When they returned to the hotel, Charlie walked her to her room. She fished in her bag for the key. It wasn’t in the inner compartment where she’d put it. She fumbled around, unable to locate it. Had she dropped it somewhere? She slumped against the wall of the corridor, utterly defeated. Fresh tears spilled from her eyes and coursed down her cheeks.
“Kitty! What is it?” Charlie cupped her face in his hands.
She shook her head, groping in her pocket for her handkerchief. The key tumbled onto the carpet as she pulled it out.
Charlie bent to retrieve it. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s get you inside.” He stood on the threshold, holding the door open, as she stumbled into the room. “Can I get you anything? A whiskey? Something to help you sleep?”
She shook her head. “Would you stay with me?” She sat down on the bed.
“Course I will.” He came and sat beside her.
“I don’t mean . . .”
“I know,” he whispered.
“Would you just hold me?” she whispered. “It’s just that I . . .”
“It’s okay—you don’t have to explain.”
They both kicked off their shoes and lay down together. He pulled the cover over them and slid his arm around her.
Kitty nestled into the hollow of his shoulder. “It was seeing Clara and her family,” she murmured. “And the shop. It made me realize just how much I miss belonging somewhere.”
The next morning, they woke up late. In the hazy space between sleeping and waking, it dawned on Kitty that something warm was touching the base of her neck. She turned to see Charlie, still fast asleep, his head half off the pillow, as if he had burrowed under the sheets in the night. It must have been his lips she had felt on her skin. He was still wearing the shirt he’d had on yesterday. She ran her hands down her body to reassure herself that her clothes were still on, too.
“Charlie!” She tugged his shoulder. “Wake up! It’s nearly half past nine!”
He opened one eye. Seeing her, he reached out, his hand finding hers. “Kitty,” he murmured. “We don’t have to get up yet, do we?”
“Yes, we do!” She pulled back the sheets. “Our train’s due to leave at ten forty—we have to get to the station.”
He leapt out of bed and stuck his feet into his shoes. Then he remembered he was in the wrong room. “I’ll be five minutes,” he said, as he headed for the door. “Meet you in the lobby.”
They made it onto the train by the skin of their teeth, not helped by the Russian official at the barrier who insisted on seeing every document they possessed before waving them through.
“Thank goodness,” Kitty breathed, as they sank into their seats. “We’d have been stuck here for another night if we’d missed it.”
“That might not have been so bad.” Charlie gave her a teasing smile.
She dug the heel of her hand into his arm. “Don’t get any ideas, buster.”
He grunted a laugh, but she saw that her words, even though spoken in jest, had hit home. There was a despondent look on his face that hadn’t been there before.
“Thank you for staying with me last night—it was kind of you.” Too late, she realized she’d made things even worse. It sounded as if she wouldn’t have wanted him anywhere near her unless she’d been desperate. It wasn’t that she didn’t want him—sometimes the strength of the attraction overwhelmed her. But if she told him that, he’d take it as a signal that she was ready to go further.
“You don’t have to thank me,” he murmured. “I’d do anything for you, Kitty. I . . .” He fixed her with his beautiful pale brown eyes. “I love you.”
She stared back at him, taken by surprise, unable to find a response. Leaning forward, she took his head in her hands and kissed the tip of his nose.
CHAPTER 20
The snow came early to Bavaria that year. On the day Kitty returned to Seidenmühle, a light dusting of flakes covered the roofs of the blockhouses. By the time the three women gathered for their evening meal, the snow was deep enough for their shoes to leave imprints on the path outside the cabin.
“Thank goodness you got back when you did,” Delphine said. “Imagine if you’d got stuck somewhere!” She ladled some of the steaming contents of a saucepan into a bowl and passed it to Kitty.
“Mmm . . . Cabbage and meatball—my favorite!” Kitty gave her a wry look. “Although, I have to say our DPs get better food than people in Vienna.”