Liz Fielding: Fairytale Christmas: Mistletoe and the Lost Stiletto / Her Holiday Prince Charming / A Princess by Christmas

The sound rippled around the kitchen, bouncing off doors, windows, an array of steel tools hanging from the four-sided rail above the island.

Waking everything up, Nat thought, setting up a hum that seemed to vibrate through him until he was laughing, too.

‘Do you have a kettle, do you know?’ she asked once she’d recovered. Then, as he reached for it, ‘I don’t need to be waited on.’

‘I do know how to boil a kettle. Tea?’ he offered. ‘Or would you prefer coffee?’

‘Oh, tea, I think. Camomile, if you’ve got it. It’s a bit late for coffee.’

Only if you were able to sleep.

She transferred the eggs from the carton to the basket while he filled the kettle, switched it on. Stretched up on her toes to replace it.

Her hair had dried into a froth of little tendrils that curled around her face, against her neck. All she needed were wings and a white dress and she’d look more at home on the top of a Christmas tree than dressed as an elf.

Eggs safe, she picked up a punnet of baby plum tomatoes and looked at them for a moment, then at the plain white china mugs he’d taken from the cupboard, a tiny frown buckling her forehead.

She wasn’t beautiful, there was nothing classic about her features, yet there was a sparkle in her green eyes that made everything right. Made something inside him begin to bubble, catch like a motor that hadn’t been used in a while, that had to be teased into life with a touch, a smile, laughing lips that begged to be kissed.

Like a limb that had gone to sleep, the return to life hurt.

He turned away, almost with relief, as the kettle boiled and reached for one of a row of polished black canisters.

‘It’s not camomile,’ he apologised, extracting a couple of tea bags. He rarely drank tea and discovered that they were disconcertingly beige in this monochrome world. ‘I’m afraid Earl Grey is the best I can do.’

‘That will be lovely,’ she said, joining him. A warm presence at his side.

He dropped the bags into the mugs, poured on boiling water, looked up.

‘You’ve settled in?’ he asked, trying to forget about the kiss.

She nodded.

‘You’ve got everything you need? Toothbrush? Toiletries?’

‘Yes, thanks. Everything for the guest who forgot to pack her toilet bag,’ she assured him. ‘Even a bathrobe. I’ll replace the toothbrush.’

‘No need.’

‘I’d have to buy one, anyway.’

‘You’ll need more than a toothbrush. You’ll need some clothes.’ And, before she could object, ‘A change of underwear, at least.’

‘You have a washing machine, I imagine?’

‘There was one included in the specification,’ he admitted. ‘Along with every other modern convenience known to man.’

‘Specified by your cousin. The man with the Gothic taste.’

‘Gothic?’

‘How else would you describe that room upstairs? It’s pure Addams family. All it needs is a belfry for the bats.’

‘It would spoil the lines. And let in the rain.’

‘Heaven forbid.’

He saw the question in her eyes, then the uncharacteristic hesitation as she decided against it.

‘Actually, it’s all black and white, glass and brushed stainless steel in the store, too, isn’t it?’ she said, changing tack. ‘I hadn’t realised before, but of course down there it’s a frame for all that colour. It works.’

‘Thanks for that. I think,’ he said, but it gave him an opportunity to revisit the subject of clothes. ‘Actually, I was wondering, in the interests of aesthetics, if I could encourage you to change into something a little less…green.’

‘In the interests of aesthetics?’ Her exquisitely threaded eyebrows rose in a pair of questioning little arches. ‘Is that an architectural get-out-of-your-kit line, Nathaniel Hart?’

‘I wasn’t suggesting you stripped off here and now.’ Although the idea had considerable appeal.

‘Are you sure? It sounded rather like it.’

He managed a shrug. ‘I was merely pointing out that they’re working clothes. If you’re planning to keep up the act, continue to hide out in the grotto, you’re going to need them fresh and clean in the morning. House rule,’ he said.

‘Is that right?’ For a moment he thought she was truly offended. Then she grinned. ‘Well, snap, Mr Pinstriped Suit. Off with your jacket. Off with your tie and cufflinks!’

Grinning back, he said, ‘I’ll change if you will. Let’s go shopping.’

She was still smiling, but she was shaking her head. ‘Until I get a proper job, I won’t have any money. And I can’t take anything from you, Nathaniel.’

Why not? Presumably, she’d allowed Henshawe to dress her. Which answered that question. But didn’t help with the problem.

‘Be reasonable, Lucy. You can’t live in that.’

‘It will be a challenge,’ she admitted, but there was a steely glint in those green eyes now, and he battled down the frustration of having an entire store full of clothes he would happily give her, aware that this wasn’t about him. This was about her. Her need to re-establish her self-esteem. Recover what had been stolen from her.

‘You’ve got a proper job,’ he reminded her, ‘at least until Christmas. I’ll sub you until the end of the week.’

‘You’re really going to let me work here?’

‘Why not? You seem to have nothing better to do and an elf with a close personal relationship with Rudolph is a real find. Besides,’ he pointed out, ‘you owe Pam.’ It wasn’t playing fair, but he was prepared to use every trick in the book to keep her safe. Keep her close.

‘Pam might have other ideas if she knew the truth,’ she reminded him as she opened a carton of milk, poured a little into each mug. ‘What is the going rate for an elf?’

He told her.

‘Sorry…’ she was going to turn him down? ‘…that’s actually not bad, but even so I wouldn’t be able to afford your prices.’

‘There’s a generous staff discount,’ he said.

‘For temps?’

‘I’m a temp, too.’ Long-term, until death us do part…

‘Are you?’ For a moment it was all there in her eyes. The questions that were piling up, but when he didn’t answer all she said was, ‘I bet you’re on a better hourly rate than me.’

She handed him one of the mugs and turned to lean back against the counter to sip at her tea. He could feel the warmth of her body and he wished he’d taken her advice, taken off his jacket so that there was only his shirt sleeve between them.

‘I wonder what happened to the real elf?’ she said after a moment. ‘The one from Garlands.’

‘Maybe, given time to think about it, she didn’t want to spend December in a windowless basement,’ he said, sipping at his own tea and deciding there were more interesting ways of heating up his, her lips. How close had they been to a kiss on the stairs? An inch, two?

‘Maybe. Or maybe, when it started to snow, she decided she’d rather go home and make a snowman.’

‘Is that what you’d have done, Lucy?’

‘Me? Fat chance. Every minute of every day is fully booked. Or it was. This afternoon I had a meeting with a wedding designer to explore ideas for my fantasy wedding.’

‘It may still happen,’ he said, glancing down at her, the words like ashes in his mouth.

‘Nope. The word “fantasy” is the clue. It means illusory. A supposition resting on no solid ground.’

He wanted to tell her that he was sorry. But it would be a lie and actually she didn’t look that upset. The brightness in her green eyes was not a tear but a flash of anger.

‘So what should you be doing this evening? If you weren’t here, tearing my life’s work to shreds.’

‘Now?’ She pulled a face. ‘I should be gussied up in full princess mode for a gala dinner at the Ritz, to celebrate the unveiling today of Lucy B.’