Page 29 of A Fortunes of Texas Christmas (Fortunes of Texas)

Robin looked up from her place behind the counter in her small kitchen. Her mother stood at the back door, apron tied around her waist, arms folded.

She shrugged lightly. “Just making spaghetti sauce.”

“You’re not joining us tonight?”

Since she’d broken up with Trey, Robin had eaten dinner with her parents most Friday nights, since most of her friends wanted to head into Austin to enjoy the nightclub scene and drink and party until dawn. Not that she was averse to dancing and a beer or two after a week of hard work, but she really was more stay at home than party hard, so Friday dinners with her parents usually suited her fine.

“Uh, no,” she said and stirred the sauce simmering on the burner. “I’ve got company tonight.”

“The Frenchman?”

Robin smiled to herself, thinking how quickly Amersen had fallen from grace in her mother’s eyes, thanks to her interfering brother. “Yes, Amersen.”

“Be careful, okay?”

She met her mother’s concerned gaze. “I will, I promise. And he’s still the same person you thought was a good sort of man a few days ago. I’m not in danger here, Mom, so you can stop worrying.”

Her mother let out a brittle laugh. “I’ll always worry. When you have children of your own, you’ll know why.”

Robin did want children, but her plan had always been to have them some years in the future. For a while she’d believed she’d have them with Trey, but that idea was now out the window. She never wanted to see him again, let alone anything else. And since the only other man on the horizon at the moment would be returning to Paris within days, Robin suspected it was time she seriously got back into the local dating scene.

“Kids are way off into the future, Mom. And you can rest easy knowing that Amersen will be leaving in a couple of days now that his deal with Kate is in writing.”

Veronica Harbin didn’t look quite convinced, but she nodded. “Okay. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Sure,” Robin said.

Once her mother left, Robin turned the heat under the pot to low and headed for the bathroom. Half an hour later she was showered and dressed in jeans, a soft purple sweater and a pair of sparkly moccasins she’d bought from a craft market recently. She’d washed and dried her hair, leaving it to hang down her back and shoulders, played around with a little makeup and then walked from room to room in the house for half an hour waiting for him to arrive.

He turned up at three minutes to seven and stood on her doorstep, a bottle of wine in one hand and a small wrapped box in the other. And he looked so gorgeous he stole her breath. In dark trousers, a black shirt open at the throat and a leather jacket that hugged his broad shoulders, he looked totally handsome and masculine. And hot.

“Another gift?” she remarked as he crossed the threshold and she closed the door behind him.

He shrugged lightly. “It’s just a small thing, amoureuse.”

Robin wasn’t exactly sure what that meant, since she didn’t speak a lick of French, but she could guess it was some kind of endearment, which made her as giddy as a teenager in the midst of a first crush. And since he smelled absolutely divine, her giddy senses did a crazy loop-de-loop.

She met his gaze as he passed her the box. “Thank you. Let’s go into the living room.”

He followed her down the hallway and stalled in the doorway to the living area. And he was smiling as he looked around the room, eyes wide.

“Too much?” she asked.

The huge, fluffy spruce tree, complete with an assortment of gifts beneath it, took up most of one corner, and the rest of the room was decorated within an inch of its life. Garlands were looped along the picture rail, and bunches of fresh holly sat in several vases on the table behind the sofa. A ceramic nativity scene lay beside the fireplace, complete with straw, backlighting and a timber manger her father had made for her years ago. And there was an array of mismatched ornaments and festive novelties on the mantel, including the glass slippers he’d gifted her.

“No,” he replied, still smiling. “Exactly what I imagined.”

Robin’s skin prickled with awareness. “I told you I like Christmas.”

“So you said,” he remarked and pointed to the small box in her hand. “Which is why I got you that.”

Robin fiddled self-consciously with the ribbon on the top of the box for a second and then opened the gift. It was a snow globe depicting the Eiffel Tower in front of a skating pond, complete with tiny skaters, snow, reindeer and a sleigh. Paris at Christmastime. Her heart skipped a beat as she held it in her hand.

“It’s...lovely,” she said and turned it upside down, turning the small key on the base. Music began, a sweet, familiar melody. “I know this song... It’s...it’s...”

“‘Douce Nuit,’” he supplied. “‘Silent Night.’”

“Of course,” she said and smiled. “Thank you. Another favor from Ortega?”

---