Free Under The Mistletoe by Mary Balogh Page B

legs and swish them carefully back and forth. Like this.” He demonstrated while she watched and then got to his feet again and looked down at the snow angel he had made. “Rather a large one.”
    â€œThe angel Gabriel,” she said softly.
    She was wearing a pale, fur-lined cloak with the hood drawn over her head. She looked ethereally lovely in the reflected light from the snow. She also looked very much on her dignity. But she lay down carefully on the snow beside his own angel and made one of her own with slow precision and downcast eyes.
    He was so much in love with her that he wanted to howl at the moon. He was also afraid, uncertain. Was this his dutiful wife he had with him? Or was she the repressed daughter of a humorless tyrant, ready to break free, like a butterfly from the cocoon? But would she simply fly past him when she discovered her wings?
    â€œAh,” he said after she had got back to her feet again, “a dainty angel. A guardian angel, I believe. Jeremy’s, perhaps. Mine, perhaps.”
    She looked at him and smiled—and then her eyes went beyond him to the sky.
    â€œOh, look,” she said, “the clouds are moving off. Look at the miracle.”
    The moon was almost at the full, and suddenly, it seemed, the sky was studded with stars. They looked unusually bright tonight, perhaps because he was in the country rather than in London, as he usually was. One in particular drew his eyes. He stepped a little closer to her and pointed, so that she could look along the length of his arm to that particular star.
    â€œI believe the Wise Men are on their way after all,” he said.
    â€œEdwin,” she said softly, “have you ever known a more perfect Christmas?”
    The sound of his name on her lips warmed him. No, he never had—he had never known a more perfect Christmas or a more perfect moment. If he held his breath, could he hold on to it forever?
    â€œI have not,” he told her.
    He was about to set one arm about her waist, to draw her to him, to begin, perhaps—one year late but surely not too late—to speak the words of the heart, so difficult for a man who spent his days speaking the practical words of business and commerce. But she spun around to face him before he could lift his arm, and in the semidarkness he could see that her body was tense and her expression agitated.
    â€œTake us back with you,” she said. “When you go home to London, take us with you.”
    The words were so stunningly unexpected, so exactly what he wanted to hear that he stared stupidly at her for several moments without speaking.
    â€œWhy?”
    She stared back at him, still tense, before closing her eyes and turning away from him.
    â€œJeremy needs you,” she said.
    Again there was a long pause, during which he dared not ask the question whose answer might shatter his newfound, fragile dream. How foolishly hesitant he was with his wife—so different from the way he was in all other aspects of his life. But she answered the question before he could ask it.
    â€œ I need you.”
    â€œDo you?” His heart felt as if it might burst.
    â€œEdwin,” she said in a rush, her voice breathless, her face still turned away, “I should have said no. Even though Mama and Papa were in desperate financial straits, I should not have agreed to buy their reprieve at the cost of your freedom and happiness. But I had met your father and liked him enormously, and I knew that he really wanted me for you. And so I persuaded myself that perhaps you wanted me too. But it was purely selfish of me. I thought I could leave behind the cold, loveless world in which I had grown up and become part of your father’s warm, joy-filled world. Instead I killed any joy you might have had. I am so sorry. But let us go home with you, and I will try . . .”
    His hand closed tightly about one of her arms, and she stopped talking as he turned her to