Someone who knew that she had an appointment to collect the keys from the notaire had made the mistake of passing on that news to Matilde Laroche and Christien’s working day had been interrupted by his distraught parent and her announcement. He had left his mother in the soothing hands of her doctor but his own patience had been sorely tested. Only once in his life had his late father attended one of Solange’s rustic picnic parties, so his son could not see how the overgrown meadow outside could be regarded by the older woman as being in quite the same category as sacred ground.
‘I can understand that you would want to take a look at your inheritance,’ Christien remarked with studied calm. ‘Naturally you’re curious but I can’t believe that you’re planning to live here.’
‘Why can’t you believe it?’
‘Pas possible…it’s not habitable!’ he retorted drily.
Out of the corner of her eye, Tabby studied him. His silk business suit was a trendy black pinstripe of exquisite cut that accentuated his wide shoulders, narrow hips and long powerful thighs. He looked absolutely gorgeous and, without her even realising it, her sneaky covert glance had become a full-on stare. Cheeks reddening as he elevated a questioning brow at the intensity of her appraisal, Tabby hefted one corner of the bulky mattress up onto the bottom step of the stairs again and slung him an expectant look. ‘Are you going to give me a hand with this?’
Complete disconcertion pleated his level brows.
‘Of course, it must be hard to stay fit when you’re in an office all day.’ Tabby sighed.
An utterly unexpected slashing grin banished the gravity from Christien’s lean dark face. ‘Do you really think I’m about to fall for a bait that basic?’
Riveted to the spot by the sheer charisma of that knowing smile, Tabby tried and failed to swallow. Closing his lean, shapely hands into the mattress, he hauled it up the stairs, negotiated with ease the bend that had caused her such grief and came to a halt in the room where the bed frame already stood assembled. As she reached the doorway he settled the mattress down onto the frame.
‘Where did you find the bed? On a dump?’ he enquired.
‘It’s old but it’s solid.’ However, her bed had come closer to the dump than she would ever have admitted. Virtually all of the elderly furniture and household effects in the van had come from her aunt’s attic and garage, both of which Alison was clearing in preparation for letting her property.
‘You still haven’t told me what you’re doing here,’ Tabby reminded Christien as she bent to rifle the cardboard box of bedding in the corner and emerged with a folded sheet.
Christien studied the sheet she was unfurling and noted that it had been carefully mended with a slightly different colour of cloth. Did people still patch linen these days? He was more shocked than he would have liked to admit by the sight of that mended sheet. He had a vague Cinderella-like image of her sitting darning by candlelight and, in defiance of that
unusually colourful flight of fancy on his own part, he spread his hands in a scornful gesture. ‘Why are you wasting your energy with this? You can’t live here-’
‘You couldn’t,’ Tabby countered, tucking in the sheet at the corners with determined industry, because at least while she was attending to practicalities she was not gawping at him like a lovelorn schoolgirl. ‘You’d be lost without your luxuries, but I’ll be quite happy getting back to basics-’
‘That’s a double bed…who are you planning to share it with?’ Christien demanded without warning.
An image of Jake’s warm little body sneaking in below the covers first thing in the morning to cuddle up to her crossed Tabby’s mind and her green eyes softened and her lush mouth took on a tender curve as she thought of her son.
Raw anger flaring and tensing his hard dark features, Christien strode forward to scrutinise her with brilliant dark golden eyes. ‘If you choose to live on the Duvernay estate, there will only be one man in your bed, and that man will be me…tu comprends?’
In rampant disbelief, Tabby straightened to stare at him. ‘Are you out of your mind?’
‘Is that what you wanted…is that why you’re here?’ Christien purred low and soft, though the sting of that insolent enquiry cut like glass against her tender skin. ‘You want to take up where we left off that summer?’
Without even thinking about what she was going to do, powered by hot, deep anger alone, Tabby slapped him. The crack of her fingers against his bronzed cheek sounded preternaturally loud in the hot, still room. ‘Does that answer that question?’
Christien was so taken aback by that physical attack that he fell back a step.
The shock in his stunning golden eyes was patent and Tabby flushed. ‘You made me do that-’
Lean bronzed hands snapped over her wrists like handcuffs. ‘Then I will have to make equally sure that you don’t do it again.’
Tabby tried to pull free of his hold and failed. ‘It is your fault that I hit you!’ she condemned like a spitting wildcat in her frustration. ‘You were very rude. I’m in my own house and I have every right to be here if I want to be. If you enter my home, I expect you to mind your manners-’
‘Or you’ll assault me?’
Still struggling without avail to slide her wrists free, she felt her face flame at that sardonic interruption. ‘Can’t I move to France without you getting the idea that I’ve only come here to chase you?’
Disturbingly, his wide, sensual mouth quirked. ‘Perhaps I want to be caught, chérie.’
‘But I don’t want to get involved with you again-’
‘Non?’ Christien prompted in a husky undertone, employing his hands to draw her closer.