The Christmas Secret

by Karen Swan

  ‘Ohmigod, where have you been?’

  She felt a hand on her elbow and she turned to find Skye staring at her with dancing eyes. ‘I’m so sorry, I got held up.’

  ‘For two hours?’ Skye half-laughed, half-wailed.

  ‘I . . . uh . . . had to talk to a client. In New York.’ She looked at Skye – her cheeks were flushed, her breath coming fast. ‘Have you been dancing?’

  ‘Non-stop,’ she said with a ‘whew!’ ‘It’s exhausting stuff. You must dance.’

  ‘I can’t reel.’ Her eyes scanned the room for Lochie. Where was he? Had he skipped this after all?

  ‘Honestly, there’s nothing to it. The guys do all the hard work. As long as they know where to put you and when to spin you, you’ll be fine.’

  ‘It sounds terrifying.’

  Skye laughed. ‘You just need a little Dutch courage. Here, have this.’ She handed over her dram. ‘You’ve got some catching-up to do, anyway.’

  Alex took a sip, anticipating the burn in her throat, enjoying it. ‘So how’s it going? With you-know-who?’

  ‘We’ve danced together twice now.’

  So he was here then. That was something. She felt herself relax a little. ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes. I mean, I say together; it’s not like slow-dancing, you know? We’re not cheek to cheek but he’s been my partner twice, which – given that he’s barely been able to look at me all year . . .’ She bit her lip.

  ‘Well, that’s good.’

  ‘I guess.’ She pulled a face.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I just feel so bad. Everyone keeps coming up to me and congratulating me, wishing me luck . . . And I keep thinking about Al.’

  ‘Don’t. Don’t think about him till you know for sure what you want to do. The decision has to be yours and yours alone. Don’t marry him out of guilt.’

  ‘You’re right.’

  ‘Just see where tonight takes you. Have the two of you . . . talked yet?’

  ‘Nup. Not yet. But I think maybe he’s building up to it, you know? I keep catching him looking at me funny.’

  ‘Sure.’ Alex looked around the room. Feeling sick. Wanting to run. ‘Where is he?’

  ‘He was just over there, near the bar. Oh yes, there he is, look. In the checked shirt.’

  Alex looked over and saw him in profile, the overhead lights cutting angles on his face as he stood with some of the guys from the mash house. But he wasn’t talking and his body was too still. He looked lost in thought. Adrift.

  ‘God, he looks so handsome tonight, don’t you think?’ Skye murmured.

  Yes. ‘I guess.’

  As if sensing that he was being watched, he looked up, falling stiller at the sight of their dual gazes.

  She couldn’t do this. ‘You should go and talk to him,’ Alex murmured, nudging Skye with her elbow. Doing it anyway.

  ‘Really? You think?’

  No. ‘Absolutely. It’s the perfect opportunity.’

  ‘I guess I do need to get a drink, now that I don’t have one,’ she giggled.

  ‘Get him to buy one for you. And ask him for the time. Or help with . . . I don’t know, your hair or something. Just keep asking him lots of little favours.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It tricks the brain, making people believe they like you even more than they already do.’

  ‘Cool!’

  Alex watched her go, seeing how Lochie’s gaze stayed on her and not Skye.

  ‘Beautiful stranger! Where have you been hiding yourself?’

  She looked around to find Callum suddenly standing before her, that cocky smile on his face, genuine pleasure in his eyes. ‘Talk about playing hard to get! You’ve ignored all my texts.’

  ‘I was away for a few days . . . out of range,’ she said tightly, feeling a kick of anger in her gut at the sight of him, angry that she had allowed herself to be flattered by a player like him, to have flirted with him. She’d known what he was long before she’d discovered what he’d done to his own cousin, but she had been lonely and worn down, and he was easy on the eye; and for just a moment, it had seemed like an easy option, that maybe she could do as she pleased and be free to act on her impulses. But that was just a fantasy. She lived in the real world, where there were always repercussions, and always – always – obligations to live by.

  He took a step closer to her, away from the table. ‘I have to see you again. I can’t stop thinking about you. What about that dinner we talked about? We could skip out of here now.’

  ‘Not happening,’ she said bluntly.

  She watched the confusion bloom in his face, that confident smile slipping. ‘But . . . we had a good time, didn’t we? I thought—’

  ‘You thought wrong.’

  She went to move past him but he caught her by the elbow. ‘Alex, wait, I don’t understand. What’s happened? Have I done something?’

  ‘Not to me, Callum, no, you won’t be getting that chance.’

  ‘You have completely lost me.’

  She took a step closer to him. ‘I know about you and Skye,’ she said in a low voice.

  His expression changed. ‘What?’

  ‘After everything you said about how close you used to be, that you were like brothers – and then you did that to him? You disgust me.’

  ‘Now just h—’

  ‘Don’t. Don’t talk to me, do you understand?’ she said, pulling her arm away.

  ‘Alex!’

  She pushed through the crowd, away from him, scrummaging towards the bar, ordering another glass. She downed it in one. Skye had been right, she did need some Dutch courage to get through tonight. She’d only been here five minutes and already it was unbearable.

  The party was in full swing, everyone having a great time, kicking off their heels. But not her. She was still working. Trying to close the deal.

  ‘What was that about? Lovers’ tiff?’

  Lochie was beside her; his elbows on the bar like her, a drink between his hands and his head dipped as he stared at her.

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘It didn’t look like nothing. Not many people can wipe that grin off my cousin’s face.’

  She swallowed. ‘I told him I knew about what he’d done to you.’

  Lochie squinted. ‘Which was what, exactly?’

  She shot him an incredulous look. Did he really want her to spell it out? ‘. . . Skye?’ she whispered.

  A look of surprise, then dark amusement dawned on his face. ‘Well, I’m grateful for your loyalty, but I’m afraid you’ve got the wrong cousin.’

  ‘. . . What?’ The floor seemed to drop an inch.

  ‘You underestimate the dark horse of the family. Just like I did. He’s his father’s son, you know,’ he said as she looked across at Torquil, now engaged in a deep and intense conversation with the redhead. ‘Sholto’s heir apparent. The prince regent in the Kentallen crown.’

  Torquil had seduced Skye? ‘But . . . he’s married! He’s got a family. Torquil . . . he wouldn’t do that,’ she blustered. And then when she saw his expression: ‘Why would he do that?’

  ‘He’ll do whatever it takes to provoke me. Sleeping with my fiancée was an easy way to show everyone I’m what they say I am: unstable, unpredictable, out of control.’

  It was true – they were all the things Sholto had said to her about him.

  ‘And credit to him, it worked,’ he shrugged. ‘Punching him at the family assembly wasn’t my finest moment, but then I’d only found out the hour before; he took great pleasure in letting it slip over breakfast . . .’ He knocked back his drink, finishing it off.

  Alex winced. Torquil had told her Lochie had punched him because of the Ferrandor deal. ‘High feelings’ he’d said, when all along he’d been the antagonist. It wasn’t just Lochie who’d been slandered in this. Those things she’d said to Callum . . . She turned, looking for him; he was talking in a small group but his body language was closed, defensive.

  ‘I need to apologize to Callum
.’

  Lochie placed a hand on her arm. ‘Not yet.’

  She swallowed as she remembered why her presence was needed here tonight. ‘No. Of course.’ She put a hand lightly on his forearm. ‘How are you doing?’

  ‘Been better.’ He looked across at her, locking her gaze to his.

  ‘Where did you go this afternoon? I was worried about you.’

  ‘I went for a run. Needed to think.’

  ‘. . . Lochie, I’m so sorry,’ she said quietly.

  He gave a hapless shrug. ‘It’s not your fault.’

  Wasn’t it? She looked away, feeling wretched. ‘Did you think about what I said?’

  He snorted. ‘Which bit?’

  ‘Grabbing an alternative future to this.’

  He turned his head and looked at her again with loaded eyes. ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Skye said you’ve danced together.’

  ‘That’s right. She always was a good dancer.’ He looked at her. ‘Do you reel?’

  ‘God, no.’

  ‘There’s nothing to it, so long as you let the man lead.’

  She cracked a small smile. ‘Not my forte, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Well, you’d better dance with me, then. I’m about the only person in here who can keep you in line.’

  ‘Ha! You wish!’ she retorted.

  ‘No?’ His eyes suddenly sparkled under the lights and she could see the whisky dancing in them as he grabbed her hand suddenly. ‘Well, let’s see.’

  ‘Wait! No, Lochie—’ But he was pulling her behind him as though she was a kite on a breeze. The fiddles had stopped, she realized, as they moved onto the dance floor, everyone seemingly getting into position for a new dance.

  ‘Alex!’ Skye cried excitedly – drunkenly – at the sight of them. ‘Lochie! Come dance with us. We need another two for the set.’

  ‘What?’ she asked, bewildered, as Skye grabbed her other hand and pulled her into a line opposite Callum. He stared at her with a look of distrust and disappointment and she felt the guilt grab at her then like a hungry child. ‘No.’ She turned to Skye, panicking. ‘I don’t . . . I can’t reel. I’ve never done it.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Skye smiled. ‘The boys will see you right, isn’t that so, Cal?’

  But before Cal could react, an accordion belched its first alto notes and everyone stood to attention. She saw that Lochie was standing opposite her.

  ‘This one’s Hamilton House,’ Skye explained. ‘It’s basically the girl setting to the man standing beside her husband who is supposedly her lover – but then, when you’d expect man number two, or the lover, to turn her, she turns to the guy next to him and he turns her instead. It’s very flirty,’ she smiled.

  Alex didn’t understand a word of it. ‘But I don’t know what setting is,’ she said in rising horror as the woman to her right began to move and then danced into the space between the middle of the lines.

  ‘Just watch what she’s doing,’ Skye laughed, as the woman did a sort of step-heel-toe to Lochie, before linking arms with Callum on his right. ‘Lochie’ll put you where you need to be, isn’t that right, Lochie?’

  ‘Aye.’

  Alex looked across at him. He was watching her with a smile, enjoying her panic and no doubt relishing seeing her composure slip. It was the night of the gold skirt all over again.

  But there was no time to dwell on it for suddenly everyone changed direction by ninety degrees, and Alex found herself at the end of a line, the woman holding her right hand, and she was now facing Skye. What? How had that happened?

  Skye winked at her as the two lines moved in towards each other, stamping their feet, before walking back out again and their group changed shape – yet again – into a circle. They went round one way, then another, like nursery-school children and she watched in bafflement as the man and woman then turned in the middle of them.

  She couldn’t keep up. It happened all over again – lines becoming circles becoming lines again – and she felt the whisky begin to soak into her bloodstream. It may have taken off the edge of her stage fright, but it also blurred her comprehension of the shapes they were making and she let out a yelp in fright when she felt a hand on her back as Skye pushed her into the centre of the two lines.

  Lochie was right in front of her and she tried to do the step-heel-toe thing to Callum that she’d seen the woman do, but she was no sooner deciding which foot to start with than she saw the man on Callum’s right side lunge for her, turning her fast with both his hands gripping hers. There wasn’t even time to gasp as she found herself put between Skye and Callum in a line. They walked, they stamped, they walked back – and then Lochie’s hands were upon hers, his grip tight as he spun her round, his eyes never leaving her. She felt her hair lift off her shoulders, the room whizz past at dizzying speed. She laughed – more in fright than exhilaration, although it was exhilarating. And then she was in a line again, holding hands between Callum and another man. It repeated – lines, stomping, lines, a circle – and then Lochie again spinning her, making her feel her feet couldn’t keep up, that he might lift her from the ground at any moment and send her high in the air, only his eyes – pinned on hers – keeping her rooted, keeping her there.

  And then it was over. Just like that, they were back in the line and Skye was dancing with Callum. She tried to get her breath back, following the others as people clapped, laughing as they whooped, aware all the time that his eyes were upon her.

  She tried not to return the gaze. It felt loaded somehow. Dangerous. Echoes of the previous weekend were sounding in her ears like warning bells. They couldn’t go back there. This wouldn’t get him over the line and she had to finish what she had started. She had to.

  But the pull was too strong. As the song played on and on – ten minutes, twelve – she let herself be moved like kelp in the sea, allowing people to take her hand and turn her, place her here, set her there; she barely noticed. She saw nothing but him.

  She tried deflecting him and when he danced with Skye, turning her, she joined in with the whooping, clapping harder, throwing her head back in laughter, encouraging him. But when it was their turn again, she felt the spark between their palms as their hands crossed. It was undeniable, inevitable and she saw absolutely no way to stop it . . . not until a warm hand took hers in the line, a hand that had once wanted to feel the touch of her skin too.

  The fiddles stopped with an exuberant falsetto, like a car in an emergency stop, and everyone clapped and cheered, some people stomping their feet, others putting their hands to their chests as they tried to get their breath back. But Alex didn’t. She kept hold of the hand that had taken hers and without a word, reached up and kissed him – his golden hair in her fingers, that ready smile stretching against her lips.

  ‘Fuck me, I had no idea you and Callum had a thing going,’ Skye giggled, from the other side of the loo door.

  ‘We don’t.’

  ‘Didn’t look like it out there! I told you he was a lady-killer. No one can resist him. Not even you.’

  Alex stared at herself in the mirror, the Barbie-pink stippled walls as offensive in the glass as in life. She barely recognized her own reflection. Who was she? When had she become this person? Her eyeliner had smudged à la Debbie Harry and her hair was wild from an evening of being flung about the dance floor. Callum hadn’t put her down since she’d kissed him – he hadn’t even cared about getting an apology – and they had danced the last six reels in a row. She had no idea what any of them were and she didn’t care. She was exhausted, but it was working – as long as she didn’t sit down or go anywhere near the bar where Lochie was standing.

  ‘I thought you hadn’t either,’ Alex said pointedly, perhaps even a little cruelly. But then she was drunk now, as drunk as the rest of them.

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘When I was told you cheated on Lochie, I assumed it was with Callum.’

  The toilet flushed and Skye came out, almost hitting the cubicle wall as she staggered over to the
basins.

  ‘But Torquil? Really?’ Alex asked, pressing her for an answer, an explanation. ‘What the hell was that about? He’s hardly irresistible . . . Skye?’

  Skye looked back at her. ‘He was just there, Alex. Whilst Lochie was permanently up some fucking mountain and trying to find different ways to torture himself, Torquil was nice to me: he paid attention to me. Listened to me. He became a friend. I was so lonely.’

  ‘He used you.’

  Alex might as well have slapped her. ‘What? No!’

  ‘I’m sorry but yes. You were a pawn in his game. He was looking for ways to hurt Lochie, to weaken him. And you allowed him.’

  Skye’s face fell at her angry, brutally direct words, her lips wobbling as tears threatened.

  Alex pulled back, instantly regretful. ‘I’m . . . I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that to sound so harsh. I’m just . . . it was a shock, that’s all. Just another shock. I wish you’d told me.’

  ‘I thought you knew,’ Skye implored, the words becoming a wail, and loud, heavy, dramatic, drunken sobs bursting through. ‘Y-you said everyone was talking about it.’

  She was right, it was a reasonable assumption to make that his name had come up. Alex grabbed her by the shoulder and squeezed it. Clearly destroying people’s lives was her forte tonight. ‘I’m being a cow. Ignore me. I’ve had too much to drink. I’m sorry.’

  Skye’s head dropped as she wept. ‘No, I’ve had too much to drink,’ she juddered as Alex began splashing water on her hands and face. ‘People have been buying me drinks all night. I feel like such a fraud.’

  ‘You’re not. You’re not a fraud.’

  ‘But what will they all think when they find out—?’

  ‘It’s no one else’s business. Who gives a damn what they think? It’s not their future happiness on the line, is it?’

  Alex wrapped her arms around her and let her cry on her shoulder for a moment. The poor girl was a wreck and it was all Alex’s fault. Everything was. The whole sorry mess.

  Skye looked up, taking in her reflection too. ‘God, I look like shit. I thought flushed cheeks were supposed to be alluring; I look like I’m about to have a stroke.’