The Helen Bianchin Collection

by Helen Bianchin

  ‘I am?’ Her eyes assumed a musing gleam. ‘If you say so.’

  How many years had they been married? Hannah posed. Six, seven? Yet the intense passion was there, burning just beneath the surface. Somehow she could imagine it would always be so. Yet it hadn’t been in the beginning, she reflected as she stood with Miguel at the front door and watched the tail-lights of their hire car glow in the darkness. An arranged marriage that had gone wrong, with Elise escaping only to find herself involved in a car crash and suffering memory loss.

  ‘More coffee?’ Hannah queried as she turned away from the door.

  ‘No,’ Miguel refused as he locked up and set the security alarm. ‘I need to pack. Alejandro is picking me up at seven-thirty en route to the airport.’

  Where the Sanmar company Lear jet would fly them across the vast Australian continent to Perth.

  Without a word she crossed the foyer with him and ascended the stairs to their room where she watched in silence as Miguel extracted a leather holdall and rapidly tossed in a few shirts, a pair of trousers, together with other essentials.

  The thought of him being absent for a few days didn’t thrill her at all, and she gathered up a silky nightshirt, then entered the en suite to shower.

  Miguel joined her there minutes later, and she felt acutely vulnerable as he took the soap from her hand, using it gently over every inch of her body before extending it to her to return the favour.

  For a second she hesitated, and the breath caught in her throat as he cupped her face and slanted his mouth down to cover her own in a kiss that was so tender it was all she could do not to cry.

  It was a while before they both emerged, and towelled dry, re-entered the bedroom and slipped beneath the covers.

  He reached for her, and she went to him willingly, curving her arms round his neck as she pulled his head down to hers.

  Miguel indulged her, allowing her to take the initiative, until he stilled her hands and held them.

  ‘Amante, no. As much as I want you, last night—’

  ‘Was wonderful,’ Hannah assured. ‘Earth-shattering.’

  ‘I don’t think—’

  ‘Don’t,’ she pleaded. ‘Think, I mean,’ she added quickly. ‘Just feel. Please.’ She extricated her hands and ran light fingers down his chest, traced a pattern over his navel, then moved low. ‘I want to make love with you.’

  And she did, with exquisite care, rising above him as she took in his length, feeling acute pleasure, enclosing him tightly she began to move.

  Yet it was Miguel who took control and measured the pace, making it a slow erotic dance that shattered them both with its intensity. Then he brought her down to him and held her long after her breathing returned to normal and she slept.

  Saying goodbye was harder than it had ever been before, and she wanted to say don’t go. Except the words never found voice, and she managed the semblance of a warm smile as he kissed her briefly before moving quickly out to the car and slipped into the front seat beside Alejandro.

  Fortunately there wasn’t much time to reflect on Miguel’s departure as she returned to the dining room to finish the last of her breakfast and skim the daily newspaper before ascending the stairs to get ready for work.

  The replacement salesgirl sent by the agency proved to be a dramatic improvement on Chantal, and Hannah began to relax as the morning progressed.

  Renee rang to check how the new girl was shaping up, and Miguel called to say they’d landed in Perth.

  When the phone rang again minutes later Hannah automatically lifted the receiver and intoned her usual greeting.

  ‘Bonjour, Hannah.’

  The voice on the other end of the phone was familiar. Far too familiar, and not one she wanted to hear.

  ‘How did you get my number?’ A silly question, she silently castigated herself the instant the words slipped from her lips.

  ‘Dearest Hannah,’ Luc drawled with cynical humour. ‘Your boutique has a name, which is listed in the telephone directory.’

  The connection to Camille was obvious. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘Ah, chérie,’ he chastised softly. ‘Straight to the point.’

  ‘I don’t have time to chat.’ Her voice was distant, formal.

  ‘Meet me for coffee.’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘You have to break for lunch, surely?’

  ‘Yes, but I don’t intend to have it with you.’

  ‘Afraid, chérie?’

  Had he always been this insufferably arrogant? She almost cringed at the thought she’d once been attracted to him. ‘Of you? No.’ She replaced the receiver, and turned towards the sheaf of invoices waiting to claim her attention.

  A client entered the boutique, and Hannah watched surreptitiously as Elaine moved forward with a practised greeting. In only a matter of hours the girl was showing her worth, and Hannah felt cautiously hopeful she’d work out.

  Elaine took a lunch break at midday, and on her return an hour later Hannah crossed the street to the café she usually frequented. The food was good, the coffee superb.

  Big mistake, she realised within seconds of entering the busy eatery. Being a creature of habit had its downfall, for anyone familiar with her regular routine would be aware this particular café was her favourite haunt for lunch…whether she chose food to take away, or took the time to eat in.

  Seated at a table overlooking the street was Luc Dubois, looking the relaxed urbane sophisticate he aspired to be.

  Now why wasn’t she surprised to see him there? Luc did nothing without motivation. It made her feel distinctly wary.

  ‘Bonjour, chérie,’ Luc greeted with deliberate warmth. ‘I knew if I sat here long enough it would be only a matter of time before you arrived.’

  ‘I must remember to change my eating venue.’ Without a further word she turned on her heel and walked out again.

  The entire street held several equally trendy eating places. She’d go somewhere else.

  Five minutes later she was seated at a table and had just given her order when someone slid into the seat opposite.

  ‘Whatever the lady ordered,’ Luc instructed the waiter, ‘make it two.’

  Hannah cast him an arctic glare. ‘Just what in hell are you trying to pull?’

  Luc extended one arm in a sweeping gesture. ‘We’re in public,’ he indicated with an eloquent shrug. ‘Why not combine lunch with a little reminiscing?’

  Hannah arched one eyebrow. ‘To what purpose?’

  He tried to look hurt. ‘Why, chérie. We shared some good times together.’

  She spared him a bitter smile. ‘It took me three months to discover your charm was only an act.’

  ‘Not all the time.’

  ‘Oh…p-l-e-a-s-e,’ she discounted wearily.

  ‘The attraction was Daddy’s bank account and my healthy annuity. I was irrelevant.’ Every instinct told her to get up and walk out now.

  The waiter delivered two lattes, and against her better judgement she tore open a sugar tube and tipped the contents into the milky froth. Luc did the same.

  She cut straight to the chase. ‘What has Camille paid you to do?’

  He spread both hands in a conciliatory gesture.

  ‘Why should Camille have anything to do with me wanting to share a coffee with you?’

  She speared him with a look. ‘Don’t take me for a fool.’

  The waiter arrived with two plates, each containing a salad sandwich. As he turned away a flash bulb exploded nearby, and she caught a brief glimpse of a photographer making a rapid exit.

  ‘Pay dirt,’ Luc informed with a cynical smile.

  It all clicked into place in an instant, and Hannah rose to her feet in one angry movement, extracted a note from her purse, then flung it down onto the table and walked out into the street.

  Dammit, she should have seen it coming! Luc played a tune to the highest bidder. In this instance, Camille. Another step down a diabolical path towards Camille’s mai
n goal…Miguel. Now, there was photographic evidence Hannah had shared a meal with Luc. It didn’t take a genius to work out how Camille intended to use the photograph.

  A car horn blared, and she halted mid-step. Dear God, she whispered shakily as realisation hit that she’d stepped off the footpath onto the road. Get a grip!

  Minutes later she entered the boutique, caught Elaine’s surprised look, and offered a humourless smile. ‘That bad, huh?’

  ‘Are you okay?’

  Hannah attempted to downplay the past thirty minutes. ‘Something disagreed with me.’

  ‘Or someone?’

  ‘You’re good,’ Hannah accorded wryly. ‘Any problems while I was gone?’

  ‘I sold two shirts, a scarf, and took two orders.’

  ‘Well done.’

  ‘You weren’t away long. Did you get to eat?’

  ‘I lost my appetite.’ Wasn’t that the truth!

  It was after six when she arrived home, and she ate the meal Sofia had prepared for her, then she retreated to the study and keyed in the digits to connect with Miguel’s mobile, only to get his voice-mail.

  Maybe he and Alejandro were out to dinner. She left a message, then took a shower and changed into jeans and a singlet top.

  Her mother called, and Hannah accepted an invitation to dinner the following evening. They chatted for a while, catching up on each other’s news, and afterwards she watched a television movie before opting to indulge herself by reading in bed.

  It was almost eleven when the sudden peal of the telephone startled her into dropping the book, and she caught up the receiver, uttered a brief curse as it slipped from her fingers.

  Seconds later she managed an articulate greeting, and heard Miguel’s husky voice on the line.

  ‘Did I wake you?’

  ‘No,’ Hannah said at once. ‘I was reading.’

  His soft chuckle set all her fine body hairs standing on end. ‘You left a message to call.’

  ‘I—’ She hesitated, then opted for the banal. ‘How are things going?’

  ‘What is it?’ Miguel demanded in a dangerously quiet tone.

  ‘What makes you think something’s wrong?’

  ‘Querida,’ he drawled with deceptive mildness. ‘Don’t stall.’

  ‘Luc came into the café opposite the boutique during my lunch break.’ She could almost see his features harden. ‘I refused to join him.’

  ‘There’s more to the story?’

  ‘Try having him follow me, sit down at the same table after I’d ordered, then, just as the waiter delivered the food, a photographer appears from nowhere and captured the two of us apparently sharing a meal.’

  ‘He set you up.’

  ‘I should have seen it coming,’ Hannah said wretchedly.

  ‘I’ll take care of him.’ His voice was tensile steel and just as dangerous.

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  Miguel smiled grimly on the other end of the line. ‘Ensure he doesn’t come near you again.’ He waited a beat. ‘Or he will answer to me.’

  Hannah shivered. ‘Miguel—’

  ‘Tomorrow there will be someone to shadow your every move.’

  Comprehension dawned. ‘I don’t need a bodyguard!’

  There was a brief silence, then he said hardly, ‘My decision, Hannah.’

  ‘Shouldn’t it also be mine?’

  ‘Accept it as a protective precaution.’

  ‘And if I choose not to?’ she pursued, angered by his high-handedness.

  ‘The bodyguard stays.’

  She took a deep breath and released it slowly. ‘I don’t like tyrannical men.’

  ‘Tough,’ Miguel reiterated succinctly. ‘Alejandro can wrap up the deal. I’ll be on the late afternoon flight Wednesday.’

  Now she was getting steamed. ‘Don’t cut an important business deal short on my account.’

  ‘You, amante, are more important than any business deal.’

  ‘Me, or my vested interest in the Martinez half of the Sanmar corporation?’

  ‘It’s as well the breadth of a continent separates us,’ Miguel declared with chilling softness, ‘or I would take you to task.’

  ‘For daring to speak the truth?’

  She had the distinct impression he was actively controlling his temper. ‘It will keep.’

  Hannah had had enough. ‘Goodnight, Miguel.’ She cut the connection, and replaced the receiver.

  Overbearing, autocratic man! A bodyguard? Was he mad?

  She picked up the book and tried to get back into the characters, the story, only to close the cover and toss it down onto the bed.

  A protective precaution, indeed! Her teeth worried the soft part of her lower lip. Luc was unlikely to do her physical harm. She doubted he’d risk life or limb or arrest, no matter what price Camille offered him. Or could she be wrong?

  It wasn’t a comfortable thought, and one that kept her awake long after she’d switched off the bedside lamp.

  Dreams invaded her subconscious, a series of scary sequences where she was mysteriously pushed from behind into the path of an oncoming vehicle, and worse, driving a car with brakes that didn’t respond when she most needed them.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  HANNAH was in the middle of eating breakfast when the ’phone rang, and she answered it on the third ring.

  ‘Buenos días.’ Miguel’s faintly accented voice curled round her nerve-ends and tugged at something she was loath to analyse. ‘You slept well?’

  No, and I missed you like hell. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘That’s not an answer,’ he reproved. Would it help her to know he’d lain awake until almost dawn?

  ‘It’s all I’m prepared to give.’

  ‘Be as angry as hell, querida,’ he warned silkily. ‘It won’t make any difference.’

  ‘That’s an ambiguous statement. I imagine there’s a purpose for your call?’

  He didn’t know whether to laugh or repress the need to wring her neck. ‘Remind me to beat you.’

  ‘Lay one hand on me, and I’ll…’

  ‘Lost for words?’

  ‘Too many choices,’ Hannah reiterated with crushing cynicism.

  At the risk of having her hang up on him, he relayed pertinent details of the man he’d hired to take care of her.

  ‘Rodney Spears is thirty-two, ex-police, average height, bulky frame, fair hair, blue eyes. He’s driving a late model dark blue Holden sedan.’ He gave the registration number. ‘He’ll be at the house in ten minutes to introduce himself.’

  The bodyguard. Hannah clenched the receiver, and threw the cat stretched out on the tiles nearby such a dark look the poor animal leapt to its feet and ran from the room.

  ‘Next you’ll tell me he’s an expert in unarmed combat and a sharp marksman.’

  Miguel didn’t answer, which in her mind was an admission by avoidance. ‘Apart from the initial introduction this morning, he’ll remain unobtrusively in the background. You won’t notice him. Nor will anyone else.’

  ‘This is beginning to sound like a scene from a cheap detective movie,’ she alluded cynically.

  ‘Indulge me.’

  ‘How long is this subterfuge to continue?’

  ‘For as long as it takes.’

  ‘Do I entertain him for breakfast and dinner?’

  Miguel’s faint laughter sent goose bumps scudding down her spine. ‘He has the days, querida. I get to take care of you at night.’

  ‘My guardian angel,’ Hannah remarked in droll tones.

  ‘You could thank me.’

  ‘I’m more likely to hit you,’ she retaliated fiercely.

  ‘Do you have any plans for tonight?’

  ‘Dinner with my parents.’

  ‘Why don’t you stay with them overnight?’

  This was too much. He was too much! ‘I’m way past the age of requiring a babysitter.’ She took in a deep breath in an effort to control her anger. ‘Aren’t you taking this protection thing just a bit too
far?’

  ‘No,’ Miguel declared with hard inflexibility. ‘Do as I ask. Please.’

  ‘I’ll think about it.’

  He wanted to reach down the line and shake her. Stubborn independence didn’t come close! Yet it was those very qualities he admired in her. But not when he was several thousand miles away.

  ‘I don’t want to see you upset or hurt.’ His voice deepened slightly. ‘Comprende?’

  ‘Okay, you’ve made your point,’ she conceded, and heard him expel a faint sigh.

  ‘Gracias.’

  Sofia escorted a man fitting the bodyguard’s description into the breakfast room, and Hannah lowered her voice.

  ‘The cavalry has arrived.’

  ‘I’ll call you later.’

  He did, and she was able to report Luc hadn’t telephoned or shown up at the café.

  The day had gone well, with new stock snapped up by various clients. Renee called to say there would be a change of plan and they’d eat at a restaurant.

  ‘I’ll go home and change first, then meet you there. Six-thirty?’

  Should she alert Rodney Spears? Just as she thought about dialling his mobile, he rang through to confirm her evening plans, and carefully noted the changes.

  Hannah checked her rear-vision mirror as she pulled out from the car park, and glimpsed a dark blue sedan follow at a discreet distance.

  Then she lost him in the flow of traffic, and she didn’t catch sight of the sedan until an hour later when she left the house en route to the restaurant.

  It was, she reflected silently, totally unnecessary for him to shadow her every move. When did the man eat, for heaven’s sake? Hamburgers and fries at a drive-through? And he had to sleep some time, surely?

  Miguel was probably paying him a small fortune, but that didn’t stop her from offering Rodney a one-hundred-dollar bill to eat in the restaurant.

  ‘Look on it as a bonus,’ she advised when he offered a protest. ‘I’ll go ahead and ensure you get a table.’

  She did, and she’d only been seated a few minutes when Renee and Carlo entered the foyer.

  ‘Darling, have you been waiting long?’ Renee greeted anxiously. ‘We got held up in traffic.’

  It was a pleasant evening. The food was superb, each course presented with flair and artistry. Hannah sipped a half-glass of wine throughout the meal, and together they caught up on each other’s news.