Читать книгу Original Sin - Rosalie Ash - Страница 5

ABRUPTLY Emily pushed her knife and fork together.

‘Lost your appetite?’ The deep voice was expressionless.

‘Sort of.’

‘Would you like dessert? Coffee?’

‘Nothing else. I’m feeling sleepy. Travelling affects me like that.’

‘Then I had better take you back to bed, Emily.’

His words hung between them, like a teasing challenge. Had he intended any double meaning?

‘Yes...’ If her cheeks had been hot before, now she felt flames consuming her.

The night air was warm and scented, but it cooled her burning cheeks during the drive back in the open car.

‘You will move into a room nearer to mine tonight.’

Christian’s cool, flat announcement made her jerk her head round in alarm. They’d crunched to a halt in the pebbled courtyard, stepped out of the Mercedes, and were standing in the lamplit darkness.

‘Whatever for?’

‘For your safety, Emily.’

‘Oh...!’ Thrown into confusion, she searched her shattered thoughts. ‘You think Greg Vernon might come creeping back to finish what he tried to start?’ She was half joking, but somehow the words came out with a more serious ring than she’d intended.

‘It is possible.’ Christian’s voice was hard as steel.

‘Oh, I really don’t think he was serious...’ She stopped, suddenly feeling cold inside.

She stared up at the dark bulk of the building. A faint frisson of apprehension slithered down her spine. The Chteau de Mordin was an old, two-storeyed mansion built around three sides of a wide shingled courtyard. Its walls—what could be seen of them beneath dense green creeper, and between endless rows of tall, arched windows with wooden shutters—were smooth-rendered and white-washed. The shrill of the cicadas was the only sound.

For her own peace of mind she’d played down the whole Greg Vernon episode. Now, standing here in the eerie silence of the night, she felt her imagination fire into overdrive. An owl hooted from the vicinity of one of the massive cedars nearby and she jumped involuntarily.

Had Greg Vernon been seriously about to molest her? If she hadn’t turned her hand to her bit of surprise judo, if Christian hadn’t appeared when he did, would things have got unpleasantly or even dangerously out of control...?

At the time she’d put the Englishman down as a relatively harmless flirt, with delusions about his own sex appeal. Now, delayed reaction was setting in.

Christian had turned to gaze around the courtyard. He stood with his back to her, his hands thrust into his jacket pockets, and she stared at him unwillingly. Tall, over six feet, and broad-shouldered, he had the smooth-muscled physique of an athlete. In profile his features had a brooding, hooded power. The trouble was, Emily acknowledged ruefully, that Christian Malraux exuded far greater danger than Greg Vernon ever could...

‘I’ll be fine, honestly,’ she countered hurriedly. ‘I’ll lock my door. Don’t worry...’

‘You will move across to the room next to mine. Tonight.’ Christian turned to gaze down at her, his expression harder. ‘I have no wish to lie awake half the night worried that rape and pillage may be taking place across there.’

‘For heavens’ sake, there’s no need for any fuss. I’ll be perfectly safe! And I can take care of myself!’

‘You will do as I say.’ The deep voice held an implacable note, raising her hackles. Christian Malraux could be charming when he wished, but he had a nasty tyrannical streak, Emily decided crossly. She recalled his icy dismissal of Greg Vernon. Here was a man used to being obeyed.

‘I’d rather stay where I am now!’

‘Indeed?’ One dark eyebrow angled scathingly as he studied her mutinous face. ‘Perhaps I misjudged the situation? Perhaps, if I had not intervened, the outcome would have been very different?’

She stared at him in silence.

‘What is that supposed to mean?’

‘Things are not always what they appear,’ he murmured thoughtfully. ‘Is it possible perhaps that you were enjoying your rough session with Greg Vernon, Emily? And my appearance spoiled things for you?’

Anger gripped her. ‘If you mean what I think you mean, that’s a...a disgusting suggestion!’

‘Is it?’ Christian sounded unperturbed by her pent-up outrage. ‘In that case, you will be happier sleeping in another room. Come, we’ll fetch your things.’

There was little option, Emily decided furiously, but to follow orders, for the time being. And humouring her new boss seemed diplomatic, when she’d controlled her temper enough to take a calm view of the situation.

‘Is the chteau always this deserted?’ In a valiant effort to somehow retrieve the deteriorating atmosphere between them, Emily’s query was made with elaborate politeness as they returned across the shadowy courtyard with her repacked cases. ‘It gives me the distinct impression that it was built to house more than two people!’

She’d endured his patronising supervision while she collected her belongings. Now she felt a fresh stab of annoyance at his humourless smile.

‘Before my aunt died, the place was usually packed with staff, guests, weekend parties. I imagine that social life tailed off these last few years. The village “fte champtre” is traditionally celebrated here. There is a floodlit grand bal here in two weeks’ time. That should bring a little more life to the place...depending on the numbers attending.’

There was that dry cynicism again in his voice, which seemed to intrude whenever the chteau was mentioned...

‘But the business side of things—surely there are more live-in staff than your housekeeper, Lisette Duvert, and the occasional casual odd-job man like Greg Vernon?’

‘This is as my uncle left it. I’ve been working on building up the sales side, but I haven’t been able to give the place my undivided attention. Too many loose ends from my former profession. And I have not yet fully decided on the future of the Chteau de Mordin.’

Emily stopped in the doorway of the bedroom he’d shown her into, staring up at him in surprise. ‘You mean you might sell?’

He shrugged. ‘It’s possible. I have not decided. Six years ago, I had no wish to vegetate in provincial France in the family business. I am not sure if anything has really changed on that score.’

For some reason, she felt shocked. She took care not to show it. She hardly knew this man. It wasn’t for her to show surprise at his lack of enthusiasm for what seemed to her an idyllic goldmine of a place...

‘This place has enormous potential,’ she began idly. ‘I thought that the moment I saw it...’

‘Indeed? I’d be interested to hear your views on it.’ His tone was wry, far from sincere, she thought resentfully.

‘Sure. Any time.’ Suddenly overwhelmingly tired, she pressed a hand to her forehead, shivering.

‘Are you all right, Emily?’ Behind the implacable shutters of his expression, the smoky blue gaze held a hint of concern.

‘I’m fine. It’s been a long day...’

This was true. She’d been up with the lark at her home in Gloucestershire, flown from Birmingham to Bordeaux, then driven up here on congested French roads in the hectic July holiday traffic. The sight of the big, square bedroom just along the landing from Christian’s suite, freshly welcoming in shades of blue and gold, with a door ajar into a matching shower-room, was enticing.

Emily suddenly realised that this window looked straight across the courtyard into the window of the bedroom she’d been given by Lisette. No wonder Christian had detected trouble and arrived on the scene when he had—once Greg Vernon had snapped on the light, the scenario in the bedroom would have been floodlit for all to see...

‘You’ve gone very pale.’

‘I think it’s delayed reaction to that ridiculous episode earlier...’ The brief smile she gave him was tight with suppressed emotion. It had only just sunk in how close she might have come to a vicious assault earlier in her room. And this arrogant individual had the nerve to suggest she’d been enjoying herself...

To her mortification she discovered that she was close to tears. Spinning desperately away from him, cursing her tiredness, her emotional state, the wine, the whole tense, edgy evening, she willed him to melt away and leave her alone to weep a few therapeutic tears and collapse into bed.

Instead, she felt strong hands on her shoulders, and she was twisted into the hard warmth of Christian Malraux’s arms, and held firmly against the muscular wall of his chest.

‘You are trembling. Emily, I apologise if I offended you. You are quite safe here...’

The deep voice was cool, with a trace of anger beneath the surface. Was he angry with her? Or with himself, for suggesting that nasty twist to what might have happened?

She tensed, panic-stricken, rigid with furious denial as he slid one hand up to the narrow nape of her neck, casually and confidently caressing her hair. He stroked the back of her head in a calming, brotherly fashion. It could have been Ben, hugging her better after some minor accident at home. She felt herself relax against him involuntarily as the warmth of his body transferred itself to her.

And then, with no warning, the warmth subtly changed. Secure and fraternal it suddenly wasn’t. Searingly aware of every intimate detail of the hard, clean-smelling male body so close to hers, Emily found all her reassurance vanished.

When Christian gave an abrupt, astonished expletive and crushed her harder to his body, she lifted her head and blindly proffered her lips to his demanding, exploratory possession of her mouth...

She parted her lips with a sort of compulsive curiosity. The exquisitely raw sensations rippled through every nerve of her body. His tongue fenced with hers, then plunged hungrily deeper. He slid his hands up her slender back and cupped her head, his fingers tangling in the short, feathery rose-gold curls of her hair.

Dragging trembling hands across his ribcage, she spread her fingers across the width of his chest, superficially going through the motions of trying to push him away. Her lack of conviction must have been pathetically obvious, she decided dimly, shivering as her fingers encountered the strong ridges of his pectoral muscles. She clenched her fingers into small fists, fighting her feelings with every ounce of her strength, but then of their own volition her hands slid to his shoulders, spanning the firm column of his neck, seeking the strong pulse beating at his throat, the texture of his hair at his nape.

His hair was thick and clean, crisp to the touch. His body, through the light cotton of his clothes, felt lean and spare, powerfully muscled. A fresh wave of fire swept through her as he traced the narrow indentation of her spine with one firm hand. He caressed lightly all the way down to her small buttocks, and with shocked awareness she felt the heavy shaft of his sex, confined by clothes but nevertheless rampantly male, powerfully and unmistakably aroused, pressing against the flatness of her stomach through the silk of her sarong-skirt. A shudder of need seemed to resonate through her, but alongside it came a faint return to sanity.

The shudder seemed to transfer itself to Christian, and with a thick curse under his breath he abruptly separated himself from her. One hand on her shoulder, he caught her chin with the other, to lift her flushed face for inspection. The smoky blue eyes were darker. The sleepy, lidded gaze was shuttered, and unreadable.

‘Je m’excuse, Emily. I did not intend that to happen. I did not seek to light a conflagration between us...’ His breathing was erratic, his deep voice was harder, but ruefully amused as well. As if he’d been taken genuinely by surprise.

‘I...you didn’t...’ Her voice sounded disembodied. She was trembling from head to foot.

‘Now I think I have frightened you even more than Greg Vernon.’

She made a determined effort to laugh it off, backing away and twisting her chin free from the disturbing warmth of his fingers. ‘Don’t worry, I doubt if I’ll have nightmares!’

‘Good.’ He was smiling wryly now, a wary, watchful light in his eyes. ‘We would not want any complications to hinder our working relationship, would we?’

‘I’ll be sure to lock my door!’ she said tartly.

‘That would be advisable.’ His blue eyes held such a gleam of dry humour that it twisted a fresh knot in the painful muddle of her emotions. Some inner parts of her body she had never even known existed until now were aching and shimmering and melting, and behaving in an outrageously unladylike fashion. ‘You’re quite a little sex siren, aren’t you, Emily?’

‘I assure you I am not!’ she snapped, incensed at his laughing mockery. ‘And what a typical sexist male comment! Blaming the female for his own lack of control!’

‘I count myself fortunate. At least I have not been immobilised by one of your terrifying judo techniques. Bonne nuit, Emily. Dors bien.’

She clenched her fists at her sides, opened her mouth to speak, but found it impossible. She was too choked with anger.

When he turned away and she closed the door on his cool, retreating lope down the landing she stood quite still, staring at the panelled dark oak door, filled with such a savage intensity of reaction that she felt like screaming and sobbing and hammering furiously against the wall.

* * *

Lisette Duvert woke her, with a tray of breakfast which she set down, none too graciously, on the table beside her bed.

‘Christian said I’d find you in here,’ she announced without prevarication. ‘What happened between you and Greg last night?’ She spoke in French, and her tone was decidedly unfriendly.

Emily blinked, rubbing her eyes, and struggled to sit up in bed, staring at her uninvited visitor. Lisette was an intensely pretty girl, with an oval face and the sort of ethereal pallor which men would doubtless find fascinating. Her eyes were as green as the sloping lawns visible through the rear windows of the bedroom. With her shoulder-length black hair and heavy fringe, and wearing a short, figure-hugging black sundress, she had a faintly witch-like air about her.

‘Didn’t Christian...Monsieur Malraux tell you?’ She managed to keep her voice level, and polite.

‘He told me some unlikely story of Greg bursting into your room and trying to molest you!’

Lisette sounded as if she had no doubt that Emily had made the whole thing up. Emily swung her legs out of bed, and stood up, facing the French girl. She was thankful for her relatively modest nightwear, an oversized white T-shirt with a yellow sun printed on the front. And she felt grateful, too, for the fact that even in bare feet she was an inch taller than Lisette.

‘I gather you hired Greg Vernon?’ she queried calmly. ‘So I’m sorry if you feel upset that he was fired straight away! But I can assure you the story is no exaggeration...’

‘No? Or perhaps you simply twisted it around to suit yourself?’ Dislike blazed out of Lisette’s green eyes.

Emily blinked involuntarily under the heat of the other girl’s temper. ‘What on earth do you mean?’

‘I mean, perhaps Christian came back and caught you in an embarrassing situation, and you threw the blame on Greg?’

This was so close to Christian’s cynical conjecturing last night that Emily felt a sick tightening in her stomach.

‘That’s simply not true—’ she began furiously.

‘On the contrary...’ It was Christian’s husky, cuttingly amused voice from the door, making both of them swing round. ‘Emily did not throw the blame on Greg, she threw Greg. Over her shoulder.’

His dark face was sardonic as he assessed Lisette’s dismayed reaction to his sudden appearance. ‘Emily is a judo expert, Lisette. We shall all need to tiptoe carefully around her while she is working here.’

With a toss of her black head, Lisette gave Christian a slow, provocative smile, then cast a withering glance back at Emily.

‘Judo?’ she sneered disbelievingly. ‘Greg is a friend of mine. I do not need to use judo against him! This girl was obviously leading him on!’

‘Ça suffit, Lisette.’ Christian’s voice contained a razor-edge which Emily was beginning to recognise. ‘If you wish to continue working for me, I advise you to occupy yourself only with matters which concern you.’

The put-down was cool and devastating. The French girl gave an angry shrug, glaring at Christian with such simmering reproach that Emily had to suppress a smile. After a fraught silence, she spun on her heel and marched from the room.

How to make an enemy in ten seconds flat, Emily reflected dubiously, left facing Christian with mixed emotions. Under that intense appraisal she felt agitated, horribly self-conscious. Abruptly she had no idea what to do with her hands. The T-shirt felt transparent...

‘You don’t go in for finesse in your relationships with your employees, do you?’ She couldn’t help it, the accusation tripped off her tongue.

Christian’s face darkened. ‘Lisette is a hang-over from my uncle Thierry’s occupancy. As housekeepers go, she leaves much to be desired.’

‘What do you mean, a “hang-over”?’ Clasping her hands behind her back didn’t help. It only served to emphasise the thrust of her breasts against the fine jersey material. She settled for a defensively aggressive position, arms folded across her chest.

‘I mean that I did not appoint her. And that, if I stay long enough, I may well have to replace her.’

Through the receding haze of sleep, and the distracting effect of Christian’s presence, Emily felt she understood the situation even less than she had last night. Was Christian Malraux here against his will, as a reluctant caretaker of his family business, because of his uncle’s death?

And yet last night he’d talked of his need to find an alternative career, to find something which literally ‘brought him back down to earth’. What could be more ideal than growing grapes, producing wine? What could be more creative, more satisfying? So why was he so stubbornly unenthusiastic about his current role? She was intrigued to find out. He didn’t strike her as the kind of person who did things half-heartedly. If he appeared to show little enthusiasm for his current situation, Emily decided there had to be a reason why...

‘Eat your breakfast. I doubt if Lisette has poisoned it,’ Christian advised, a mocking note in his husky voice.

She levelled a calm gaze at him, taking in his cool, muscular appearance in suede boots, denims and loose white sweatshirt.

‘I may be fresh from secretarial college,’ she told him succinctly, ‘but I hope I don’t have many jobs with quite such a bizarre beginning as this one.’

‘Things can only get better,’ he agreed laconically, turning away with a glitter of laughter in his eyes. ‘I’ll see you down in the office in half an hour. D’accord?’

‘I’ll be there.’

When she’d consumed the strong chicory-scented coffee and warm buttery croissants, showered and dressed, and gone in search of her employer, she was struck once again by the potential for tourist trade here. The old chteau seemed sadly neglected. Most of it seemed unused. There were endless possibilities, she decided, her brain whirring as she took in the dilapidated reception area, the unvisited cellars, the lack of wine tastings. Yes, there were plenty of improvements she could suggest, just waiting to be put into effect...

The office, however, when she finally found it, wasn’t the dusty cell she’d half expected. It looked surprisingly well equipped. There was some highly polished antique furniture, but the contrast of ultra-modern computers. The room was full of sun, with windows overlooking the rear lawns.

Christian was propped against one of the desks, ankles crossed, talking in quick-fire French on the telephone.

‘Ah, Emily...’ He cradled the receiver momentarily, his gaze intent on her appearance. ‘I’ll be with you in a moment.’

She hesitated, then went to sit behind the other desk, studying the brand new word processor with interest, assessing her ability to instantly master its intricacies.

The receiver clicked back in place. She jerked up her head to find the lidded blue gaze trained exclusively on her. Her skin prickled in reaction. Immediately she became body-conscious. The nutmeg silk suit she was wearing, short-skirted, chic and businesslike, somehow felt insufficient covering.

‘Well?’ he enquired flatly, watching as she lowered her eyes and made a show of examining the keyboard of the computer. ‘Do you think you will be happy working here?’

‘Happy?’ She blinked involuntarily, then nodded hastily. ‘Happy’ wasn’t a word she’d use to describe her tangled emotions so far, but it really was high time she pulled herself together.

‘Yes. I’m sure I shall be quite happy,’ she confirmed evenly. ‘This office is far more up-to-date than I expected...’

‘You were expecting some airless cellar surrounded by cobwebs and bats?’

‘More or less.’ She felt a smile tug at her mouth, but if she’d expected a similar flash of warmth from Christian it wasn’t forthcoming. Whether it was the telephone call or some other reason, he seemed even more tense and preoccupied than usual. The relaxed if cynical escort of last night’s meal seemed to have vanished into thin air. The tyrant seemed to have the upper hand at the moment.

‘My three months here have not been entirely wasted,’ he said abruptly, ‘although my uncle’s illness meant the place was neglected for longer than it should have been.’

‘I...I’m sorry about your uncle...’

‘So am I. He was my last living relative!’ There was a bleak flippancy in Christian’s voice which idiotically made Emily want to reach out and lay a hand on his shoulder, comfort him. She controlled the urge. Last night’s unnerving eruption had arisen from an innocent act of sympathy, or comfort, hadn’t it? Being in this man’s vicinity felt like walking on eggs.

She caught her breath in frustration. She wouldn’t be intimidated by him, overawed, like a shy child...

‘You said you lived with your uncle and aunt as a child? What happened to your own parents?’

‘They died,’ Christian supplied briefly.

‘When? How?’ she persevered gently, secretly aghast at her forwardness.

‘Together. From smoke asphyxiation. They’d gone for a touring holiday in India. There was a fire in one of the hotels.’

‘How old were you?’ Emily found she simply couldn’t help herself. The questions just tumbled now, irresistibly, off her tongue.

He shot her a look of barely suppressed impatience. ‘Seven. They’d sent me to stay at Chteau de Mordin while they made their trip. So instead of going back to my own home in Avenue Foch in Paris I just stayed on with my uncle and aunt. And now, Emily,’ Christian’s smile was humourless, his tone deeply cynical, ‘enough questions. You were right—you are commendably inquisitive. Perhaps not so commendable when it becomes personal. Save it for your job.’

‘Fine. Sorry I spoke,’ she said with a tight smile. ‘Emily Gainsborough, reporting for duty. Ready for work when you are!’ As a rebellious follow-up, she clicked her heels and sketched a cheeky salute.

Levering himself off the desk, he gazed down at her consideringly. There was a slightly bemused expression on his hard, dark face.

‘A word of advice, Emily...’ he began softly, a twitch of humour finally lifting the corner of his mouth.

‘Not more advice on affairs of the heart?’ she queried, wide-eyed.

‘No. Advice on how to ensure you don’t get sacked on the first day of your Foreign Office post in September.’ The deep voice held elaborate patience.

‘Right. Let me guess... Number one: don’t let my new boss catch me practising judo in the nude on the point of introduction? Number two: don’t let my new boss practise his hot French kissing technique on me a couple of hours later?’

The silence which followed this defiant humour seemed endless. Braced for a possible eruption of anger, Emily stood before him, erect and slender, huge brown eyes levelled on his dark face. Finally, to her intense relief, Christian lifted his hands and dropped them to his sides in a quick, essentially Gallic gesture, and then he laughed.

‘In fact, I was going to advise against cheek, sarcasm, and acting too clever for your own good,’ he informed her wryly, gesturing towards the door. ‘But I have the feeling I was about to waste my breath. You will just have to learn the hard way. Come, Emily, let me take you on a guided tour, so you know your way around.’

Chastened, she followed in silence. Her light-hearted attempts at ice-breaking hadn’t worked out quite the way she’d envisaged.

The tour proved infuriatingly hard to concentrate on. One half of Emily’s mind was on the information Christian was relaying, the names of the chteau employees who apparently lived locally, the layout of the working areas of the chteau, the storage and the ageing cellars.

The other half was absorbed in fighting down the insidious attraction she felt towards Christian Malraux, an attraction which grew stronger the more time she spent in his company, an attraction which seemed intent on defying all laws of common sense. Think about self-preservation, she told herself impatiently, the dangers of getting involved, of somehow forfeiting any of her independence while her own career plans were still so fresh and untried ahead of her...

‘And this is virtually back where we started from. What do you think of my ideas, Emily?’ Christian was saying, sending her into a flurry of embarrassment as he turned a quizzical gaze on her, clearly awaiting a reply.

‘Sorry? I’m afraid I drifted,’ she confessed, colouring slightly.

They’d finished the interior of the chteau, done a complete circuit of the grounds, and returned to the ageing cellar, with its impressive line-up of big four-hundred-litre oak barrels. This was where the pineau cognac matured for up to ten years. There was a display, beside an old copper still. It showed the different stages of the ageing process, from pale yellow to marigold-orange to its final dark sienna.

‘You drifted? Didn’t your secretarial college include a course on how to combat drifting, Emily?’ The deep, husky voice sounded harshly amused.

They were standing very close, far too close for her peace of mind. Her throat dry, she glanced around them in panic. His physical presence was doing unspeakable things to her poise.

She met the lidded blue gaze with a fresh surge of resentment. No one had any right to upset her equilibrium quite so thoroughly. If only he hadn’t grabbed her last night, demonstrated that super-macho expertise, she’d have been fine...

‘No...it didn’t,’ she heard herself saying. ‘It didn’t include a course on how to combat the after-effects of kissing our new boss within three hours of meeting him, either...’

There was a charged silence. Her heart was thudding uncontrollably as Christian stared down into her face, his expression narrowed, his mouth grim.

‘You found last night...disturbing?’ he said at last, deceptively casual. The faint jerk of a muscle on the hard jaw betrayed his sudden tension.