When Neve envisaged seeing her ex-boyfriend for the first time since their break-up, she had never imagined it playing out like this. She kind of thought, if she ever saw Oakley Rey again, she would be dressed in a sexy, floor-length dress and looking utterly fabulous. She wouldn’t be standing there with tears falling down her cheeks at seeing him again and she wouldn’t be dressed as an elf with red and white tights and oversized green pointy shoes with bells on the ends.
She couldn’t believe he was here. He should be at some super-glamorous, glitzy party in California but instead Oakley Rey, Hollywood superstar, was climbing out of a helicopter on the tiny remote Juniper Island, the northernmost island of the British Isles.
She wiped her eyes and watched him stride across the grass towards her. Her heart physically ached. There was a part of her that wanted to run straight into his arms, but it was outweighed by the part that had her pointy elf shoes glued to the ground. He looked amazing. Incredibly he had bulked out in the nine weeks since they had been apart, somehow looking so much bigger and more muscular than she remembered. He looked strong, confident and every inch the Hollywood star.
His eyes locked with hers as he moved towards her and it was almost as if they were the only people in the world before she suddenly remembered that she was standing in the grounds of the Stardust Lake Hotel. Her unexpected reunion was about to be witnessed by probably half the guests as they all peered out their windows to see who had arrived in the black, sleek helicopter. It was Christmas Eve, every lodge at the hotel had been taken up by the guests and journalists that had arrived for the grand opening a few days before. And worse still, her family was standing there with her.
Her mum and dad stood frozen to the ground to the right of her, while Gabe, her brother, had his arm round her shoulders, trying to offer some comfort at the shock of seeing Oakley again. She heard Gabe’s girlfriend, Pip, asking quietly who the man was and Gabe telling her it was Oakley, confirming that she wasn’t having some kind of hallucination. No one moved, no one said anything, and there wasn’t a single word in her head that she could utter to encapsulate her feelings over seeing him again.
In the end Neve’s four-year-old niece broke the silence.
‘Oakley!’ Wren squealed with delight and ran forward to greet him as Neve herself should have done. Wren launched herself at him and Oakley dropped his bag and caught the bundle of arms and legs and threw her up in the air before catching her again. She let out a shriek of joy and giggled as Oakley threw her over his shoulder and hung her upside down. He adored Wren, always had, and the ache in Neve’s chest grew to something almost tangible as she watched them play and laugh together. He would make a wonderful father. One day – he was too young now. At twenty-six, his lifelong dream of being a movie star was about to be realised and a child would get in the way of that.
With Wren still slung over his shoulder, Oakley walked up to them so that he was within touching distance. Every bone in her body screamed at her to take that last step, lean her head against his heart and feel his arms around her, with his head resting on top of hers as he always used to hold her. But she couldn’t.
For a second, all his confidence seemed to falter at a lack of any reaction from her, but as he clocked the tears in her eyes, he smiled, sadly. ‘Hey, Freckle,’ Oakley said, softly.
His voice, his name for her on his lips. It was enough to send the tears straight back to her eyes again. How could she ever think she could let this man go?
When there were still no words forthcoming, Gabe cleared his throat. ‘Hi Oakley, erm... It’s good to see you again.’
Oakley tore his eyes away from Neve to address her brother.
‘Hey, Gabe, I think this belongs to you.’ Oakley handed over a giggling Wren to Gabe. ‘I hope you don’t mind me landing there. We were heading to the airport when I saw you guys walking over to the hotel. I didn’t want to waste any time getting to my girl.’
My girl. Neve swallowed, painfully.
The helicopter suddenly took off with an ear-splitting noise and as it faded into the distance, silence descended on them again.
Gabe spoke again, clearly trying to fill the gaps. ‘We weren’t expecting you. All our lodges are full. We have houses down in the village where you could stay for a few days but I think we’ve filled a few of them for the New Year’s Eve ball. We could—’
‘You don’t need to worry, I’ll be staying in Neve’s house,’ Oakley said, simply.
Her heart thundered against her chest at that thought.
‘I don’t think that’s a good idea,’ Gabe said, clearly uncomfortable about him showing up like this and not knowing what Neve’s reaction to it would be. She couldn’t help him out. She had no idea what her reaction should be either.
Her mum, Lizzie, stepped forward and to Neve’s surprise she embraced Oakley in a hug. ‘It’s so lovely to see you again. We’re all heading over to have some lunch. You’d be very welcome to join us but I expect you and Neve have some talking to do.’
Lizzie stepped back and then with meaningful looks at the rest of her family she ushered them all away from Neve and Oakley.
Luke, her older brother, hovered for a moment, his hand on Neve’s back. ‘You OK?’
Neve nodded. Luke gave Oakley a meaningful glare then walked after the rest of his family, leaving her alone with the man who had stolen her heart.
Oakley stared down at her, his face breaking into that gorgeous heart-stopping smile. ‘You don’t look too happy to see me. I did promise I’d spend Christmas with you, you know I never break a promise.’
She cleared her throat. ‘That was before we broke up.’
He stepped closer, so close she could feel his warmth, his wonderful scent that reminded her of sweet roasted chestnuts, close enough to see the flecks of toffee gold in his warm chocolate eyes.
‘We never broke up, Freckle, we were just... taking a break.’
She wanted to kiss him, to lean up and press her lips to his. How could she feel this way? She’d chosen to break up with him and it had been nine weeks. She was supposed to be over him by now. It wasn’t supposed to still be hurting like this. She had missed him so much.
Clarity came when her eyes found the small scar on the side of his head. The scar she knew he’d got while filming a scene in his latest movie. Mere days after she had read about it online, she had switched on her computer to find that he had been rumoured to be seeing the pretty red-headed doctor who had stitched him back up. One of many women he had been linked with over the last few weeks. She didn’t know why she tortured herself daily with reading the Google alerts for him, but he was like an addiction for her and if she couldn’t be with him then that had been her poor substitute.
She stepped back out of his proximity and immediately felt cold without him.
Unperturbed, he turned and grabbed his bag. ‘Which way to your house?’
‘You’re not staying with me. I have one bed and one shower.’
‘Looks like we’ll have to share then,’ Oakley said, walking off.
She marched up to him. ‘We are not sharing anything. Lord knows whose bed you’ve been sharing for the last few weeks! I’d like to keep my sheets clean, thank you very much and—’
She let out a yelp as he wrapped a hand round her waist and tugged her up against him, his brown eyes shadowed by his eyebrows as he scowled at her. ‘Is that what you really think? That I’ve been working my way around the female population of California in your absence? There’s been many a woman who has flashed me a pretty smile and her phone number or in some cases her room number. Not one of them interested me. Not one of them made my pulse race like you do. Not one of them made me laugh as hard as you do. They weren’t you and being with them would not even have scratched the surface of what I got from you so there was absolutely no point. You are the only one I want and I’m here to get you back.’
He released her and walked away towards the lodges.
She watched him walk up the path ahead of her. He made it sound so simple when in reality it wasn’t. He lived in California, she lived here at the Stardust Lake Hotel. He was about to become a huge Hollywood star, she was a hotel manager. Their worlds couldn’t be any further apart. And the biggest problem was the secret she carried inside of her, the secret she had kept to herself for the last ten days. If he knew that he would run a hundred miles away from her.
He turned back briefly. ‘Which house, Freckle?’
They needed to talk, she knew that. As Neve noticed a few guests peering out their windows at what was transpiring, she knew they needed to talk in private and the only way she was going to get that was by taking him to her house.
She pointed. ‘That one in the corner with the holly wreath on the front door.’
He turned and walked towards it.
She would tell him and let the cards fall where they may.
Adam Douglas looked out of his office window as the helicopter took off, shattering the tranquil peace of the island for a second time. Oakley Rey was here and while he was happy for Neve that they would hopefully be able to sort out their differences, he had a good mind to go down there and give Oakley a piece of his mind for landing so close to the hotel. If only he could get off the phone. He watched Oakley talking to Neve and decided for her sake to let it go. He tuned back in to what was being said on the other end of the line.
‘...I’m ever so worried,’ said Deborah, the owner of the chocolate shop in the village.
Adam sighed and rubbed his head. ‘How long has Ivy been missing?’
‘Well, as I said, she always goes out for a walk at about seven in the morning. She’s normally back after an hour. We’ve been so busy with the shop I didn’t realise she hadn’t come back. We’ve been round to her house but there’s no answer.’
Adam glanced at his watch. Ivy, the woman who ran the painting shop, had been out for nearly five hours. The hotel had an agreement with the villagers that their shops must be open between the hours of ten and six and although he didn’t know Ivy personally, he knew that all the shop owners in the tiny village were reliable and wouldn’t just not open unless there was a really good reason for it. It was freezing outside – if she had gone out for a walk and fallen over somewhere, she’d be at risk of hypothermia now as well as any injuries she had sustained from the fall.
‘I’ll get a search party together, any idea where she goes?’ Adam asked.
‘No, I don’t, I’m afraid.’
‘OK, can you keep an eye out for her and if she comes back to the village, can you call through to the hotel and let us know?’
‘Of course, I’m sorry to bother you, I didn’t know who else to call.’
‘It’s no bother.’
He finished the call and phoned through to the reception asking Iris to contact the boys from the maintenance team, the porters and round up anyone else who was free. He asked her to put together some basic rescue bags including blankets, water, a walkie-talkie, some snacks and a first aid kit.
He pulled his coat and snow boots on. There were never problems like this to sort out at the hotel he worked at as deputy manager in London. The worst thing he had to sort out there was a mistake with a reservation, a wedding not up to the high standards of a bridezilla or men who were using the hotel for extramarital affairs and their wives finding out. He had been on the island for four days, on a secondment from the London hotel to help Neve with the opening of Stardust Lake Hotel, and he was already realising how different life was going to be for the next few months on this tiny island.
The hotel accommodation was made up of lots of ski lodges instead of rooms, and instead of spa facilities and a pool there were snowmobiling and sledging activities and a giant ice palace where the New Year’s Eve ball was to take place in a week’s time. The only way onto the island was by boat or plane, whereas normally everyone who arrived at the hotel in central London came by taxi or a chauffeur-driven car. The weather was brutal – it had snowed every day since he had arrived and the cold coastal winds were harsh and cruel. And he had Shetland ponies that ran riot around the village, apparently stealing things from the villagers and the tourists.
The village was another thing to contend with. He had met many of the villagers a few days before – wonderful, colourful, mostly elderly characters. Many of them telling him excitedly about the predicted spectacular show of the Merry Dancers over the Christmas period. It had taken him a while to realise that they were talking about the Northern Lights. Deborah had told him the meanings of the different colours. He remembered that a red aurora was a foretelling of love, which brought a whole new meaning to the expression, ‘Red sky at night, shepherd’s delight’.
The town called Christmas was to be an almost year-long Christmas and winter-themed market. Most of the people in the village were islanders who had lived there all their lives. Gabe Whitaker had come along and converted all their houses into wooden ski lodges and somehow persuaded them all to run individual little shops selling crafts and food straight from their front rooms. Although they were supposed to be independent shops, Neve had explained to him that the islanders were to be treated almost like hotel staff and would need to be looked after, especially the older folk, who might need hand-holding during the first few weeks of the hotel opening.
And that was another thing that was causing him a headache. Neve. He’d known her for eight years and she was the most organised and efficient person he knew. Nothing fazed her, she never got upset, she was fiery and took no crap. But since he’d got there she had been in a complete state, crying all the time, she’d been sick several times as well and, although he knew she was upset because of her break-up with Oakley, he strongly suspected she was pregnant and that was the reason why she was an emotional wreck.
And now he had a missing old lady to contend with too.
He ran down the stairs to the reception and spoke to Iris and Jake, the receptionist and porter, co-ordinating the search. He grabbed his rescue bag as Iris made up a few more and then headed outside, just as Gabe, Luke and their parents walked up the steps with Pip and Wren, probably heading for lunch.
‘Ivy Storm has gone missing,’ Adam said, not bothering with any preliminaries. ‘She went out for a walk around seven this morning and hasn’t come back. I’ve organised a search of the island, around the south, east and north. Can you guys take the west side and I’ll cut through the middle road?’
Gabe’s dad, David, scooped up Wren. ‘We’ll take care of Wren, you guys go and find this lady.’
Gabe looked at his parents apologetically and Adam knew that he had planned to spend the whole day with Pip, his parents and his daughter.
‘Sorry, Princess, I won’t be long,’ Gabe said, pressing a kiss to Wren’s forehead.
‘It’s OK Daddy, you need to find Ivy and make sure she is safe,’ Wren said, with all the wisdom of someone five times her age.
Iris came out and handed bags and walkie-talkies to them. Luke agreed to take the coastal path and Gabe and Pip said they would head to the west.
‘Shall I go and get Neve?’ Gabe asked.
Adam looked over at Neve and Oakley, who were standing talking to each other as if they were the only people in the world that existed.
‘No, they need to talk. We can handle this one without her.’
He watched as Oakley marched over towards Neve’s house and Neve followed him.
He turned back to Gabe, Pip and Luke and they all split up in search of Ivy. Adam headed towards the road that cut straight through the middle of the island. Snow started to fall again and he looked up and cursed the sky. He only hoped they would find Ivy soon.
Oakley looked around the resort as he walked up to Neve’s house. It had changed so much since he had been up there with her in the spring. The little snow-capped wooden ski lodges looked cosy and inviting, some of them with trails of smoke drifting from the chimneys. Behind the lodges, up on the hillside, he could see the cluster of glass igloos, some of them glowing gold against the backdrop of the sparkling snow. He’d seen the spectacular ice palace as he’d flown over, which was another new addition. He knew Neve had worked so hard to get everything ready for the opening and he was so proud of her and what she had achieved.
He glanced back at her, smiling at how adorable she looked in her elf costume. Her long, black hair cascaded over one shoulder in loose curls and he longed to run his fingers through it again. She looked pale, paler than normal, which was saying something when she normally had skin the colour of fresh fallen snow. Her freckles, peppered over her cheeks and nose, seemed darker than usual. Maybe she was ill or maybe just shocked to see him turn up here like this. She’d be even more shocked when she found out the reason why he’d come. He smiled at the thought, though nerves and fear slammed into his stomach as soon as he allowed himself to think about it.
Oakley pushed the thought away and walked up the stairs to her front door. He let himself in and looked around as he dumped his bag on the chair.
Inside it was small and cosy, decked in wood panelling with colourful rugs and cushions. There were two bright blue sofas facing each other either side of a log fire and a Christmas tree dressed in silver ribbons and twinkling lights stood in one corner. Open wooden stairs led up to a mezzanine bedroom; he presumed the bathroom was up there too. There was a small kitchen area at the back. It was nice, but there was something about the place that suggested this was somewhere that Neve stayed, not lived. There was nothing personal about this space, no photos, no trinkets or ornaments. It lacked anything of her personality at all.
‘Nice place.’
Neve closed the door behind her and leaned up against it. Why did she look scared to have him here?
‘Can I get you a drink, or something to eat?’ she said.
She was being so polite to him and he hated it. Their relationship had always been filled with chemistry and passion. He wanted to grab her, kiss her hard, taste her, run his fingers over her silky skin and then drag her down in front of the fireplace and show her how very impolite he could be. This politeness made him worry that maybe he’d left things too late. Maybe they really were over.
She was still waiting for his answer.
‘Burger and fries would be great. It feels like I’ve been travelling for two days to get here and even in first class the airplane food is bad. I’ll take a beer too, please.’
‘Burger and chips,’ Neve corrected, and he was relieved to see the small smirk playing on her lips.
Oakley laughed. ‘I’ve been stateside too long.’
Neve pushed away from the door and picked up the phone, presumably dialling through to reception. She put the order in for food to be delivered and when she put the phone down she turned back to face him.
God, he had missed her so much. He should never have let her go, he should have fought for her when she had broken up with him. He should have called before now, talked to her, but his stubborn pride had prevented him from begging her to come back. But now he would get down on his knees and beg and plead for her to give them another chance, pride be damned. He loved her and he needed her in his life and he had no intention of leaving here without her.
Silence stretched between them. How had it come to this? When they were together they would talk for hours barely drawing breath and now things were awkward between them. He looked around the room, he needed to say something and he knew he couldn’t lead with the main reason for his trip.
He glanced at the fireplace and walked over, getting to his knees as he built and lit a fire. Maybe if the room was warm and cosy it might make them both relax a bit.
Neve was watching him, he knew that, and as he glanced over his shoulder he saw her staring at his bum. He smiled, a sliver of hope blooming in his heart.
He stood up and wiping his hands down his jeans he stared at the flames as they flickered and danced in the fireplace.
She came over to stand next to him and that gave him hope too.
‘How’s it been going here at the hotel?’ Oakley asked. ‘I know you were helping to oversee the development of it for months when you were in London, flying back and forth between the two hotels, you worked your arse off. Did everything go smoothly for the opening?’
‘It couldn’t have gone better. The ice palace is a big hit, people love the glass igloos and the village with the Christmas market. People have been hiring the snowmobiles or hiking around the island and the grand opening and the Christmas carnival were a huge success. I’m so pleased for Gabe, all his hard work paid off.’
‘All your hard work too. He is very lucky to have you.’
‘I’m lucky to have him. He gave me a home when I had nothing, gave me a job. I owe him so much.’
‘I think you’ve paid your dues.’
It annoyed him that she felt this huge sense of loyalty to her brother. She worked her arse off for him. Gabe was a good man and Oakley respected how he looked after his family and his staff, but he didn’t want Neve’s loyalty to him to stand in the way of her own dreams.
‘Oakley, we need to talk.’
He looked at her and saw real fear in her eyes. What on earth did she want to say that had her looking like that? Not unless she had moved on with someone else already. That would put a real dampener on his plans.
He lifted a curl of her black hair off her face and tucked it behind her ear. ‘I’m listening, Freckle.’
Her breath caught in her throat at his touch and any words she had been trying to say dried in her mouth.
With his blond hair curling at the back of his neck, his white shirt open at the collar and his tanned chest peeking out the top, he was a sight for sore eyes.
‘You look good, Oakley.’
He grinned as he appraised her. ‘You look amazing.’
‘I’m dressed as an elf.’
‘You still look amazing. Always do.’
She sighed. He was such a charmer and, like many women before her, and probably many women after her, she had fallen for it, hook, line and sinker.
‘I’m going to get changed. One of the porters will be bringing over the food shortly.’
‘Do you need any help getting out of that costume, Freckle?’ Oakley called after her as she walked up the stairs.
‘I’m sure I’ll manage.’
‘Well, give me a call if you need me.’
Neve walked into her bedroom and sat down on the bed, glad to have the space from him. He was here in her home. The last time she’d seen him, he’d been just about to jet off to Hollywood to start filming the latest comic book superhero blockbuster with Oakley in the title role of Obsidian. And now he was here, on this tiny remote island off the coast of Scotland with a permanent population of sixty-three people, probably a hundred if you counted all the hotel staff staying there. The last time she had seen him, she had broken his heart by ending things between them and, as he had stormed out of her bedroom and slammed the door . . .
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