Page 29 of All I Want for Christmas

She heard the front door click open and whirled round with a smile. ‘Hi—’

The word died on her lips as Max Lorensen looked back at her. For a moment, he looked as surprised as she was – but only for a moment. ‘Darcy...I didn’t expect you so soon.’ He stepped back to allow her in.

Darcy blinked, utterly stunned. Viggo hadn’t mentioned Max would be here. Could he not have given her a heads up? Andwhywas he here anyway? On a Saturday? Were they having a meeting?

‘...Thanks.’ She stepped in, now bitterly regretting her decision not to go home, shower and change before coming here. Her sartorial decline from their first meeting had beenbrutal: from dazzling black tie the first night to work-sensible, slouchy jeans, and now sweaty running kit.

He was wearing jeans and a grey sweatshirt. No shoes. No socks.

Nosocks?

He shut the door and openly looked her over with scepticism. ‘Running again, I see. You must be keen.’

‘Not in the least. My flatmate bullies me. She does triathlons.’

‘She sounds impressive.’

‘Oh, she is. She’s a microbiologist. Decodes the origins of human life.’

‘Whereas you discover the identities of long-dead women.’ His gaze was so steady, always so steady upon her.

‘Yeah. It’s not exactly the same, is it?’

He blinked. ‘Both are valid.’

A silence descended as they stood there for a moment; Darcy remembered the crushing disappointment of their last meeting, his casual dismissal of her, and she wondered: if Erik hadn’t been standing at the bottom of those steps that night – if she had gone back to Max’s for a nightcap instead – how different would things be between them now? Would it be better or worse than this strained, enforced professionalism?

She looked away, noticing for the first time the beautiful hallway. It had antique timbered floors, matt black panelled walls and a verdure tapestry hanging down behind a beautiful round walnut table. On top, a huge pale clay pot had been planted with an extravagant abundance of sprigs of yellow forsythia.

‘Follow me. They’re up here,’ he said, leading her towards the staircase and up to the next level.

Darcy trailed behind him, her eye falling to the few butspecialobjetsdotted around the place: the Picasso sketch between two doorframes, a small Diego Giacometti bronze of a bird, a worn and faded Heriz carpet that seemed as old as the building. Was Viggo a collector? He had mentioned in passing that he had lived alone since his wife had died and connoisseurship often could fill a void, she knew that. It was her opinion that most collectors had unhappy love lives. The obsession had to go somewhere.

She followed Max into a room on the first floor. It was vast, spanning the entire back of the house, with a run of huge windows looking out over a mature garden. In contrast to the moodiness of the hall, it was painted a thick ivory with a black open-plan kitchen in the middle of the space and a huge dining table, seating fourteen, set beyond by the windows. Where she stood, in the foreground to all that, a soft seating area had been arranged with dark green velvet sofas arranged in a U. On a low table in the middle sat two marbled burgundy boxes she recognized very well...Only two?

She looked around the space again, recognizing a Maria Slavona on one wall, a Max Liebermann on the other.

‘Viggo lives here?’ she asked in disbelief.

‘Viggo?’ He gave a small laugh as he crossed the room and headed for the kitchen. ‘What on earth makes you think that?’

‘I...He said he’d managed to arrange for some of the boxes to be released and that I could collect them from this address.’ She glanced again at his bare feet with a sinking feeling.

‘Collect?’ Max glanced over at her as he reached for a bag of coffee beans and tipped them into a grinder. ‘Iarranged the release for you – and I was only able to do it because I gave the insurers my assurance, as a trustee, that the material would be safe inmyhome, undermysupervision. The fact that I live up the street from the gallery reassured them, but you won’tbe able to take anything away from here. Their conditions were strict.’

This was his house? ‘You mean I’ll have to work here?’

He arched an eyebrow. ‘Is that a problem?’

‘But this is your home.’

‘Yes.’

‘And it’s the weekend.’

‘Yes.’

She gave an astonished laugh. ‘You don’t wantmeworking here, getting in your way.’

---