How they’d practically leapt at each other, without saying a word.

Then the kiss itself.

Oh, my god, that man can kiss.

Should she feel a certain way about the dozens of actresses Archer had kissed on screen? Or about the millions of women and men around the world who could only dream of kissing him—like she had until yesterday? Or that, until very recently, those lips were kissing a famous woman who Cecily had referred to as “that horrid girl”?

Chloe brushed aside every thought, deciding that she needn’t feel one way or another about Archer’s kissing history. The most important fact was that he’d kissed her and would very likely do it again.

Merry Christmas to me.

Her thoughts landed on what he’d said while they were sitting on the wall, about wanting to make the most of the next few days. She would have to find a polite way to wangle some time with Archer without upsetting the Brownings. They’d been so lovely to her.

The smell of toast wafted under the bedroom door and Chloe realised she was starving. She threw back the cosy covers and, shivering in the chilly air, stepped into her Uggs and wrapped herself in the fluffy robe she’d brought.

Then she ran down the stairs steeped in anticipation, just like someone thirty years younger.

As Lucy had promised, the Brownings were big on tradition and even though the traditions were different from her own family’s, Chloe had one of the best Christmas mornings she could remember.

Breakfast back home in Australia was mimosas, a summer fruit platter—berries, melon, pineapple and mangoes—and more prawns than the average person ate all year. In a tiny village in Oxfordshire, it was the traditional English breakfast, most of which, Susan told her, was sourced from the same local farm as the dinner on her first night in England. No wonder it was the best bacon Chloe had ever had.

After breakfast, and after Chloe convinced Susan to let her help clean up the kitchen, the three of them assembled in the front room, still clad in pyjamas and robes—something her own mother would never allow—to open presents.

Max had lit a fire and tuned the radio to Radio Three for classical Christmas music. Chloe carried a tray laden with a teapot, teacups, a milk jug, and a plate teeming with sliced Christmas cake, and as she carefully placed it on the coffee table, she noticed that the red candles on the mantle had been lit. The glow from their flames, along with the crackling fire and the stockings hung from the mantle, formed such a perfect Christmassy tableau, that Chloe’s eyes prickled with tears. Even before they’d opened presents, she knew she’d remember this Christmas always.

“I’ll pour, shall I?” asked Susan rhetorically, as she poured the steaming tea into three cups. “Now, Chloe love, we usually open our stocking presents first, then the proper presents from under the tree. How does that sound?”

Chloe’s eyes settled on the stockings, three of them now plump with gifts and only Lucy’s hanging limply from its hook. Was she supposed to have brought stocking presents for the Brownings? Somehow, she hadn’t thought of it until then and she felt terrible.