The Christmas Marriage Mission

by Helen Brooks

  ‘Mitchell, I have two children.’ She had gone white then scarlet before hauling herself into a sitting position on the bed, desperately aware of the state of her clothing and feeling more humiliated than she’d ever felt in her life. She had thrown herself at him and he had refused her. It was the one refrain beating in her head. ‘I’m no virgin.’

  ‘Not physically maybe.’ He watched her as she groped with the buttons of her blouse, her frantic haste adding to her clumsiness. ‘Kay, when we make love—and we will—it will be a decision of your mind and not just your body. You will know exactly what you are doing.’

  ‘How civilised,’ she said with an attempt at derision that didn’t come off at all.

  ‘If you want to put it like that.’ His voice was cold now, contained. ‘Whatever, you won’t have any regrets because you were swept away by emotion or curiosity or anything else. It will be your first time—in everything that counts it will be your first time,’ he added as Kay went to protest again, ‘and you will make a conscious decision as a grown woman to let me love you.’

  Kay’s eyes jerked to meet his at the last words. If only, if only he had meant that in the real sense of the word. But he was talking about sex, not love. ‘And if I don’t?’ she said shortly, forcing iron into her voice to combat the trembling she was trying to hide.

  ‘You will.’ It was supremely confident, and for a moment she actually hated him. ‘You will come to me of your own volition and I will make you into the woman you were always meant to be. It’s fate, kismet.’

  ‘It’s wishful thinking.’ She didn’t know where she was finding the strength to act as though her heart hadn’t been just torn out by the roots, but she was grateful for it.

  ‘Still fighting,’ he said softly.

  His eyes had gone to her hair and now Kay snapped, her fragile cool deserting her. ‘Don’t you dare mention the colour of my hair or, so help me, I’ll hit you. And could you please leave my room? I was brought up to think that when one was a guest in someone’s home it didn’t automatically mean the host had visiting rights.’

  He ignored the slur but she had seen his eyes narrow momentarily and knew he hadn’t liked it. It was a poor comfort in view of all that had gone on, but better than nothing.

  ‘Goodnight, Kay.’ He walked over to the door, his tall, lean body more relaxed than it had the right to be, she thought tightly. Here was she burning up inside and knowing she would toss and turn for hours in an agony of sexual frustration, whereas he looked as cool as a cucumber. ‘Dream of me.’

  She glared at him. ‘A very remote possibility,’ she lied icily.

  “‘Satire should, like a polished razor keen, Wound with a touch that’s scarcely felt or seen.” That was written by a woman over two hundred and fifty years ago,’ he said silkily. ‘Do you think Lady Mary Wortley Montagu had such as you in mind?’

  Kay raised her chin haughtily, two spots of bright colour still burning on her cheekbones. ‘If there were men like you around, very probably.’

  ‘Ow.’ He pretended to wince as he opened the door, turning on the threshold one last time as he surveyed her, rumpled and flushed, still sitting on the bed. ‘Don’t forget we’re building a snowman tomorrow,’ he said softly. ‘I want you up bright and early or else I’ll have to come and fetch you.’

  How dared he talk in that sexy, smoky voice when he had just refused her? Kay asked herself furiously. She hated him; she really really hated him.

  She was still trying to think of an adequately scathing retort when Mitchell closed the door.

  CHAPTER NINE

  BOXING DAY dawned crystal-bright, the blue sky and pearly cold sunlight turning the thick snow to a carpet of shimmering white and sending the twins mad with delight.

  Leonora and Henry opted for staying in the warm, so it was left to Kay and Mitchell to build the snowman with the two little girls.

  The acute embarrassment Kay had felt at breakfast when she had first set eyes on Mitchell faded somewhat in the general mayhem, which involved much shrieking and rolling in the snow by Georgia, a great deal of serious and careful building by Emily and a bit of both by Mitchell, much to the delight of the twins.

  When Frosty—christened so by Georgia and Emily—was finally finished, Mitchell lifted both little girls in his arms so they could put the snowman’s hat and scarf in place along with his coal eyes, carrot nose and pebbled teeth.

  ‘He’s just lovely, isn’t he, Mummy?’ Georgia breathed reverently, turning in Mitchell’s arm to hold out her hand to Kay, which immediately prompted Emily to do the same. As Kay took the mittened paws in her hands she was aware of Mitchell’s eyes tight on her face, the four of them joined together in what could have been a family unit. It hurt. Unbearably.

  ‘He’s wonderful, darling,’ she said brightly, her smile brittle. ‘The best snowman in the world.’

  Whether Mitchell had noticed the tell-tale glitter in her eyes Kay didn’t know, but she felt his gaze brush over her face before he said, ‘Now Frosty’s all wrapped up in his hat and scarf, how about we go and feed the ducks on the lake, eh? Why don’t you two go and ask Henry for some bread?’

  ‘Can we? Really?’ The twins didn’t need any prompting after Kay had nodded her permission, racing off as fast as their little red wellington boots would take them.

  When they had disappeared into the house there was a vibrant silence for a moment or two, and then Mitchell said softly, ‘How were the dreams?’

  Trust him not to pretend last night hadn’t happened! The dart of anger produced enough adrenalin for Kay to be able to answer stiffly, as though he had just made a polite enquiry, ‘I slept very well, thank you.’

  ‘I didn’t.’ He wasn’t smiling as he looked into her eyes.

  Your fault. ‘Really?’ She raised superior eyebrows, refusing to meet his gaze as she turned to survey the winter wonderland in front of them. ‘You should try warm milk with a spot of honey. It always works for the twins.’

  ‘I know what the cure for my disturbed sleep pattern is, Kay,’ he said drily, ‘and it sure as hell isn’t warm milk.’

  There were a hundred and one answers she could make to that, but, as she might betray herself with every one, Kay contented herself with turning her back on him and pretending to adjust Frosty’s nose until Georgia and Emily reappeared two seconds later.

  ‘Henry let us have a great big bag of bread, Mummy, and some cake too,’ Georgia shouted as she hurtled towards them, Emily in her wake. ‘Won’t the ducks be pleased?’

  The little family of ducks on Mitchell’s small but charming lake were pleased, delighting the twins by coming up out of the water and taking the bread right out of the girls’ fingers.

  ‘They’re virtually tame,’ Mitchell said quietly, ‘thanks to Henry. He went to see his sister in Kent in the spring—she keeps a smallholding, nothing grand—and while he was there a fox took the mother. He brought the eggs home still in the nest but enclosed in a polystyrene box with a hot-water bottle, so the kitchen became a duckling nursery. They all hatched and he didn’t lose one of them. Would you believe the utility room off the kitchen had a paddling pool in it for weeks?’

  ‘Really?’ Kay was fascinated. She decided she thoroughly approved of Henry.

  ‘It was a bit difficult as they grew to convince them that Henry wasn’t their mother,’ Mitchell said with a wry smile. ‘For weeks there was the patter of tiny feet about the house if the utility-room door was left ajar. There would be Henry going to answer the door with a perfectly straight line of seven balls of fluff with webbed feet behind him.’

  He grinned at her and her heart turned right over.

  ‘Do you know that ducks have got personalities?’ He turned to look at Georgia and Emily kneeling in the snow with the ducks all about them, bills opening and shutting. ‘That one there in the front, the little bruiser, is called Charlie and he’s the boss. And the little brown one hanging at the back is Matilda. She’s the most timid one among them and yet Ch
arlie and her are inseparable. It’s like he knows she needs looking after.’

  He turned to look straight at her, his gaze intensifying and the silver eyes holding hers in such a way she couldn’t have spoken to save her life. Kay began to feel she were drowning in the mercurial blue orbs, which seemed to be reflecting the vivid azure of the sky; she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move. There was just Mitchell in all the world.

  ‘Have…have the others got names?’ she managed at last, her voice breathless.

  He smiled, a beautiful smile. ‘Oh, yes.’ He moved closer, taking her hand and slipping it through his arm as he pointed them out. ‘That’s Clarence, Lolita, Nessie, Percival and Agnes. Although Nessie might be Agnes and Agnes might be Lolita, if you get my meaning. Henry’s the one who can pick them out as though they’re his grandchildren.’

  If she could just stand here for ever, with the blue sky above and the twins giggling and laughing as they fed Henry’s little tribe, and the feel of Mitchell’s hard body next to her, she would be happy. She slanted a glance at him from under her eyelashes, the big charcoal overcoat he was wearing making him even more dark and male in the white fairy-tale world surrounding them.

  He must have sensed her gaze, his head turning as he looked down at her. Slowly his mouth came closer and she made no move to turn her face away. The kiss was light, sweet and warm in the frozen air and lasted no more than a breath or two, but afterwards his other hand came across hers where it rested in his arm.

  ‘Why is it I want to lay you down in the snow and ravish you until you’re moaning my name?’ he asked, shockingly, a moment later, his voice a low murmur audible only to her ears.

  Her eyes opened wide and she saw his mouth twist in the lopsided smile that spoke of self-derision. ‘And now I’ve lost all the brownie points I’d gained with the account of Charlie and his tribe,’ he said sadly.

  She laughed, she couldn’t help it, but at the same time an inner voice said despairingly, Why did he have to be so drop-dead gorgeous? She would have been satisfied with average, she really would, if Cupid could have shot his arrow into an appropriate male. But instead she had to go and fall for Mitchell. An impossible situation. An impossible man.

  He kept her arm in his on the walk back to the house, the twins dancing in front of them like a pair of tiny winter sprites. Their last full day here. As they entered the house by the kitchen door Kay’s heart was suddenly as heavy as lead. They would never come again; she would make sure of that. It was too sweet, too intoxicating, too dangerous. It gave her a taste of what could have been if Mitchell had felt differently.

  Her mother and Henry were sitting at the kitchen table, close together, the fragrant aroma of percolating coffee scenting the air. Kay watched as Georgia and Emily ran to them, the children’s faces glowing as they recounted the adventure with the ducks, and the older couple’s expressions benevolent.

  What would she do if this affection she could sense between her mother and Henry grew? Kay asked herself as she divested herself of her outdoor clothes. It would mean Mitchell would for ever be on the fringe of her family, even when he had someone new and she was just another of his exes. The thought stung like a scorpion.

  Lunch was a cold buffet but none the less delicious for it. Henry had the enviable knack of making even the most ordinary food taste sublime, and Kay thought it showed the strength of Mitchell’s will-power that he wasn’t showing any signs of surplus fat on his altogether perfectly honed body.

  Leonora must have had similar thoughts, because they had just finished the last of a wickedly calorie-loaded chocolate mousse when she said, ‘Henry, that was wonderful but in spite of the flu I know I’ve put on a good few pounds. I’m amazed you and Mitchell are so slim.’

  ‘Men are built differently to women,’ Henry said factually. ‘Different fat cells and so on. Besides, what does it matter?’

  ‘Plenty when you get to my age and middle-aged spread starts showing its ugly face,’ Leonora said ruefully.

  ‘You’re perfect.’ Henry was looking straight into Leonora’s eyes and Kay thought he’d forgotten the rest of them for a moment. ‘Fat, thin, it wouldn’t matter to me. You are perfect.’

  Oh, wow! Kay glanced across at Mitchell, who raised laconic eyebrows. There was definitely something going on here all right.

  Leonora had gone pink and fluttery and by unspoken mutual consent the conversation moved to safer channels, but the look in Henry’s eyes and the emotion in the older man’s voice stayed with Kay for the rest of the day.

  It was much later, when Kay was lying in bed, that she dissected the events of the day. Building the snowman, the episode with the ducks, the way Georgia and Emily had utterly insisted Mitchell read them a story after their bath once they were tucked up in bed, the wonderful candlelit dinner Henry had cooked for the four adults and the easy laughter and camaraderie between Mitchell, Henry and her mother—it was all too beguiling. She could deceive herself very easily here—pretend it was the start of a for-ever story. But it wasn’t.

  ‘Reality check, Kay,’ she whispered in the darkness. Tomorrow morning Mitchell was going to take them back to Ivy Cottage and real life would resume again. The strange cat-and-mouse game he seemed determined to play would begin once more, but this time she had to start making a few changes. Cooling things down, refusing the odd date, cutting out any contact between Mitchell and the twins so the little girls could gradually forget him. It was all for the best, it was, she assured herself desperately, so why did she feel she was being unfair to everyone?

  She turned over onto her stomach with a sigh, angry with Mitchell, herself and the whole world.

  As it happened, the return to Ivy Cottage went far easier than Kay had anticipated, mainly due to the fact that there was an emergency with Mitchell’s branch in Southampton, which necessitated a personal visit from the man himself. Nevertheless, he insisted on taking Kay, her mother and the girls home even when Henry offered to do it with Kay backing the older man enthusiastically.

  ‘Holden and his inefficient workforce can wait,’ Mitchell said grimly after the call during breakfast from the manager in Southampton. ‘An hour or two either way is not going to make any difference. I’m taking you back, okay?’ He glared at Kay as though she had contrived the situation herself. ‘And we’ll call in at the supermarket on the way as planned. No argument.’

  Kay nodded, said thank you and left it at that then. At least, with Mitchell having to dash off, the farewell should be brief and short-lived, no need to offer coffee or anything else that might have delayed his departure. A quick, clean and concise end to what had been a vitally disturbing and—she had to admit—wonderful Christmas.

  It happened exactly as she had envisaged, and within a couple of minutes of their return to their tiny home Kay, her mother and the girls were standing waving Mitchell off from the doorstep.

  ‘Such a shame,’ Leonora murmured at the side of her as Georgia and Emily jumped up and down, waving wildly to their hero. ‘It would have been nice for us to offer Henry and Mitchell a meal tonight after all they’ve done for us.’

  Oh, no, no. She wasn’t starting that. No cosy foursomes. ‘We haven’t got the room to entertain here, Mum.’ It was firm and brooked no argument. ‘Besides which, you know how I feel about things.’

  Leonora pursed her lips disapprovingly. ‘Darling, I wish you’d think again,’ she said quietly. ‘Henry is sure Mitchell is very fond of you.’

  ‘I’ve no doubt he has been very fond of plenty of women in the past,’ Kay said just as quietly as, the Voyager having driven out of sight, the twins disappeared up to their bedroom to reacquaint themselves with their room and toys as though they had been away for several months instead of several days.

  ‘But how do you know this isn’t different?’

  ‘Because I face facts.’ Kay turned to look at her mother once they had walked through into the kitchen to unpack the shopping Mitchell had insisted on paying for. ‘For example, has Mitch
ell had other women back to the house for romantic dinners and so on in the past?’

  Leonora wriggled uncomfortably. ‘I guess so,’ she admitted unhappily.

  ‘You know so, and so do I. Probably quite a few stayed over too, and on a regular basis. They got to know Mitchell and be part of his life—but only for as long as he wanted them in it. That’s the sort of man he is, Mum. He’s head of a large and successful business, he works hard and plays hard, and enjoys the bachelor lifestyle with no ties and no commitments. All his loyalty and commitment is to his business.’

  ‘That doesn’t mean he couldn’t give it to a woman if he fell in love,’ Leonora argued stubbornly.

  ‘That’s a bigger “if” than you’ll ever know where Mitchell is concerned.’ Leonora stared at her unhappily and Kay’s voice softened as she said, ‘Look, Mitchell doesn’t understand about family. His own was disfunctional and violent, and he has never wanted to settle down. Why would he take on a ready-made family, for goodness’ sake? And I come as a package, Mum. Those are the facts. Face them. I have.’

  And then she surprised them both by bursting into tears.

  Some time later, after a mopping-up session followed by a hot, milky mug of chocolate, Leonora said apologetically, ‘No more talking about you know who, I promise. Okay?’

  Kay smiled. Until the next time. ‘Okay. But don’t let how things are with Mitchell and I affect your relationship with Henry, all right? He’s lovely, I mean it, and I want you to see him as much as you want to. I think Mitchell and I will begin to tail off now, anyway, and it’s all for the best. Really.’ Really.

  At ten o’clock Kay sat toasting her toes in front of the fire, a glass of wine at her elbow. Her mother had gone to bed early and she was all alone in the small sitting room, the Christmas tree lights twinkling and the beginnings of a storm howling outside, if the wind was anything to go by. It was cosy and snug, she was warm and safe with all her family around her—and she felt more miserable than she had ever felt in her life.