Reawakened By His Christmas Kiss. Jessica Gilmore

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ it’s a real tradition at Blakeley. I hear the parties here used to be wild. Full of every kind of celebrity from pop stars to princes.’

      ‘Right. Then we need to make sure we publicise that angle.’

      Her heart began to thump; her hands felt damp. Christmas Eve. Her birthday. More than that, the day Blakeley had always celebrated Christmas.

      For generations, friends and lovers, enemies and rivals had descended on Blakeley on Christmas Eve to feast and dance, intrigue and plot.

      As a child Alex would spend the afternoon hosting a sumptuously over-the-top party for her friends—and then spend the evening darting through the dancing, flirting adults, sipping champagne from discarded glasses and sneaking canapés. No one had ever told her to go to bed. Instead she had been the spoilt princess of the house, petted and indulged, falling asleep on a chair or a sofa, where she would wake on Christmas morning to find herself covered with some discarded jacket.

      In her mid-teens the two parties had been combined, with lithe, knowing teenagers far too at home amidst the glamour and heady atmosphere of the adult affair. At least they’d pretended they were at home. Alex had been very good at pretending. Until the night of her eighteenth birthday, that was, when her world had become real for the first time—for a few blissful hours, until the moment when it had stilled and stopped for ever.

      She tried to inhale again, to take those sweet, calming breaths that kept her pulse even, her heart still, her head clear. But her breath caught in her throat.

      I can’t do this, she thought, panic threatening to flood through the walls she had built so carefully, so painstakingly, solid walls, covered in ivy and thorns, ready to repel all invaders. I can’t.

      But she could. She had no choice. Stay and deal with it or leave and run the risk of exposure.

      She was stronger than this. Nothing and no one could hurt her now. Blakeley was just a place, Christmas Eve was just a date, her birthday would go unremarked. She would show Finn that he hadn’t won. Not then, not now. And she would do so by making sure his planned launch ran absolutely perfectly.

      Gradually her pulse returned to normal, her emotions stilled, and she calmly made another note.

      Check the invite list for the Christmas party.

      ‘Okay,’ she said, her voice as steady as ever. ‘What’s next?’

      The conversation with Kaitlin was illuminating in several ways, taking up the rest of the morning and lunch. It had been a long time since her airline breakfast, and Alex had had no chance to get anything to eat, but Kaitlin ordered a working lunch, which the two ate at the desk as they finished going through the notes. Alex’s to-do list was getting satisfactorily ever longer.

      At some point in the afternoon the younger woman finally returned to her own desk and Alex sank thankfully into work. There she could forget that Christmas Eve had once meant something, meant everything, deep in the absorption that working out how to craft and manipulate a story gave her.

      As always, she lost track of time, and when she finally stretched and looked up she realised it was now dark outside, the office lights bright against the gloom. The room was almost deserted. Just a few people were left at their desks and they seemed to be packing up. Alex leaned back and stretched again, glad that the weeks ahead looked interesting but achievable.

      She would give Finn no reason, no excuse to find fault with a single thing she did. He had the power and the influence now. With one word he could tell everyone who she was—who she’d used to be—and trash her fledgling agency’s reputation. She wouldn’t have thought him capable once. She knew better now.

      ‘Alex?’ Kaitlin hovered by her desk, her bag already on her shoulder. ‘I’m off now. Is there anything you need before I leave?’

      ‘No, I’m fine. Thank you. You’ve been so helpful.’

      ‘I hope so.’ The younger woman looked pleased, brushing her thick dark hair away from her face as her cheeks turned a little pink.

      Alex looked around at the gleaming new office. ‘I guess you haven’t been based here very long?’

      ‘No, Finn’s been here since the summer, but the rest of us moved in October. There’s still a London office, but the plan is to scale it right back. For now some people are splitting their time between there and here. It’s easier for those of us without families, I guess. Finn has converted an old mill into flats and a few rent there. One or two rent in the village and quite a lot of us are in Reading—we’re not ready for a totally rural life just yet!’

      ‘It’s impressive that so many of you were ready to uproot yourselves.’

      ‘Finn’s so inspiring...his whole ethos. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.’

      ‘That’s reassuring to hear. I hope I’ll feel the same way.’

      ‘I hope so too.’

      The deep masculine tones made both Alex and Kaitlin jump, the latter’s cheeks going even redder as Finn sauntered towards them.

      ‘Loyalty is very important here at Hawk.’

      But it wasn’t Finn’s unexpected appearance that made Alex’s pulse speed up, and nor was it the sardonic gleam in his eye as he looked at her. It was the two small girls holding on to his hands. Finn had children? He had security, money, her old home and a family? Everything she had lost. Everything she would never have.

      The oldest girl looked, to Alex’s inexperienced eye, to be about nine, the other around five. They were both in school uniform, their dark hair so like Finn’s own in messy plaits, and the same dark, dark eyes fixed on Alex.

      ‘It’s the Sleeping Princess,’ the younger one said, pointing at Alex. ‘Look, Saffy, it’s the Princess from the painting.’

      Finn suppressed a grin as Alexandra’s startled gaze flew to his. Turned out the lady could show surprise after all.

      ‘Alex...’ The name felt clumsy on his tongue. ‘I’d like you to meet my nieces. Saffron, Scarlett, this is Alex. She’s working here for a little while.’

      ‘No, Uncle Finn.’ Scarlett tugged at his hand. ‘She’s a princess in disguise.’

       Wasn’t that the truth?

      ‘Nice to meet you.’ Alex smiled uncertainly at the girls. ‘But I’m afraid it’s a case of mistaken identity. I’m not a princess, although it’s lovely to be thought one.’

      ‘You are,’ Scarlett insisted.

      Kaitlin nodded. ‘I see what you mean, Scarlett. You’re thinking of that painting, aren’t you? The one of Blakeley Castle and the Sleeping Beauty? She does look a little like Alex.’

      Alex’s cheeks reddened, just slightly. Finn was certain she knew exactly which painting Scarlett was referring to; it was a Rossetti, part of the castle’s famed Pre-Raphaelite collection. Alex’s great-great-grandmother was the model: a woman who in her youth had been as scandalous as her granddaughter СКАЧАТЬ