Mistletoe Marriage (Harlequin Romance)

by Jessica Hart

  He glanced smugly round the table. ‘But then I’ve always been a maverick that way.’

  ‘I’ve always understood that you shouldn’t walk or climb on your own for safety reasons,’ said Bram evenly.

  Nick waved his objection aside. ‘That’s for people who don’t know what they’re doing,’ he said. ‘I quite agree that tourists who amble around the moors here need to walk in pairs at least, but I prefer to walk on my own—especially when I’m testing the clothes we sell. When you’re experienced you can take things onto a whole new level, without being shackled by a slower pace or intrusive chatter.’

  ‘You’re not afraid of getting lost?’ said Bram, wondering what it was about Nick that Melissa and Sophie could possibly love so much. ‘The moors can be quite deceptive.’

  ‘Not when you know what you’re doing.’ Nick helped himself to more wine and sat back, ready to illuminate them. ‘It’s a matter of instinct. I’ve been out in the wilds enough to know how to get myself out of trouble, no matter what happens.’

  ‘I hope you do.’ Bram kept his voice even. ‘I get called out by Mountain Rescue several times every winter, and it would be embarrassing if it turned out to be for a member of the family.’

  Nick laughed heartily. ‘That’s not going to happen! The thing is, you just know one tiny section of the moors where you farm,’ he told Bram, with a patronising smile. ‘It’s natural you should be cautious about venturing beyond that. When you have wider experience to draw on, as I do, you feel confident anywhere, no matter what the conditions.’

  He launched into a lengthy account of all the times when his mastery of survival techniques had enabled him to triumph over the odds in the wilder parts of the world. To hear his talk of battling against the elements, one would never believe that he lived in a comfortable detached house in Pickering.

  Bram switched off after a while. It was hard to concentrate anyway when Sophie was sitting beside him in that dress. She looked so lush and gorgeous his hands itched to reach out and touch her. She had finished eating and was studying her glass, her eyes lowered so that it was impossible to know what she was thinking.

  Was she as bored and irritated as he was? Or was she loving the sound of Nick’s voice? Was she impressed by his stories and wishing that she could be with him? Was she wishing that it was Nick she had kissed earlier?

  The kiss, that sweet kiss, had been designed as a message for Nick, Bram knew. It had had nothing to do with him, he realised bitterly, withdrawing behind a barrier of hurt pride. It had been a message for him too. Sophie might be wearing his ring, but it was Nick that she was thinking about, Nick she still wanted.

  Well, she had never pretended otherwise, had she? And Nick was still married to Melissa. Perhaps he could accept being second best, Bram thought, if he were married to Sophie. Something was better than nothing. He would see her every day, and be with her, and if he was patient she might come to love him the way he so suddenly and so desperately loved her.

  Until then, Bram decided, he would have to settle for being friends.

  Sophie didn’t get a chance to talk to her sister alone until just before they were ready to leave. She met Melissa on the landing, on her way back from the bathroom, and the two sisters hugged. ‘It’s been lovely to see you again, Mel,’ Sophie told her in a rush of affection. ‘I’m sorry it’s been so long.’

  Melissa clung to her. ‘I’m sorry too,’ she said. ‘I’ve missed you.’

  Her voice cracked and Sophie held her sister away from her and looked into her face in concern. ‘Mel, is everything OK?’

  ‘Of course.’ Melissa dabbed her eyes in embarrassment. ‘I was just getting all emotional.’ She managed a wobbly smile. ‘You know what I’m like!’

  Sophie frowned, unconvinced. ‘Are things all right with Nick?’

  ‘Oh, yes. Well, he’s sometimes a bit…But, yes, everything’s fine,’ said Melissa, and rushed on before Sophie had a chance to enquire any closer. ‘This is your evening, Sophie. I haven’t had a chance to tell you properly how happy I am for you. Bram’s such a star. I think he’s wonderful—so kind and understanding…’

  She sounded on the verge of tears again.

  ‘Hey,’ said Sophie, hoping to lighten the atmosphere. ‘You’ve had your chance with Bram! I hope you’re not changing your mind? He’s mine now,’ she joked.

  ‘Of course not.’ Melissa’s laugh sounded a little forced to Sophie. ‘I just hope you know how lucky you are to have a man like Bram. He’s really special.’

  Sophie thought about Bram, about his steadiness and his strength and the directness of his eyes. She thought about how safe it felt to lean against him, how good it felt to kiss him, and a strange feeling uncurled deep inside her.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I know.’

  ‘Thank goodness that’s over,’ said Sophie with a sigh as they drove back to Haw Gill.

  As always, the farewells had seemed to take for ever. She longed to ask what Bram had said to Melissa as he hugged her goodbye. Sophie thought that he had held her sister for longer than was strictly necessary, but Melissa hadn’t objected. She had smiled and nodded, but then Sophie’s mother had claimed her attention, to discuss last-minute wedding details, and she hadn’t seen any more.

  Now she studied Bram from under her lashes as he drove along the dark moorland lanes. In the muted light from the dashboard he looked withdrawn, almost stern.

  ‘Was…was it awful for you?’ she asked hesitantly, not sure that she really wanted to hear that he was still in love with Melissa but feeling that she ought to acknowledge how difficult it must have been for him.

  Something had happened during the evening, that much she knew. Bram hadn’t carried her back to the car, the way he had when they arrived, and when Sophie thought about the mud on her lovely shoes she wanted to cry. There seemed something symbolic about it somehow.

  ‘It certainly wasn’t the best night of my life.’ Bram answered her question at last. He glanced at her and then returned his gaze to the road ahead. ‘Nick hardly took his eyes off you all evening.’

  Sophie felt herself flush in the darkness. ‘I think Nick may be the kind of man who’s more interested if you’re not available than if you are,’ she admitted painfully, staring straight ahead.

  ‘Is that why you were at such pains to make it look as if you were in love with me?’

  The hardness in Bram’s voice made her head jerk round. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘That’s why you kissed me like that, isn’t it?’ said Bram. ‘You wanted to make him think that you weren’t interested in him any more.’

  Fatally, Sophie hesitated. She had wanted Nick to think that, she remembered, ashamed. ‘Yes,’ she said, unwilling to lie to Bram. ‘Partly, anyway. But—’

  ‘You don’t need to explain, Sophie,’ he interrupted her. ‘I understand.’

  ‘But—’ she began helplessly, not even sure what she was going to say. But Bram wasn’t going to listen anyway.

  ‘I don’t think we should talk about it,’ he said. ‘We both know what the situation is, and nothing has changed for either of us.’

  It’s changed for me, she wanted to say. But she didn’t know how or why.

  She just knew that it had.

  CHAPTER NINE

  BRAM came into the kitchen, rubbing his hands against the cold. ‘I don’t like the look of that sky,’ he said. ‘I’m going to bring the last of the sheep in off the moor, so I might not be back for lunch until later.’

  Sophie was at the table, spooning mincemeat into pastry cases for mince pies. Outside the window, the moors looked bleaker than usual, frozen white and solid under clouds which hung so low they blurred the horizon. They bulged with the ominous yellow greyness that signalled snow, and probably lots of it.

  She frowned and brushed flour from her apron. Snow wasn’t unusual up here on the moors, but it was easy to get caught out. ‘Do you want a hand?’ she asked.

  ‘Bess and I will manage.’
>
  Sophie bit her lip. Nothing had been the same since the dinner to celebrate their engagement. It was nearly two weeks since that tense evening, but it seemed like longer.

  Bram had refused to discuss that evening, Nick or Melissa any further. The next morning he’d been his usual calm, friendly self, and ostensibly they had gone back to the way they were before. But Sophie sensed a greater distance in him now, as if there was something tightly leashed inside him, and she didn’t know what had caused it or what she could do to make it better.

  While she worried about it, the arrangements for the wedding rolled inexorably on. Her wedding dress was hanging up at Glebe Farm, the caterers had been organised down to the last parsley garnish, and the flowers were being delivered first thing on Christmas Eve.

  ‘But I can’t find a hairdresser or anyone to do your make-up who’s free to come out on Christmas Eve,’ her mother had lamented. ‘You’ll have to do the best you can. You will make an effort to look nice, won’t you?’

  ‘Of course,’ Sophie had said, but the wedding seemed like something vague and unreal that her mother talked about. It was hard for her to believe in it herself when she was preoccupied with Bram.

  She couldn’t seem to talk to him at the moment. When she tried, he would change the conversation, pleasantly but firmly, and retreat behind a barrier of horribly polite friendliness. Sophie was terribly afraid that he was seriously regretting his offer of marriage as a way out of her problems.

  It made her realise for the first time how much she did want to marry him. She would miss him, miss Haw Gill and their isolated life up on the moors. Leaving now would be doubly hard, but she couldn’t stay if it was going to make Bram unhappy. She couldn’t bear that.

  And sooner or later they were going to have to talk about it. It was the twentieth of December already. In a few days’ time it would be too late. Sophie had been rehearsing how she might raise the issue as she made the mince pies, but she wasn’t sorry to be diverted now Bram had come in, and the prospect of snow offered a welcome distraction.

  There was no point in trying to talk while Bram was thinking about the sheep up on the moor, but tonight, Sophie vowed, tonight she would make him listen.

  ‘At least have some coffee before you go,’ she said, moving over to set the kettle on the range. ‘I’ll make you a sandwich too. You shouldn’t go up there without something to eat.’

  ‘OK. Thanks,’ said Bram, anxious to get on his way but knowing that what she suggested was sensible.

  He warmed his hands by the wood-burning stove and watched Sophie as she moved around the kitchen. She was wearing his mother’s old apron, and there was a smudge of flour on her cheek where she had brushed her hair away from her face as she was rolling out the pastry.

  He wished that they had never gone to that engagement dinner. He had been hoping against hope that when Sophie came face to face with Nick again she would find that the magic had gone, but it had been clear instead that there was still something between them. Nick had had his interest piqued; that was obvious, and as for Sophie—why would she be so determined to show Nick that she was over him unless she still cared desperately about what he thought?

  That kiss, that piercingly sweet kiss, had been for Nick’s benefit, not Bram’s. Sophie had admitted it herself. Bram told himself that it was unfair to resent her when she had never tried to hide how she felt for Nick. He knew that he was one who had suggested himself as second best. It hadn’t been her idea. He just hadn’t bargained for how much it would hurt him.

  The only way he could deal with it was to seal himself off as much as he could. He could see that Sophie sensed that something was wrong, and wanted to talk about it, but what could he say other than that he loved her and that he didn’t want to be second best, after all? That wasn’t the deal they had made, and all Bram could do was to try and stick to that as far as he could.

  Sophie put a mug of coffee and a hearty ham sandwich in front of him and looked worriedly at the tiny flakes drifting down outside the window. ‘It’s starting to snow.’

  ‘I’ll get going as soon as I’ve had this.’ Bram kept an eye on the snow as he drank the coffee gratefully. It was hot and strong—just what he needed. The snow was barely more than spitting at the moment. Certainly nothing to get too worried about yet.

  ‘I wonder if we’ll have a white Christmas this year,’ said Sophie, sitting down opposite him and cupping her hands around her own mug of coffee.

  ‘Might do,’ said Bram, his mouth full of sandwich. ‘It’s cold enough out there, and if it does snow heavily it’ll lie. The ground’s like iron.’

  ‘I thought I’d get out Molly’s decorations this afternoon,’ she said hesitantly. ‘She always made the sitting room look so pretty at Christmas. I’d like to do it for her.’

  He smiled at her, Nick and his own uncertainties forgotten for the moment. ‘She would have liked that. Shall I find a tree in the wood?’

  ‘Oh, that would be wonderful.’ Sophie’s face lit up. She had been wondering how to ask him, afraid that the loss of his mother would make it too painful for him.

  ‘I think it’ll be too late by the time I get back this afternoon, but we’ll go and look tomorrow,’ Bram promised.

  Sophie’s smile faded as he drained his mug of coffee and began putting on layers of jumpers and jackets. ‘How long do you think you’ll be?’

  ‘It depends where the sheep are.’ Bram’s voice was muffled as he pulled a fleece over his head. ‘If they’re waiting by the gate to be fed there shouldn’t be a problem, but if they’re sheltering under one of other walls it might take a bit of time to find them.’

  To Sophie’s anxious eye, the snow was already thickening. ‘You be careful,’ she said, hugging him, and Bram’s arms, much padded by that stage, came round her and held her tight for a moment.

  ‘Don’t worry about me,’ he said. ‘I’ve got Bess to look after me.’ Awkward in all his layers, he moved to the kitchen door to put on his boots. ‘I’ll be back as soon as I can.’

  And then he was gone. Sophie finished her mince pies and put them to bake in the range, all the time watching the snow outside the window. It seemed to be falling faster by the second. What had once been fine flecks were now thick flakes of snow, spiralling steadily downwards and settling on the stiff branches of the trees and Molly’s pots of herbs just outside the kitchen door.

  Sophie couldn’t settle. The sky grew darker and the snow fell more heavily, blanketing the moors in white until it was impossible to tell the ground from the sky. If only Bram would come in she might enjoy it.

  She had checked the fridge and the freezer. They had plenty of food to see them through, and more than enough firewood stored. If it carried on snowing they might even be snowed in for a while. Haw Gill Farm was at the end of the track, and it wasn’t unusual for it to be cut off for several days. Sophie could think of worse things than to be shut in a warm farmhouse with Bram. They could have Christmas on their own and everyone else could have the wedding without them.

  Outside, it was bitterly cold, and the snow was swirling with a new intensity as a fierce wind picked up momentum over the moors and hurtled towards the farmhouse. It was frightening how quickly conditions could change. Sophie tried to push the word ‘blizzard’ from her mind, and concentrated on how far Bram might have got instead. If only mobile phones worked up here. She could at least ring him then, and find out where he was. As it was, she just had to wait.

  Tomorrow would be the shortest day. There was little enough light as it was, even without the snow, and by half past three it was too dark to see beyond the white flakes swirling at the window. Sophie paced restlessly back and forwards to the kitchen door. Every now and then she would stand in the open doorway, wiping the snow flurries from her face, and strain her ears for the sound of Bram and the dog over the howling wind.

  Bram knew what he was doing. There was no need to panic, Sophie told herself endlessly. But she was very close to panic nonet
heless by the time the sound of the door opening had her bolting from her restless perch by the fire. She practically ran across the room and wrenched open the door to the utility room, where Bram stood, barely recognisable beneath his riming of snow, attempting to towel the worst of the snow off poor Bess.

  ‘Thank God you’re back!’ Sophie threw her arms round him, dislodging a shower of snow, and hugged him tightly. Bram managed a tired grin, but he didn’t hug her back. He might have been too cold and bundled up to move easily, or perhaps he was embarrassed by her welcome.

  Afraid that it might be the latter, Sophie took the towel from him and bent to deal with the dog so that he could strip off his outside layers. ‘I was beginning to think you were lost up there,’ she said, not looking at him.

  ‘I nearly was. The sheep had taken themselves right over the far side of the moor, and by the time we found them it was snowing so hard we had a hard time making it back. But Bess did a grand job.’ Bram bent to pat the dog, who thumped her tail wearily.

  ‘It’s too cold for you in your kennel,’ Sophie told her. ‘You’d better come in by the fire.’

  So Bess was allowed to stretch blissfully in front of the wood-burning stove, a position she had long coveted, while Sophie made Bram some tea and fussed around him, taking away his cold, wet outer clothes until he sat in his shirt and trousers, his feet in thick grey socks stretched out towards the fire.

  He sighed contentedly as he took a sip of the hot tea. ‘I dreamed of this up on the moor,’ he said. ‘A lot of the time I could hardly see where I was going, but I kept thinking of getting back to this kitchen and being able to sit in front of the fire like this. I imagined it being warm and full of good smells, like it is.’

  He paused, glancing at Sophie, who was draping his fleece over the drying rack that hung above the range. ‘And I thought about you being here,’ he said.