Sheathed in black denim jeans that fitted him like a second skin and a trendy shirt, Christien swung out of a scarlet Aston Martin V8 and scooped Jake out of the car seat fixed in the rear. Tabby’s jaw dropped. Last seen, her three-year-old son had been the possessor of a cute mop of black curls. Since then he had had a severe run-in with a barber and not a curl was to be seen.
‘What have you done to him?’ Tabby heard herself yelp accusingly.
Christien angled a look of pure challenge at her. ‘I trashed the girlie hairstyle…you might not have noticed but boys aren’t wearing pretty curls this season.’
‘It looked girlie,’ Jake told his mother slowly but carefully, and he even pronounced it just as his father must have done complete with French accent. Her little boy then carefully arranged himself in the exact same posture as his unrepentant father.
‘Girlie is in the eye of the beholder,’ Tabby remarked.
‘Girlie is girlie,’ Christien contradicted.
Christien, she understood, was staking possession on his son and ready, even eager, to fight any attempt to suggest that he might have overreached his new parental boundaries. But, grateful for their return and blessed with great tolerance, Tabby was willing to overlook Christien’s current aggressive aura for the sake of peace. She surveyed the two males who owned her heart with helpless appreciation. She missed her son’s curls but had to admit that the cropped style was much more boyish. Christien? Christien looked irresistibly sexy and fanciable. Her mouth ran dry. Her breathing quickened. Involuntarily she remembered how she had felt on that sofa and her knees quivered and her face burned with mortification over her own weakness.
‘What time did you get up this morning?’ Tabby enquired, dredging her attention from him.
‘Jake woke up at seven and I took him out for breakfast. Lock up,’ Christien urged. ‘I want to take you for a drive.’
Tabby did as she was asked and climbed into the passenger seat of the powerful car. ‘Where else did you go this morning?’
‘Daddy showed me his cars. I got little cars and he’s got big cars,’ Jake volunteered chirpily.
Jake was already calling Christien Daddy and he said it with such pronounced pride. From the corner of her eye, Tabby watched Christien’s handsome mouth curve with eloquent satisfaction. Evidently the morning had been spent in a male bonding session composed of laddish haircuts and car talk. Tabby did not begrudge them their mutual appreciation. She was delighted that they had got on so well.
When Christien drove through a colossal and imposing turreted entrance, Tabby tensed and dragged herself from her preoccupation. ‘Where are we?’ she questioned even though she already knew, for at the end of a very long, arrow-straight drive lined by trees sat a château.
‘We’re home!’ Jake announced.
‘Sorry?’ Tabby gasped.
‘Duvernay. I needed a change of clothes earlier and I brought Jake back here before we went out for breakfast,’ Christien advanced with the utmost casualness.
She had a delightful image of Christien playing it cool over breakfast in some café while Jake attempted to mirror his every action and expression.
‘It’s very big…’ Tabby went on to remark because, the closer the car got to the ancient building at the end of the drive, the more enormous the château seemed to get.
‘Where will I sleep?’ Jake asked.
‘I’ll show you later,’ his father responded.
Tabby froze at that casual assurance. Christien brought the car to a halt and sprang out. He lifted out Jake. A rather rotund lady with a big, friendly smile was approaching them. Christien introduced Tabby to Fanchon, who had been his nurse when he was a boy. Jake planted a confident hand in the older woman’s and, beneath Tabby’s disconcerted gaze, woman and child headed off into the gardens.
‘I w
anted to speak to you without Jake present,’ Christien explained.
Her oval face flushed and set, Tabby came to a halt in the vast marble entrance hall and fixed angry green eyes on Christien. ‘Why is my son asking where he is going to sleep? And why did he refer to your home as his home?’
‘It is a challenge to keep a secret with a chatty three-year-old around.’ Christien pressed open a door and stepped back in invitation.
‘Well, what I heard was more of a fantasy than a secret!’ Tabby retorted sharply, entering a terrifyingly elegant reception room furnished with loads of antiques.
‘Is it? Duvernay is where my son belongs.’
Tabby collided with the cold glitter of Christien’s challenging appraisal and her tummy gave a frightened lurch. ‘At present, our son belongs with me—’
‘Long may that arrangement last,’ Christien remarked softly, and there was something in his intonation that made goose-bumps rise at the nape of her neck. ‘Children need their mothers as much as they need their fathers.’
‘Thank you for that vote of confidence.’ Tabby tilted her chin but her heart was starting to thump very fast and her chest felt tight. ‘Although I have to admit that I haven’t a clue why you should take the trouble to tell me that.’