Chapter 14

14

I’m sure the city sparkles even more brightly outside by the time hunger drives us out of bed. The only bright light I’m interested in is the one inside the fridge where I rummage for some supper. Ordinarily, doing that in only my underwear and a crumpled sweatshirt could be chilly. I don’t get a chance to shiver with my Trelawney-shaped radiator behind me.

Reece’s bare chest kicks out heat I’d snuggle into if his stomach didn’t rumble loud enough for me to hear. He also reaches past me for ingredients that we put together in a kitchen that is trademark Heligan chaotic. We sit down to eat from plates that don’t match, and fuck knows where Rex hid the bread knife, but this cheese sandwich laced with some of the chutney Gran gifted to Rex for his birthday?

It’s epic.

So is Reece’s bedhead, but being neat and tidy is overrated compared to sharing a table with someone who reminds me of the man I’ll meet tomorrow. Arthur can look similarly wild when he’s been on battlement duty, keeping watch over the same rocks Reece will guard this weekend after his family celebration.

We’re so in tune, he mentions the same person. “Arthur’s train get in from Penzance early tomorrow?”

“He’s not coming from Penzance. He’s been catching up with friends. His train won’t get in until eleven.”

He nods, that bedhead catching the light and gleaming so gold I don’t have a single urge to find my comb or hair gel. He’s perfect exactly as he is. Precious, even with his mouth full. His stuffed cheeks are a housemate reminder. I reach for my phone to snap a shot of that similarity, and Reece notices me looking for it. He swallows before asking, “Missing something?”

“My phone. Must have left it upstairs.”

“Me too.”

Neither of us wear clothes with pockets, which is just as well. Adding a post-sex selfie to my housemate group chat would only prompt a bullet-fast response.

I can already predict what Sebastian would type.

omfg r u happy

I am.

I also prickle with something less so.

Patrick’s blackboard isn’t in this kitchen. I still picture this affirmation.

I choose my own direction.

That would be easier to believe if the chutney jar on the table between Reece and I didn’t have a love heart drawn on the label like I once drew on a Post-it in an unconscious mirroring of who taught me how to show care. “I need to talk to Gran.”

Reece nods, not probing or pushing for more info. I bet that’s why this pours out. “I haven’t helped her, have I?”

He’s sympathetic. “Who could fault you for being her shield?” This tells me how hard he’s listened. “Her cloak when she needed shelter.” There’s a table between us. His feet find mine underneath it. “Kids show me over and over that the only real way out of grief is through it, Jack. Feeling all the feelings. Opening that closed drawer or locked window.” Reece pushes away from the table to stand. “I’ve got some support links on my phone you could share with her if you want. Hang on.”

His steps creak overhead up the stairs. So does my heart when he comes down that staircase so much faster than he climbed it.

He doesn’t only hold his phone. Reece holds his bag and is fully dressed, or he would be if I wasn’t wearing his sweatshirt. He’s even more rumpled than usual. So is his face, which creases. “I missed a ton of messages from Rex.” He shows me.

“He’s two volunteers down?”

“Yes, and the radar is popping off and a storm is coming. If I leave now, I can get there before it does.”

He’s leaving sooner than I expected. Or that I’m ready to deal with.

I still have so much to tell him.

He speaks first, outside where his voice is starker than usual. “The water’s so cold, kids won’t…”

He doesn’t need to finish. I nod, unable to speak as he crouches to dig in his bag for something. I accept what he offers, too gripped by what he tells me to pay attention to this soft handful. “For your gran, yeah? And for you. Might help get your conversation started.”

He backs away, bag and car keys already in hand.

I’ve never wanted to roar more loudly. Instead, I squeak, “Let me know you’re okay?”

He comes back, which he doesn’t have time for. He still cups my face with a warm hand, and so what if anyone sees me standing in the street in my socks and a borrowed sweatshirt to watch him drive away a minute later.

They didn’t hear his answer.

“Not even a storm could stop me.”

The first rule in the PA handbook is on my mind the next morning.

Don’t lose track of your boss.

That’s why I pace the concourse at Paddington Station long before the train arrives with a duke aboard it. Arthur isn’t my employer, but by the time he steps off, I’ve got a whole plan of action to keep that first rule long term.

With Reece.

That means I’m in a hurry.

“Well, hello to you too, Jack,” Arthur grumbles as I chivvy him along the platform. At least he makes ploughing through these crowds of new arrivals easy. The man is a broad-shouldered force of nature. No one gets in his way, which is handy. It means we get to a second platform before another train can leave without us.

Unfortunately, that’s where he chooses to dig his heels in.

“Wait,” he booms, and at any other time, so many strangers stopping dead would be funny, but I don’t have time to laugh or to follow orders.

I’ve never needed to lead more than now, and it must show—Arthur has good hands, strong and steady, regardless of his age. They’re warm too, cupping my face in a familiar way that makes my heart ache. “What exactly is the big rush?” He glances at the train. “We aren’t getting the Tube into town to go shopping?”

We aren’t. This train will head in the entirely wrong direction for central London. All I can do is ask, “Help me?”

He nods right away, but that’s Heligans for you. When they aren’t being stubborn, they go all in for their people with no question. To be honest, he doesn’t get a chance to ask me any— the moment we settle into seats with a table between us, I spill my guts. Or perhaps it’s my heart and soul that gush out as Arthur listens.

I share with him about Rex setting me up for a working week I first dreaded. Now I only dread not getting to repeat it. I mention our fundraising template, and how Smallbone being a slippery knob was the start of a snowball rolling. “He’s so bloody desperate for an invite to the island.”

“To Kara-Enys? Over my dead body.”

Arthur is less grumpy when I mention who filled a toy library for the foundation’s children.

“American tourists? Jolly generous of them.”

He’s generous too by listening to the rest without interrupting, so I tell him how we could have sold tickets to fill ten more toy libraries in return for a single dinner with him. Then I backtrack, and he smiles during my story of glitter spilling in a community centre and mistletoe painted onto cardboard. His smile softens when I mention starry courtyards and red carpets. I skip the part where I did more with my Prince Charming than with any of those frogs I threw back, but I do mention Gran, and how what started as a distraction for her has somehow escalated. “She lost what used to light her up. I think I’ve made that worse, not better.”

He’s gruff about my motivation. “I imagine seeing where she was happy through your eyes brought her a great deal of comfort in some dark days.”

I hope so, but I also have to admit what Reece oh-so gently suggested. “Now it feels more like a holding pattern. For us both.”

He nods, nodding again next at what a fierce librarian pointed out after taking one look at my lock screen, and what must have been obvious to everyone else but me. Arthur takes one look at the same image of Reece and me with a cupid in the background, and he doesn’t say omfg why r u so slow . He just straightens in his seat and summarises.

“You were going to leave us.”

I nod.

“Because you care a great deal for someone who used to take a great deal of care of you.”

“Gran?” I nod.

“ And you were going to leave us because you couldn’t see how to work under someone you wanted to be involved with?”

My throat has never been hotter.

Arthur won’t drop our eye contact. His sea-glass stare is so kind; I have no idea why people find him scary.

Perhaps I should have held that thought for a moment longer—Arthur won’t let me avoid this. “I’m not convinced any of this is about Reece or your grandmother.”

The train lurches. So do I when he adds, “Do you remember the first Christmas we met? You took me to see an archive of old Horse Guards photos. Then I took you to visit the Household Cavalry Museum. But do you know what I saw when those guards rode past in their winter cloaks and red plumes?” He goes ahead and tells me. “I saw a desperately sad boy who lost the person who guarded him his whole life. And do you know what I’ve watched you do ever since?” He leans closer and almost whispers, “You stepped straight into his shoes.”

He finishes me off with two statements and one order.

“Your grandfather would be so proud of the care you’ve taken. I know I am. Let me take care of you now, for him.”

I’m pretty sure we’ve left London far behind us.

Countryside must be outside this window.

It blurs, and I let it. I’m so done with fighting feelings that flood in like the light Reece promised.

It’s so much.

I’m still red-eyed when we reach our destination. Still a bit shaky as well, right up until Gran opens her front door to me.

“Jack!” She’s delighted. Then she’s concerned. Finally, she’s bewildered, and thank fuck for Heligan genetics. Arthur throws himself on his sword just like Rex would.

He takes the blame for a change in heart that has to shock her. “I’m terribly sorry, but I have to insist on keeping your grandson. He’s entirely too valuable to let go.”

That has to be a nasty surprise. It must be. I don’t know why she hugs me and won’t let go for what feels like forever, or why she hugs Arthur just as tightly, but she shares that I haven’t been the only one having NYC doubts. Gran does that over tea we drink at a table where silver candlesticks gleam like her damp eyes. “It’s so far away. I didn’t think about that until I started researching.”

“Researching?” Arthur asks, which leads to her sharing way more than lists of the movies Gramps used to call mushy but would always watch with her, hand-in-hand. Now we both get to see that she’s checked out flight times, as if I already scored a job I have zero intention of interviewing for now, let alone accepting. I wouldn’t take it, or transfer to be a PA for another London partner, which I tell her.

“I don’t want to change jobs. I mean, I want to keep working with the same people.” Here’s my entire truth. “I want to see more of Reece, not less.”

“Reece? From the foundation?”

“Yes.” I get out my phone to show her. “He took all these photos.”

There I am beside London landmarks, over and over. All of me, not slivers. I’m a whole person in each shot because of him, so I don’t stop until I reach a photo of me smiling under angels.

“Regent Street,” she sighs.

I keep scrolling, and she names places she first visited with someone we both miss. I stop when I reach a black-and-white timbered storefront. “Liberty’s.” She touches the phone screen as I dig in my pocket for what I now realise made Reece late for his library visit.

He went back first to buy this.

I spread out a remnant of fabric. It’s an off-cut, not something of great value, but this silk is also printed with locations I know are priceless to her. It’s woven with reminders of a person special to us both, so I choke this out. “Reece said this was for you. And for me.” I swallow, not sure how to explain until light glints again from candlesticks she once taught me how to polish. She also taught me how to sew on buttons, which I mention. “Remember when you cut down one of Gramps’ old cloaks to fit me, and I helped you?”

Her smile is watery. “You were so happy.”

“I am now. Happy, I mean.”

I don’t know how things will work out, but I do want every single happy ending in my future to feature Reece Trelawney.

This is tougher to get out. “But I need to know that you are too. Happy, I mean.” I point out landmarks on that fabric. “Because I’ve taken photos of these all on my own each Christmas since I came to London. It’s so much better doing that with two people.” I reach for her hand and take it. “So how about we figure out a way to see the same sights together?”

“You and me, in London?”

I nod. “You and me, by next Christmas.”

Arthur harrumphs. “And I visit the city each December. It would be my pleasure to escort both of you.”

Good grief, I could kiss him. I settle for saying, “We could make a plan, like you used to for formal parties. If we worked on a template, we could take it one step at a time together?”

My phone pings.

Reece.

I lurch like I did on the train, getting up in such a hurry the candlesticks wobble. Arthur catches them before they can fall. On my way out, I hear him ask, “Of course, you must have planned plenty of parties as a housekeeper. Maybe you could help me?”

I close the hallway door and my heart lurches again at a message going against all of our old text-based rules. Reece breaks them for me.

Reece: Been thinking about you.

Reece: Can’t stop, to be honest xxx

I haven’t stopped thinking about him either. He types another message before I can tell him.

Reece: Hope you aren’t worrying about choosing your own direction.

I’m not worried. I’ve already chosen. It’s towards him.

Reece: Got to head out again now. Then I’ll go see Mum. Call you after?

I nod as if he can see me, then I type quickly.

Jack: Yes.

I follow up with three little words that feel vital.

Jack : Please don’t capsize.

A few extra letters feel true as soon as I type them.

Jack : ily

Arthur is still talking when I rejoin them. I’m grateful he’s kept Gran too busy to worry about my London suggestion. She’s focussed on him, and for a usually gruff man, his questions are gentle. “If you were organising a dinner with a duke at short notice, how would you make the evening special?”

“A dinner with a duke?”

“Yes. For some new American friends of the foundation.” He eyes me, sea-glass stare a touch sharper, which is his version of issuing a challenge. I know, because Rex did the same when he raised a glass at Penny’s restaurant and told me I was all Reece’s. He wasn’t wrong about that. Now Arthur is just as accurate in stating, “Because there’s a very strong chance we could raise some extra money for little ones who don’t have much if we can set up something quickly. Maybe between now and the new year?”

I nod, already fishing out my phone, where contact details wait for thank-you letters, and Arthur admits, “It’s been years since Kara-Enys saw anything more than a small family celebration. My dear wife dealt with anything fancy, God rest her. I wouldn’t have the first idea where to get started.”

Gran repeats what I told Reece at the start of our one week together. She counts off priorities on her fingers. “I’d start with the four pillars of entertaining: location, guest list, menu, and decorations.”

Arthur harrumphs again. “I’ve got the location, and Jack has a guest list.”

“I could help you with menu planning,” Gran offers. “That only leaves decoration.” She grabs her handbag to gather everything that used to spell Christmas could get started, her eyes shining and not for any old, sad reasons. Out comes her pencil case and a planning notepad. She opens it to a clean page, smoothing the paper before lining up pens and pencils in length and colour order. Very satisfying.

For a brief, heart-clenching moment, Gran looks so like her old self that I have to blink away a sudden sting at her getting busy. For us. “Talk me through what you have already, decoration-wise.” She gestures at the tree in the corner of the room, each bough sparkling. “Is there enough to make your castle festive?”

Arthur shakes his head. “No, I can’t say there is. I’m particularly low on lights and tinsel.”

That’s okay.

I know someone who has plenty.

One train later, I’m in Cornwall.

I only wish it was faster instead of stopping at every station. At least these extra hours give me time to plan how to thank Arthur for staying with Gran. All I hear is the happy scratch of her pencil as a train carries me even further from London. That happy scratching and Arthur’s gruff, “Hurry home,” are sung by train wheels along tracks heading southwest instead of southeast, and I am hurrying home, only not to mine.

It still takes forever, but I’m on a trajectory that started seven days ago with Rex refusing to accept my notice.

How the hell did I ever think escaping to a bigger and brighter city was an option?

Now a taxi drives me steeply downhill, into a little village that sparkles in a new way to me. Porthperrin is a pretty setting to see stars twinkle, if faintly, over the sea. I bet there will be more once the sky fully darkens. For now, it’s laced with dusky pink and purple, and with what I’m always going to think of as Trelawney golden. That’s what catches my eye when the front door is opened at my destination.

Reece’s mother is as fair-haired as him. “Jack! Does Reece know you’re coming?” I’m not sure whether to answer as a PA or a boyfriend. Lynne makes it clear she knows the difference. “Now he won’t have any excuse not to stay for dinner.”

“He wasn’t going to stay?”

“No. He told me he’d pop in for a chat, but he’d arranged cover at the island to get straight back to London. To you. ” Her hug could give Gran’s a run for tightness. I’m almost strangled, but that’s okay. It stops me from mentioning what is stacked behind her.

Tote after tote fill the hallway, all labelled Reece’s Room , and I bet I know what they hold.

I also know he wants to have a conversation about their contents himself, and a good PA always keeps their employer’s counsel. That rule comes directly after the never lose track of your boss instruction, so I zip my lips and wait for her to grab her coat to show me to the pub where he’s meant to meet her.

“We were all going to eat there until he said he couldn’t wait to see you. Now he can stay, we’ll just fit an extra chair for you next to his. You’ll enjoy it,” she promises. “Friday nights are always fun at the Anchor. There’s a live band and dancing.”

We head downhill together, to where another flash of gold signals that I’ve found the only man I want to dance with in London or Cornwall.

Reece.

I’d know those wide shoulders anywhere, even if a harbour light didn’t make trademark Trelawney hair glint this brightly. I spy it gleaming at the end of a narrow alley, and I can’t help hurrying ahead, splashing through puddles left by last night’s storm, where I almost lose my footing.

I yelp, and Reece turns, only he isn’t alone—his coat is open, someone snug against him and sheltered, and I grind to a complete halt.

Tell that to my body.

Forward momentum keeps me sliding, and for one long and sickening moment, I spin on slippery cobbles. Maybe that’s for the best—by the time I face forward again, still flailing for balance, I’m close enough to see it isn’t Reece at all.

Another brother runs to catch me.

Patrick.

He needn’t have bothered—Sebastian launches like a rocket, and we all topple into another puddle, but I’ll take getting a cold and soggy bottom for this kind of welcome.

They get me back onto my feet and steer me safely, like they’ve done for the last three years in London, only now they bring me safe and sound, if damp, to a harbour where music drifts from a nearby pub. Lynne heads off to organise an extra chair and two more dinners as Patrick tells me, “We were waiting for Reece. He’s on his way now.”

“There.” Sebastian points, and it takes a moment, but each one of those faint stars in the sky seems to brighten the second I spot a boat approaching.

Sebastian has questions. “So, are you gonna stay or go to?—”

“Later, babe.” Patrick adds what he might as well have chalked onto my heart as well as onto the blackboard in our kitchen. “Jack will choose for himself when he’s ready.”

That’s what I do as soon as Reece motors through waves into the harbour, although I don’t run to meet him. I don’t slip or slide, either, or end up in another puddle. I march, as determined as any soldier, until he reaches the top of granite steps and sees me.

Forget anything I ever wished or hoped or dreamed for. Him running to meet me is everything I want this Christmas.

I’m in his arms, being kissed like he hasn’t seen me in forever, and everything comes right.

It’s that easy.

Boss or not, he’s the right man for me.

He murmurs a single word that says so much about our future. “Same.” His breath across my ear doesn’t only light nerve endings. I’m warmed to the core by him adding, “Wherever, Jack. However.” His kiss is salty. Sweet. Perfectly Reece, like his next promise. “I love you, so we’ll figure it out together.”

We kiss again, and part of me remembers Gramps calling romance mushy. I can’t help swooning like Gran pretended to do for rom-com heroes. My real-life version breaks off to inhale all the way down to his ankles, harbour lights illuminating tiredness. And care. “You okay?”

I am. Or I will be. I walk with him and channel one of my housemates—I can’t stop talking, telling Reece about so much more than Arthur’s last-minute need for tinsel. I also share about Gran, and how things have to be different, going forward. “For both of us.”

He nods, his arm heavy around me as we head towards pub windows that speckle cobbles with red, gold, and green light. That arm across my shoulders feels like shelter. I want to be the same for him, so I stop him before we reach the door and echo what he once offered in a starry courtyard. “Want to lead?”

I mean lead in a conversation that has been a long time coming, and that I’m pretty sure any mother who raised sons with huge hearts will be open to hearing. I’m also pretty sure the next time Reece gets into a boat, it will be with totes full of tinsel, but music starts, and Reece takes me up on my offer.

He opens his arms for me, and I’m turned in circles under stars that glitter seven days after I typed life to him, so I guess Gran was right. It can only take a week for wishes to come true for some lucky people.

Talking can wait.

So can tinsel and party planning.

Right now, we’re busy getting all of our Christmas wishes.