He left the room with almost indecent haste, and Georgie put Josh down on the floor and let her breath ease out of her lungs on a sigh of relief. She’d forgotten just how good he looked, how sexy, with his hair rumpled and his jaw roughened with stubble.
And tired. He’d looked tired, she thought, as if he’d been up all night. Because of the kiss? Or the wind, hammering against the house until she thought the windows were coming in? Between the kiss and the wind, they’d made sure she hadn’t slept all night, and she’d only just crashed into oblivion when Josh had woken.
She hadn’t realised it was so early until she saw the kitchen clock, because the snow made it lighter, the moon reflecting off it with an eerie, cold light that seemed to seep through the curtains for the sole purpose of reminding her of the mess she was in.
Why had she let him kiss her?
‘Biscuit,’ Josh said, and she sighed. They had this conversation every day, but he never gave up trying.
‘No. You can have a drink of milk and a banana. There must be some bananas.’
She opened the pantry cupboard and found the fruit in a bowl. She pulled off a banana and peeled it and broke it into chunks for him, and left him kneeling up on a chair and eating it while she made some tea and warmed his milk in a little pan. She would have given it a couple of moments in the microwave, but she couldn’t find one. She’d have to ask about that.
She sat down with her tea next to Josh, in the place where Sebastian had been. He’d left half a slice of toast on the plate, with a neat bite out of it, and she couldn’t resist it. She should have finished her supper the night before instead of running out on him, and she was starving.
‘Me toast,’ Josh said, eyeing it hopefully, and she tore him off a chunk and ate the rest.
‘More.’
‘I’ll make you some in a minute. Let’s go and get dressed first.’
She took him upstairs, protesting all the way, and heard water running. Sebastian must be showering, she realised, and tried really, really hard not to think about that, about the times she’d joined him in the shower, getting in behind him and sliding her arms around his waist—
‘Right. Let’s get you dressed.’
‘Then toast?’
‘Then I have to get ready, and then you can have toast,’ she promised, but she dragged out the dressing and teeth cleaning and face washing as long as possible, then sat Josh on the bed with a book while she washed and dressed herself and tidied the room.
The sound of running water from Sebastian’s room had stopped, she realised as she tugged the bed straight. There was no sound at all, no drawers shutting or boards creaking. He must have finished in the shower and gone downstairs again. With any luck he was in the study, and if not, he could show her where the toaster was to save her scouring the kitchen for it.
She retrieved Josh from the bathroom where he was driving the nailbrush around on top of the washstand like a car.
‘Toast?’ she said, and he beamed and ran over to her, taking her outstretched hand. He chattered all the way down the stairs and into the kitchen, and she was suddenly really, really glad that he’d been with her in the car, that she hadn’t been stuck here with Sebastian on her own.
Not with all the fizzing emotions in her chest—
She found the bread, but there wasn’t a toaster and he wasn’t around. She was still standing there with the bread in her hand and contemplating going to find him when Sebastian came back into the room.
She waved the bread at him. ‘I can’t find the toaster.’
‘Ah. There’s a mesh gadget for that in the slot on the left of the Aga. Just stick the bread in it and put it under the cover, and then flip it. It only takes a few seconds each side so keep an eye on it.’
He pulled the thing out and handed it to her, then headed into the boot room.
‘I’m just going to check the lane,’ he said. ‘See how bad it is.’
‘Really? It’s almost dark still.’
Except it wasn’t, of course, because of the eerie light from the snow and the fact that she’d dallied around for so long getting ready.
Even though she’d resisted putting make-up on...
The door shut behind him, and she put the bread between the two hinged flaps of mesh, laid it on the hotplate and put the cover down. Delicious smells wafted out in moments, and she flipped it and gave it another moment and then buttered the toast while the kettle boiled again.
It smelt so good she made a pile of it, unable to resist sinking her teeth into a bit while she worked, and all the time she wondered how he was getting on and what he’d found at the end of the drive.
* * *
Sheesh.
He stood inside the gates—well inside, as he couldn’t actually get near them without a shovel and a few hours of solid graft—and stared in shock at the lane beyond.
He was already up to his knees in snow and it was getting deeper with every step. Beyond the gates, the snow reached to head height at either side of the entrance. It only dipped opposite the gates because the snow had had somewhere to go.
Straight across the entrance, through the bars of the gates and right up the drive.
There was at least a foot everywhere, but it wasn’t smooth and level. It was sculpted, like sand in the Sahara, swirls and peaks and troughs in shades of brilliant white and cold bluey-purple in the light of dawn.
Beautiful, fascinating—and deadly. If he hadn’t been here they could have been trapped inside the car, buried alive in the snow, slowly and gradually suffocating in the freezing temperatures—
He shut off that line of thought and concentrated on the here and now. It wasn’t good.
In a freewheeling part of his brain that he hadn’t even consulted he realised Georgie wouldn’t even be able to get away if they landed a helicopter in the field opposite, despite the fact that it was virtually bare of snow now, because the snow in the lane was so deep they’d never cross it. Not that he’d really contemplated hiring a helicopter on Christmas Eve to take her and Josh away and bring his family back, but even if he had...
And the snow wasn’t going anywhere soon. Although the wind had finally died away, it was cold. Bitterly, desperately cold, the change from the previous few days sudden and shocking, and he shrugged down inside his coat with a humourless laugh.
He hadn’t needed a cold shower. He should have just come out here. Naked. That might have done the trick. The shower certainly hadn’t.
He gave the lane one last disparaging look and waded back to the house, walking in to the smell of toast and the sound of laughter, and for a moment he felt his heart lift.
Crazy. Stupid. She left you.
But even so, he’d still have her there for another twenty-four hours
