Christmas at Lilac Cottage - Holly Martin Page 0,21
months old when her maternal grandparents left her with me for a weekend and never came back to collect her, just as she was getting used to them raising her instead. She was so clingy for the first few years and understandably so – even putting her down and staying in the same room as her would cause her to cry buckets. I’m sure subconsciously she was waiting for me to abandon her too. For the first six months she lived with me she would only sleep in my bed, with me lying next to her. I couldn't even leave her once she was asleep as she would be completely inconsolable if she woke and I wasn’t there. It took a long time for her to realise that I was in it for the long haul but clearly she still doesn’t totally trust me now if she is still having nightmares.’ He rubbed his face to clear it of sleep and then suddenly looked horrified as he realised he had said too much. ‘Sorry, I shouldn’t have talked about that with you.’
‘It’s OK, I won’t say anything, to her or to anyone else. But her nightmares don’t reflect badly on you.’
‘Of course they do. She has nightmares because she thinks I’m going to leave her.’
‘You stood by her when no one else did. You raised her when you were no more than a child yourself and you should be incredibly proud of that and of the wonderful girl she is because of you. You put her first above everything else. Don’t ever doubt your parenting skills – you gave her love and she can’t ask for anything more than that.’
He smiled at her. ‘Thank you.’
She watched him, unable to take her eyes off him and he stared right back, the tension fizzing between them like lightning about to strike. She looked away, focussing on the task of making the hot chocolate.
‘I’m sorry she was in your house, I have no idea what she was doing here. I’ll speak to her tomorrow.’
She felt him move behind her, her body embarrassingly erupting in goosebumps at his proximity. Why was she so attracted to this man? Sure, he was good-looking, any idiot could see that, but there were lots of good-looking men in the town and she’d never reacted like this around them before. Was it the way he stared at her, as if he saw deep inside her? Was it having him in her home, the one place she always felt safe, and she just felt nervous about him being in her space? He wouldn’t hurt her, she knew that, well not physically, but he was exactly the sort of man who would ruin her. She feared for that.
‘You’re cold. Here, put this on,’ Henry said, draping his soft towelling robe round her shoulders. The scent of him washed over her, sweet, intoxicatingly spicy. She pushed her arms through the sleeves. The warmth of the robe did nothing to dispel the goosebumps.
‘I’m sorry she woke you.’
She turned round to face him, determinedly looking at his eyes and not at those abs that she just wanted to reach out and touch.
‘It’s no problem at all.’
He stared at her. What was with all the staring, that solid, unblinking, grey gaze? It made her want to run away and hide from it.
‘I’m sorry about…’ he gestured vaguely to upstairs and his bedroom. ‘I’d just woken up and thought I was dreaming.’
She smiled, wanting to tease him to break the tension between them. ‘I gathered you were dreaming when you tried to pull me into bed with you. Who did you think I was, Angelina Jolie or Keira Knightley? I had a dream once that I was in bed with Brad Pitt and when I woke up I was cuddled up to poor Bernard.’
He frowned. ‘I was dreaming about you and then I woke up and you were there.’
There were no words in Penny’s head, nothing at all.
Henry stepped a bit closer and pulled the robe tighter around her, fastening it with the belt. ‘Best dream I’ve ever had.’
Part of her felt euphoric at the attention he was giving her but part of her was annoyed. He wasn’t really interested in her – flirting for him was like breathing. Henry could have any woman he wanted; he certainly wasn’t going to choose someone like her.
He moved in, he was so close she could feel his warmth, feel his breath on her face, but he didn’t touch