Christmas at His Command

‘Yes.’ Well, it had sounded like that. ‘All the rest’. How else could she take that?

‘So you assumed from this snippet which you overheard that I have a lover but indulge in brief affairs with other women when the fancy takes me. Is that it? And you did not think it pertinent to ask me about it? You preferred to freeze me out all night?’ he grated softly, looking as though he would like to shake her or worse.

Marigold stared at him. What had she done? Oh, what had she done? ‘I…I didn’t freeze you out—’

‘The hell you didn’t,’ he said grimly, starting the engine as he spoke and then swinging the large vehicle so violently round the drive in a semicircle that Marigold nearly screamed.

The set of his jaw warned her to say nothing more as he drove—far too fast in view of the treacherous conditions—back to the cottage. Marigold sat hunched in her seat, her mind numb and all her senses concentrated on getting out of the vehicle in one piece.

By the time they drew up outside the garden gate Marigold felt weak with relief that they weren’t in a ditch or wrapped round a tree, and as Flynn left the car she just managed to pull herself together sufficiently to shrug off the rug before he opened the door, holding out his hand to help her down.

She glanced at his coldly impassive face. ‘Thank you.’ Her voice was very small but as she descended he said nothing, merely holding her arm as she limped along the path, which was now a sheet of ice.

She had to have two tries at sliding the key in the lock before her trembling hands could negotiate the point of contact, and once the door swung open he turned and began to walk away. Marigold stared after him,

her heart racing, and knew she had to say something, anything. She couldn’t just let him go like this. ‘Flynn?’ Her voice was shaking.

He stopped but didn’t turn round. ‘Yes?’

‘If I got it wrong, I’m sorry. Truly. But they made it sound…’ Her voice trailed away. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said again.

‘You believed what you wanted to believe,’ he said flatly.

Marigold opened her mouth to deny it but the words hung on her tongue unsaid. He was right. She stared at the big figure in front of her, appalled. He was absolutely right. There could have been all manner of explanations for what she’d overheard, but she’d jumped to the obvious one because she had needed to distance herself from this man. From the moment she had met him he had been a threat somehow.

When she remained silent he swung to face her, and now a mirthless smile twisted the hard mouth briefly as he read the truth on her face. ‘Don’t worry, I won’t bother you again; you can have your quiet Christmas,’ he said wearily, turning and walking on down the path again.

‘Flynn?’ She had no right to ask and it was probably the height of presumption in view of all that had been said, but she would never sleep again if she didn’t know. ‘Who is Celine?’

For a second she thought he was going to ignore her but then he halted again, his back to her as his voice said flatly, ‘Celine was my fiancée; you may have heard of her—Celine Jenet?’

Marigold had heard of her; there probably wasn’t a woman in the western world who hadn’t heard of the beautiful French model.

‘We were together for a while some years ago but we parted a week before the wedding. It caused a great deal of interest at the time; probably, in view of what you heard tonight, it still does.’ There was a biting note of cynicism running through the cold voice now. ‘It deeply disappointed the media, and to a lesser extent our friends and families, that we didn’t choose to tell all or rip each other apart, but at the risk of sounding tedious we were friends. We still are, but that’s all we are.’

Marigold didn’t know what to say but in the event it didn’t matter because Flynn obviously considered the conversation finished. He walked on, climbing into the vehicle without even a nod of his head or a wave of his hand.

Long after the lights of the 4x4 had disappeared Marigold continued to stand on the doorstep, only entering the house when she became aware she was chilled to the bone.

Celine Jenet. She sank down onto the rug in front of the glowing fire in the sitting room, removing the guard she had put in place before she left for the party and placing several small logs on the red embers, which leapt into immediate, crackling life. Celine Jenet. She was gorgeous. Six feet of sultry, large-eyed, tousled sex-kitten appeal, and she had been his fiancée. No wonder those women had said no one else could match up to Celine. Why had she left him? For another man? Because of her career maybe?

Marigold stared into the flames, her heart thudding. Whatever the reason, it had not caused Flynn to hate Celine, but did he still love her? He had said they were only friends but that didn’t mean he didn’t secretly wish for more, perhaps even hoped they might get back together some day.

She held out her cold hands to the fire but found the chill came from within rather than without. Flynn might not hate his ex-fiancée but it was a sure-fire bet he hated her, Marigold thought miserably. And now she thought about it, especially in view of his explanation about the Frenchwoman, she didn’t understand why she had behaved so badly. She didn’t normally jump to erroneous assumptions about people; in fact she was just the opposite. If she hadn’t given Dean the benefit of the doubt on various occasions she would have realised what he was up to long before she had. But with Flynn…

With Flynn it was different. For some reason this man affected her like no other human being she had ever met.

Marigold bit hard on her lip, hating the way she was feeling but unable to conquer the utter desolation that had swept over her. So much for a quiet, peaceful Christmas by herself to recharge her batteries and get strength to face the changes she intended to make in the future. She wished she’d never set eyes on this cottage, or Flynn, or—

The knock at the door startled her so much that for a second she was in very real danger of overbalancing into the fire. She put a hand to her thudding heart, rising quickly and limping across the room and into the hall. She went right up to the front door, her voice small and cautious as she said nervously, ‘Who is it?’

‘Father Christmas, who else?’ Flynn’s voice said sardonically.

Flynn! Marigold opened the door with a certain amount of embarrassment, her head whirling. She hadn’t expected to see him again and she’d been amazed how badly that had made her feel, but now he was here she was warning herself, This doesn’t mean anything, not a thing. After Celine Jenet, how could it?

As the door swung open Flynn just stood and looked at her steadily for a moment or two before saying, ‘Hello, Marigold. Can I come in?’

‘Oh, yes, of course.’ She was so flustered she hardly knew what she was doing and was quite unaware she’d kept him standing on the doorstep.