by Lauren Smith
A small, almost hesitant smile touched his lips. “I have an idea. Let’s go out tonight for a little while. Let me show you what Christmas at Cambridge is like.”
Christmas at Cambridge? With him? It would be perfect. She knew he was avoiding talking about his father’s estate, most likely because he was upset by what Edward had done to them today. Yet Kat knew he needed to stop associating his father with the estate. Pembroke was to be his life, his future.
She turned in his arms and kissed him soundly. “I’d like that.”
A boyish smile lit his face. “Dinner at a pub, King’s College Choir, and maybe ice-skating?”
She laughed. “Sounds wonderful! Have you done all this before?”
His smile slipped. “After my parents separated, Mother and I started spending Christmas here. They are happy memories for me, coming here with her, just the two of us.”
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered. Her heart squeezed, and she trailed her fingertips over his sensual lips.
Tristan’s smile was back. “Don’t be. We’ll make more memories tonight.”
“New memories,” she agreed. Our last ones together.
He led her downstairs to retrieve their coats, and they passed the butler, Whitney.
“We’ll be out for the night, but will be back late. Don’t wait up for us.”
“Very good, sir,” the butler said as they headed for the door.
They walked to Tristan’s car, and he held the door open for Kat. They were quiet as he drove them into town. Dusk had settled around the sleepy snow-covered town, and most of the streets were empty. Glittering lights and holiday decorations were splashes of bright color against the white background. She’d been gone two weeks, and in that time Christmas had taken over.
“How about dinner at the Old Spring Pub? It’s not fancy, but it’s fun,” Tristan suggested as he parked the car against the curb.
“Sounds great.” Kat followed him to the little restaurant.
They found a table by the window. A slight chill from the cold glass made her shiver despite the fireplace nearby and the warmth of the pub’s interior.
Tristan sat beside her rather than across from her, and he wrapped an arm around her shoulders. His body heat seeped into her, and she sighed.
This was heaven. A man she could call hers for one more night.
When a waiter came over, they ordered roast turkey and mince pie with brandy butter. “Oh, and chestnut soup to start,” Tristan added.
“Why is it your food always sounds so good?” Kat nudged him playfully in the ribs.
He winked. “Better than pizza?”
“Better.” She laughed and rested her head against his shoulder. “Now, would you please tell me about Pembroke? I know you were avoiding it before. But I need to hear about it. Please?” Sometimes opening up about things helped, and she thought asking him one more time was worth it. If he really didn’t want to talk about his father’s estate, then she’d let it go.
Tristan reached for one of her hands and linked his fingers through hers.
“I’ve lived most of my life at Pembroke. I know every nook, cranny, and dusty attic, but it doesn’t feel like home. Father always reminds me it isn’t mine, not until he dies. It’s hard to love a place when someone stands in your way.”
Kat squeezed his hand. “What if your father weren’t part of the equation? Take him out. Pretend it’s just you running Pembroke. Is that something you could do for the rest of your life?” She wasn’t trying to challenge him or his duty to his title; she was just curious. If Tristan were free to live his life, she wanted to know what he’d choose.
“I would choose Pembroke. Carter and I have been planning things for years. The estate is self-sufficient, but only just. It still needs a healthy source of income, and my father is too old-fashioned to embrace any ideas to bring Pembroke into the future.”
She lifted her head and stared at him. True excitement gleamed in his blue-green eyes. He raised their joined hands and kissed her knuckles. The sweet gesture made her insides flutter in joy and pleasure.
“What would you do to modernize the estate?” she asked.
His eyes lit up. “That’s the fun part. I’d open it up for film and TV crews. We’d get incredible exposure and be paid for location shooting. Then, of course, there would be tourists, busloads of them coming to see where everything was filmed. It could really define Pembroke’s future. Open the gates, let the people come in and experience a true working British estate.”
Kat instantly saw the appeal of his idea. He was right: Tourists would eat up the entire idea of visiting a filming location, as well as a home with a historical heritage.
“And your dad won’t entertain the idea at all?” she asked carefully.
His lips wilted from a smile to a frown. “No. I’ve mentioned it, and he flatly refused to let tourists trample his beloved grounds. I didn’t even have the chance to present my working plan on how Carter and I would implement changes and start making contacts with studios and tour companies.” There was a frustration to his voice, and the shadows in his eyes told Kat how upset he was.
“It’s not your fault that he won’t listen to a brilliant idea when he hears one.”
“Thank you, darling.” He chuckled and pressed a kiss to her temple.
It stung her deep inside to think that a parent would discount a child’s dream or ideas. Her father would never have done that. She’d talked his ear off about her plans to be a history professor. It wouldn’t make a lot of money, but it was her calling. To give the students the gift of loving the past. For Tristan’s father to callously put down his son’s plan to secure the future of the family estate made her heart ache for him.
Their food arrived and they ate the delicious pub fare, talking about a thousand little things and laughing as outside a group of students ran past throwing snowballs at one another.
We won’t talk about tomorrow. We can’t.
“Finished?” Tristan squeezed her waist and eyed her mostly empty plate.
“Yeah, you?” She giggled at his immaculately clean plate.
“Mm-hmm. Let’s see if we can catch King’s College Choir.” He left a couple of fifty-pound notes on the table, nodded at their waiter, and led her back out into the night. Their last night…
Chapter 9
Kat and Tristan navigated the narrow Elizabethan streets until they reached King’s College. It was perhaps the most architecturally elaborate of all of the colleges at Cambridge, with its tall spires and large, sprawling edifices. They followed a crowd that was making its way through a set of doors leading into a chapel.
A choir of thirty white-robed boys and young men were flipping pages in their hymnals on wooden pedestals. Candles in clear glass hurricanes flickered, casting golden illumination upon the choir and the crowd.
Tristan led her to one of the end rows near the front, where they had a stunning view of the stained glass. The interior of the chapel, with its pillars stretching toward the heavens and feathering outward over the ceiling in exquisite slopes was breathtaking.
“Tristan, this is beautiful,” she whispered.
He didn’t respond except to kiss her lips and stroke a thumb over her mouth before he handed her a hymnal.
As the choir burst into song, the sounds echoed off the aged stone, and the effect was surreal. She curled her arm through his and rested her head against his shoulder. It felt like they were just another couple attending Christmas service. Cuddling, singing, celebrating the holidays. A normal guy and a normal girl.
She stifled a sigh. Tristan was anything but normal, but tonight she could pretend he was just her boyfriend, not the future Earl of Pembroke, and not her stepbrother.
Toward the end of the service, she noted that cameras on tripods were sweeping the crowd gathered for the service. One moved slowly past them, then drifted back and paused on them for nearly two minutes. The red light indicated it was recording, and Kat’s heart jumped into her throat
.
“Tristan,” she whispered. “The cameras.” She tilted her head at the one facing them.
“I know. They broadcast the service worldwide.”
“Oh my God, what if someone sees us?” she gasped.
His boyish smile faded, and with a seriousness that shocked her, he replied, “Exactly.” And then he grasped her waist and kissed her, right there in front of God and the world.
Long after she’d lost herself in his kiss, she came floating back to reality. The service was over, and people were shuffling past them, a few glaring at them, recognition flashing in their eyes. Tristan wouldn’t let her go though, even when she felt embarrassment flood her face with heat.
“Let them look. I’m not ashamed to be with you, Kat. I never was.” He brushed his fingertips over her jaw, down to her chin and up again to her lips.
He isn’t ashamed of me. It felt so good to hear him say it. She hadn’t wanted to let those self-deprecating thoughts inside her head, but they’d been there, buried by the sweet memories of his touch, his kiss. He wasn’t trying to hide their relationship, or what few hours remained of it.
“Let’s go skating. Then we have gifts to open.” The boyish look was back.
This was what Tristan would’ve looked like if his childhood had been a happy one. The sardonic smiles and ruthless seductions would not have been second nature to him. Yet, tortured as he was with his painful family situation, he was perfect to her.
“What are you thinking about?” he asked as she swept her hair back from her shoulders.
Damn, the man was so sweet sometimes.
A lie was on the tip of her tongue, but she didn’t want to lie to him.
“I was just thinking I’d give anything to have a normal life with you. No parents, no paparazzi, no peerage titles or fancy estates. Just us.”
Shadowing his eyes was the grief of a man who’d learned long ago to give up what he wanted. Sacrificing his own happiness was in his blood, but he didn’t want to do this any more than she did.
“That’s a wish for another day. Another life.” He stroked her lips again but didn’t kiss her.
He was hurting deeply, like she was.
They exited the chapel and followed the shoveled sidewalks back out to the main streets. Neither of them spoke for several minutes. When they reached the ice rink, it was empty of the crowds she’d expected, but perhaps the families were at home, opening presents.
Tristan purchased two tickets, and they collected skates. Sitting down on a bench, Kat pulled her boots off and put on her blades. He was quicker, and knelt at her feet, jerking the white laces together, then tying them up.
She watched him, her heart so full her chest seemed fit to burst.
With a gentle tap of his fingers on her toes, he stood. “All set.” Then he held out his hand to her as they walked toward the ice.
The second they were ready to step out, Kat clutched Tristan’s arm.
“I may have forgotten to mention that I don’t know how to ice-skate.”
Tristan chuckled. “I get the pleasure of taking your skating virginity as well? Excellent!” He clapped his hands together like an overeager schoolboy, and the look of sheer delight on his face was enchanting, and sexy as hell.
She couldn’t resist smacking his chest.
“You’re a bastard,” she whispered, but tugged him down to kiss him soundly.
“Come on, Scaredy-Kat,” he teased, and stepped onto the ice, pulling her with him.
Every bone in Kat’s body was rigid as she followed him. The ice gleamed, its slickness looking treacherous, but Tristan curled an arm around her waist.
“Feet apart,” he instructed, using his body as a guide. “Straighten your back a little, but lean forward slightly. It’s all about balance and strong ankles.” He bent his legs in at the knees, but kept his ankles straight.
She imitated the stance. He was right. Kat felt a lot steadier like that.
Tristan held out a hand and she took it. “Keep that position and I’ll pull you.”
“Okay.” She held her free hand out, keeping her body balanced, and Tristan started to skate. His powerful legs kicked across the ice, the soft scrape-scrape noise echoing against the white waist-high walls of the rink.
He pulled her along by the hand for a few minutes before he suddenly let go. She sucked in a breath as she coasted past him and wobbled to a stop on her own. Kat turned around, arms flailing a little, and scowled at him.
Tristan was watching her, arms crossed, a wicked smile on his lips.
“How about a game?” he asked.
“Oh, no! Whatever you’re thinking, stop!” But she started to laugh as he prowled across the ice, digging the pointed end of his skates in like a mountain climber’s boots.
“If you can catch me, I’ll let you be in charge in bed tonight. If you can’t catch me, I’m the master tonight.” The grin he flashed was dangerous, and it made her shiver with desire.
“Master?”
“Yes, as in I tell you what to do, and you do it. Or else I might have to punish you.”
Kat had heard of role-playing games. She may have been a virgin, but it wasn’t as though she hadn’t read romance novels before. The idea of playing something like that with him? Tristan as the master? Her body flamed at the thought. Not a bad way to spend the night. She stifled a giggle.
“I have to catch you?” she clarified.
“Right. And if you don’t try hard enough, I’ll make it devilishly hard for you, darling. I might have to bring you to the edge over and over before I let you come. So don’t think to play it easy. Come after me.” That smile got bigger as he watched her process what he’d said.
The idea had her entire body flushing with so much heat, she actually felt beads of sweat dewing on her skin.
“Oh yeah?” she called out breathlessly.
“Yes. I might order you to lie flat on your back and hold very, very still while I go down on you. Maybe I’ll have to bind your hands so you can only enjoy what I want to do to you.”
Those silken suggestions were irresistible.
Her thighs clenched and her abdomen quivered with desire at the thought of his mouth on her down there, his tongue flicking against her and…
“I’ll give you a full minute to catch me. Sporting chance and all that.” He winked and skated backward.
Kat braced herself and used her legs to propel herself forward. He dared to skate close a few times, teasing her, taunting her with wicked whispers of how much he wanted her on her knees, her lips wrapped around his cock, sucking him off, how he wanted to make her ride him cowgirl style. A thousand things that made her blush and had her body heating with excitement.
After a few close calls where his clothing was just within a few inches of her grasping hands, she realized she needed to outsmart Tristan. When she wobbled and almost face-planted, a brilliant idea struck.
She waited until he swished past her and lunged as if trying to catch him, before letting gravity do what it did best. With a squeak of mock surprise, Kat fell on the ice. Pain aside, it was a genius plan. She didn’t have to fake the agony as she clutched one of her ankles.
“Kat!” Tristan was bearing down on her, sliding into a fancy hockey stop inches from her.
She held her breath, and the second he crouched beside her, she launched herself at him, tackling him onto his back.
“Gotcha!” she panted, laughing at the shocked look on his face.
Blue-green eyes wide, brows arched up, he just blinked at her. “You sneaky little colonist!” He broke into a grin as he gripped her waist, keeping his hold on her body, letting her lie atop him.
“Hmm…Should I dump some tea into your harbor?” She flashed him a coquettish look, batting her lashes and licking her lips.
Tristan burst out laughing. “What does that even mean?”
Heat flooded her cheeks and she ducked her head. “I have no idea. I thought it sounded dirty.”
He cupped her face
and gave her a nipping kiss. “Bloody hell, woman, I adore you.” Tristan chuckled, the words soft, a little rough, as he continued to laugh.
Her heart turned over in her chest, and she couldn’t resist kissing him back.
It was a playful kiss, full of light and heat, like warming one’s hands in front of a fire in winter. She wanted to tell him so much, everything she felt deep inside, but those words would bring tears. She refused to cry tonight.
“Oi! No snogging, you two!” A gruff man in a thick winter coat leaned over the rink railing, frowning.
Kat rolled off Tristan, her face flaming, but she couldn’t keep a smile off her face.
Tristan leaned in close to her when she sat up on the ice. “He’s right. Snogging is much better at home.” He winked. “I’ll want you naked when I obey all your commands.”
“You’re terrible, you know that?” She shoved at his shoulder.
“Terribly charming? Terribly sexy?”
She snorted. “You know exactly what you are.”
“And you like that about me.” He kissed her cheek and helped her to her feet.
As they skated back to the edge of the rink, Kat caught a glimpse of a man with a camera, his lens aimed in their direction.
“Tristan, I think that guy took photos of us.” She pointed, an anxious knot suddenly forming in her stomach.
“Probably followed us from King’s College,” Tristan muttered. “Oh well. What harm could it do? The news is already all over London, and your father knows about us as well.” They stopped at the benches and hastily removed their skates and put their shoes back on before leaving the rink.
Kat hated to think that her relationship with Tristan was so public. She’d never been infamous for anything before, and it made her feel jittery.
Tristan pulled her to a stop on the sidewalk and cupped her cheek.
“Don’t let it bother you. I know that seems impossible, but they’ll lose interest as soon as the next scandal happens.”
The idea of her personal life on display made her stomach turn, but she wasn’t sure it could be prevented. Tristan had to deal with this every day. His playboy past and the attention the press put on him wasn’t something he’d sought out. The paparazzi forced it upon him.