Chapter 5 #2
“What is this?” Ellen leaned over and scooped them up. After yanking off the ribbon, she unfolded the first one with an exclamation that she bit off at the last second. “These are all addressed to Father Christmas.”
“From Colin?” Lucy gawked at the letters still in Ellen’s hand. “Er, I mean from Lord Hartsford?”
“No, silly. They appear to be written by children.” She handed a few letters to Lucy. “How very odd, don’t you think?” Her eyes sparkled with mischievous excitement. “I wonder how they came into Father’s possession.”
“Yes, I wonder that myself. He and Christmas don’t exactly go about hand in hand,” Lucy mused as she unfolded one of the letters. Her heart trembled at the innocent, childlike requests—prayers really—that someone had taken the time to write down. But who, and why?
“What shall we do with them?” Ellen asked, and her excitement caught fire into Lucy’s veins.
“Let me think about it. There must be some way to use these to help show your father the holiday is about more than what he can reap from people or gain from their gifts to him.” Lucy gathered the letters, slipped the ribbon around the slim stack and then returned the correspondence to his interior pocket.
When she caught a whiff of his scent—BayRum and cloves with a hint of citrus—her mind wandered, and she was transported back to their last Christmas together.
It had been magical. There was snow for the first time in a long stretch of years. They’d slipped away from the party out gathering holly and fir boughs to make snow angels in a hidden glade Colin had found during one of his rambles on the property.
They’d made ever so many of the figures, laughing when snow crept beneath their clothes to chill their skin. She remembered the tingle of cold fingers beneath mittens and numb toes in her boots, but with Colin, it hadn’t mattered, for he warmed her from the inside out.
When he’d helped her up from her last snow angel, he’d kissed her properly.
Not the chaste pecks on the cheeks—or the one beneath the mistletoe—he’d given her before.
Oh, no. This had been his mouth fully pressed against hers while he held her securely in his arms. It had been romantic and wonderful, and she’d had stars in her eyes and dreams in her heart for days afterward.
They’d lingered in that snowy glade for long moments, kissing, exploring each other’s mouths, tasting the first nibbles of the heady adult world of love and romance, and they hadn’t come up for air until the calls of his siblings and their friends intruded.
That first string of delightful kisses had been days before he’d brought her crashing to Earth with his plans for their future. Yes, even back then he’d managed to miss the point of Christmas even though he’d nearly embodied the holiday.
With a swift intake of breath, Lucy came back to the present.
She flopped against her bench with a rapid pulse and an aching chest. When she pressed a hand to her heated cheek, that elusive scent caught in her nostrils.
Back then, she’d mentioned she adored the smell on him, and he’d apparently never changed, all this time later.
A tiny half-smile tugged at one corner of her mouth.
Was it in deference to her, or did he prefer that aroma over all others found in the shops?
“Are you quite well, Mrs. Ashbrook, I mean Lucy?” Ellen asked, eyeing her with speculation. “You look as if you were haunted too.”
“Nothing but a memory that jumped into my mind, unbidden,” Lucy murmured and turned her face to the window. It wouldn’t do for the child to see too much in her gaze.
“A happy one? I hope so, for you are blushing.”
“Most definitely happy.” And heated. Even now she wished to fan her face, but she didn’t dare, for Ellen would want to know why. Lucy swore she could still feel—after all these years—the urgent press of Colin’s lips against hers as they’d shared an intimate piece of themselves that snowy day.
Memories such as those shouldn’t come with a heavy dose of regret.
What happened between her and Colin couldn’t be changed, and those were happy, wonderful times, even if they hadn’t followed each of them into adulthood.
Decisions had been made, and they brought their own lovely memories, perhaps more so for her than Colin.
But it needn’t be that way. Surely, he could recall joyous scenes from Ellen’s childhood at Christmastide.
I should help him down that path and out of the shadowy world he currently walks.
She glanced at him, and suppressed a sigh. Mayhap he needed permission to take out the memories and separate the feelings from them. Enjoy them for what they were in that one moment in time, when everything had been perfect.
Or perhaps he needed to remember more, for if he’d truly lost the spirit of Christmas, remembrances held the power to beckon him back.
Could she survive that herself?
Locking those precious memories away else her own guilt and regrets rise up, Lucy fished about the floorboards for her dropped embroidery. “We have much to do, Ellen, if we’re to help your father this holiday season.”
For she would bring Christmas back to him if only to see him happy once more, regardless of how much pain it brought her.