Just for Christmas - Emily Harvale Page 0,52

Assuming any are flying.’

Molly’s tummy rumbled. ‘We need to devise a plan. But first I need to eat. What have you got for breakfast? And please don’t say smoked salmon blinis.’

Twenty-Six

Christmas Day with Sarah and Terry was great fun, as it always was, but every so often throughout the day, Molly was missing Chance.

She kept wondering what he and Vicky were doing. Were they watching TV? Opening more presents? Reading? Taking the dogs for a walk in the deep blanket of snow?

Was he wondering what she was doing? Or was he video-calling Jolene and telling her how much he loved her and missed her and was counting the days until New Year’s Eve?

Opening presents made her miss Chance, far more than she expected, but she loved the Christmas jumper Sarah had knitted her, and the reindeer embellished PJs from Terry. They’d also bought her a bottle of her favourite wine, a cook book she had wanted, and a gorgeous, glittery fountain pen she’d longed for months ago.

Christmas dinner took her mind off Chance for just a moment or two. It was delicious, mainly because Sarah was a brilliant cook.

Molly had helped peel the veg, and watched, as always, as Sarah worked her magic and when she was done, the table virtually groaned beneath the bounty laid on its Christmassy decorated top.

Carrots bathed in a mustard and sherry dressing with a sprinkle of toasted hazelnuts for good measure. Sausage, walnut and sage and onion stuffing made from a family recipe. The honey-glazed parsnips were cooked to perfection as were the pigs in blankets and a tray of baked sausage meat, which was one of Molly’s favourites. Roasted sprouts with pistachios and chestnuts, and braised red cabbage with apples and cider, piled high in beautiful, Christmassy serving dishes, along with a large platter of rosemary and garlic, crispy roast potatoes, so golden that they almost glimmered.

Molly did make the Christmas trifle, adding far more sherry than she should, but hey. It was Christmas Day. There was day-old, homemade sponge cake, which Sarah had made on Christmas Eve and Molly had broken into pieces and drowned in sherry. On top of that, she added jelly and once that was set, she layered it with forest fruits and covered the whole lot in homemade custard before smothering it with cream, grated chocolate and multicoloured edible sprinkles. You had to have a bit of ‘kitsch’ at Christmas.

Sarah had also made a Christmas pudding, which she’d decorated with edible holly, using marzipan for the leaves and cranberries soaked in brandy for the berries. They removed the marzipan leaves before they lit the pudding, but they left the cranberries. The flames made them pop and sizzle as the mini fire encased the entire pudding in a cloak of blue, purple, gold and red before burning itself out having consumed all the brandy.

Sarah’s Christmas cake was scrumptious, and her Yule Log was to die for. Molly joked that she’d eaten so much, she probably would.

Sarah had even gone so far as to make a special chocolate alternative, doggy Yule Log for Miracle. And one for Beauty too. She’d found the recipe on the internet on one of the animal welfare sites. That’s how lovely Sarah was. Even though she was allergic, it didn’t mean she didn’t like dogs.

‘They’ll love these,’ Molly said. ‘Thanks Sarah. You’re such a star. My brother is a very lucky man.’ She glanced at Terry.

‘There’s no need to tell me, I know.’

Terry looked at Sarah with eyes filled with love.

Chance’s eyes had looked a bit like that last night.

Did that mean …? Was it possible? No. She must’ve imagined it. Chance wasn’t in love with her. In lust, maybe. But he was in love with someone else.

But she couldn’t stop wishing that he might fall in love with her. And preferably before New Year’s Eve.

When she and Sarah pulled the turkey wish bone, on Terry’s insistence, Molly wished that Chance would tell her he loved her. And when she got the winning half of the bone, she prayed that for once, this Christmas wish would come true.

After lunch they played Charades, Monopoly and Poker. Molly lost at all three.

‘What’s the saying?’ Sarah asked. ‘Lucky in Love, unlucky at cards.’

‘And games,’ Molly added. ‘But I’ve never been lucky in Love, either. Does that make me a full-on loser?’

‘You’ve been lucky in your career,’ Terry said. ‘Although a lot of that is down to talent and hard work.’

‘Ah thanks, brother dear. That’s the nicest thing you’ve