‘You’ll have to do better than that to get support!’ Tabby spluttered, for she was in the grip of helpless giggles.
Christien held her until she subsided: Tabby under one arm, their son, who seemed to find giggles highly contagious, beneath the other. Should he call his own mother to tell her that he was marrying Gerry Burnside’s daughter? He was no coward, but he felt more like sending a note and keeping his distance until the hysterics were over and the tears had dried. Phoning, he decided, would be the safest and kindest first line of approach. Did he then risk taking Tabby for a brief visit? For perhaps ten minutes? He refused to contemplate the possibility of Tabby being slighted or hurt. Ought he to say something to that effect to his mother beforehand? Above Tabby’s vulnerable head, he grimaced and his possessive embrace became even more pronounced.
That afternoon, Christien shepherded Tabby and Jake into his mother’s apartment. It seemed less gloomy than it had been on his last visit. The curtains were no longer half shut and some of the blinds that blocked the sunlight had been raised. He could only stare when his parent walked to greet them, looking quite unrecognisable, not only because she had a tentative smile on her face, but also because she was wearing something other than black for the first time in almost four years: a dark blue dress.
‘Madame…’ Tabby murmured cheerfully, offering her cheek French-fashion for his elegant mother’s salutation.
‘Tabby…’ Christien’s parent murmured in warm welcome, kissing her on both cheeks. ‘Please call me Matilde.’
Jake opened his arms for a hug. Matilde knelt down to oblige and informed the little boy that the French word for grandmother was mamie.
Christien could not credit what he was seeing. It was picture perfect. It seemed too good to be true that the very first time his parent laid eyes on Tabby, she should greet the younger woman like a cherished family member. But there it was: his mother was enthusing over Tabby’s engagement ring and listening to Jake’s chatter while their son hung onto the older woman’s hand.
Christien cleared his throat. Both women gave him an innocent look of enquiry.
‘Non…the show is over,’ Christien pronounced drily. ‘I’m not fooled. I’m not that stupid. The two of you have met before!’
‘How did you know?’ Tabby demanded in exasperation.
A rerun of Veronique’s first meeting with his parent after their engagement
had replayed in Christien’s memory. Although she’d known the brunette since childhood, his mother’s polite reception of her future daughter-in-law had had little warmth. A belated deduction that came as a sincere shock to Christien led him into a rare indiscretion.
Christien studied Matilde in surprise. ‘You didn’t like Veronique…’
The older woman was taken aback by his lack of tact in referring to his former fiancée on such an occasion and then she sighed in answer. ‘Even when that young woman was a little girl, I thought she was sly.’
‘So how did you meet Tabby?’ Christien asked, only casually wondering why Veronique had such a very bad track record when it came to befriending her own sex. Sly?
‘Ask us no questions and we will tell you no lies,’ Tabby interposed at an instant when, ironically, she was gasping to ask a curious question on her own account. Veronique? Had Christien and his parent been referring to the same woman whom she had met in the Dordogne?
Matilde announced that she wanted to throw a party to celebrate their engagement. As a distraction it was very successful, particularly as Christien was also caught up in silencing his son’s innocent attempt to tell Matilde that Tabby had had such a bad nightmare that her nightie had fallen off.
Having left Matilde’s apartment, Tabby and Christien were in the lift before Tabby had the opportunity to say, ‘Veronique…was that the same Veronique I met years back?’
Christien gave her an uncommunicative nod of confirmation.
So he had been seeing the other woman. Tabby almost winced. She was disappointed in him. All right, Veronique had been beautiful and stylish and clever, but she had also been a cold, nasty piece of work as Tabby had found out to her cost after that car crash when she had gone up to the villa in the hope of seeing Christien again. But there it was, deserved or otherwise, evidently Veronique had finally got what she had wanted all along: her chance to shine with Christien as something other than a good mate. For once, however, life appeared to have handed out its just deserts for Christien had obviously been less than impressed, Tabby reflected with a satisfaction that was only human.
But that satisfaction was just as swiftly replaced by a disconcerting stab of unease that prompted her to say, ‘I gather that you and Veronique were together a while back…so I don’t have anything to do with you breaking up with her, do I?’
‘Ne fais pas l’idiote…don’t be silly!’ Telling all, Christien had decided, would only cause distress. In fact it was a kindness to keep quiet for Tabby was happy and an awareness of how recently he had been engaged to Veronique would only make her very un- happy…
On the night of their engagement party, Tabby twirled in front of a giant gilt-edged mirror in the grand salon at Duvernay and then twirled again for good measure.
Courtesy of Christien’s generosity, an antique Cartier diamond necklace of deco vintage encircled her throat. It looked fabulous and her dress had a to-die-for glamour that thrilled her. Ruby-red in colour, it bared her shoulders, hugged her shapely figure to perfection and fell into a flirty hem round her ankles, scoring on all three counts of being feminine and sexy and chic into the bargain. But without Matilde, she would never have had the nerve to enter the high fashion emporium on the Rue St-Honore where she had found the gown.
The past eight days had been hugely enjoyable for Tabby and jam-packed with activity and entertainment. With Christien she had picnicked below the chestnut trees in the Jardin des Tuileries, visited Disneyland Paris with Jake, toured fabulous art collections and on one memorable occasion had gone out clubbing until dawn. They had talked about her career as an artist and stolen hungry kisses behind doors like guilty teenagers. They had spent virtually every daylight hour together with Christien making up business hours most evenings and Tabby was now fully convinced that she had had very good taste when she’d fallen in love with him almost four years earlier.
He had become so romantic since then too, she thought blissfully. He kept on sending her flowers and buying her little gifts, like the teddy bear with the silly smile that he had said reminded him of her…and big gifts like the diamond necklace and a gorgeous deco bronze of a dancing woman. With Matilde Laroche being so welcoming, Tabby truly felt as though she was becoming part of a family again and that it should be Christien’s family was a source of real joy to her for it healed the wounds of the past.
In between times, and regardless of the reality that she had yet to officially give her agreement to marrying Christien, their wedding plans had marched on with Matilde in enthusiastic charge. Tabby’s actual spoken agreement had come to seem quite unnecessary. In just thirty-six hours, they would undergo a civil ceremony in the mairie or town hall, and that would be followed by a church blessing.
Tabby could hardly wait for the wedding, not least because she and Christien would finally be able to make love again. They had both learned an embarrassing lesson by letting Jake catch them in the same bed before she had a wedding ring on her finger. Not the least of their punishments had been Jake’s earnest suggestion that he keep his mother company at night in case she had another nightmare. Indeed Tabby and Christien had reached the conclusion that it was their duty to set their son an example until that magical moment when they could freely point out that married people slept in the same bed.
Christien appeared in the doorway, a sleek and spectacular masculine vision in an Armani evening suit.
‘Show-stopping,’ he pronounced with intense appreciation when he saw her in the ruby-red dress. ‘You look hot and you’re mine, ma belle.’