Carole Mortimer - New Year Kisses

She looked up at him. ‘How about here? At twelve-thirty? There’s a nice pub a couple of miles away where they serve a great Sunday lunch.’ Working at the hotel, she did not want to be seen by Peter Meridew eating lunch here with one of the guests. Especially a guest like Max!

‘Okay.’ Max nodded slowly, bending down so that he filled the doorway, making it impossible for January to close the car door. ‘You won’t change your mind?’ he prompted huskily.

She already had—several times! But, no…she wouldn’t change her mind.

‘I’ll be here at twelve-thirty,’ she promised, giving an involuntary shiver as the piercing wind and snow entered the car. ‘Brr.’ She grimaced pointedly.

‘Sorry,’ Max murmured ruefully, stepping back so that she could close the car door.

January wound down the window. ‘You should get inside,’ she advised lightly, grateful when her car started the first time she turned the key; it was an old car, and prone to letting her down at inconvenient moments. ‘You’re getting very wet!’ As were his tailored suit and expensive-looking leather shoes.

Now where had she—?

‘I’ll wait here until you’ve driven off, if you don’t mind,’ Max told her grimly. ‘It’s the least I can do!’

He so obviously wasn’t accustomed to having his wishes overridden in this way that January couldn’t help but smile. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow,’ she told him as she drove off with a wave of her hand.

She passed John on his way to his own car as she drove out of the car park, giving him a friendly wave too before accelerating out onto the deserted road.

She would be lying if she said it was an easy drive home, because it was far from that, the drive on the untarmacked cart-track that led up to the farm the worst part of it. But at last she arrived in the farmyard, relieved to switch off the car engine and get out of the car, flexing the tension from her tired shoulder muscles.

Tension not just caused from the difficult drive home, January conceded ruefully. There was Max, her response to him, to worry about, too.

But the tension left her completely as she stood looking at the surrounding countryside, at the snow-covered hills, slowly becoming filled with an inner peace. The land, as far as her eye could see, belonged to them. It might be a tough life sometimes, a lot of hard work, often with no obvious return, the weather and circumstances unkind to them occasionally, too, but it was all theirs.

Nothing—and no one—was ever going to change that…

She was late for their luncheon appointment, by precisely ten minutes, Max realized, scowling after yet another glance at his gold wrist-watch as he strolled restlessly up and down the reception area of the hotel.

Always a stickler for being on time for appointments himself, Max found January’s tardiness doubly frustrating. Firstly, because of that abhorrence of lateness in others as much as in himself; secondly—the fact that January hadn’t arrived at twelve-thirty, as she had said she would, might mean that she wasn’t coming at all!

It was that second reason that was the most frustrating.

Maybe he had come on a little strong with her again last night? Maybe he shouldn’t have kissed her quite that passionately?

But once he’d held January in his arms, not to have kissed her in the way he had had been totally beyond his control. In truth, he had wanted to do a lot more than just kiss her!

Her body had been warm and fluid, her breasts pressed invitingly against his chest, her thighs moulding perfectly against his; it had taken every ounce of his will-power not to sweep her off her feet and carry her up to his hotel room. Where he had wanted to explore every delectable inch of her body with his hands and lips!

Stop it, Max, he instructed himself firmly. Wasn’t it enough that he had spent a sleepless night, initially worrying in case she hadn’t got home safely, and wishing that he had asked her to call him when she’d got in, followed by a hunger just for sight or touch of January, without repeating that discomfort now? He couldn’t remember the last time he had hungered for a woman in this way—if he ever had!—let alone got up in the middle of the night to take a cold shower in an effort to deal with the problem.

He glanced at his watch again. She was fifteen minutes late now—

‘Er—sir? Mr Golding, isn’t it?’

He turned to scowl in acknowledgement as the receptionist called hesitantly across to him.

‘I believe there’s a telephone call for you.’ She pointed to the telephone at the end of the desk, the flashing light indicating the call.

Probably Jude, checking up on progress, Max realized frowningly as he moved to take the call. Just what he needed at this precise moment!

‘Yes?’ he snapped into the receiver.

‘Max?’ January returned uncertainly.

He willed himself to relax, not to show how angry he was—and failed miserably. ‘Where the hell are you?’ he rasped; the fact that she was telephoning him at all meant that she wasn’t on her way here—or, in fact, intending to be!

‘Well, at the moment I’m at home—’

‘You should be here!’ he snapped, his hand tightly gripping the receiver.

‘But until a short time ago I was sitting in my car in a ditch,’ January continued, determined. ‘Max, I’m sorry,’ she added huskily.

‘I really am. I set out in plenty of time to get there at twelve-thirty, but the car skidded on some ice, I lost control, and—well, I ended up in the ditch. I telephoned as soon as I could—’

‘Are you hurt?’ Max cut in sharply, furious with himself now for having lost his temper with her initially. If she were hurt—! That possibility didn’t bear thinking about!

‘Just a little bump on the head,’ January dismissed. ‘But the car is probably a write-off—’

‘Forget the car,’ he cut in. ‘It’s easily replaceable. You aren’t.’

‘Well it might be easily replaceable to you.’ She laughed ruefully. ‘I’m not in such a healthy financial position, I’m afraid. But never mind that,’ she changed the subject. ‘There is no way I’m going to make it for lunch now, so could we make it dinner this evening, instead? March says she doesn’t need her car this evening, so I can borrow that. As long as I promise not to put that in a ditch, too,’ she added dryly.

Max’s head was still full of horrifying visions of the first time she had landed in a ditch, at how nearly he had lost her, when he had only just found her!

‘Wouldn’t it be easier if I were to pick you up?’ he suggested tautly. ‘That way, if anyone ends up in a ditch, it will be me!’

‘No, that won’t do at all,’ she came back instantly.

‘January, could you just forget this idea you have that my meeting your family is tantamount to an engagement announcement,’ he interrupted impatiently, ‘and just look at the safety aspect instead? I do not want—’

‘Max, this has nothing to do with what my family may or may not think—’ The embarrassment could be heard in her voice ‘—and everything to do with the fact that I live in a very remote area, high up in the hills. Trying to direct you there would be a nightmare.’

In that case, the thought of her driving down to him was a nightmare, too—for him. He—

‘Maybe we should just forget meeting up at all,’ January continued evenly. ‘The weather seems to be against us, and—’

‘No!’ Max cut in tautly. ‘No, January, to me not seeing you today is not an option.’ He simply couldn’t go through another night like last night!

‘To me, either,’ she came back softly.

So softly, Max wasn’t sure he had heard her correctly, or whether it was just wishful thinking on his part. The former, he hoped!