Waiting For Mr. Wonderful!. Stephanie Howard
flicked him a scathing look. My, but weren’t those low-lifes touchy? ‘OK. Employee, then. I’m sorry I trod on a tender nerve. But the message is still the same.’ She glared into his face. ‘And now, for the last time, get out of my way.’
‘I’m not his employee either. I don’t work for Duval. That’s not why I’m here. Like I told you, I’m here to help you.’
‘Oh, yes. I forgot. And why do you want to help me? You didn’t get round to telling me that.’
‘No, I didn’t. My reasons are not something you need to know. Just be grateful that I do want to help you, Miss Dee—for, believe me, you very much need my help.’ His eyes raked her face, then suddenly he smiled. ‘Put it down to my passion for helping damsels in distress.’
‘So, you’re a white knight in disguise?’ She really was supposed to believe that! ‘Well, I’m sorry, Monsieur Lasalle, but I’m afraid I don’t buy that. I stopped believing in fairy tales when I was twelve years old.’
‘But you still believe in monsters? Having met Duval, you must.’ The deep blue eyes looked steadily into hers. ‘And though, alas, I’m definitely no white knight, I can help you fight the monster Duval.’
There was a silence. Georgia stared at him, suddenly unsure what to believe. There’d been an earnest fless, almost an urgency in his eyes when he’d spoken then. Could he be on the level, after all? Was he really here to help her? Ought she to listen to whatever it was he’d come to say?
He seemed to read her mind. ‘Let’s go inside and talk. It’s important. I know how much your shop means to you.’
‘I doubt that.’
She glanced away. Her shop meant the world to her. For over three years she’d poured herself, body and heart and soul, into making it the runaway success it had become. It was the fulfilment of a dream. A lifetime’s ambition realized. But it was much, much more to her than just a business. It was the means to enable her to pay back those she loved. The thought of losing it and all it stood for made her blood run cold.
‘All the more reason to hear me out. Come on. Let’s go inside.’ As he spoke, he stepped forward and touched her lightly on the arm.
The touch of him scorched her. Something flared deep inside. A rush of excitement. A twist of longing like a knife. Georgia almost gasped out loud as she blinked up into his face.
Next moment, she was drowning in the black-fringed blue eyes, feeling the warm, physical aura of him wrap around her like an embrace. She opened her mouth, a mere breath away from saying, OK.
But at the last moment she stopped as a sense of panic seized her. It was utterly insane, but all at once she had the feeling of having been taken over by some irresistible force. He has the power, she suddenly sensed, to make me do anything he wishes. But I must resist. I must. Hurriedly, she took a step back.
‘No!’
Her tone was firm. She glared into his face. Jean-Claude Lasalle was clearly under the illusion that all he had to do to win any woman over was just look at her with those wonderful cobalt-blue eyes of his and treat her to one of his heart-stopping smiles. And no doubt it usually worked. Women would drop like ninepins at his feet. She’d very nearly dropped like a ninepin herself. It was the raw sexuality of him. Some rare magic he possessed.
But she refused to be one of his conquests. She would not do as he wished. She had no reason to trust him and every reason not to. In recent weeks, she’d learned to be sparing with her trust—especially when dealing with mysterious Frenchmen who were displaying just a little too much interest in her shop. Who knew what he might be planning?
‘No!’ she said again. ‘I’ve already told you the arrangement. If you want to discuss my business, you’re going to have to speak to my solicitors.’
‘And I’ve already told you I’ve no intention of doing that.’ The seductive charm had gone. His eyes were hard again. ‘I speak to you or I speak to no one. And time is short. I’ll be leaving Bath first thing tomorrow. So, if you want to hear what I have to say, you’d better make up your mind fast’
‘I’ve already made up my mind. I don’t want to hear what you have to say.’ Georgia shot him a withering look. ‘Now get out of my way.’
‘You’re making a big mistake.’ He ignored her command, and that withering look had simply bounced off him like rainwater. ‘But do what you like. I’m not going to insist If you want Duval to take your shop from you, what business is it of mine?’
He glanced down at her with a grim smile. ‘And he will take it from you. I know Duval well and that’s one thing I can guarantee.’
‘Don’t try to intimidate me! I’m not scared by your stupid threats! And if you don’t get out of here this minute I’m going to call the police and have you thrown off my property!’
But he was already leaving anyway, heading swiftly up the gravel path. At the gate, he turned to look at her. That was a warning, not a threat. And you’re just wasting precious energy shouting at me when you ought to be saving it for your coming fight with Duval.’ He flicked her a dark look. ‘He hasn’t finished with you yet.’
‘How do you know? You do work for him, don’t you?’ Anger and fear and confusion rushed inside her. ‘Since you seem to know so much, why don’t you tell me what he’s planning?’
He answered none of her questions. ‘Up until now, you’ve had it easy. He’s played pretty clean, at least by his standards. But all that’s about to change. He’s beginning to get impatient. And when Duval gets impatient he starts to play dirty and he doesn’t give a damn who he destroys in the process.’
Georgia was aware that her cheeks had turned as white as sheets of paper. She stared at Lasalle numbly as he pulled open the gate.
‘I don’t believe you. You’re making all this up. You’re just trying to scare me. But I’m sorry, it won’t work.’
Brave words, but even to her own ears they sounded hollow. She did believe him and she definitely was scared.
She watched in dismay as the gate shut with a dismissive click. Then, without so much as a backward glance at her, Lasalle was stepping off the pavement and striding across the road to where a shiny low black Porsche was parked. As he snatched the door open and was about to climb inside, sudden panic rose up in Georgia’s throat.
‘Wait! Where are you going? Hang on! Don’t go yet!’
Without realizing what she was doing, Georgia was hurrying up the path after him. Perhaps she’d been too hasty. She ought to have listened to him, after all. He’d offered to help her. She shouldn’t have just sent him away.
She reached the gate as he slid behind the wheel and slammed the door.
‘Wait!’ she called out. ‘Please wait! Please come back!
But he paid her no heed. With a squeal of tyres, he was gone.
Jean-Claude got back to his hotel in central Bath to find a whole stack of phone messages and faxes waiting for him at Reception.
‘You’re an extremely sought-after man.’ The receptionist smiled at him prettily, cheeks pinking with pleasure as the blue eyes smiled back at her. For Georgia had been perfectly correct in her assumption that women the world over, regardless of age or race, tended to fall like ninepins at Jean-Claude’s well-shod feet.
Jean-Claude was not unaware of this power he possessed and which he’d first properly recognized at about the age of sixteen, and he’d never been particularly reticent about exploiting it. Good fortune, he firmly believed, was not something to be wasted, particularly not good fortune with women.
For Jean-Claude loved women. Looking at them. Being with them. Talking to them. Making love to them. Without women the world would be a grey and charmless place.