By Winter's Light: A Cynster Novel (Cynster Special Book 2) by Stephanie Laurens

then proceeded to cover and conceal the finer-leafed greenery with the boughs of fir they’d just carried down.
    They were probably right in thinking that Claire, at least, would not encourage them to hang mistletoe, but what should he do? What should his stance be?
    Regardless of whether they were trying to specifically help him or not, he could use all the help he could get.
    “How much have we collected?” Claire said from behind him. “Do we need any more?”
    Daniel turned; from the corner of his eye, he saw Louisa and Therese shoot startled looks at him and Claire. Hands rising to his hips, he stood squarely between Claire and the sled, blocking her view of the sudden flurry of activity there. “We have plenty of fir, but I suspect we need more holly.”
    Claire glanced toward the sled, but he didn’t move.
    Instead, he pointed upslope to the pile of holly he’d trimmed and stacked beside the fallen tree. “That’s all the holly we have so far—at a guess, I would think you might need twice that much.”
    Boots crunched on pine needles as Louisa and Therese—both rather breathless—came up. “We’ve been gathering fir up to now,” Louisa said, pale green eyes innocently wide. “If we switch to gathering just holly, it shouldn’t take long to finish collecting what we need.”
    “I can’t wait to get back to the hall and hang everything up.” Therese’s anticipation was very real.
    It didn’t escape Daniel that nothing but the truth had passed their lips. Looking at Claire, he arched his brows. “That sounds like a viable plan.”
    Claire tipped her head in agreement. Louisa and Therese went ahead, moving swiftly up the slight slope to join Annabelle and Juliet, who had trailed behind Claire when she’d headed down to the sled. Claire turned and followed the girls, acutely aware of Daniel when he fell to pacing beside her.
    But neither felt moved to speak; after reclaiming their tools, they separated, following the girls under the trees. As Juliet was her true charge, Claire tended to gravitate instinctively to watching over her. Luckily, in this section of the wood, the bushes with the best holly—with the greenest of dark leaves and most amply supplied with the reddest of red berries—grew in a single large clump; even though she was watching Juliet, Claire could hear the other girls and could see them as they moved around the bushes.
    Somewhat less helpfully, Daniel took up station opposite her, keeping an eye on Louisa and Therese, and also Annabelle when she hove into his sight. Although his gaze wasn’t constantly on her, Claire knew he was there; it was disconcerting and somewhat irritating to discover just how much of a lodestone for her unruly senses he had become.
    But as they gathered in the holly, paying due attention to the thorny prickles, and nothing occurred to exacerbate her awareness, she gradually relaxed and found herself sharing genuine smiles with Juliet and, all in all, enjoying the moment.
    While listening and occasionally responding to Juliet’s artless chatter, Claire found her attention repeatedly caught by comments Daniel and the other girls exchanged. She found herself smiling at several; he was really very good with them.
    “Watch out!” he called.
    Claire shifted; boots scuffed, and she saw Daniel shoot out an arm—a bent-back holly branch, released, slapped against the thick sleeve of his overcoat.
    “Oh!” Louisa had been the one in line to get slapped—thorns and all. She looked up at Daniel and smiled, sincerely grateful. “Thank you—I forgot I’d hooked it back.”
    Disentangling the spiky leaves from his sleeve, Daniel asked, “Do you really need to burrow so far into the bush?”
    “That’s where the best berries are,” Therese pointed out.
    “Might I remind you that we will not be eating holly berries?” Daniel’s tone and the look he bent on the girls were resigned.
    When Therese and Louisa just blinked at him, then returned to ferreting