felt for her father as she drove into the deserted village square. Battling with confused emotions, she parked her bike against the massive stone base of a pillar supporting the roof of an open-sided market hall with fascinating medieval rafters.
Off she went in search of the Rue Boulangerie, half expecting to see her mother beckoning from a window.
Tessa’s excitement and nervousness mounted.
Half an hour later she was trudging disconsolately back down a narrow, stepped street, her leather jacket slung over one shoulder. She’d explored the whole village in vain. Tiredness flowed over her in dizzying waves as she came in sight of the square. Her cropped top clung to her sweating body. Her feet hurt, her neck ached and her stomach rumbled. An irrational dread nagged at her mind that she’d come on a wild-goose chase.
And, to cap it all, there was the dreaded Citroën convertible parked in the square—as large as life and twice as unwelcome!
‘Blow it!’ she muttered in dismay, hastily flattening herself against a wall.
The man she’d met earlier was walking beside a high wall in the direction of a pair of ornate wrought-iron gates. No, not walking. He was striding, with an oddly grim and angry expression, as though he’d snarl at anyone who stood in his way and kick them aside.
What a change in his manner! she thought. No longer suave, elegant and charming, but a totally different man altogether. And therefore not the sort to be trusted.
He held a large iron key in his hand and she realised he must live—or lodge—here, in this very village. She perked up. He’d know where The Old Bakery was. She’d have to ask, like it or not.
‘Beggars and women who can’t speak French can’t be choosers,’ she told herself firmly out loud, dismissing the little flurry of nerves which skimmed around her stomach. ‘Hey! Hang on there!’ she shouted, striding quickly towards him before she lost her courage.
The broad shoulders seemed to square before he turned. ‘You again. What a surprise!’ he declared calmly, as if her appearance wasn’t at all unexpected.
‘Isn’t it?’ she replied with a little jut of her chin, trying to steer an even course between being downright discouraging and yet nice enough to enlist his help. Aware of his eyes on her silky bare midriff, she hastily tried to reclaim his attention. ‘Do you live here?’ she asked politely.
Slowly his gaze travelled upwards to her hopeful face. ‘Kind of.’
Touché! she thought tiredly, seeing the small smile playing around his mouth. She found a smile from somewhere too. A cool one. Nothing too friendly. ‘I’m looking for The Old Bakery…’
‘Yes.’
She blinked. Judging by the expression on his face, he was playing with her, making her work for information. Hadn’t he anything better to do? she thought crossly. She drew in a deep breath. ‘It’s in—’
‘Rue Boulangerie,’ he provided, much to her relief. Yet he made no move to say where it was.
‘I know. Where is that, exactly? I’ve been everywhere looking for it,’ she explained, with a patience she didn’t feel. ‘I’ve tramped up and down every street. It doesn’t exist, as far as I can see.’
Her long fingers pushed damp strands of flopping pale blonde hair back behind her ears as she stood dispiritedly before him.
The enigmatic smile spread into a grin of clear delight. ‘Do you mean that no one would tell you where it is?’ he asked cheerfully.
‘I haven’t asked yet,’ she admitted, puzzled. What was going on here? Her heart began to thump. This was creepy. ‘The place is deserted. There was no one to ask. Anyway, I don’t speak French and I wouldn’t have understood what was said. I thought I could find it on my own.’
‘The Old Bakery is where the owner of the holiday lets lives,’ he murmured. ‘You’re staying in one of her cottages?’
‘No, I’m staying with her,’ Tessa corrected him. ‘She’s my mother.’
‘Ah.’ He nodded, as though that explained everything.
Tessa paused, wondering if he’d seen some resemblance earlier and had been trying to place her. ‘She’s expecting me,’ she went on. ‘And she’ll be getting rather worried by now—’
He interrupted her with an involuntary snort of disbelief. ‘Estelle Davis? Worried about another person?’
Tessa bridled at his tone. ‘Yes! Of course! Why not?’
‘She’s not the sort.’
A cold fear ran down Tessa’s back. What did he know of her mother? ‘You’re being extremely rude—’
‘It would be difficult to be otherwise,’ he agreed, quite unfazed.
Tessa felt crushed by his contempt. And increasingly worried. All her life she’d done her best to ignore her doubts, her private belief that her mother had behaved selfishly. This stranger was bringing them back. ‘If you know her—’
‘I know of her. It’s not quite the same thing.’ His gaze held hers with a suddenly chilling intensity that she found rather frightening. ‘And you are?’
She gulped, pierced by the icy black eyes and his expression of frank hostility. It upset her that someone should loathe her mother so much, and through her head went the same question, over and over again. Why?
‘Tessa Davis.’
‘Guy.’
‘Guy,’ she repeated. ‘It sounds French, the way you say it.’
‘It is.’
Not a man who gave much away unless he wanted to. New Orleans French? She gave up trying to work that one out and returned to the worrying connection between her mother and this Guy.
‘You don’t have a very high opinion of my mother,’ she observed flatly.
‘Got it in one.’
Now the dislike was right out in the open, with every line of Guy’s face showing a frank contempt that scared her. Unexpectedly, a film of unshed tears washed over her limpid green eyes. This wasn’t the situation she’d expected at the end of her journey. She’d worked so hard to sweep away all her uncertainties about this reunion, building it up in her mind into a moment of joy and laughter. Suddenly everything was going wrong.
‘I’m sorry if there’s bad feeling between you—’ she began, clasping her shaking hands.
‘That’s too mild a description. I’d call it hostility,’ he said coldly.
Tessa flushed, and concentrated on stopping her mouth from describing a downward droop, angry with her quickly aroused emotions which made her laugh and cry too easily.
She felt so tired. Near to breaking-point, she stood in a pose of utter dejection, furious that a huge teardrop was trickling from the corner of one eye and burning a hot, wet path down her peachy
