The Christmas Sisters: The Sunday Times top ten feel-good and romantic bestseller!

There was still a chance she might not be pregnant. True, she was five days late, but there were other things that could cause that. Stress, for example. She was definitely stressed.

She dropped her phone back into her bag, feeling guilty about Beth.

She hadn’t forgotten dinner. She’d canceled because she knew she couldn’t handle an evening in the child-centered chaos of her sister’s apartment.

Was she crazy going home for Christmas this year? Last year she’d lost her nerve at the last minute and pretended she was working. She’d switched off her phone and spent the time in her apartment numbing her feelings with several bottles of good wine and a reading marathon. By the time she’d closed the final book, the festive season had been over.

This year that wasn’t an option.

She dreaded the forced togetherness of Christmas and the pressure that came with it.

Her family thought she was a career woman, with no time for relationships.

That was going to make for an interesting conversation if she was pregnant.

She should do a test. Find out one way or another. But then she’d know, and right now she’d rather cling to the vague hope that her perfectly organized life wasn’t about to become complicated.

“Everything all right, Hannah?”

Hannah opened her eyes. Adam was standing in the aisle of the first-class cabin, stowing his overnight bag.

“Everything is fine.” Hannah already had her bag safely tucked away and her laptop by her seat. She lived with a sense that things were about to go horribly wrong, and did what she could to prevent it by planning and controlling every last detail of her life.

“Are you sure? That conversation sounded tense.” He sat down next to her. He was tall and rangy, his long legs filling the abundant space in front of his seat. “Problems?”

Normally when she was traveling, Hannah preferred to keep herself to herself. If such a thing as a Do Not Disturb sign existed for passengers, she would have been wearing it.

Today, however, she was traveling with Adam. Adam was her colleague and, for the past few months, her lover.

Turned out he might also be the father of her child, which she knew would be as much of a shock to him as to her.

“I was talking to Beth.”

Guilt pricked like holly. Beth was right that she hadn’t seen her nieces for a while. The girls were adorable, but being with them made Hannah feel inept and inadequate. She found it impossible to read fairy stories where everyone lived happily ever after. She couldn’t bring herself to perpetrate that lie. There was no Santa. There was no tooth fairy. Love couldn’t be guaranteed.

She’d tried explaining that to Beth once, but her sister had thought she was being ridiculous.

Maybe life doesn’t always end happily, Hannah, but I’d rather protect my kids from that reality when they’re young if that’s all right with you!

Hannah thought it was healthier if one’s expectations of life were grounded in reality. If you didn’t expect much, you didn’t have as far to fall when you finally realized that no amount of planning could stop bad things happening.

A few years before, after an unexpected snowstorm, Hannah had been forced to stay the night at Beth’s apartment. In the middle of the night, Ruby had crawled into her bed. Hannah had felt the tickle of soft curls against her skin and the solid warmth of the child through the brushed cotton of her pajamas as she’d snuggled close for reassurance. It had reminded her so much of that one terrible night when Posy had climbed into her bed that the memories had almost suffocated her.

The fact that her sister didn’t understand simply made her feel more isolated.

She’d left before breakfast, choosing to battle snowdrifts and bad weather to escape the memories. She’d been careful never to put herself in that position again. Until now.

She ran her fingers around the neck of her sweater, even though it wasn’t tight.

Christmas was going to be hard, but even she couldn’t find a way to evade it for a second year. The McBride family always gathered at Christmas. It was tradition. She’d resigned herself to the fact that it was something she was going to have to live through, like a bad bout of the flu. But now she had this added complication.

“She was upset that you canceled?” Adam watched her, concerned, and she looked away quickly. He noticed things. Small things that other people missed. It was one of the attributes that made him good at his job. It was also part of the unsettling attraction she’d felt since his first day at the company. Hannah had been completely unprepared for the startling chemistry between them. She was so good at controlling her feelings it had come as a nasty shock to discover they were capable of rebellion.

“I’ve hurt her.”

He removed his phone from his pocket and handed his jacket to the steward. “Why don’t you tell her the truth? Tell her you find it hard being around the kids.”

Oh the irony.

If I’m pregnant, I’m going to have to find a way to be around kids.

It still surprised her that she’d talked to him about her family, but Adam was remarkably easy to talk to.

She hadn’t told him everything, of course, but more than she’d shared with anyone else.

“It’s…complicated.” She noticed that a couple across the aisle from her were traveling with a baby. They hadn’t even taken off but already the baby was fussy and restless. Hannah hoped it wasn’t going to cry for the whole flight. Listening to a child cry made her stomach hurt.

“Introduce me to her, and I’ll do it.”

“What?” She turned back to Adam, confused.

“I want to meet your sister.”

“Why?”

“Because that’s what people do in our position.”

“Our position?”

“I’m in love with you.” He said it easily, as if love wasn’t the most profoundly terrifying thing that could happen to a person. “Or are we going to ignore that?”

“We’re going to ignore it.” At least for now. She had the same control over her feelings as she did over her schedule. She’d learned to hold them back. If there was one thing she hated in life, it was emotional chaos.

“I should be offended that you’re treating my heartfelt declaration of love so lightly.”

“You were drunk, Kirkman.”

“Not true. I was in full control of my faculties.”

“As I recall, you’d consumed several glasses of bourbon.”

“It’s true that I may have needed a little liquid support to give me courage—” he shrugged “—but saying I love you is a big deal to a guy who has been single for as long as I have.”

She hadn’t allowed herself to believe that he was serious.

For Hannah, love was an emotional form of Russian roulette. It was a game she didn’t play.

Her emotional safety was the most important thing in the world to her.

She didn’t even want to think about how complicated it would be if there was a baby in the mix.

“You’re worried I’m going to strip you of your assets?” He leaned closer. “We’ll sign a prenup, but I should warn you that in the event of an irrevocable breakdown of our marriage I want possession of your books. Given time and medication, I can probably learn to live without you, but I can’t learn to live without your library. Do you know what a turn-on it is knowing that you have a first edition of Great Expectations on your shelves?”

She could barely concentrate on what he was saying. She should do a test. “We won’t be needing a prenup.”

“I agree. A love like ours is going to last forever. You could say I have Great Expectations.” He winked at her, but this time she didn’t smile.

Love was fickle and unreliable, and definitely not something you could control. If someone’s feelings weren’t right, then you couldn’t force it. She preferred to build her life on a more secure footing.

He rejected the offer of champagne from the steward and asked for bourbon instead, raising an eyebrow when Hannah refused, too.

“Since when do you refuse champagne?”

Since I might be pregnant. “I need a clear head to finish this presentation.”

“You can handle this presentation with your eyes closed. I don’t understand why you’re stressed. What happened to the woman who danced barefoot in the office around an empty pizza box?”

She slid off her heels. “Can we forget that happened?”

“No. I have photographic evidence, in case you ever tried to deny it. And I intend to show it to your sister to prove how misunderstood you are.” He dug out his phone and scrolled through the photos. “Here. This is my favorite.”

She barely recognized herself. Her hair had fallen out of the neat style she favored for work and she was barefoot and laughing. What really stood out was the expression on her face. Had she really revealed that much?

“Give me that!” She tried to snatch the phone from him, but he held it out of reach.

“I will never forget that night.”

“Because I took my shoes off and danced?”

“I was thinking more of the pizza. It was good pizza. There were other nights, and other pizzas, but that was the best. I think it was the olives.” Smiling, he leaned forward and kissed her. “I love it when you laugh. You are always so serious in the office.”

“I’m a serious person.”

Adam eased away. “Who told you that?”

“My father.”

You’re so damn serious, Hannah. Lift your head out of a book for five minutes and have some fun.

Even now there were days when she felt guilty for picking up a book, unable to shake the feeling that there was something more valuable she should be doing with her time.

“I’ve got news for your father—he’s wrong.”

Adam had gradually chipped away at her defenses, and he’d done it so subtly she hadn’t even realized she needed to defend herself.

Her work often demanded that she work late, and there had been nothing notable about that until the first time Adam had strolled into her office carrying a pizza box.

She’d raised her eyebrows.

I don’t eat pizza.

There’s a first time for everything, McBride.

Somehow they’d ended up sprawled on the office floor eating pizza out of the box long after everyone else had gone home.

Hannah had never eaten pizza out of a box before she’d met Adam.

Hannah had never kicked off her shoes or sprawled on the office floor.

She wasn’t sure she’d even known how to relax before he’d arrived in the company, but those late-night work sessions had fast become the favorite part of her day. She looked forward to being overloaded just so that she could have an excuse to stay after everyone else had left.

They’d worked, they’d shared food and they’d talked. There was something about being in the nighttime stillness of the office cocooned by the glitter of the city outside that made it easy to say things she never would have said in other circumstances.

One night he’d confessed that his aunt had insisted he learn ballroom dancing because she thought it was an essential life skill.

He’d insisted on teaching Hannah.

Everyone should be able to dance the tango, McBride.

I don’t dance, Kirkman.

But somehow, with him, she’d danced barefoot around the empty pizza boxes.

It was ridiculous, but she’d ended up laughing so hard she couldn’t breathe.

And that was how intimacy happened, she thought, watching as he took a mouthful of his drink. Not in a giant leap, but step by gentle step, each movement forward as stealthy as the incoming tide. One minute you were standing alone on dry land and the next minute you were in over your head and drowning.

Light wings of panic fluttered across her skin. If she could have fastened those wings to her back, she would have flown away. For some people, fear was a dark alley at night or a growling dog with sharp teeth. For her, it was intimacy.

Maybe he thought he loved her, but she knew that whatever she had to offer, it wouldn’t be enough.

A crash and a curse dragged her out of her thoughts and she saw a woman trying to wrestle her case into the overhead bin.

Adam stood up to help, using his superior height to wedge it into place.

Hannah saw the woman’s eyes linger on his profile and then slide to his shoulders. A faint smile acknowledged this prime specimen of manhood, and then she turned and registered Hannah’s presence. Her smile went from interested to resigned. Hannah could almost see her thinking all the good ones are taken.

“When are you going to tell Beth about us?” Adam sat down again. “Not that I mind being your dirty little secret, but it would be a lot easier if you told them. I could come to dinner with you. I’m great with kids.”

Hannah hoped he would still feel that way if it turned out she was pregnant.

He stretched out his legs again. “We’ve been virtually living together for the past six months. You can’t hide me forever.”

Six months? “I’m not hiding you.”

Prior to Adam, her longest relationship had been two months. Eight weeks. It was a time frame that suited her. Hannah preferred to focus her efforts on things she excelled at. Relationships fell outside that category.

With Adam, it had been different.

The connection had been so powerful she hadn’t known how to handle it. At first their only interaction had been at work. She couldn’t recall who had made the first move.

The first time they’d had sex had been in his apartment. They hadn’t made it as far as the bedroom. The second time had been at hers, and that time they’d made it as far as the floor of her living room. She’d assumed that urgency would fade, but some days they didn’t even pause for conversation. It was as if everything they held back in public during their working day demanded to be released the moment they were in private. Twice in the past week they’d made love standing up in the entryway with the lights still on. Part of her had wondered why sex with Adam always felt desperate. Maybe because in her head she believed it was going to end soon.

Everything ended, Hannah knew that, and yet here they were, six months later.

She shifted in her seat.

If she was pregnant, she’d know, surely? Weren’t women usually sick?

She didn’t feel sick.

As the plane’s engines screamed ready for takeoff, Adam finished his drink. “If you’re going home to your family this Christmas, I should be there.”

“To cause trouble?”

“To protect you.” This time he wasn’t smiling. “I hate seeing you like this. I want my Hannah back.”

My Hannah.

Her family, she knew, wouldn’t recognize the Hannah that Adam knew. She barely recognized that woman, either.

“I don’t need you to come with me, but it’s kind of you to offer.” She could just imagine Suzanne’s reaction if she showed up with Adam. She would have booked the church and bought a hat before Hannah had even unpacked.

Above their heads the seat belt light went out and Adam made himself more comfortable. “If Christmas is stressful, why go?”

“I don’t want to disappoint Suzanne.” And that feeling that she was falling short, not delivering, brought back uncomfortable memories.

“Suzanne? You don’t call her mom?”

“She isn’t my mother. My mother is dead.”

She saw the shock in his eyes and wondered what had possessed her to blurt out that fact in these stark, impersonal surroundings. She never talked about her real parents, but there was something about Adam that unraveled the part of her she usually kept tightly wound.

“I didn’t know.” He spoke quietly. “I’m sorry to hear it.”

“It was a long time ago. I was eight.”

“Dammit, Hannah. That’s a difficult age to lose a parent. Why haven’t you told me this before?” He held out his hand, palm upward, and she hesitated for a moment and then slid her hand into his. His fingers closed over hers, strong and protective, and she could feel the ropes of intimacy tightening around her.

I love you, Hannah.

“It’s not the kind of thing that comes up in general conversation. We lost both our parents. They died in the same accident.”

“Car?”

“Avalanche. They were climbers.”

He raised an eyebrow. “So you weren’t always a city girl?”

She had a feeling she’d always been a city girl.

“So who is Suzanne?” His tone was neutral, as if he’d recognized her need not to be smothered with sympathy.

“Suzanne and Stewart adopted us. Suzanne is American. Stewart is Scottish. After the…accident…we moved back to Scotland to be close to Stewart’s family.” Her heart was thumping. “Can we work now?”

He hesitated. “Sure.” He retrieved his laptop and opened it. “Unless you want to finish that game of chess we were playing?”

“I captured your knight.”

“I remember.” His smile was almost boyish. “I can still take your king. Give me a chance to try. You won the last two games we played and my confidence has taken a severe blow.”

His confidence had always seemed to her to be indestructible.

“I think we should finish the proposal.”

“You’re afraid you’re going to lose.” He leaned forward and kissed her on the mouth. “I looked at your presentation. It’s brilliant. We’re going to win this business.”

Relaxing slightly, she leaned across to scan the spreadsheet on his screen. “You need to change that.” She tapped one of the numbers. “Didn’t you get my email?”

“The one you sent at 3:00 a.m? Yes, I picked it up this morning on our way to the airport, but we’re not all as lightning fast as you.” He altered the number. “You have a hell of a brain, McBride, but why weren’t you sleeping?”

“I like work.” More specifically, she loved numbers. Loved data and computer code. Numbers were reliable and behaved the way she wanted them to. Numbers didn’t wrap themselves round your heart and squeeze until the blood stopped flowing. “I wanted to finish this project.”

“You couldn’t have done that in the eighteen-hour day you put in?”

“I had things on my mind.” And not just the fact that her period was late.

She’d been thinking about the two voice mail messages that had been sitting on her phone for a month.

She’d had similar calls before over the years, particularly at this time of year as the anniversary of the accident approached. This time she didn’t recognize the name. She’d learned not to respond, but still the message sat like a leaden weight in the pit of her stomach, reminding her of things she didn’t want to think about.

She’d almost asked Beth if she’d had a call, too, but then she would have had to talk about it and she didn’t want to.

It was something she and Suzanne had in common. They both preferred to ignore the past.

Adam saved the file they were working on. “Suzanne and Stewart were relatives?”

“Friends of my parents. They adopted the three of us.” Which only served to intensify her guilt that she couldn’t be the person they wanted her to be.

“And that’s why you feel you have to be there at Christmas. Because you owe them.” It was a statement of fact, not a question, and she didn’t argue with him.

She did owe them, and she knew she could never repay the debt. “That’s part of it.”

“Take me with you.”

“My family live in Scotland, in the remote Highlands. I can’t imagine you dealing with dodgy Wi-Fi and an intermittent phone signal.” She eyed his polished loafers. “You’d hate it.”

“I would not hate it. For a start, I’m a lover of single malt. Do your folks happen to live near a distillery?”

Hannah sighed. “In fact, they do, but—”

“Well, there you go. I’m already sold. Also, I appreciate beautiful scenery. A few romantic walks in a misty glen would be a perfect way to unwind.”

“A misty glen? You’ve been watching too much Braveheart. At this time of year the glen is usually buried under a foot of snow, and if there’s mist, you’re going to be lost and die of hypothermia.”

He gave an exaggerated shudder. “I knew there was a reason I chose to live in Manhattan. Seriously though, think about it. If I was there with you, we could work on the presentation. Believe it or not, I can live without the internet. No internet might turn out to be the greatest Christmas gift of all.”

It was one thing to tell Adam about her family. Quite another to introduce them.

Champagne corks would pop.

Hannah would be swept along by an uncontrollable tide of expectation.

“You’re going to the Caribbean and that, believe me, is going to be a thousand times better than Christmas in the Scottish Highlands. It’s likely we’ll be snowed in.” The thought of it made her hyperventilate. Trapped. Unable to breathe. Buried.

She heard Suzanne’s voice, thick with tears. They’re gone, Hannah. They’re dead.

Maybe she should have invented a business trip to some far-flung corner of the globe to get herself out of it for another year. If she visited a client in Sydney, she could be on a plane for almost all of the festive season.

Last year she’d chickened out at the last minute and she knew Posy hadn’t believed her limp excuse.

Who the hell decides they need to revamp their company on Christmas Eve, Hannah?

Even Santa leaves his corporate evaluation until the New Year.

There had been a time when Posy had worshipped Hannah and followed her round like a shadow. She’d crawled into her bed and refused to be dislodged. She’d held her hand. She’d sat on her lap. She’d clung like a burr, all softness and vulnerability.

Hannah felt the tightness in her chest increase as she thought about it.

To say that they’d grown apart would be an understatement, and Hannah knew the whole thing was her fault.

Her relationship with her youngest sister was yet another piece of evidence to support her belief that she’d be a terrible mother.

So what was she going to do if she was pregnant?

CHAPTER FOUR

Posy

IN A REMOTE valley in the Scottish Highlands, Posy McBride stood at the base of an avalanche field buffeted by an icy wind. It froze exposed skin and crept through gaps in clothing. The air smelled sharply of winter and each breath emerged as a cloud of vapor.

Snow the size of boulders lay strewn across an area that attracted climbers from all over the world. This area of the Highlands was known for its steep cliffs, challenging routes and its tendency to avalanche in the winter months.

The dog waiting next to her was tense with anticipation and excitement.

“Away find!” Posy gave the command and the dog bounded onto the debris field, weaving to and fro, nose to the snow.

Other members of the mountain rescue team had formed a probe line and were searching with slow, methodical purpose.

“She’s a champ,” Posy muttered, striding to catch up as Bonnie struggled over the huge boulders of snow, a smudge of gold in a sea of white as she searched for human scent.

Rory, the training officer for the team, walked up to her, a radio in his hand. “Phil fell over a few times. His scent will be all over the snow. That’s going to confuse her.”

“It’s not going to confuse her. She’s trained in air scent and trailing.” Posy didn’t take her eyes off Bonnie. “See? She’s showing interest in that spot right there. She’s a natural.”

“Phil would have put human scent on the surface.”

At that moment Bonnie started barking. Then she flew across the snow back to Posy.

“Show me!” Posy followed her back to the place that had caught her attention.

Rory followed at a slower pace, cursing as he stumbled. “I bet Luke a tenner she wouldn’t find him.”

“And for that lack of faith you’re going to have to pay up.” Posy reached Bonnie, who was now playing tug-of-war with a sweater. “You’re Wonder Dog. Good girl, good girl.” This, fortunately, was a training exercise, but still she made a big fuss of the dog, giving Bonnie her favorite squeaky toy as a reward. Then she grinned down at the man lying half-buried in the snow. “Hello there. How are you feeling today?”