“Don’t see how.” The dowager dropped into a chair by the fireplace and stuck out her legs before the flames, raising her skirts to warm her stockings.
“There is a bit of mistletoe,” said Matilda, glaring up at a particularly large bit of white-berried greenery, “in every single window and doorway. There’s one in the middle of the room.”
“I do not see a problem.” Franny tilted her face to the ceiling.
“I think the problem might be,” Clara said, stepping carefully into the room, “that one cannot avoid the mistletoe, and that one might not be able to avoid kissing someone one does not wish to kiss.”
Matilda threw her arm out in Clara’s direction. “Precisely. I don’t wish to kiss Zander.” She shivered. “Or Theo or Andrew.” Another shiver.
Franny set up right, her gaze darting from one bushel of ribboned mistletoe to the next. “I did not consider that.”
“Let us remove some,” Matilda said, “please? We shall think more strategically about it. Let us put some in that corner and put a fire screen over the corners so that anyone who wishes a private kiss may dart behind there.”
Franny scowled at the corner Matilda indicated. “But then I can’t see.”
“You do not need to see.” Matilda’s fists found her hips.
“You know exactly how to ruin an old lady’s fun.” Franny sank back into her chair.
“So I have been told before, numerous times.” Matilda did not seem to mind.
“What’s this?” Raph stepped into the room. Looking up at the mistletoe in the doorway, he grinned. “Matilda, darling, come here.”
“No.” She stuck her feet to the other side of the room. “I don’t think I will give your mother a show.”
He scowled, and then he seemed to have spotted another piece of mistletoe and another and another, and then his wolfish grin returned. And he strolled across the room to his wife. He glanced up once he had her in his arms. She glanced up, too.
Right at the large bundle of mistletoe above them.
“Bother,” she said, but with no real heat.
And then he kissed her.
Clara looked away.
“See,” Franny said, “it’s perfect. No need to rearrange. Raph likes it just as it is.”
When Raph came up from the kiss, Matilda leaning weak-kneed against him, he said, “Oh yes, I had a reason for seeking you out. Mother, your children have arrived.”
“Your favorite children.” Theo stood in the doorframe, his wife, Cordelia, on his arm.
Behind him stood Lord Andrew and his new wife, the secretary Clara had met before.
Franny jumped to her feet and gathered her sons into her embrace. “All of you at once! Why, you never let me know!” She bounced up on tiptoe and pinched Lord Andrew’s cheeks. “We did not expect you so soon, dear. My dreams said not a word on the matter.”
Miss Amelia Dart, Lady Andrew Bromley now, grinned. “I apologize for not letting your dreams know our travel plans.”
“A sudden change to the schedule,” Lord Andrew said. “And more efficient to travel with Theo and Cordelia.” He looked away from his mother, his sharp gaze scanning the faces of all assembled. And stopping on Clara’s. “I have a new sister-in-law to greet.” He left his wife’s side, but she followed after, a bounce in her steps, her feet lively beneath her berry-colored skirts. He stopped just before Clara, and his new wife looped her arm through his.
“We’ve met before,” Clara said. “No need for introductions.”
“But we were not sisters then.” The secretary beamed. “Then, I was Mrs. Amelia Dart to you, but now, I am just Amelia.” She folded Clara’s hand between her own.
And Clara felt the welcome so completely, she almost could not speak. “Clara.” Her name a bark she forced from her throat. “You must call me Clara.”
“Naturally, I will.” Amelia released Clara’s hand, the stern Mrs. Dart returning in her raised brow. “I know how things go in this family.”
Lord Andrew, behind her, cleared his throat, and when Amelia turned around to see what he wanted, he shot his gaze directly upward. Amelia looked up, too.
