Page 40 of The Magic of Provence

He was assuming she was asleep, given that it was 3a.m., but the escape into much-needed rest was so elusive for him that he’d got up to get another glass of wine in the hope that it might work some magic and slow a spiral of thoughts that was so relentless it was making him feel dizzy.

Sick, even.

If he hadn’t been so emotionally exhausted after those hours at the hospital with Nonna yesterday, he would never have been able to step back far enough to pretend that nothing had changed between himself and Fiona with that kiss. It was one of the hardest things he’d ever done, but something told him that, if she could see how shocked he was, it would only make it worse. Pushing closer could hurt her.

And hurting her was the very last thing Christophe wanted to do.

Because he now knew, instinctively, that someone else had already done that to her. Someone had hurt her physically. Emotionally.Sexually…

He’d seen the scars that first day they’d met – that hint of darkness in her eyes that told him she knew about fear. And pain. But it was that kiss that had let him feel how big that darkness was. And what it was that she was so afraid of.

He could actuallytasteit in the moment she froze when his tongue touched hers.

That, as much as the concern he had for Nonna, was what was keeping him awake and making him feel heartsick.

It had been like the flip of a coin with a perfect kiss on one side and acauchemaron the other. It had, in fact, been a kiss like nothing Christophe had ever experienced before, and perhaps that was partly due to what he hadn’t known.

He’d earned Fiona’s trust – enough for her not to have run from his touch. If only he’d known how huge that had been for her. If he hadn’t let the fire of an unexpectedly powerful desire flicker into that kiss to see if she would like it to go further – as much as he did.

And she had. For just the tiniest fragment of time, as his tongue met hers, he’d sensed a passion that was coiled – as if it had been waiting for a chance to be unleashed. It had thrown an astonishing amount of spice into the taste of that kiss until it was instantly obliterated by the bitterness of fear.

This was his fault.

It could have been the perfect kiss if only he’d stopped it in time. He’d known he was on the cliff edge of losing all the trust he had earned from this extraordinary woman, and the only way he could think of trying to fix it was to pretend he hadn’t noticed her reaction.

That nothing had changed.

And now he was remembering other moments with her. Tiny hesitations that, in retrospect, were there because she’d needed courage to choose to be in his company. Like the shy way she’d greeted him when they were introduced and when he’d asked her to help with the donkeys. He remembered the first smile she’d given him that had reached all the way to her eyes, and hearing her laugh for the first time. The way she’d looked at him yesterday, as if she really was as madly in love with him as he wanted his nonna to believe.

He’d felt a depth of emotion like that in the first touch of their lips last night and, if there was any truth in that impression, it would be heartbreaking, because Christophe could never give her that kind of love. He couldn’t give it to any woman and he would never give them reason to believe that it was possible, so that no one would get hurt.

He wondered now if he’d simply imagined a depth that wasn’t actually there, because Fiona seemed to have been as happy as he was to brush the kiss aside and simply ignore the fact that it had happened.

Trust was very like love, wasn’t it? That was more likely to have been what he’d seen in Fiona’s eyes and felt from her lips.

Like love, if trust was broken badly enough, you could only sweep up the pieces and either try to stick them together again eventually or take the easier option and throw them away and get on with your life.

Christophe had thrown away the pieces of a lifelong love. He had made a considered decision not to keep them or to try to stick them back together, only to have it nearly destroy his life all over again.

But what if Fiona had kept the pieces of her broken trust? It he could helpherstick those pieces back together, it could change the rest of her life.

She deserved to believe in trust again. And in love.

To find someone who would love her the way she deserved to be loved.

It was his fault the kiss had been ruined, but perhaps that was actually a good thing. Because now he knew.

He didn’t know whether he was the first man to have earned this level of trust from Fiona.

He did know how fragile it was, however.

It had cracks in it but he also knew, beyond a shadow of doubt, that he was going to do his best to make sure he didn’t break it completely.

Shecouldstill trust him.

14

Fi woke to the aroma of freshly brewed coffee the next morning.

---