Christmas Nights (22 page)

He must have moved, done something… turned his head, because she had never intended to kiss him so intimately, only to brush her lips against his cheek in a small gesture of gratitude for his care of her. She had certainly never planned to do anything so bold as kiss him on the lips, but oddly, even though her brain had registered her error, her body seemed to be having trouble responding to its frantic message to remove her mouth from the male one which confusingly, instead of withdrawing from her touch, seemed to be not merely accepting it but actually actively…

Lisa swallowed, panicked, swallowed again and jerked her head back, only to find that somehow or other Oliver’s hand was resting on her nape, preventing her from doing anything other than lift her lips a mere breath away from his.

‘If that’s the way you kissed Henry, I’m not surprised the two of you never went to bed together,’ she heard him telling her sardonically. ‘If you want to kiss a man you should do it properly,’ he added reprovingly, and then before she could explain or even object he had closed the small distance between them and his mouth was back on hers, only this time it wasn’t merely resting there against her unintended caress
but slowly moving on hers, slowly caressing hers, slowly and then not so slowly arousing her, so that…

It must be the drink, Lisa decided giddily. There could be no other reason why she was virtually clinging to Oliver with both her hands, straining towards him almost as though there was nothing she wanted more than the feel of his mouth against her own.

It
had
to be the drink. There could be no other explanation for the way her lips were parting, positively inviting the masterful male thrust of his tongue. And it had to be the drink as well that was causing her to make those small, keening, soft sounds of pleasure as their tongues meshed.

And then abruptly and shockingly erotically Oliver’s mouth hardened on her own, so that it was no longer possible for her to deceive herself that what they were sharing was simply a kiss of polite gratitude. No longer possible at all, especially when the rest of her body was suddenly, urgently waking up to the fact that it actively liked what Oliver was doing and that in fact it would very much like to prolong the sensual, drugging pleasure of the way his mouth was moving on hers and, if at all possible, to feel it moving not just on her mouth but on her…

Shocked by her own reactions, Lisa sobered up enough to push Oliver away, her eyes over-bright and her mouth trembling—not, she admitted inwardly, because he had kissed her, but because he had stopped doing it.

‘I never meant that to happen,’ she told him huskily, anxious to make sure that he understood that even though she might have responded to him she had not deliberately set out to encourage such intimacy between them.

‘I just wanted to say thank you for—’

‘For making Henry think you’re having an affair with me,’ he mocked her as he sat back from her. ‘Go to sleep,’ he advised her, adding softly, ‘unless you want me to take up
the invitation these have been offering me…’ As he spoke he reached out and very lightly touched one of her exposed breasts.

The bedclothes must have slipped down whilst he’d been kissing her, revealing her body to him, even though she herself hadn’t realised it, Lisa recognised. And they hadn’t just revealed her body, either, she admitted as her face flushed to a pink as deep as that of her tight, hard nipples.

Quickly she pulled the bedclothes up over herself, clutching them defensively in front of her, her face still flushed, and flushing even deeper as she saw the fleeting but very comprehensive and male glance that Oliver gave her now fully covered body.

‘Forget about Henry,’ he advised her as he turned to leave. ‘You’re better off without him.’

He had gone before Lisa could think of anything to say—which in the circumstances was probably just as well, she decided as she settled back into the warmth of the bed. After all, what was there she possibly could have said? Her body grew hot as she remembered the way he had kissed her, her toes curling protestingly as she fought down the memory of her own far from reluctant reaction.

No wonder there had been that male gleam of sensual triumph in his eyes as he’d looked at her body—a look which had told her quite plainly that he enjoyed the knowledge that he had been responsible for that unmistakable sexual arousal of her body—his touch… his kiss…
him
.

It had been an accident, that was all, Lisa reassured herself. A fluke, an unfortunate sequence of events which, of course, would never be repeated. Her toes had relaxed but there was a worrying sensual ache deep within her body—a sense of… of deprivation and yearning which she tried very firmly to ignore as she closed her eyes and told herself sternly to go to sleep.

L
ISA OPENED HER EYES,
confused by her unfamiliar surroundings, until the events of the previous evening came rushing back.

Some of those events were quite definitely ones that she did not want to dwell on and which had to be pushed very firmly back where they belonged—in a sealed box marked ‘very dangerous’. And some of those events, and in particular the ones involving that unexpectedly passionate kiss she had shared with Oliver, were, quite simply, far too potentially explosive to be touched at all.

Instead she focused on her surroundings, her eyes widening in disbelief as she looked towards the fireplace. She rubbed them and then studied it again. No, they were not deceiving her; there was quite definitely a long woollen stocking hanging from the fireplace—a long woollen stocking bulging with all sorts of odd shapes, with a notice pinned to it reading, ‘Open me.’

Her curiosity overcoming her natural caution, Lisa hopped out of bed and hurried towards the fireplace, removed the stocking and then returned to the sanctuary of her bed with it.

As she turned it upside down on the coverlet to dislodge its contents, a huge smile curled her mouth, her eyes dancing with a mixture of almost childlike disbelief and a rather more adult amusement.

Wrapped in coloured tissue-paper, a dozen or more small
objects lay on the bed around her. Some of them she could recognise without unwrapping them: the two tangerines, the nuts, the apple…

There could, of course, only be one person who had done this; the identity of her unexpected Father Christmas could not be in doubt, but his motivation was.

Her fingers trembled slightly as she removed the wrapping from what turned out to be a tube of thick white paper. As she unrolled it she began to frown, her frown turning to a soft gasp as she read what had been written on it in impressive copperplate handwriting.

In this year of our Sovereign Queen Elizabeth it is hereby agreed that there shall be a formal truce and a cessation of hostilities between Mistress Lisa and Oliver Esquire in order that the two aforenamed may celebrate the Festival of Christmas in true Christian spirit.

Beneath the space that he had left for her to sign her own name Oliver had signed his.

Lisa couldn’t help it. She started to laugh softly, her laugh turning into a husky cough and a fit of sneezes that told her that she had not, as she had first hoped, escaped the heavy cold Oliver had warned likely the previous evening.

At least, though, her head was clear this morning, she told herself severely as she scrabbled around amongst the other packages on the bed, guessing that somewhere amongst them there must be a pen for her to sign their truce.

It touched her to think of Oliver going to so much trouble on her behalf. If only Henry had been half as thoughtful… But Henry would never have done anything like this. Henry would never have kissed her the way Oliver had done last night. Henry would never…

Her fingers started to tremble as she finally found the parcel containing the pen.

It hurt to think that the future that she had believed she and Henry could have together had been nothing more than a chimera… as childish in its way as her daydreams of a perfect Christmas which she had revealed to Oliver last night, under the effects and influence of his malt whisky.

Her eyes misted slightly with fresh tears, but they were not, this time, caused by the knowledge that she had made a mistake in believing that she and Henry had a good relationship.

After she had signed the truce she noticed that her signature was slightly wobbly and off balance—a reflection of the way she herself had felt ever since Oliver had thrust his way into her life, demanding the return of his cousin’s girlfriend’s clothes.

Thinking of clothes reminded Lisa that she had nothing to wear other than the things she had discarded the previous evening. Hardly the kind of outfit she had planned to spend Christmas Day in, she acknowledged as she mourned the loss of the simply cut cream wool dress that she had flung at Oliver’s feet before her departure from Henry’s parents’ house.

Still, clothes did not make Christmas, she told herself, and neither did Christmas stockings—but they certainly went a long way to help, she admitted, a rueful smile curling her mouth as she pictured Oliver painstakingly wrapping the small traditional gifts which for generations children had delighted to find waiting for them on Christmas morning.

It was a pity that after such an unexpected and pleasurable start the rest of her Christmas looked so unappealingly bleak. She wasn’t looking forward to her return to her empty flat. She glanced at her watch. She had slept much later than usual and it was already nine o’clock—time for her to get up
and dressed if she was going to be able to retrieve her car, fill it with petrol and make her return journey to London before dark.

She had just put one foot on the floor when she heard Oliver knocking on the bedroom door. Hastily she put her foot back under the bedclothes and made sure that the latter were secured firmly around her naked body as she called out to Oliver to come in. She didn’t want there to be any repeat of last night’s still blush-inducing
faux pas
of not realising that her breasts were clearly on view.

The sight of him carrying a tea-tray complete with a china teapot, two cups and a plate of wholemeal toast made her eyes widen slightly.

‘So you found it, then. How are you feeling?’ he asked her as he placed the tray on the empty half of her bed, half smiling as he saw the clutter of small objects still surrounding her and the evidence of her excitement as she had unwrapped them in the small, shredded pieces of paper torn by her impatient fingers.

‘Much better,’ Lisa assured him. ‘Just as soon as I can get my car sorted out I should be off your hands and on my way back to London. I still haven’t thanked you properly for what you did,’ she added, half-shyly. Last night the intimacy between them had seemed so natural that she hadn’t even questioned it. This morning she was acutely conscious of the fact that he was, after all, a man she barely knew.

His soft, ‘Oh, I wouldn’t say that,’ as he looked directly at her mouth made her flush, but there was more amusement in his eyes than any kind of sexual threat, she acknowledged.

‘I haven’t thanked you for the stocking either,’ she hurried on. ‘That was… I… You must think me very childish to want… I’m not used to drinking, and your whisky… I’ve signed this, by the way.’ She tried to excuse herself, diving amongst her spoils to produce the now rerolled truce.

As she did so she suddenly started to sneeze, and had to reach out for the box of tissues beside the bed.

‘I thought you said you were feeling all right,’ Oliver reminded her sardonically.

‘I am,’ Lisa defended herself, but now that she was fully awake she had to acknowledge that her throat felt uncomfortably raw and her head ached slightly, whilst yet another volley of sneezes threatened to disprove her claim to good health.

‘You’re full of a cold,’ Oliver corrected her, ‘and in no fit state to drive back to London—even if we could arrange for someone to collect your car.’

‘But I have to… I must…’ Lisa protested.

‘Why… in case Henry calls?’

‘No,’ Lisa denied vehemently, her face flushing again as she suddenly realised how little thought she had actually given to Henry and the end of their romance.

But it was obvious that Oliver had mistaken the cause of her hot face because he gave her an ironic look and told her, ‘It will never work. He’ll always be tied to his mother’s apron strings and you’ll always have to take second place to her…

‘It’s half past nine now,’ he told her, changing the subject. ‘The village is only ten minutes away by car and we’ve got time to make it for morning service. I’ve put the turkey in the oven but it won’t be ready until around three…’

Lisa gaped at him.

‘But I can’t stay here,’ she protested.

‘Why not?’ he asked her calmly. ‘What reason have you to go? You’ve already said that you’ll be alone in your flat, and since I’ll be alone up here—if you discount a fifteen-pound turkey and enough food to feed the pair of us several times over—it makes sense for you to stay…’

‘You want me to stay?’ Lisa asked him, astonished. ‘But…’

‘It will be a hell of a lot easier having you to stay than
trying to find a reputable mechanic to sort out and make arrangements for a garage to collect your car, check it over and refuel it. And having one guest instead of two is hardly going to cause me any hardship…’ He gave a small shrug.

It was a tempting prospect, Lisa knew. If she was honest with herself she hadn’t been looking forward to returning to her empty flat, and even though she and Oliver were virtually strangers there was something about him that… Severely she gave herself a small mental shake.

All right, so maybe last night her body
had
reacted to him in a way that it had certainly never reacted to Henry… Maybe when he had kissed her she
had
felt a certain… need… a response… but that had only been the effect of the whisky… nothing more.

She opened her mouth to decline his invitation, to do the sensible thing and tell him firmly that she had to return home, and instead, to her chagrin, heard herself saying in a small voice, ‘Could we really go to church…?’ As she realised what she was saying she shook her head, telling him hastily, ‘Oh, no, I can’t… I haven’t anything to wear. My clothes… your cousin’s girlfriend’s clothes.’

‘Are hanging in the closet,’ Oliver informed her wryly.

Lisa looked at him. ‘What? But they can’t be… I left them at Henry’s parents’.’

‘I didn’t,’ Oliver informed her succinctly.

‘But… but you wanted to give them back to Emma.’

‘Originally, yes, but only because Piers was so convinced that the moment she knew what he had done she’d walk out again. However, it transpires that she’s off Armani and onto Versace so Piers was allowed to make his peace with her by taking her out and buying her a new wardrobe.’

‘So you went to all that trouble for nothing,’ Lisa sympathised, knowing how she would have felt in his shoes.

The look he gave her in response made her heart start to
beat rather too fast, and for some reason she found it impossible to hold his gaze and had to look quickly away from him.

His slightly hoarse, ‘You’d have been wasted on a man like Henry,’ made her want to curl her toes in much the same way as his kiss had done last night, and the small shiver that touched her skin had nothing to do with any drop in temperature.

‘I’ll meet you downstairs in half an hour,’ Oliver was saying to her as he moved away from the bed.

Silently, Lisa nodded her agreement. What had she done, committing herself to spend Christmas with him? She gave a small, fatalistic shrug. It was too late to worry about the wisdom of her impulsive decision now.

Thirty-five minutes later, having nervously studied her reflection in the bedroom mirror for a good two minutes, Lisa walked hesitantly onto the landing.

The cream wool dress looked every bit as good on as she had remembered; the cashmere coat would keep her warm in church.

Her hair, freshly washed and dried, shone silkily, and as yet the only physical sign of her cold was a slight pinky tinge to her nose, easily disguised with foundation.

At the head of the stairs she paused, and then determinedly started to descend, coming to an abrupt halt as she reached the turn in the stairs that looked down on the hallway below.

In the middle of the large room, dominating it, stood the largest and most wondrous Christmas tree that Lisa had ever seen.

She gazed at it in rapt awe, unaware that the shine of pleasure in her eyes rivalled that of the myriad decorations fastened to the tree.

As excited as any child, she positively ran down the remaining stairs and into the hall.

‘How on earth…?’ she began as she stood and marvelled at the tree, shaking her head as she was unable to find the words to convey her feelings.

‘I take it you approve,’ she heard Oliver saying wryly beside her.

‘Yes. Yes. It’s wonderful,’ she breathed, without taking her eyes off it to turn and look at him. ‘But when… How…?’

‘Well, I’m afraid I can’t claim to have gone out last night and cut it down. It had actually been delivered yesterday. Piers and I were supposed to be putting it up… It’s a bit of a family tradition. He and I both used to spend Christmas here as children with our grandparents, and it was our job to “do the tree”. It’s a tradition we’ve kept up ever since, although this year…

‘I brought it in last night after you’d gone to bed. Mrs Green had already brought the decorations down from the attic, so it was just a matter of hanging them up.’

‘Just a matter…’ Lisa’s eyebrows rose slightly as she studied the rows and rows of tiny lights, the beautiful and, she was nearly sure, very valuable antique baubles combined with much newer but equally attractive modern ones.

‘It must have taken you hours,’ she objected.

Oliver shrugged.

‘Not really.’

‘It’s beautiful,’ she told him, her throat suddenly closing with emotion. He hadn’t done it for her, of course. He had already told her that it was a family tradition, something he and his cousin did together. But, even so, to come down and find it there after confiding in him last night how much she longed for a traditional family Christmas… suddenly seemed a good omen for her decision to stay on with him.

‘It hasn’t got a fairy,’ she told him, hoping he wouldn’t notice the idiotic emotional thickening in her voice.

As he glanced towards the top of the tree Oliver shook his
head and told her, ‘Our fairy is a star, and it’s normally the responsibility of the woman of the house to put it on the tree, so I left it—’

‘You want me to do it?’ Fresh emotion swept her. ‘But I’m not… I don’t belong here,’ she reminded him.

‘But you are a woman,’ he told her softly, and there was something in the way he said the words, something in the way he looked at her that warned Lisa that the kiss they had shared last night wasn’t something he had forgotten.