The Mills & Boon Sparkling Christmas Collection. Kate Hardy

most of the food finished thanks to Jamie and Eva, Helen turned her attention to Jamie again.

      ‘Now, Jamie, come and spend some time with me before your mum whisks you away again.’ The remark wasn’t lost on Eva, managing to make it sound as if she never saw him even though she visited as often as possible and was constantly inviting her to visit.

      Jamie dutifully followed Helen out of the room, throwing Eva an accusing look as he went. She ruffled his hair as he passed and started to collect plates from the table, glancing over to see Sarah’s manicured fingers tapping furiously away. Eva assumed it was business but then what did she know? Maybe she was arranging a romantic rendezvous with a secret lover. She knew so little about her sister’s life these days.

      How and when it had got to this stage she didn’t know. Their personalities had always been different but once they had been close. Eva remembered the two giggling girls hiding behind the curtains waiting for their dad to come home. Or the teenagers sitting up late into the night discussing what boys they fancied at school. Everything changed after their dad’s heart attack. Instead of bringing them closer, it had seemed to tear them apart.

      Sarah showed no signs of helping to clear the table and Eva felt a rush of anger.

      ‘Surely it can wait, whatever it is?’ she snapped. Sarah jumped slightly and looked up. Eva could see slight shadows beneath her sister’s expensive make-up and immediately felt guilty.

      ‘Is everything all right?’ she asked her.

      ‘Yes, why shouldn’t it be?’

      ‘No reason. I just thought you looked tired.’

      ‘Well that’s what happens when you work a fifty-hour week,’ Sarah replied sarcastically. Eva took a deep breath, willing herself to stay calm. Eva knew very well what it was like, but of course Sarah would never acknowledge that.

      ‘Maybe you could take a break after this case,’ Eva suggested.

      ‘Maybe,’ she sniffed. ‘It will depend on my work schedule and I can’t just leave Mum.’

      ‘Why not?’ Eva asked surprised.

      ‘She’s not getting any younger you know.’

      ‘She looks fine to me. More than fine, in fact. Is there a problem I don’t know about?’

      ‘No,’ Sarah replied defensively. ‘She just needs to know I’m here, that’s all. I can’t just take off.’

      ‘But I’m here for her too! I’m only an hour away and she could come and stay with me if she wanted.’ Eva had lost count of the times she had invited her mother to come to St Andrews. She glared at Sarah and then shook her head in despair. Balancing a pile of plates in her arms she carried them through to the kitchen, not trusting herself to speak.

      She plonked the dishes down and began to stack the dishwasher. She took a few calming breaths, suddenly overwhelmed with sadness. She couldn’t bear the thought of her and Sarah spending the next few years fighting like this every time they met until eventually they wouldn’t bother to see each other at all. Maybe if they could see each other in different circumstances and relax, they would have a chance to fix whatever it was that was broken between them.

      She thought of Jamie’s trip in a couple of weeks. Deep down she knew she’d have to agree to let him go. Until she actually told him though, she felt she still had some control. Once he knew he was going there would be no turning back. She couldn’t even imagine what she would do with herself that weekend. Before she could change her mind, she went back to the dining room.

      ‘I was thinking, Sarah – Jamie’s got a trip coming up at the end of November – one of those activity weekends for kids. There’s rock climbing, abseiling … that type of thing. I’m a bit nervous about it to be honest, the thought of him doing all those things.’ Eva forced a little laugh, not feeling natural to be confiding in her sister.

      ‘Anyway, why don’t you come up to St Andrews that weekend? There are some great restaurants. We could go for a few walks, maybe open a few bottles of wine. I think there’s even a winter market on that weekend.’

      Sarah looked at her blankly. ‘Sorry, what? Oh no, I’ll be busy that weekend.’

      ‘But I didn’t even say which – you know, it doesn’t matter.’ Eva felt her shoulders slump, suddenly deflated. She gathered the linen napkins from the table, absently admiring the orchid design on them.

      ‘I’d better go and find Jamie and Mum,’ she muttered, not waiting to hear if Sarah replied. In the gleaming new kitchen Eva stood helplessly for a moment. She wished she didn’t have to leave feeling this way. She told herself she’d be home soon, home to her sanctuary. But even that didn’t feel the same any more without the MacKenzies being there. A sudden image of Ben Matthews came into her head and she found herself wondering how he was spending his Sunday.

      ***

      Ben had woken late on Sunday, surprised he had slept for so long. In the kitchen he looked out of the window at the inky grey sky and wondered if it rained here every day. Realizing he was hungry he took eggs from the fridge, deciding to make an omelette. After he had eaten maybe he would go for a walk, explore the town some more. He could buy a paper and come back and read it at leisure.

      It still felt odd having Sundays free. Every Sunday for the past five years he had visited his mother at Cartvale care home. He tried but usually failed to fit in a midweek visit too if work allowed. But he would always spend the whole Sunday with her no matter what. If she was having a good day, they’d walk in the local park or perhaps even have lunch somewhere.

      In some ways, Ben had started to grieve for his mother years before she actually died. The strong woman who had brought him up alone after his father had died started to disappear long before her diagnosis of early onset Alzheimer’s. Yet even now at odd moments like this, the grief and guilt could creep up on him, its severity taking him by surprise. He took a deep breath, sloshing hot water over the coffee granules in a mug, determined not to go there.

      In the dining room – now Ben’s makeshift office – he cleared a space on the table for his plate and ate hungrily. He flicked through a few of the papers and books in front of him, his mound of reading to catch up on. His meeting at the university had gone well on Friday. Meeting up with Professor Drummond had felt like reclaiming something valuable from his old life.

      A slightly eccentric Scot, he had guided Ben through his PhD at Oxford University with patience, wisdom, and more than the odd dram of whisky. Ben had respected him so much and always felt he had let him down in some way, turning his back on research and going to work as an analyst in the city.

      But the Professor had never passed judgement and had understood Ben’s need to earn the type of money you couldn’t earn in academia. Ben hadn’t been surprised when he discovered his old Professor was now at St Andrews, the oldest university in Scotland. An image of him came to Ben’s mind, sitting by a roaring fire with a tumbler in hand. But Ben knew his Professor’s easy charm was matched by his ferocious intelligence. He was still at the forefront of research into gravitational waves. Ben had read his recently published paper, and knew he wanted to be part of it again.

      He had responded to Ben’s email with all the enthusiasm Ben remembered. They both knew it wasn’t an obvious or easy option to return to academia from the world of finance but in typical style Professor Drummond had seen it as a positive, not a negative. ‘Be good to get some fresh blood into the place, a new perspective. Things can get a bit stuffy in academia.’

      After several exchanged emails, Ben had a formal interview via Skype with the Professor and two of his colleagues in the department. He had been questioned in detail about his plans for research – and more importantly, what funding he would obtain. He had listed the grants he could apply for, what journals he would publish in. Ben had studied the curriculum and courses on offer for students and expressed his willingness to be flexible, happy to fit in with the department’s teaching requirements but also had some ideas of his own about teaching.