Page 57 of Falling for Provence

To Julien’s surprise, Ellie took hold of Theo’s hand, and they walked on either side of his son – like any parents of a small child.

Initially, he was shocked that Ellie, to outward appearances, was taking the place of his son’s mother, but then Theo looked up at him and the smile on his face was so happy it almost broke his heart. Could a child so young be aware that, for the moment, Ellie was filling the enormous gap in their lives?

But was it breaking Ellie’s heart as well?

Should he pick Theo up, perhaps, and give him a piggyback so that he wasn’t able to hold Ellie’s hand?

As if she’d caught his thought, or felt his gaze, she glanced up and there was reassurance in her eyes. There might have been a tiny tremble in her lips as they curved into a small smile that was definitely poignant, but she wasn’t distressed. She was, however, completely silent as they sat amongst the crowd a minute or two later. But that could simply have been because she was as mesmerised as Theo by the huge birds of prey soaring and swooping between handlers who were dressed in traditional costumes, with white shirts beneath leather jerkins and breeches tucked into high boots.

They moved on after the performance to find one of the viewing platforms where they could try and spot some members of the wolf packs and watch a feeding time, and Julien knew hehad to check that Ellie was really okay with Theo wanting to hold her hand again.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said softly, when Theo had let go of Ellie so that he could press his hands and his nose to the glass of a viewing area and couldn’t hear him speaking. ‘It was an… imposition, perhaps? For you to come here with Theo?’

‘It’s fine,’ Ellie said quietly. ‘Theo is adorable. I love that he’s not shy with me any longer.’

Julien hesitated. He wasn’t surprised that his son liked Ellie so much: he felt the same way himself. But could he say that? Or that he envied the way the little boy had taken hold of her hand, as if it was the most natural thing in the world to do. He would have liked to be holding her hand himself right now, to be honest, but he would never do that in front of Theo. As he’d reassured his mother and grandmother, when they’d been peering through the window at the woman sitting in his car, Ellie was his neighbour. A friend. Nothing more.

‘I’m sorry I didn’t take you in to introduce you to my mother and grandmother,’ he said quietly. ‘That was rude of me.’

Ellie shrugged. ‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said. ‘I understand.’

But Julien could sense that it did matter. That there was a barrier that he didn’t want to be there today.

Theo had spotted a wolf and was excitedly looking back at his father and pointing. Julien nodded and gave him a thumbs up, but he was thinking of something very different.

If he told Ellie the truth, she would really understand why they could never be anything more than friends. Knowing the truth might mean she could look back, when thisaffairewas over, on what they had had together without any regret for what they didn’t have. And it would be over soon. Very soon.

Theo was completely focused on the park attendants walking in the enclosure with buckets of food to leave for the wolves.Not that he would have understood what Julien was saying in English, anyway.

‘My mother and mygrand-mèrehave never forgiven Sarah,’ he told Ellie quietly. ‘I knew they might not make you feel welcome.’

Ellie’s eyes widened. ‘They’ve neverforgivenher?’ she echoed. ‘Why? Was the accident her fault?’

‘She wasn’t driving,’ Julien said, his voice without expression. ‘It was her lover’s car. She was leaving and, as far as I know, she had no intention of ever coming back to me. Or to Theo.’

He could see the total shock in Ellie’s eyes. He wanted to confess that he believed it had been a good thing Sarah had never come back, because she hadn’t loved him. She’d only married him because she was pregnant. He hadn’t loved her, either. Not the way you should love the person you were choosing to spend the rest of your life with.

Sarah hadn’t even loved her son enough to take him with her.

And maybe that was why Ellie was looking so shocked. Because she would do anything to have her own son with her again. She would never ever have left him behind.

But Julien hesitated before admitting that guilty secret and the opportunity was lost. As if he knew he was being talked about, Theo’s head turned swiftly, his eyes shining with happiness. A small finger was pointing into the wolf enclosure.

‘Regardez, regardez…’he called. ‘Les loups viennent manger maintenant.’

Julien smiled back at Theo. Maybe part of that smile was relief that he could shut the past away again – in that locked space where it belonged.

‘The wolves are hungry,’ he said to Ellie. ‘Here they come…’

It wasn’t until they had driven to Saint-Martin-Vésubie, parked the car and started walking down the main street – with its distinctive channel creating a downhill stream that was running fast enough to create tiny waves and delight Theo – that the implications of what Julien had told her began to surface from the shock it had given Ellie.

She had been so sure it was because he’d lost the love of his life that there could never be a future for her with Julien.

But if it was because he wasn’t ready to trust again, that felt like… like a light at the end of a tunnel.

A glimmer of hope…

Theo found a small branch, like a miniature tree with a bunch of shiny green leaves at the top, broken off a laurel or bay tree that was growing in a huge urn outside a shop. He dipped the leafy end into thegargouilleand watched the water rippling around it as he walked beside it, holding the sharp, snapped-off end with care. And then he dropped the whole branch into the stream and trotted after it as the current swept it downhill.

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