A Winter Wish by Christi Caldwell

Author:Christi Caldwell
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Romance, Regency
Publisher: Christi Caldwell
Published: 2020-07-06T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 8

It had been one week of seeing to the holiday preparations. From before the sun rose, until many hours after it set, Merry was rushing about seeing to her responsibilities. From coordinating arrangements with servants, to drafting the menu for the Christmastide meal, to creating decorations to hang about the household, hers was not an unfamiliar role she’d taken on in numerous households. There was, however, one difference between this assignment and all the others to come before it.

Luke.

All the times prior, her sole focus had been on work. There’d been little time for laughter and celebration. Oh, she’d always loved the holiday season, but the pleasure and enjoyment of it was not something the servant class had the luxury of. Nay, servants were too busy transforming households for the lords and ladies of the ton.

Since she’d come upon him sprawled in the foyer, and he’d insisted on taking part in the day-to-day goings-on of holiday preparation, he’d risen with her and worked well into the night beside her. Long after the rest of the household had fallen asleep.

He was the first—and only—gentleman to ever help her.

And having him beside her as they saw to those tasks never felt like work.

Side by side in the nursery, with garland and the adornments laid out before them, she threaded a string of gold beads through a long branch of evergreen.

From the corner of her eye, she peeked at Luke.

Muttering to himself, he jabbed a piece of red velvet into an untrimmed branch at the middle of his creation. “Close your eyes,” he said for the eleventh time since they’d begun.

“I cannot close my eyes, Luke. I’m working,” she reminded him, neatly winding the remainder of her adornment and then tying it off at the end.

“Very well. Then stop peeking at mine. I told you at the start, it is a surprise.”

A surprise.

There could be no greater one than the gentleman beside her. The teasing, thoughtful, and proud viscount who had put the same effort into their preparations for the holiday season that he had his studies.

Only, there was so much different from then to now. She didn’t recall so much as a smile from the somber little boy. Now, whenever they were together, he wore a perpetual grin. An infectious one.

Despite his warning from moments ago, her gaze drifted unbidden to him.

Everything about him was real and warm and human, from the relaxed lines of his features to the looseness of golden curls he’d once kept slicked back in place.

Her heart fluttered in an all-too-familiar quickened tempo.

He paused in his task and glanced over at her.

Merry hurriedly dropped her focus to—

Her lips twitched.

“I see you laughing,” he mumbled.

“I’m not laughing.” She winked. “I was smiling. It’s not exactly the same.”

“It’s not entirely different either,” he said, all of his attention trained on that oddly shaped arrangement.

No, it wasn’t. Nor did that adorably imperfect garland he’d worked tirelessly at since they’d arrived that morn account for the perpetual smile she’d worn that morning.

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