The Christmas Surprise Read Online Free PDF

mother. Rosie had called her worse.
    ‘Not yet.’
    ‘Oh man, don’t let her get her claws into the baby. She’ll be sending it out chasing horses and trying to make friends with Prince George and whatever posh people do.’
    There was a pause.
    ‘Can it make friends with Prince George?’
    ‘No, Mum.’
    ‘Ooh, I’ll have to come over. Or you guys come to us!’
    ‘You want me to fly to Australia with a newborn baby?’
    ‘You’ve got the ticket!’
    Her family had given her a ticket to Australia for Christmas.
    ‘Anyway, babies are easy. Just coat the dummy in sugar water and you can basically pop to the shops.’
    ‘Thanks, Mum,’ said Rosie, rolling her eyes.
    ‘Also, on the flight, you give them a little bit of valium …’
    ‘Mu-um!!!!!!’
    ‘Oh my Rosie-Posie, this is so amazing.’
    ‘Well, Pip’s got kids.’
    ‘Yes, I know.’ Her voice softened, and she sounded English again. ‘But when it’s your daughter, it’s something else. Something a bit special … PI-IP!!!! YOUR SISTER’S EXPECTING!’
    ‘Bonzer!’ shouted Pip from what sounded like a long way away.
    ‘Are you out in the garden splashing in the pool this early in the morning?’ asked Rosie suspiciously.
    ‘Yip,’ said Angie proudly. ‘You’d love it here, Rosie.’
    Rosie looked out of the window at the frost-spattered trees and the sparkling garden.
    ‘Maybe,’ she said. ‘But here is pretty good too.’
    ‘Is it as cold as it was at Christmas?’
    ‘It is FAR worse than it was at Christmas. And there’s not even any Christmas!’
    Rosie moved to the front, where Farmer Isitt was walking his old horse. On her back were two of the village children, screaming and laughing, their breath visible on the dark air.
    ‘Brr,’ said Angie.
    ‘No, it’s all right,’ said Rosie, smiling. The fire was crackling invitingly down below. ‘And I’m fine. Hungry.’
    ‘You’re always hungry.’
    ‘Yes, thanks for that. And my bosoms … Uh, never mind.’
    ‘I never will know where those came from,’ said Angie wonderingly. ‘Lilian and I are flat as pancakes.’
    There was a pause while they both wondered, briefly, about Rosie’s father, a travelling man Rosie had never known.
    ‘That child is going to have plenty of family,’ said Angie fiercely, putting Rosie’s thoughts into words. ‘Too much probably. You don’t have to worry about that.’
    ‘No,’ said Rosie.
    She rang off promising to send a picture of her bump week by week, though the idea that she would even have a bump seemed very odd to Rosie, some kind of medical miracle that she couldn’t imagine happening.
    She went back downstairs. Stephen didn’t quite look up; he was gazing at his laptop, as usual cursing the ridiculous slowness of their rural internet connection. It never really bothered Rosie. Angie posted pictures of the children on Facebook every single day, along with inspirational messages about guardian angels and things you had to ‘like’ if you loved your daughter or your niece or stuff like that, and Rosie normally let it load at its own speed then crawled through it later. It was nice keeping up with her old friends – Mike and Giuseppe both changed their relationship status about once every two days – and she ordered supplies for the shop, but apart from that it wasn’t something she was crazy about. Stephen, on the other hand, liked to read the papers and keep up with rugby teams and so on, and was always grousing about how long it took.
    ‘So, you know,’ she said, ‘we’ll have to move to Peak House. We’ll freeze our bums off.’
    Stephen looked up.
    ‘I didn’t think of that,’ he said and bit his lip thoughtfully.
    When Rosie had arrived in Lipton, he had been living in Peak House, the draughty Georgian pile that belonged to the big house. It was right at the top of the hill, open to the wind and rain, but the views were staggering. Stephen’s memories of it were not, however. He associated Peak House with cold