Santa's Secret Read Online Free PDF Page B

boy screamed with pleasure.
    Eva chuckled. “Okay you, time to go in, and
then it’s bath and bed.”
    “I don’t want to go to bed!”
    She ignored him and smiled at Rudi as he
lowered the boy to the ground. “Thank you for a lovely evening.”
    “Thank you for letting us join you.
It was very kind and I had a nice time.” His eyes showed regret. Was he wishing
he’d kissed her after all?
    She nodded, fighting against her own regret
that threatened to rise. “Perhaps we’ll see you around tomorrow?”
    “Of course. It is a small place, after
all.”
    They smiled at each other, and then Eva
walked away, Oscar wet mitten in hers.

Chapter Four
    The following day, Rudi got up, showered,
dressed, then sat at his computer just as Isabel rolled over in the sofabed and
rubbed her eyes.
    “Morning, Daddy,” she said.
    “Good morning.” He smiled. She had undone
her braids and her hair now lay spilled out on the pillow around her, a mass of
golden waves like a wheat field in summer. She looked like a Scandinavian
goddess, Freyja maybe, or a princess, he thought—Eva was right.
    Isabel sat up and stretched, then pushed
herself out of bed, shoved her feet into the slippers and padded over to him.
To his surprise, she climbed onto his lap and put her arms around him.
    “Hey, rakas. What is the matter?”
    “I had a bad dream.”
    “What was it about?”
    She refused to tell him, but seemed happy
to snuggle up to him, comforted by his presence, so he sat back in the seat and
put his arms around her, resting his lips on the top of her head. There was
nothing to her; he could feel the bones of her ribs through her nightdress, and
she weighed hardly anything.
    A rush of love ran through him, and he
tightened his arms around her. She was not a daddy’s girl and had never been
overly demonstrative, so this sudden display of affection caught him unawares.
How long had it been since someone—anyone—had put their arms around him like
this? He had been starved for physical contact for so long that he had trained
himself to think he didn’t need it. Frieda gave him a kiss on the cheek when
she saw him, but apart from that he hadn’t had a decent hug for an eternity.
    In the cabin next to his, the front door
banged and through the curtains he saw Eva walk down the path to the village,
Oscar running beside her. He blew out a long, slow breath. The night before he
had come very, very close to kissing her. That showed how starved for affection
he was. He’d only just met the poor woman. She’d lost her husband and come to
Rovaniemi to escape—the last thing she would have wanted was some strange guy
taking advantage of her.
    And yet…she’d looked up at him with those
dark brown eyes, and her lips had parted, and she’d looked very much like she
wanted to be kissed. He remembered what she’d said in the restaurant , I
don’t miss him as much as I should . The admission had upset her, and her
eyes had glassed over, with tears not far from the surface. Rudi had changed
the subject, even though he’d wanted to ask her more. He had felt the guilt
rolling off her in waves, and he could understand why—what an admission to make
to a complete stranger! And yet, he thought he understood.
    In a way, it was the same with him and
Vanessa. When they were first together, he’d thought he would be consumed by
jealousy and would kill any man who touched her, but by the time he found out
about her affair, the only emotion he could summon was a vague sense of relief
that he finally had an excuse to divorce her—that he didn’t have to make
something up. Everyone, including Frieda, had treated him with kid gloves for
months as if worried he was going to break down or something, but although he’d
thrown himself into work and retreated socially, the overriding feeling had
only been satisfaction that she wasn’t his responsibility anymore. He was still
supporting her financially, which irked him considering she’d never