‘I am not thinking of marriage,’ Christien interposed in flat denial.

Veronique looked mollified by that assurance. ‘Then why end our engagement over something as trivial as an affair? Fidelity means nothing to me. I don’t mind if you keep the Burnside woman as a mistress, for there are far more important matters in life!’ she proclaimed with unhidden impatience. ‘This situation is exactly why I offered to deal with that calculating little creature on your behalf.’

‘Forgive me, but I will not discuss Tabby with you, nor listen to abuse of her.’ His brooding dark eyes were veiled, his well-modulated speaking tone discouraging.

Veronique removed the huge solitaire on her engagement finger and set it down on the table with just the suspicion of a snap.

‘It is yours…it was a gift,’ Christien asserted. ‘If you no longer want it, give it to charity.’

Veronique’s thin lips stretched into an unexpectedly warm and reassuring smile. Rising, she tucked a slender hand into his elbow. ‘At least I can now talk to you as a friend and perhaps you will listen with more patience. I do hope that we’re still going out to meet our friends for lunch…’

‘So,’ Pippa Stevenson recapped, rolling her very blue eyes, ‘although we’ve moved on nearly four years in our lives you’re still happily falling for the Christien Laroche solid gold seduction routine.’

Tabby winced. ‘It wasn’t like that, Pip-’

‘Lean, mean and magnificent, the guy most likely to succeed in business, in bed and every other place because conscience will never keep him awake,’ her friend quipped with a cynically curled lip. ‘You moving into Christien’s neighbourhood is like a goldfish opting to go swimming with sharks!’

Tabby stiffened for, having let herself down very badly, as she felt, with Christien, she was less laid-back about the prospect of taking up permanent residence in the same locality. It was ironic that their renewed intimacy was likely to bring about the sale that he had wanted from the outset, she reflected unhappily. ‘I may have to reconsider where Jake and I should live-’

‘Considering your non-existent ability to resist Christien, I think that has to be the best news I’ve heard in a long time!’ As Tabby flinched the redhead groaned in guilty embarrassment. ‘I’m sorry…I am truly sorry. Believe it or not, I didn’t invite you and Jake to stay here on your last night in England just so that I could make snide comments.’

‘For goodness’ sake, I know you didn’t…’ But as usual, Tabby recognised, her closest friend, who was burdened by a demanding job and the care of a disabled parent, was stressed out and exhausted.

‘Whatever happens, I still feel that you ought to tell Christien that he has a son,’ Pippa admitted in some discomfiture.

‘I agree.’ Tabby no longer required prompting on that score. Having reached that same conclusion, she almost smiled at her companion’s surprise over her change of heart. ‘When I decided to move to Brittany, I honestly did believe that I wouldn’t see Christien again. I didn’t think things through, which was foolish and short-sighted-’

‘Easy enough to do in the circumstances.’ Pippa gave her a look of understanding.

‘But I do think it would be unfair to put Christien in an awkward position with his family…or perhaps a girlfriend over Jake while we’re living so close,’ Tabby revealed uneasily. ‘I still have to work out how best to handle that.’

‘It’s Christien’s own fault that he’s likely to be the last to know about Jake. Naturally you were intimidated by the animosity that you met with when you attended the inquest into the crash.’ Pippa frowned. ‘That was so cruel-’

‘But the way some people couldn’t help feeling and probably will still feel about me,’ Tabby emphasised with a grimace. Pippa dropped her gaze and neither woman chose to mention the reality that, since that accident, Tabby had also lost touch with their other friends, Hilary and Jen.

‘They needed a focus for their bitterness and grief and Dad was dead, so I made the next best target,’ Tabby continued. ‘It’s just I couldn’t bear Christien or anybody else in his family to look at Jake in that same tainted light…as though he was something to be ashamed of, apologised for and concealed-’

‘Why should he be? Your son is the mirror image of his very handsome papa. And Christien Laroche is not the male I took him for if he does not relish the sight of himself reprised in miniature,’ Pippa opined drily. ‘Furthermore, when Jake reveals his meteoric IQ and his deeply boring current obsession with fast cars Christien will experience such a shocking sense of soul-deep recognition that he will be flattered to death.’

Tabby cherished much less ambitious notions. She only hoped that once Christien got over the shock, he would be interested in getting to know his son. An hour later, sighing at the sound of her much-put-upon friend trekking downstairs again to fulfil yet another late-night demand from her domineering parent, Tabby climbed into the spare-room bed where Jake already lay fast asleep.

Eight days had passed since she had left France. Christien had tucked her into bed that last night and left her alone. Although that was what she had wanted, she had felt ridiculously abandoned the next morning and very sad driving away in the van. Indeed it had been a week during which Tabby had become increasingly angry with herself for her repeated failure to push Christien out of her mind, not to mention her reluctance to tell Christien that he was the father of her child. That smacked of a cowardice that Tabby was determined to confront within herself.

As Tabby drove off the ferry into France the following day she was keen to draw Jake’s attention to the more unusual cars on the road to keep him occupied during the lengthy drive ahead. ‘There’s a Rolls Royce…’ she told her son helpfully.

The little boy shifted excitedly in his seat.

‘Are you excited about the new house?’ Tabby asked.

‘Can I jump on my new bed?’

‘Forget it!’ Tabby said with a grin.

The minute Tabby parked in the driveway at the cottage, Jake headed straight for the back garden with his football, eager to stretch his legs after being cooped up for so long. Tabby decided to let him burn off some energy before she took him indoors. In truth, she was afraid of seeing disappointment on his earnest little face. He was only three years old and it took adult imagination to see that the drab cottage had promise.

‘Stay in the garden and don’t go near the road!’ she called in his wake, knowing her first priority would have to be the installation of a gate across the driveway.

Jake stopped and uttered a world-weary sigh that would have done justice to a little old man. ‘I know…I’m not a baby now,’ he muttered in reproach.

Entering the cottage while she thought about how shockingly fast Jake seemed to be growing up, Tabby came to an abrupt halt and stared with bewildered eyes at her unfamiliar surroundings. In panic she started backing outside again, believing that she had somehow contrived to gain entry to someone else’s home. Only when she saw the gorgeous artistic arrangement of flowers beside the fireplace and the large envelope that bore her name in Christien’s writing did she halt her retreat. In a daze, Tabby crept back inside again and snatched up the envelope to extract the card within.

‘I respect your right to live where you choose…call me, Christien.’

A phone sat beside the floral offering. He had even had a phone line connected. The windows had been replaced and the walls had been painted in fresh colours. In a daze she looked around the room, which now was furnished with twin sofas and a handsome armoire. Dumbstruck, she peered into the kitchen and saw superb new freestanding units complete with discreet appliances and a beautiful dining set. A clock ticked on the mantel. The wine rack was packed with bottles. She looked into a fridge bursting with fresh produce and let the door fall shut again. Her son waved at her from the garden and she lifted a nerveless hand in response.

All of a tremble, she snatched up the phone and stabbed out the number that Christien had put on the card. As she waited for the call to connect she glanced into the little washroom and stopped dead. Because the ‘little’ washroom now appeared to encompass the enclosed porch beyond it as well and had a shower, marble tiles and a Jacuzzi that was state-of-the-art. A walk-in airing cupboard was packed with an array of fleecy towels and what looked very much like entire rows of crisp bed linen.

‘Tabby…what do you think?’ Christien purred as she hurried up the stairs with the receiver of the cordless phone clutched in her perspiring hand.

‘I think…I think I’m hallucinating,’ she mumbled, gaping at the rich wool carpet on the stairs.

‘Bien…I thought I was having a nightmare when I first saw inside the cottage as it was,’ Christien confided teasingly. ‘A home fit only for a cave dweller-’

‘Christien…there is just no way that I can accept any of this,’ Tabby asserted in a wobbly voice. ‘Have you gone out of your mind? This whole place has been torn apart and remodelled into far more than it was ever meant to be. It’s so seriously trendy it must have cost a fortune!’

‘It’s my way of saying sorry for being pushy and welcoming you back to your new home, ma belle,’ Christien murmured smoothly.

‘How on earth did you even get into this place?’ Tabby queried. ‘Did you break in?’

Her bedroom had been embellished with a bed in which a princess would have felt at home and dressed with snazzy silk curtains and an over abundance of crisp white lace-edged pillows and sheets. The colour scheme was in her favourite shades of pale turquoise and lemon and she wondered dizzily if he had remembered that.