delicious... well, everything, really.”
“How can you eat that castle food all year long?” Aunt Octavia fussed at Angelica’s pelisse. “No wonder you’re so skinny. When I get you back to London—”
“I weigh five pounds more than I did when I left home,” Angelica whispered to Jonathan. “But I’d be three stone heavier just from breathing in the aroma from her kitchen. It might be the thing I miss the most about home.”
“I thought you missed us the most!” clamored the nieces Jonathan had met previously, a claim that was at once challenged by three other nieces and a small army of nephews.
He repeated everyone’s names over and over again in his mind, determined to commit them all to memory. Not just names, but faces. The sensation of having so many people inspecting him all at once was dizzying.
Some of her relatives were smiling.
Some were not.
He didn’t blame them. He could only imagine their experiences with those that would judge them based on the color of their skin. The sight of him with their beloved relative must have come as a shock.
His throat tightened. If ever someone had cause to reject him, it was this close-knit family who clearly adored Angelica. In their shoes, he would no doubt feel the same.
What must she have told them?
This is Jonathan MacLean, an overly friendly Scotsman who barged into my shop and plied me with pies until I got used to his canty blether and no longer wanted to shoo him out. He’ll be leaving soon enough, though. No need to get used to him.
Jonathan was used to being an outsider. Yet he had never wanted to belong as much as he did in that moment. He wanted them to like him. Wanted to taste the aunt’s cooking, wanted to participate in a cutthroat game of hopscotch, wanted to find the missing doll.
But the thought of having all those things was frightening. If he ever did belong somewhere, or to someone, leaving would feel like ripping his heart in two.
Missing one person would be torture enough. Missing an entire family... He could not allow himself to get attached.
“Jonathan MacLean, at your service.” he began, as he always did, smiling at each one in turn. “Ask me anything. I’m an open book.”
The smiling relatives spoke over each other at once.
“Angelica says you’re well-traveled. Have you ever seen—”
“Angelica says you’re selling fancy clothes from a catalogue. What about—”
“Esther and Florence said you gave them a mountain of biscuits. Did you bring any for us?”
The tension in his shoulders eased. Had he worried about thinking up things to say? Young and old alike peppered him with questions the entire winding path around the castle.
“Angelica says you’ve been to our neighborhood. Do you know the haberdasher on the corner of—”
“Angelica says you’re quite the artist. Can you draw—”
“Where’s your tartan? Do you play the bagpipes?”
Jonathan answered each question as thoroughly and entertainingly as possible, providing detail and making exaggerated faces and funny voices to go along with each story.
By the time they emerged from the other side of the evergreens, what had started as somewhat of an interrogation was now a hotchpotch of teasing and banter across all parties. No wonder Angelica had missed being in the midst of such loving chaos. Jonathan had never experienced anything like it.
Before he knew what was happening, he was seated amongst a row of nieces and nephews atop tiny, precarious, flat wooden sleds at the top of a hill.
Angelica grinned at him. “Off you go, vagabond!”
She gave his shoulder a little push, and his sled went flying down the icy-slick slope. Luckily, the children’s shrieks drowned out his own.
“Again!” they cried after they tumbled into an inglorious heap at the bottom. “Let’s do it again!”
“My heart...” Jonathan clutched at his lapel. “I think it’s a triple apoplexy...”
“Last one up to the top has to buy chestnuts for everyone else,” one of the lads called as he scrambled up the hill.
Jonathan couldn’t be expected to let that stand. He grabbed the ropes to a few sleds and scooped up the smallest little girl, then charged up the hill to be first in line to purchase chestnuts.
Somewhere between the snowball fight and the fifth round of hot chocolate, he realized the two hours of Yuletide activities he’d begrudgingly promised to tolerate had turned into an entire day full of merriment and laughter. His lips were chapped and his back was sore and his face hurt from all the smiling.
“Admit it,” Angelica said as