‘No, sir, he hasn’t,’ the man told him, hauling his cap from his head in a gesture of deference. ‘But Miss Pippa said we could refer this to you. She said as Prince Regent you’re in charge now. Miss Pippa says she’s sure you’ll agree. Do you not, sir? Do you want us to stop?’

He didn’t want anything. He surely didn’t want to be so enmeshed in the workings of this place that he had to think about things like decking.

He had no intention of being hands-on in this place. There might be issues with how Carver ran the palace but he was competent, and Max intended to save his energy for the big battles.

‘Where is she now?’ he asked, and if his voice was a bit grim he couldn’t help it.

‘Miss Pippa saw the cows coming in to be milked,’ the gardener said. ‘I believe they’ve gone to the dairy to help. Sir, do you wish us to stop building the decking?’

What the heck? ‘You’ve started now. You might as well continue.’

The man smiled. ‘Yes, sir,’ he said.

Pippa and the children were indeed in the dairy, perched on a top rail overlooking the cows going into the bails. The twins and Marc were dressed in knickers and nothing else. Pippa was in jeans and a T-shirt. Her jeans were rolled up to the knees and her T-shirt was knotted under her breasts, leaving her midriff bare. They were all dripping wet.

They saw him and they waved him to come closer. No sound, though. They knew their cows.

‘Hi,’ Pippa whispered. ‘I thought this’d be really foreign but it’s just like home. Without Peculiar.’

Peculiar. He thought back to the cow who’d be even now causing trouble in Bert’s yard. ‘I bet there’s another Peculiar here,’ he said darkly. ‘There always is.’

‘There isn’t,’ she said. ‘I’ve been talking to the guys here and they’re saying these girls are really placid. I’m thinking we might take a few test-tubes home.’

‘Test-tubes?’

‘For cross-cultural fertilization,’ she said patiently. ‘Don’t you think that’d be ace?’

‘We might get some calves just like these,’ Marc said. The kids were glowing, high on warmth and good food and fun and excitement. They’d been good-looking kids back in Australia, Max thought, but now he looked at their beaming faces and he felt a twinge of…pride? They hadn’t complained once, he thought. He’d seen them tired and hungry and right out of their comfort zone but still they giggled and looked out on life as an adventure. Marc would make a great prince.

Pippa had done a wonderful job of raising them.

Would she agree that they stay?

‘Nothing’s decided,’ Pippa said before he could open his mouth.

‘How the hell do you know what I’m thinking?’

‘I can see it. I look in your eyes and I see this plus this plus this equals…ooh, let’s see…sixty-seven? And then you open your mouth and out it comes. Sixty-seven. Easy.’

He didn’t like that it was easy. He was feeling more and more confused.

‘Well, how do you understand what these guys are saying?’ he asked. ‘And the gardener. How did you talk him into building decking?’

‘He’s building decking?’

‘To protect his grass.’

‘What a sweetie.’

‘You talk French? I didn’t know you spoke French?’

‘I talk a type of French,’ she said. ‘I’ve always been told it’s a hybrid, some sort of rural dialect. Now I’ve discovered where it comes from.’ She beamed. ‘Here. Well, of course it makes sense, but how lucky’s that?’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘Alice,’ she said simply. Then, as he looked even more confused, she explained. ‘Alice left her family when she was little more than a kid. She got into trouble, she ended up having Gina and being stuck with me, and she made the best of our life together. But there must have been a part of her that was homesick, for every night she’d read to the two of us in her own language. It became fun-it was Gina’s and my secret language when we were at school. After Gina got married we had to stop-Donald kept thinking we were talking about him-but it’s still a part of me. Finding there’s a whole country that speaks it is a joy.’

‘It’s fun,’ Marc said in the same language, and Max stared.

‘The kids too?’

‘Gina started it with Marc, maybe to make Alice happy. I kept it up. It’s always seemed comforting. Some sort of a link. And now we know who we’re linked to.’

Wow. He’d brought back family who spoke the language. The enormity of this almost took his breath away.

His task was suddenly a thousand per cent easier.

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

‘You didn’t speak it to us. I honestly didn’t know what it was until I heard it here.’

‘I do speak it,’ he said, switching effortlessly. ‘My mother…well, there was an insistence that Thiérry learned it and it was easier for us to practise together.’

She frowned and tugged the two little bodies on either side of her closer so they couldn’t topple off the rail. ‘So we speak the language-sort of. Why does that make you relieved? I can understand pleased, but not relieved.’

‘I was just pleasantly surprised.’

‘And relieved.’

‘You can’t read my feelings.’

‘Yes, I can.’

‘Then don’t,’ he snapped, and the cow nearest him swerved his head and gave him a reproachful look.

‘Shh,’ Sophie whispered. ‘We have to be quiet until the cows get to know us.’

‘I wonder if I can help milk,’ Pippa said.

‘You surely don’t want to.’

‘No.’ She peeped a smile. ‘But it might make Mr Levout happier. He obviously thinks I’m one of the workers.’

‘He’s got another think coming. Speaking of which…he’s having dinner with us tonight.’

‘Really?’

‘Really.’

‘Eggs and toast in the nursery?’

‘Don’t push your luck. Do you have anything to wear to a formal dinner?’

She stared. She looked down at her dripping jeans and her bare feet.

She giggled.

‘Sure,’ she said. ‘As formal as you like. I’ll wear my dry jeans.’

‘Pippa…’

‘Don’t fret,’ she said. The rail they were perched on was four feet high. He was standing right beside her, so she was just above his head height. She reached out and ran her fingers through his hair, an affectionate ruffle such as one she might have given Marc. Or Sophie or Claire. So there was no need for him to react…as he did. ‘I won’t disgrace you,’ she said.

‘I know that,’ he said stiffly and moved away.

‘I won’t do anything else either,’ she told him, quite kindly. ‘There’s no need to back off like a frightened horse.’

‘I did not!’

‘Yes, you did,’ Marc said. ‘Don’t you like it when Pippa rubs your head?’

‘No. Yes. I…’

‘He doesn’t like getting his feathers ruffled, kids,’ she told them, turning her attention back to the cows. ‘Leave him be to settle. What time’s dinner, Mr de Gautier?’

‘Seven. The kids will be fed at six. And before you say you and the kids are sticking together, Beatrice, the older of the two maids in the children’s wing, will sit with the children. If they give the slightest sign of needing you she’ll fetch you. But by the amount of excitement they’ve had today I suspect they’ll be well asleep.’

‘So might I be.’

‘You slept for fifteen hours on the plane. I’ve got a crink on my shoulder to prove it.’

‘On your shoulder?’

‘Where your head landed. You fell sideways.’

‘I did not.’

‘No, you didn’t,’ he agreed cordially and she glowered.

‘How can I fall sideways in a first class seat?’ she demanded.

‘You wriggle in your sleep.’

‘Well, you snore.’

‘I don’t!’

‘Oh, yes, you do. We need an independent arbitrator. Failing that I refuse to accept responsibility for your crink.’

‘I accept your lack of responsibility,’ he said and grinned. ‘But about dinner. You think you might stay awake until seven?’

‘I’m pretty hungry,’ she told him. ‘But I guess I can always pinch a toast finger from the kids to keep me going.’

She was gorgeous.

Max left them and walked slowly back to the castle entrance, past the gardeners busily erecting their decking, past the pile of kids’ clothing…

The castle had subtly changed already.

She was gorgeous.

They were all great, he told himself hastily. The kids and Pippa would breathe new life into this place. He just had to persuade them to stay and things would be fine. The kids could have a glorious time. The load of responsibility would be lifted from Pippa’s shoulders and he could leave and get on with his life.

For the first time since he’d been approached after Bernard’s death, the awful feeling of being trapped was lessening.

Okay, he still needed to be Regent. He’d accepted that. But back in Paris his construction company was waiting, and in four short weeks he could be back there. He could keep on with the work he loved. He could cope with the legalities of the regency from a distance. He could stay low-key. Okay, he’d accept a bit of publicity now as he persuaded Pippa to keep the children here, but after that he could disappear into the background.

His mother need never be brought into it. It was a solution that suited them all. It felt great.

Or it should feel great. There was one little niggle.

The children’s safety?

That was crazy. The maid hadn’t said outright she was worried. He was reading too much into it.

Pippa would keep things safe.

And there was another niggle.

Pippa was gorgeous.

So what?

So he wanted to kiss her. He’d already kissed her and it had felt excellent. He wanted, quite desperately, to kiss her again.

Which was dumb. Even one kiss was dumb. Even though for him it had been a light-hearted bit of fun-it must have been-she might not have thought of it as that.

Of course she had. She’d giggled. She’d ruffled his hair then as she’d ruffle one of the kids’ hair. She was beginning to hold him in some sort of affection, he thought. She was starting to think of him as family.