Sleigh Bells in the Snow (O'Neil Brothers 1)

She cradled the warm mug in her hands. It should have offered comfort, but inside she was cold, so cold she felt as if she’d never be warm again.

She’d discovered long before that loneliness could be a dull background ache or it could be sharp and painful. It could bite into the soft parts of a person leaving bruises, or it could just nip gently at the edges of your subconscious.

She’d learned to live with it, but tonight the O’Neils had ripped away all the protection she’d so carefully wrapped around herself, leaving her vulnerable and exposed.

It wasn’t just the hostility, although there was no doubt Walter had been openly hostile. Alice and Elizabeth had been almost smothering in their affection and level of welcome, and that was almost as bad.

She kept her interaction with people superficial. She didn’t bond. She didn’t make attachments. She didn’t want attachments.

But if she wanted this business, she was going to have to find a way of working with the O’Neils.

Snuggling against the pile of soft pillows, she sipped her tea and thought about what lay ahead.

The family setup might be unusual, but the business problems weren’t.

Tonight had been a disaster, but not because she didn’t know her job. Because of the people. Because she had no idea how to relate to them.

She told herself she didn’t have to bond with them to help them.

No one was asking her to become part of the family.

All she had to do was win their trust, find out what mattered to them and what they needed and then produce a tailored marketing plan that would solve their problems.

It really wasn’t that hard.

She had to ignore the other stuff.

She especially had to ignore the chemistry with Jackson.

CHAPTER SIX

SHE WAS AWAKE at five, after a night in which sleep occupied less than a few hours. That, at least, was familiar.

She stuck to her usual routine. Brisk shower followed by strong coffee and an hour spent on her laptop, first clearing emails and then working on ideas. This was always her most creative time of day, before the sun came up and her phone starting ringing. Ideas flowed, and she spread papers over the work surface in the kitchen, scribbled notes, wrote down what she’d learned, afraid to lose even a single thought, terrified that if she slowed down or stopped to think about the night before her brain would freeze again.

She paced the length and breadth of the vaulted living room, watching darkness turn to dawn and snowy treetops emerge from a blanket of early-morning mist.

The beauty of it soothed her.

Here, deep in the forest, there were no reminders of Christmas. No glittering decorations, no maniacally grinning Santas, no canned Christmas music playing on a loop. Just nature at its most peaceful.

Her emotions, violently disturbed by the events of the night before, gradually settled.

By the time she took a break, her list of questions were longer than her list of answers, and her coffee had sat untouched on the table for an hour.

Kayla drank it cold while reading the notes she’d made. Her hair hung loose over the soft white robe that had been left for her use in the luxurious bathroom and her feet were bare on the wooden floor. It was the way she always started her day. The same routine she followed each day of her life and it felt familiar and yet unfamiliar.

Lifting her head, she realized the unfamiliar was the silence.

She was used to noise. Traffic noise. Street noise. The noise of a million people jostling for space in the same small slice of a city. First London, then New York. Here, there was no traffic, no people and no noise. The trees muffled sound and the snow fell in gentle silence.

Halfway through her third cup of coffee she heard a tap on the door and looked up in dismay, assuming she’d lost track of the time.

It wasn’t Jackson who stood there, but a girl. Dark hair peeped from underneath a fur-lined hood, and she carried a large box in her arms.

Under the padded ski jacket and trousers she was slim and fit and, judging from the way she balanced the box and tapped on the door, she had no trouble walking on ice.

Resenting the disturbance, Kayla put down her mug and walked to the door. She was greeted by a punch of cold air and a friendly smile.