Giselle's Choice (14 page)

 

Two days later they were back in London, where Giselle managed just over two weeks of what felt like having her every minute with Lucas and her every breath monitored by the professor's nurse, whilst she had to watch the nanny taking over what she felt was
her
rightful role as Lucas's mother, before she finally snapped. She turned on Saul one evening after they'd had dinner together and he was asking her solicitously how she felt. ‘You don't
care
how I feel,' she accused him angrily. ‘No one does. I'm sick of being watched all the time, of
having twice-daily discussions with the nurse about my feelings, so that she can report them to the professor—as though I'm on probation as a mother. I can't even take Lucas out in his buggy without either the nurse or the nanny fussing and looking at me as though they don't trust me. I want them both to leave.'

She waited for Saul to protest, to warn her to remember why they were there, but instead to her astonishment he simply said, ‘Good.'

‘Good?' Giselle repeated.

‘Yes, good,' Saul agreed. ‘When I told the professor that in my view you are perfectly mentally and emotionally stable he agreed with me. But he said there was no point in telling you that, and that you would have to reach that conclusion yourself before we could remove from you the props that neither of us believe you need.'

‘Reach that conclusion myself? I knew the minute Lucas was
born
that I would be all right.
You
were the one who insisted on bringing me back here like a…a prisoner.
You
were the one who didn't trust me.'

‘Not trust you? Of course I trusted you. Like you, I knew the first second I saw you with Lucas that you would never hurt him.'

They looked at one another for a minute, and then Giselle told him shakily, ‘I've felt so alone, Saul. As though we've been on different sides of something. I've missed you so much.'

‘I just wanted to hold back and give you time to make up your own mind about what was right for you.'

They both started to laugh.

 

Six weeks later, when both the professor and Giselle's obstetrician pronounced her well and healthy, Giselle and Saul celebrated the news in one another's arms—whilst their son, very thoughtfully, remained happily and contentedly asleep.

‘Y
OU SEE
—I
TOLD YOU
that you are a Freeman, and nothing like your mother,' Giselle's great-aunt announced six months later, as she stood proudly holding her great-great-nephew outside Arezzio's cathedral for a formal christening photograph.

Giselle laughed, unable to resist smiling down into her son's face as he held out his hand to her. It seemed impossible now to imagine that she had ever thought she might harm her own child, or suffer from the same devastating illness that had struck down her mother. Motherhood for her was the crowning jewel in her happiness—a true joy and delight that had enriched the love she and Saul shared and fulfilled her. Although she hadn't as yet said anything to Saul, she was already thinking about increasing their family.

‘What's that smile for?' Saul asked her, detaching himself from the group of ministers surrounding him to come over to her.

‘Oh, nothing,' Giselle told him.

Saul leaned forward and said softly, ‘This
nothing
wouldn't have anything to do with any plans on your
part that might involve increasing the size of the nursery, would it?'

‘Saul! How did you guess—?' She broke off, and then laughed at herself for giving the game away.

Her laughter was silenced by Saul's brief but fiercely passionate kiss.

‘I know you, and I love you, which is why I knew all along that our son would have the best mother in the world.'

She was so lucky. So incredibly, wonderfully, blessed and lucky. And she knew it. She would never cease giving thanks for all that she had. She would never stop counting her blessings.