Page 29 of Christmas All the Way

It wasn’t anything she hadn’t suspected. ‘I’m a Cornish girl myself. I grew up in Newquay, not far from Fistral Beach.’

An expression of amazed delight lit up his face. ‘You’re kidding? Fistral is where all the best waves are, although you hardly need me to tell you that.’ He frowned. ‘But you don’t have a Cornish accent.’

‘No,’ she admitted. ‘I made a big effort to ditch it when I went to university, in an effort to be cool and blend in with the crowd. I’m not sure my mother has ever forgiven me.’

Xander gave her a long look. ‘I don’t imagine you’ve ever blended in with the crowd.’

The way he said it did something strange to her insides. She hid the reaction by pouring the tea. ‘Milk?’ she asked, adding a splash when he nodded.

‘So how did you end up here?’ he asked as she finished stirring and handed him a cup. ‘Rather than lecturing at university or writing dry academic papers on the symbolism of flocked wallpaper in nineteenth century literature, I mean.’

She did her best to look offended. ‘I’ll have you know that paper was very well received.’

He gaped at her for a second, uncertainty in his eyes, but she couldn’t prevent herself from grinning and his expression instantly relaxed. ‘I’m not saying there isn’t a lot to be inferred from the way people decorated their walls,’ he explained solemnly. ‘I just meant that if you were writing academic papers, they’d be anything but dry.’

It was another compliment and once again, Keeley felt herself knocked off kilter. ‘Oh, believe me, I’ve written some stinkers. My PhD thesis on the redemption of the Victorian pickpocket in contemporary literature even sent Grace to sleep and she loves Eliza’s novels as much as I do.’

Now Xander grinned. ‘Okay, that doesn’t sound like much of a page turner. Did you take the job here straight after you finished your doctorate?’

She took a sip of tea. ‘No. I fell in love with someone desperately unsuitable – a guitarist in a grunge band who spent ten years smoking weed and insisting his big break was just around the corner, while I worked two jobs to keep a roof over our heads. Eventually, I saw the light, told him he needed to grow up and got a divorce. The position of curator at Juniper Cottage came up around the same time so I applied. And here I am. Watching you take pictures of biscuits and thinking I’m pretty lucky too.’

She meant it as a joke and only realised how it sounded when his eyes met hers. The sudden flicker of warmth in the pit of her stomach blossomed into something altogether more difficult to ignore. Get a grip, she told herself sternly, dropping her gaze to her cup of tea. Apart from anything else, he was a colleague – probably already in a relationship with someone who was not at least five years older than him – and she had no intention of making both their jobs more difficult by developing a crush on him. ‘Speaking of pictures, we should probably get those interior shots you wanted. You’ve got further to go to get home than I have.’

Draining his tea, he nodded. ‘That’s true. It must be nice, living so close to your work.’

She carried the cups to the sink and rinsed them. ‘It is. My house is only a few minutes away – no long commute for me.’

He picked up a tea towel. ‘That’s the only downside of my work. Most of my contracts are short term, so I never know where I’ll be from one month to the next. It’s probably why I’m still single, or at least that’s what I tell my mother.’

The revelation was typically self-deprecating but the information that he wasn’t in a relationship interested Keeley more than she cared to admit. ‘Your contract here isn’t short term,’ she pointed out, striving for nonchalance. ‘You’re contracted to work with us for a year, right?’

‘Yes,’ he said, his gaze flicking sideways. ‘You’re stuck with me for a while yet.’

His words caused another burst of pleasure to bubble up inside her and she dug her fingernails into the palms of her hands in case it showed on her face. When exactly had she gone from wishing he would get out of her hair to being glad he’d be around for many months to come? She had no idea but it was playing havoc with her much-prized professionalism. ‘Shall we head to the library?’ she said, and immediately wanted to cringe at her too-bright tone. ‘That was where you wanted to focus, wasn’t it?’

‘I think so,’ he said. ‘We might need to get creative to achieve the right atmosphere but the sun has set so we should get the full effect of the lantern I brought.’

She glanced at him curiously. ‘You brought your own lantern?’

‘It’s almost October,’ he said as she pushed back the door of the library and switched on the lights. ‘Spooky season. I thought it might be fun to take some shots to use around Halloween.’

He slid his rucksack from his shoulder and she eyed it with some trepidation, hoping he wasn’t about to pull out a severed hand or, worse still, a rubber mask. But all he had was an ornate metal lantern, of the kind she’d seen on display at Ruggles during her most recent visit, and she let out an inward sigh of relief. She didn’t even object when he asked if he could use a real candle. ‘Make sure you don’t drop wax on the carpet,’ she warned. ‘And don’t set off the smoke alarm.’

Although the truth was that a fire burned in the hearth most days in the colder months and the smoke from that had never triggered the alarms. But once again, Xander slipped into professional mode and she knew there was no danger to the floor or her eardrums. As before, it was a pleasure to watch him work and she found herself seeing the library through new eyes. She’d never felt anything but a sense of peace and calm while inside the room, but seeing him create shadows and puddles of darkness for the photographs, she could almost believe the notion that something wicked was lurking just out of sight, watching them and waiting. She shook the thought away, reminding herself that she was forty-two, not four.

‘How would you feel about moving this?’

The question broke the spell. She turned her attention back to Xander and saw he was standing beside Eliza’s writing desk, which sat in front of the window. The lit lantern had been positioned in the centre, and she saw the problem right away. No matter where Xander stood, his image was reflected in the glass of the window, ruining the shot. ‘Can’t you edit yourself out?’ she asked.

‘I can try,’ he said. ‘But it would be much easier to move the desk a metre to the side and avoid the problem completely.’

Keeley gnawed at her lip. The desk was an authenticated original by Thomas Chippendale dating from around 1800, with a polished walnut veneer and delicate claw legs. Eliza had written her correspondence, diaries and novels while seated at it and the drawers contained several of her own ink pots and nibs. The volunteers were under strict instructions to take the utmost care when dusting and vacuuming, and to the best of Keeley’s knowledge, it had never been moved. But Chippendale had been a master craftsman; his furniture had been made to withstand the test of time. It ought to be fine to move it temporarily, she thought. If they were very careful.

‘We’ll need to remove the drawers,’ she told Xander. ‘I don’t want any of them to fall out and get damaged.’

‘No problem,’ he said. ‘Would it help if we wore gloves?’

It was a thoughtful suggestion, although she doubted either of them had anything on their skin that might damage the wood. ‘There’s a box in my office,’ she said. ‘I’ll go and grab them.’