The Yuletide Child

to; it would have brightened the whole weekend.
Sighing, she got out of bed and began the usual dull routine of showering, dressing in jeans and a shirt, tidying the bedroom, collecting the clothes she and Ross had worn yesterday, taking them downstairs to go into the washing machine. Within half an hour she had eaten breakfast and finished tidying the already tidy house, so she went out into the garden to deal with the ravages of the night.
The wind had wreaked havoc—torn flowers off stalks, flung twigs and leaves all over the lawns, ruined young lettuce, broken the stems of sweet peas and runner beans. The garden was a sad sight. She spent part of the morning working out there, staking and pruning and raking up leaves and wrecked plants to put on the compost heap.
When she had finished she went back indoors to wash, flushed, with aching muscles. That was the hardest physical work she had done since she’d left the ballet company and she’d enjoyed it. As always, it had changed her mood; she felt more positive, less weepy. Amazing the chemical changes in you brought about by working your body!
Just as she was going upstairs to shower and change she heard the sound of a car engine slowing, stopping, right outside the garden gate. A door slammed, the gate creaked, there were footsteps on the path. Dylan’s heart leapt—it must be Ross, home earlier than he had feared!
She jumped back down the stairs, ran to open the door, ready to fling her arms round him, but it was not Ross standing there. Her entire body jerked in shock, as if she had touched a live wire.

CHAPTER THREE
‘MICHAEL!’ She was so overjoyed to see him that she flung her arms round him impulsively. People in their world were casually affectionate, although she and Michael had never been very demonstrative. He wasn’t that sort of man. There was a deep well of reserve inside him; he guarded his mind and heart from casual eyes and even Dylan had never been entirely sure what he was hiding, only that Michael kept his secrets, even from her.
As their bodies met in close, warm contact she abruptly became aware that this was a man she was holding, not some sexless body she had known most of her adult life.
Shock jabbed into her. She hurriedly began pulling away, but Michael caught her face, framing it between his hands, palms against her flushed cheeks pressing in on the high bones, the smooth, silky skin.
Shaken to her roots, she stared up into his hard grey eyes.
‘Missing us already, you are? What did I tell you?’ His voice was deep with anger, satisfaction, triumph, or perhaps all three. ‘I knew you’d be lost away from us. You made a stupid mistake when you married this guy. You don’t belong with someone like him.’ He stared deep into her eyes and she helplessly leaned on him, like someone paralysed.
In a wail she protested, ‘I love him, Michael!’
‘You mean you wanted to go to bed with him! Wasthat worth ruining your life for? Why didn’t you just spend a couple of weeks having sex with him all day until you were bored with it?’
Was that really how he saw love? Did it mean nothing to him but a drive to sate a passing lust? The idea horrified her. Ross was so much more than just a body she desired; he was the only man she had ever met who really meant anything to her.
‘Love isn’t just sex, Michael!’ she protested. ‘That may be all you think about, all you need—but for a woman love means a whole lot more than that. I want to share his life, have his children, be with him all the time.’
His blond head lifted: he flicked a glance past her into the house, raising his brows. ‘Oh? So where is he now?’
‘At work,’ she reluctantly admitted.
‘On a Saturday?’ Michael’s tone was sardonic, his face full of mockery, and her flush deepened.
‘There were storms last night; some trees came down—he has to clear a blocked road. He’s responsible for a wide area of the forest here; he deals with every aspect of it, from planting to fighting fires. He doesn’t do a nine to five office job, you know. His work is far more important than that.’
Michael studied her serious face, his own ironic. ‘And how long will Mr Wonderful be working today?’
‘How can he tell? It all depends how long it takes to clear the road,’ she said absently. She had started to think now that her original shock had died away. ‘Michael, what are you doing here? Why didn’t you let me know you were coming?’
‘I brought your car up here for you.’
‘What?’ She looked past him in surprise. She hadn’t noticed the car until now, although how on earth shecould have managed to miss it she had no idea! It was parked right outside, the big, multi-coloured tropical flowers glowing as if they were real in the fitful sunlight! You wouldn’t think she could fail to see them, now would you?
‘My flower wagon! Oh, thank you, Michael!’ She ran down the path and walked round the little car, stroking the bonnet, delighted to have it back again. ‘It will make life a lot easier,’ she told Michael, who had joined her. ‘It’s quite a walk to the village, and I can’t go further afield unless Ross drives me. The buses take for ever and there’s only one a day to Carlisle. So I’d be lost without a car.’
Michael’s mouth twisted wryly as he stared at the landscape: the green forest stretching on and on, the road, the grey/blue sky. No houses, no break in the endless trees.
‘How are you going to stand it here? It would drive me out of my mind in twenty-four hours. Give me city life any time. You’re a city girl, Dylan—what on earth are you going to do with yourself up here? Especially if