Snowbound Surrender. Louise Allen

said, returning the salute. The relationship between him and his elder sibling could not quite be called an estrangement, but it had never been easy.

      ‘No pride for the honour you did your uniform? No relief at your safety?’ Fred said, surprised as they raised their swords to fight.

      ‘Nothing obvious,’ Jack replied.

      ‘Do not let him trouble you. He was always thus. And you still have friends who love you dearly and are eager to add to your acquaintance.’

      ‘You are speaking of your fiancée,’ Jack said.

      Fred began the bout with a direct attack that was easily parried. ‘I wrote to tell you of the engagement. I received no answer.’ There was a hint of petulance in his tone, to remind Jack again where his obligation lay.

      ‘I meant to congratulate you in person.’ Parry and riposte. The action of his sword was strong and sure. But it was a weak conversational counter, since he’d given no indication thus far that he knew or cared about Fred’s plans to marry.

      ‘Thank you,’ Fred replied, obviously distracted since he’d failed to block Jack’s blade as it touched his shoulder. ‘Miss Forsythe is eager to see you, since I have spoken of you often.’

      ‘I am sure she is a lovely girl.’ Jack’s jaw clenched. Was Fred really dead to the irony of expecting good wishes from the man whose hopes he had ruined? He followed up his first attack with a second, to the stomach, the force of which was met with a woof of expelled air.

      Fred straightened to regain his wind, then dropped back into fencing stance, advancing. ‘And it surprises me that you have not enquired about Lucy.’

      Just the mention of her name shattered Jack’s concentration and allowed Fred to score a touch, directly to the centre of his chest. If he had been so careless in any of the last five years, he would not be alive to be so troubled by the memory of her.

      ‘How is she?’ he managed to say, trying to pretend that the answer did not matter to him.

      ‘Much the same as she ever was. If you come home with me for Christmas, you may see for yourself.’

      The ice around him cracked and, for a moment, everything was unbearably real. Jack did his best to keep a calm tone and a neutral expression. ‘Your sister is still with you?’

      Fred laughed. ‘Where else would she be but at home?’

      ‘I thought...perhaps she had married by now.’ He had done his best to think of nothing but that. There had to be something that put her firmly out of reach and out of mind. It was clear by the rush of blood he felt at the thought of her that time and distance had done nothing to change his feelings.

      Her brother laughed again, scoring another touch against an opponent who was suddenly without defences. ‘For the moment, at least, she is still unattached. But not for want of trying on my part. I found her several men who would have done nicely and she refused them all. But it seems she is finally about to settle. The local Vicar has been the front runner for her affections for some time.’

      ‘The Vicar.’ A man of God was exactly the sort of husband Jack would have expected Fred to choose for Lucy. Someone quiet, proper and altogether wrong for the girl he remembered.

      ‘She has put the fellow off for so long that I was worried she meant to stay on the shelf. But things are coming to a head and I expect we will have good news on that front before Twelfth Night.’

      ‘That is good to know,’ Jack replied. ‘She was a lovely girl.’

      ‘Still is,’ Fred corrected. ‘I rather fancy the idea of a double wedding. But I cannot make her decision for her.’

      ‘Not any more,’ Jack said, pleased that there was no trace of bitterness in his voice. ‘She is of age now, is she not?’

      ‘Two and twenty,’ Fred replied. ‘Well past time for her to settle down. But she is still the most obstinate creature imaginable and refuses to be rushed.’

      When he’d last seen her, she had been nothing of the kind. She’d been as eager and impetuous as he had been, both of them hurrying to arrive simultaneously at some place they’d no right to go. To drive the thought away, Jack renewed his attack with a grunt of exertion and a thrust to the gut that would have ended his friend if it were not for the button on the end of the blade.

      Fred gasped in approval and surrendered his weapon. ‘Well done. Did you learn that in Portugal?’

      ‘Spain,’ Jack said.

      ‘You must teach it to me. In exchange, I will provide you with the finest Christmas dinner to be found in any of the north counties and a stocked cellar as well. Good food and good company. It shall be just as it was in our youth.’

      ‘It sounds delightful,’ Jack said, surprised by the sound of his own voice. He’d meant to tell Fred to go to the devil, if such a thing was suggested. His plans for Christmas Day were far darker and lonelier than anything Fred could imagine. But if there was still hope...

      There was not, he reminded himself. Though Lucy was not already married, she had found someone who might make her happy. She would be wed soon enough. He’d not heard a word from her in five years to hint that she wanted to renew what they’d shared or wished to see him again, even over a holiday table. But it seemed he was as big a fool as ever he had been and could not resist one last look at the only woman he would ever love.

       Chapter Two

      ‘Jack Gascoyne is home.’

      Lucy Clifton’s heart thumped in her chest at the sound of the name that had not been spoken aloud in their house for almost five years. Then, as she had with every other element of her life, she gained control of it, smothering it to silence. She answered her brother, Frederick, without looking up. ‘He was so long in Belgium after the war that I had begun to wonder if he meant to return at all. Is he well?’

      ‘No,’ her brother said, in a dire tone that made it impossible for her to pretend uninterest.

      Fred’s brief answer did nothing to quell her fears. Was he whole? Was he unhurt? Was he as handsome as she remembered, or would it be easier to resist him, should she see him again? If he had been sickly, or missing a limb, she’d have hoped that her brother might have added this information freely after the negative. Instead, there was something in her brother’s silence that made whatever was wrong with him sound even worse than a life-altering injury. ‘What is the matter? Was he hurt in battle?’

      Fred shook his head. ‘He is intact, as far as I can tell.’ Then he added cautiously, ‘But something is not right about him. When I saw him, it felt as though I was talking to a stranger.’

      ‘Time changes people,’ she reminded him, wishing that it had done more to change her own feelings.

      ‘So does war,’ her brother added, unsmiling.

      It did not really matter what had caused him to forget her. There were any number of reasons that he had not come home to them, the chief one being that he had not wanted to. Just as he’d often done when they were younger, he had walked away from the trouble he’d caused and let others deal with the resulting mess. For a moment, her sympathy was overwhelmed by the anger she felt when she thought of him. Then she forced it below the surface again.

      ‘If he is a changed man, then I suspect that is why we have not seen him before now,’ she said, wondering if her brother had any inkling of the true reason he had chosen to stay away. ‘He has other, newer friends that understand him better.’

      ‘Perhaps so. But they are neglecting him, or he them, for he is in a sad state. But I am sure a visit here will put him to rights again,’ her brother said as if character could be turned like a wheel.

      ‘If he is content, then it is not our business to