Snowbound: Miracle Marriage (Lakeside Mountain Rescue 8)

Oh, God, please, please, don’t let him reject her. Please let him be dreaming of her right now. And most of all please let him have spent the past few weeks frantically calling detective agencies trying to track her down. All I know about her is that she has great taste in underwear.

Surely he was going to be pleased to see her?

Imagining his reaction to her unexpected arrival brought a smile to her face. Perhaps she’d better make sure that their first meeting took place in private in case he just hauled her into his arms and proposed on the spot.

She wondered what her stepsister would say when she met him.

How did our Hayley ever get herself a man like that?

Smiling at her own fantasies, she reached towards the doorbell.

Patrick pushed the haphazardly wrapped presents under the tree and looked at his ten-year-old son. ‘Alfie, why are you looking at the clock?’

Alfie gave a guilty start. ‘I don’t keep looking at the clock.’

‘Yes, you do.’

‘Well, it’s Christmas Eve. I—I’m excited.’ Alfie’s gaze slid furtively to the door. ‘Daddy, don’t you wish you had someone to help cook the turkey?’

‘I can cook a turkey.’ Patrick added a strip of sticky tape to a parcel that was bursting out of its wrapping.

‘Last year you said if you ever saw a turkey again it would be too soon.’

Patrick winced. Was Christmas ever going to run smoothly? ‘That was last year. I’ve studied a cookery book. I don’t foresee any complications.’ He tried to look confident. He could perform a Caesarean section in less than four minutes if the need arose. Why did he struggle to cook a turkey?

‘If you had a wife, she could cook the turkey.’

‘That isn’t a reason to get married. These days, women don’t always like doing that sort of thing.’ Patrick extracted himself from under the tree, his wide shoulders dragging through the branches and sending a shower of needles over the pale wooden floor. ‘Why are you talking about wives? We’re going to have a great Christmas. You, Posy and me.’

‘And the kittens.’

‘And the kittens.’ Remembering the kittens, Patrick frowned. ‘That woman who phoned earlier is coming to look at them any moment now. With any luck she’ll fall in love with them and that will solve one of our problems.’

‘The kittens aren’t a problem!’

‘Having four of them is a problem.’ Seeing the forlorn look on Alfie’s face, Patrick felt a flash of guilt and squatted

down in front of his son. ‘Alfie, we cannot keep four kittens.’

Alfie fiddled with a bauble on the tree. ‘What if the woman gets here and she doesn’t want the kittens?’

‘Why wouldn’t she want the kittens? That’s why she’s coming.’ Patrick scooped up a pile of discarded books and stood up. ‘Take this lot up to your bedroom, will you? We need to make room for all the new mess you’re going to make on Christmas Day.’

Alfie looked up at him, a flash of desperation in his eyes. ‘Do you promise that whatever happens you won’t be angry?’

Patrick frowned. ‘Alfie, what is going on?’ He forced himself to ask the question that always niggled at the back of his mind. ‘Are you missing Mum? Is that what this is about?’

Alfie rubbed his foot along the groove in the floor. ‘Do you miss her?’

How did you tell a child that divorce had come as a blessing?

‘Your mum and I made a mistake when we got married,’ Patrick said gruffly. ‘It happens. It has nothing to do with you. We both love you.’

‘But you didn’t really love each other.’

Abandoning the books, Patrick squatted back down in front of his son. ‘No,’ he said quietly. ‘We didn’t. Not enough to make marriage work. We’d only known each other a month when we decided to get married.’ He didn’t add that Carly had become pregnant on purpose. ‘We didn’t know each other well enough and it’s important to take the time to get to know someone. I didn’t make your mum happy.’

‘Is that why she was always yelling at you?’