The Magic of Christmas (10 page)

‘You've made me an angel costume?'

‘Not exactly. I paid a quick trip to the shops,' Lara confessed, reaching for the bag. ‘Try it on. Chloe? I picked up some paint cards when I was in the shops. I thought you might like to choose a colour for your bedroom. Have a look at them.'

Chloe stared at her. ‘My bedroom?' She shook her head. ‘My bedroom is fine. It can wait.'

‘I have an idea, but if you hate it, you must tell me.' Lara reached for Aggie's crayons, which were strewn over the table, and started to colour in broad strokes. ‘Look at this. How about we paint three wide stripes around two of the walls? Different colours. Purple, orange and blue. Not bright ones. Pastel. Disgusting or amazing?'

Chloe looked at the sketch and then at the paint colours that Lara pushed in front of her. ‘A-amazing,' she stammered. ‘But that would take ages and be really hard.'

‘No. It would just take patience, a sense of humour and lots of masking tape,' Lara said blithely, turning to look at Aggie who had wriggled into the costume. ‘Now, that is what I call an angel costume! Do you like it?'

Aggie stared down at herself. ‘It's way beyond awesome,'she breathed, and Lara grinned at Chloe.

‘Does that mean she likes it?'

Chloe laughed. ‘It means she likes it.'

C
HRISTIAN
opened the front door and then paused on the threshold, wondering for a moment whether he'd walked into the wrong house.

Lively Christmas music blared through the tall, elegant building, punctuated by the steady thumping of feet and shrieks of female laughter. The thumps and bangs were so loud that he glanced upwards, wondering how many more thumps it would take to bring the ceiling down.

Were they having a party?

Christian gave a faint smile. Whatever Lara was doing with his children, they were clearly enjoying it and that was all he cared about. If necessary, he'd pay someone to fix the ceiling.

He closed the door behind him, shutting out the bitterly cold December evening, and the delicious
smell of garlic and herbs wafting from the kitchen made him realise how hungry he was. Suddenly he was glad that he hadn't succeeded in stopping Lara from cooking,

He hung up his coat and then followed the sound of laughter. Pushing open the drawing-room door, he stopped in amazement.

Chloe, Aggie and Lara were all wearing toy antlers and gyrating furiously to a rock and roll song about Rudolph. Christian watched his children for a moment and then he looked at Lara.

And continued to look.

She was wearing a tartan miniskirt with a black jumper and thick black tights, and she moved her whole body in perfect time to the music, somehow managing to combine both grace and energy as she executed a deceptively simple dance that Chloe and Aggie were both trying to emulate. Her legs went on for ever and her blonde hair and blue eyes provided a splash of colour against the unrelieved black of her jumper. With the brown, furry antlers on her head, she looked young, uninhibited and—
gorgeous
?

Captivated by the sudden injection of life into
his home, Christian could have watched her for ever but Aggie noticed him and gave a shriek.

‘Daddy's home!' She raced towards him and leapt, forcing Christian to catch her in mid-air. ‘We're playing discos. Lara calls it the Rudolph Jive. She says it's great for warming you up on a cold day.'

Lara stopped dancing and pushed strands of blonde hair away from her pink face. Her eyes sparkled with humour as she smiled at him. ‘Hi, there! I couldn't find the controls to turn up your central heating. It was dance or freeze. This is a big house. I'm used to living in a tiny flat. If I just turn on the hairdryer, the place heats up so fast I have to open the window.'

‘The boiler is in the basement. I'll show you how to adjust it later.' He stroked Aggie's hair and glanced over her shoulder at Chloe. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes were sparkling with laughter, but there was a wary look in her eyes that hadn't been there when he'd first entered the room.

Was it him? Had he done something?

Did she blame him for the fact that her mother had left?

‘Hello, Daddy.' She rushed to turn the music down. ‘Did you have a good day?'

Christian frowned, wondering why she felt the need to stop what she was doing. It didn't escape his notice that in comparison with Aggie's unselfconscious exuberance, Chloe was painfully, almost unnaturally well behaved. He studied her for a moment, trying to work out the problem and failing. He wanted her to act like the child she still was and it seemed as though she'd been doing exactly that until he'd walked into the room.

Why had his sudden entrance had that effect on her?

Suddenly he wished that baby daughters were delivered with manuals. He had absolutely no idea how he should be handling this current phase in her life. What if her subdued behaviour had nothing to do with the divorce? What if she was being bullied at school?
What if there was a boy?

He broke out in a cold sweat and then reassured himself that there was no way that Chloe had boy trouble.
Yet.
But boy trouble would undoubtedly come in time, and he would be expected to help her with her problems.

Lara was still trying to catch her breath. She didn't appear to notice anything amiss so he just smiled at Chloe. ‘I had a good day, thanks, sweetheart. How about you?'

‘Very good. Lara's a great cook. We made nuggets together and she's made you casserole.'

Aggie bounced in his arms. ‘And she's going to decorate the whole house and Chloe's bedroom, and, if I help unpack the last of the boxes, can we go and get a huge tree on Sunday?'

Christian's eyes slid to Lara. Her cheeks were still pink from the dancing, her blonde hair kicked up at the edges and her full mouth was curved in a wide, happy smile.

‘Sorry. Hope I haven't overstepped the mark,' she said breathlessly, waving a hand in front of her face in an attempt to cool herself down. ‘You're working on Saturday so I thought the girls and I could spend the day transforming the house into something Christmassy. But if you'd rather we didn't…'

‘That sounds like an excellent idea. I have a decorator that I used when we first moved in. I'll call him. The whole house used to be red.'

‘I loved it,' Aggie sighed. ‘It was like living inside a fire engine.'

‘How relaxing.' Lara laughed, exchanging a look of sympathy with Christian. ‘If your decorator is free, that would be great. He could do Chloe's room and that would leave us free to concentrate on the rest of the house.'

‘Lara made you dinner.' Aggie jiggled in his arms. ‘Will you read to me now or do you have to go and eat?'

His eyes slid to Lara in a silent question but she shrugged, completely relaxed.

‘Dinner can wait. It's just a casserole. I didn't want to make anything elaborate because I didn't know what time you'd be in or whether you would have eaten. Read to Aggie. It's much more important. You can eat when she's asleep. Chloe—why don't you and I finish that design for your bedroom?'

Christian tried not to remember the number of times that his wife had lost her temper when he'd wanted to relax with the children after a day at work.

But Lara wasn't his wife, he reminded himself. ‘Have you eaten?'

‘Not yet.' She pulled the antlers from her head and dropped them onto the sofa. ‘I'll grab some casserole later. Or make some toast. Whatever.'

‘We'll put the girls to bed and then eat together.' Like one big happy family. He almost laughed as he listened to himself, wondering with cynical amusement which of his suggestions sounded more intimate. Eating together or putting his children to bed? He lowered Aggie to the floor, wondering why on earth he'd agreed to Lara's offer to move in with them. ‘Go and get into your pyjamas, clean your teeth and I'll come and read to you.'

And then he was going to pour himself a large drink and try not to think about Lara's legs.

* * *

Lara emptied the bath, cleared up the toys, checked on Chloe, who was reading a book on her bed, and then returned to the kitchen.

She lifted the large casserole dish out of the oven and placed it in the middle of the table, then added warmed plates, baked potatoes and a bowl of broccoli.

She'd considered serving dinner in the formal dining room and had then thought better of it. It didn't take a genius to know that Christian wasn't entirely comfortable with the situation so it would be more sensible to eat in the kitchen. It would look less as though she was trying to be romantic.

She was humming to herself and removing a bottle of mineral water from the fridge when Christian strolled into the room.

‘You're always singing.'

‘Sorry. I like singing.'

His eyes slid to the bottle of water. ‘Given that neither of us are working this evening, I think we can do better than that.'

It was so much easier to resist him when he was dressed in a blue scrub suit, Lara thought desperately, flattening herself against the fridge door as he crossed the room towards her.

He'd showered and changed into jeans and a chunky roll-neck jumper. His hair was still slightly damp but he hadn't bothered to shave and his jaw was dark with stubble. He looked impossibly sexy and for a distinctly unsettling
moment she felt her stomach roll over, as if she were on an extreme ride at a theme park.

She contemplated crawling inside the fridge in order to cool herself down but opted instead for clutching the chilled water against her chest.

Apparently oblivious to the emotions that were threatening to overwhelm her, he reached past her and pulled out a bottle of wine. His arm brushed against hers and the contact was like an electric shock. Lara gritted her teeth and closed her eyes briefly. When she opened them it was to find him looking at her, and the fire blazing from his blue eyes made her realise that she wasn't the only one who was struggling with the situation.

She waited for him to speak but he said nothing. He just looked at her and awareness exploded between them.

‘Is it me or is it getting hot in here?' She gave a weak smile. ‘We'd better move before we defrost the fridge. Let's open that wine and drink it.'

His jaw tightened and he moved away and reached for a bottle-opener. ‘This thing between us…' he stabbed the cork viciously ‘…isn't going to go anywhere, Lara.'

So he wasn't denying that the chemistry existed.
She made a noise that was something between a whimper and a laugh. ‘That's fine by me. I'm off to Australia in a month and a broken heart isn't on my Christmas list.'

He yanked the cork out of the bottle with more force than was necessary and turned to face her, his expression serious. ‘So that's settled, then.'

‘Yes.' Her eyes met his and they stared at each other for a long moment. Ignoring her shaking legs, she walked over to the table. ‘It would make the process easier if I could find a major flaw in you. Usually I manage it without any help but with you—I don't know, I seem to be struggling.'

‘I'd be happy to help.' He lifted two glasses out of the cupboard, the tension visible in his shoulders. ‘What sort of flaw are you looking for?'

‘Anything, as long as it's big and seriously off-putting. OK, let's try something. Here's a question for you. If I handed you a large bar of chocolate, would you eat some of it or all of it?'

‘It depends on how hungry I was.'

‘Perfect answer!' She felt a rush of relief and sat down on the nearest chair. ‘You've just
revealed a
major
flaw because I'd eat the whole thing even if I was completely full to bursting. Restraint when it comes to chocolate is a major flaw as far as I'm concerned. You're sunk. We'd never be happy together.'

He put the glasses and the wine down on the table. ‘Do you always look for flaws in men?'

‘Not intentionally. They just sort of jump out at me. According to my mother, I'm just too fussy, but I don't see how you can be too fussy, do you? I mean, there's no point in spending the rest of your life with a man who makes you shudder, is there?'

Christian gave a faint smile as he poured the wine. ‘I think you're right to be fussy. It's easy to make a mistake.' He handed her a glass. ‘And then other people suffer.'

Was that what had happened to him?
Had he made a mistake?
‘I don't think your girls are suffering. I think you're a fantastic father and they're jolly lucky to have you,' she said softly. ‘And now let's eat. I can't have a conversation as deep as this on an empty stomach and the casserole is getting cold.'

Without giving him the chance to answer, she
spooned casserole onto his plate, trying to slow the thud of her heart.

When she'd suggested moving in, it hadn't occurred to her for a moment that she'd find it as difficult as this. She never found men irresistible. Never.

It was just because he was keeping his distance, she thought dryly as she put a baked potato on her plate. If he'd shown anything less than iron self-control, she would have been the one backing off.

He watched her for a long moment. ‘Do you always say exactly what's on your mind?'

‘Almost always. It's my biggest failing. I find it impossible to think one thing and say another.' She shrugged. ‘My mother thinks I'll never find a man until I learn not to talk so much. Which basically means that I'm doomed.'

‘You're obviously close to your family.'

‘Very.' She put a knob of butter on her baked potato and watched while it melted. ‘We grew up on a farm in a pretty corner of Dorset where everyone knew everyone. London has been quite a culture shock for me. Everyone lives parallel lives. No one notices or cares what anyone else
is doing.'
And she'd never quite got used to being so far from her family.