Once Upon a Christmas Night...

by Annie Claydon

  He wasn’t either of those any more, though. Not quite a lover yet, but Jess was becoming acutely aware that it would only take one touch. One kiss, and this time nothing would be able to stop them.

  And if they didn’t stop? If they went ahead? Greg would have the power to tip her well-ordered life on its head. Jess had no doubt whatsoever that he would, that was what Greg was like, he thought outside the box. The scariest thing about it was that this only made him even more irresistible.

  She sighed. There was no guarantee that he wouldn’t transform her world and then leave. If the hospital grapevine was anything to go by, that’s exactly what he would do. But that didn’t matter any more. However many reasons there were to have nothing more to do with Greg, she was going with him next weekend. That was all there was to it.

  CHAPTER THREE

  JESS’S WARDROBE WASN’T large, but it was focussed. Plain skirts and trousers and an assortment of matching blouses for work. A tailored suit for interviews, a few pairs of jeans, ranging from new to falling to pieces, and tops, ranging from very warm to very summery. A dress, bought for a summer wedding, which she’d worn only once. Nothing seemed suitable for a visit to the house that Greg had inherited from his father, which sounded large—no, sprawling—and far grander than anything she was used to.

  Going out and buying something might have been an option, but she felt unequal to the task. New clothes would only serve to make her feel more uncomfortable anyway. Taking a little more care with her hair and make-up and choosing favourite pieces from her wardrobe would have to be enough.

  ‘You look nice. I like your scarf.’ He grinned as he took her coat and weekend bag, opening the passenger door of his car for her.

  It was the one thing she’d allowed herself to buy. A pretty lilac scarf that went with her plain grey trousers and sweater and the black leather jacket that she normally kept for best. Greg was wearing jeans and a warm, slightly battered, leather jacket but he had a knack of making scruffy look stylish. Sexy too, but Jess was trying not to think too much about that.

  ‘Do you want to put your jacket in the back? It’s a long drive.’ Greg had taken his own off and slung it on the back seat before getting into the car.

  ‘Yes. Thanks.’ She shrugged out of her jacket and he took it, draping it carefully over his.

  ‘Right, then.’ He twisted the key in the ignition. ‘Let me know if you get cold and I’ll turn the heat up.’

  By the time they reached the suburbs she was feeling hot and cold by turn. When they hit the motorway, her stomach began to lurch. What was she doing? She’d been so brave, so thoughtless in agreeing to come away with him. He was so much more than a nice guy and a good doctor. He was sophisticated, drop-dead gorgeous and far more than a girl like her could handle. She was sure to make a fool of herself.

  ‘You okay?’

  ‘Hmm? Yes, fine.’ Jess turned her head away from him, staring at the hard shoulder of the motorway.

  ‘Sure?’

  Cold perspiration began to form on the side of her brow. Suddenly she felt trapped, carried inexorably towards goodness only knew what. ‘Um. Actually, I do feel a little sick.’

  ‘Did you have breakfast this morning?’

  She hadn’t had time. She had been too busy fussing over her packing and her appearance and stressing about her trip with Greg. ‘Not really… ’

  ‘There’s motorway services a mile up ahead. We’ll stop there.’

  Just to swell the small fountain of misery that was bubbling up inside her chest, he helped her out of the car when they parked. And because standing made her head swim, she allowed him to. He kept hold of her until she was seated in the corner of the bleak, utilitarian cafeteria and then hurried to fetch toast and two cups of tea.

  ‘Feeling better?’ An awkward silence had only been rendered slightly more acceptable by having something to eat and drink.

  ‘Yes. I’m fine, just one of those stupid things.’

  He gave the throw-away line rather more consideration that it deserved. ‘I could try acupressure.’

  ‘Since when have you done acupressure?’ Suddenly there was something to talk about. Something they shared. ‘Don’t tell me you’ve been getting into alternative medicine.’

  He grinned. ‘Don’t tell me you’ve been getting into labels. There are lots of interesting techniques out there that bear quantitative investigation. When I was in the States, I met a guy who uses it to very good effect, in tandem with drug regimes.’

  ‘So you were working as a doctor in America?’

  ‘Just taking an interest.’ He steered deftly around the question. ‘Here, give me your arm.’

  ‘What, so you can experiment on me? In a café at motorway services?’

  ‘Well, I wouldn’t do it on a patient.’ She felt his fingers on her wrist, the thumb pressing firmly between the two bands of muscle that ran down the inside of her arm. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘Too many variables. I don’t know whether we can come to a definite conclusion.’ She was on steadier ground now. Jess ventured a smile.

  He chuckled quietly. ‘Do you think it matters which arm you do it on?’ He’d clearly decided she felt better and had switched to ruminating on variations to his technique.

  ‘I wouldn’t know. Here, you want to have a go?’ She held out her other arm.

  ‘Hmm. Probably a bit late now.’ He grasped her arm anyway and tried again. ‘How’s that?’

  ‘Feels… okay.’ Much, much better than okay. She was starting to tingle all over. Either he’d hit on a discovery that had eluded other medical practitioners for centuries or her body had decided that responding to his touch was a good idea. Great. A little warning might have been in order.

  ‘Jess, we’ve known each other for long enough… ’

  ‘Worked together.’ She corrected him quickly. Working together was one kind of knowing. This was another.

  ‘I’m not your boss any more.’ Something dark, like liquid promise, glowed in his eyes.

  ‘I suppose that makes things less complicated.’

  He grinned. ‘Yep. But I won’t pretend that I haven’t worked alongside you for more hours at a stretch than either of our contracts allows for. I’ve seen you exhausted, cranky, messy… ’

  ‘Thanks a lot!’

  ‘Fabulous, formidable… ’

  ‘Better.’ They both smiled at the same moment.

  ‘We’ve got past the point where we need to apologise for all our little foibles.’

  ‘You mean you have foibles?’ He did have a way of lifting her worries off her shoulders. Always had.

  He shrugged. ‘Well, when I said our foibles I was just trying to make you feel better about yours.’

  ‘Oh, so you think you don’t have foibles?’ Jess wrinkled her nose at him. ‘What about that famous charm of yours?’

  ‘Doesn’t seem to work on you.’

  ‘Works on everyone else.’

  ‘Can I help that?’

  ‘Oh, yeah, you can help it. And the love ’em and leave ’em… ’

  ‘It keeps things simple. Anyway, I’ve changed. The last person I loved and left was… ’ He frowned, as if consulting his memory and not quite believing the answer he got back.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘You, actually.’

  ‘Me! We didn’t…  .’

  He leaned across the table towards her. ‘You don’t need to. It only takes a touch.’ He ran one finger down the back of her hand and Jess gulped, pulling her arm away.

  ‘So what about my foibles, then?’ Time to change the subject.

  ‘Your what?’ His gaze slid across her body, making her shiver.

  ‘Foibles. Pay attention.’

  ‘I am paying attention.’ He pushed the teacups and the plate that stood between them on the table out of the way. ‘Okay, so your eyes look as if they have flecks of gold in them. That’s not contacts, is it?’

  ‘Of course not.’ She nudged her leg against his under t
he table. ‘Foibles, I said.’

  ‘I heard. Well, you’re resourceful, talented, generally a force to be reckoned with. Only you don’t much like being out of your comfort zone.’

  Yes, okay, he might have a point. There were good reasons for her to feel that way. ‘Maybe.’

  He leaned forward, and Jess couldn’t help but move towards him. She felt his lips brush her ear. ‘It’s a rather nice comfort zone, though.’

  ‘Stop it.’ She was feeling better now. As if the weekend wasn’t so much of a trial to be got through. Jess almost wished that it was more than two days.

  He drew back. From the look in his eyes there was no question that the dialogue was still continuing somewhere in the back of his mind.

  ‘Do you want to drive?’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘Sometimes driving can help if you’re feeling a bit queasy.’

  She stared at him. He knew just as well as she did that this was an excuse. That somehow, indefinably, she would feel a bit more in charge of her own destiny if she was in the driving seat. He was good. Good at putting her at her ease. Very, very good at making her want him.

  ‘Okay. If you don’t mind.’

  He shrugged. ‘Why would I mind?’

  His car was a pleasure to drive. When she put her foot down on the motorway, it responded with a purr, rather than the laboured growl that her own car would have emitted. Greg pushed the passenger seat back so he could stretch his legs, and confined himself to giving directions. An hour later they turned into a long, gated drive and drew up outside the house.

  ‘It’s big.’ Jess scanned the complex roof structure, which accommodated an elaborate arrangement of mock crenellations beneath it. There was even a circular tower, tacked onto one side of the building, with a set of battlements and a flagpole at its top.

  He grinned. ‘Yeah. Not the prettiest of places.’

  ‘It’s not meant to be. Victorian, right?’

  ‘Yes, that’s right.’

  ‘Then the architecture’s not about welcoming visitors, eh?’

  He looked again. Leaned back to study the red-brick patterns over the windows and the heavy portico, as if this was the first time he’d seen the place. ‘Never really thought about it. So what is it all about, then?’

  ‘It’s a statement. This house is all about the people who live here being different from the people who live down in the village. They wanted to impress with their power, not their good taste.’

  He nodded. ‘You think so?’

  Yes, she knew so. The girl from a two-up, two-down felt confronted and challenged by this place and Jess imagined that was exactly how she was meant to feel. ‘It’s one way of looking at it.’

  He nodded, obviously turning the idea over in his head. ‘Well, come inside. It’s a bit more homely there.’

  Not so you’d notice. The large hallway was big enough to contain her whole flat, with height to spare, and the sweeping stone staircase continued the theme of a fortified castle. Leading up to a wide half-landing that was illuminated by a large, stained-glass window, the whole thing reminded her of a film set for a medieval saga.

  ‘Here you are!’

  A woman’s voice sounded, and for a moment Jess couldn’t work out which direction it had come from. Greg turned and made his way towards the back of the hallway.

  ‘We stopped for breakfast.’ He spared Jess the indignity of mentioning why. ‘What are you doing here?’

  A laugh. The first piece of warmth that Jess had met in this place. A figure emerged from the gloom, walking towards her. Mid-fifties, tall and slim. One of those women that made style look like a fortuitous accident.

  ‘I popped in to turn the heating on and put some food in the fridge.’ The woman ducked around Greg and made straight for Jess. ‘You must be Greg’s friend. I’m Rosa.’

  ‘My mother.’ Greg was grinning. ‘Who never misses a chance to check out who I’m associating with.’

  Rosa dismissed him with a casual movement of her fingers. ‘Don’t be so parochial, darling. Your friends might want to check me out.’ She grasped Jess’s hand, holding it in both of hers, and leaned in to kiss her. ‘There. Both cheeks.’

  ‘The Italian way.’ Greg was leaning against the heavy stone balustrade which enclosed the stairs, his hands shoved into his pockets.

  ‘Don’t listen to my son. I hope you’ll come over to my home for something to eat.’

  ‘You live near here?’ This was Greg’s father’s house. He’d said that his mother and father had divorced when he’d been a child, but she seemed very much at home here.

  ‘Two miles in that direction.’ Rosa flicked her fingers towards the dark recesses at the back of the hallway. ‘You can walk across the fields, it’s a nice day.’

  Jess shot a questioning look at Greg. Perhaps this wasn’t in his plan for the weekend.

  ‘Have you made cannoli?’ Greg was smiling at his mother.

  ‘Of course.’ Rosa turned to Jess. ‘Did he think to tell you to bring any walking shoes?’

  No, he hadn’t. Jess wasn’t sure how well her own shoes would stand up to a cross-country walk. ‘Perhaps we can go by road.’

  ‘If you want. Or I think there may be a pair of wellingtons in the cloakroom. If they’re too big I’m sure that a couple of pairs of socks… ’

  ‘We’ll manage.’ Greg looked at his watch. ‘When do you want us?’

  His mother shrugged. ‘Whenever you’re hungry.’

  ‘How does one o’clock suit you?’

  ‘Perfect. Make it one-ish. Don’t worry about being a little late.’

  Greg rolled his eyes and kissed his mother, helped her into the waterproof coat that was slung on a low settle in one corner of the hallway and bade her goodbye. Alone again with him, the temperature in the cavernous, empty space seemed to drop a couple of degrees and Jess drew her jacket around her.

  ‘Sorry, Jess. My mother wasn’t really checking you out, she’s not like that.’

  ‘It was nice of her to come by, this place could do with warming up a bit. I didn’t realise that your mother lived so close to your father.’

  ‘My father wasn’t here much.’ Greg’s mouth twitched downwards and he turned away, moving to the door at the back of the hallway where his mother had appeared from. ‘He lived mostly in the States, but he came over here three or four times a year to take care of his business interests in Europe.’

  ‘He kept this place empty, then, most of the time?’ It was a huge house, even for a family. For one man, who was hardly ever there, it was ridiculous.

  ‘He used to entertain a lot when he was here.’ There was a trace of bitterness in Greg’s voice.

  ‘I suppose it was handy to see you as well.’ Jess followed him into the large, well-equipped kitchen, which could have accommodated an army of caterers.

  He raised an eyebrow. ‘He was mostly working. Mum used to bring me over, and half the time we’d just make our own entertainment because my father was locked away in the study, on the phone.’

  ‘But she still brought you.’ A picture of Rosa, walking her young son across the fields so that he could see his father, floated into her head. How must she have felt when the boy was ignored?

  ‘My mother was an eternal optimist where my father was concerned. She always encouraged me to see him.’ He dumped the kettle down onto the range and lit the gas underneath it.

  In this house, he seemed surrounded by things he didn’t want to talk about. But he’d come here. He’d brought her here. On some level he must be aware of that, and that the seemingly complicated tangle of his relationship with his father wasn’t going to straighten itself out all on its own.

  ‘So this is where you grew up?’ She settled herself onto one of a long row of kitchen stools.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘And you didn’t see much of your father.’

  ‘Nope. Not a lot.’

  She’d hit a sore spot, but she kept pressing. Sometimes you had to do that.
‘But your parents were on good terms?’

  He barked out a short laugh. ‘Yeah. She loved him, and in his way he loved her. They just had very different priorities. And it’s not particularly easy to maintain a relationship with someone who only has about five uninterrupted minutes a day to spend with you.’

  ‘No. I imagine not.’ Jess wondered whether Greg was talking about his mother’s relationship with his father or his own. Probably a bit of both. ‘Neither of them married again?’

  ‘Not straight away. But that doesn’t mean they were secretly yearning to get back together. My father had his share of women friends. They loved the lifestyle for a while and then realised that they’d always be playing second fiddle to his work. And my mother remarried when I was fifteen. The local doctor. You’ll meet Ted when we go over there.’ There was sudden warmth in his voice.

  ‘So it was his footsteps you followed in.’

  ‘Guess so. Mum made him wait, but he was always there when I was a kid. He’d take us out somewhere every weekend, we used to have great adventures together.’

  ‘But they never moved away from here?’

  ‘Why should they? Ted’s practice is down in the village. This is my mother’s home much more than it ever was my father’s.’ He shrugged. ‘Although he came back here at the end.’

  ‘You mean he died here?’

  Greg nodded. ‘He hadn’t told anyone that he had cancer. But when he turned up here, two days after Christmas last year, it was obvious that he was ill. My mother called me, and I arranged for him to be seen by a specialist. My mother looked after him, right up until the end.’

  ‘That was a nice thing to do.’

  ‘Yeah. She’s a nice person. I think somehow my father reckoned that he could correct some of the mistakes he’d made, but it was too late.’ He poured the tea and set a cup in front of her on the marble worktop. ‘Does that cover it?’

  ‘I don’t know. Does it?’ Greg’s secrets ran deeper than this. Nothing that he’d said explained the eight-month absence after his father’s death. Or the air of weariness that broke through whenever he talked about his father.