‘A perfectly normal business suit,’ she corrected, ‘and the car’s not mine, it’s a rental. You’re judging me, Xav, and you’re being unfair.’
Unfair? He hadn’t been the one to walk away. The sheer injustice stung, and he had to make a real effort to hold back the surge of irritation. An effort that wasn’t entirely successful. ‘What do you expect, Allegra?’
‘Everybody makes mistakes.’
Yes. And he had no intention of repeating his.
Clearly his thoughts showed in his expression, because she sighed. ‘You’re not even going to listen to me, are you?’
‘You said it all yesterday.’ And ten years ago. When she hadn’t given him time to deal with the way his life had just imploded, and she’d dumped him.
‘This isn’t just a whim, you know.’
And then he noticed the shadows underneath her eyes. It looked as though he wasn’t the only one who’d spent a sleepless night. No doubt she’d been reliving the memories, too, the bad ones that had all but wiped out the good. And he had to admit that it had taken courage for her to come back, knowing full well that everyone here would have judged her actions and found her very much wanting.
‘All right,’ he said grudgingly. ‘Explain, and I’ll listen.’
‘Without interruptions?’
‘I can’t promise that. But I’ll listen.’
‘OK.’ She took a sip of her coffee, as if she needed something to bolster her—though her plate was still empty, he noticed. ‘Harry and I fell out pretty badly when I first left for London, and I swore I’d never come back to France again. By the time I graduated, I’d mellowed a bit, and I saw things a bit differently. I made it up with him. But I was settled in England, then. And I…’ She bit her lip. ‘Oh, forget it. There’s no point in explaining. You wouldn’t understand in a million years.’
‘Now who’s judging?’
She gave him a wry smile. ‘OK. You asked for it. You grew up here, where your family has lived for…what, a couple of hundred years?’
‘Something like that.’
‘You always knew where you were when you woke up. You were secure. You knew you belonged.’
‘Well, yes.’ Even when he’d planned to go to Paris, he’d always known that he’d come back to the Ardèche and take over the vineyard. But he’d thought he’d have time to broaden his experience in business, first, see a bit of the world.
‘It wasn’t like that for me. When I was a child, I was dragged all over the world in my parents’ wake—the orchestra would be on tour, or my mother would do a series of solo concerts and my father would be her accompanist. We never settled anywhere. The nannies never lasted long—they’d thought they’d have an opportunity to travel and see the world, but they didn’t bargain on the fact that my parents worked all the time and expected them to do likewise. When they weren’t on stage, they were practising and didn’t want to be disturbed. My mother would sometimes practise until her fingers bled. And then, just as somewhere started to become home, we’d move on again.’
He could see old hurts blooming in Allegra’s expression, and her struggle to keep them back. And suddenly he realised what she was trying to tell him. ‘So once you’d settled in London, you had your own place. Roots.’
‘Exactly. And I could run my life the way I wanted it to be. I wasn’t being pushed around and told what to do by someone else all the time, however well meaning they were.’ She looked relieved. ‘Thank you for understanding.’
He blew out a breath. ‘No, you were right in the first place. I still don’t understand. Surely your family always come first?’ It was what he’d always believed. The way his family—with the notable exception of his mother—had always done things. If there was a problem, you worked together to fix it.
‘I didn’t say it was logical.’ She looked away. ‘There were other reasons why I didn’t want to come back to France.’
‘Me?’ He really hadn’t meant to say it, but the word just slipped out.
‘You,’ she confirmed.
Well, at least it was out in the open now. They could stop pussyfooting round the issue.
She clearly thought the same, because she said, ‘I was hoping you wouldn’t be here.’
He rolled his eyes. ‘I’ve been Harry’s business partner since Papa died. Surely you knew that?’
A muscle flickered in her jaw. ‘We never discussed you.’
Was she saying that her falling-out with Harry had been over him? But he couldn’t see why. It was pretty clear-cut: she’d been the one to call a halt to their affair, not him. And Xavier couldn’t imagine Harry breaking Jean-Paul’s confidence and telling Allegra what had been going on here—about the problems with the business and Chantal’s desertion. Had Harry perhaps counselled her to give Xavier some space and time, and she’d reacted badly because she felt he was trying to push her around, the way she’d been pushed around as a child?
But he needed to know the answer to the most pressing question first. ‘Why are you here now, Allegra?’
‘Because I owe it to Harry. And don’t waste your energy giving me a hard time over missing his funeral. It wasn’t intentional and I feel guilty enough about it.’
‘I don’t have the right to judge you for that,’ Xavier said quietly, ‘but Harry was my friend as well as my business partner, and I think he deserved better.’
‘I know he did.’ Colour stained her cheeks.
‘Surely your business wasn’t that urgent? Why didn’t you tell your boss or your business contact that you had a family commitment?’
‘I did. The client couldn’t move the meeting.’
‘Couldn’t someone else have gone in your place?’
‘According to my boss, no.’ Her tone was dry, and Xavier had a feeling that there was more to this—something she wasn’t telling him. ‘I did my best to wrap everything up as quickly as I could, but the meeting overran and I missed my flight.’
‘And that was the only flight to Avignon?’ he asked. As excuses went, that was a little too pat for his liking. Too convenient.
‘Nice, actually,’ she corrected. ‘It was the only flight to France from New York without a stopover, until the next day. The reservations clerk spent an hour on the computer, trying to find me a flight that would get me somewhere on French soil at some time before breakfast, French time.’ She spread her hands. ‘But there simply wasn’t one. Not even to Paris.’
‘Your parents didn’t turn up, either.’
‘I know. They were in Tokyo. Coming to the funeral would’ve meant missing a performance. You know what they’re like.’ She lifted her chin. ‘And, yes, you could say I fell into the same trap. I put business before family, and I shouldn’t have done.’
‘At least you admit it was a mistake.’ He paused. ‘So, where do you suggest we go from here?’
‘You trusted Harry’s business judgement, yes?’
Xavier inclined his head.
‘And Harry trusted me to take over from him, or he wouldn’t have left me his part of the business.’ She looked him straight in the eye. ‘So are you going to do the same?’
Tricky. He didn’t trust his judgement at all, where she was concerned. And trusting her was one hell of an ask. He took refuge