“Six years old!” She knew that the upper-class English put great stock in educating their youth away from home, but a six-year-old seemed hardly more than a baby to her. “Didn’t your mother object?”
The corners of Christopher’s lips pinched grimly inward, and she knew she’d said something terribly wrong. But before she could apologize, he was speaking in that incredibly dry, unemotional way she was beginning to suspect might be his form of self-protection. “Apparently, her sons’ welfare wasn’t at the top of her list of priorities. She left my father and the three of us before I turned a year old.”
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered, shocked at the very idea of a woman abandoning three sons and a husband.
“It’s all right. I remember nothing of her.” The chill in his words was a thing she could almost touch. His pain showed in the fine lines around his eyes and mouth, despite his unemotional denial. She didn’t know what to say to comfort him, but she sensed she had to keep him talking or risk losing the one chance she might have of understanding him. For some reason, that seemed important to her.
“Are you and your brothers close?” she asked hastily.
It took a moment for him to gather his thoughts and answer this time. “Not in any way you might expect. My oldest brother, Thomas, is an advisor to the King of Elbia. He lives with the royal family, travels with them, rarely returns to England. He recently married an American woman and inherited a gaggle of youngsters in the bargain.” He chuckled affectionately. “Thomas has his hands full now, but seems happy as a clam in an ocean of mud. Our middle brother is Matthew. I think he took our mother’s desertion the hardest. He was three years old when she left, and swears he remembers her vividly. As soon as he turned twenty-one and collected his inheritance, he lit out for America. He’s been there ever since, running an import business.”
She waited for Christopher to go on. Something in the halting way he had spoken told her that he wasn’t accustomed to talking about his family. When he didn’t continue on his own, she prodded gently. “Do you often travel to visit your brothers?”
“I have obligations here,” he said, casting her a sharp, sidelong glance.
That was it then. He was ending the conversation.
“I see,” she murmured. But she didn’t, not really. What was more important than family?
Elbia, she mused, as her clients chatted happily among themselves in the seats behind her. She tried to envision a simple map of Europe. Wasn’t that the tiny alpine country about the size of Monaco? How difficult could it be for a man with Christopher’s means to jet across the continent for a quick visit with his brother? Traveling to the States was a little more difficult but surely the business that kept him tied down in Scotland would allow for a few weeks off now and again to see his own family.
“What are your plans for the rest of the day?” Christopher asked after a long silence.
“Edinburgh Castle, of course, then Queen Mary’s Bathhouse and the Royal Mile for shopping and house tours.”
He glanced up at the sky. “The rain should hold off long enough.”
She nodded, then let a grin slip out.
“What is it?” he asked, glancing at her curiously as he pulled over a lane to let a lorry pass.
“Queen Mary of Scots. Legend has it, she bathed in white wine and goat’s milk. I wonder if that mixture really is good for the complexion.” She held her arm out to inspect it as the truck sped past them.
“I’ll bring the wine and milk, you try it out and—” he lifted a dark brow aimed toward the dip in her neckline “—I shall be the judge.”
She laughed, thinking she wouldn’t put it past him. Stand ready for inspection, miss! He’d insist on seeing every inch of her. Fat chance she’d let him!
Christopher accompanied Jennifer’s group to the castle and sixteenth-century cottage known as the queen’s bathhouse, which, more likely, had been a simple summerhouse or dovecote. He then asked her to drop him off at his car and arranged to meet them after lunch.
Jennifer watched him drive off in a bottle-green Jaguar, weaving expertly through the noonday traffic. She promised herself that when he returned she would find out one more thing about him. Just one more thing before she let herself like him any more than she already did.
So far, she had been careful. She had done nothing wrong. It was all just talk and a little flirting, the way strangers do—particularly when one is from out of town. Talk, harmless glances, a few touches. That was all.
But she felt in her bones that he wanted more. And, in truth, so did she. She wanted him to run his thumb in those little circles on the back of her hand. She wanted him to call her “luv,” in that playful, un-aristocratic, bad-boy way. She wanted him to touch her where his eyes had suggestively rested as they discussed Queen Mary’s baths.
All this, even though she knew in her heart that they had no more than a few days to share. But first she had to know if there was another woman in his life.
As Christopher drove out of the city in the Jag, his thoughts turned from one female to another. Lisa was the most precious thing in his life. Yet she had never really belonged to him. Ever since he had learned he was to be a father, eight years ago, he had set aside all else for the child. Whatever was best for her came first.
When a woman he had had a brief affair with told him that she was going to have his baby, Christopher initially had been shocked and troubled. He immediately offered to marry her, only to discover she wasn’t interested in marrying him. His masculine pride took a hard hit, but another part of him was relieved. He knew he didn’t love her, and she was quite honest about her lack of feelings for him.
“Our marrying,” he remembered her saying coldly, “would be stupid. I’ve already told Sir Isaac, my fiancé, about the problem. He’s fine with it. Really. As long as we publicly let on that the baby is his, for the time being.”
At first this had seemed fine to Christopher. He’d been let off the hook. But when Lisa was born, he couldn’t stay away from the hospital. And at the instant his gaze settled over her tiny pink face and crystal-blue eyes, he lost his heart. From that day on he had done all he could, without going back on his promise, to see his little daughter and support her in any way he could.
He became an official friend of the family. As soon as she could speak, Lisa took to calling him Uncle Chris. If he was lucky, the nurse would bring the little girl down to greet houseguests, which often numbered in the dozens. Lisa grew from fragile infant to delightfully rambunctious toddler, to a charmingly intelligent child who favored wearing her riding jodhpurs and helmet over white eyelet and pink ribbons. He never tired of talking to her or reading her stories. And she always seemed just as happy to see him.
When she was old enough to go to school, he offered to pay her tuition. All her mother had to do was choose the school. Much to his dismay, instead of selecting one of the better London institutions, Sandra Ellington chose her own alma mater in southern Scotland. So very far from London, where he lived.
Determined not to lose contact with Lisa, he had secured a position for himself on the board of regents at St. James School for Girls. He had been present at nearly all school functions in the past year that she had attended, particularly when Lisa’s
