Page 89 of A Winter Kiss on Rochester Mews
‘Goodness me! I kissed you back! With bells on! For someone who has a PhD in romantic fiction, you really are clueless when it comes to picking up signals,’ Mattie said, gently tugging on Tom’s hair so he had to raise his head and see the tenderness that had softened her features. ‘I don’t hateallmen but I don’t want to see other men when the only man I want to see is you.’
There was a moment’s silence and Mattie couldn’t look at Tom any more so she stared down at the floor, at his feet in his old-fashioned brown lace-ups, until he cleared his throat. ‘Oh, I see. Well, that rather changes things, doesn’t it?’
Mattie’s heart was beating just as fast as Tom’s, even as it unfurled like a flower, when before it had been tucked away out of harm’s reach. ‘I hope it does.’
‘I do know that I’m punching above my weight with you and that if you did decide to see other men, then there’s no way I can compare, with my cardigans and my dull academic books,’ Tom said and Mattie put a finger to his lips so he couldn’t say any more because he was talking utter rubbish.
‘Underneath the cardigans is some pretty fine musculature,’ she said. ‘The way you leapt over the gate when we were trying to free Strumpet … I hardly even noticed the hunky firemen after that display of impressive upper-body strength.’
Tom met her eyes. ‘You’ve been perving on meallthis time?’ he asked. ‘While I was compartmentalising. Separating work from life, business from pleasure.’ He all but purred the last word and his eyes were fixed on Mattie, darkening when she nervously licked her lips.
‘Notallthe time. There’s also quite a lot of time that I’m genuinely cross with you.’ Mattie put her arms around Tom’s neck, so they were nose to nose again. ‘You’re not punching above your weight with me. Not at all. Apart from my certificate in – what did you call it? –cupcakery, I left school with two GCSEs and the only books I read are cookbooks.’
‘Well, nobody’s perfect,’ Tom said. ‘But perfection is kind of boring.’
‘So boring,’ Mattie agreed and like the one angry kiss that they’d shared weeks before, she couldn’t say who kissed who first, only that they were kissing.
Four years ago, she’d run away to Paris. Two years ago, she’d run away from Paris. And over the last two years, even as she carved out a life for herself in London, striving for and achieving her dreams, it had still always felt as if something was missing.
Now, as she sat in a glorified photo booth in the arms of a man who was a leading expert on romantic fiction, his mouth on hers, his thumb doing something quite delicious to the pulse point behind her left ear, Mattie was no longer running. There was no longer something missing. She was where she wanted to be with someone that she wanted to be with.
‘So much nicer kissing each other when we’re not in the middle of a fight,’ she murmured when they came up for air.
‘I think we can do much better than nice,’ Tom declared, taking her mouth again. Mattie didn’t know how long they kissed under the solitary sprig of quite bedraggled mistletoe, but suddenly the curtain was pulled back by Sophie, who was clutching something in her hand. Something that looked a lot like a webcam, while in her other hand, she had a mobile phone on speaker so they could hear Posy squawking, ‘Can you two do thatafterwe shut up shop? There’s still two hours left of shopping time.’
‘Yeah, get a room,’ Nina called out from the sofa where her neck was craned so she didn’t miss out on any of the action.
‘And to think that you tell me and Sophie off when we’re kissing,’ Sam piped up, then turned pillar-box red as Nina and Verity looked at him with great interest. ‘Not that we were actually kissing and anyway, this is about Tom and Mattie. Who were definitely kissing. Look at them!’
Both blushing furiously, Tom and Mattie peered out at the shop floor and the people peering in at them. Mostly customers, most of them smiling indulgently, who broke out into a round of spontaneous applause.
‘We don’t need an audience, thank you very much,’ Mattie said, pulling the curtain shut again.
‘Couldn’t agree more,’ Tom said. ‘Though I have to say, maybe Christmas isn’t so bad after all.’
‘Christmas has been severely underrated,’ Mattie said, pulling his head down so their lips were on a level. ‘Now why aren’t you kissing me?’
‘Merry Christmas, Tom,’ Mattie said, nudging him with her elbow so he’d wake.
They’d spent all night on the sofa, dozing in between the snuggling, stroking and so much kissing that Mattie thought that her lips might be about to go on strike.
Tom struggled to alertness, his hair rumpled in fifty directions, his eyes bleary but focused. He’d sworn last night that he absolutely needed his glasses but when Mattie tried to take them off so she could try them on, he’d batted her hands away, which had just led to more kissing. A lot more kissing.
‘Did you just wish me Merry Christmas?’ he mumbled. ‘You know I don’t do Christmas.’
‘You’re going to have to do Christmas this year,’ Mattie said, settling back in his arms, which Tom obligingly wrapped round her. ‘Ian’s coming round to pick us up in an hour. My mother’s told him not to come back empty-handed. Unless …’ A thought occurred, which made her frown, which made Tom instantly kiss her furrowed brow.
‘Unless …?’ he prompted.
‘Unless, you think it’s far, far too soon to meet my family,’ Mattie blurted out.
‘Technically I have already met your family,’ Tom pointed out. ‘And I would say you could come to mine for Christmas but I was meant to be on the six o’clock train out of Euston bound for Wolverhampton last night, and I’m pretty sure that my failure to catch said train has led to me being excommunicated.’
Another piece of the puzzle slotted into place. ‘You’re from Wolverhampton?’
Tom smiled and tugged at a lock of Mattie’s hair. ‘That’s not really important right now. What’s important is that all we have foodwise is several pig-in-blanket rolls and a few cupcakes left over from yesterday, so I’m more than happy to spend the twenty-fifth of December with you …’
‘Christmas Day! Just say it, Tom,’ Mattie said, rolling her eyes.
