Second Chance With The Best Man. Katrina Cudmore

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СКАЧАТЬ looked up at his softly spoken question. Had he guessed she was remembering that night on his bedroom floor? Her anger resurged. ‘I’ve been offered a promotion which would involve a transfer to the Singapore office.’

      Up ahead on a bend in the river, below a string of lights threaded through trees, a wooden sign on the riverbank announced that they had arrived at La Belle Epoque.

      Laurent guided the boat towards the restaurant’s river steps, nodding approvingly to her news. ‘That’s fantastic. When are you moving?’

      He shifted the oars inside the boat, wood upon wood making a solid thump, a sound just like the thud her heart gave to his enthusiastic congratulations.

      She gritted her teeth and eyed him, not caring at the hurt heat flaming in her cheeks. Did he not even feel a single pang that she would be moving so far away? How could he not realise how torn she was about leaving her family behind?

      The move to Singapore was an incredible opportunity, but in truth, deep down, she was scared of being lonely...forgotten by her family.

      ‘Are you going to accept?’

      She shrugged at his question. ‘Do you think I should?’

      He considered her for a moment and then those blue eyes blazed with an ominous energy. ‘Is something or somebody keeping you in London?’

      She folded her arms. ‘Perhaps.’

      The blaze in his eyes intensified. ‘Are you dating someone?’

      She’d been on some dates during the past few months; wasn’t getting back on the figurative horse the best way to get over a fall? By dating other guys she’d hoped that maybe she could rekindle the hope and optimism and openness that had been growing in her before she’d met Laurent, but her dates hadn’t been a success. She’d felt too wary, had struggled to connect with them. Now she clung to the hope that maybe it was just a case that she’d tried dating too quickly and that with time she would be more open to a relationship...but she feared that maybe she would never find it inside herself to trust a man again. ‘How about you? Are you seeing someone?’ she countered.

      * * *

      Laurent stood and jumped onto the landing steps, jealousy coiling in his stomach. For the past year he’d immersed himself in work, driven by the need to prove himself as a worthy CEO, but now as he turned to find Hannah’s eyes sparking with anger he realised it was also to distract himself from the pain he’d caused her. He held out his hand and Hannah reluctantly took it. When she leaped, her hand tightened for a split second on his but the moment her foot touched the step she snatched it away.

      They stood facing each other, the air between them dense with tension.

      Hannah’s jawline tightened. ‘So, are you dating someone?’

      ‘I’m too busy with work.’

      ‘You worked crazy hours in London—it didn’t stop you dating then.’

      ‘It’s different now.’

      ‘In what way?’

      She was testing him, pushing him for an answer and he wasn’t sure what her question really was.

      ‘Running a family business is complicated.’

      Her nose wrinkled at that.

      He pulled in a breath and admitted, ‘After what happened between us, I don’t feel like dating.’

      ‘Yet?’

      Would he ever want to date again? Right now, he couldn’t see himself wanting to ask another woman out. But he couldn’t admit that to her so instead he simply shrugged.

      She looked at him with a puzzled expression. ‘You’re the one who ended it.’

      When he’d ended their relationship, he’d used the excuse of needing to focus on his new life in France. And the fact that they wanted different things in life, namely that he wasn’t interested in marriage. He’d kept from her the actual reasons why he would never marry, how his trust in others had been destroyed as a teenager, because to do so would have meant revealing his true self to her, a self he spent most of the time trying to avoid.

      They shifted apart at the sound of footsteps behind them. Gabriel, the owner of La Belle Epoque, greeted them warmly and guided them to an outdoor table with views of a weir and an old mill.

      Local teenagers were playing in the river, laughing and calling to one another in the evening sunshine.

      After Gabriel had taken their order and poured them a glass of white wine each, Hannah smiled as one of the teenagers swung over the river, whooping loudly before landing with an enormous splash in the water, which earned her applause from her gang. ‘When we were teenagers and the weather was fine, I used to go down to the river that ran through our land with Cora and Emily to swim and hang out. Did you and François do the same?’

      ‘We spent our summers with my grandparents in Paris.’

      She placed her elbow on the table and balanced her chin in the cup of her hand. ‘I thought Parisians left the city for the summer. Why didn’t they come here?’

      ‘My grandparents moved to Paris after my father took over the family business.’ He stopped with the intention of saying no more, but thanks to Hannah’s expectant silence he found himself eventually admitting, ‘There were arguments. My grandfather didn’t approve of how my father was running the business, so they moved away. When we were old enough I asked my grandfather if François and I could spend the summers with them in Paris.’

      ‘Did your parents not mind?’

      He couldn’t help but give a rueful laugh. ‘They were too busy to even notice we weren’t around.’

      She grimaced but then, ever the optimist, asked with excitement, ‘Did you like Paris?’

      ‘We both loved it. François even stayed and finished his final years of school there.’

      Her brows shot up. ‘Wow, I couldn’t see my parents agreeing to that—they even struggled when we left for university. Your parents obviously encouraged you to be independent.’

      She was reading the situation all wrong. Not surprising given her background. Once again this evening he felt torn between changing the subject and telling her about his family. Before, he’d never felt that compulsion. In London, he’d been able to block out his past, but being back in Cognac for the past year had stirred up all the memories and emotions of how betrayed he’d felt by his parents’ affairs.

      ‘Is everything okay? You seem upset.’

      He started at Hannah’s words. She’d always been so good at reading his moods.

      ‘Our family life was rather chaotic. I persuaded François he would do better in a calmer environment.’

      ‘Have you always been the protective older brother?’

      He grinned at the playfulness of her question. ‘Probably.’

      Hannah СКАЧАТЬ