One Night with His Wife Read online

  Taken aback by that statement, Star swallowed uncertainly.

  ‘And not only that,’ Luc continued with glacial cool, ‘At the same time you actually expect me to behave as if our marriage is normal and treat you as my wife—a bond which requires a sense of trust and security. What do you think I am? A split personality?’

  ‘How long did it take you to work out that argument?’ Star asked with helpless curiosity, eyes now wide with wonderment.

  Disconcerted by that offbeat question, and by the way she was studying him, Luc frowned.

  Star gave a slow, rueful shake of her bright head. ‘Never mind. I have to admit that I’m torn between resentment and admiration. You’ve made a very good point and pretty much trashed my argument.’

  Without another word, she threaded her feet into her sandals and then whisked up the rug and carefully folded it. She planted the rug into his surprised hands and then, retracing her steps, wheeled the pram in the direction of the path. She glanced back, noting Luc was still poised like a devastatingly handsome statue in the same spot.

  ‘Aren’t you coming?’ she asked in surprise.

  ‘What you just said…’ Luc drawled as he strode onto the path. ‘What did it…mean?’

  ‘I’ll tell you when I work it out. Mmm…’ she sighed with a sunny smile. ‘I love the smell of the woods.’

  ‘Star, we need to sort this out—’

  ‘Relax…unwind…loosen your tie,’ Star urged pleadingly.

  He wanted to organise their marriage along the strict lines of his daily schedule. Nothing unexpected, nothing outside normal boundaries, everything under his rational, structured control. He couldn’t help himself. His brain was like a steel trap. And arguing with him was a waste of time. She wasn’t about to be browbeaten into changing her mind on the spur of the moment. She was a lateral thinker who worked on gut instinct. Luc was just going to have to accept that.

  When they got back to the chateau, they entertained the twins for an hour. After that, Venus and Mars had their tea and Bertille helped Star to bathe them. By the time the children were tucked into their cots Star was hungry, and, since Luc was now home again, she went to change for dinner. Clad in a floaty lemon dress that skimmed her ankles, she went downstairs and joined Luc in the drawing room.

  To her surprise, Luc wasn’t wearing his usual formal evening dress. Dressed in beautifully cut khaki chinos and a toning shirt, he looked very elegant, yet very much more casual than she was accustomed to seeing him. In that split-second first encounter with his brilliant dark gaze, her tummy clenched and her pulses quickened. Her awareness of his devastating masculinity intensified to a degree that made her suddenly selfconscious.

  ‘Where’s your dinner jacket?’ she muttered in a rush to fill in the silence, shifting from one foot to the other, her cheeks warming as she hurriedly lowered her eyes from the downright lure of his.

  ‘Do you remember telling me that when I wore a dinner jacket I reminded you of the men who appear in old black and white movies?’ Luc enquired gently. ‘Since then, for some reason, I’ve never felt quite the same about dressing up for dinner.’

  ‘Well, times do change, although they never did here, did they?’ Star started talking in mile-a-minute mode. ‘Your father was a real old stickin-the-mud for living the way your ancestors did. The last time I stayed here it was like I’d strayed back into the eighteenth century and was living history!’

  Luc scanned her simple dress with its delicate embroidery. ‘But in spite of that, you’re now dressing for dinner.’

  Star just grinned; she couldn’t help it: it was just typical that they should be out of step. But as she connected with his magnetic dark eyes a second time, that thought drifted from her again, more elemental responses taking over. All she really wanted was to be in his arms, and she felt she ought to have more control over herself.

  ‘You do look gorgeous in that dress,’ Luc extended softly. ‘And it’s going to be the perfect foil for my present.’

  ‘Present?’

  Luc swept a gift-wrapped box from the table behind him and settled it into her hands.

  In genuine surprise, Star sat down hurriedly to open the box. When she lifted out a chakra necklace, she studied it in total shock. She only recognised what it was because she had once seen one in a book. Each different gemstone and crystal had been exquisitely cut and framed in intricate settings, the whole joined by delicate gold links.

  Stunned, Star looked up and stared at Luc in amazement. ‘It’s just gorgeous…where did you get it?’

  ‘I had it made for you while I was in Singapore. A practitioner skilled in the healing qualities of crystals and gemstones helped me to decide what to include.’

  Star slowly swallowed. ‘B-but you—’

  Luc touched the first gemstone. ‘Amber for calm, amethyst for spiritual peace, aquamarine for communication…’ he enumerated steadily. ‘Azurite to help you find your life path and to trust in your intuition, topaz to protect you through life changes, opal for meditation, tourmaline to heal past traumas, lapis lazuli to change negative views into positive ones…and a rose quartz pendulum for powerful healing energy.’

  ‘I just can’t believe this…’ Star mumbled, examining each gem with close interest backed by growing appreciation and excitement at the meaning of so very personalised a present. ‘This means so much to me, Luc…and that you should have taken the trouble, made the effort when you don’t even believe in—’

  ‘There is a scientific basis to your convictions. Now that I know that, I can handle the concept better.’

  ‘You mean you don’t think I’m a crackpot any more?’ Star asked hopefully.

  ‘I never said you were a crackpot.’

  ‘It must have cost you a fortune…not that that counts for anything, with your wealth…but this is just one of those very, very special gifts that speaks so loud…’ At that point, Star got up and flung her arms round him, her heart singing like a thousand violins reaching a crescendo. ‘You are turning into a really wonderful guy, Luc!’

  His arms full of Star, Luc frowned. Turning into? From a rat into a wonderful guy. It was a meteoric rise, he conceded. He had known that she would be really surprised by the necklace, but he was astonished that a gift had the power to inspire her with such an emotional response. But then she was very impressionable. Recalling the amount of cool calculation that had gone into that necklace, he suppressed a very slight pang of conscience.

  ‘Put it on for me,’ Star whispered.

  Taking the necklace from her, Luc undid the catch. She turned round and bent her head for him, felt the cool weight of the jewellery and then, in shock, the hard, sensual promise of his lips pressing to the exposed nape of her neck. Her knees wobbled and every nerve-ending just seemed to sizzle, making her gasp.

  ‘You are so deliciously responsive, Madame Sarrazin,’ Luc teased huskily above her head as she fell back into the waiting circle of his arms, every inch of her so tormentingly aware of that lean, hard frame of his that she blushed all over.

  He held her fast, the warm, sexy scent of him engulfing her, wiping out all self-discipline. Instinctively she pushed back against him, and he vented a roughened groan at that contact. ‘Luc…’ she framed with a desperate little shiver.

  ‘Relax…’ he urged slumbrously, effortlessly in control when she already felt weak with physical need.

  He let his hands roam with sure expertise up over the straining thrust of her urgently sensitive breasts and she jerked and moaned, arching back in a fever of trembling excitement. It had only been a week but it felt like a hundred years since she had last felt his touch.

  With a ragged sigh, Luc turned her back to him and stole one devouring kiss full of a hunger that more than matched her own. Then he dragged his mouth free again and held her tight against him until the fever inside her had subsided to a more bearable level. ‘Touching you wasn’t the brightest idea…’ His own breathing was fractured, his deep voice uneven. ‘Part
icularly not when the bell’s already gone for dinner.’

  Star hadn’t even heard it sounding.

  Luc set her back from him with determined but gentle hands. ‘Our chef always pushes the boat out when I’ve been abroad,’ he shared ruefully. ‘There’s probably five courses coming our way. He’ll be mortally offended if we don’t at least try to eat some of it.’

  Star touched her necklace several times during the meal which followed. She noticed nothing she ate. She couldn’t take her eyes off Luc. She felt buoyant, and full of hope for the future. Luc had used his imagination on her behalf. He had made a real effort to move beyond his own conventional boundaries. Considerable care had gone into the selection of those particular gemstones. And he had done all that purely to please her. From a guy who was at least ninety per cent preoccupied with banking most of the time that was a really impressive gesture, and it touched her to the heart.

  They got as far as the dessert during dinner. Then Luc pushed his plate away and held his hand out to her. Her face hot with colour but her body hot with wild anticipation, Star rose from the table to join him.

  ‘Are you feeling happy?’ she asked him as they crossed the big hall hand in hand for the very first time.

  ‘It’s not a concept I’ve explored since childhood. What does it feel like?’ Luc enquired with amusement.

  ‘I think you’d have to be really unhappy before you could appreciate what the reverse feels like.’

  ‘Are you planning to sleep on the sofa tonight?’ Brilliant dark eyes encountered and held hers.

  ‘No…’ Star muttered breathlessly.

  ‘I am experiencing happiness at this moment, ma cherie,’ Luc drawled with unconcealed mockery.

  Star tensed with sudden discomfiture at the strength of her desire for him. ‘A lot of things are more important than sex, Luc—’

  ‘Not to most men,’ Luc slotted in softly.

  ‘Is that like a guy thing?’

  ‘Definitely. And, speaking as a male who only planned to marry after his fiftieth birthday—’

  Star stopped dead and surveyed him in amazement. ‘But why?’

  ‘I didn’t want to risk wasting the best years of my life in a bad marriage,’ Luc admitted without hesitation. ‘It makes sense. Think about it.’

  Star didn’t want to think about it. She was appalled by such a pessimistic outlook. ‘You can’t plan stuff like that, Luc.’

  ‘Not with you in the vicinity,’ he conceded.

  ‘But didn’t it even cross your mind that you might fall madly in love?’

  ‘In lust, yes…in love, no.’

  ‘But I always feel good when I’m in love…well, most of the time,’ Star adjusted ruefully.

  Sudden silence reigned.

  Star glanced at Luc’s hard profile and sighed, her eyes veiling. ‘You’re not comfortable with this conversation, are you?’

  Luc tightened his grip on her slender fingers as they began to slide inexorably from his. ‘I think the less you think about love the happier we will be,’ he stated with flat conviction.

  A faraway look of regret in her eyes, Star realised that she was still wishing for the moon, and that Luc had just forced her dreams into yet another crash landing. Only a week ago she had been telling herself that she had come to terms with the fact that Luc didn’t believe in romantic love. But it was hard to feel optimistic about a potential future with a husband who didn’t love her. Particularly when they were such different kinds of people. How loyal would he be to a wife he didn’t love?

  Now rigid with seething tension, Luc removed his gaze abruptly from her preoccupied face. ‘I’ve got some work to do,’ he told her flatly, and released her hand.

  Literally exploded out of her anxious thoughts, Star stilled in complete confusion to watch Luc stride away from her and head back down the magnificent staircase again.

  She gripped the banister. ‘I could keep you company…?’

  At the foot of the stairs, Luc swung round, his lean, hard features icily sardonic.

  Shrivelled by that look, Star stepped back, the warmth inside her evaporating beneath that chill. ‘I guess you don’t need company…’

  One minute they had been heading for bed, excitement in the air—well, in her air anyway. No longer did she feel qualified to say how Luc had been feeling—but the next minute she had become as undesirable as cold tea. Had she said something which annoyed him? She had started talking about love. She groaned, thoroughly irritated with a tongue which frequently ran ahead of her brain in Luc’s company. Why did he have to be so touchy? Not just touchy, she conceded heavily, Luc had seem derisive…repelled?

  Was that her fault? What made a guy go from keen to cold? Too much eagerness? Had Luc been in the act of dragging her off to bed only because she herself had made it so painfully obvious that she could hardly wait for him to make love to her again? Star cringed at that suspicion. No doubt after a couple of sexual encounters she no longer possessed quite the same ‘wild’ appeal. In fact, maybe now that Luc suspected that in all likelihood she was always going to be around, her stock in the desirability stakes had sunk a great deal lower.

  After an hour’s wakeful twisting and turning in a bed which seemed far too big and far too empty for her, Star sat up with the sense of having finally penetrated the mystery of Luc’s behaviour with an explanation that was very slightly less humiliating. For goodness’ sake, what an idiot she was! She remembered him admitting that he hadn’t planned to marry until he was at least fifty. Now she knew what was wrong. All of a sudden Luc had felt trapped, twenty years ahead of his time. In presenting him with two children she had deprived him of the freedom and female variety that all young, sexually active males supposedly cherished. An extra twenty years was a long term to serve for not using contraception, she allowed miserably.

  Seated at his desk, Luc sank a brandy in one long, unappreciative gulp. And she called him insensitive! He had never been the sensitive type, but Star was getting to him on levels he did not wish to explore. He saw that wistful, yearning expression on her face afresh. His anger got colder and deadlier. Or was it anger? He realised in some surprise that he felt bitter. He felt very, very bitter.

  *

  From below her lashes, while pretending to still be asleep, Star watched Luc emerge from the bathroom the next morning.

  Stark naked, he was towelling dry his hair. A sensation akin to a tightening knot tugged low in the pit of her stomach. Feeling like a voyeur, she shut her eyes tight in shame. She recalled telling him that there were a lot more important things than sex and decided it was time she learned to practise what she preached. She didn’t know what time Luc had finally come to bed. By that stage she had given up hope of him ever appearing and she had dozed off.

  ‘I know you’re awake,’ Luc remarked lazily.

  Her lashes practically hit her eyebrows. ‘How?’

  A vibrant smile curved Luc’s mouth. ‘I spoke and you took the bait!’

  She laughed, but it was a challenge. At that instant, his dark, vibrant magnetism just took her breath away.

  Wearing only a pair of boxer shorts, Luc strolled across to the bed and sank lithely down on the edge, all bronzed skin, rippling muscles and tangible energy. He handed her a gold credit card and a fat wad of francs. ‘You need to do some serious shopping today.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Surprise…’ His dark eyes gleamed. ‘But shop for somewhere hot.’

  She sat up with a jerk. ‘Are we going away?’

  ‘Late afternoon. You, me, the twins.’

  Very slowly Star nodded; she was totally stunned. Luc had once had the same view of holidays as Scrooge had had of Christmas. What was making him so volatile? Why all these inexplicable changes of mood? Last night he had been grim as hell when he’d turned away from her in a very hurtful rejection, and now? Like a guy on a mission, he radiated charisma and smiles.

  ‘For a couple of weeks,’ Luc added casually.

  ‘What abo
ut the bank?’

  ‘I’m tearing myself away from it…but I have to go in today to tie up a few loose ends…OK, mon ange?’ Lowering his dark head, Luc crushed her parted lips with hungry brevity beneath his, and then rose with unconcealed reluctance again.

  ‘OK…’ she said breathlessly.

  As he got dressed, Luc listened with the utmost contentment to Star singing off-key in the shower. To think he had actually been apprehensive about the reception he might receive! Storming off last night had been a major misjudgement, he acknowledged. If she had done the same thing to him, he would have been ready to strangle her. Fortunately, Star was happily distracted by the idea of a holiday.

  And around dawn Luc had finally seen the error of his ways. Under no circumstances was he prepared to wait until the end of the summer to discover their ultimate fate as a family. And the solution to that problem was so simple that Luc could not credit he had taken so long to see it. He had to make Star fall in love with him again. Then a nuclear bomb wouldn’t shift her from his side…

  *

  Star spent the morning shopping in Nantes.

  In a medieval side-street, she found a fabulous baby shop, and kitted Venus and Mars out with substantial new wardrobes. When cost didn’t have to be considered, she discovered to her delight, she could shop at supersonic speed. She bought lingerie by the handful, swimwear and new toe-post sandals in five different colours. In quick succession she went on to purchase T-shirts, two short skirts, five long floaty ones she couldn’t choose between, three new dresses and canvas shoes. Stocking up on suncream, a new straw hat and a pair of leopard print sunglasses completed the trip.

  With Bertille’s organisational ability to hand, and the wonderful knowledge that she could pack the kitchen sink if she so desired, Star had closed the last suitcase and had changed into a fashionably short lemon lace-lined skirt, teamed with a sequinned white T-shirt, when the internal phone rang to inform her that she had a visitor waiting to see her, a Mr Martin. Rory…Rory was here in France?