Susan Stephens Selection. Susan Stephens

course it’s worth mentioning,’ Guy insisted calmly. ‘You must have been at the peak of your career when it happened. I used to read about you all the time in the arts columns…and then nothing.’

      Kate’s mouth twisted in a wry smile. ‘That’s right. But I was too tall.’

      ‘Nonsense,’ Guy argued. ‘All the critics said you were a dream.’

      ‘Yes,’ Kate said, forcing out a short laugh. ‘But it was always my mother’s dream, not mine. And in a strange sort of way the accident freed me.’

      ‘Freed you?’ he said in a puzzled voice.

      ‘Yes. To be myself,’ Kate explained. ‘To do what I wanted to do.’

      ‘To start up in business?’

      He clearly found the idea bewildering, but for Kate breaking into the world of commerce had fulfilled her dreams however crazy that might seem to Guy. ‘That’s right,’ she confirmed. ‘At first I thought of becoming a chef, but that wasn’t quite right for me. Then one day when I was trawling the Internet to find a holiday I hit on the idea of opening a travel agency with a difference. A one-stop shop which you could access via the Internet, put a package together yourself, but also with the option to ask for advice from staff who really knew what they were talking about. At first I was the only staff member,’ she said with a self-deprecating laugh. ‘But if there was one thing my career as a dancer had given me it was the chance to see the world. So Freedom Holidays took off like a rocket—beyond all my wildest expectations. At last I’d found something I wanted to do—something I enjoyed.’

      ‘Past tense,’ Guy observed shrewdly.

      ‘Not at all,’ Kate returned quickly. ‘I still love what I do. But now it’s time to expand.’

      ‘And expansion doesn’t always mean getting bigger,’ he reasoned out loud. ‘Sometimes it means taking a broader view.’

      ‘Exactly,’ she agreed, enthusing at his quicksilver grasp of the situation.

      ‘So, what is your plan?’ he said, surprising her with the accuracy and speed of his lunge into the soft, exposed heart of her deception.

      ‘I thought you wanted to hear about what happened to me, not my business,’ Kate parried. She never talked about the accident, but right now it seemed the safer…no, the only option. She saw his gaze soften fractionally.

      ‘Continues, Kate.’

      ‘It was stupid really…’ Now it had come to it, she knew it sounded nothing less than lunatic. ‘I accepted a dare…’ She stopped. His face had adopted an all too familiar look. ‘It was my twentieth birthday. I know.’ She said it for him. ‘You’re thinking I should have grown out of my daredevil phase long before then.’

      Guy managed to confine himself to a wry shrug as he waited for her to go on.

      ‘There was a gantry over the flies,’ she explained, referring to the iron structure that spanned the space high over the backstage area in the theatre where she had been working.

      ‘And the dare was?’ he pressed when she hesitated.

      ‘To walk across it à pointe.’ She could only wait a few moments when his imagination took flight and he groaned. There really was no way to explain what she had been doing all that way off the ground, tiptoeing across a six-inch beam in a pair of ballet shoes. ‘My fall was broken by the ropes and—’

      Guy’s face tightened with concern as he held up his hands to stop her. ‘It sounds like the most horrendous accident. It’s a miracle you weren’t killed.’

      ‘I know,’ she said softly.

      ‘Well, now you’ve returned here to Villeneuve, I hope you can assure me that your days of risk-taking are well and truly over.’

      How was she supposed to answer that? Kate thought, as her mind drifted back to his kiss. How did that rank on a risk scale from one to ten? However cool Guy might be choosing to play it now, safe men didn’t kiss like that—and cautious girls didn’t let them. ‘It’s not always obvious at the time that you are taking a risk,’ she argued sensibly.

      ‘It is to me,’ he said vehemently. ‘And now that’s out of the way,’ he said, as if her compliance was a given, ‘I want to take another look at the damage so I know just who to send round to put it right.’

      * * *

      Guy had been as good as his word, Kate thought as she stood outside the cottage watching the decorator putting the final touches to the wooden shutters. Guy’s business interests might have taken him abroad, but the work had continued just as he had promised it would. And his absence had allowed Kate to concentrate on her own plans, rather than waste time on dreaming up fanciful possibilities between them—even if that didn’t stop her from gazing down the lane umpteen times a day—just as she was doing now, she realised, pulling herself together.

      She walked briskly back up the path to attach the last tie to the vigorous rambling rose she had managed to rescue. Now it was securely fastened around the newly painted front door it was already showing brand new clusters of hectic pink blooms after its violent upheaval. She had placed two large terracotta pots on either side of the door, each containing a miniature palm whose delicate fronds whispered a sibilant tune as the light summer breeze played through them. And the path had been repaired and then edged with every fragrant species of plant she could lay her hands on.

      Standing back, Kate gave a sigh of satisfaction. On the outside, at least, she was satisfied that La Petite Maison looked as welcoming as it possibly could. But now it was time to clean her fingernails and move indoors, where the real work still had to be done. She felt a rush of excitement as she remembered that there was just a little over a week to go before her first guests arrived. And it was only a week to the famous house-warming party.

      Guy had sent a brief handwritten note apologising for the fact that he was unable to give any indication as to whether he would make it back in time. But there was no risk if he did attend, Kate consoled herself. As far as Guy de Villeneuve was concerned, the many improvements to the cottage had been made for her benefit alone. And the party for the village was just what it seemed to be—a chance for her to get to know everyone a little better. And it was a fact that she would need to integrate herself fully in village life if everyone was to reap the full benefit from her new business venture.

      Pushing open the front door, Kate kicked off her flip-flops and relished the fresh clean smell. It was hard to imagine that this was the same place Guy had brought her to after the fire. And now that she was able to look at things calmly and objectively, she could see that the damage had given her the chance to make some real improvements. Once she had taken him into her confidence the builder had come up with some of his own ideas. Knocking down the wall between the kitchen and the morning room, for instance, had given her at least three times the space. And when he had installed the island unit with a cooking hob where she intended to hold some of her demonstrations, he had suggested the addition of a part-mirrored wall behind the other work-surfaces, allowing food preparation to be seen clearly.

      The mirrors had the added advantage of reflecting the light, so that what had once been a cosy but decidedly shady area had been transformed into a spacious, airy room with plenty of natural light. To this Kate had added a number of comfortable chairs in mellow wood made snug with plump cushions in her chosen colours of egg-yolk yellow, white and blue. Lined white voile curtains billowed out from the open windows and on the freshly scrubbed floor she had placed a huge new rug in neutral shades to soften the appearance of the original stonework. It only remained to unpack all the equipment she had ordered and the kitchen was ready.

      ‘I’ve got the old range going for you.’

      Turning to thank the builder who had made it a matter of pride to see that she would be as comfortable as possible as quickly as possible, Kate returned his smile of achievement. Husband of the affable lady owner of the local fruiterie, Giles Dumas was a walking