approval when the offer finally came. Mr Thoroughgood would be the perfect husband.
For most young ladies, at least.
Jack’s insides clenched. He wished he were back on the battlefield. There he could strike out against this interloper, removing him from the field with a single blow. This was not the man for Lucy. Not for his Lucy. She needed someone with spirit, someone who could make her laugh, hard and often. Someone who could make her happy.
The Vicar was not that man. But then, neither was he. Jack was the last man on earth to give a woman a joyful future. So he turned away from her, just as he had once before, and went to find his room.
Once all the guests had arrived, the crowd adjourned to the parlour, where a buffet of sweets awaited to refresh them after their journeys. Lucy had arranged for an enormous silver bowl to be filled with Regent’s punch and set trays of mulled wine and eggnog beside it. Next to those were heaps of mince pies, thickly sliced cakes and enough nuts and oranges to satisfy even the greediest child.
She watched the happy people around her with numb satisfaction, wishing that she could enjoy it even a tenth as much as they did. She pretended to smile in response to William Thoroughgood’s prattling, nodding in time to it without paying much attention. But though she should be ignoring him, her eyes followed Jack Gascoyne around the room, observing as he made polite conversation with the other guests.
She could still feel the flush of anger in her face from Jack’s greetings for her, though she had assured William that her colouring was caused by the heat of the fire. She was a sister now, was she? He had chosen to forget the best night of her life and act as if she was simply a childhood friend. She had held that night in her heart and mind like a diamond to be treasured. It had helped her get through the lonely years he’d been gone and kept the hope alive that he might still return to her.
But it had meant nothing to him. The diamond had been glass all along.
There was no point in revealing it to him or showing him the hurt he had caused her. She could not announce in front of anyone else what the problem was, since such an indiscretion should never have happened at all. The truth would ruin her.
So she waited. Guests came and went and she greeted them, saw to their needs and had servants show them to their rooms.
The hours passed, the afternoon ended and the room was nearly empty, except for Millicent Forsythe, standing in a corner, looking rather lost as the last group of friends abandoned her to dress for dinner.
Before Fred could claim her again, Lucy went to her and held out her hands. ‘You must be tired, Miss Forsythe. Do not be afraid to treat our home as your own. No matter what happens, you will always be welcome here, just as Jack is.’ She had meant to give a warm greeting to her future sister, but the result had sounded dire, as if she was expecting a disaster.
Now Millicent was staring at her, obviously puzzled, and looking far too miserable for a woman who was weeks away from her wedding. ‘Nothing has happened,’ she said firmly. ‘Nothing at all.’
‘Of course not,’ Lucy responded, feeling like a fool for infecting the girl with her own dark mood. ‘Your room is at the end of the hall on the first floor. My brother is in the entrance hall. I am sure he will help you find your way, should you ask him.’
Millicent gave her a nervous smile. ‘He should not even know the location of my room. We are not yet married.’ Then she gave a single, apprehensive glance in the direction of her fiancé.
Lucy knew from experience that it was possible to get into a surprising amount of trouble without ever leaving the ground floor. ‘I am sure he can guess it,’ Lucy replied. ‘He has lived here his whole life. But if he gets lost, he can knock on doors until he finds your maid.’
‘But if I go, you shall be alone with Major Gascoyne,’ the girl said, blinking. ‘Do you wish me to find someone to chaperon you?’
Lucy gritted her teeth and pressed her palms flat against her bombazine skirt. ‘Chaperons are not necessary. I do not flatter myself to think his mind would turn in that direction over me.’ She looked across the room to where Jack stood, looking out of the window at the snow which was battering the windowpanes. ‘As he said before, apparently, Major Gascoyne is like a brother to me.’ Before Millicent could question her further, she gave the girl a gentle shove in the direction of Fred.
When her brother saw his beloved, his face lit up with a smile brighter than a ballroom chandelier. The sight was all it took to make Miss Forsythe evaporate like hoarfrost, leaving Lucy alone with Jack.
As she looked over at him, the years seemed to drop away, revealing the boy she had fallen in love with. His shoulders were broader, perhaps, his legs muscled from riding and his features had lost their boyish softness. But other than a thin scar on his chin, he was physically unmarked by the war. His eyes were the same clear grey, though more sombre than they used to be, and his chestnut-brown hair was shorter and cut in the style of a man who did not have time to bother with fashion.
‘Let us drop the pretence,’ Jack said, interrupting her thoughts. ‘Miss Forsythe was correct. We should not be alone together.’ He had obviously been eavesdropping.
‘I do not see why not,’ she replied. ‘You have not bothered to speak to me since that hypocritical greeting when you arrived.’
He crossed the room and glanced down the hall to make sure that Fred and Millicent had gone upstairs before wheeling on her with a stern frown. ‘You know perfectly well how risky this is. Have a care for your reputation.’
‘I suppose I should mind my honour, since you never did,’ she said, then spoiled it by pushing past him to close the parlour door, leaving them shut in together. As there had been the last time they were together, there was a kissing bough hanging in the doorway. That year, it had been an elegant arrangement of ivy, mistletoe, apples and ribbons, that she had made with the express purpose of trapping Jack Gascoyne in a kiss.
It had grown less involved with each year he had been gone and she had come to dread the preparation of it, not wanting to think about kissing him or anyone else. This year, despite the fact that her house was full of company, there was but a single red ribbon holding a sprig of mistletoe, the berries of which could be numbered on her fingers.
He turned slowly to face her and waited to see if she would speak again, giving no indication that he had noticed her anger. Then, at last, he said, almost to himself, ‘I should not have come here. But I could not refuse your brother’s invitation without a reason.’
‘Without a reason?’ She resisted the temptation to shriek like the mad old maid her brother was afraid she had become. ‘What happened between us before you went away is reason enough for you to avoid this house.’
‘Some would say it was reason to come back,’ he corrected.
‘If you had returned earlier, perhaps I would believe you,’ she snapped. ‘But to appear after six months in England, only to call me a sister?’
He shrugged. ‘You made no effort to contact me, in all the time I was gone.’
‘Because
