‘When?’
What did it matter when? Didn’t he believe her? She lifted her chin. ‘Two days ago.’
He raised an eyebrow.
‘I spoke to someone. A woman.’ In hindsight, the woman had been quite curt, despite Hattie’s self-conscious fumbling through her pre-prepared Google translation ofJe suis l’organisateur de mariage. J’arriverai dans deux jours.‘I said I was coming. And in French,’ she added indignantly, not wanting him to think she was one of those high-handed people who expected everyone to speak English.
‘Hmm,’ said Luc, his handsome face was marred by the briefest of frowns as if he wasn’t convinced.
‘I did honestly. I wouldn’t just turn up,’ she said at pains to reassure him that she wasn’t that sort of person.
‘The wedding isn’t for two months.’
‘No, it isn’t but they do take a bit of planning,’ she said crisply, not wanting to admit she might have acted precipitately. When Chris had given the ultimatum, him or France, she jumped right into the escape hatch with both feet. She smiled at Luc in what she hoped was a winning fashion. ‘I hope it’s not a problem but I understood the château has been reserved for the next two months.’ She certainly wasn’t going to admit that she’d booked the Eurotunnel as soon as she could. Business had been light at Bliss, the wedding planning agency she worked at, and she’d surmised correctly that they’d be happy to let her go.
‘You have a beautiful…’ Could she call it a home? Did people really live in places like this? ‘… a beautiful place.’ And how lucky was she that she was going to be living here for the next few months?
‘Yes, it is abeautifulplace,’ he agreed, those beautiful eyes darkening, ‘although I’m not sure if you’ve been made aware –’ he paused ‘– this is a working vineyard. And it is our family home. My father has only agreed to let out the château because Monsieur Carter-Jones is an old and trusted friend.’
This very polite reminder made Hattie pause. Having a whole load of partygoers descending on his house when he was trying to work probably wasn’t his idea of fun but the actual wedding was only one day and the guests staying the week would all be staying at a hotel. Her uncle had even booked several Eurostar carriages so that some guests could come just for the day. ‘No expense spared’ didn’t begin to describe his approach to this wedding. She picked up the holdall at her feet.
‘Are you just here for the weekend?’ he asked with a quick hopeful look at the holdall in her hand.
‘No.’ She bit back a smile.
‘You pack light.’
Hattie laughed, relieved to think about something else. ‘I wish.’ She looked back to her car where another suitcase was nestled in the boot.
‘Ah.’ He caught on quickly. ‘Would you like a hand?’
‘No. No, it’s fine,’ said Hattie, hoping he didn’t think she was expecting him to play doorman – she was far too self-sufficient for that. ‘I’m sorry you weren’t expecting me. I don’t need to be waited on or anything.’
‘Just as well,’ he observed, dryly.
She frowned, suddenly sick of pussyfooting around fragile male egos. She’d had enough of that to last a lifetime. ‘That,’ she said with a sharp bite in her voice, ‘was supposed to be an olive branch. I apologise for not giving more notice that I was coming but I’m here now.’ And he was just going to have to suck it up.
He paused and to her surprise gave her a charming, and somewhat blinding, smile that had her nerve endings lighting up in response. He strode over to her car, opened the boot and hauled out her case as if it were no more than a feather pillow. Muscles bunched in his sinewy arms and she was aware of an odd tightening low in her belly.
‘It’s not a problem,’ he said tossing another smile over his shoulder at her. ‘I too should apologise. We’ve never done anything like this before. So I guess we’ll all be feeling our way. Why don’t you come in?’
She followed him into the wide airy hall, full of sunshine and light that gave the soft yellow walls a golden glow. The scent of flowers in a huge vase on an elegant console table perfumed the air with the fragrance of summer and what she thought of as happiness. For a moment she paused, the smell evoking sudden light-heartedness. A grand pure white marble staircase, fenced on one side with intricate iron tracery in black and gilt, swept down into the hall, the rounded and smoothed-off lower steps pouring and pooling at the bottom like the train of a wedding dress. Although sparsely furnished, everything was of exquisite quality, including the slender-legged wooden tables etched with gilt that were dotted around the walls, and elegant art deco bronze statuettes of willowy-limbed women arranged to draw the eye to their delicate beauty.
‘This is…’ Lost for words, she simply stared. Her eyes were probably popping out of her head. This was a full-on stately home. It was difficult to imagine real people actually living here.
‘Nice, isn’t it,’ Luc said with a wink, and strode swiftly towards the back of the house. She upped her pace to follow him, admiring the fit of the fabric of his shorts that moulded his bottom rather nicely, which was totally inappropriate, but seriously he was a hottie. Totally out of her league, of course. She thought of her ex-boyfriend, Chris, with his ratty heavy metal concert T-shirts and perennial jogging pants. She gave a small internal sigh of regret. He hadn’t always been so attached to the same clothes. When they were at university, he’d loved his button-down-collared shirts. Could she have done more to encourage him to smarten himself up? The decline in his dress standards mirrored the decline of his zest for life. But you could only badger someone about things so much. She’d felt such a nag all the time. The break-up still felt raw and unfinished. Although it was what she wanted, she couldn’t help feeling guilty.
Luc turned onto a long corridor which seemed to run the length of the house, parallel to the front elevation. He led her into a huge kitchen and immediately it was obvious this was the heart of the house. Several tastefully distressed wooden beams criss-crossed the ceiling from which three large antique glass lamps were suspended. Everything else, including the two dressers, the long breakfast bar and the twelve-seater dining table, was in beautifully co-ordinated shades of white and grey, apart from the bright splashes of copper pans hanging from a rack above the big stainless-steel graphite-grey range. Despite the tasteful styling, there was a homely warmth to the room that invited you to take a seat and stay a while. Hattie couldn’t help the smile that spread across her face as she stood in the full beam of sunshine streaming in through double French doors that led out to a pretty patio.
‘This is gorgeous,’ she said.
‘Good, I’d hate you not to like it when you’re going to be here for so long.’
Gosh, were all French people so direct? Although his words were diluted by the teasing smile on his face.
‘Would you like a coffee or is it tea you drink?’
‘Not everyone in Britain drinks tea all the time, you know,’ she said feeling a bit of her usual spirit fizzle into life. It wasn’t like her to be intimidated or flustered by anyone. Perhaps it was because she was a bit of a fish out of water and completely out of her comfort zone.
