Second Day of Christmas
Kestrel woke in her Pembrook Park bedroom in a panic.
Christmas Day had rushed by too quickly.
They had played games, eaten take-out Indian food (Mrs. Wattlesbrook apologized profusely, but the kitchen staff hadn’t yet arrived), and roasted honest-to-goodness chestnuts around the fire while singing carols.
Although lovely, it had not been nearly enough.
Kestrel reminded herself, There’s still time!
In Austenland, Christmas lasted for twelve whole days.
Kestrel opened the heavy scarlet curtains and greeted the view of a winter-subdued park adorned with stark-naked trees.
It was December twenty-sixth. Today the other Pembrook Park guest and two more gentlemen would arrive, and the unpredictable and swoony adventure would start in earnest. And it would change everything.
Kestrel wished it would. With all of her, she yearned.
“I’m here, Miss Austen,” she whispered. “I’m in your story. Write me into it. Rewrite me.”
As if in answer to her wish, Kestrel just then noticed a wrapped gift on her side table. Had it been there last night? The attached note, written in an elegant, inky scrawl, read: On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me . . .
Kestrel unwrapped a red cashmere scarf and looped it around her neck at once, her skin shivering with delight at the instant warmth and delicious softness.
She had a tendency to underestimate temperatures.
Hank used to tease her: Cold weather? In January?
Who could have predicted it? She found she could laugh at the memory even while cursing Hank.
Maybe that was a sign that she was indeed touched with the Christmas spirit.
A rap at her door and Juliette entered carrying a tea tray, on which waited yet another wrapped gift, this note declaring: On the second day of Christmas, my true love gave to me .
. . Inside was a leather satchel fit snugly with six glass vials of essential oils.
The aromas sent her soaring—lavender, apple blossom, rose, sandalwood, citrus, and jasmine.
Did Charming mean to give her gifts every single day?
As if winning an all-inclusive vacation wasn’t enough.
Juliette helped her into a corset, secured with Velcro.
“The Velcro is Regency appropriate, I gather?” Kestrel asked.
Juliette smiled. “This was Miss Charming’s rather brilliant idea. Of all her changes at Pembrook Park, the new corset is the most popular among the maids.”
Kestrel nodded, understanding. A guest who can remove her own corset at 3 a.m. won’t ring for help.
“And the drawers are optional now,” said Juliette. “Ever since Miss Charming learned that most Regency ladies—er, ladies of this current time period—go without.”
“Are you serious?” asked Kestrel. “All those proper British girls were secretly going commando? I assumed past time periods were more prudish, not less.”
Juliette cast a glance toward the door, as if worried Mrs. Wattlesbrook might be eavesdropping, and then whispered, “Maybe they didn’t see lack of underpants as a moral matter. I suppose it was more a laundry matter.”
Deciding to indulge in the whole experience, Kestrel slid on the drawers. Again, the different way these clothes touched her gave her skin a tiny thrill.
Juliette dressed her in a cap-sleeved brown-and-cream-striped dress, did her hair, and sent her to the morning room.
Breakfast was set out on the sidebar, reminding Kestrel of a hotel buffet, despite the fine oil paintings decorating the walls.
She frowned at a gilt-framed portrait of an old man glaring judgmentally back at her and tried to reach an itch between her shoulder blades.
“Gooood mornin’!” Bobby said from the threshold, his hand rising to tip a cowboy hat that wasn’t there. He wore a Regency’s man’s white shirt and breeches with suspenders, no jacket or cravat, and slippers instead of boots. “You’re one of the ladies?”
“I’m Miss Spinster,” she said, bobbing a curtsy as Mrs. Wattlesbrook had taught her.
“Don’t give me your name, just the price, honey.”
“Excuse me?”
He laughed and joined her at the sidebar. “I’m pulling your leg! But really, is this place for real? It’s a brothel, ain’t it? A namby-pamby brothel!”
“I’m pretty sure it’s not.” Kestrel slopped some eggs onto her plate, determined to be polite and stay in her Regency persona. “So, you and . . . uh, Charming? Were married?”
Bobby laughed again. “Charming! I guess I’ll get used to that. We’ve been together since high school.”
“King and queen of the prom?”
“You got it. She was kinda cute, and I had a car.” He scooped half the eggs onto his plate. “Match made in heaven, right?”
He winked at her. Kestrel didn’t care for it.
“Why did you come here?” Kestrel asked as she sat down at a round, four-chaired table. He joined her.
“What can I say? I’m a sucker for that gal. I love her down to her pink little piggies, despite everything she’s done.”
“What has she done?” Kestrel asked, genuinely curious.
“We were married for over thirty years. I was devoted to her. But she . . .” He sighed deeply, and there was pain in it.
“Listen, you probably noticed that she’s not the brightest bulb?
It ain’t easy, growing up where we did and being two steps behind everyone else.
She has the self-esteem problems, and it makes it hard for her to believe anyone could love her.
I tried every day to show it, but she was paranoid, always accusing me of philandering.
Finally I gave in and agreed to a divorce, but I regretted it.
She never made life easy for me, but I can’t help loving her. ”
It was an attractive story. A man so in love with a woman that he was willing to cross an ocean and beg her to return. But Kestrel’s gut felt uneasy, a prickly, cold ache of warning. She shoved it down, an old habit first honed at Farm Home.
“Yoo-hoo, Mr. Charming!” The lady herself walked in, coyly fluttering a fan.
“There she is!” Bobby hollered, his tone all warmth and fun. He stood and opened wide his arms, and she skipped into them. The pair nuzzled faces and giggled. Charming did look genuinely happy, more evidence that Kestrel’s gut instinct must be way off.
After the ladies finished their breakfasts, Bobby was going back for round two, so they retired to the drawing room. There they found Mrs. Wattlesbrook surrounded by baskets of chocolate bonbons, tangerines, lotion bottles, potpourri sachets, and a stack of gift cards.
“It’s Boxing Day!” Charming sang out.
“You don’t put people in boxes, do you?” Kestrel asked, trying to make a joke, but her body shivered from a muscle-deep memory.
“Ha! You’re so funny,” said Charming, still high on love. “No, we’re putting together gift boxes for the servants.”
Charming stuffed a box so full it started to bend outward.
“That’s quite enough!” said Mrs. Wattlesbrook.
“But this one is for Edwin,” said Charming. “Don’t you think he deserves extra?”
“Yes, I suppose so. Edwin is—”
“The best thing since frickin’ fish fries,” said Charming.
“As you say.”
“Who’s Edwin?” asked Kestrel.
Charming was struggling to close the lid on the overloaded box. “Well, he’s the groundskeeper and chauffeur and stable man and—he does everything. He’s the best. Everyone loves him.”
“Do you love him?” Kestrel asked.
She’d meant it as a flippant comment and was surprised when Charming looked down, her cheeks turning pink. As if to change the subject, Charming thrust a box in Kestrel’s face and demanded, “Lend me your paw to hold this sucker closed while I tie the bow.”
“Do not put our guest to work!” said Mrs. Wattlesbrook.
“Please let me!” said Kestrel. “I really would rather do things.”
Mrs. Wattlesbrook passed a hand in front of her eyes. “There are so many boxes for the staffs of both estates and I suppose . . .” She sighed with deep regret. “I suppose it’s not proper to ask the servants to wrap their own gifts.”
“We’ve got this, Mrs. Wattlesbrook,” said Kestrel. “Why don’t you put up your feet and have a cup of tea?”
Mrs. Wattlesbrook sniffed as if a bit affronted, but then she acquiesced so quickly Kestrel assumed she’d guessed right and the lady was dying for a break.
As soon as they were alone, Kestrel said, “Okay, tell me about Bobby.”
Charming squealed. “Can you believe he flew to England for me? Here I was, naming particularly large bowel movements after him, but all the while he was at home full of regret for breaking my heart and longing for me. Longing! Isn’t that a great word?
Making yourself longer? It’s like he put himself in one of those torture devices that hook around your ankles”—Charming mimed it out—“and around your wrists and stretch you while you holler in agony? Those things? So romantic.”
Machines of torture aside, it did seem romantic. Kestrel again shoved down that discomfort in her gut.
“It’s like a Christmas miracle. I have my husband back and I have Austenland. I’m Missus Charming now, and he’s gonna stay on as my mister. If I look tired,” Charming said coyly, “it’s because I didn’t get much sleep last night.”
“Is that so?” Kestrel lightly elbowed her, smiling.
“Yep! Because we were up all night long!”
“Good for you.”
“Having marital relations!”
“I figured.”
“And you know what marital relations means?”
“I do.”
“It means having conversations about your marriage relationship.” Charming dropped a handful of bonbons into a box. “But after all the conversations, we had S-E-X!”
Charming’s eyebrows rose high, her eyes bright.
And Kestrel yearned to believe in her happy ending.
But the moment Bobby joined them, wrapping his arms around Charming from behind and whispering in her ear, Kestrel felt her energy switch into high alert.
Some part of her was always shouting a warning: Beware of men who say they love you.