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Hannah found herself imagining Lottie dropping her at her front door and leaning in. She shook her head slightly. No. That was ridiculous. She had clearly had far too much to drink. Lottie didn’t want to be with anyone. And besides, Hannah was straight. Or at least, she’d been straight for the last forty-two years.

Chapter Twenty

LOTTIE

Hannah had sparked something protective in Lottie. Somehow, she managed to be both worldly wise and tough but also incredibly vulnerable in many ways. Lottie still felt bad for telling Hannah she was ‘doing sex wrong’. It had been a glib, throwaway remark, but it was also really patronising and clearly made Hannah feel uncomfortable – at least, to start with.

Even so, the conversation they’d had in the pub had been more expansive than she had expected from Hannah. Lottie had forgotten herself when Hannah asked her to describe her type. She’d essentially described Hannah before realising what she’d done. The truth was that Hannah was exactly her type. Except for the fact that she was a bit of an ice queen. And straight. Lottie had long given up on crushes on straight women. That was a fool’s errand she had abandoned in her teens.

She held tight onto Hannah’s arm though, telling herself it was about keeping her safe on the windy walk home. She conveniently forgot the fact that it was Hannah who had in fact prevented her from falling earlier on, in a move that had very nearly made her swoon. She rolled her eyes at herself. She was clearly in some kind of sex-starved state, to be fixating on a woman who was very much not available.

The lights of her cottage glowed from the path. “Well, I can tell Freya’s already home,” said Lottie. “It would seem she has lit every light in the house,” she observed drily.

“You just need to walk in and say that it looks like Blackpool illuminations to complete your role as parent, right?” Hannah shouted over the wind.

“Too right,” giggled Lottie.

“You know, you can just go straight in and I’ll find my own way back to the castle. I can see the lights of the back doors from here.” Hannah pointed, her arm wavering in the wind.

“No,” said Lottie, even though she knew Hannah was perfectly capable of looking after herself and walking the last hundred metres or so to safety. Something inside her didn’t want to say goodnight to this mysterious woman. At least, not yet. “Come on, it’ll only take a moment.”

Hannah didn’t argue, and before long they were in the stone porch by the back door, sheltering from the weather. “Wow,” said Hannah. “That was quite a walk.”

“It was,” said Lottie, thinking both of the weather and the way her meandering thoughts had been considering what it would feel like to kiss Hannah’s lips.

Hannah pulled off her hat, her hair wild about her head in the gale. Lottie laughed. “I’ll bet they’d never let you on TV looking this windswept.” She put out a hand to push a few strands of hair behind Hannah’s ear.

Hannah’s eyes widened, and her own hand covered Lottie’s. They were facing each other now, their breath visible in the relative stillness of the porch.

“Sorry,” said Lottie, making to pull away her hand. She knew she’d overstepped. She hadn’t meant to. It had just happened.

Hannah tightened her grip on Lottie’s hand and held it in place, against her own face.

“I don’t know how to…” Hannah trailed off, and it looked for a moment as though she might cry.

Lottie gently stroked Hannah’s cheek. “It’s OK.” She wasn’t sure what Hannah was trying to do, or say. But it was clear that the woman in front of her needed to be reassured, to be loved even.

Hannah reached out her other hand to Lottie’s sleeve and rested it there. She didn’t say anything, but she looked into Lottie’s eyes. “I never really knew you before,” she breathed. “I think I should have made more of an effort.”

“Oh, I was a flyaway party girl, you’d have hated me,” said Lottie with a gentle smile.

Hannah chuckled, then looked serious. “If I wanted to kiss you now, would that be a bad thing?”

Lottie’s own eyes widened. She took a breath before speaking. “It could be a very good thing, Hannah, if that’s what you really want to do.”

“OK,” said Hannah, blinking fast.

Lottie could see their breath mingling in the warm air between them. She knew this was a risky position to put them both in. Not least because until a moment ago she had taken Hannah at her word that she was straight.

But this evening, things had felt different. And somewhere between the conversation in the pub and the walk back to the castle, an intimacy had blossomed between them.

Hannah took a half step forward and looked directly at Lottie, as if examining her every thought. She took a shallow breath, then leaned forward. Lottie’s eyes shuttered closed, and she felt the warmth of Hannah’s face before she felt her lips.

Their lips touched, tentatively at first. Lottie felt the first contact in every cell of her body. God, it had been a long time since anyone had kissed her. But even that didn’t explain the intensity of the sensation she experienced as Hannah wrapped her arms around Lottie, pulled her close and kissed her, more certainly this time.

Lottie felt a bolt of desire travel through her, despite their thick coats, the howling gale and drops of sleet that had begun to blow into the porch.

She brought a hand up to Hannah’s face and held it gently. Hannah pulled back slightly, her eyes open and a look of confusion on her face.