Annie West - Rags To Riches - His Wish, Her Command - The Last Summer of Being Single / An Enticing Debt to Pay / A Navy SEAL's Surprise Baby

He flicked open the folder, and quickly sorted through the jumble of mostly black and white prints he found inside.

Some of the faces were so familiar to him they were like friends he vaguely remembered but could not name. His grandmother and his parents were in many of them, but in others strangers smiled back from locations and events from a very different world he knew nothing about—a world called the past.

Then he found it. A small colour print with his mother smiling out. Her beauty and life force captured in two dimensions for all time. Only as he picked it up he saw that there was writing on the back.

His heart skipped a beat as he read the faded words in French. ‘Engagement Party. 26 May. Andre’s house.’

That was all. No indication of who had been celebrating their engagement. Or who André was. A friend? A relative?

Perhaps André was one of the young people in the bundle of photographs he had just glanced at? Someone who had known his mother as a young woman and who could tell him who his birth parents had been and what had happened to them.

He had so many questions. And way, way, too few answers.

Seb dropped the folder of photographs onto the sofa and started pacing up and down the room between the fireplace and the garden.

He had known the old house would have mixed memories for him, but this was something new. Something he could not have expected.

Hot resentment flashed through him and his fingers clenched into his palms. His dad had left these precious photographs of his mother and his heritage behind in his rush to abandon everything and leave for a tiny apartment in Sydney.

Seb stopped pacing and picked up the colour print. How could he do it? How could he have left these pictures behind for strangers like Ella Martinez to sort through? Maybe even throw out or burn in the fire? He could easily have made room for these few precious pieces of paper.

Back in Sydney he had three photographs of his mother. Three worn, faded and torn prints, the surface coating worn away by the rubbing of his fingers over the years. His dad had one single wedding photo in a silver frame in his bedroom, which Seb used to sneak in and look at. He never got tired of grinning back at the pretty dark-haired girl in a long white dress and carrying a huge bouquet of flowers that trailed almost to the ground, standing next to his dad in his best banker’s smart suit, as they both smiled for the camera.

Four photographs. And yet here in this house he had already seen more photographs than he ever knew existed.

It was almost as if his dad had deliberately kept these photos from him. Was he trying to hide something? Trying to protect him?

Not any more.

Change of plan.

He was here now. He had the means and the opportunity and he could spare a few hours of personal time. In a few days he would be back to Australia. This could be the only chance he might have.

The more he thought about it, the more decisive he became.

He had used his tenacity and determination to take his business to the top. Now it was time to apply that same energy and drive to do some digging into his own past.

Decision made.

He had a new mission. He was going to find any and every scrap of evidence of his family’s past. Even if it meant turning this house upside down to find them.

Starting with the attic.

Because whatever he found from now on, he had every intention of claiming for himself. This was personal and had nothing whatsoever to do with Nicole or her housekeeper. Nothing at all.

Ella tried to wind her way through the jumble of unwanted furniture and assorted objects that had accumulated in the attic. And fought a sudden urge to kick them out of the way. Hard.

Stamping her foot, she squeezed her eyes tight shut, dropped her head back and counted to ten. Backwards. The furniture was bashed enough without her adding to the knocks and scrapes.

They said that bad things came in threes. Well, her Friday was certainly turning out to be a lot more challenging than she had expected. First was the news about the mistral. A summer storm was the last thing this garden needed a few days before a garden party. And it could last for days!

As for the second? It was obvious to her now that Sebastien Castellano never had any intention of staying around long enough to attend Nicole’s birthday party. And that was just cruel.

How could he do that? How could he promise to be here then change his mind?

She simply did not understand that at all. He had travelled halfway around the world for a business trip, only to take off again without seeing Nicole!

How could he be so selfish? Surely he could put Nicole’s needs in front of his own for once? And what was so urgent back in Sydney that he could not stay for a few more days?

And then there was the killer. The thick letter stuffed into her trouser pocket that had been waiting for her when she got back from the school run.

The very sight of the Spanish stamps made her heart sink into her deck shoes.

To a six-year-old, Barcelona might just as well have been next to India and not just a few hours’ drive away. Not that Christobal’s parents came to see them very often. They hated staying at Sandrine’s clean but simple hotel and made repeated comparisons with their luxury villa complete with indoor heated swimming pool and every possible item of the latest technology.

They truly could not tolerate the fact that their grandson was being brought up in a tiny French village while their daughter-in-law worked as a housekeeper for a wealthy woman.

She did not even drive any more.

7Christmas had been a nightmare. As soon as Dan had gone to bed they had bombarded her with their elaborate plans for his education—all the time making her feel like a completely selfish mother by not providing personal tutors and modern computer games and the like so that Dan would not feel left out at the expensive private schools he would soon be attending.

Yeah. Boarding schools. Right. Like she was going to let that happen! Except of course by selfishly keeping Dan here with her she was ruining his chance of a good education and a career. Guilt. Guilt. Guilt.

Ella groaned, then shrugged and sat down on the curved cover of an old trunk and opened the letter under the light beaming in through the dirty glass-covered skylight in the attic roof.

Then hot tears burned the corners of her eyes, blurring her vision.

Two return train tickets to Barcelona. First class. For Monday next week! Two days. She only had two days before she had to hand her baby boy over to his grandparents.

Oh, no. Of course she had known that they wanted to see Dan during his summer school holidays, but the first week! The Martinez family took their holiday in August, not July! And Dan had been so looking forward to Nicole’s party. If she used these tickets, she would be forced to leave him there on his own while she scurried back here to work every hour she could to create this very special birthday party for Nicole.

So what if she had been putting on a brave face in front of Sebastien Castellano? He didn’t have to know that she was secretly panicking. Swan on the water did not come close.

No. She would simply reschedule the dates and… Ella scan-read the letter that came with the tickets. His grandparents had already booked more tickets for a whole programme of special trips and wonderful treats for Dan, which she knew that he would adore.

The energy and the fight drained out of her.

She couldn’t reschedule the trip without throwing all of those plans away.

They were Christobal’s parents! Of course they wanted to see Dan and give him a wonderful time. Dan was all they had left of their son. Chris would have wanted this. Of course, Chris would also have liked them to welcome her as well. But that was a lot more difficult.