Royal Holiday (The Wedding Date, #4)(28)

“Kissing on horseback seems rather dangerous, Mr. Hudson,” she said.

“Not with experienced riders like me around, Ms. Forest,” he said. “I would never let anything happen to you.”

She smiled as they rode on.

“I usually like to be the one who wouldn’t let anything happen to me,” she said. “But a little bit of danger never hurt anyone.” She grinned. “Everyone at work would be shocked to hear me say that. I’m usually the cautious one.”

The sunlight made her face glow. How could anyone not smile back at her when she smiled at them like that?

“Well, you’re obviously very good at your job, so let’s just call this different attitudes for different parts of life.”

She laughed.

“How is it obvious I’m good at my job?” she asked. “I am, but we’re over five thousand miles away from it, so how can you tell?”

He touched her hand.

“The way you can talk to everyone, the way everyone likes you—Tim, Julia, James, the Duke and Duchess—and the way you’ve managed to get me to talk about myself, which I try to avoid doing at all costs.”

She looked down, then smiled up at him.

“Well. Thank you for that. And I’m probably so good at my job because I love it. Granted, it’s really hard sometimes—as a social worker, and especially a social worker at a hospital, you see so much of the bad parts of life. But I also get to see so many good parts, or funny parts, and”—she laughed—“so many of the ridiculous parts. But I love when I know I’ve made a difference for a patient—connected them with services they’ve been desperately needing, helped fight some of their fights with the hospital or their housing or their schools for them, or done some of the heavy lifting with their families. I work with so many families who want to be good for one another, but they just don’t know how, and it’s wonderful when I can give them the tools to do so.”

He liked how she talked about her work, with so much humor, but also kindness and warmth.

“It must get really tough, though. I’m glad you have this break.”

She nodded.

“I’m glad, too. I think I needed a break more than I realized. And honestly, it feels great to be this far away from work right now, with the potential new job and all.” She sighed. “It’s a big deal and more money and all of that, but it means I’ll get to do a lot less of the parts of my job that I love—less working directly with patients and their families, less coming up with ideas to solve problems to really help them. It’ll all be a lot more global solutions for all of our patients, which is good, too, just . . .”—she sighed again—“different. And it also means I’ll be working a lot more—always needing to check my email and to be available from wherever, all of that stuff I don’t have to do now. So it was good to take this vacation, since it might be the last real one I have for a while.”

She glanced around Sandringham with a wistful look on her face.

Malcolm suddenly had a ridiculous idea.

No, he definitely couldn’t do that. It made no sense.

Or did it? Vivian said she needed more of a break, didn’t she? And Miles was always telling him he had to be more spontaneous.

He looked over at Vivian and smiled.

On the walk from the stables back to Sycamore Cottage, Malcolm reached over and took Vivian’s hand. She blushed and looked away as their fingers intertwined, like if she didn’t see it happening, it wouldn’t be real. It had definitely been a while since she’d walked hand in hand with a man. His hand was smooth and firm, and hers felt so secure within his grasp.

“Should I bring anything for dinner tomorrow night?” he asked. “Thank you again for the invitation.”

She smiled at him.

“I’m delighted that you’re coming, but I’m not the person to ask that question. You should ask Julia,” she said.

Was Christmas Eve going to be the last time she saw him? Probably, since he was going to leave Sandringham the next morning to go to his sister’s house for Christmas.

“When do you fly back to America?” he asked.

He was apparently on her same wavelength. But she wasn’t ready to think about leaving yet. This trip had been better than she’d ever imagined, and she still had days to go.

“The twenty-eighth,” she said. “Maddie and I leave Sandringham the day after Christmas—Boxing Day, as I guess people really call it here—and then we’re in London for a few days before we fly home.”

“What would you think about staying a few extra days in London?” he asked.

“What?” She stopped and turned to him. She tried to drop his hand, but he held on. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, Maddie would fly back on the twenty-eighth as scheduled, and you would stay an extra few days. With me. Maybe through the New Year. I’m on holiday all next week, and you just said that this is your last holiday for a while, so why not make the most of it? Plus”—he looked straight at her—“I’m not ready for you to go.”

Oh.

She looked down and didn’t say anything.

“I’m not just flattering myself that you want to spend more time with me, too, am I?” Malcolm asked after a few seconds.