Fiona Harper - Snowkissed!

Bryony reached out and squeezed her hand. ‘Just take it a day at a time. What you need is a new love interest. I’m going to find you someone gorgeous to help take your mind off my brother.’

Sally shook her head. ‘No, thanks. I’m better off on my own.’

‘Can I ask you something?’ Bryony pulled up outside her old cottage and switched off the engine. ‘Has there been anyone since Tom?’

Sally turned away, her eyes fixed out of the window. ‘Let’s just say he was a hard act to follow.’ She gave a sigh and then turned to Bryony with a bright smile. ‘But I’m working on it. Truly.’

Somewhere out there was a man who wouldn’t seem like second best.

She sat, lost in thought, and the silence stretched into infinity.

Finally Bryony spoke. ‘Are you truly going to be able to move on?’ Her tone was doubtful and Sally stirred.

‘I’ve moved on. I’m home,’ she said simply, undoing her seat belt and reaching for her bag. Suddenly she needed to be on her own. ‘Thanks for lending me the cottage. I’ll find somewhere of my own soon.’

‘No need,’ Bryony said with a frown. ‘Jack and I don’t use it any more. We were going to rent it out anyway. Does Tom know you’re staying here?’

Sally paused with her hand on the doorhandle. ‘No. He asked where I was living but I dodged the question.’

‘But it isn’t going to take him long to figure it out. What if he comes here?’

‘I hardly think he’s going to go to those lengths to have a conversation,’ Sally said with a faint smile. ‘Goodnight, Bry. Thanks for the lift.’

‘You left your bike at the hospital,’ Bryony reminded her. ‘I’ll pick you up in the morning.’

Smiling her thanks. Sally let herself into the cottage, flicked on the lights and walked through to the cosy kitchen, feeling the tension in her neck and shoulders.

It had been a hard day. Harder than she’d anticipated.

She’d known that the first meeting would be difficult, of course. Known that seeing Tom would be painful.

She’d expected to feel anger and contempt. Expected to dismiss him with a few well-rehearsed words.

What she hadn’t anticipated had been the race of her heart and the kick of her breathing.

Sally made herself a coffee and then sat down at the kitchen table, her hands coiled round the hot mug.

Tom Hunter was still a dangerously attractive man.

But he had no place in her life any more.

She wasn’t that careless with her heart.

Tom sat in his sister’s kitchen, tapping long fingers on the table.

‘She’ll be home in a minute, but I probably ought to warn you that you’re not flavour of the month,’ Jack said mildly, opening two beers and handing one to his friend.

Tom drank from the bottle and then banged it down on the table. ‘Did you know Sally was back?’

Jack settled himself opposite, his feet on the table. ‘No. If Bry wanted to keep it from you, she’s hardly going to tell me, is she?’

‘You’re her husband.’

Jack grinned. ‘And you and I have been best mates since primary school, Tom. Takes more than a woman to come between us, even if that woman is your sister.’

Tom sighed and rubbed long fingers over his aching temples. ‘I wish someone had warned me.’

‘Why?’ Jack took a slug of beer. ‘I thought you weren’t interested in her anyway.’

Tom reached for his beer. He’d thought that, too.

But seeing her again had unsettled him more than he would have thought possible.

Being on the receiving end of her cool indifference had made him feel as though he’d lost something special.

At that moment the kitchen door flew open and Bryony stalked into the room, her whole manner confrontational.

Tom rose to his feet, his own gaze equally accusing. Ordinarily they were as close as a brother and sister could be, but tonight they glared at each other like enemies.

‘Why didn’t you tell me that she was coming back?’ Tom’s voice was hard and Bryony’s gaze was equally hard as she met her brother’s eyes.

‘And good evening to you, too, Tom.’ She leaned forward and kissed Jack, her expression softening slightly. Then she straightened and shrugged out of her wool coat.

‘You should have told me she was coming back,’ Tom snarled, and Bryony lifted an eyebrow, refusing to be intimidated by the dangerous light in her brother’s eyes.

‘Why? What reason did I have to believe you even cared? You ended it, remember?’

Colour touched Tom’s cheekbones and his jaw tightened. ‘That is none of your business.’

‘It’s my business when you expect me to help you smooth the path with her.’

‘I can’t change the past.’ Tom sat back down in his chair and reached for his beer. ‘And Sally and I need to move on. We can’t do that if we don’t have a conversation. We need to clear the air.’

‘You mean you need to make yourself feel OK about what you did.’

Tom tensed, realizing with a considerable amount of discomfort that she was right. His conscience was troubling him. And he had a feeling that a conversation wasn’t going to cure his problem.

‘I did what I thought was right at the time.’

‘Right for her or right for you?’ Bryony put her hands on her hips, her expression disapproving, and Jack frowned.

‘Bry, this really isn’t our business.’

Bryony ignored him, her eyes still on her brother. ‘You drove her away and now you’re expecting her to be pleased to see you again.’

‘I’m not expecting that.’ Tom cursed softly and ran a hand over the back of his neck. ‘And I didn’t drive her away. She left.’

‘Because of you! Because you didn’t want her and she couldn’t live in this small community alongside a man who’d rejected her. Do you know your problem?’ Bryony glared at him. ‘You just can’t bear the fact that there’s a woman in the world who doesn’t think you’re God’s answer to romance. You broke Sally’s heart but you want her to say, “That’s fine, Tom.” Well, it isn’t fine! ’

Tom’s eyes narrowed. ‘You’re being emotional about this.’

Bryony gave a growl of feminine frustration. ‘And you’re being ice cold, as usual! Show a modicum of sensitivity here, Tom Hunter! You decided you didn’t want her. End of story.’

It wasn’t the end of the story.

Not by a long way.

It had been so much more complicated than that.

‘You should have told me she was back.’

‘Why would I do that? I assumed it would be of no interest to you.’

Tom gritted his teeth. ‘Sally and I were together for almost three years, for goodness’ sake. Of course I would have been interested in the fact that she was back.’

‘You drove her away, so I assumed her return was a matter of the same indifference to you.’

Tom closed his eyes briefly and muttered something under his breath. ‘Whose side are you on?’

‘Sally’s,’ Bryony replied sweetly. ‘And if you want my opinion, she should have blacked your eye seven years ago when she found you with that—that— tart !’

Jack winced. ‘Sweetheart, you—’

‘Don’t sweetheart me!’ Bryony glared at her husband. ‘Tom behaved horribly to Sally.’

‘I wasn’t with anyone,’ Tom gritted, ‘I went on one date with another woman, that’s all! One date and it was after Sally and I had split up. After we’d agreed to see other people.’

‘ You’d agreed to see other people,’ Bryony reminded him coldly. ‘Sally was so devastated she just sat in her flat broken into tiny pieces.’

Tom winced at the description. ‘It was the wrong time for both of us and we were in an impossible situation, Bry, as you would realize if you took the emotion out of it and looked at it logically.’