Fairytale Christmas: Mistletoe and the Lost Stiletto / Her Holiday Prince Charming / A Princess by Christmas

‘You’re not an elf,’ she declared loudly. ‘I saw you out there—’ she pointed dramatically ‘—in the real world.’

Oh…fairy lights!

Having done her best to restore a little girl’s faith in Santa, she’d immediately shattered it.

Maybe that was the message. There are no such things as fairy tales. On the other hand, if she’d had a moment or two of fantasy as a child, she might not have grabbed so desperately for it as an adult.

But this was not about her and, putting her finger to her lips in a quick, ‘Shh!’ she folded herself up so that she was on the same level as the child. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Dido.’

‘Can you keep a secret, Dido?’

The child, thumb stuck firmly back in her mouth, nodded once.

‘Well, that’s great because this is a really huge secret,’ she said. ‘You’re absolutely right. You did see me in the lift, but the reason I was up there in the real world was because I was on a special mission from Santa.’

She hadn’t worked as an assistant in a day-care nursery for years without learning how to spin a story. The pity of it was that she hadn’t learned to spot one when it was being spun at her.

‘What’s a mishun?’

‘A very special task. The toughest. I shouldn’t be telling you this, but the thing is that Rudolph—’

‘Rudolph?’ Eyes wide, Dido abandoned the comfort of the thumb.

‘Rudolph,’ she repeated, ‘had run out of his favourite snack. I had to disguise myself as a human, go up to the food hall—’

‘Is he here?’

Lucy raised her finger to her lips again and then pointed it towards the ceiling. ‘He’s up there, on the roof with all the other reindeer,’ she whispered. ‘As soon as the store closes on Christmas Eve, we’re going to load up the sleigh and off they’ll go.’

‘Really?’ she whispered back, eyes like saucers.

‘Elf’s honour,’ she said, crossing her heart.

‘Can I see him?’

Oh, good grief… ‘He’s resting, Dido. Building up his strength. It’s a big job delivering presents to all the children in the world.’

‘I ‘spose…’ For a moment her little face sagged with disappointment, then she said, ‘Was it a carrot? His favourite snack? We always leave a carrot for Rudolph.’

‘Well, carrots are good, obviously,’ she said, wondering what the rest of the poor reindeer had to sustain them. ‘Great for his eyesight as he flies through the night. Good for children, too.’ Good for you was so boring, though. Christmas was about excitement, magic. ‘But what Rudolph really loves when it’s cold is a handful of chilli-flavoured cashew nuts to warm him up.’ She paused. ‘They’re what make his nose glow.’

‘Wow! Really? That is so cool…’

‘That’s a very special secret,’ Lucy warned. ‘Between you, me, Rudolph and Santa.’

‘So I can’t tell Cleo? She’s my big sister.’

‘The sister who tried to tell you that Santa doesn’t exist? I doooon’t think so.’

The child giggled.

‘Only a very small handful, though. If Rudolph has too many his nose will overheat…’

Stop! Stop it right there, Lucy Bright!

‘Dido…It’s time to go,’ her mother said, rescuing her. Mouthing a silent thank you over her daughter’s head. ‘Say bye-bye.’

‘Bye-bye.’ Then she whispered, ‘Say hi to Rudolph.’

‘I will.’ Lucy put her finger to her lip, then said, ‘Merry Christmas.’

‘Merry Christmas.’

Whew. The magic restored to one little innocent. Clap if you believe in fairies…

Not her.

Not fairies. Not fairy tales.

Lesson learned.

She looked up, saw the Chief Elf watching her from his little window and, as ordered, began picking up toys that had been picked up and dropped, restoring them to the shelves. Holding the hands of children who’d momentarily lost sight of their mothers.

When all was calm and ordered, she hitched herself onto the vacant stool and began buttoning teddies into jackets and trousers. While her fingers moved on automatic, she found herself wondering not about her future, or where she was going to spend the night, but about the man on the stairs. The way he’d caught her, held her for what seemed like minutes rather than seconds.

The broad support on his hand at her back. Dangerously mesmerising grey eyes that had locked into hers, turning her on, lighting her up like the national grid. She could still feel the fizz of it. She’d never understood why men talked about taking a ‘cold shower’ until now.

‘Any trouble evicting the bodyguards?’ Nat asked, dropping in at the security office in the basement. It was hopeless hunting through the store, but he might catch a glimpse of her on the bank of screens being fed images from CCTV cameras around the store.

‘No, although they were on the phone calling up reinforcements before they were through the door. Whoever replaces them won’t be as easy to spot.’

Women. He’d use women, he thought, scanning the screens but she’d gone to earth. Found a hiding place. Or perhaps she really had slipped back out into the dark streets. That should have been his hope; instead, the idea of her out there, alone in the cold and dark, filled him with dread.

‘Have you seen them before?’ he pressed. ‘Any idea who they work for?’

Bryan Matthews, his security chief, frowned, clearly puzzled by his interest, but shook his head, keeping whatever he was thinking to himself.

‘They didn’t say anything? Offer any explanation?’

‘No, they were clam-mouthed professionals. They must have been in a flat panic to have drawn attention to themselves like that. Any idea who they’ve lost?’

‘Maybe. It’s possible that she’s about this high,’ he said, his hand level with his chin. ‘Short pale blonde hair, green eyes, wearing a black knitted dress with a big collar.’ He looked at the shoe he was still carrying. ‘And no shoes.’

‘You saw her?’

He’d done more than that. He’d not just seen her, but caught her, held her and she’d filled up his senses like a well after a drought. There had been a connection between them so physical that when she’d run it had felt as if she’d torn away a chunk of his flesh and taken it with her.

‘I saw someone who seemed to be in a bit of a state,’ he said. ‘Pass the word to keep alert for anything out of the ordinary, especially at the store exits. When she does leave I want to be sure it’s her decision. Any problem, call me.’

‘I’ll pass the word.’

He nodded. ‘I’ll be in my office.’

He glanced once more at the screens, not knowing whether to be relieved or disappointed when he came up empty.

The common sense response would be relief, he reminded himself as he strode through the electrical department, heading for the lift. But this was about more than the smooth running of the store. It was rare for a woman to catch his attention with such immediacy.

Her fear had only sharpened his reaction, taking it beyond simple interest in an attractive woman. A snatched moment that had raised his heart rate, leaving him not just breathless, but exposed, naked, defenceless. The kind of feelings he hated, did everything possible to avoid. But still he wanted to know who she was. What, who, she was running from. Wanted to taste lips that had been close enough to tantalise his memory, send heat spiralling down through his body…

He came to an abrupt halt as he realised that she was there. Right there in front of him. Not just once, but over and over, her face looking out from dozens of silent television screens banked up against the wall. Her hair was longer, her face fuller and she was smiling so that those green eyes sparkled. The heat intensified as he focused on her lips. How close had he come to kissing her?

Close enough to imagine how it would feel, the softness of her lips, how she tasted as her body softened beneath him…

Whoever she was, it seemed that her disappearance was important enough to make the national news.

Or maybe just dramatic enough.

He reached the nearest set and as he brought up the sound the picture switched to a ruckus at a press conference.

’…scenes of total confusion as she very publicly ended her engagement to financier, Rupert Henshawe, accusing him of being a liar and a cheat…’

The camera caught Henshawe’s startled face, moving in for a close-up of a trickle of blood that appeared on his cheek, before swinging wildly to catch the green-eyed girl clutching a file against her breast with one hand, while swinging her bag, connecting with the jaw of a man who was trying to hang on to her with the other.

The picture faded to the familiar figure of business tycoon, Rupert Henshawe, making a statement to camera.

‘I blame myself. I should have realised that such a change in lifestyle would lead to stress in someone unused to the difficulty of being always in the public eye—’

His phone rang. He ignored it.

‘Meeting Lucy was a life-changing moment for me. She’s encouraged me to see the world in a new light…’

Lucy. Her name was Lucy.

’…her passionate belief in the fair trade movement has given a new ethical dimension to our fashion chain, which today I’m relaunching under the new name, Lucy B, in her honour…’

That was why she’d looked familiar, he realised as Henshawe paused, apparently struggling to keep back the tears.

He’d seen something in the papers about a romance with some girl who worked in his office—about as likely as Henshawe becoming a planet-hugger, he’d have thought…

‘Yes?’ he snapped, finally responding to the phone’s insistent ring, never taking his eyes from the screen.

‘It’s Pam Wootton, Nat—’

‘…I realise that I have been too wrapped up in all these new initiatives, visiting overseas suppliers, to give her the support she so desperately needed. To notice how tired she has become, her lack of appetite, her growing dependence on the tranquillisers that were prescribed after the press drove her to move out of the flat she shared with friends—’

Tranquillisers?

Nat felt a cold chill run through him. History repeating itself…

‘She needs rest, time to recover, all my best care and, as soon as I have found her, I will ensure—’

‘Nat?’

The voice in his ear was so insistent that he realised it wasn’t the first time his PA had said his name.

‘Sorry, Meg, I was distracted,’ he said, still staring at the screen. Then, as the news moved on to another story and he forced himself to concentrate, ‘Pam Wootton? What’s the matter with her?’

‘She’s collapsed. She was down in the grotto when it happened and Frank Alyson has called an ambulance, but I thought you’d want to know.’

‘I’ll be right there.’

‘What are you doing?’

Lucy, teddy-dressing on automatic while her brain frantically free-wheeled—desperately trying to forget the man with the grey eyes and concentrate on thinking about where she could go when the store closed—looked up to find a small boy watching her.

‘I’m wrapping this teddy up in a warm coat. It’s snowing,’ she said, glad of a distraction. Short of a park bench, she was out of ideas. ‘It will be very cold on Santa’s sleigh.’

‘Can I help?’

‘James, don’t be a nuisance,’ his mother warned. She had two smaller girls clutching at her skirts, half scared, half bewitched. Lucy smiled reassuringly.

‘He’s fine,’ she said. ‘Do you all want to give me a hand?’

Within minutes she was surrounded by small children dressing teddies, grinning happily as she helped with sleeves and buttons.

How long had it been since she’d done that? Not a posed for the camera smile, the kind that made your face ache, but an honest-to-goodness grin?

She’d been so busy shopping, being interviewed by the gossip magazines, having her photograph taken, that there hadn’t been any time to catch her breath, let alone enjoy the crazy roller coaster ride she was on. Or maybe that was the point.

She hadn’t wanted time to stop and think because if she had, she would have had to listen to the still small voice whispering away in the back of her mind telling her that it couldn’t possibly be real.

Mental note for diary: always listen to still small voice. It knows what it’s talking about.

Being here reminded her of how much she’d missed working in the day-care nursery. Missed the children.

‘Your turn for a break,’ one of the elves said, as it was time for the children to get back on the sleigh, and she began to gather up the bears. ‘Through the office, turn left. Coffee, tea, biscuits are on the house. There’s a machine with snacks if you need anything else.’

The tea was welcome and although Lucy wasn’t hungry she took a biscuit. Who knew when she’d get the chance to eat again? With that thought in mind, she stocked up on chocolate and crisps from the machine.

Rather than get involved in conversation with the other staff, she took a moment to check her phone, although what she was expecting to find, she didn’t know. Or rather she did. Dozens of missed calls, all of which she ignored. Texts, too. And hundreds of tweets, all demanding to know the whereabouts of Cinderella.

They couldn’t all have been from Rupert’s stooges. But how could she tell the real from the phoney? If someone was hoping to entice her into trusting them, they wouldn’t be leaping to his defence, would they?

She was considering whether to send a tweet to reassure the good guys that she was safe—at least for now—when something made her look up. The same prickle of awareness that had made her look around on the stairs.

And for the same reason.

There, not ten feet away, talking to Frank Alyson, was the man with grey eyes. The man who’d caught her, held her in one hand as easily as if she were a child and who had, for one brief moment, made her forget everything. Where she was, why she was running…

She could still feel the imprint of his hand on her back, the warmth of his breath against her cheek and, as she sucked her lower lip into her mouth to cool it, she almost believed that she could taste him on her tongue.

Chapter Four

GREY Eyes was head to head with the Chief Elf and Lucy scarcely dared breathe as she watched the pair of them.

One look and the game would be up.

It was one thing keeping her identity a secret from people who weren’t looking for her, didn’t expect to see her, but anyone who knew her, or was looking for her, wouldn’t be fooled for a moment by her disguise. And he had to be looking for her. Didn’t he?

The thought filled her with a mixture of dread and elation. While her head was afraid, she had to restrain her body from leaning towards him, from shouting Look! Here I am!

But, standing back like this so that she could see all of him—the broad shoulders, the long legs—she could also see that he was wearing an identity tag just like the one Pam had been wearing, which meant that he wasn’t a customer, someone just passing through.

He worked in the store and if Rupert’s bodyguards had elicited help from the management in finding her she was in deep trouble because one thing was obvious. He wasn’t junior staff.

His pinstriped suit was the business, his tie, navy with a tiny pattern, was eye-wateringly expensive; she’d bought one like it in the store just yesterday. And, even without the designer gear, he had that unmistakable air of authority.

But if she’d thought he’d seemed intense as he’d held her balanced above the stairs, now he looked positively grim.

‘Keep your eyes open, Frank.’ His voice was low; he didn’t need to raise it to make a point.

As she watched, pinned to the spot, he took a step back, glanced around, his eyes momentarily coming to rest on her. She’d left it too late to move and she lowered her lashes, opting for the if-I-can’t-see-you-then-you-can’t-see-me scenario. Holding her breath as she waited for the got you hand on the shoulder.

Her heart ceased to beat for the second or two that he continued to stare at her, but after a moment she realised that, while he was looking at her, he wasn’t actually seeing her. He wasn’t even in this room, not in his head, anyway.

Then someone put his head around the corner. ‘Whenever you’re ready, sir.’

Without a word, he turned and walked away. Which was when she realised that he was gripping something in his hand. A shoe.

Her shoe.

Had it fallen out of her bag when she’d stumbled?

Well, duh…How many red suede peep-toe designer shoes were there lying around Hastings & Hart? How many dumb females whose coach had just turned into a pumpkin were there fleeing up the H&H stairs scattering footwear in their wake?

How many men who could stop your heart with a look?

Stop it!

Enough with the fairy tales.

She was done with fairy tales.

‘Wh…who was that?’ she asked, as casually as she could, once she’d finally managed to retrieve her heart from her mouth and coax it back into life.

Frank gave her a weary look and she remembered, too late, that he didn’t like inquisitive elves.

‘That, Miss Mop and Bucket,’ he replied, ‘was Nathaniel Hart.’

‘Hart?’ She blinked. ‘As in…’ She pointed up at the building soaring above them.

‘As in Hastings & Hart,’ he confirmed.

‘No…’ Or, to put it another way, Nooooooo!

‘Are you arguing with me?’

‘No!’ And she shook her head, to make sure. ‘I just hadn’t realised there was a real Mr Hart.’ It certainly explained the air of authority. If he looked as if he owned the place it was because, well, he did. ‘I thought that most of these big stores were owned by big chains.’

‘Hastings & Hart is not most stores.’

About to ask if there was a Mr Hastings, or even a Mrs Hart, she thought better of it. She was having a bad enough day without feeling guilty about lusting after some woman’s husband.

‘Is that all?’ Frank asked with a sardonic lift of the brow. ‘Or are you prepared to honour us with another teddy-dressing class for the under fives?’

‘I’m sorry. It got a bit out of hand,’ she said, fairly sure that was sarcasm rather than praise. ‘I won’t do it again.’

‘Oh, please don’t let me stop you. You are a hit with the children, if not with their mothers.’

Definitely sarcasm and she had been feeling rather guilty since several of the children had refused point-blank to surrender their bears to the rigours of a freezing sleigh ride and insisted they come home with them in a nice warm taxi. Not that it should worry Frank Alyson. It was all the more profit for Nathaniel Hart, wasn’t it? Which was all men like him cared about.

But all the practice she’d had smiling in the last few months stood her in good stead and she gave him one of her best.

He looked somewhat startled, as well he might—she didn’t imagine he got too many of those—and, satisfied with the effect, she returned to her stool, where she would be safely out of sight of Mr Nathaniel Hart, unless he borrowed Frank Alyson’s Chief Elf robes.

But, while the children kept her busy, her brain was fizzing with questions. Had Grey Eyes been contacted directly by one of Rupert’s minions? Asked to organise a discreet search for her? Or even perhaps by Rupert himself? They probably knew one another—billionaires united was a very small club—because he seemed to be taking a personal interest in the search.

He hadn’t sounded at all happy when, having belatedly come to her senses, she’d taken off up the stairs, leaving only her shoe behind.

And it would explain why he was carrying it around with him. He assumed that she had the other one tucked away in her bag and, obviously, she would need two of them if she was going to walk out of here.

Tough. He should have kept his mind on the job.

Or maybe not. Even now, her heart flipped at the memory as she absently sucked on an overheated lip.

Having been assured by the paramedics that Pam was suffering from nothing worse than the latest bug that was going around, Nat drove her home and insisted that she stay there until she was fully recovered.

‘But how will you cope? There’s so much to do and—’

‘Pam, we’ll manage,’ he insisted. ‘And the last thing we need at this time of year is an epidemic.’

‘Sorry. I know. And no one’s indispensable. Petra will manage. Probably.’ She rubbed at her temple. ‘There was something I was meant to be doing…’ He waited, but she sighed and said, ‘No, it’s gone.’

‘Can I get you anything? Tea? Juice?’

‘You’re a sweet man, Nathaniel Hart,’ she croaked. ‘You’d make some woman a lovely husband.’

An image of the woman on the stairs, her scent, the softness of her dress, disturbingly real, filled his head…

‘I’m just a details man,’ he said, blanking it off. ‘Go and get into bed. I’ll make you a hot drink.’

‘You should get back to London before the roads get any worse,’ she said. Then, as headlights swept across the window, ‘That’s Peter home.’

‘Closing time, Lou.’ The elf sitting on the next stool stood up, eased her back. ‘Reality beckons.’

‘I’ll just finish dressing this bear.’

‘You’re keen. See you tomorrow.’

It was a casual throwaway line, needing no answer, and Lucy didn’t reply. Tomorrow would have to take care of itself; it was tonight that was the problem.

She tucked the teddy into a pair of striped pyjamas and a dressing gown, putting off the moment when she’d have to face a cold world. Because no amount of thinking had provided her with an answer to where she could go. Certainly not the flat she’d shared before she’d met Rupert. That would be the first place anyone would look.

She had a little money in her purse that would cover a night at some cheap B&B. The problem with that was that her face would be all over the evening news and someone was bound to spot her and call it in to one of the tabloids for the tip-off money.

The sensible answer, she knew, would be to contact one of them herself, let them take care of her. They’d stick her in a safe house so that no one else could get to her and they’d pay well for the story she had to tell. That was the reason they’d been grabbing at her, chasing after her. Why Rupert would be equally anxious to keep her away from them.

The problem with going down that route was that there would be no way back to her real life.

Once she’d taken their money she’d be their property. Would never be able to go back to being the person she had been six months ago.

Instead she’d become one of those pathetic Z-list celebrities who were forever doomed to live off their moment of infamy, relying on ever more sleazy stories to keep themselves in the public eye. Because no one would employ her in a nursery or day-care centre ever again.

But this reprieve was temporary. Out of time, she placed the teddy on the shelf and went to the office.

Frank looked up from his desk, where he was inputting figures into a computer. ‘Are you still here?’

‘Apparently. I was looking for Pam.’

He pulled a face. ‘She collapsed not long after you arrived,’ he said in an I-told-you-so tone of voice.

‘Oh, good grief. I’m so sorry. Is she going to be all right?’

‘It’s just a bug and an inability to accept that we can manage without her for a day or two. Mr Hart took her home a couple of hours ago. Why did you want her?’

‘Well…’

About to explain about the swipe card, it occurred to her that if Pam had collapsed not long after she’d mistaken her for an elf, she might not have had time to do the paperwork. Make her official. Log her in.

‘It’s nothing that won’t wait. Although…’

She couldn’t. Could she?

‘She didn’t mention what time I’m supposed to start tomorrow,’ she added, as casually as she could.

‘The store opens at ten. If you’re honouring us with your presence, you’ll need to be in your place, teddy at the ready at one minute to. Is that it?’