Chapter Three
Robyn found herself wringing her hands, her palms suddenly sweaty despite the draughty kitchen as they sat down opposite each other.
“Ah, okay, so…” Matt began, his expression the grim countenance of a man about to deliver extremely bad tidings.
“Actually,” Robyn shot up, her chair scraping offensively in the charged silence around them.
Matt paused and looked up at her, his face cocked to the side and his mouth half open. Robyn felt a small shiver pass through her – from the discomfort of the situation, of course, certainly not from the way his eyes moved from boring into her own, slowly down to her mouth and back up again.
“Actually?” He asked softly.
“Ah yes, Sorcha.”
“Sorcha?” Matt looked as confused as Robyn felt.
“Yes, I promised I’d help her clear one of the front rooms at the castle.”
Sorcha was one of the other members of their vintage vocal quartet, The Oakettes, and had the dubious pleasure of living in the local Norman castle with her elderly parents – dubious because the place was crumbling around them and, much like the pub, the coffers were empty making repairs a case of DIY or die trying.
“Right now?” His brow crumpled, the worry lines that had sprung up in the past six months becoming even more apparent.
“Yup,” Robyn put a hand out to pick up her cup, ready to down the contents and be on her way, however scalding they may be, but was caught before she could reach it.
“Matt?” She whispered, staring at his large hand encasing hers, hoping ridiculously that he couldn’t feel how slick her palm was as she tried not to focus on the delicious heat snaking from that point of contact and up her arm.
Matt stood, entwining his fingers with hers so as not to break the connection as he came around the side of the table. This had not been the plan, and to be honest he had no idea what the heck he was doing, but his arm had had a mind of its own in that moment, in the sudden desperation of not wanting to see her leave.
She was only going up the hill for a few hours, you numpty, he told himself, as they stood now toe to toe. Robyn looked up at him with a mixture of confusion and something else… Shock? Impatience?
No, heat. Matt recognised it as a reflection of what he knew would be in his own gaze in that moment.
Neither moved, the heavy rise and fall of their chests the only indication of each one’s heightened awareness of the other.
“Can you feel that?” Matt asked, his voice a rough croak.
“Your hand?” Robyn dragged her eyes away from his and down to their shared connection, which nestled tightly between their bodies, her own torso swaying even closer as she did so.
“Well, yes, but also that, ah,” Matt licked his dry lips and wished for the umpteenth time that he was better at this kind of thing. More experienced. Which he definitely would have been by now had the beautiful woman opposite him not owned his heart for the past two decades, effectively quashing any desire for anyone else.
“I’m sorry, I’m not good at…” he began.
“Shh,” Robyn lifted her spare hand and ghosted her thumb across his lips. Matt tried to hide the shudder it caused, “Shh, I’m beginning to.”
“To feel it?”
“Umhm,” she looked at him expectantly and Matt found himself frozen. Now certainly wasn’t the moment to admit he’d never even kissed a girl. That he’d not had the same experiences as the woman whose hand he now held, whom he had comforted through several breakups in the past year alone. She must suspect, of course, having never seen him in a relationship in all the years they had known each other, but Matt had never been able to openly share the fact, given the questions that would prompt as to why.
Robyn felt like her head was swimming and her body was taking control.
It didn’t feel like she was standing here with her best friend, Matty, the boy whom she had shared her packed lunches with in primary school and who had helped her scrape through her maths GCSE. Suddenly, she was standing here with a man, a very manly man at that, as if she had never seen him before.
And boy was she beginning to really see him.
But this was her Matty, her rock through bereavements and breakups, the one constant in her life. She couldn’t be attracted to him.
Could she?
If he kissed her now then they would know, one way or another, if there was a spark. Certainly, Robyn felt like she might combust, so he’d better hurry up about it. If they felt nothing, then it could be brushed off as, as… well, she wasn’t sure right now, but that was the fault of her brain turning to mush just as she needed it to be rational.
Matt’s eyes were darker than she’d ever seen them, his breaths short, his hand holding hers squeezing almost to the point of pain, and yet he made no move towards her mouth.
Reality began to set back in, and Robyn was just dragging her eyes from his, her hand soon to follow suit, just as something in Matt seemed to finally click into place. In one swift move he pulled her tightly against him with the hand joined to hers, used his other palm to gently cup her cheek and leaned in slowly until Robyn could feel his breath against her chin.
“Ruby,” he whispered, the name sounding more pain than pleasure.
Robyn felt the tremble of his palm on her face, felt the strong rigidity in his body as if the force of holding himself back might snap the man in two.
And decided to put him out of his torment.
The shock of the back door blowing open, a literal blast of freezing air causing them to stop just as Robyn’s lips hovered above his, was not as great a surprise as what followed. To be fair, Matt would have braved hell or high water in that moment just to experience the feel of her lips against his, but he certainly didn’t want his first fumbling foray into sensual pleasure to have witnesses.
And his own father at that.
“Dad?” Matt jumped away from Robyn, dropping her hand as if it were a hot coal, as the man whose good opinion he had always strove for loomed large in the doorway.
“Aye son, thought we could have a family Christmas this year.”
“It’s barely December,” Robyn mumbled under her breath, before waving at Dennis, mentioning Sorcha and the castle once more and practically running from the room.
Matt felt the cold of her departure even more than the still open back door, which now saw a hefty suitcase being dragged through.
“There’s two more where this came from, lad,” his dad gestured back outside with a flick of his chin.
Matt blinked several times in quick succession, as if this might all be some surreal dream, a nightmare more like, only to be convinced by his father’s heavy hand on his back as Matt staggered past that this was indeed all sickeningly real. He had no idea what a ‘family Christmas’ might entail, since they hadn’t shared a special occasion together since mam’s death, nor why his dad hadn’t given him advance warning of it, but none of that seemed to matter in that moment, as the knowledge of what he had just lost loomed large in Matt’s mind.
Possibly his only chance with Robyn, to know what it felt like to kiss her, to perhaps be able to share his true feelings for her, gone in a blast of icy air and a frigid dose of reality.