how far along are you?’
‘Ten weeks.’
Gabrielle sighed heavily. ‘God, I hate being right.’
No more than Simone hated being proved reckless, and thoughtless and stupid. She’d thought her low-dose pills would protect her. They hadn’t.
‘You have to tell him,’ said Gabrielle next.
‘Tell who?’
‘Don’t give me that.’ Gabrielle shot her an icy reprimand. ‘My brother. Rafael. Used to give you head starts in running races and the occasional frog. CEO of Angels Landing Wines. Son of Josien. Son of Harrison. Son of Etienne. Heir to the throne of bloody Maracey. Oh, and father of your unborn child.’
‘It’s not Rafe’s fault that he ended up son of Etienne and heir to Maracey,’ Simone felt compelled to utter in his defence. ‘That one came as a complete surprise.’
‘And yet, strangely, I still want to strangle him,’ said Gabrielle. ‘Has he contacted you since the wedding?’
‘No.’ Simone looked away as her heart constricted. ‘I don’t expect him to. We shared one night, Gabrielle. It meant nothing to him.’
‘Well, it produced something,’ said Gabrielle curtly. ‘You have to tell him.’
‘Don’t you think he’s had enough responsibilities thrust upon him for the time being?’
‘I don’t care what responsibilities he’s had thrust upon him,’ snapped Gabrielle. ‘This responsibility is one he brought upon himself! For heaven’s sake, Simone. Do you want this child to grow up without ever knowing its father? Do you want this baby’s childhood to echo Rafael’s?’
‘I love this baby,’ said Simone fiercely. ‘And he will never have a childhood like Rafael’s.’
Gabrielle slumped back into her seat, tears streaming from her eyes. ‘Bloody hormones,’ she said shakily, wiping them away.
‘It’s not the hormones.’
‘You’re right. It’s my overprotective friend and my foolish brother who are making me weep.’ Gabrielle picked up her coffee with both hands and sipped. ‘Would you like my opinion? As your friend and as Rafael’s sister?’
Simone nodded.
Gabrielle looked troubled. ‘Okay, here it is. I appreciate that Rafael has a lot on his plate right now. I appreciate that you appreciate that, but there’s no way around this, Simone, and it’s not going to get any easier. You have to tell him.’
‘I will.’ Simone’s hand shook as she reached for her bread. ‘Soon.’ As soon as she’d gathered the courage for it. ‘But not just yet.’
Etienne’s vineyard estate was a forbidding stone fortress, built in the Spanish style. Older than Caverness, it cut across the hillside and stood sentry over the valley below. Rafael hadn’t wanted to feel comfortable here. He hadn’t wanted the beauty of the land and the stark splendour of the fortress to get to him, but the undeniable fact was that it had.
He liked this place.
Etienne had wanted him to stay at the palace in the capital, but Rafael had resisted taking up residence there. The vineyard Etienne was paying him to oversee the restoration of was here. He didn’t need to stay at the palace. He didn’t want to stay there.
The papers had been full of pictures of him and Etienne from the moment he’d set foot in Maracey. The resemblance had been unmistakable. A simple palace announcement had taken care of the rest.
Maracey, please meet Rafael Alexander de Morsay, son of Etienne.
The press had gone wild.
Sinner or saint. It depended which paper you read. Apparently, he had the face for either and the background for both.
Rafael smiled grimly. He’d been here for a month and he’d thrown himself into the work of restoring Etienne’s vines. Occasionally, Etienne would request the pleasure of his company at a state dinner or function. Increasingly, he sat in on political negotiations as part of Etienne’s facilitation team. Rafael had come to enjoy those negotiations more and more. When the days were eighteen hours long and fraught with complex world issues there was no time to think about the things he’d said to Simone Duvalier.
And the things he hadn’t.
Harrison had urged him to visit Caverness and speak with Simone in person. Harrison had urged that if returning to Caverness was the problem then perhaps Rafe could arrange to meet Simone in Paris instead. He’d urged Rafe to phone her, at the very least.
Rafael had picked up the phone and punched in the number for Caverness a hundred times over, but fear had stilled his hand. What could he offer Simone? Another night?
It wouldn’t be enough for him.
Time shoehorned in between his commitments and hers?
His current commitments now spanned two countries and a small territory. Simone’s covered all of Europe. Maybe if both parties were willing to juggle their schedules a little they might be able to manage a week here and there.
It still wouldn’t be enough for him, but it’d be a start.
And then he would think back to those last raw words he’d thrown at her before she’d walked out of the Sydney restaurant and knew himself a fool for thinking that Simone would ever want any kind of relationship with him at all after all he’d said and done.
She wouldn’t.
All she would want was his apology. He owed her that much at the very least, and he should have made it weeks ago, months ago, for the longer he left it, the harder it got.
I’m sorry for the things I said.
That was the start of it. That was the easy bit.
If there was a woman in my life I could trust, I think it would be you.
If.
Was that an apology? He didn’t know. He didn’t think so.
The sun beat down on his back through the thin cotton of his shirt. Sweat slicked his skin from the effort of having taken to row upon row of hard and stony soil with a pickaxe. The gardeners had tried to stop him doing any of the physical restoration work when he’d first hoisted a shovel. Apparently princes of the realm did not labour like dogs beneath the fierce Maracey sun—even bastard ones.
They’d learned soon enough to leave this bastard alone when he was driving out his demons.
His mobile buzzed from amongst the assortment of tools in the wheelbarrow. Downing pickaxe, Rafe headed for it, his aching shoulders grateful for the reprieve, but as was the way of electronic devices, the buzzing had stopped by the time he reached it.
He wasn’t in the mood to talk with anyone anyway.
Rafael
