Mistletoe Marriage. Jessica Hart

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      CHAPTER TWO

      BRAM’S side felt cold where Sophie had been leaning against him, and part of him wished that she would come back, instead of turning up her collar against the cold and thrusting her hands into her pockets like that. The other part of him was glad that she had moved away. For some reason her nearness was making him feel strange today.

      So strange that when Bess, snuffling along the hedgerow, put up a pheasant, he actually jumped as it exploded out of its hiding place, squawking with indignation.

      It made Sophie start, too, and she looked guiltily at the bales still waiting to be unloaded in the fading light of the winter afternoon.

      ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I’ve held you up. You’ve got better things to do than listen to me moaning on.’

      ‘You know I always enjoy listening to you moan,’ said Bram lightly, ‘but I should finish moving those bales.’ He glanced down at Sophie. ‘It won’t take long. Why don’t you go and put the kettle on? You know what Mum used to say…’

      ‘It’ll all feel better after a nice cup of tea!’ she chanted obediently.

      Molly Thoresby had been a great believer in the power of tea. How many times had Sophie heard her say that? She smiled at the memory as she walked back to the farmhouse. She could see Molly now, lifting the lid on the old kitchen range, setting the kettle firmly on the stove, while Sophie sat at the table and poured out her problems.

      Sophie loved her own mother, of course she did, but she had loved Bram’s almost as much. Harriet Beckwith was smart and well-groomed, while Molly had been warm and comfortable and wise. Molly had never pushed or criticised or complained the way Harriet did. She’d just listened and made tea, and funnily enough things almost always had felt better afterwards. When Molly had died suddenly, a couple of months ago, Sophie had felt nearly as bereft as Bram.

      The big farmhouse kitchen looked exactly the same as it had always done, with its sturdy pine table set in the window, its cluttered dresser and the two shabby armchairs drawn up in front of a wood-burning stove, but it was empty without Molly.

      The clock on the mantelpiece ticked into the silence. Sophie filled the kettle and set it to boil on the range, just the way Molly had used to do. She had always loved this shabby, comfortable kitchen. Her mother’s was immaculate, full of modern appliances and spacious work surfaces, but it wasn’t a place you wanted to linger.

      Outside, the sky was streaked with pink over the moors, and it was getting darker by the minute. Sophie liked the short winter afternoons, and the way switching on a lamp could make the darkness beyond the windows intensify. She put on the lights in the kitchen so that Bram could see their inviting yellow glow as he came home. It must be awful for him coming back to a dark house each evening now that Molly had gone.

      She stood in the big bay window and watched the light fade over the moors. Her mind drifted to thoughts of Nick, the way it always did at quiet times like this. She thought about his heart-shaking smile, about the shiver of pleasure that went through her at the merest brush of his fingers, about the thrill of being near him.

      Being with Nick had never felt safe—not in the way being with Bram did, for instance. There had always been an element of risk in their relationship. Sophie could see that now. She had never been able to relax completely with Nick for fear that she would lose him. Even when she had been at her happiest it had felt as if she were on point of exploding with the sheer intensity of it all. It had been a dangerous feeling, but a wonderful one too. Loving Nick had made her feel electric, СКАЧАТЬ