The Frenchman's Love-Child

‘Since when did I have to drag you?’ Christien derided silkily. ‘We’re talking in circles here, ma belle.’

‘No, we’re not, you’re not listening to what I’m saying. I want to marry you, but not if it’s likely to end in tears so that Jake suffers for my having made the wrong choice-’

‘I can’t offer you some miracle guarantee-’

‘If you’d loved me, I wouldn’t have needed any more.’

‘I can make you happy without love,’ Christien murmured with immense assurance.

‘How far would you be prepared to go to make me happy?’ A germ of an idea had occurred to Tabby.

‘I’m no quitter.’

At least, she consoled herself, in the radius of his father’s unquestioning confidence Jake was highly unlikely to suffer from low self-esteem.

‘You said it would be ten days before we can get married. So you’ve got that amount of time to persuade me that I should marry you-’

‘Persuade?’ Christien frowned. ‘I don’t follow.’

‘You’ve got from now until the ceremony to convince me…while we occupy separate beds,’ Tabby hastened to add.

The silence pulsed like a live thing.

Christien angled a sardonic scrutiny over her. ‘This is a joke…right?’

Tabby stiffened. ‘No, it’s not a joke. You see, we’ve never had a normal relationship-’

“‘Normal” is defined by separate beds?’

‘The very fact that that is the first thing you home in on proves that-’

‘I’m a guy and honest enough to admit that separate beds have zero appeal?’ Christien slotted in darkly.

‘I’d just like us to spend time together, go out to dinner and stuff…I’ve never had that.’ Tabby compressed her lips on that grudging admission. ‘Not with anyone. Before I met you, I went around with a crowd but it wasn’t really dating and then I fell pregnant.’

Christien had gone very still. ‘What about after Jake was born?’

Dully amused at how little he understood about how much parenthood had changed her life, Tabby released a rueful laugh. ‘Single mothers aren’t high on the hot list of babes in the eyes of male students. I didn’t have time to date anyway. I was studying, looking after Jake and working several nights a week to bring in some cash.’

Without the smallest warning, Christien was feeling gutted by guilt and a reluctant awareness of the privileged existence that he took quite for granted. He could easily imagine how he would have felt being saddled with the care of a baby as a teenager and he almost shuddered. She had had to be responsible way beyond her years. Jake’s conception had deprived her of all freedom and fun. That she had still got through college was a tribute to her.

‘Don’t think that I didn’t get asked out, because I was asked!’ Tabby wanted him to know that.

‘So why didn’t you go?’

Tabby grimaced. ‘Blokes tend to assume you’re a sure thing if you already have a baby. After I got that message, dating seemed more trouble than it was worth.’

His lean, strong face was taut. ‘You don’t have to answer this…but have you ever been with anyone but me?’

Glancing up in surprise, Tabby collided with his intent gaze and blushed to the roots of her hair before uttering a sheepish negative.

Something in his chest tightened and he dragged in a deep, ragged breath. He swung away. His son had been as good as a chastity belt. He was ashamed that he was pleased that she had never been to bed with any other guy. After all, self-evidently, he had wrecked her life at seventeen. Ironically that had been the one and only time that he had ever chosen to rely on a lover to take precautions. Why? In certain situations condoms were inconvenient and he had thought of his pleasure rather than her protection.

‘D’accord…’ Christien squared his wide shoulders like a male ready to assume an unpleasant duty. ‘So I demonstrate that I can make you happy without sex…I hope you’re not expecting me to be happy too.’

‘You might be surprised.’

‘Not that surprised,’ Christien drawled.

They lunched with Jake at a polished table in a grand dining room lined by rather gloomy ancestral portraits. Even so, she did recognise that the men were a pretty fanciable bunch. After the meal, he informed her that they were flying to Paris.

‘Don’t be annoyed with me…Jake has an appointment with a specialist this afternoon,’ Christien imparted.

‘That was quick.’ Tabby had no desire to question anything that might benefit her son’s health. ‘Money talks-’

‘Not in this instance. The specialist concerned is a family friend.’

Her face flamed with embarrassment. They called in at the cottage so that she could pack, for he had suggested they stay the night in the city. Zipping shut the bag, suppressing a groan at the noisy sound of Jake spilling his Lego bricks over the tiled floor, she turned round to see Christien watching her from the bedroom doorway. He looked incredibly tall and dark and lethally attractive. Her mouth ran dry, tummy muscles tightening.

‘You’re never going to live here,’ he commented.

Tabby tried to shrug as though she didn’t care either way.

‘I always play to win…’ he murmured silkily.

Her lashes lowered over her eyes as she evaded the stunning directness of his gaze. A ripple of awareness ran down her spine in the heavy silence. The sexual buzz in the atmosphere was intense and her heart was thumping like mad. She drew in a quivering breath. Her nipples were pushing in stiff little points against the lace of her bra cup and a wave of hot pink washed her face.

She watched his brilliant eyes darken and shimmer. He extended a lean brown hand and she grasped it, let him tug her forward.

‘We shouldn’t,’ she said shakily.

‘What’s a kiss, ma belle?’

Downstairs she could hear Jake making ‘vroom-vroom’ sounds while he played with his cars. Christien leant down. His breath warmed her cheek. She was so excited she stopped breathing. Without laying a hand on her, he tasted her lips, suckled them, savoured the eagerness with which she opened the moist interior to him. She strained up to him, electrified by the penetrating sweep of his tongue, the greedy ache stirring between her thighs in response.

‘Christien…’ she whimpered shakily.

‘Stop acting like a hussy…this is our first date-’

‘A first date?’ Tabby parroted.

Crhistien frowned. ‘You asked me for what you called a normal relationship-’

Tabby was nonplussed. ‘I did?’

‘A request which was in effect a direct challenge for me to redo what I seem to have got very wrong the first time around four years back-’

‘It…it was?’

Christien laughed. ‘So you had better learn how to say no…loud and clear. It takes two to play this game and I need all the help I can get.’

Bemused chagrin warming her face, she dropped the heavy bag at his feet and preceded him downstairs. Her body felt heavy on the outside and tight and achy on the inside. In her mind separate beds had already fallen in stature from being a common-sense precaution to being a rather naive and narrow-minded embargo. It was slowly dawning on her that on that score she had no right to feel superior to him: she might love him but, when it came to the lust factor, she was as guilty as he was.

CHAPTER NINE