Chapter Twelve #2
“What if we go to Baslow and have dinner there? I don’t think you’ve been to Baslow.
The village sits on the outskirts of Chatsworth, Chatsworth being one of England’s most famous country estates.
It’s also the home of the Duke and Duchess of Devonshire, their family, the Cavendish family, have lived there for over five hundred years, which is unusual today in Britain. ”
“We’re not going to have to go see the house, are we?” Jillian asked, sounding put out at the idea of another history house tour.
“No, we’d go visit the Chatsworth Christmas Market, they are open until six on weekends and then after we wander around, we could have dinner in Baslow and then come home.
“But if you’re too tired to go, Jilly, maybe Catriona would be willing to stay home with you, and I can just take Livy—”
“I never said,” Jillian snapped. “I just asked a question.” She looked over at Cat who was washing up the lunch plates from earlier. “Besides, it doesn’t seem very nice to Cat to just leave her here while we go out and have fun. It’s her holiday too.”
“I’m fine,” Cat said, giving Jillian a smile over her shoulder, but it was halfhearted at best. “I have plenty of work—”
“No, Cat. Come with us!” Olivia cried. “We’ll all go. Unless Cat is tired of us…” Her voice faded off uncertainly. “Are you?” she asked Cat’s back.
Cat turned all the way around and managed a bigger, steadier smile.
“I could never be sick of you,” she said.
“But do go with your father and have some family time. He misses you, and this is his chance to have you all to himself.” And then with a last reassuring smile, she dried off her hands and headed upstairs.
As soon as Cat was gone, both girls were talking at once, telling him that he’d hurt Cat’s feelings and that he should have been nicer to her.
“Go speak to her,” Olivia demanded. “Make sure she’s not sad.”
Rhys found Cat upstairs in her room, sitting on her bed with her laptop, her door open. She rarely closed it, leaving it ajar as if to make sure they knew she was always available.
“Cat,” he said, from the doorway.
She looked up at him, smiling, but the smile didn’t reach her eyes. “Yes?”
No makeup, no fancy hair, no posh clothes and she was beautiful. “The girls would like you to come with us.”
Her gaze met his and held. She seemed to be searching for something before she smiled again, an even smaller, sadder smile than before. “I do have work I should do. You go and the girls will tell me all about it later.”
“If I hurt your feelings—”
“You didn’t.”
“I know it hasn’t been comfortable the last few days, and I’m sorry if I’ve made it worse. It’s just that I’m finding this difficult to navigate. My feelings—”
“We’ll be back in London before we know it. It’s best to keep it professional.”
The drive to Baslow was short, the late afternoon sky already deepening into indigo.
Frost clung to the hedgerows, catching the last of the light, and Jillian sat next to Rhys up front with Olivia buckled in the back.
Olivia chattered during the drive, but Jillian was quiet, staring out the window, fingers restlessly twisting the cuff of her coat sleeve.
Rhys caught her reflection in the passenger window. Something in her expression tugged at him. He made a mental note to get her alone for a moment so they could talk without interruption.
Baslow’s high street was strung with modest Christmas lights, the lights white and delicate, swaying in the chilly winter breeze. The shop windows glowed with wreaths and candles, and the scent of roasting chestnuts permeated the air.
“Look!” Olivia pointed excitedly as they parked. “There’s a reindeer in the window!”
“It’s not a reindeer,” Jillian muttered, but without her usual bite. “It’s just a wooden carving.”
They walked along the pavement, the three of them wrapped against the cold and then left the village for the Christmas market on Chatsworth’s grounds. The girls were talking now, comparing Langley Park to Chatsworth which they could see ahead.
“Ooh, Chatsworth House is much bigger,” Olivia said. “And its outside is golden. Which is much prettier than brick.”
“I like Langley Park,” Jillian answered. “It feels more like a home. Chatsworth is like a palace.”
“Some people say Chatsworth has one hundred and twenty-six rooms, while another source has said it has over three hundred,” Rhys said, wondering how the girls would react to a place so vast.
“No one needs three hundred rooms,” Jillian said.
“Or one hundred,” Olivia added.
“The Cavendish family are important people, and they have entertained important people throughout history.”
“Any kings or queens?” Olivia asked hopefully.
“Mary, Queen of Scots stayed at Chatsworth several times as a prisoner from 1570 on—”
“Any willing guests?” Jillian asked.
“Princess Victoria, before she was Queen Victoria, visited at the age of thirteen.” Rhys looked down at Jillian. “Just about your age.” He smiled at her then added, “She returned eleven years later with Prince Albert. There have been others but those were the two that always impressed me the most.”
It was a good brisk walk to the market, but once there they discovered close to one hundred market stalls, many with food and drink. They wandered through the stalls, examining everything that caught their eye, pleased to see so many vendors with homemade gifts.
“Cat would have liked this,” Olivia said in a small voice, as they left a stall that featured lovely handknit jumpers.
“Did you see that one cardigan that looked like the one she always wears?” Jillian asked the others.
“The blue one with big buttons?” Olivia asked.
“No, but she would look pretty in blue,” Jillian said.
They walked until there was no more to see and then began the trek back to Baslow where they’d left their car.
They ducked into a small café with steamed-up windows and a chalkboard sign promising the best mac and cheese in Derbyshire, and both girls wanted the macaroni and cheese while Rhys ordered the roast beef sandwich.
Conversation lagged, not from upset, but from the kind of tiredness that settled in after a long, cold, busy day.
*
Cat had remained upstairs when everyone left earlier for Baslow and was still upstairs when the Harmons returned.
She sat cross-legged on her bed, listening to Rhys finish the chapter he’d been reading tonight, glad he was building those new traditions and memories he’d wanted for the girls.
Somehow, the story of the Pevensie children stepping through the wardrobe, leaving the familiar world behind, lost at first, overwhelmed, searching for something to hold on to, fit this cottage Christmas.
While Lucy and Susan, Edmund and Peter searched for the things they’d left behind, the Harmon girls were searching too—only not through a snowy wood, but through the days of December, hoping something would make everything feel right again and things were slowly coming together for them, for Rhys and his children.
Cat might have her own heartache, but at least she knew she’d done what was right for the girls.
They needed to feel safe. They needed to feel secure. And hopefully by Christmas they would.
*
Rhys couldn’t fall asleep, despite his best efforts to turn off his brain and just relax.
It wasn’t his work keeping him up tonight or worries about his girls.
Tonight, it was guilt over leaving Cat behind when they went to Baslow, and guilt over being frostier and more detached.
He didn’t like the distance between them, but he didn’t know how else to handle his emotions … the attraction.
He gave up on sleep just after midnight. No point lying there, staring at the ceiling, thinking about everything he couldn’t fix, everything he wanted, and everything he shouldn’t want. He might as well read or work. Or make some tea. Anything that might possibly distract him.
He tugged on a heavy sweatshirt and stepped into warm slippers before heading down, the stairs in the middle creaking as they always did. But at the foot of the steps, he saw into the sitting room and stopped.
Cat sat on the floor directly in front of the fire, wrapped in the heavy quilt from her bed, her dark hair loose, gleaming with highlights from the embers.
He knew she must have heard him on the stairs, but she didn’t turn. “You can’t sleep either?” he asked, stopping behind the sofa.
“No.” Her voice was so soft it was barely audible. “Too much on my mind.”
He rested his hand on the couch. “Want to talk to me?”
She turned her head just enough to give him her profile. Firelight brushed her cheek, the line of her jaw, the curve of her mouth. She looked breakable, but also … resolved.
“It won’t change anything.”
Her voice was husky and thick with something he couldn’t name. Before he thought to question it, he went to her and sat on the floor beside her, shoulder to shoulder, thigh to thigh, close enough he could feel her warmth through the quilt.
For a long moment, neither of them spoke. He reached for her hand. She hesitated only for a moment before letting him take it, her fingers curling into his.
“Are you unhappy here?” he asked, aware that he could hear the worry in his voice, the fear he hadn’t been able to name.
She drew in a tremulous breath. Tears shimmered instantly, catching the light. “No.”
Her voice broke. “Just the opposite.”
He turned his head to better see her face, but she kept her gaze on the fire.
“I love being here … with you, with the girls. It’s—” She swallowed hard. “It’s like a fairytale, Rhys. But it’s not mine. I don’t belong here.”
“You do.” It came out rough, immediate.
She shook her head, eyes glistening. “I’m a temporary childminder.
A stopgap until Charlotte returns from holiday and the girls start back to school.
Then I’ll leave. It’s how it’s meant to be, but I’ll remember this.
All of it.” She finally looked at him, really looked at him, tears pooling but not falling.
“I haven’t felt like this in maybe forever, and I’m grateful.
I guess that’s what I want to say. I’m grateful. ”
Something inside him—something tired and starved and aching—gave way.
He slid his hand behind her neck, beneath the cool weight of her hair, and drew her toward him.
Her breath caught but he felt no resistance, just the tension and awareness that had been there between them since the beginning.
Then his mouth was on hers, and the kiss wasn’t careful or cautious.
It was everything he’d been holding back—need, longing, relief, the fierce desire to keep her close for just one moment longer.
She made a soft sound against his mouth, surprise melting into need, and then she was kissing him back, her hands clutching at his sweatshirt, answering his hunger with her own.
Heat surged through him, fierce and consuming, but beneath it beat something deeper—a need for closeness, comfort, and the connection he’d denied himself for years. But this need couldn’t be met by just anyone. This was about Cat, his need and desire for her, and only her.
Rhys gentled the kiss, slowing it, deepening it, until she was on his lap, facing him, her body pressed fully to his, fitting him as if she’d been meant for him from the beginning. It made him want all of her, the rest of her. But not here. Not now. Not like this.
Gradually, he eased back, her lovely, flushed face held gently in his hands, her soft breasts still warm against his chest. “Don’t ever think you don’t belong here,” he said gruffly, his thumbs stroking her hot cheeks, then brushing once over her swollen lips.
“If I know anything, I know you, Catriona Blake, belong with me.”
A door opened near the top of the stairs and suddenly footsteps sounded on the staircase. Cat jumped off his lap and moved to sit in the chair with her quilt.
Olivia peeped around the stairs, face flushed, eyes bleary. “I don’t feel good,” she said hoarsely. “It hurts to swallow.”
Cat immediately rose but Rhys beat her, reaching Olivia’s side with just a couple long strides.
He put his hand to her brow. Definitely feverish.
He tipped her head back, felt beneath her jaw.
Swollen lymph nodes. “I’ll get you some Paracetamol,” he said, “and some warm honey tea, and then I’m going to tuck you in bed with me so I can keep an eye on you, right? ”
She nodded and leaned wearily against him. “Will I be sick for Christmas?” she croaked.
“No, love. We’ll have you better in just a few days. We’re going to make sure you rest and watch lots of movies—”
“I like that,” Olivia said.
He smiled and smoothed her hair back from her hot cheek. “Let’s get you fixed up now, and then you’ll be able to sleep.”
*
Cat made a cup of warm honey-sweetened tea and took it to Rhys’s room and then said to get her if he needed anything before going to her room. But back in bed, sleep continued to elude her.
How could she sleep after that kiss? After the things he’d said?
She lay awake for almost an hour, staring at the low beams of the ceiling, the quilt pulled to her chin, arms across her chest, holding the emotion in.
Every part of her felt too alive—skin sensitive, chest tight, lips still tingling with the shape of his kiss.
Even now she could feel his hands cradling her face, and the warmth of his breath against her cheek.
She still felt the solid weight of him beneath her as she’d pressed herself into his lap, his body so hard, so strong she wanted to stay there forever.
Cat pressed her palms over her eyes, trying to quiet the tremor running through her.
What had she done? What had they done? But what she felt wasn’t regret.
She couldn’t regret that kiss. It had been everything—loneliness and longing, heat and hunger—and it probably had been the most real thing she’d ever felt.
She had never been kissed like that, had never felt more real and alive, either.
And that was the problem.
Because wanting Rhys as much as she did was dangerous. Ruinous. She knew that. She knew how these stories played out.
Rolling onto her side, Cat curled her knees toward her chest, as if by making herself small she could hide from the consequences, as there would be consequences. What was it that Newton had written? Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.
If Cat hadn’t promised Jillian that she wasn’t attracted to her father maybe there were options … possibilities … but having made that promise to Jillian, Cat was determined to keep it because she loved them. All of them. Far more than she’d meant to.