that.
She’d assumed that he’d pushed the paper at her so that she could check out her ‘double’. Think about the career opportunities it offered. But he hadn’t actually said that.
Even with the evidence that she wasn’t the ‘people’s virgin’-and could it be any more lowering than to have her lack of sexual experience pitied by a sixteen-year-old?-on the table in front of her.
She was in Bab el Sama. It said so right there for the whole world to see, yet still he’d handed her back her disguise as if he thought she needed it.
Too late for that, she thought, dropping the glasses into her bag and switching on her cellphone to thumb in a quick text to Lydia.
Tomorrow there would have to be pictures to prove she was there.
‘Are you all right, dear?’ The woman who’d served them came to clear the table and wipe it down and glanced after George meaningfully.
‘I’m fine,’ she said, switching off the phone. ‘Honestly.’
‘Christmas…’ she said, sighing as Rudolph started up yet again. ‘It’s all stress. You wouldn’t believe the things I hear. Did you know that there are more marriage break-ups over Christmas than at any other time of year?’
‘Really? I’ll bear that in mind. Should I ever get married.’
‘Oh…You and he aren’t…?’
‘We only met yesterday, but thank you for caring,’ Annie said, stowing her phone and standing up. ‘Being ready to listen. That’s the true spirit of the season.’
‘The Christmas fairy, that’s me,’ she said with an embarrassed laugh before whisking away the tray.
And nothing wrong with that, Annie thought, before crossing to the window to see how far things had progressed.
One of the trees had already been hoisted onto the roof of the car, but as George and a good-looking boy bent to lift the second, larger tree, Xandra, who had climbed up to lash the first into place, stopped what she was doing and looked down, not at the boy, but at her father.
Full of longing, need, it was a look that she recognised, understood and she forgot her own concerns as her heart went out to the girl.
They’d both lost their parents, but in Xandra’s case the situation wasn’t irretrievable. Her mother might not be perfect but she’d be home in a few weeks. And George was here right now, bringing the scent of fresh spruce with him as he returned to the chalet to pay for the trees.
For once it didn’t bring a lump to her throat, the ache of unbearable memories. This wasn’t her Christmas, but Xandra’s. A real celebration to share with the grandparents she adored. And with George, if he took his chance and seized the opportunity to change things.
‘All done?’ she asked.
He gave her a look that suggested she had to be joking. ‘This is just the beginning. When we get back I’m going to have to find suitable containers and erect them safely so that they don’t topple over if the cat decides to go climbing.’
‘Back’, not home, she noticed. He never called the house he’d grown up in ‘home’.
‘Then I’ll have to sort out lights and check them to make sure they won’t blow all the fuses.’
‘Why don’t you ask that boy to give you a hand?’ she suggested. ‘Earn yourself some Brownie points with your daughter.’
‘I don’t think so,’ he said, handing a grubby handwritten docket to the woman behind the till along with some banknotes.
Protective. A good start, she thought.
‘You can’t keep her wrapped in cotton wool.’ At least not without the kind of money that would make Dower House fees look like chicken feed. ‘And, even if you could, she wouldn’t thank you for it.’
‘Nothing new there, then,’ he said, slotting the pound coins the woman gave him as change into a charity box on the counter.
They piled back into the car and this time Xandra gave her more room so she wasn’t squashed up against George. Just close enough to be tinglingly aware of every movement. For his hand to brush her thigh each time he changed gear.
‘We’ll need to stop at the garden centre in Longbourne to pick up some bags of compost,’ Xandra said carelessly as he paused at the farm gate. ‘If the trees are to have a chance of surviving.’
‘I don’t think-’
‘Granddad always plants out the Christmas trees,’ she said stubbornly.
‘I remember,’ he muttered under his breath so that only she heard. Then, raising his voice above the sound of the engine, ‘He won’t be fit enough to do it this year, Xandra.’
Her eyes widened a little as the reality of her grandfather’s heart attack truly hit home, but then she shrugged. ‘It’s not a problem. I can do it.’
‘Damn you!’ George banged the steering wheel with the flat of his hand. ‘You are just like him, do you know that? Stubborn, pig-headed, deaf to reason…’
Xandra’s only response was to switch on the personal stereo in her jacket pocket and stick in her earplugs.
George didn’t say a word and Annie kept her own mouth firmly shut as they pulled into the garden centre car park.
It was one of those out of town places and it had a huge range of house plants that had been forced for the holiday, as well as every kind of seasonal decoration imaginable.
While George disappeared in search of compost, Annie used the time to pick out a dark pink cyclamen for Hetty and Xandra disappeared into the Christmas grotto.
When they met at the till ten minutes later she was half hidden behind an armful of decorations in just about every colour imaginable-none of that colour co-ordination nonsense for her-and wearing a three-foot-long Santa hat.
CHAPTER NINE
ANNIE, desperate to find some way to make George see beyond the defence mechanism that his daughter was using to save herself from the risk of hurt, was so deep in thought as she pushed open the kitchen door with her shoulder that the spicy scent of the Christmas cake baking took her unawares.
A punch to the heart.
Like the fresh, zingy scent of the trees, it evoked only painful memories and the armful of tinsel she was carrying slithered to the floor as she came to a dead stop.
‘What’s wrong?’ George asked, following her in.
She tried to speak, couldn’t. Instead, she shook her head and, giving herself time to recover, she bent to scoop up the glittering strands, only to find herself face to face with George as he joined her down at floor level.
‘What is it?’ he asked quietly as he took the pot plant from her.
‘Nothing. It’s nothing.’ Dredging up a smile-a lady never showed her feelings-she wound a thick gold strand of tinsel around his neck. ‘Just blinded by all this glitter,’ she said, clutching it to her as she made a move to stand.
He caught her by the wrist, keeping her where she was.
‘G-George…’ she begged, her voice hoarse with the effort of keeping up the smile.
‘You will tell me,’ he warned her, his own smile just as broad, just as false as her own as he took a purple strand of tinsel and slowly wrapped it, once, twice around her throat before, his hand still tightly around her wrist, he drew her to her feet.
‘Oh, well, there’s a picture,’ Hetty said, laughing as she caught sight of them. ‘Did you buy up their entire stock, Xan?’
‘You can never have too much tinsel,’ she said as she trailed in with the rest of it.
