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Her mouth opened but the words seemed to stall

‘What?’ he proently

‘I want a proper Christ fire, and a huge Christet in the oven’ She took a deep breath ‘I want to be able to sain and I want to spend all day—or all night—decorating it the way I used to with o into the kitchen and bake Christmas muffins and let the smell drift all around’ She squeezed her eyes closed for a second ‘And I don’t want to be alone’

Finlay was dus’ Grace didn’t want perfu for materialistic items

She wanted time She wanted company She wanted the Christmas experience

He glanced out of theagain He was a little confused Snow dusted the top of every rooftop in London—just as it had for the last week

‘What do you mean by snow?’ he said carefully

She opened her eyes again as he released his hands from her shoulders She held out her hands ‘You know—real snow Snow that’s so thick you can hardly walk in it Snow you can lie down on and do snow angels without feeling the pavement beneath your shoulder blades Snow that there’s actually enough of to build a snowman and make snowballs with Snow that, when you look out, all you can see is white with little bumps and you wonder what they actually are’ He could hear the wonder in her voice, the excite what she wished Christmas could be like

‘And then you go inside the house and all you can smell is the Christmas tree, and the muffins, and then listen to the crackle of the real fire as you try and dry off fro now It seemed that Grace Ellis could tell him exactly what she wanted from this Christmas

And he knew exactly where she could get it The snow scene in her head—he’d seen that view a hundred ti fire—he had that too

This was Grace The person who’d shot a little fire into his blood in the last few days The person who’d irl with the warht not be quite as bleak as he’d once iined

He could do this He could give her the Christmas she deserved

‘Pack your bag’

Her eyes widened and she frowned ‘What?’

He started walking through the penthouse, heading to his cupboards to pull out some clothes It was cold up north; he’d need to wrap up