Christmas Under a Starlit Sky

by Holly Martin

  He lifted her and she wrapped her legs around him. As the kiss continued, he carried her to the dining table, sitting her down on the edge.

  She tugged at his towel, letting it drop to the floor as he made quick work of all her clothes, his mouth barely leaving hers for a second. As his mouth began to travel down her neck to her shoulder, clarity slammed through the desire-filled fog and she suddenly remembered she had to tell him the truth about his baby.

  ‘Oakley, wait. I need to tell you something.’

  ‘Hmmm?’ Oakley’s mouth drifted lower.

  She closed her eyes at the feel of his mouth on her skin. ‘You’re not going to like it.’

  ‘Then don’t tell me, Freckle. Whatever it is, I don’t want to hear it.’

  His mouth continued his slow torture of her body.

  ‘I can’t not tell you, Oakley, it’s important. Oh, God...’ All thought and reason went straight out of her head as his lips moved even lower to her most sensitive area. His mouth felt hot and divine and he knew exactly what to do to drive her insane within a matter of seconds.

  ‘Then tell me tomorrow.’ The vibrations of his voice against her flesh did the most wonderful things to her insides.

  ‘I really think I should tell you now,’ Neve moaned, her voice strangled as she tried to find the strength to stop this before it went any further. But she had missed him so much over the last few weeks and she knew when she told him the truth he would be angry, so maybe she should just make the most of him now. She cringed about how cowardly she was being over this but with his mouth doing wicked and wondrous things to her, she was finding it hard to think of anything else.

  ‘All I’m interested in knowing is whether sex is on the “no” list too,’ Oakley said, standing back up and moving between her legs.

  ‘No, thankfully that’s not on the list,’ Neve said, wrapping her legs around him and promising herself she would tell him as soon as they were finished.

  ‘I can’t hurt the baby?’ Oakley asked, concern filling his eyes.

  ‘No, definitely not.’

  ‘Good.’

  And with that, he slid inside her, filling her completely.

  She shouted out, holding him tight as he moved against her. Cradling her against him, he lowered her to the table, kissing her, caressing her.

  With a sudden groan of frustration, he pulled out of her and disappointment hit her in a huge wave. But the next thing he was pushing her gently backwards across the table and climbing up on the table on top of her. He slid back inside her again. He felt so divine, so hot, and as he moved against her she could feel herself building so quickly.

  He pulled his mouth from hers to look at her, his eyes filled with love and adoration.

  ‘I love you, Freckle.’

  It was those words that sent her tumbling over the edge and he quickly followed.

  Neve was in a blissful, comatose state. She could see the early morning sunshine from the other sides of her eyelids, but she couldn’t bring herself to open her eyes. After they had made love on the dining table, Oakley had carried her upstairs and made love to her again and then kissed her all over, sending her off into a blissful sleep. She was half awake now but the kisses were still continuing and slowly she came round more to what was happening.

  She opened one eye and found him laying soft kisses over her belly. He smiled up at her when he saw she was awake and she knew now, when they were both so happy and relaxed, was the right time to tell him, crossing all her fingers and toes that Pip was right and he wouldn’t be that angry about it.

  ‘Oakley, I need to tell you something.’

  ‘I need to tell you something too,’ he said, laying another kiss on her belly.

  ‘I have to go first,’ Neve insisted.

  Oakley laughed. ‘Let’s toss a coin to see who goes first.’

  She tried to stop herself from groaning in frustration, he wasn’t taking this remotely seriously and why should he? In his mind, what could possibly be worse than her carrying another man’s baby?

  ‘OK, forget that,’ Oakley said. ‘I’ll go. I had a lot of time to think yesterday and over the last few days. I love you, Freckle. I told you that there was no problem too big that we couldn’t make this work. I still want to marry you and I want to raise this baby as mine. I will love this baby because it’s yours. He will want for nothing, neither of you will. And I’ll help with all the night feeds and changing the nappies. Mikki told me that marriage is taking the rough and the smooth and she’s right. I want to support you through this.’

  Neve stared at him in shock. She hadn’t been expecting this for one second. ‘Oakley –’

  ‘And if you track the real dad down and he wants to be a part of this kid’s life then he can, I won’t stop him. But I’ll be the kid’s proper dad. I’m the one that will play football with him and teach him how to play baseball and rock him to sleep every night. And we can still live here if that’s what you want. My job is in California for the next few years but we can come back here after the job is finished or whatever you want, but the important thing is we’re together, wherever we are. I want this baby with you. I know I was scared before, I know I didn’t want children just yet, but I do want this now. I want to have a family with you.’

  He wanted to be with her. He loved her so much that he wanted to raise a baby that, as far as he was concerned, wasn’t his. He wanted them to be together like a proper family. It was everything she ever wanted. Every doubt about the permanence and durability of their love vanished. She was good enough for him, he had just proved that. Any fears that he wasn’t serious about a proper relationship just faded away. He really did want forever. She had never really given him a chance. She had been waiting for him to let her down and that wasn’t fair on him. They deserved a chance at being together and this time she was going to take it.

  She rolled up onto her knees and kissed him hard. ‘I love you.’

  ‘I love you too and—’

  She silenced him with her fingers over his lips. ‘I love you and I hope you will understand that what I’m about to tell you, I did it for you. I did it because I love you so much.’

  He frowned in confusion.

  ‘Oakley, I lied to you,’ Neve blurted out.

  The smile faded from his face. ‘You lied? About what?’

  ‘The baby. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I did it for you. I could see you didn’t want the baby, that you were scared about the responsibility and how it would affect your job, and I didn’t want it to ruin your dreams so I lied. I told you the baby wasn’t yours when he is. The baby is yours, Oakley. I haven’t been with anyone else. You’re going to be a dad.’

  Oakley stared at her in shock and for the longest moment neither said a word. Then he climbed off the bed, still staring at her in horror. If she thought the pain he had been in before when he thought she had slept with someone else was bad enough, this was nothing to what he felt now.

  He suddenly started to get dressed.

  ‘Oakley, wait! Please understand that I made a terrible mistake but it was with good intentions. It wasn’t nasty or malicious, I did it for you. I acted rashly and I shouldn’t have done it.’

  He pulled his jumper over his head and fastened up his boots. Then he stood up to look at her.

  ‘You’re carrying my son?’ he choked out. ‘The boy is mine?’

  ‘Yes, I’m sorry.’

  He started pacing the room. ‘You lied to me. What if I’d left after you told me the baby wasn’t mine, went back to America? I would never have known that I had a son. My son would never have known his father. You know how I feel about my dad, about him abandoning me and how upset that makes me feel that he never wanted me, that I was never enough to make him want to stay, and yet you would have put our son through the same thing, making him believe I never wanted him.’

  ‘I would have told you.’

  ‘When? When my son was five or ten or when he was eighteen and wanted to track me down?’r />
  ‘I’ve been trying to tell you the truth. When we went down to the stables and I told you I hadn’t slept with Adam, I was trying to tell you then and you assumed I’d just slept with someone else, and when we came back here before the surprise Christmas party, I told you we needed to talk. When I gave you the bracelet and we ended up kissing and then again last night after the boat. I’ve tried but everything kept getting in the way. I’m so sorry,’ Neve said.

  He was still pacing and he was barely looking at her. ‘I can’t believe you lied to me about our son. The hell I’ve been through over the last few days! All I could think about was whether we had any kind of future together, wondering whether you loved me at all if you could have been with someone else so quickly. And it was all a lie. The stress was for nothing.’

  ‘Don’t you understand? I did it because I do love you. You were talking about your job and how it was everything you ever wanted and how babies just weren’t on your radar at the moment. I didn’t want to ruin your life with a baby you didn’t want. You looked so scared when I told you and I wanted to let you go, to free you of the responsibility.’

  ‘That wasn’t your choice to make,’ Oakley snapped. ‘Christ, my mum has spent my whole life making decisions for me and you know how much I resented that and then you decide to take the biggest decision of my life out of my hands.’

  ‘I know, it was stupid. I reacted badly. As soon as I said it, I wanted to take it back.’

  ‘But you didn’t.’

  ‘No, because five seconds after I said it, I fell down the stairs and knocked myself out.’

  Oakley paced away again, pushing his hands through his hair. ‘You didn’t think I was good enough to raise your baby.’

  ‘No, God no! I never thought that.’

  ‘I wasn’t sensible enough for you, didn’t take life seriously. I was too busy enjoying myself. You never thought I was mature enough to be a dad.’

  ‘Oakley, no, this isn’t what it was about.’ How could he ever think he wasn’t good enough when she had always thought she wasn’t good enough for him?

  ‘Is that why you finished with me in the first place, because you found out you were pregnant and you didn’t want me to be the dad?’

  ‘No, I swear, I didn’t know until about two weeks ago,’ Neve insisted.

  ‘And yet you didn’t call me when you found out.’

  ‘I was going to. I was just shocked myself and I didn’t know how to tell you. It wasn’t something that I wanted to do over the phone. I was going to wait until after Christmas and then I was going to fly out and tell you.’

  He turned to look at her and she was shocked to see he had tears in his eyes.

  ‘I might not know how to change a nappy or what temperature the milk needs to be heated up to, and I have no idea how to hold a baby or how to wind one, but I would be a great dad to our son because I would love him so much. I would read every god damn baby book there is and learn how to look after him. I’d love him as much as I loved you but you weren’t ever prepared to give me that chance.’

  Neve quickly stood up. ‘That’s not the reason at all, please. . .’

  He backed away from her as if he didn’t know her any more.

  ‘I need some space, don’t follow me.’ He headed for the stairs.

  ‘Please, don’t go, we need to talk about this.’

  Oakley didn’t look back. He walked down the stairs and a few moments later she heard the front door close behind him.

  She sat down on the bed and burst into tears.

  Chapter 17

  Adam knocked on Ivy’s door, determined to talk to her before she went out for her early morning walk. He hated that there seemed to be this tension between them and he didn’t know why.

  There was no answer. He tried the door handle but for the first time since he’d met her the door was locked.

  He knocked on the door again, just in case she was upstairs ignoring him, but there was no answer and no movement from inside.

  ‘Adam, hello!’ Deborah called from the shop next door. ‘She’s not in, I saw her go out for her walk about half an hour ago.’

  Adam sighed, knowing she rarely took the same route on her walks and it’d be impossible to try and find her now.

  ‘Why don’t you come in for a cup of tea, dear, and a slice of cake?’ Deborah suggested, gesturing for him to come in.

  ‘Thank you, that’s very kind, but I really need to get back to the hotel. There’s a lot of work to be done ahead of the New Year’s Eve ball in two days—’

  ‘Nonsense, dear, there’s always time for cake. This one is banana cake, it’s lovely for breakfast.’

  She turned and walked into the shop, not taking no for an answer.

  Adam bit his lip and followed Deborah inside the shop, which smelt wonderfully delicious from all the melted chocolate.

  Stephen was already walking around and turning all the chocolate fountains on and Adam knew that later the scents would spill out onto the street, attracting tourists in their droves.

  ‘Go on back,’ Stephen said, pointing to the back of the shop where the kitchen was. ‘Just ask for a small slice, or she’ll probably give you the whole cake.’

  Adam smiled and walked into the kitchen, where there was a huge oak table and trays of fresh fruit were in the middle of being cut, ready for the tourists to dip into pools of melted chocolate. There were quaint flowered mugs hanging from a dresser and fairy lights strewn across the ceiling. Deborah was already cutting three extra-large slices of banana cake. She turned to the kettle as it came to the boil and poured the water into a big red teapot.

  ‘How’s things going with you and Ivy?’ Deborah asked as if she had known him all his life and had every right to know all the details of his love life.

  ‘Things are good,’ Adam said, vaguely.

  Deborah sat down and handed him his slice of cake. ‘I noticed you spent the night several times this week.’

  Adam had to stop his mouth from falling open as Stephen came into the kitchen too.

  ‘Deborah, you shouldn’t ask him things like that,’ Stephen said as he took a big slice of his own cake.

  ‘Oh, don’t mind me, dear, I’m not going to judge. You young uns always get together a lot quicker than we did in our day. There was a lot more courting in my time, it’s just the way of it now. I think it’s wonderful that you and Ivy have found happiness together, even if it isn’t forever. She needs someone to make her smile after all that unpleasant business with her ex.’

  ‘I like her, I really do. It’s early days for us, but I kind of hope what we have is going to be for the long haul.’

  ‘You’ll be going back to London though in a few months?’ Deborah asked.

  ‘Gabe has asked me to stay and I’ve agreed.’

  ‘Oh. And are you thinking about marriage and children with her?’

  Adam nearly choked on his cake.

  ‘Debs!’ Stephen said, incredulously. ‘They’ve been seeing each other for a few days. It’s too early for them to be thinking of that.’

  ‘Ivy wants a child. I’ve seen the way she looks at Joy and Rebecca. She wants that more than anything,’ Deborah persisted.

  ‘Is that what she’s said?’ asked Adam, knowing straight away that his vagueness about having children the night before had been the thing that had upset Ivy.

  ‘We’ve not talked too much about it. Just that her and her ex-husband tried for a while and it didn’t happen. But I know she is desperate to have one. I don’t think it would be fair to get involved with her if you don’t want that too.’

  Adam rubbed his head. He certainly hadn’t expected a lecture when he came down there that morning.

  ‘What makes you think I don’t want that?’

  ‘Your job means long hours. You’ve lived in London for the last few years with all the parties and shows. Not too much time for a child with that lifestyle.’

  ‘There wasn’t much time for parties and shows in my job a
s deputy manager either. My job does require long hours but if Ivy and I decide we want children in the future then we can work it out then. But really that is our business, not yours and as we’ve said, I’ve known her for less than a week, she could get bored of me and end things between us next week. I really don’t think we need to worry about marriage and children just yet.’

  ‘I just don’t want to see her get hurt.’

  ‘That’s the last thing I want too,’ Adam said, honestly.

  ‘You obviously care for her so I’ll say no more about it,’ Deborah said. ‘You certainly don’t want us old fogies interfering.’

  Stephen stared at his wife in shock at being lumped in with her as one of the interfering old fogies.

  Adam smiled slightly to himself. Life was certainly going to be a lot different here than what he was used to.

  Oakley hadn’t come back. Neve had waited and waited, hoping he would come back to her lodge, but there had been no sign of him. Eventually, when their baby had demanded that he needed feeding, she had got washed and dressed with great difficulty and headed over for breakfast.

  She grabbed a plate with a pile of pancakes and fruit and sat down at the table with Gabe, Pip and Wren, who looked like a blissfully happy little family. Her mum and dad were there too.

  Gabe’s smile fell from his face when he looked up to greet her. ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘I’m an idiot, that’s what’s happened,’ Neve said, taking a big mouthful of pancake. She couldn’t stomach the thought of eating when everything lay in tatters around her but she forced it down anyway because the baby needed it. When her family continued to look at her with concern she gave them all a very quick bullet-pointed version of what had happened since Oakley had arrived and how stupid she had been.

  ‘Oh my darling, why would you do something like that?’ her mum asked.

  ‘It was for him, I did it for him,’ Neve protested but she knew in her heart there was more to it than that. She knew that underneath all that was the fear of her not being good enough for him and therefore her baby wouldn’t be good enough to keep him too. It was only now, after his noble proposition that morning, that all those fears had gone. She didn’t care what the public said or the newspapers or even his mum. She deserved to be happy and she deserved to be with Oakley. But that realisation had come much too late.