Kiss Me at Christmas

One

Their eyes met through the curls of steam twisting out of their mugs. His were the color of burnt honey, framed by dark eyelashes and skeptical S-shaped eyebrows. Hers were the color of faded denim, and they watched him with the hunger of an alley cat that's just spied a tasty-looking field mouse.

At the other end of the pub-despite only being the third week in November-the Christmas karaoke was in full swing, and the main bar area was swamped with swaying punters trying to cram in another round before the end of "happy hour." The smaller bar in the saloon area was quieter. Couples cozied up in corners or ate at the candlelit bistro tables.

Her phone rang. Emma. She sucked on the inside of her cheek as she debated taking the call and then decided that she wasn't ready to talk about it yet. If she did, she might cry, and she didn't want to cry. She dismissed the call and buried her phone deep in her handbag. Tonight, she wanted to forget.

This was Harriet's second mug of mulled wine, and she was enjoying the taste of cinnamon and star anise and the velvety caress of the hot wine slipping down her throat. The warmth feathered out through her chest in a delicious trickle. The man smiled and one of those skeptical eyebrows quirked a little higher, giving him serious Jack Nicholson vibes. A delightful zing of excitement ricocheted around inside Harriet's sensible knitted tights. She smiled back in what she hoped was a flirtatious way and then wider when he began walking toward her. She could do this; it was just like riding a bike. Right?

"Do you mind?" he asked, gesturing to the barstool next to hers. His voice was moody blues and sandpaper. She nodded and he perched, keeping one foot planted on the sticky carpet. He smelled like sawed pine and cloves. His suit was sharply cut and expensive, the top button of his white shirt undone, tie ever so slightly pulling to the left. He was so good-looking that she had the urge to punch him. This wasn't a normal response, she knew this, but something about this level of attractiveness was sparking a visceral physical reaction inside her. Perhaps she was just horny; it had been a while. She kept her free hand in her lap and instructed it not to make any sudden movements.

"Can I buy you another drink?" he asked.

"Thank you." She furnished him with a cool smile, like she did this kind of thing every night of the week. I'm doing it! I'm actually doing it. I am the smooth, self-assured woman at the bar; I am goddamned Kristin Scott Thomas!

"Same again?"

"Please."

The flirting at a distance had come easily, but now that he was here, she felt her bravado scurry away like a spooked squirrel. She was out of practice and drank deeply from her mug of crimson bravery.

He was watching her with an amused expression.

"Slips down easily, doesn't it?" he remarked.

"A bit too easily," she confessed. "That's the trouble with mulled wine, it tricks you into thinking it's a warm bedtime drink instead of alcohol."

"And is it making you feel ready for bed?" His eyebrow quirked up again, so bold that Harriet immediately was indeed ready for bed.

"You're very forward, aren't you?"

His cocksure demeanor slipped, and he looked away as though embarrassed. When he met her eyes again, his smile was shyer but no less potent.

"Sorry," he said, "I had some long-awaited news today and I think I've maybe indulged a little too freely with the mulled wine."

His dark hair was smart like the rest of him, short at the sides and just a little longer on the top, swept up at the front; the lamplight highlighted flecks of gray at his temples. The sounds of a drunk couple doing a convincing rendition of "Fairytale of New York" drifted through the bar.

"It's easily done. Was it good news or bad news?" Harriet asked, taking another deep swig.

The bartender placed two more mugs of steaming wine on the bar. Sexy-eyebrow man handed one to Harriet, and she smiled a thank-you.

"It was both," the man said, picking at a loose thread on the bar towel. "I'm not sure whether I should be celebrating or commiserating."

"Aha, you're experiencing a commiserbration."

"I think you just made that word up."

"But it fits the experience."

"It does," the man agreed. "I potentially put wheels in motion on an endeavor that could make one of my clients an even wealthier woman than she already is and throw me into the path of other wealthy clients."

Harriet raised her mug. "Well, cheers to that!"

"But I wonder if I may have to sell a piece of my soul in the process."

"Souls are overrated." Harriet waved away his concerns. "Cheers!"

They clinked and sipped.

"What about you?" he asked. "Celebrating? Waiting for a friend?"

Her smile flattened.

"Unlike you, there is no ambiguity in my emotions; I am comprehensively commiserating."

"Oh, that sucks. Is it insensitive to ask what happened? You can tell me to mind my own business, I'm drunk enough not to mind."

He looked sincere. Sincerely hot. Was she really going to spill her guts to a stranger with come-hither eyebrows? Yes.

"My seventeen-year-old daughter has been on a school exchange trip for the last three weeks. Cooperstown, in upstate New York. She was due back next week; I was going to decorate the flat ready for Christmas for when she got back home."

"That's sweet," said the man.

"Yeah. Except I got a phone call this evening saying the family have invited her to stay for Christmas."

"Ouch."

"Ahhgghh!" She threw her arms in the air. "I don't know. I mean, I'm happy for her, of course I am, what a wonderful experience, and she's so excited . . ."

"But?"

Her sensible head told her that she was sharing far too much with this handsome stranger, but her wine head was yelling, Just tell him already, what have you got to lose? Her wine head won.

"But. This is the longest time we've ever been apart. Next autumn she'll be off to university and . . . I guess I was just trying to soak her up before she goes, you know?"

Good-hair man gave a noncommittal nod. He obviously didn't have children.

"This last three weeks has been a snapshot of what my empty nest is going to look like, and I've got to be honest, I don't like it one little bit. Who even am I without her to look after? What's the point of me?" she shouted, sloshing hot wine down her cleavage. She mopped her boobs with a bar towel and lowered her voice. "It'll be our first Christmas apart. But I want her to do it, she's going to have an amazing time, and I'm so proud of her. Sooooo, I guess I'm commiserbrating too. Sorry-hic-that was a lot. More wine?"

He continued to watch her, his face close to hers, his eyes oh so sincere, like he was really listening.

"Does she know how you feel?" he asked.

Harriet laughed. "Don't be ridiculous! She doesn't need to know. I'm not going to guilt my daughter into spending the holidays with me. She was still unsure about whether to accept the invitation, but I know it was only because she was worried about me, bless her. She's a good girl. I told her she absolutely had to stay; I wouldn't hear another word about her coming home."

"That's very selfless."

"That's being a parent."

He flinched infinitesimally, but it passed almost before Harriet had registered it, and she had neither the presence of mind nor the will to chase it up. She didn't know him; it wasn't her job to wonder. Two more mugs of hot spicy wine arrived, and she blew on hers before taking a sip, Christmas dancing on her tongue.

"It's all about consumerism these days, anyway, isn't it? You're probably better off out of it," he said plainly.

"No!" Harriet was aghast. "I love Christmas. I am Christmas's biggest fan. I love everything about it. People are so much kinder at Christmas, have you ever noticed that? For the month of December even the most hardened bum-barnacle can find a little charity in his heart. I love doing all the Christmassy stuff and making it magical for my daughter and my family; I am the Christmas fricking queen! Or at least I was. Now I'm . . ."

"Dethroned?" he added helpfully.

"Surplus to requirements," she sighed. "Christmas feels like a demonic candy cane poking me relentlessly in the ribs."

"So you convinced your daughter to leave you alone at Christmas and then came to a pub that's decorated like Father Christmas's grotto, hosting Christmas karaoke and serving the most Christmassy of all the alcoholic beverages." There was that eyebrow again, being all sarcastically sexy and suggestive.

"Yes, I did," she deadpanned.

"Isn't that rubbing salt into the wound?"

"I am vaccinating myself against the holidays. Building my resistance. By December the twenty-fifth I will be completely immune."

He looked dubious about her logic, but he nodded sagely.

"What about you?" she asked. "Are you a Grinch or a Saint Nick Nut?"

"Are those my only choices?"

"You can add your own."

He pondered for a moment and then said, "I would describe myself as middlingly merry. I like the festive esthetic; I like the way the decorations bring light to an otherwise dark month. And I like that I get time off work. I would say that up to now I've been happy to take advantage of Christmas while not fully partaking." He paused, as though wondering whether to continue. Seriousness fell like a shadow across his face. "But there have been recent unexpected developments in my life that have made me wonder what I might have missed . . . what I might have found if things had been different."

Even through her haze she could feel his regret, see the longing in his eyes and the drop of his shoulders. She could taste it on him, and it had the same bitter tang as her own.

"Regret is the ultimate party pooper." She heard the weariness in her voice. "Its mission in life is to constantly suck you backward into the past, where it forces you to replay all your mistakes on a loop. The only way is forward; you've just got to keep on trying to outrun it, my friend." She smiled lopsidedly and took another drink.

"Spoken like someone who knows," he said. "Have you tried vaccinating against regret?"

"I get my yearly booster shot and live in hopes that one day it will take." I am so much wittier when I'm drunk. I wonder if there's a way to carry this forward into sobriety.

He nodded as though he understood. "Sorry." He shook himself. "This got deep all of a sudden, didn't it?"

"I think we're working through the many stages of drunkenness." She smiled.

"What's the next stage?" His eyes had become darker; they glinted with something enticing.

She took a breath and let her eyes drop to his lips, twisted up at the edges in a devilish smile. A dark line of stubble ran along his jaw.

"Dubious decision-making," she answered, licking her own lips.

His smile widened into a full grin as he raised his mug, and Harriet was all in.

"I propose that in the interests of doing justice to this fine evening of commiserbrating, and vaccinating against negative emotions, we continue to drink hot wine until we can think of something better to do."

This time his eyebrow lifted so suggestively that Harriet had to bite her lip to stop herself from biting his. He clocked it straightaway and grinned wider still.

"When you say 'something better to do,' do you have anything specific in mind?" she asked, leaning toward him, so that he could smell her perfume and get a better view of her chest. This was most unlike her; the alcohol had released her inner vamp, and she'd be lying if she said her own brazenness wasn't acting as an aphrodisiac. His Adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed hard, and she felt powerful.

He cocked his head and regarded her, smiling wickedly.

"One or two things," he said enigmatically, bending his body and sliding his arm along the bar to move even closer to her. "But I'm open to suggestions."

The sounds of bad karaoke faded to black and the other patrons in the bar melted out of her consciousness, leaving only the two of them in sharp focus.

Oh my god, this is so sexy! Her heart was pinging around in her chest. His hand was on the bar next to hers, their fingers not quite touching, and she could swear she felt static zinging in the sliver of space between. She needed to keep up the appearance that she was a temptress. What would Kristin Scott Thomas do?

She looked up, blinking slowly to show her nonchalance, and fixed him with her eyes.

"I'm sure if we put our heads together, we can come up with something to satisfy us both," she purred.

She watched his pupils dilate and wanted to moan with pleasure. Who or what had taken possession of her this evening? In her head Sean Connery's voice whispered, The name's Wine. Mulled Wine. Her fourth mug had gone down a treat, settling around her shoulders like a velvet shrug and softening her bones. She smiled at him and felt a warm pleasure as he looked hungrily at her mouth before he raised his eyes to hers again. He leaned in close.

"I'm James, by the way."

His voice rumbled through her body like a train she was running to catch.

"Harriet," she responded breathlessly.

With the barest of movements, she closed the gap and brushed his lips with hers.

"I am delighted to meet you, Harriet," he whispered hoarsely.

She smiled as he crushed his mouth to hers. Stars collided behind her closed lids. A sweet tickling sensation began to build inside her as though she were on the slow climb to the top of a roller coaster. This was exactly what she needed tonight.

Harriet allowed herself to follow that feeling all the way back to his place, where an hour later, shouting in ecstasy, they finally dropped over the edge of the roller coaster together.

Two

The first thing that confused Harriet as the fog of sleep began to dissipate was the light shining in through her closed eyelids. She had blackout curtains in her bedroom-had she forgotten to close them last night? Her eyes were stuck shut with last night's mascara, and as she unpeeled her top lashes from her bottom ones, the sight of the unfamiliar room caught her momentarily off guard before the events of last night slammed back into her mind like a series of stills being played at top speed on an old movie projector. The images might have been grainy, but there was no mistaking their X-rated nature. Sweet Magic Mike! What was his name? J. Jake? Jacob? James! Okay, that was something, at least she had a name. The crumpled sheets in the space next to her were barely warm and she could hear a shower running in the en suite. Ooh, an en suite! Fancy. She peered around the room. There was a lot of dark wood furniture and a seascape canvas on the wall; it screamed well-heeled-bachelor-with-taste. What was the etiquette these days with one-night stands? She was a bit rusty; it had been . . . years. Did one stay for awkward conversation over breakfast or leave quietly and maintain an element of mystique? She fast-forwarded her mind through their sexual gymnastics-feeling slightly smug that she could still bend like that in her midforties.