‘There’s not much we can do. It looks as if we’re stuck.’ He looked at his watch. ‘Summer should be in the office soon. I’ll ring her in a few minutes. She’ll have to reschedule tomorrow’s appointments, and she can let Acquisitions know why you’re not in.’

‘And meanwhile, we’ll have to be engaged another day?’ said Romy, who thought there were more important issues to be dealt with than Lex’s meetings.

‘Yes,’ said Lex after a beat. ‘One more day. Do you think you can manage that?’

She looked back at him over the rim of her mug, her eyes dark and cautious. ‘I’ll have to, won’t I?’

Lex fully intended to spend the day working as normal. He had the technology. Between his iPhone and his laptop, there was plenty he could do. But breakfast turned into an extended affair, with Romy chatting easily to Willie while Freya ate porridge with her fingers, and then, when Freya had a nap, Romy was determined to go outside and enjoy the snow.

‘There’s masses of old boots and coats in the utility room,’ said Willie when Lex pointed out that she had nothing suitable to wear. ‘Help yourself.’

Lex thought he might slope off to a quiet room and get on with some work then, but Romy was unimpressed. ‘You’re supposed to be madly in love with me,’ she said when he suggested it. ‘What’s Willie going to think if you let me wander off into the snow on my own while you huddle over your laptop?’

Which was how Lex came to be wearing a pair of old wellies and a faded oilskin jacket over a jumper he’d borrowed from Willie, who’d raised his brows when Lex had appeared at breakfast in a suit and tie.

Romy had never seen him in anything so shabby before, and she laughed that deep, husky laugh of hers at his expression. She was swathed in a similar jacket that had to be about six sizes too big for her, and the boots were nearly as big. A woolly hat was pulled down over her ears and a scarlet scarf wrapped jauntily around her throat. Her eyes were dark and bright. She looked, Lex thought, rather like a robin.

‘I don’t know what you think we’re going to do out there,’ he said grouchily as he pulled on a pair of gloves. ‘The snow’s far too deep to walk anywhere.’

‘It’ll be fun,’ said Romy, opening the door to a glittering world. ‘Just look how beautiful it is!’

Lex had been right about the snow making walking difficult. It came almost up to Romy’s knees, but she refused to give up and insisted on trudging down to the lochside.

It was so cold that her teeth ached with every breath, but she was conscious of exhilaration bubbling along her veins. The light was dazzling. Every twig, every leaf bending under the weight of a pristine mound of snow, seemed to jump out at her, and when they turned to look back at Duncardie it rose out of the snow like something out of a fairy tale, with its battlements and turrets and the backdrop of the mountains.

‘It looks like a stage set, doesn’t it?’ said Romy. ‘You could almost believe a princess was sleeping in one of those towers. Perhaps we’ve stumbled into a magical kingdom without realising it!’ She sniffed happily at the crystalline air. ‘There’s something unreal about today.’

‘That would certainly explain why we’re freezing our butts off out here when we could be warm and dry inside,’ said Lex, slapping the arms of his waxed jacket for warmth.

‘Come on, Lex, you’ve got to admit it’s beautiful.’ Romy turned and headed along the edge of the loch. It was hard going. She had to lift her feet high and stamp down through the snow, and she was soon puffing, but at least the exercise kept her warm.

‘It looked beautiful from inside,’ Lex grumbled, but he fell into step beside her.

‘Look, there’s Willie,’ Romy said, spotting the portly figure watching them from one of the windows. She waved, and Willie waved back.

‘I notice he’s staying tucked up nice and warm. He’s got more sense. Probably there shaking his head at crazy Sassenachs. ‘

Romy rolled her eyes and pushed him. ‘Oh, stop being such a crosspatch! I know you hate being unlashed from the office, but it’ll do you good to get outside like this. You’re getting some exercise, breathing in all this clean air…’

‘Getting frostbite,’ Lex put in.

‘Can you put a hand on your heart and tell me that no part of you finds this exciting?’

Lex stopped and, surprised, she stopped too. She was smiling. Her skin glowed, and her eyes were brilliant. The light was so crisp that he could see her in heart-stopping detail-the few strands of hair escaping from beneath the hat, her brows, the crooked front tooth-and he felt something shift and crumple inside him.

He hoped it wasn’t his heart.

He opened his mouth to answer. Afterwards, Lex often wondered what he would have said, and if it would have been the truth, but before he could decide Romy caught sight of something behind him and terror rinsed the smile from her face. Sucking in a sharp breath, she stumbled towards him, grabbed him by the waist and buried her head in his chest.

Instinctively, Lex closed his arms around her, and looked over his shoulder. Magnus, the Irish wolfhound, was bounding towards them, snapping at the snow with his great jaws. His muzzle was encrusted with white and as he got close he barked with exuberance and shook joyously, spraying snow everywhere.

Romy made a tiny sound deep in her throat and burrowed closer, as if she were trying to get inside his jacket.

‘He’s playing,’ said Lex calmly. ‘He won’t hurt you.’ Then, to the dog, ‘Magnus, sit!’

Surprised at the sudden command, Magnus skidded to a halt and sat, tongue lolling.

‘Let him sniff your hand.’

In response, Romy held tighter, but Lex was stronger and had already taken her hand in its glove and was stretching it towards the dog, who sniffed curiously.

‘Now stroke his head.’

‘I can’t,’ muttered Romy, shrinking as far from the dog as she could get without letting go of Lex.

‘You can.’ Lex moved her hand to the wiry head. Heart pounding, Romy let her glove rest there for a second before she whipped it back.

Lex clicked his tongue. ‘That’s not a stroke. Do it again.’

‘He’ll bite me.’

‘Romy, look into his eyes.’

Romy was stuck. She didn’t dare let go of Lex and walk away past the dog, but if she stayed where she was she would have to touch the dog again.

Resentfully, she turned her head against Lex’s chest and made herself look into the dog’s eyes. They weren’t a rabid red, as she had imagined, but a warm, liquid brown and their expression, she realised once she had got past the dog’s monstrous size and those fearsome teeth, was calm and alert and not in the least aggressive.

Very, very cautiously, Romy let go of Lex and laid her hand on the dog’s head once more. Her heart jerked as Magnus butted his nose upwards, and she would have snatched her hand away if she hadn’t been afraid that Lex would think her a coward or, worse, make her stroke him again.

‘See?’ said Lex. ‘He likes that.’

And Magnus didn’t bite her hand off. He just sat there, watching her with intelligent brown eyes as she patted him. Romy let out a shaky breath. She was stroking a dog! She felt quite giddy with it.

‘Well done,’ said Lex, and added to the dog, ‘Good dog. Go on, off you go now.’

With that, Magnus took off, scattering snow as he went.

Romy laughed unsteadily. ‘I can’t believe it! I stroked that huge dog!’ She watched him running in wide, exuberant circles, a faint, puzzled frown between her brows. ‘I feel…liberated,’ she realised after a moment.

‘That’s because you confronted your fear,’ said Lex. ‘It’s a hard thing to do.’

‘I bet you’ve never had to do it.’

Romy set off again through the snow. She was remembering how she had clutched at him and wincing inwardly. For someone so determined to look after herself, it had only taken the sight of a big dog for her to throw herself into Lex’s arms, acting entirely on instinct. And the worst thing was how safe she had felt there. It wasn’t a comfortable thought.

‘I can’t imagine you ever being afraid of anything,’ she said.

There was a tiny pause. When she glanced at Lex, she found him watching her, but as their eyes met he looked away. ‘You’d be surprised,’ he said.

‘What are you afraid of?’ she asked, her expression rife with disbelief, but he shook his head.

‘I’m too scared to tell you.’

Romy laughed. She was suddenly very happy. She wasn’t sure if it was the snow, creaking and squeaking beneath their boots, the sunshine or the purity of the air.

Or the man beside her.

When she glanced at him under her lashes, his austere profile was etched in startling detail against the sky. She could see the texture of his skin, every hair in the dark brows, the touch of grey at his temples that made her feel oddly wistful. He had a big nose that suited his strong face, and something about the line of his jaw made Romy ache with longing and memory.

She could remember how it felt to trail her lips along that jaw. She remembered the smell of him, the taste of him, the roughness of his skin where a faint stubble pricked.

She wanted to do it again. Lex was so big, so solid. She wanted to throw her arms about him and hold onto all that hardness and all that strength, not because she was scared of the dog, but because she could.

Which was pathetic, she knew. And wrong. Because she didn’t need anyone else to be strong. She could be strong on her own. She had to be.

Anyway, it wasn’t his strength that appealed, Romy told herself as that sudden wash of happiness was sucked away like a wave and something darker and more primitive crashed through her in its place.

Lust, plain and simple. She wanted to run her hands over him and press her mouth to his throat. She wanted to push her fingers through his thick hair and lick his skin. To taste him, touch him, kiss his lashes, his mouth, his mouth, and, oh, God, in spite of the cold, Romy could feel heat flooding her, burning in her cheeks and pooling deep inside her.

Desperate to distract herself, she bent and grabbed a handful of snow. Packing it into a ball, she threw it at Lex, who was stamping along beside her, absorbed in his own thoughts. The snowball glanced off his arm, and he turned, startled to see Romy eyeing him with a mixture of guilt and wariness as she stooped to try again.

Something flared in Lex’s pale eyes. ‘Right, you asked for it!’ he said, scooping up his own snowball. His aim was much better than Romy’s and, although she turned quickly away, it hit her right on her hat.

Her attempt missed him completely, of course, but she was already backing away, laughing as she tried to collect more ammunition. Lex’s next snowball caught her on the shoulder and she fell back For the next few minutes, they hurled snow at each other like a couple of kids, until Romy stumbled in the deep snow. She would have fallen if Lex hadn’t grabbed her arm and held her up with one hand. In his other, he held a huge snowball that he lifted, ready to stuff it down her neck.

‘No, no, please!’ Romy was laughing and shrieking at the same time. She was covered in snow by then, but the thought of it down her neck… Ugh! She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had so much fun.

‘Do you give in?’

‘I give in! I give in! You win!’

‘All right, then.’ Lex let the snowball fall, but he didn’t let go of her arm. They had both been laughing, but all at once their smiles faded and their eyes locked with an almost audible click as the glittering landscape shrank to a bubble where there were just the two of them, staring at each other.

‘Do you think Willie is still watching?’ he asked softly.

‘I…don’t know,’ said Romy with difficulty.

‘If we were really engaged, I’d probably kiss you now, wouldn’t I?’

‘You might.’ Romy’s throat was so tight, it came out as an embarrassing squeak.

‘And would you kiss me back? If we were really engaged?’

‘Probably,’ she managed.

Lex brought his gloved hands up to cup her face, and Romy trembled with a terrible anticipation.

‘Then let’s show Willie just how in love we are,’ he said, and bent his mouth to hers.

His lips were warm, so warm in contrast to the stinging cold of the air, and so sure. They sent Romy plummeting through twelve long years, and she clutched at Lex’s jacket, gripped by a dizzying mixture of excitement and fear and utter peace. Her senses whirled as she swung wildly between extremes, between heat and cold, between then and now. Between stillness and rush. Between the sense of coming home and the sense of standing on the edge of a dizzying drop.

When Lex pulled her closer and deepened the kiss, Romy wrapped her arms around him and kissed him back harder, breathless at the rightness of it. It felt so good to taste him again, to hold him again. Every cell in her body was sighing-no, was singing-’ At last! At last!’ The sunlight glinting on the snow was inside her, sparkling and flickering and shimmering along her veins in a glittery rush.