straightened. ‘Like what?’
‘Like a mouse expecting to be mauled by that bear Scott originally thought that I was!’ He sighed his exasperation. ‘Compared to my usual demeanour I’m behaving like a goddamned pussycat, okay?’
Meg bit on her top lip as it twitched with laughter. At the moment he looked as Scott used to when he’d gone through ‘the terrible twos’, totally disgruntled at not being able to get his own way.
‘Okay,’ she agreed mildly. ‘Do you want dressing on this salad?’
‘Do I want…’ He closed his eyes, drawing in a controlling breath before opening them again to glare at her. ‘Who the hell are you, Meg Hamilton? And what warped quirk of fate,’ he rasped before she could reply, ‘landed you on my doorstep?’
‘Actually it was the side of the cottage,’ she corrected softly as she mixed a mustard dressing together. ‘But we won’t argue the details just now,’ she dismissed brightly.
‘We’ll save that until later, huh?’ he muttered, a grudging respect now in those deep blue eyes as he looked at her consideringly. ‘What was with your mother earlier? She seemed more concerned with her eating arrangements than whether or not you and Scott were okay.’
The kitchen, small at best, with barely enough room for the two of them to move around it, suddenly didn’t even seem big enough for that, with no room for her to hide, to avoid the piercing intrusion of Jed Cole’s gaze.
Because he was right. Not once during that brief conversation had her mother bothered to ask why Meg and Scott had been delayed, merely commenting that her sister had managed to get there, also from London, because she had sensibly come by train.
It simply hadn’t been worth the effort of explaining that, unlike Sonia, who had probably got all her Christmas presents for the family in one elegant designer-label bag after being gift-wrapped by the store they were bought from, Meg had all Scott’s Father Christmas presents to bring too. Gifts lovingly bought and wrapped by Meg herself, this being the first Christmas that Scott, aged three and a half, had really appreciated and looked forward to. She had even gone to the expense of hiring a car so that she could transport the things here.
The car that was now crumpled into the side of the cottage.
She would have to call the hire company in the morning and explain what had happened, sincerely hoping that the insurance would cover the costs of the damage.
She managed to give Jed Cole a casual shrug as he stood waiting for an answer to his questions. ‘Mothers are like that,’ she evaded. ‘Feeding their family is of high priority.’
Which might have been true of her mother if she did the cooking herself, but ever since Meg had been born, probably before that too, Mrs Sykes—Bessie—had presided over the Hamilton kitchen. But as Jed Cole would never meet her mother, let alone eat a meal in the Hamilton household, he didn’t need to know that.
‘I’m sure your mother is the same,’ she dismissed.
There was a slight softening of his expression. ‘For as long as I can remember my mother has always had enough extra food in the house to feed a family of ten, and often has, and if she hadn’t she’d send my dad out to kill a cow.’
‘She sounds nice,’ Meg murmured wistfully, almost able to imagine the warm kitchen and the motherly figure there caring for her family.
‘She is.’ Jed nodded. ‘So’s my dad. And my two younger brothers. And their wives, and the numerous offspring they’ve produced.’
Meg gave him a considering look. ‘So why aren’t you there for Christmas, instead of—well, here, alone?’
His mouth twisted. ‘Maybe because I prefer “alone” to my Mum and Dad, two younger brothers, their wives, and numerous offspring.’
Maybe.
And then again, maybe not.
She certainly hadn’t imagined that softening when he’d spoken of his family, or the slightly wistful tone in his voice.
But she didn’t have time to probe any further before he snapped, ‘Will you stop asking so many questions, woman, and dish the food up?’
In other words, end of discussion about his family.
But that didn’t stop Meg’s curiosity about them, about whether or not Mum, Dad, two brothers, their wives and their numerous offspring were sad because one of their number was missing from their Christmas this year.
Somehow, and she didn’t know why she felt that way, she had a feeling that they were.
Mistake, Cole, Jed remonstrated with himself even while he inwardly acknowledged that the dressing on the salad was just as he liked it. But he should never have mentioned the idea of kissing Meg. Because now he couldn’t take his eyes off her mouth. It was a rather nice mouth, too, the lips full, with a permanent tilt at their corners, as if this woman liked to smile a lot.
As she was smiling now at her small son as they all sat at the dining table and Scott manfully tried to tackle his own small piece of steak, fries and salad.
And she most definitely was a woman, and not a girl, he accepted self-derisively, her smart comeback before dinner that of an adult. And the soft swell beneath the dark green sweater she wore over faded denims was adult too, as was the curve of her hips. And as for those full, inviting lips.
Damn it, he should never have mentioned kissing her, because now he couldn’t think of anything else!
Two months he had been holed up here, that was all, and now he was looking at Meg Hamilton as if she were a bottle of water in the desert. A carton of ice cream in a heatwave.
‘Is the food not to your liking?’
Jed focused on her scowlingly. ‘What?’
She gave him a quizzical smile. ‘You were glaring at your steak as if it had done something to offend you,’ she teased.
Oh, very funny. Ha, bloody ha.
It was okay for her to laugh, she wasn’t the one sitting here having carnal thoughts about a woman who had arrived on his doorstep in distress, her young fatherless son in tow.
‘The food’s fine,’ he rasped curtly. ‘It’s all fine.’ As if to prove his point he stabbed a piece of steak on his fork and shoved it into his mouth and began chewing.
And chewing.
Maybe cutting the steak down a little in size might have been a good idea, Jed, he berated himself, aware that both Meg and her son were now looking at him, Meg surreptitiously Scott with the frank intensity of a child.
‘It’s rude to stare, Scott,’ his mother remonstrated as she noticed his intensity of concentration.
The little boy turned away obediently. Only to turn back again seconds later when his mother wasn’t looking, those green eyes studied on Jed’s face.
Obviously he had never seen a man try to eat half a cow in one mouthful
