A Wallflower Christmas (Wallflowers #5)(32)

Most likely his heart.

He kept his face calm even as he struggled with two irreconcilable truthshe couldn’t have her, and he couldn’t not have her. He focused on marshaling his breathing, stacking his thoughts into order, pushing away the mass of unwanted feeling that kept flooding over him like ocean waves.

Finishing the verse, Hannah looked up at Rafe with a self-satisfied grin, while the others clapped and praised her. “There, I took your dare, Mr. Bowman. Now you owe me a forfeit.”

What a smile she had. It set off sparks of warmth all through him. And it took all his self-control to keep from staring at her like a lovestruck goat. “Would you like me to sing something?” he offered politely.

“Please, no,” Lillian cried, and Daisy added, “I beg you, don’t ask him that!”

Descending the ladder, Rafe came to stand beside Hannah. “Name your forfeit,” he said. “I always pay my debts.”

“Make him pose like a Grecian statue,” Annabelle suggested.

“Demand that he give you a l-lovely compliment,” Evie said.

“Hmmm …” Hannah eyed him thoughtfully, and named a popular parlor-game forfeit. “I’ll take a possession of yours. Anything you happen to be carrying right now. A handkerchief, or a coin, perhaps.”

“His wallet,” Daisy suggested with glee.

Rafe reached into his trouser pocket, where a small penknife and a few coins jingled. And one other object, a tiny metal figure not two inches in height. Casually he dropped it into Hannah’s palm.

She regarded the offering closely. “A toy soldier?” Most of the paint had worn off, leaving only a few flecks of color to indicate its original hues. The tiny infantryman held a sword tucked at his side. Hannah’s gaze lifted to his, her eyes clear and green. Somehow she seemed to understand that there was some secret meaning to the little soldier. Her fingers curved as if to protect it. “Is he for luck?” she asked.

Rafe shook his head slightly, hardly able to breathe as he felt himself suspended between an oddly pleasurable sense of surrender, and an ache of regret. He wanted to take it back. And he wanted to leave it there forever, safe in her possession.

“Rafe,” he heard Lillian say with an odd note in her voice. “Do you still carry that? After all these years?”

“It’s just an old habit. Means nothing.” Stepping away from Hannah, Rafe said curtly, “Enough of this nonsense. Let’s finish the blasted tree.”

In another quarter hour, the decorations were all up, and the tree was glittering and magnificent.

“Imagine when all the candles are lit,” Annabelle exclaimed, standing back to view it. “It will be a glorious sight.”

“Yes,” Westcliff rejoined dryly. “Not to mention the greatest fire hazard in Hampshire.”

“You were absolutely right to choose such a large tree,” Annabelle told Lillian.

“Yes, I think” Lillian paused only briefly as she saw someone come into the room. A very tall and piratical-looking someone who could only be Simon Hunt, Annabelle’s husband. Although Hunt had begun his career working in his father’s butcher shop, he had eventually become one of the wealthiest men in England, owning locomotive foundries and a large portion of the railway business. He was Lord Westcliff’s closest friend, a man’s man who appreciated good liquor and fine horses and demanding sports. But it was no secret that what Simon Hunt loved most in the world was Annabelle.

“I think,” Lillian continued as Hunt walked quietly up behind Annabelle, “the tree is perfect. And I think someone had very good timing in arriving so late that he didn’t have to decorate even one bloody branch of it.”

“Who?” Annabelle asked, and started a little as Simon Hunt put his hands lightly over her eyes. Smiling, he bent to murmur something private into her ear.

Color swept over the portion of Annabelle’s face that was still exposed. Realizing who was behind her, she reached up to pull his hands down to her lips, and she kissed each of his palms in turn. Wordlessly she turned in his arms, laying her head against his chest.

Hunt gathered her close. “I’m still covered in travel dust,” he said gruffly. “But I couldn’t wait another damned second to see you.”

Annabelle nodded, her arms clutching around his neck. The moment was so spontaneously tender and passionate that it cast a vaguely embarrassed silence through the room.

After kissing the top of his wife’s head, Hunt looked up with a smile and extended his hand to Westcliff. “It’s good to be here at last,” he said. “Too much to be done in London I left with a mountain of things unfinished.”

“Your presence has been sorely missed,” the earl said, shaking his hand firmly.

Still holding Annabelle with one arm, Hunt greeted the rest of them cordially.

“St. Vincent is still away?” Hunt asked Evie, and she nodded. “Any word on the duke’s health?”

“I’m af-fraid not.”

Hunt looked sympathetic. “I’m sure St. Vincent will be here soon.”

“And you’re among friends who love you,” Lillian added, putting her arm around Evie’s shoulders.

“And there is v-very good wine,” Evie said with a smile.

“Will you have a glass, Hunt?” Westcliff asked, indicating the tray on a nearby table.