Читать книгу One Night Of Consequences Collection - Ким Лоренс, Annie West - Страница 34
ОглавлениеKIRA shifted to make more room for him, her muscles clenching deep inside her as he slid a hair-roughened thigh between hers. She trailed a hand up his muscular arm and over his shoulder, savoring the bunch of strength beneath his hot, smooth skin.
“Make love with me,” she said, her hand trekking down his chest to rub a palm over his hardened nipples, feeling his body quicken.
His eyes flared with lust, his hand shifting to caress her with slow, agonizing strokes. “But of course.”
Yet he made no move to hurry things along. Desperation sizzled in her. She wanted all he had to give now, to sink into him before she had time to analyze this driving need building and building within her. But he was clearly in no hurry.
His big hand glided down the back of her thigh and she squirmed, begging for him to touch her intimately. Instead, his hand meandered back up to her waist, and she dug her fingers into his shoulders as need rocked through her again, her body quivering like jelly.
His fingers splayed over her stomach and a different emotion gripped her, so sharp and new that it shrank her world to what mattered most: him, her and their child.
The tense expression on his face made her wonder if he felt the same. If he felt anything at all except lust and the need to maintain control.
Their child. Could he love their baby?
She closed her eyes, wishing she knew, wishing her emotions weren’t so intense and raw with André, wishing what they’d shared was based on love instead of passion.
A child didn’t have to be conceived in love to be loved. She would adore her baby—she already did. For once in her life, she’d have someone to love her in return.
But how would André fit into this tidy family?
Kira bit her lip, fearing he’d regard their child much like her father had treated her. She’d been a responsibility he hadn’t wanted, yet he’d assumed her care at a young age and placed her in boarding school.
Strangers had raised her, praised her, nourished her as best they could. When the other students had gone home on holiday, she’d been shuffled off to a posh hotel in London and watched by a nanny. She’d never shared a birthday or Christmas with family. Never had anyone who cared about her.
That was why her child would know that he or she was loved. Her child would have a home. Security. A mother. A father?
“What is going on in that pretty head of yours?” he asked.
Us, she wanted to say, but knew that would spoil the moment. So she tucked that truth away with her other secret, that made this dream a challenge to attain.
“I was thinking how good this felt,” she said, and it did.
“It gets better.”
His hand swept up her ribs, leaving a trail of shivers in its wake. He palmed one breast, his thumb rubbing over the nipple until it throbbed.
She arched against him, craving his touch, craving him. Their future was as substantial as the tropical haze that hung in the dense valleys, but she ached to get lost in the sultry mist with him once more.
His head lowered a fraction. She met him halfway, their mouths brushing once, twice, before melding—a teasing glide of lips and tongues that sent a hum of need vibrating through her. She squirmed, desperate to get closer, to rub against the heat of his sex.
He obliged, grinding against her and making the hammock swing erratically. Her stomach did an odd quiver—and not a pleasant one.
She pulled back, gulping. “This might not be a good idea.”
He went still, his intense eyes narrowing to convey his patience would not tolerate any of her machinations now. “You no longer wish to make love?”
She shook her head and let her own hands drift around his torso to trace the tense muscles on his back and the deep indentation of his spine. “Not here. This hammock is a rather unstable bed.” And her stomach tended to get queasy.
More so since the jaunt to Noir Creux. She was also a bit light-headed, though looking up into André’s magnetic eyes chased both symptoms away.
A slow smile curved his sensuous lips, and raw desire flared in his dark eyes, the combination leaving her breathless for what was to come. “But I thought you enjoyed taking risks.”
“Never.” Though she was taking a monstrous one now. “I’m a very proper Englishwoman. Brisk walks along well-trod paths and the like.”
“How boring.”
And so very lonely. But she wouldn’t admit that. She’d never revealed this awful emptiness that dwelled within her to another soul. She held close the fact that with him she’d felt a connection and purpose she’d never felt before. She knew no matter how good it seemed now, their affair was tenuous at best.
“Kiss me again,” she said, tangling her fingers in his hair and pulling him to her.
“With pleasure.”
His mouth was sheer heaven, his kiss so deep and drugging that she couldn’t think anymore. Just feel. His taste, his power, his passion were more potent than any drug.
His tongue parried with hers while his hands pillaged her body, molding her breasts, teasing the nipples until she was reeling from want. She arched against him, finding small relief as she rubbed against the hard wall of his chest like a cat in heat.
Sensations crashed within her, her heart swelling with love, her body crying for release. She was drunk on him, torturing herself with a need that the world couldn’t contain.
She spread her legs wider and he settled fully against her, his engorged sex hot and hard on her belly. A whimper tore from her, for she needed him in her, filling her. She needed the connection of another soul dancing with hers.
Arching against him only intensified her frustrations, so she wrapped her legs around his hips and ground against him. She was done with the torment—done with the waiting.
His mouth left hers with a gasp, the eyes staring into hers near black. He whispered in French, his voice low, pausing to nuzzle her ear, lap at the lobe, then tug it with his teeth, sending liquid heat rushing through her.
I love him. The litany sang in her heart, filling her with wonder, chasing the dark shadows to their corners.
She moaned, grinding against him, running her hands down his back to skim the taut swell of his derrière, holding back the words that ached to break free. For she was afraid that truth would shatter the mood. Make him think. Doubt.
Her fingers dug into his taut arms as she arched against him, gasping as he shifted and his hot sex moved between her legs.
Yes, she thought, squirming, clutching his back, his ribs, his buttocks. The gentle breeze kissed her through the netting, but she burned with a sensual fever that could only be broken with completion. Only with him.
She panted with need, her senses consumed by him, her heart ensnared as well. The hammock rocked and shimmied, the ropes biting into her bare back. If he didn’t make love to her soon she’d die.
His hips rocked forward, his sex pushing inside her. She gasped and smiled, clinging to him, welcoming him home, wanting more, wanting all of him.
He shifted again, pulling from her. “Mon Dieu, you’re tight. Perfect.”
She moaned, frustrated by the torture and the insatiable need for him that raged within her. He was large, powerful, and driving her mad with want.
“You are taking too long,” she said, clutching at him.
He pushed into her before the last word left her mouth, filling her completely, touching her heart, her soul. The heat of his unsheathed sex sinking into her pulsing core ripped a gasp of wonder from her. She hadn’t remembered this feeling from before, coming at the end of a long night of passion.
This time it felt new. A beginning. Giving birth to a hope she harbored in the secret recesses of her heart. Could it be?
The power and carnal promise in each thrust lifted her higher toward the sun, burning her with his desire, with his need. His brand of absolute possession seared her soul.
She was his. Now. Always. She accepted it. Embraced it. For she knew she’d never find this oneness with another man.
His movements came faster, deeper, keener, stealing her ability to think. He’d pushed her past reason to a shimmering aura where she could only feel, into a spray of glorious rainbows that blinded her.
She clung to him, trembling with the force of her climax, welcoming his release. Nothing she’d experienced came close to this wonderful feeling of unity.
He held her so tightly she thought they’d become one, was sure there no longer existed a place where he ended and she began.
“Mon amour,” he said, nearly chewing out the words.
She smiled and blinked back tears, for he’d whispered the only French she knew, the only words she’d ached to hear.
My love.
Yes, she was, she admitted, gliding her hands down his sweat-slicked back and marveling at the steely strength rippling beneath her fingers.
She could’ve lain there the rest of the day, but she felt him pulling away from her. Knew this ideal had come to an end.
It was too soon. She wanted more. She wanted forever.
The hammock shimmied beneath her. She stilled and grabbed his arms, the muscles taut. He gave a swift jerk, his body bowing and pulling her flush with his.
Her breath caught in her lungs as the hammock shuddered and flipped. She yelped and clung to André.
Her world turned upside down, air whispering over her bare body, the weight of him on her removed. She sprawled on him, breast to broad chest, stomach to corded belly.
She felt his arms tremble with the strain of holding on to the hammock as he became a new cradle for her.
“Relax, ma chérie. The best is yet to come.”
She stared into his handsome face, his tension gone and his smile positively lascivious. The impeccable island tycoon garbed in tailored French suits had been replaced by a wild-eyed pirate with seduction oozing from his pores.
Naked and free. And hers.
“Show me,” she said.
His smile widened as he let go of the ropes. He dropped, taking her with him, his arms cradling her long before he slammed into the sand.
She straddled him, glorying in the shift of position, of power. The admission was shocking, for she’d never dreamed she’d have sex with a man in the middle of the day on a beach and feel no shame. That she’d revel in being on top.
“The appetizer was wonderful.” She dropped a quick kiss on his gorgeous mouth. “What’s the entrée?”
“Amour sous le beau ciel.”
“I hope that’s not fried squid or eyeballs boiled in seaweed.”
He threw his head back and laughed, the sound rich and sensual. “Not at all. It means love under the beautiful sky.”
“I like that.” Especially the love part. For without a doubt, despite everything, she’d fallen hard and fast for André.
She glided her palms up his taut belly, her thumbs tracing the line of black hair that widened over his pectorals. He treated her to much the same torment, sliding his palms up her ribs to cup her breasts.
Their gazes locked, their breaths labored. She stared into eyes that had gone nearly black again. Her fingers danced in an erotic melody over his tanned skin, kneading, marveling at the play of muscle.
She grazed his nipples with her thumbs, dragging a moan from him. Before she could savor her feminine power his hands cupped her breasts, then shifted to tug and roll her nipples between his fingers.
Her mouth opened on a soundless sigh of pleasure, her head tossed back, her world reduced to this moment. This man who knew her body better than she knew it herself.
“About that love under the beautiful sky…” she said, dropping a kiss on his chin, his brow, his nose.
“But of course,” he said, between plucking kisses, his voice deep and ragged and oh, so sexy. “Whatever the lady wants.”
His heart, she thought. To love and be loved. Now. Forever.
Was that too much to ask? She knew the answer. Knew that it was impossible with him.
His hands shifted to her back, gliding from her behind to her shoulders, kneading the taut muscles in both with such erotic precision she moaned with pleasure and awakened need. Live for the moment, she thought. That was all she could do—all she wanted to do right now.
“I want you,” she said, her mouth lowering to his.
She got a fleeting glimpse of longing in his eyes before he jerked his gaze toward the sea. Before she could register that something was wrong, he pushed her down and lunged across her body.
“Sacre bleu! Paparazzi.”
André yanked a rope on the shelter’s post and a bamboo shade unfurled and rolled to the sand. But not before she’d seen the small speedboat bobbing near the shore on a mocha-tinged wash of gold and copper.
Kira flattened on the sand, angry the world had intruded to catch her and André again. How long had they been out there?
André tossed his shirt at her. “Put this on.”
She shrugged into it while he stepped into his denim cutoffs. Even with the media drifting dangerously close he left them unbuttoned, seeming content to let them ride low on his lean hips.
He punched numbers into his mobile phone as he hurried her up the slope and into the concealing forest. “Step up the patrol. Paparazzi are offshore at my private beach.”
“Don’t they ever give up?” she asked, when they’d emerged from the forest and had started toward the house.
“No,” he said, giving her a pointed look. “Interesting that they came when we first made love, then again the night you first arrived here, and now.”
All times when they’d made love—or nearly. “It’s as if they know when we’re intimate.”
He released a short bark of laughter that sent a chill down her spine. “The same thought crossed my mind, ma chérie.”
“Do you believe someone is tipping them off?”
“Oui—and who among my trusted employees on this small island would betray me?”
She shook her head, having no idea. Then she caught the accusatory glare in his eyes and wanted to retch.
“My God, you can’t think that I’ve alerted the media?”
“Someone has.” He opened the door off the back terrace that led directly upstairs and motioned her to precede him.
“It wasn’t me,” she said, but he merely stared at her.
After the love they’d shared, after isolating her here on Petit St. Marc, he still believed her capable of the impossible. He continued to believe she’d betrayed him, instead of considering that a disgruntled employee had alerted the media.
“If I’d had any means of getting a call out I wouldn’t have risked my life rowing to that island today,” she said. “I’d have rung my solicitor straightaway and tried to find out who had betrayed me.”
He shrugged, as if dismissing that possibility. “You could have stowed a cellphone in your luggage.”
She jammed her fists at her sides because she truly wanted to cosh him for being so cynical. So arrogantly pig-headed. “I only had one mobile and you took it from me at the Chateau. My God, if you don’t believe me, have my room searched.”
“It’s already been done.”
She stepped back, shocked when she shouldn’t be surprised. Throughout her days at boarding school everything she’d done, said, or put on paper had been watched. Edouard’s orders. Because of his suspicions, shredding paper documents and eliminating electronic ones had become second nature to her—even destroying something as innocuous as jotting down a luncheon date with a friend.
But André’s invasion of her privacy had crushed the fragile emotions she held close to her heart. His ordered search of her belongings reminded her that she was a prisoner here. Like her years at boarding school, she was here because of a billionaire’s largesse. He didn’t trust her or want her.
“You didn’t find a mobile phone,” she said, the ice of cold reality stabbing her heart when he gave a curt nod. “Have you kept me under surveillance as well?”
His sensuous lips thinned, but his silence was answer enough.
“I’m tired. I need to rest,” she said, pushing past him.
Her only thought was fleeing to her room, putting a wall between them when she longed for a continent to divide them. Even then it wouldn’t be enough, for André would always be a part of her. Their child would be a constant reminder of what she’d loved. And lost.
She hurried up the stairs. Her feet felt as leaden as her heart, and tears threatened to cloud her vision.
Halfway down the hall her balance deserted her and she stumbled. She pitched forward and threw out her hands to catch herself. Strong arms caught her and swept her off her feet. She gasped, instantly flinging her arms around his neck.
Their eyes clashed. His unreadable. Hers no doubt windows to her soul, her heart.
André broke eye contact first, and the dismissal was another blow in a long line of them.
“Does it bother you to touch someone you distrust so much?” she asked as he carried her to her room, straining away from the welcoming warmth of his chest. The last thing she wanted was his false comfort.
“Oui.” He laid her on the bed, then stalked from the room.
Good! She didn’t want to be near him. Didn’t wish to be subject to his foul mood any longer. But before she could set aside her inner turmoil and will her tense limbs to relax, he returned with a carafe of cold water.
He poured some in a glass and handed it to her. “Drink. I’ve sent for a doctor.”
“That isn’t necessary.” She took the glass, careful not to touch the fingers that had given her such pleasure an hour before, refusing to look into his eyes and see cold accusation glinting there instead of passion.
“I say it is,” he said.
“And, as everyone knows, Monsieur Gauthier’s word is law on his island kingdom.”
She saluted him with her glass and stared at the wall, her pulse thrumming in time to his harsh indrawn breaths, his shadow looming over her like a dark specter. But she refused to be intimidated—refused to be cowed by him.
“The doctor will be here within the hour,” he said.
“Will you stay to oversee his examination?” she asked. “Or watch it through your surveillance cameras?”
“Neither,” he said, not denying that monitoring devices were in place, that at some point he had in fact watched her.
Without another word he crossed to the door and shut it with a demoralizing click.
Silence throbbed around her.
Kira closed her eyes, furious. Hurt. Torn by the conflicting emotions clawing for dominance in her heart. She hated him. She loved him.
And loving André Gauthier could destroy her.
After the doctor had visited Kira spent the day in her room, eating and drinking whatever Otillie brought her and attending to a presentation she’d been working on for the Chateau. Though André owned it all now, she needed to see the project through—if only for herself.
She was just putting the finishing touch on it when her door opened. Assuming it was Otillie again, with more food or water, she continued working.
His spicy scent enveloped her a heartbeat before his shadow fell over her. “Is this your renovation plan for the Chateau?”
“Yes. I’ve been working on it for a month.” Likely wasted hours and energy—more dreams crumbling in her grasp.
“I wish to study it.”
“You’re the boss,” she said, trying for a light tone, trying not to feel excited that he was interested in her plans.
If he noticed, he didn’t comment as she saved the file to a portable drive and handed it to him. That was when she looked up at him. His powerful aura always took her breath away.
But tonight his dark hair was windblown, and there was a darkly intense gleam in his eyes. He looked as rugged and wild as if he’d just climbed down from the ratlines of a tall ship. And so sexy she trembled with renewed desire.
“You seem pleased with yourself,” she said.
“Oui. It’s begun.”
She took a breath, afraid to ask. “What do you mean?”
“Bellamy Enterprises.” He tossed the portable drive in the air and caught it, over and over. “I launched a hostile takeover bid roughly an hour ago.”
The breeze drifting through the windows died to a whisper, as if awed by the power he’d wielded. Or perhaps, like her, simply stunned he showed no more excitement over destroying another man’s empire. No, not another man—her father.
“You’ll control it all, then?” she asked, when she could trust her voice to remain steady. “Blend the two companies into a massive corporation?”
“No. I’ll take the dozen or so properties that interest me and sell the rest.”
She shook her head, admiring his cunning in the defeat of an adversary. “Peter will have to start all over to acquire half the wealth his father amassed.”
“Oui. He’ll have to earn it.”
Which he’d never done. Peter was the heir, whereas she’d had to prove herself to gain her shares in the Chateau.
“Will I have to earn back my position at the Chateau as well?” she asked. “Or have you already dismissed me?”
“I’ve not replaced you—yet.”
She waited for him to go on, to give her an inkling if he would keep her on or let her go, but he simply stared at her, his expression closed. If he shut her out now—
“Does it upset you that I’ve ruined Peter?” he asked.
“No.”
She was certain now that Peter was responsible for selling Edouard’s shares in the Chateau, and her own as well. She knew she’d gotten caught in a battle between Peter and André. She knew there was only one way to stop it.
That was the story of her life. In limbo, with neither parent wanting her. She’d lived in the shadow of Edouard Bellamy and his son. She was tired of being a pawn in rich men’s games.
That was what she’d been to Edouard. To Peter. And to André, she realized with a sinking heart.
He’d forced her from the Chateau to break Peter, and he’d crushed her hopes and dreams when he’d seized control of her hotel. Now it was over—or nearly so.
“If you are not grieving for your lover, then why do you look so sad, ma chérie?” he asked.
Her lover? If he only knew—
She shook her head, sighed. “Perhaps you are right. I am grieving over the fact that my lover believes I came here to ruin him, that I conspired with his enemy. I’m sad that he believes lies and discounts everything I say.”
“The facts are black and white, ma chérie. They don’t lie.”
She’d never win with him. Never. And that realization broke her heart all over again.
“Let me go, André. There’s no reason for you to keep me—”
“You are pregnant with my child.” He stood over her, as warm and welcoming as a marble statue. “Or is there something you wish to tell me?”
Yes, I am Edouard Bellamy’s daughter! The unwanted, unloved, daughter of André’s enemy. Get it out in the open. Swiftly. Brutally. Like ripping the bandage off a wound. Then deal with the consequences. And there would be consequences.
If she thought he loved her— If she believed that he could come to love her—
“Answer me, Kira. What are you afraid of?”
She looked up into his mesmerizing eyes and spoke with her heart. “That you’ll toss me aside after I’ve served my purpose to you, when you grow tired of me.”
He stared at her a long, charged moment, his body impossibly stiff and unyielding. Then he drew her to him, his head bent so close to hers she saw an inferno of need blazing in his eyes.
“I can’t imagine that day ever coming,” he said, and captured her mouth with a kiss that seared her to her soul.
She could imagine it coming when she revealed the secret that was festering in her. He’d despise her. She’d be the enemy.
But for the moment she was still his lover. She wanted him too much to spoil the moment with painful confessions. Just one more night together.
Talk could come later, for it would signal the end she wasn’t prepared to make yet. Never mind André had used her—was using her now. She wanted him. She was using him to fill that void.
And, most importantly, she loved him.
It was that simple, and that complex.
She’d pour everything she had into this moment, willing him to believe her, to look into her heart and see the truth. If only she could win his heart, his trust, then maybe the truth wouldn’t be so horrible to bear.
And if she was wrong?
She closed her mind to the crippling fear that his hatred would blind him to reason. Blind him to her.
Nothing was stronger than love. She had to believe that.
His long strong fingers entwined with hers as she drew near, the warmth of his touch melting her chilling fears. He brought her hand to his mouth, his eyes ablaze with passion. The kiss he pressed into her palm fired her with heat and she trembled with guilt and anticipation.
He escorted her into his room and peeled off his shorts. Her body quivered at the sight of him, warmed her skin and her heart, for he was beautifully sculpted, his tanned skin stretched smooth over chiseled muscles gleaming like bronze.
“You are magnificent,” she said.
“I am just a man.” He took her clothes from her, then dropped kisses on the flesh he’d exposed. “But you are a goddess of pleasure and beauty.”
His compliment needled her conscience, for she was a goddess who’d kept something vital from him.
He trailed kisses up her arms, his breath hot against her skin, his body burning her where it touched. Hot, cold. Fiery passion, cold reality.
She opened her mouth, guilt spoiling her pleasure. Her confession was poised on her tongue. But his mouth fused to hers, his kisses an addiction she could never get enough of.
“Only in your arms,” she said. But how long could this passion last?
A lifetime wouldn’t be long enough, she admitted, as his hands played a lusty symphony on her breasts while his teeth nipped at her collarbone, her neck. She clung to his broad shoulders and let her head fall back, surrendering to him.
He made a rough sound in his throat and tugged her into his en suite bathroom. And he proceeded to teach her a whole new appreciation for high-dollar French water jets.
In the small hours of the morning André sprawled in bed with Kira snuggled to his side. He should have fallen asleep shortly after she had, but slumber had eluded him.
Their lovemaking had been intense, passionate, deeper than he’d ever experienced in his life. He’d deliberately avoided talk, for he planned to spend the night making love with lazy abandon—a rich dessert to savor in nibbles and bites after a sumptuous meal. To celebrate. To seduce. To delight in each touch, each kiss, each joining.
But he’d sensed a desperation in Kira that had left him on edge. As if she feared this would be the last time they’d make love. A time or two he’d glimpsed guilt in her eyes.
Oui, she was keeping some secret, one that was causing her anguish. The likely scenario ate at him like acid.
The baby was Bellamy’s—not his. Despite the passion they found in each other’s arms she would chose Bellamy over him. She’d betray his trust and make a fool out of him again.
André set his jaw, anger tensing muscle and tendon, eroding the exquisite pleasure he’d found in her arms. Pleasure he’d never experienced to this extent with another woman!
Even knowing she’d been Peter’s mistress, he wanted her for himself. The admission came hard. He hated to be so captivated by a woman that he’d debate even for a second considering having something more than an affair with her.
But the brutal fact remained that he wanted Kira as his lover, his wife. As the mother of his children. He would give her anything she whimpered for to please her. He wanted her child to be his.
But if it wasn’t?
The guilt he’d sensed in her burned like acid in him, for it could only mean one thing. She’d already been carrying Bellamy’s child when she’d first come here to deceive him. His enemy was the father of her baby.
Mon Dieu, she was the fire that coursed through his blood. The siren who invaded his thoughts. She’d made a soft home in his hardened heart.
He wanted her. Now and forever.
But he couldn’t—wouldn’t!—claim Bellamy’s child. Admitting that pained him as nothing else had, and if that was her secret he’d lose Kira forever.
He should be relieved. When he was free of her he’d regain control of his life, his emotions.
He would escape the silken trap that had destroyed his father. He wouldn’t become intoxicated by a conniving woman, rendered drunk by her essence.
He would escape this affair with his pride and honor, leaving with only a few scars to his heart. They’d heal. He’d forget her. He would.
Then he’d be rid of this driving need to cover her luscious body with kisses, to sink into her welcoming heat and forget the world. Like he ached to do now.
He lurched from the bed and crossed to the window, refusing to heed her siren’s call, offering him the sweetest nectar of the gods. It was a trap, for her kind lured men to their ruin.
André heard the slither of silken sheets on the bed and tensed, willed her to stay there even though his body begged her to come to him. He’d be strong. Unyielding. Resistant to her charms.
“Is something wrong?” she asked, her voice soft and sexy.
“No.” He flattened a palm on the windowsill, staring out into the night when every cell in his body ached to return to the bed. To her.
“I don’t believe you.”
His mouth pulled in a mocking smile, and he applauded her for her insight. “Go back to sleep.”
“I’d rather talk.”
Talk was the last thing he wanted to do. He didn’t wish to hear her confession. Didn’t wish to end this idyll.
A sudden gust of wind sent the filmy curtains fluttering over his heated skin like feathers, filling the room with whispers of the dark desires he’d run from all his life.
He was lost and he knew it, because he still wanted her. Standing here wouldn’t change that. Perhaps she was right. Perhaps it was time they talked. Then she’d know what he was willing to give her, and what he’d never be able to relinquish.
“Very well. What is it you wish to say?”
He heard her shaky indrawn breath, and took satisfaction at knowing she was as off balance as he felt.
“What did Edouard do to merit your vengeance?” she asked.
Mon Dieu, she dared to bring Bellamy into their bed?
André whirled to face her, his body taut with anger. “I told you—he destroyed my family.”
“How?”
“C’est sans importance!”
“Speak English!”
He made a slashing movement with his hand and stalked across the room. “It’s not important. Nothing can change the past.”
Because if it had been possible he would have done so. He wouldn’t have told his father what his headstrong sister had done. He held himself to blame for setting in motion the events that had led to his parents’ deaths and his own abandonment.
“Please. I want to know,” she said. “I must know.”
He looked at her then, and a good deal of his rage cooled. She was huddled against the headboard, the sheet pulled tight around her. Even in the wan moonlight her face looked unnaturally pale.
Looking at her, he had trouble believing this woman with scruples had conspired with Peter to gain control of Edouard’s empire—that, like his sister, she’d done whatever a Bellamy wanted on the promise of inheriting the Chateau. Kira had come here to seduce him when his defenses had been at their lowest. Like his sister, she’d chosen a Bellamy over him.
How could he ever forgive her for that? He didn’t know if he could, and that realization had him tied in hard knots.
“André?” she asked. “Please?”
“My sister was Edouard’s mistress,” he began. “Seduced by him when she was fifteen.”
She jerked her gaze from his, staring at the wall as if enthralled by watching a drama play out. When she spoke, her voice was a pained hush that vibrated along his raw nerves. “You hate him for stealing her innocence, then?”
“Oui, it started then,” he said, and then wondered if anyone had given a damn when Bellamy had taken Kira from the schoolroom and become her benefactor.
He had proof of it even if she denied it. Even though she had ended up becoming Peter’s mistress.
“What’s the rest?”
He shook his head, bitten with guilt that his concern now rested with Kira instead of his family. Even admitting it didn’t change anything, for he suspected she’d been an easy target.
She should be the last person he’d wish to share his deepest grief and guilt with. Not the one woman he wanted to talk to about his tragic past.
“It’s complicated,” he said.
“Most intrigues are. Please go on.”
“My parents were outraged and forbade Suzette to see Edouard,” he said, frowning as memories of his parents’ heated arguments filtered back to him. “But my sister was charmed by Edouard’s wealth, by his promises of showering her with riches.”
“And Edouard was relentless in his pursuit of her?” she said, accurately guessing that much.
“Oui. One night she ran away.” He shook his head, having relived that event a thousand times in his nightmares. “I was twelve, and I took great pleasure rushing to let my father know.”
She swallowed, the sound loud in the tense stillness. “Did he go after her?”
He stiffened, his hands fisting. “No, my mother did. My father jumped in the car to stop her, for her driving was atrocious. They never made it down the mountain.”
She winced, pinching her eyes shut. “And your sister?”
“I learned later that Edouard was waiting to whisk Suzette away to America.” To the Chateau Mystique. He stared at her, letting her see the anguish and torment he’d lived with for years.
“What happened to you after your parents died?”
“I was shipped off to a distant relative.”
“Then you were raised by family?”
André laughed—the sound as cold and calculating as his mother’s conniving cousin. Only by the grace of God and his own determination had he survived.
“They didn’t want me, ma chérie, but they gladly accepted the monthly allowance they were given to keep me.”
“I know how difficult that kind of life is.”
“You can’t begin to guess. While you were taking your lessons at an elite boarding school, I was working when the local school wasn’t in session.”
He glanced out the window at the bloated moon, the pain of being shuffled off to strangers still festering under the service. He’d had a roof over his head, a small closet-like room with a cot to call his own, and food that had been better fitted for the swine raised on the farm.
“Who provided your allowance?” she asked, her voice small.
“Edouard Bellamy. He paid them to keep me out of his and Suzette’s way.”
André had counted the days until he could escape that hell. Marked time toward the day he would ruin Edouard Bellamy.
“I’m so sorry,” she said.
“Don’t be.” He didn’t want her pity. Nor would he admit how deep those scars cut—how much he blamed himself for telling his father what his sister had done. “Suzette made her choice. I made mine.”
How ironic that Edouard and Suzette had died after a horrible car wreck. Poetic justice? Perhaps.
“Why can’t you give up your vengeance?” Kira asked.
“Pride. Le code d’honneur,” he said, and when she slid him a questioning look added, “My honor demands I avenge those who have wronged my family.”
She shook her head, looking rather appalled. “That’s it? You vowed to ruin Edouard because your sister willingly became his mistress?”
Mon Dieu, she made it sound trivial. “There is more to it than that.”
He drove his fingers through his hair, loath to talk about his parents. They’d been spoiled and rich, living for the moment in whatever spotlight shone on them. They had been ill suited to raise a family or manage their wealth.
André reasoned it had been only a matter of time before his parents made a powerful enemy. Not surprisingly, it had been his mother who’d played a dangerous game with Edouard Bellamy—all to make her husband jealous enough to cease his wanderings.
He doubted either parent had realized Edouard Bellamy was vindictive to a fault. That when Bellamy realized he’d been played for a fool he’d ruthlessly lured André’s father into bankruptcy and André’s sister into his bed.
“André?” she asked. “What happened? Tell me.”
“My father built the Chateau Mystique for my mother,” he said. “His gift to her. Before it was completed Bellamy set out to acquire it by dubious means. I am merely reclaiming what belonged to my family and restoring our honor.”
She stared at him for the longest time, then lifted her hands and clapped, the sound obscene in the tense stillness. “Bravo, André. You have accomplished what you set out to do in the name of honor by employing dubious means—just like Edouard.”
He bristled, hating the comparison. Hating that she was right. But at least he wasn’t alone.
“Look in the mirror, ma chérie. You came here to do Peter Bellamy’s bidding. You are the one enceinte. Or have you so quickly forgotten the role you played for him three months ago?”
She scooted from the bed, her face ashen. “I’m going to my room to sleep. The ghosts in here make it too crowded.”
André took a step forward to stop her, then stilled the urge. The timing was bad. He’d only dig a bigger hole for himself if he pulled her back to him as he longed to do. If he kissed her. Loved her. Sought comfort in her arms.
His emotions were too raw. Tomorrow, he thought, as she left the bedroom without looking back.
Tomorrow he’d have total control of Bellamy Enterprises—and of Kira Montgomery.
