Hattie’s mum and Gabby both smiled beatifically, completely charmed by Luc.
‘I’ll speak to the florist tomorrow,’ said Hattie, interrupting the love-in to break the Brémont spell.
‘Thank you, Hattie, you’re the best,’ said Gabby with a sappy smile.
‘Mm,’ she replied, anxious to wind the call up and making a mental note to avoid speaking to her mum for a few days. She could do without the Spanish Inquisition. Mum would ask those questions she didn’t want to answer. ‘Do you like him? How long have you been seeing him? (Hattie didn’t think ‘every day since I’ve been here’ would cut it – what her mum would want to know was how long they’d been sleeping together and whether it was serious.)
‘Lovely to meet you,’ said Luc.
‘Speak soon,’ said Hattie, reaching to terminate the call. She grabbed her wine and took a swig.
‘They seem nice,’ said Luc.
‘How can you possibly say that?’ Hattie scoffed. ‘On such brief acquaintance.’
Luc shrugged. ‘They’re like you. You’re a close family.’
Hattie was about to deny it. She’d only seen her family a handful of times in the last year but then she realised that keeping her distance hadn’t diluted their feelings for her or vice versa and it heightened her guilt about deliberately shutting them out. Had she done it for self-preservation or so they wouldn’t see what was going on?
‘They care about you.’
Her guilt redoubled because she knew Luc didn’t have this from his own family. She rose and put her arms around him. ‘I know,’ she said softly. ‘I’m very lucky.’
‘Not lucky. You deserve it.’
She pulled away, appalled. ‘And you don’t?’ She leaned in and kissed his mouth, his cheek, his neck. ‘Never think that. Never. They don’t deserve to have a son as wonderful as you.’
He raised a hand to her face. ‘I’m not sure they would even think that.’
‘Their loss, Luc,’ she said, reaching up to brush the curl from his forehead. ‘Their loss.’
For a moment they stood, knee to knee, toe to toe, in silent contemplation of each other. Like a pair of batteries drawing strength from one another.
Luc cupped her face. ‘Thank you, Hattie. Thank you.’
Then he kissed her, a gentle reverent kiss that almost broke her heart. The boy that didn’t believe he deserved to be loved.
Unable to help herself, Hattie wrapped her arms around him and kissed him back, pouring her heart and so much more into the kiss, so that he would know he was cherished, he was loved, he was cared for.
When he answered the kiss, his arms coming around her, holding her in a gentle embrace, the sort of embrace that she could either step back from or step deeper into, she knew that she loved this man. This time it didn’t strike her like a bolt of lightning; it was more like a bud unfurling in her heart, a bright flower unfolding in sunshine, breathing life into the desert.
They stood there together, arms around each other, soaking in the moment. Hattie closed her eyes. This wasn’t sensible, it was very unsensible. The very opposite of sensible. She wasn’t supposed to fall in love with Luc Brémont. She never wanted to be trapped again.
Luc kissed her and she looked up into his eyes, her heart flooding with warmth and unspoken joy. This wasn’t supposed to happen. But even though the words echoed in her head, a hopeless warning that no part of her was taking any notice of, she melted into the kiss and abandoned all thoughts of being sensible. That could wait until tomorrow. Tonight, she couldn’t resist the siren call of his kisses, the heat of his body and the wonder of being with him.
ChapterThirty-One
‘What do you think about making acroquembouche?’ said Hattie, waltzing into the kitchen the following morning, closely followed by Luc.
‘You mean a traditional French wedding cake made from a pyramid of choux pastry buns?’ asked Fliss with a pert smile.
‘Show-off,’ said Hattie.
‘Great – and funnily enough, Solange and I were discussing that very thing yesterday. We wondered if she might like acroquembouche.’
‘Great minds,’ said Hattie. ‘I texted her and sent a picture of an example.’
‘You have, have you? Just as well some of us are ahead of the game.’ Fliss cast a conspiratorial smirk towards Solange, who was leaning on the counter. ‘We were thinking limoncello-cream-filled choux buns, decorated with sugared roses and stuck together with white chocolate.’
