The Baby Who Saved Christmas
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Alison Roberts
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Chapter One
SOMETHING WAS GOING very wrong for Alice McMillan.
She was not supposed to be enjoying herself right now.
‘I’m sorry...’
Silent, one-sided communication had become a habit even though the feeling of connection had faded over the months of this year. Now it only served to increase the prickle of guilt.
‘But it is gorgeous... You must have loved it, too.’
All those years ago. Twenty-nine, to be exact. A period of time that had included Alice’s conception.
Having stepped off the bus from Nice in the heart of the small town of Villefranche-sur-Mer, Alice crossed the road to start walking downhill, skirting around a man on a ladder who was part of the team installing a huge pattern of tinsel that would hang over the centre of the main street like a giant tiara. She’d printed off a map before leaving Edinburgh and the route looked easy enough. All she had to do was find the beach and follow it. At the other end was the start of the peninsula that was St Jean Cap Ferrat and the address she was heading for looked like it was within easy walking distance.
There was a small market happening on a grassed area opposite the bus stop. Stalls were selling things like cheese and preserves, hand-made soaps and Christmas decorations. There was music coming from somewhere and the smell of hot food made her mouth water. When had she last eaten? That bag of cheese and onion crisps and a bottle of water on the last leg of her long train journey didn’t really count.
She had to edge her way through a group of people who seemed to be there to socialise rather than shop but they made way for her politely and the smile of the man at the stall was welcoming.
‘Bonjour, mademoiselle. Qu’est-ce qu’il vous fait aujourd’hui?’
This might be her first day ever in France but Alice had been surrounded by the sound of this language since her arrival in Paris early this morning. She’d already learned that the best response was a smile and an apology that she didn’t speak French.
The apology was genuine. Most people learned at the very least to say ‘please’ or ‘thank you’ in the language of a country they chose to visit and Alice could do that in Spanish or Italian. Even Greek. But not French.
Never French...
‘One of those, please.’ Alice pointed to a baguette that had been split and filled with a thick slice of ham and some cheese.
‘Of course.’ The man switched languages effortlessly. ‘You are English?’
‘Scottish.’
‘Ah... Welcome to Villefranche.’ The sandwich was being wrapped in paper. ‘You are here on holiday?’
A holiday? A place you chose to go to relax and enjoy yourself? No. This journey was definitely no holiday.
But Alice smiled and nodded as she handed over some money because the truth was far too personal to tell a stranger and too complex to explain anyway. She wasn’t even sure she understood herself why she had made the impetuous decision to come here and now that she was here she felt like she was on an emotional roller-coaster.
It was a relief to get away from all the people. The buzz of conversation and laughter faded and the group of people she passed near the tourist attraction of the old citadel were clearly English tourists.
There was a marina below the citadel and Alice found a bench where she could sit and eat her sandwich in the afternoon sunshine. There was a man working on a boat nearby. Joggers went past and people walking their dogs or pushing prams but nobody seemed to notice Alice and she gave herself a few minutes to bask in the sunshine, enjoy the delicious fresh bread with its perfect filling and get her bearings.
She could see the curve of the beach not far away—past a line of restaurants and cafés and she could see the tongue of land that had to be St Jean Cap Ferrat. She knew the main village was out of sight, on the other side of the peninsula, but there were lots of houses on this side and one of them was the address she was heading for. Right on the coastline, in fact. If she knew where to look, she would probably be able to see it from here.
But what, exactly, did she think was going to happen when she knocked on the door? That she would only have to come face to face with this famous racing-car driver called André Laurent and he would somehow recognise her as his daughter? Or that she would show him the faded photograph she’d found hidden in her mother’s most private belongings to remind him of their relationship and then disbelief would morph into amazement and finally joy?
That she would, again, have at least one person that she could think of as family?
Nerves kicked in. This had been a stupid idea. She wouldn’t be welcome. It was quite likely she would have to turn around immediately and retrace her footsteps and then what would she do? With the knowledge that the big city of Nice was so close and there was bound to be plenty of hotels, she hadn’t even tried to book a room for the night or find out what time the buses stopped running.
Maybe she should just turn around now.
Alice closed her eyes and waited and, yes...there it was. That feeling that this was the right thing to do. That flicker of hope that it might even be the best thing she had ever decided to do. Okay, it was a huge gamble and it was quite possible that it would turn out to be her worst decision ever but there was only one way to find out.
And there was something important here.
She could feel it. A sense of...belonging?
Well, that wasn’t so crazy, was it? She was half-French. She might have been brought up to dismiss this heritage as something to be ashamed of but there could be no denying that the lilt of the language around her and the feel of these streets and houses was touching a part of her she didn’t recognise. A part that held whispers of contentment. Of being home...
Hence the silent apology to her mother.
Jeanette McMillan would have been so horrified by her making this journey it was no wonder that the very idea would have been unthinkable while she was alive. Even now, Alice could hear an echo of the words that had stopped any queries about her genetic history.
‘Your father was French...’ The biggest insult ever. ‘And he tried to get rid of you...’
Curiosity about even the country had to be firmly squashed because she’d loved her mother and any intermittent yearning to find out who her father might be had been something that had needed to be kept even more private, especially in recent years when her mother had already been coping with more than anyone should have to bear.
How sad was it that she would never know if her mother had loved this place as much as Alice knew she might be capable of loving it herself?
She opened her eyes again and scanned the buildings she could see more closely. Maybe the bar where her mother had been working when she’d only been eighteen was nearby. Had it had a view of this sparkling blue bay of the Mediterranean dotted with yachts or had it been tucked away amongst the ancient stone buildings on the steep, cobbled streets of the old town?
That flicker of hope ignited into tendrils of excitement. Had her mother felt this sense of freedom as she’d embarked on her first adult adventure? Alice had left it far too long to stretch her wings but how could things have been any different with first her grandmother and then her mother having to suffer through such unbearably slow and debilitating terminal illnesses?
But she was here now and everything felt new and wonderful. This hadn’t been a stupid idea at all. This was magic—as if she was taking the first steps into a real-life fairy-tale. It was a shame she didn’t have time to explore this historic part of the small town right now but time was marching on and it was winter. Daylight wouldn’t last past about five p.m., and she didn’t want to be trying to find her destination in the dark.
Her breath came out in an incredulous huff at the reminder of the season. This bright warmth was another wave of the magic wand—like the feeling of the scenery and the sound of the language was proving to be. Had it only been two days ago that Alice had been wrapped up against the bone-chilling temperatures of a Scottish winter? She’d shed her coat hours ago but still felt overdressed in her long-sleeved jumper and skinny jeans that were tucked into short boots.
The coat felt heavy over her arm as she followed the signposted walkway to the beach. It was a good thing that the few items she’d deemed necessary for a trip that might only last a day or two had fitted into a small backpack so she didn’t have anything else to carry in her hands.
The beach was almost deserted, wavelets lapping at the golden sand. Even now, the sea looked inviting and Alice knew that the water temperature would probably be warmer than any beach in Scotland in midsummer. No doubt it got horribly crowded here in the high season, though, given that it was such a popular playground for the rich and famous. Didn’t people like Madonna come here for holidays?
And Monaco was only a short drive down the coast. The place where her father had apparently become so famous and another Mecca for the kind of people that had always seemed like an alien race to Alice McMillan. She wasn’t just visiting another country right now—it felt like she was heading for a different planet.
The path seemed to end in a car park, which was momentarily confusing, but then Alice spotted the stairs tucked against the steep bank. There was a path that followed a railway line at the top of the stairs and moments later she saw a street with a sign that gave her a name she recognised. Pulling a now crumpled map from her back pocket, Alice kept walking and it was less than ten minutes later that she came to another road that clearly led down towards the coastline again. The view back over the bay to Villefranche was spectacular but there seemed to be a downside to living on this street. There was certainly no room for anyone to park. There were vans and trucks parked nose to tail, and further down the hill she could see a large group of people milling about.
As she got closer, she could see that a lot of them were holding cameras.
Paparazzi? Was Madonna taking a winter break, perhaps? In the same street her father lived in? It wouldn’t surprise her. When she’d found the street on the internet, it had looked like every house could be an exclusive resort—the dwellings massive, with huge gardens and swimming pools of Olympic size. The gates advertised just how prestigious this real estate was. Ornate black iron with gold gilding that were at least twice Alice’s height, decorated with security features like cameras and intercoms. There were even security guards standing in front of the most ornate she’d seen so far. This property was also the one attracting the attention of the media. There was more than one television crew set up amongst a bank of cameras.
Disconcertingly, as Alice skirted the back of the small crowd she discovered that this was the end of the road. There were no more houses. With her heart thumping, she checked the map again. Okay, she’d known her father was famous. But this famous...?
The voice so close to her ear made her jump. She crumpled the map in her hand but it was too late. The man had seen the red circle and her notes and he was asking her something in a tone that was unmistakeably extremely interested.
Alice didn’t bother to apologise this time. She shook her head and stepped back.
‘I don’t understand. I don’t speak any French. Not even a single word of it.’
The man only spoke louder. And faster. He even took hold of Alice’s arm and started pushing her towards the crowd.
Alice tried to pull her arm free. She had no idea what was going on but she knew she’d made a mistake now and the sooner she got away from here the better. The fairy-tale was taking an ominous twist and she needed to think about this. About taking a different approach to reach her goal, maybe.
This was frightening. Her unwelcome companion was now talking to someone else. About her. Her hand tightened around the ball of the map. This was nobody else’s business.
How awful would it be if the media discovered that André Laurent had an illegitimate child before he did?
‘It’s okay,’ the second man said. ‘You’re not in trouble. My friend is just wanting to know why you look for the house of Monsieur Laurent?’
‘I... I need to talk to him, that’s all. About something...important.’
‘Talk to him?’ The reporter, if that’s what he was, couldn’t have looked more astonished. ‘Mon Dieu... Don’t you know?’
‘Know what?’
But the two men were talking to each other again. In low voices, as if they didn’t want to be overheard. They were still attracting attention, though.
‘Come with me.’
‘No... I think it might be better if I come back another time...’
But Alice was being firmly ushered forward. Towards the gate and the uniformed guard. Another rapid conversation followed, with the second reporter providing translation.
‘He wants to know who you are.’
‘My name is Alice McMillan. I’m...’ Suddenly, this was terrifying. She was in a strange country and couldn’t understand a word of what was being said around her. Something was going on and there was a grim note in the atmosphere. How was it that she hadn’t noticed the presence of the police on the outskirts of this group? What if she found herself in trouble simply by having arrived in the wrong place at precisely the wrong time?
She seemed to have unwittingly walked into a nightmare situation and maybe the only way through it was to be honest.
She swallowed hard. And then she stood on tiptoe and spoke quietly enough that only the security guard could hear what she said.
‘André Laurent is my father.’
* * *
The phone would not stop ringing.
You would have thought that after this morning things would have settled, but there had been no sign of things calming down the last time he’d checked.
Without altering the stride of his pacing, Julien Dubois flicked a sideways glance at the floor-to-ceiling windows of the grand salon. Not that he could see more than a glimpse of the driveway between the trees edging such a private garden but he knew it led to the massive gates that locked the property away from the rest of the world. And he knew what was waiting on the other side of those gates.
What were the vultures outside the gate waiting for, exactly? A clip of a celebrity looking grief-stricken? Or better yet, not looking grief-stricken, which would give them permission to go digging into a background that was dripping with juicy topics.
How old was he when the mother died?
How long is it now since the tragic death of his sister?
What had caused such a family rift?
What reason could he have to hate a national icon like André Laurent so much?
Who are the people in the house with him?
What’s going on?
On the other side of a room big enough to easily host a ball was a corner of the house that had a view of not only the main garden and the pool complex but a glimpse of the private beach with the background of the bay and Villefranche beyond.
Of course the owner of this house would have chosen this jewel as his man cave. The rich red of the Persian carpets was as sombre as the dark glow of the enormous mahogany desk. An entire wall was a gallery of trophies and photographs with a gilt-framed monstrosity of the man himself behind a dense spray of champagne as he celebrated one of his early wins in the Monaco race.
Julien’s jaw tightened as he deliberately ignored the real reason he loathed the image but really...it was a shameful waste of a magnum of Mumm Champagne.
The muscles of the rest of his body were as tense as his jaw by the time he’d taken two steps into the room. He didn’t want to be in here at all but he’d discovered it was a place that contained some particularly useful technology. Not the huge screen that had an endless loop of overpriced cars racing through the streets of Monaco. No...it was the smaller screen that provided a live feed to every security camera the property boasted. He knew which corners of the screen came from the cameras on the gateposts because checking them was becoming a half-hourly ritual.
He only needed the crowd to thin out enough and he would be able to escape a property he’d never intended setting foot inside in the first place. It wasn’t as if he was getting anywhere on the mission that had brought him through the gates. It was clearly a stalemate.
The media interest didn’t seem to have died down at all yet, unfortunately. And what on earth was going on right in front of the gate?
A girl looked, for all the world, as if she was kissing one of the security guards. No wonder he looked so shocked, stepping back and staring at her as if she was completely crazy.
Julien found himself leaning closer to the screen, as if that would help him see the image more clearly. The woman was nothing like any journalist he’d ever seen. Was it because she wasn’t holding a camera or microphone? Maybe it was the odd accessory of what looked like a child’s schoolbag on her back. Then she turned enough for him to see her face and he realised that his impression probably had more to do with body language than anything else. The confidence was missing. The pushiness...
Yes. She looked like a fish out of water. Bewildered even, as the guard moved further away from her, reaching for his phone.
Frightened?
The urge to offer protection was instinctive. Well honed. And quite enough to trigger a wave of a grief that he’d believed he’d come to terms with by now.
He’d tried, so hard, to keep Colette safe...
And he was failing her again, even now...
If only the tears of grief would come, they might wash away some of the anger building today but it wasn’t going to happen here in this room of all places.
And it wasn’t going to happen now. Not with a phone ringing yet again. And this was his personal mobile, not a house landline, which meant that it was a caller he needed to take notice of. His solicitor, probably. He’d walked out on the argument still going on in the small drawing room on the other side of the foyer but decisions had to be made about which legal documents had precedence. Was he going to win the battle he’d come here today to fight?
But this call was not a summons back to the tense meeting. It was coming from outside the gates, from a member of his own entourage.
A glance at the screen gave him the odd feeling of a breath of wind that targeted only the hairs on the back of his neck. As he answered the call, his gaze went straight back to the security images. He could see his caller. The bodyguard his solicitor had deemed necessary for this potentially volatile visit.
‘Sorry to disturb you, Monsieur Dubois.’
‘What is it?’
‘There’s a girl here...an English girl...’
His gaze shifted fractionally. Yes, he could still see her. Just standing there, looking lost. He wasn’t the only one looking her way either. In the boring hours of waiting for something newsworthy, any distraction for the reporters was probably welcome.
‘And?’
‘And...’ The security guard muttered something incomprehensible.
‘Pardon? You’ll have to speak up.’
‘I’m not sure that’s a good idea.’ On the screen, Julien could see the guard turn his back on his audience and step even further away. He spoke in a hoarse whisper that hissed over the line.
‘She’s saying that Monsieur Laurent is her father.’
Julien’s breath came out in a derisive snort. ‘Of course she is. She won’t be the first to turn up with a convenient claim like that now. Send her packing.’
‘But...she wants to talk to him...’
‘What?’
‘I know. It’s bizarre but she really doesn’t seem to have any idea what’s going on. I thought it might be better to deal with it away from prying eyes and ears.’
Julien closed his eyes and cradled his forehead in one hand, applying pressure to both temples.
Could this day get any more complicated?
After a long silence he forced his eyes open again and let his breath out in a defeated sigh.
‘Fine. Send her up to the house.’
* * *
Alice McMillan wasn’t used to being the centre of attention.
It was unnerving the way she could actually feel the intense interest of the crowd of people behind her as the massive gates were opened just far enough to let her squeeze through in the company of the security guard she had whispered her secret to. She could imagine the crowd pressing closer as they shouted questions at her.
She should feel safer shut away from the pack but, if anything, Alice felt like she was falling further into a rabbit hole, like the Alice she’d been named for. Tumbling into an alien world that she was not at all sure she wanted to visit. She lifted her chin. No...this was a fairy-tale, she reminded herself. She was Cinderella and she was being escorted to the palace where the ball was about to begin.
The guard escorting her to the house was completely silent and it was a long walk. Plenty of time to look around. At a perfectly manicured garden with enough palm trees to make it look like a tropical island and citrus trees with lemons bright jewels against a glossy green background. The blue of the infinity pool was an almost perfect match for the sea it blended into, and the house...
The house looked like the kind of mansion people paid good money for the privilege of being allowed to enter. Not quite a palace but an ancient, stately villa with pillared terraces and enormous windows that probably did have a ballroom tucked away, along with a whole wing for staff quarters. It loomed ever larger as Alice walked towards it and by the time they reached the stone paving leading to the biggest front door she had ever seen, she could feel the shadow of the house settling onto her like a dark cloud that was menacing enough to suggest an imminent storm. The heavy chopping beat of a hovering helicopter overhead added to the unreality and made her feel as if she’d stepped into a movie. A modern twist on an old fairy-tale. Some kind of psychological thriller perhaps.
The guard stopped and jerked his head towards the door.
‘Allez. Il vous attend.’
The message was crystal clear. Somebody was expecting her arrival.
Her father?
Oh, Lord...this was all far more dramatic than she’d ever imagined it could be. Maybe she should have paid more heed to the advice her gran had given her so many years ago.
‘Don’t ever go looking for your father. You’re better off not knowing...’
Too late now. She was here and...and the door was opening, possibly by the very man she had come here to meet. Despite the hammering of her heart, Alice took a deep, steadying breath and walked on. She even summoned a smile as if that would somehow make her more welcome.
Disappointment that the wrong person had opened the door was remarkably crushing and her smile died instantly. Who was this young man who’d been sent to greet her? An employee? Yes, that seemed most likely. A personal assistant maybe. Or a press secretary.
Someone who’d been given clear instructions to get rid of her as quickly as possible judging by the look on his face. The glare from those dark eyes, along with the fact that he was dressed from head to toe in black, made it all more sinister. A glance upwards and he then seemed to melt into the shadow of the house as he stepped back.
‘Come inside, please,’ he said. ‘There will be photographers in that helicopter and they have very sophisticated lenses.’
His English was perfect but his accent more than strong enough to reveal his nationality. He looked French, too. Following him across an ornate foyer and through a room with a parquet floor that was easily big enough to entertain a couple of hundred people in, Alice had plenty of time to notice those superbly tailored clothes and that smoothly combed hair that was long enough to have been drawn back into a small ponytail.
She could almost hear her grandmother clicking her tongue and muttering darkly about foreigners and their incomprehensible habits but a wayward thought sneaked in that if there was any casting going on for this real-life fairy-tale, this man might have blown any competition out of the water as far as the role of the handsome prince went.
A room like a conservatory could be seen leading from the end of this ridiculously large room. Behind glass doors was a forest of indoor plants and cane furniture and beyond that Alice could see the mirror-like surface of a swimming pool. She was led towards the other side of the house, however. Into a room that was overwhelming full of...stuff. Pictures and trophies and even a wide-screen television that had a movie playing silently.
And then she saw the enormous portrait in its elaborately gilded frame and her mouth went completely dry.
This was her father’s office. These were his trophies. He was probably the driver in that speeding car in the movie.
Wow... He was larger than life in every sense in here. Supremely successful, charismatic...incredibly wealthy. Would it matter to him that she wasn’t any of those things? Would he accept her for simply being his child? Love her even...?
The hope was so much stronger now. A happy ending was beckoning. She couldn’t wait to meet him. Okay, she was nervous and knew she might be shy to start with but this meant so much to her. Surely he would sense that and give them a chance to explore their connection?
Her guide shut the door behind them. He walked past Alice and then turned. For a long, long moment he simply stared at her. Then he gestured towards an overstuffed chair that was probably a priceless antique.
‘Take a seat.’
It was more like a command than an invitation and it ignited that rebellious streak that Alice thought she’d left behind with her schooldays. She stayed exactly where she was.
‘As you wish.’ The shrug was subtle. The way he shifted a large paperweight and perched one hip on the corner of the desk was less so. This was his space, the action suggested. Alice was the intruder.
Another piercing stare and then a blunt question. ‘Who are you?’
‘My name is Alice McMillan.’ It was the first time she had spoken in his presence and her voice came out more softly than she would have liked. A little hoarsely even. She cleared her throat. ‘And you are...?’
The faint quirk of an eyebrow revealed that his bad manners had only just occurred to him.
‘My name is Julien Dubois. Who I am doesn’t matter.’
Except it did, didn’t it? He was a gatekeeper of some kind and he might have the power to decide whether her quest had any chance of success.
‘Where are you from, Miss McMillan?’
‘Call me Alice, please. Nobody calls me Miss—even the children in my class.’
‘You are a teacher?’
‘Yes. Pre-school. A nursery.’
‘In England?’
‘Scotland. Edinburgh at the moment but I was brought up in a small village you won’t have heard of. Where it is doesn’t matter.’
Good grief...where was this urge to rebel coming from? The feeling that she’d done something wrong and had been summoned to the headmaster’s office perhaps? It was no excuse to be rude enough to fling his own dismissive words back at him in exactly the tone he’d used.
That eyebrow flickered again and he held her gaze as another silence fell. Despite feeling vaguely ashamed of herself, Alice didn’t want to admit defeat by looking away first. His eyes weren’t as dark as they’d appeared in the shadows of the entranceway, she realised. Much lighter than her own dark brown, they were more hazel. A sort of toffee colour. He had a striking face that would stand out in any crowd, with a strong nose and lips that looked capable of being as expressive as that eyebrow, but right now they were set in a grim line, surrounded by a jaw that looked like it could do with a shave.
‘And you claim that André Laurent is your father?’
The disparaging snap of his voice brought her drifting gaze sharply back to his eyes.
‘He is.’
‘And you have proof of this?’
‘Yes.’
‘Show me.’
Alice slipped the straps of her backpack from her shoulders. She sat on the edge of the uncomfortable chair to make it easier to open the side pocket and remove an envelope. From that, she extracted a photograph. It was faded now but the colour was still good enough to remind her of the bright flame shade of Jeannette McMillan’s hair and that smile that could light up a room. A wave of grief threatened to bring tears and she blinked hard, focusing instead on the man in the picture. She raised her gaze to stare at the oversized portrait again.
With a nod, she handed the photograph to Julien.
‘My mother,’ she said quietly. ‘I wouldn’t have known who she was with except that she kept these magazine clippings about him.’ She glanced down at the folded glossy pages still in the envelope. ‘Well hidden. I only found them recently after she...she died.’
If she was expecting any sympathy for her loss it was not forthcoming. Julien merely handed the photograph back.
‘This proves nothing other than that your mother was one of André’s groupies. It’s ancient history.’
‘I’m twenty-eight,’ Alice snapped. ‘Hardly ancient, thanks. And my mother was not a “groupie”. I imagine she was completely in love...’
‘Pfff...’ The sound was dismissive. And then Julien shook his head. ‘Why now?’ he demanded. ‘Why today?’
‘I... I don’t understand.’
‘Where have you been for the last week?’
‘Ah... I went home to my village for a few days. And then I’ve been travelling.’
‘You don’t watch television? Or read newspapers?’ He raised his hands in a sweeping gesture that her grandmother would have labelled foreign and therefore ridiculously dramatic. ‘How could you not know?’
‘Know what?’
‘That André Laurent crashed his car three days ago and killed himself. That his funeral was today.’
‘Oh, my God...’ Alice’s head jerked as her gaze involuntarily flicked back to the huge portrait. ‘Oh...no...’
From the corner of her eye, she could see that Julien was following her gaze. For a long second he joined her in staring at the image of a man that was so filled with life it seemed impossible to believe that he was gone.
But then, with the speed of a big cat launching itself at its prey, Julien snatched up the paperweight from the desk and hurled it towards the portrait, creating an explosion of shattering glass, leaving behind a horrified silence that only served to magnify his chilling words.
‘I wish he’d done it years ago... If he had, my sister wouldn’t have married him. She would still be alive...’
