Christmas at a Highland Castle

Chapter 2

5 DAYS TO CHRISTMAS

The next morning, Tania was at the picture window on the top level of the lodge, staring out at a view she knew well, but never tired of. She’d missed seeing the rose-coloured tips of the mountains which came with the sun rising behind them, but the sky still managed to make up for her tardiness. Without a cloud in sight, the pale blue stretched to infinity above the jagged beauty of the scenery below.

‘Tom?’ She glanced briefly away from the view. ‘It is Tom, isn’t it?’

A figure peered around the pillar separating the kitchen area from the rest of the open-plan living area. The new chef was pale-skinned, with messy dark hair and tattoos it was impossible to ignore winding their way up both arms. He wore a nervy smile. ‘Yes? And yes, I’m Tom.’ The touches of a Scottish accent swirled around the edges of his words.

‘Could I have a coffee, when you have a moment? Black, no sugar, thank you.’

He probably thought she was a lazy privileged bitch. She expected he already had a cast-iron idea in his head of what she was like.

Well, he could think what he wanted. She could make her own coffee, but that would involve turning away from this window – which framed her favourite view in the entire world – and she didn’t want to do that just yet. Anyway, she thought with a wry smile, if he thought this week was going to be bad, he had no idea what he’d signed up for. He couldn’t predict the perfect storm he would be facing when her stepmother, Brigitte, and her cronies turned up. Pouring a mug of coffee would be the least of his worries once they arrived. She was doing him a favour, breaking him in gently.

Tania had had to fight tooth and nail to get Christmas week, this year, a week usually favoured by Brigitte. And in usual circumstances, Tania would prefer to wait until later in the season; sometimes the snow wasn’t all that great this early on. But she wanted to get Clara away from her empty cottage, take her away from the hideousness of being at home, alone, for her first Christmas since it had happened. So far, everything had fallen into place. Clara had agreed to come to France, the snow was exceptional for so early in the season, and Tania was going to spend Christmas skiing with Rose and Clara – the two people she treasured the most in the world.

A few moments later, Tom appeared at her shoulder.

‘Thank you,’ she said, taking the mug he offered.

‘Awesome view.’

She watched from the corner of her eye as he scanned the full panorama. ‘It’s the best thing about the lodge,’ she said. ‘How are you settling in?’

‘Well, thank you,’ he said. ‘I wanted to ask; would you like me to get a tree?’

Tania pulled in a breath. She hadn’t decided yet how much they should acknowledge the fact that it was Christmas week, or whether it would be easier for Clara if they ignored it – as far as was possible to, in a resort permanently glittering with strings of winter fairy lights. ‘Perhaps a small one,’ she said, gesturing to the corner nearest the doors out onto the wrap-around balcony. ‘It could go over there.’

It would also go some way towards hiding the new painting hanging on the wall. The painting she was doing her best to ignore.

‘You’re not big on Christmas?’ he asked.

‘Not this year,’ she said, but didn’t elaborate. She’d brought little presents for Clara and Rose, a token gift for Madeleine. It would be good to have somewhere to put them. ‘The decorations are in a box in the storeroom.’

He nodded. ‘I’ve seen it. I’ll do that later today for you.’

‘Thanks. Have you worked in Près du Ciel before?’

‘Aye. I did last season for Ice and Fire in a little chalet at the base of Près Village, but I have to say the views from up here are amazing.’

‘Do you ski?’

‘I board, mostly. But I like skiing. It depends on the snow.’

She nodded. She’d had a go at snowboarding a few times but had concluded years ago that she preferred skis.

‘Does your father still get out on the slopes?’ he asked.

And there it was.

It never took too long, when people knew who she was, before talk turned to her father.

‘He’d hardly bother to own a property up here if he didn’t, would he?’ Her tone was icy, her eyes narrowing. She was angry with herself for being upset by it. Though she’d lived her whole life under his shadow, even in direct sunlight the shadow never seemed to diminish. And the annoyance raged through her, every time.

Maybe that was what had been driving her, why she’d flirted with the media for so long. Maybe it was an underlying feeling that no one was interested in her , that there always had to be some reference made to her father. She sniffed. ‘Is something burning?’ she asked, the words stalking their way from her mouth, forcing their way out from between tight lips.

Keeping her gaze firmly on the view, she ignored him as he mumbled something about bacon and retreated to the kitchen area. She remained put when footsteps up the twisting wooden staircase announced the arrival of someone else.

‘Morning.’ It was Rose. ‘That view is as picture perfect as ever.’

Rose was right. It didn’t matter what time of day you looked at the mountains, there was always something changing out there, and it was always beautiful: the colours, from vibrant sun-soaked morning pinks through to the grey-blues of the failing afternoon light, and every infinitesimal shade in between; the eerie sharp granite peaks, partially cloaked in white and bathed in starlight; the way the clusters of pine trees clung to impossibly rocky outcrops, smudges of green amongst the monotones.

After greeting the chef, Rose pulled one of the heavy wooden chairs out far enough to be able to slip onto it, and poured herself orange juice from a clear jug already on the table. Tania watched her in the reflection of the window as she passed her fingers over the knobbles of the plaits running down each side of her head, checking they were even. ‘No one else up yet?’

Tania didn’t reply, her attention back on the view.

‘Just the two of you so far,’ Tom said, filling the silence. ‘Would you like breakfast now, or will you wait for the others?’

‘Oh God, I’m not waiting for Clara. She might not make it out of bed until tomorrow, the state she was in last night. You got her back here all right?’

Finally, Tania turned away from the view and took a seat at the table. ‘She fell and managed to cut her hand on some broken glass before we left the bar.’ She shook her head a little but didn’t say anything else, didn’t want to acknowledge how bad the journey back from the bar had been.

‘She’s getting worse, isn’t she?’ Rose said.

Tania pulled in a deep breath. ‘A few days of mountain air will do her good. Sort her out in no time. Put things into perspective.’

Was she trying to persuade Rose or herself? Before she could say anything more, another set of footsteps clumped up the stairs and heralded the arrival of another breakfaster. The crown of Madeleine’s head appeared, a warm, open smile alighting on her face when she saw Rose at the table.

‘We’ll talk about it later.’ Tania spoke quietly, then engaged Madeleine in trivial conversation about how well she had slept. She hoped the message was clear. Clara’s private hell was to remain just that, private. Her own Pandora’s box of troubles.

But Tania was beginning to wonder just how much longer it would be before the lid blew itself open, whether they liked it or not.

Madeleine had been right. She’d thought she could smell the sweet scent of frying bacon. The soft curls of that delicious smell had made it all the way down from the top floor – the living area of this upside-down lodge – so she’d known the cooking was well underway.

The unfolding knowledge that someone was cooking breakfast for you, and that bacon was involved, had to be one of life’s most glorious awakenings.

Not that getting out of bed had been easy. She’d woken up with a heaviness similar to a hangover, but she’d only had a couple of glasses of wine the previous evening. No, she didn’t have a hangover, instead the feeling was more one of exhaustion. The previous day had been a long one. Catching a lift with Rose to the airport had meant being ready to leave home before dawn; before the sun had even peeked out from beneath the comfort of its thirteen-tog duvet. But it wasn’t only that which had Madeleine exhausted, it was the role she was trying to play. Having to watch everything she said and everything she did in front of Rose’s friends.

She hadn’t appreciated how tiring subterfuge was, it was proving far harder to maintain than she had expected. So, she’d made the most of the last few moments in bed this morning, stretching, then starfishing under the covers, revelling in the amount of space. The bed in her room must be king-size. Maybe even super-king. Was that as big as beds went, or was there an even bigger version? Mega-king? Galactic overlord-size?

Either way, this made her standard double at home feel a bit underwhelming in comparison. And changing the duvet cover was challenge enough with the size of bed she already had. Now was not the moment to recall the time she ended up inside the duvet cover, when she mistimed things and tripped over the edge of the bed. The fact that there was no one in the room to witness her embarrassment didn’t diminish it a whole lot.

As Madeleine had crested the top of the stairs, and zeroed in on Rose who was already seated at the dining table, she realised she could smell freshly baked pastries, too. Rose had told her their stay would be fully catered, but Madeleine hadn’t been entirely sure what that meant in this setting. She’d been expecting a choice between cornflakes and muesli for breakfast, to be honest. Maybe a filled and ready to boil kettle for hot drinks. There was clearly a great deal more to fully catered than that. Her reservations about going on a skiing holiday hadn’t gone anywhere. After all, the closest she’d been to a pair of skis was watching Ski Sunday in her pyjamas with a hot chocolate in her hand. But she decided she’d worry about all of that after breakfast.