Kiss Me on This Cold December Night

by Charlotte Phillips

  Had there been anyone since Ella, with her drive to have fun and live in the moment, who’d really rocked him? For the first time he wondered if his lack of interest when it came to women could have anything to do with that short encounter with her in the past. She represented perfectly all the things he denied himself – freedom, unpredictability, no ties to hold her back, no guilt. Her life was well and truly her own.

  ‘What happened to you?’ he said suddenly. ‘Why did you just leave without saying goodbye back then?’

  She shrugged.

  ‘I just thought it was fitting. Why prolong it? It was no big deal really, was it? You were off to catch your damn flight out of the country. I had a train to catch.’ She paused. ‘Also, I hate goodbyes.’

  ‘We could have kept in touch.’

  Not that he had intended that at the time. It had only occurred to him afterward, when the decision had been taken out of his hands.

  She laughed.

  ‘And how exactly do you think that would have worked? Where exactly do you think we would have gone from there, Tom? You were off to your huge family in Barbados and then back to Oxford, big career all mapped out. Lifelong family commitments. Just where exactly were you thinking you could slot me into all that? I was going to wait tables over Christmas and borrow a friend’s sofa for a while.’

  He didn’t answer. She had a point.

  Ella cut her eyes away from his and looked down at her cup.

  ‘I didn’t really think I needed to say goodbye,’ she said. ‘We’d be going our separate ways the next morning anyway. I thought you’d be glad I made it so easy, I spared you that awkward who-uses-the-bathroom-first thing. And I look like Shrek first thing in the morning; trust me, I did us both a favour.’

  A surge of surprise coursed through her that he was actually bothered. She hadn’t imagined for a moment he would give her leaving a second’s thought all that time ago, when she’d shrugged her way into her jacket and crept out of the hotel and into the dim light of the early morning, freezing rain stinging her cheeks, mist clinging to the sea. Except possibly to be thankful that she’d made it so easy for him.

  They’d both known what it was. Each knew they didn’t fit the other’s life. She was hardly about to tell him that walking away without saying goodbye had been her safety net. It hadn’t been the sex, unbelievable though it had been, it had been the talking, the way he’d stroked her hair and held her. That night back in 2008, Ella had felt special. She’d felt safe. And weren’t those also the exact reasons she’d backed away, taking control of the situation at the last moment? They were also the reason that her stomach was now fluttering softly and her heart rate was set to speedy.

  Ella watched him closely. He didn’t disagree, he simply took a sip of his cider, and she could tell from his you’ve-got-me expression that she was spot on. His life had been mapped out back then and it was even more so now – he was just a few years further down his plotted path. Just the thought of it made her feel claustrophobic.

  ‘Five years later and we’re still polar opposites,’ she said. ‘Our lives are totally different. I did you a favour by leaving, it would only have turned into some goodbye love-in, and who needs that kind of schmaltz?’

  Not that it had really been the fear of schmaltz that had put her off staying; a chance would have been a fine thing. It was more the thought of him backtracking, trying to undo the night they’d spent. She hadn’t wanted it to end up as that, some inconsequential embarrassed morning after. It would have belittled it. It had been a funny, crazy, happy night and she’d wanted it to stay that way. Perfect in her mind.

  But he had regrets. It was absolutely clear. The twist of excitement that this knowledge caused in her stomach was full of danger and she took a big swig of her mulled cider, hoping its warmth would spread there and take it away. She forced a breezy smile.

  ‘Is that what this is really about?’ she said. ‘Closure? Did I deprive you of that by not staying put to say goodbye? Trust me, Tom, I did us both a big favour. It would have just been awkward. What do you think we would have said to each other before we disappeared back to our own lives? Thanks for a night of great sex?’ She shrugged. ‘I couldn’t see the point.’

  She couldn’t face the rejection, more like. But she wasn’t about to tell him that. Not after the years she spent since her teens, steeling her heart and telling herself there was no room for looking back in her life. She had bigger fish to fry in terms of regret, and not swapping addresses with Tom Henley came way down the list.

  His smile melted away.

  ‘That’s all it was to you?’

  She made herself hold his gaze.

  ‘That’s all it was, period.’

  ****

  Well that put him straight and he really should be pleased. A true one-night stand with no complications was just the way he liked it. And based on what she’d just said a repeat performance right now would have all the same qualities and the same lack of drawbacks. No bombarding with texts when he cut contact, no phone calls, no angst.

  He ignored the twist deep in his stomach that felt a lot like disappointment. He had no room in his life for that. He stood up, held out his hands and when she took them he tugged her to her feet.

  ‘Let’s get something to eat,’ he said.

  The refined Michelin quality dining had, in her company, morphed into chips and hotdogs with a side of curry sauce as they walked between tiny log-cabin stalls selling everything from pretzels and sweets to gifts. He watched as she stopped near a jewellery stall, taking in the display of silver pendants, beads and bangles.

  ‘I’d like to take a stall here,’ she said, excitement lighting her face. ‘I do quite a lot of craft fairs but this is something else. The fairground rides, the market stalls, the ice rinks, imagine the footfall you must get.’

  ‘So are you still drifting up and down the south coast, job to job like you were before?’ he said. I thought after you finished college you might settle down.’

  She watched him suspiciously. Was this some attempt to angle for an address, some way of pinning her down? Good luck with that. She shook her head.

  ‘I do travel quite a lot for craft fairs and markets,’ she said. They began walking again. ‘The odd thing is that I kind of thought I had put down roots. The few years before I met you I was living with my Gran. She had a cottage in Looe, in Cornwall. Tiny little two up two down thing, but it was lovely being there. I was having a nightmare at home with my mum and Gran stepped in and offered me her spare room for a bit.’ A wistful smile rose on her lips. ‘It turned into more than just a bit. I found work at some of the local hotels and restaurants and I started saving up to go to college.’

  The familiar, dull ache when she thought of her grandmother and the cottage on the Cornish coast that had been home for a time, just after her mother finally moved in with one of her squeezes instead of moving on to the next one the way she usually did. A loathsome car salesman called Gordy who had wandering hands and who made Ella’s skin crawl. No way was she living there. If that was what was going to pass for normal family life, she’d much preferred her mother’s unplanned absences, thanks very much. The cottage had been the one place where, for those interim few years, she’d felt grounded and secure.

  She’d felt able to commit to a college course with her Gran behind her and a sense of steadiness at last, a place to stay during the holidays. She’d long loved the sea, right from her sporadic visits as a small child and her love of the coast had never left her. She’d even begun to think she might stay there herself when her course finished, perhaps do some waitressing to support herself while she tried to get her dreamed-of jewellery business off the ground. Her Gran had been full of encouragement.

  He was watching her, sharp interest on his face.

  ‘What about when your course finished? Are you still based there now? How come you aren’t still living with your Gran? I don’t remember you mentioning her last time we met.’

&nbs
p; She shook her head.

  ‘I never mentioned a lot of things last time we met,’ she said. She took a deep breath. ’She died nearly a year before I met you. She’d been ill for a while, it turned into pneumonia and she was just too weak to fight it off.’

  How desperate Ella had been for her to fight. Yet still she’d slipped away. And security and love had slipped away with her. Ella had come to the conclusion that she wasn’t meant to have that kind of life. She could count on herself and that would have to do.

  ‘I’m really sorry,’ he said, and when she glanced at him she could see he meant it. ‘You should have said.’

  She was long-practiced at glossing over the past. It wasn’t even that hard anymore.

  ‘It was a fling, Tom,’ she said. ‘I wasn’t about to give you my life story when I knew we only had one night. We were living in the moment, remember? The whole point of it for me was to have fun, not work through my grief and family issues. Can you imagine if I’d started in on that – you’d have run a mile.’

  ‘You don’t know that,’ he said, his tone indignant enough to make her look up. ‘You make me sound like I was just after sex.’

  She laughed out loud at that.

  ‘Wake up and smell the mulled cider, you idiot,’ she said. ‘Wasn’t that exactly what both of us was after?’

  ****

  A slow walk back to the hotel, the cold really biting in the air now. She could see the moisture in the headlamp beams as they crossed the road and the grit crunched beneath her feet. The what-next hung in the air between them, so strong she could almost feel it. She’d made it crystal clear to him. She had life rules. The steam room encounter had been no more than a slip. And this would be no more than dinner. Yet still she wondered if he would make a move or if this would really be an end. A proper end to them this time.

  He walked with her up the stairs and through the lobby, both of them having collected their key cards at reception on the way past. No going their separate ways in the lobby. Her pulse rate was going crazy as she walked up the curving staircase, the surroundings paling because of her heightened awareness of him next to her.

  Her door came first.

  She stopped outside, key card in her hand, and turned to smile at him, trying to make it an arms-length breezy friendly smile, not a come-in-and-jump-my-bones one.

  ‘Thanks for a fun evening,’ she said. ‘It was good to see you again.’

  ‘You too,’ he said. She looked up at his easy smile, trying to imprint it on her brain so she could replace the previous memory with this older version of Tom. The same molten grey eyes but less of a starting-out-in-life sparkle in them. Instead, this version of Tom was broader, stronger and more serious.

  He was close enough that one small movement would be enough for him to pull her against him or for her to step in and kiss his cheek perhaps. If either were to crack it would be him. She was sure of it. She was the one who’d left that morning by the sea, not him. She had the stronger will. Yet still he made no move. Anticipatory tension hung in the pause between them. It was so strong she could almost feel it crackle. Finally she could stand it no longer and turned to slide the key card into the lock.

  ‘Enjoy the rest of your weekend,’ he said from behind her.

  She gave him a parting smile.

  ‘Safe journey,’ she said. ‘Merry Christmas.’

  The lock clicked and she opened the door. With every slow motion moment that passed she expected him to make his move, reach out, tug her back, and then…who knew how the night would end. And then the door was closed against her back and she was alone in the dark hotel room.

  Alone except for her stupid pride, of course.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Tom stared at the polished wood of the door with its glossy scarlet number plate, and shoved away the hideous plummeting sensation deep in his abdomen. It was that same desperately sinking feeling he remembered from five years ago, but this time it had an added twist of triumph because he hadn’t been the one left behind while she walked away. There had been a moment back there when to kiss her would have been so easy. The decision was within his control, his choice not to go any further. He’d wanted to redress the balance and now he’d done exactly that.

  Dodged a bullet there, he was sure of it.

  He walked down the passage and rejoined the stairs. Up to the top floor and his own suite where a fire had been lit and subtle lighting switched on around the room. The sitting room with its velvet sofas was the epitome of opulent luxury. But it could have been a broom cupboard for the amount he noticed it.

  Triumph was a pretty hollow sensation, it turned out, when you’d won it by playing safe. He’d walked away because she walked away last time. Because his life now didn’t allow for it. Because it could only ever be a couple of days.

  None of those reasons seemed remotely significant now.

  ****

  After the steam room she’d thought it was a forgone conclusion how the night would end, despite the way she’d knocked him back afterwards in the shower. Had he been waiting for her to make a move? Was that what this was about? He’d taken her at her word then, decided to respect her choice not to let this second encounter end up in bed.

  Or after an evening in her company had he now decided she looked a whole lot better looking back? She’d forced him to go out with her instead of eating a civilised meal in the fabulous restaurant. Her plans, apart from waitressing here and there, barely scanned into the following week, while his pretty much took him the full way up to retirement. She still didn’t fit in with his life and it was a hundred times more obvious now than it had been back then. She stared at her face in the bathroom mirror, cheeks pink, teeth gritted, barely able to stand still with unrequited tension. And finally, unsure what the hell she intended to say or do, knowing only that she would drive herself mad within the space of ten minutes if she didn’t at least ask the question and find out what he thought of her, she crossed the room at speed and threw open the door.

  He stood inches away from her, knuckles upraised in a mid-knock of thin air. She caught her breath.

  ‘You see,’ he said, holding her gaze steadily with his own. ‘Fate.’

  He moved at the instant she did, and then his arms were around her, his mouth crushed against hers, and she sank her fingers deliciously into his hair.

  ****

  The kiss was a visceral moment for him, a burning uprising of suppressed desire for her, filled with five years of comparisons, five years of remembering her when the whole point of dating (which he’d done to some excess for a while there) had been to keep things forgettable. He realised now how laughable the idea of leaving her in the past really was. A part of him was still lying in that bed, looking in disbelief at that opposite empty pillow.

  It was her. It always had been her. That maddening feeling of unfinished business when he’d been on the cusp of life.

  He’d forgotten the way she curled her hands around his neck and that she liked to pull her fingers through his hair. His stomach simmered at the feel of it.

  The way her body responded to his touch, his kiss, felt like slaking a thirst that she hadn’t known existed. Yet maybe there was a part of her, deep in her subconscious, that had known all along the inherent danger in this moment. The part of her that had told her not to talk to him in the lobby, not to have coffee with him, not to have dinner, to try and backtrack after the steam room. She hadn’t listened. Resolve was fuelled by self-preservation and it had diminished in strength with every moment she spent with him.

  Too late, she recalled in all its full clarity her state of mind as she headed for the station five years ago. She had known she was walking away from him because she was too afraid to stay and accept the kick-in-the-teeth rejection that would surely come. She couldn’t bear to hear it from him. And so she made the break herself.

  Now it all came back in a flood of memories and delicious sensation.

  Her heart hammered, reminding her how in-dee
p she really had been last time she saw him, and proving that she’d been kidding herself all these years; telling herself it hadn’t been mindblowing, that it was just her memory playing tricks, in the way that in your childhood memories it always seemed to be sunny.

  She’d been caught out by her memory playing tricks once too often. It had been easy to convince herself Tom Henley wasn’t the dream she’d thought he was. She had her stupid ill-judgement of her father right there to prove that point. Memories couldn’t be trusted. And going back was a bad idea.

  Yet here he was, bucking that trend.

  He backed her away from the door at urgent speed and she moved with him blindly, not thinking or caring whether furniture was in the way. His arms slid around her, grinding her against him as if he couldn’t hold her closely enough. One of his hands tangled in her hair, tilting her head back to deepen his kiss and she could taste the faint twist of spiced apple on his tongue. She could feel the press of his erection against her, rock hard, and she ground her hips against him, secretly thrilled that she invoked that acute arousal in him.

  Carefully laid safety nets pinged away in her mind. Guards slipped. She could think of nothing except that she was back in his arms.

  Her fingers found the buttons of his shirt, the urge to feel his skin against hers so strong that nothing else mattered. She tugged them free, slid impatient hands up the taut warm skin of his chest. Her mind vaguely registered differences, similarities. The faint scent of his aftershave, still the same brand, something fresh that reminded her of the sea. A scent she associated with the salt air of the coast and a time when she’d felt truly happy. He felt broader now, his pecs rock hard, his arms roped thickly with muscle. He must work out.

  His hands caught up a twist of her sloppy joe sweater and tugged it over her head. The instant it was gone his mouth groped for hers again, his hands moving to her jeans with unstinting urgency. She found his buttons, pulling at his clothes with an urgent kind of madness, and then the back of her knees hit the edge of the nearest twin bed and she was falling back. The soft velvet of the counterpane against her bare back, his bare skin against her own.