Читать книгу Hot And Bothered - Liz Maverick - Страница 7

Chapter Two

“Tall, dark and ooh la la,” Anna said, sticking her face over my shoulder. The video intercom showcased three figures on the landing below. The Marchand brothers. Luc, Christian and yes, Jacques.

Yeah, they still had plenty of ooh la la. “Your perfume is making me lightheaded, Anna,” I lied, gently head-butting her aside. The view was making me lightheaded.

One of the brothers tossed a cigarette to the ground. Probably Luc, if his high school habits hadn’t changed. The three men appeared to argue over the discarded cigarette, and then a shoe crushed the butt into the ground. A shoe very much like the one that used to press against the back of my chair in history class.

Whoa. Obviously, I’d expected to feel something in this moment. Something akin to doom-like resentment. Or bloodthirsty vengefulness. I hadn’t expected to feel...excited. “I’m thrown, dammit,” I whispered. “Thrown.”

“Um, that’s the third time they’ve pressed the button. They’re going to be just as fun to watch once they’re inside.” Anna squeezed my arm. “It will be fine, sis. It was a long time ago.”

I flushed. “Right.” I didn’t move. I stared at the leg attached to the shoe, followed it up to the chest and squinted at the tiny screen, hoping for a less-pixelated glimpse of Jacques “Jack” Marchand’s expression. Was he thrown?

“I’ll handle Jack. You take care of his brothers.” Anna reached across me to hit the buzzer and then floated to the door in a cloud of pink chiffon.

She was right. Closure would be a good thing. I should think of this as an opportunity. Besides, I looked as good as a girl is going to get in Paris. I was wearing one of my go-to LBDs accessorized with a badass updo from a fantastic salon tucked away on Boulevard St. Germain, smoky eyes thanks to a special event in the cosmetics department at Le Bon Marche and a dash of red at the soles of my precious Louboutin shoes. I wasn’t that awkward high school girl anymore, and this was my damn party.

“Zero,” I muttered, steeling myself as Luc and Christian came through the door all tanned skin and perfect hair. In school we called the trio The French Revolution, and they still deserved the nickname; I actually felt a surge in the party energy around me as they entered the hall. I moved forward as Anna expertly peeled Jack away with a hand on his back and a glass of champagne.

I resisted the urge to crane my neck in Jack’s direction, whispering, “Zero,” again. But I couldn’t force myself not to care. Okay, fine, Cassie. At least force yourself to look like you don’t care.

“Bonsoir,” I said, airily kissing Jack’s brothers on the cheeks and likewise leading them to a champagne station on the opposite side of the room. It should have been way harder to ignore Jack’s presence. Luc still looked like the wild one, more casual than his brothers in motorcycle boots under his slacks and a V-neck under his blazer. I’d never gotten more than a few words out of him in high school, and I always took Jack’s word for it that his brother’s dark glower was more bark than bite. Clotheshorse Christian was easier to put your finger on—and many a girl in my class had tried—looking entirely at home in his rich man’s uniform—full suit and tie—though he wore his tie purposely loose like a naughty prep-school boy.

Luc immediately drifted to the wall where he planted himself like a bouncer, one hand jammed in his pocket, his shoulders tight. “Is he okay?” I asked Christian, just as a platinum-blonde joined his brother at the wall. “Oh, he’ll be okay,” Christian answered with a suggestive lilt in his voice.

I suddenly recognized the blonde, and my fingers went cold. Irina Lively from high school. She was the nicest head of a three-headed hydra that included Beatrix Swan and Mary-Ann Peterson, but even a nice monster is still a monster. For a second, I was that girl again, the one who stood out in all the wrong ways. My palms started sweating. Great. Ten years had passed, and thinking about high school still made my palms sweat. Would Anna kill me if I left my own party? What the hell was Irina even doing in Paris? Were Beatrix and Mary-Ann here, too? Well, what the hell was I doing here? Anna’s birthday wasn’t really until next week, but I’d timed it this week for a reason, and it made perfect sense for Irina’s tony set to be in Paris at the same time.

Twice a year the government allowed the fashion world to officially offer sales under the unassuming moniker, les soldes, or “the sales.” Ever since discovering this secret, I’d made it my business to save my Paris business for July and January, and I can say with great certainty that nothing makes a bitter European winter more tolerable than fifty percent off. Fifty percent off during a Parisian summer is just the icing on the bon bon. I looked around nervously for the other two hydra heads and thankfully didn’t see them.

I escaped to the kitchen where I asked the servers to put out more food to accommodate Anna’s expanding guest list, got my shit together and went back to the party, which was already getting pretty crowded. There, as I stepped into the living room, was Jack directly in my sightline.

My heart pounded in my chest. He sported a sleek charcoal-gray suit that draped perfectly off his broad shoulders, a crisp white shirt open at the collar to reveal sun-kissed skin, and those shoes. His trademark Italian leather sneakers, fashionably rebellious enough to say I don’t care what you think. Except I knew he did care what people thought. If he hadn’t cared so much what people thought back in high school, things wouldn’t have gotten all messed up.

Okay, look away, Cassie. If you don’t look away soon, he’s going to see you...staring. Sigh. Jack saw me, all right, and I’d be damned if I was gonna spook. We locked eyes, me staring defiantly back across the room, watching him process my existence. There was something tougher about him, more of a self-assurance in his air. Maybe, like me, he’d just become more comfortable in his skin. But just as I was telling myself that maybe he’d actually grown meaner, a slight smile softened his jawline, and he headed straight for me.

I’m sunk.

“You’re going to have to forgive me,” he said, the first meaningful thing from his mouth since that French kiss ten years ago.

“You’re going to have to make me,” I replied coolly. That voice. I used to pray he’d ask a question in class just so I could hear that rich voice. If you closed your eyes and just listened to him talk, it was better than standing under the Eiffel Tower with a crepe smothered in chocolate hazelnut sauce.

His eyebrow arched and then he smiled, laughing softly. He reached out and took my hand, holding it in both of his for a moment. And then he slid my palm under the edge of his suit so I pressed against the warm linen of his shirt, just over his heart. My breath hitched but no way did he hear it against the rest of the party noise.

With his hand against mine, with my fingers buried in his warmth, he looked down at me and said, “I was a stupid high school boy who didn’t stand up for what he wanted.”

I pulled my hand away and switched my champagne glass to that hand to dissipate the heat. You’re not going to seduce me this time, Marchand. I mean, he was doing a good job given that it had been about one minute, but I wasn’t falling for it this time. “You were the worst thing that could happen to a teenage girl. The ultimate high school humiliation.”

“You think of me that way? As your high school humiliation?”

“You should be flattered I think of you at all.”

“You make it very difficile for a guy to explain. You never come to the alumni reunions.”

“Have you heard of a little thing called email?”

“These things are better in person, non? And I assumed you’d have my name set up in your SPAM filter,” he added with a sheepish grin that produced a couple of killer dimples.

“Not even,” I said with a disdainful snort, making it clear he wasn’t important enough for that. Actually, I had a filter with his name on it set to go to my “Important” folder, so it wouldn’t accidentally go to SPAM. Nothing he needed to know.

“Cassandra, I wish I could go back and change it all.”

“Words, words, words,” I said.

“What would it take for you to believe me? Shall I make a public declaration?”

I hastily put my hand out to stop him, but he’d already raised his drink, and my fingers hit a wall of muscle commonly known as the six-pack. “No! This is Anna’s night. Besides, if they’ve forgotten, I don’t need to remind them of what happened.”

“Was it that bad?” he asked, and I’ll be damned if it didn’t sound genuine.

“If you have to ask, we must not remember it the same way. Think of it from a high school girl’s point of view.”

“You give me your version, and then I’ll give you mine.”

I laughed, hating that I liked him even when the topic was how much he deserved me hating him. “Here’s the condensed version. You flew to New York with your brothers for high school, landed in the seat behind me for history class, seduced me with your accent and started hanging out with me in secret under the auspices of needing tutoring, even though we were studying the Napoleonic Wars, which made me think that you might actually like me, a suspicion that was confirmed after we talked and talked forever about everything until we both said we must be soul mates and then you asked me on a date and took me to that swanky Upper East Side party where you purposely palmed the piece of paper with my name on it for Seven Minutes in Heaven so you’d have an excuse to make out with me and put your hands in places they probably shouldn’t have been at that point, and when our time was up you, in fact, told me how much you liked me and asked me to be your girlfriend, and I said yes and then we left the bathroom, and you took me to your house and I lost my virginity to you, after which you took me home, and it was then it probably dawned on you that Anna and I didn’t live on the Upper East Side like everybody else, and didn’t have gobs of money and a swanky apartment like everybody else, and I don’t know who gave you a big speech that weekend, but you never called me and when Monday rolled around, I’d already told Anna you were my boyfriend and she’d apparently spread it around, and then all that was left was for you to confirm it, except when I got to school the only thing you confirmed was that American girls were suckers for boys with accents, and that having sex didn’t make me your girlfriend, and because every sundae needs a cherry, I also tanked history with the only C grade I ever got in school.”

“Breathe, Cassie,” Jack said.

I took his advice and then kept going. “You know, here’s the thing. I realize it might sound like a small infraction. And I realize that it seems...well, a little much to be pissed off about it for ten years, but here’s the thing. I was just a young girl. I was already on the outside when it came to social status and money. And here you come, making me think you don’t care about any of that, and that you like me for myself, but the next thing I know, the whole school is laughing at a joke with my name on it.”

I noticed that in spite of the calming breath, I was advancing on Jack, backing him slowly toward a tower of canapés. I planted my feet and continued my explanation.

“You know how mean girls can be, Jack. That’s just a shitty, shitty thing to do to a young girl who is still developing her self-confidence. It took me a long time to build myself back up, and luckily I did a good job, so I don’t have to stand here and suck up and pretend that what you did is okay because you’re handsome and rich. Because it’s not. It’s not okay to treat people like that.”

Jack was looking down at me, a muscle working in his tight jaw. “I was young and stupid and worried about the wrong things. I wish you could have known what was in my mind and in my heart. I regretted it, but didn’t know how to fix it.”

I’m not sure why his honesty surprised me. I felt bare, somehow. I hadn’t expected a meaningful conversation. There was that whole thing where I was supposed to greet him properly and then move on to the next guest. Certainly, in my daydreams, I’d march up to him at some point and spill something expensive and sticky on his suit, call him a douchebag and flounce off. But meaningful conversation hadn’t really been in my plans. I made a show of watching the rest of the partygoers to hide my confusion, but I didn’t really register more than the swirl of colorful skirts and the flash of diamonds. I shrugged, as if I didn’t much care, and said, “So what happened? Walk me through it,” like I was just sort of curious.

The grim set of his mouth relaxed into a smile. “Yes, let’s walk through it. We’ll begin where it started going wrong. We were at the party.”

That was kind of where it started going really right before the wrong part, in my opinion, but I didn’t want him to take it as a compliment. “Geneva Sims’s party,” I said. “If we’re going to do this, I think we ought to be precise.”

“You want this walk-through to be precise? I have no quarrel with that,” he said. The delicious twist of his mouth probably should have served as some kind of warning, but I nodded for him to continue, once again flying toward flame.

“So. Geneva Sims’s parents’ condo on Park Avenue. You, in a blue dress. Très jolie.”

“Me, in a blue dress,” I repeated robotically, suddenly realizing I couldn’t remember exactly what I’d worn that night, but I was willing to go with blue dress in exchange for the naughty look in his eye.

“A blue dress with a short skirt and some sort of...” He reached out and lightly touched my chin, tracing down my neck with a fluid motion until his finger rested just below my collarbone. His fingertips pressed against my flushed skin. “Some sort of necklace. A fussy thing. I remember it got in the way.”

Oh, I remembered that. It was probably still behind Mrs. Sims’s toilet or wherever Jack had flung it.

“Someone had proposed Seven Minutes in Heaven, and I stole your card from the bowl while everyone was gathering.”

I couldn’t help but smile. Jack leaned over, and with his lips pressed to my ear softly asked, “Où sont les toilettes, s’il vous plait?” I burst out laughing. I couldn’t help it. I pointed out the bathroom door, across the room and at the end of a hall. And before I knew what was what, Jack was walking me toward it, ignoring the guests who were parting in our wake.

“Jack,” I said, in my best warning tone. “We don’t have to be that precise. I’m the hostess. I have duties.”

“Anna is happy,” he said, pointing to my sister, who was, indeed, happily doing hostess things, flitting from one group of guests to another. He held out his hand, and God help me, I put my palm in his. “I led you to the bathroom,” he continued. “I loved having an excuse to hold your hand.”

I actually blushed. Damn you, Jack.

He pushed open the door and dragged me inside the gleaming marble bathroom. Jack switched the light off, and we stood there in the pitch black.

“I reached out for you in the dark,” he whispered. “And I grabbed nothing. I felt like a fool. My heart was pounding. I felt so rushed.”

Now we have all the time in the world.

His hand grazed my shoulder. I sucked in a quick breath as he wrapped both hands around my shoulders and pulled me closer. “Do you remember what happened next?”

I couldn’t think.

“Let me remind you.” His hands slid up my arms, grazed my neck and cradled my face. His thumb stroked my mouth until I opened for him, and his tongue found mine. Pure fire. Divine. I hate you, Jack.

“I’d kissed other girls before,” Jack whispered against me. “But none that meant anything to me. You were different.”

The only answer I could manage was a quick breath as my body relaxed in his arms, and the strap of my dress slipped down my shoulder. Liquid lust. That’s what he sent traveling through my veins. Just like he’d done ten years ago. But there was one big difference. I wasn’t the same tentative teenager experiencing her first kiss, unsure of herself, unsure of what she liked.

I was damn sure now. I let my brain shut down cell by cell as his sinful mouth took control, and I answered the play of his tongue with mine. “Mais oui,” he whispered, his mouth slanting over mine again and again, hot, wet, so demanding. I’d thought of Jack as sophisticated and experienced once; now I realized we’d both been unsure of ourselves then. No longer.

“I backed you up against the wall...”

Velvet-soft towels caressed my shoulder blades; I shivered with delight. In the dark, every sensation seemed amplified. The scent of fresh peonies by the sink, the buttery soap, the warm hum of the party seeping under the door. Oh, wow. Maybe I should stop him, I thought vaguely. But I tipped my head back, and he followed the path. My skin flamed as he dragged his mouth over my throat, biting softly, an electric jolt sweeping through me each time. His hands held me by the hips, and I could feel the pressure of his thumbs close to the apex of my thighs through the thin material of my dress.

“I lost track of time,” Jack murmured, his mouth pressing into my skin. “Seven minutes could have been seven seconds. Some idiot pounded on the door.”

“Anna,” I said.

“She has a very annoying sense of time.” He gripped me harder, trailing his mouth toward my cleavage. He nudged my dress down along with the lacy cups of my strapless bra.

His teeth gently raked my breast, and his tongue swirled to claim my nipple. I gasped, arching my back as desire raced through me. Jack groaned, the passion of his kisses intensifying. I wanted to touch him, run my hand down between his legs, but I just clung to his taut frame like I was drowning, my fingers pressing hard enough to feel the muscles working beneath his shirt.

His hands slid to my lower back, ruching up my hem, even as he lowered his mouth to my bikinis.

“I don’t remember this part,” I said breathlessly. I was so wet, so wanting.

“I don’t think you remember wearing a blue dress, either,” he said softly, his mouth kissing the lace.

His fingers nudged down the edge of the lace, and I felt Jack’s breath hot against my clit. I let go of him, bracing myself against the wall. “I definitely don’t remember this part.”

“I may be embellishing somewhat,” Jack said, his voice husky, his accent more French than ever. “Artistic license.” His tongue flicked at my damp heat.

I cried out with pleasure, unprepared for the delicious intensity, unable to stop myself. “Whaddeyouknowaboutart?”

The only answer he needed to give me didn’t involve words. I may have been the art-history major, but Jack had apparently been hard at work studying the field.

In the dark, with the scent of flowers twining around us, Jack stroked and sucked, his lips and fingers working crazy magic. I came hard, crying out with his finger still inside me, and his mouth pressed between my thighs.

“Je suis désolé,” he whispered. “I’m sorry.” And then he kissed me again, hard and demanding, as if to press the point home, leaving my head swimming with light and lust and everything in between.

All I could think was, now, that’s an apology.

Some idiot pounded on the bathroom door. “Um, everything okay in there?” asked a too familiar voice.

“Anna?” Jack asked.

I sighed. “She has a very annoying sense of time.”

But I was glad she’d knocked. I needed to get back to the party, plus some wicked part of me kind of enjoyed that there’d only been enough time for me to receive without giving. Maybe in my weakened orgasmic state I’d accepted his apology, but I hadn’t forgotten the past, just maybe sorta forgiven him. “Be right out!” I called as I slid out from between Jack’s arms and went to assess the damage in the mirror. As I straightened my bra and pulled at my dress so the fabric settled properly, I watched Jack’s reflection fix his shirt. Chocolate-brown lashes swept toward his cut cheekbones as he looked down to slip a rebel button back through the hole. The Marchands were all beautiful boys, but for me, there was something special about Jack’s dark elegance that sent the butterflies flying.

He took a deep breath like the ones you take when you’re forced to keep your shit together whether you want to or not. That thought made me smile. I make him lose control. He’s trying to keep his shit together. After all this time, I still mess him up as much as he messes with me. So now what? Now nothing, Cass! That’s that! Demons slayed, credits rolling.

Jack looked up at me in the mirror and smiled back. “How much longer will you be in Paris?”

“One week,” I said, tightening the posts on my earrings.

He stilled for a quick second and then continued checking the rest of his buttons. “One week? This is unfortunate. Can you stay longer?”

“No, I can’t. There’s a lovely little villa on the market between Florence and Siena that my employer wants me to investigate. And frankly, I think the Italian sunshine will do me some good. My base tan is a disaster.” If I was laying the insouciance on a bit thick, I didn’t care. It was all true.

He looked legitimately disappointed, which made me unaccountably pleased. Then he shrugged. “A week in Paris. It’s doable.”

I reset a couple of bobby pins in the back of my hair where the towels had wreaked havoc. “What’s doable?” Me? I wasn’t sure I liked that. I wasn’t sure I didn’t.

Jack’s fingers tickled the back of my neck, and I shivered as desire shot through me once more. I turned around to break his hold on me and caught a stare so naughty I wouldn’t have been surprised if the peonies spontaneously combusted. “I suppose a man can rewrite history in a week,” he murmured, that rich voice burying into my skin.

I leaned against the edge of the marble counter and stared at him with all the incredulity I felt. It was starting to dawn on me just how quickly I’d succumbed to the charms of a man who’d charmed the pants off me pretty quickly ten years ago. I could only hope it wasn’t in his plan to walk into my world and get it on so easily just because he’d done it before. Yeah, I was definitely glad I hadn’t reciprocated. Well, mostly. “Was this your plan all along? I mean, by coming to this party, did you have a plan to, uh, rewrite history with me?”

“Absolutely,” he said with a shrug.

I burst out laughing. “That’s ridiculous. It’s been ten years. You’re making this up.”

He leaned over and pressed his mouth to my ear, igniting my skin as his lips streaked across my cheek to my lips, which he just barely grazed before pulling away. “I’m a grown man. I don’t worry about looking ridiculous. Some things we cannot forget. We know what we know, oui? And I know I want a—what do you call it? A do-over with you.”

My eyes narrowed but I couldn’t move my focus from his mouth, which had definitely left my own lips too soon. The tip of his tongue moistened his top lip and then vanished. Somewhere between my legs I started to get antsy again and had to switch my gaze back to his eyes before I lost my mind. What was he saying? He wanted a do-over? No, he didn’t. He didn’t want us back. “You don’t want a do-over, Jack. You just want to do me.” Which you halfway did.

“You would also like a do-over,” he said with extreme confidence. His smile dripped with knowing, wicked lust. “You would like to spend the next week with me.” He voice dropped to a whisper when he added, “I know this to be true.”

The audacity of it all. The bossy, self-assuredness of it all. I loved it. Ugh. “Just because you get to say things with a sexy accent doesn’t make the things you say right. You want me to drop everything and play Girlfriend of the Hot French Man for a week?” Almost immediately after I’d asked myself this question, I started getting confused about why this was bad, and had to pull myself out of a nosedive. “I’m not sleeping with you, Jack. I appreciate the, um, apology. And now I have to go back to the party.”

His mouth twitched like he thought that was funny, which really wasn’t the reaction I was going for. “You American girls are so on the nose. I thought we would begin by attending the Festival de Mille Feux . It’s a gala—”

“I know what it is.” It wasn’t just a gala. It was a private society gala that was impossible to infiltrate unless you were part of the money set. Only an idiot with excessive pride would turn down an invite. “And thanks, but no,” I said, opening the door and holding out my open palm, indicating he could leave first. “In the original version of our story, I lost my virginity to you and before we parted that night you said you were going to take me out the next night. But I think we both know what happened in the light of the day. The light-of-the-day Jack is a different guy. So no. Leave well enough alone.”

He studied my face for a good ten seconds, and then he leaned in. I stiffened, thinking he might try to stuff his tongue in my mouth just at the moment I expressly didn’t want to believe he was all seduction and no heart. But he merely kissed me softly on both cheeks and closed the door behind him. “I understand,” he said, and that was it.

That was it! For the rest of the party, he left well enough alone, as I’d asked. With one eye configured like a GPS to know Jack’s position in the apartment at all times, I went back to hosting duties. Jack kept his distance—was it just me, or did he somehow calculate just how far he could go without ever leaving my sight or my mind?—shooting me polite, loaded smiles across the room if our eyes accidentally met, but generally being a great guest by introducing himself to new people, moving the furniture at midnight to start a boisterous dance party in the living room—always a good sign that the party is working—and basically making no trouble for his host. And wouldn’t you know it, there I was at the end of the night so drunk I almost yelled out, “For God’s sake come back here and make some trouble for your host!”