had gone well without any hitches, the weather had been kindness itself—mild, sunny with a positively warm breeze—and she’d had plenty of time for a snack at lunch time plus a couple of coffee breaks during the day. So why, she asked herself as she wearily parked the bike at the side of the house and pulled off her crash helmet, did she feel as if everything was wrong? It wasn’t like her.

  She flexed her aching neck muscles, looking up into the dark evening sky as she did so. It was Halloween in a day or two, then Guy Fawkes night and before you knew it Christmas would be upon them and the end of another year would be fast approaching. And it had been a good year. The business had grown, the twins were well and happy and had taken to big school like ducks to water. Her mother was settled and comfortable in her mind again, and Peter and his family were financially secure after finally paying off the last of the debts that had accumulated during the time her brother had been out of work, before she’d started Sherwood Delivery.

  So—everything positive and nothing negative. Moonlight lay in silver pools in the garden and someone somewhere had lit a bonfire earlier, the smell of wood smoke drifting in the breeze and adding to the perfection of an English autumn evening. Stars sparkled above, the last of the dying leaves on the trees whispered below—and she couldn’t stop thinking of Mitchell Grey. It was a relief to finally admit it to herself.

  Kay lowered her head, staring blindly into the sleeping garden as the faint sounds of a television and children’s laughter from within the house brushed over her.

  What was it about him that had so got under her skin? she asked herself silently. She knew there wasn’t one single thing going for any sort of relationship between them, and they were as far apart as east was to west, so why had he been there in her head for every second of every minute of the day?

  Was it just the dizzying and lethal combination of fascination and danger? Or the sexual magnetism he exuded like no other man she had ever come into contact with? Or the potent aphrodisiac of wealth and success and power?

  She leant back against the wall of the house, taking a deep lungful of sweet smoky air. Whatever, she was in a spin and she had never felt like this before, alive from the top of her head to the soles of her feet—tinglingly, frighteningly, thrillingly alive.

  ‘Stop it.’ She actually spoke the words out loud, needing to hear them. ‘Stop this right now. It’s over, finished, not that it ever really began. You were just an irritating hiccup in his busy life, that’s all. He didn’t ask to see you again, which is just as well. You are a mother of two children, not exactly the sort of woman Mitchell Grey would go for.’

  She took a few more lungfuls of air before straightening her shoulders and raising her chin.

  It would be dangerous to get mixed up with him, very, very dangerous; every instinct in her body was telling her so. And with Georgia and Emily relying on her to be both mother and father, danger was not an option. Everything had worked out for the best and these ridiculous feelings would soon shrivel and die. They would have to.

  She marched round the side of the house to the front door, opening it and stepping into warm light and the delicious smell of one of her mother’s pot roasts—that and the sweet perfume emanating from the most gigantic basket of flowers set at an angle on the coffee-table to catch her eye as soon as she came in.

  ‘Kay! Hallo, darling.’ Her mother appeared from the direction of the kitchen at the same time as the twins jumped up from the sitting-room carpet where they had been lying in their pyjamas playing a board game together.

  ‘Mummy, Mummy, look!’

  ‘Mummy, we’ve been waiting for you to come home for ages.’

  They had seized her hands, pulling her over to the basket of flowers, their small faces alight, and over their heads her mother mouthed silently, Mitch?

  ‘There’s a card, Mummy, but Grandma wouldn’t let us open it.’ Georgia was hopping from one foot to another in an agony of antici
pation. ‘Look, there.’

  Kay obediently extracted the small envelope from the profusion of cream and yellow rosebuds, carnations, orchids, daisies and freesias, hoping her mother wouldn’t notice her hands were trembling. It was addressed, ‘Mrs Kay Sherwood, Ivy Cottage, 24 Bishops Road’. She stared at it for a moment before turning it over and carefully slitting the top open. The small card inside read, ‘I enjoyed last night. Can we do it again some time? M.’

  She read it twice and then handed it to her mother who was at her elbow, before turning to the twins and saying, ‘It’s a present to all of us from Mr Grey, the gentleman you met last night? Isn’t that kind of him?’

  ‘For us too?’ Georgia and Emily were enchanted.

  ‘For all of us,’ Kay repeated firmly. ‘Can we do it again some time?’ What did that mean? Was this an extravagant brush-off or did he really mean to contact her? And if he did, what was she going to do? It would be utter folly to see him again; it would give all the wrong signals. But perhaps this was how he always gently let a woman down? She had no idea of how men in his position of wealth and influence behaved.

  She glanced at her mother and the older woman’s eyes were waiting for her. ‘They’re beautiful flowers,’ Leonora said impassively, handing Kay back the card as she spoke.

  ‘Yes, they are.’

  ‘And there’s so many of them,’ Leonora pointed out.

  ‘Yes.’ She stared at her mother and Leonora stared back.

  ‘I’ll see to our dinner while you shower and change. The girls have already eaten but I said they could stay up a while, okay?’

  ‘Yes, fine,’ Kay agreed quickly. Anything to prevent a cosy chat over dinner.

  She asked the twins about their day and admired some paintings they had brought home from school for her before going upstairs, angry with herself for the excitement bubbling in her veins. She had to get a handle on this, she told herself, stripping off her clothes in the bedroom and padding through to the bathroom in her robe. She hardly recognised herself any more.