We were tired by the time we went to bed and Jasper and I fell asleep without talking about what had passed earlier.
I woke before him and sat up, watching his peaceful face, his trembling eyelids, the strong arm that held me and punished me in equal measure slung over the duvet. I couldn’t love him more than I did.
I put my hand to the collar that I wore even in bed.
Perhaps I should wake him and tell him so.
My intentions were interrupted, though, by the creak and clatter of the back garden door. I got up and went over to the window, curious to know who might be going out at this hour. It was not yet eight o’clock and the dark still hung about the snow-laden trees, casting a greyness over the blanketed ground.
A heavily coated and booted figure stepped out and walked towards the formal garden. Not Dimitri – too short. Rosie or Trix.
After a few steps, she turned to look back at the house. It was Rosie. Where was she going?
I decided to go after her. I could do with a private catch-up with her, minus all the other people in the house. I pulled on jeans, jumper and thick socks and pattered out on to the landing and down the stairs.
Wellies, winter coat, gloves and a hat later, I followed Rosie out into the grounds. It took me a little while to find her, but I tracked her footprints into the trees and found her eventually, bending over in her big furry coat scooping up handfuls of snow which she then … what the hell was she doing?
‘Rosie,’ I called out.
She whipped around like a person caught committing a crime, her cheeks stung with more than the cold.
‘Oh, God. Sarah.’ Her breath gushed out in a stream of steam. ‘It’s you.’
‘Yes. I saw you come out and thought we could have a chat in private. But … am I interrupting something?’
She moved her hand away from the inside of her coat, which was unbuttoned. Underneath it, I saw with a shock, she was wearing only a set of very revealing underwear. And inside the cups of her bra, snow was melting around her nipples, rendering the fabric translucent. God, that must be painful. And freezing.
‘Just a little, uh, game,’ she said. ‘Shit. Thought everyone was asleep.’
‘I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to spy on you. But I have to ask …’
She sat down on a stump and drew her coat close around her.
‘Don’t you and Jasper play little games like this?’ she asked. ‘With a house and grounds like this, the possibilities are endless, I should think.’
‘Oh, we get up to all sorts,’ I assured her, perching myself next to her. ‘I don’t think snow has ever been involved, though. Yet. So Dimitri …?’
‘He said I should get a taste of what life was like for him in Moscow,’ said Rosie with a giggle. ‘He said he was freezing his tits off most of the time and I should experience it for myself. He said it would bring us closer together.’
I laughed. ‘He’s a character, isn’t he? What he actually wanted to do was get you to put snow in your bra, end of story.’
‘Yes. Not just my bra either …’ She squirmed on the stump, inhaling sharply.
‘Probably might have felt nice last night though. On your …’
‘Yes.’
We basked, in a shivery kind of way, in the memory.
‘You’re very happy with Dimitri,’ I said, and it wasn’t a question.
‘Oh, yes.’
‘He is gorgeous,’ I said, and she hugged herself tighter into her coat. ‘Very sexy.’
‘He’s the man I would have dreamed of, if I’d had the imagination,’ she said. ‘But I would never have thought he could exist, even if I had.’
‘That’s lovely. What a piece of luck that you met the way you did.’