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Sprinkle a generous amount of muscovado sugar over the top so there is an even layer.

Grab your blow torch and toast the sugar until it is a deep brown colour. Allow it to set, then enjoy!

Chapter Forty-Four

LOTTIE

The small cottage was bursting at the seams with people, gifts and food. Lottie’s modest Christmas tree was sagging with decorations. Many of them had been made by Freya and Zack when they were children, and she couldn’t bear to part with them.

She’d already put the turkey in the oven and was enjoying a quiet cup of coffee in the kitchen, listening to carols on the radio. Next door in the living room she could hear Zack and Freya having a good-natured disagreement about the rules of Monopoly. She couldn’t hear Tom, but she knew he would be there, quietly supporting Zack. She had the sense that Tom was the one for her nephew, and that made her happy. There was a quiet confidence about their partnership that she envied.

Lottie lamented her own inability to win anything like that for herself. Just look at this recent drama with Hannah. She couldn’t imagine that happening to Zack and Tom. Perhaps it was a sign that her and Hannah could never work out.

But she’d meant every word of her note, hastily posted under Hannah’s door the night before. She knew that admitting she was falling for Hannah, especially after the scene in the office, might not land well. But she couldn’t bring herself to let Hannah leave without knowing how she really felt. She wanted the chance to explain herself.

Once she’d finished her coffee, she started to lay the round pine kitchen table. She decided to be optimistic and lay it for five. It wasn’t a large table, so it would be a squeeze. But Christmases in that cottage were always cosy and with the snow outside, that was even more the case today.

The table laid, she returned to the work surface to prepare the vegetables, idly fantasising about being alone in the cottage, and Hannah arriving. In her mind, Hannah knocked on the door and when Lottie opened it, she pushed her inside, kissed her passionately, and then they missed lunch, instead spending several hours making up in bed.

“Penny for your thoughts?” Tom asked, catching Lottie unawares.

She blushed. “Oh, you know, the usual. Thanking my lucky stars for my two – and for you.”

“That’s a lovely thing to say,” he said, helping himself to coffee from the percolator that had seen better days. “Do you want another?”

“Ooh, yes please,” said Lottie with a smile. “I do mean it, though. You’ve been so good for Zack. You’ve made him really happy.”

“He’s been good for me, too,” admitted Tom, a shy smile on his face. “He’s brought me out of myself.”

“He’s good at that,” nodded Lottie.

“And how about you? I wondered if you might have helped bring Hannah out of herself?” Tom asked. “You don’t have to tell me anything, though, so tell me to be quiet if I’m being too nosy.”

Lottie chuckled. “You’re so much more polite than my children.” She gratefully accepted the refreshed coffee. “I’m not sure yet what will happen with her.”

Tom didn’t say anything, but stood still, ready for Lottie to continue.

“I think I might have made a stupid mistake and messed things up,” said Lottie in a low voice. “Don’t tell the others. I couldn’t bear the endless questions.”

“Of course not,” said Tom quietly. “You never know, though. I once heard someone say that ‘what’s for you won’t go by you’.”

“Yes, I’ve heard that,” said Lottie, taking a sip of her coffee. “This definitely needs some whisky in it.”

Tom laughed. “I’ll leave you to it. But don’t lose hope.”

Lottie whiled away the morning in the kitchen, preparing food, humming along to the radio, and trying to limit her glances at the clock as half past one drew closer. She was tempted to go over to the hotel and knock on Hannah’s door. But she knew she couldn’t. She had to give the woman space, just as she’d asked. Ugh. She hated it. She wanted to take back the words she’d written. But she couldn’t. She’d meant them at the time. They seemed to mean less now. Hannah had demonstrated in so many ways that she was no ice maiden.

Zack, Tom and Freya flitted in and out of the kitchen. “Can we open our presents now?” asked Freya, in the same wheedling tone she’d used when she was tiny.

“You’ve had your stocking,” said Lottie with a smile. “We’ll open the rest after lunch. You know how it works.”

“Yeah, yeah, it means you get to relax with all of us opening presents rather than worrying about what’s going on in the kitchen. Ya-di-ya-di-ya-da.” Freya sashayed around the kitchen.

“Anyway, what’s your plan for pudding? You said you had something in mind for us?” Lottie was desperate to know what her mysterious niece had prepared.

“Never you mind. You’ll have to wait until after the main course,” Freya teased, poking the tip of her tongue out at Lottie. “Do we have any more Prosecco?”

“Have you guys already drunk the first bottle?” said Lottie with faux incredulity.