She glanced around again, wondering if sexy Mr. Dalban was going to spring up out of nowhere and catch her again. It had been one hell of a risk slipping out of bed early this morning and sneaking out. It had taken forever to find her dress. Then she had to find the key to her room and get back into it and get some fresh clothes. The whole time he had only stirred twice, making her stand frozen on the spot.
So much for your alert precision military training, Mr. Dalban. Imagine if Philip, your CO saw you sleeping on the job. Then you would be for the high jump. Civilian life must be making you slack.
Still she hadn’t been able to resist taking a long lingering look at the sleeping man. The bed sheet had ridden down to his waist exposing his enticing athletic muscled chest and narrow waist. He was in excellent shape. His icy blue eyes were intoxicating, but thankfully they were still closed in sleep. His skin was smooth and lightly tanned highlighting his incredibly handsome features to perfection. They were crowned with a light covering of neatly trimmed stubble around his mouth and jaw. His fair wavy medium-length hair was woven through with strands of dark caramel. It spread out over the pillow and she was unable to resist the urge to stroke her fingers through it. She pulled them back quickly when he stirred, frightened he would catch hold of her and drag her back to bed and spank her bare bottom for daring to get up and attempt to leave.
Isabelle shuffled on her seat, feeling the sting of his hand on her bottom even now. Then there was that threat to watch her pee and even worse diaper her and make her wet in it and then change her like a baby. She shuddered, but then she remembered the stirrings of arousal she felt at his dominance over her. Her mind had wondered what it would feel like to be controlled in such a fashion. Her thoughts shamed her to the core. It was uncomfortable thinking about them even now. Then there was the sex and the spanking and how wet she had become with sexual need.
No more thinking. Focus on the task in hand.
Isabelle distracted herself by listening to the hum of French and German conversation around her. She watched one of the waiters serve the next table, and a couple of English tourists look at a map of the city. The man pointed across the street. Isabelle’s eyes followed and rested on a poster advertising a film she had seen a while ago in England. They had given it a French name.
It was promoted on one of those round things she never knew the name for, but they stood on the corners of French streets advertising films, programmes and magazines, often with a lewd picture of a woman proudly displaying her breasts or underwear. This one had one too, on the top section. Isabelle found it offensive. She made sure she didn’t glance in its direction again, feeling the heat of anger and frustration rise inside.
Across the street, the already hot sun was gleaming off the metallic tops of the expensive cars rushing down the street. It was early, just before eight, but the street was growing heavy with people going to work and tourists determined to get an early start. She pushed the Brioche roll away from her and signalled to one of the waiters. With determination, she made herself take another two gulps of the disgusting tea.
Hell I can’t remember the last time I drank a decent cup of tea since coming to Paris, except last night. Mr. Dalban, you make a great cup of tea. But I am doing this on my own.
This was her tenth escape attempt and the furthest she’d got. Her Uncle Michael had known exactly what he was doing when he sent her away when Mayer started taking an interest in her when he got of college. He wanted to marry her even then. When he hit her for refusing his proposal and started interfering with her career as a Barrister, Uncle Michael made her leave. No one knew where she had gone apart from Uncle Michael and his closest advisor. When her father, Uncle Michael’s oldest brother, who had left the family and renounced himself as its leader, she had not yet been born. She knew nothing of his previous life and she was six years old when he was killed in a car accident along with her mother. Isabelle couldn’t even remember that she had a stepbrother from her mother’s first marriage. Trauma from being in the accident with her parents had erased a lot of her earlier memories.
She was placed with Uncle Michael who brought her up like his own without her stepbrother who she learnt later had been sent to live with his aunt. Uncle Michael never let her forget her parents and he would tell her about how he wanted to leave the family one day as well. His legitimate business, Mayer Sport, was his way of trying to make the dream come true. She had been contacted by Michael Mayer’s advisor saying he was ill and he was sure someone in the family was trying to kill the old man. She came back immediately to nurse and protect him. It was to be her downfall.
The moment she returned, the advisor was murdered and Declan trapped her. With Uncle Michael unable to help her and the family taking orders from Declan after the death of his own father, she had no one to turn to. When Uncle Mayer died and she inherited the business at the same time as being named the new controversial head of the Mayer family with the proviso she turned them legitimate, Declan beat her severely out of sheer frustration and anger. None of the families were pleased. The links between the English Mayers and the French Dumonts and Deschanels had been forged in the eighteenth century, along with their international smuggling ring. Isabelle threatened all of their businesses and Declan was under pressure to keep her under control and contest the will.
Lucien Deschanel had come to see her in hospital when he had returned to Paris two weeks ago and offered her a way out. He could protect her. But he was Mafia albeit rogue from his family and his father with his own successful business. She wanted to be on her own. He had threatened to kidnap her, but she had escaped from the hospital when he came to collect her. Then it was only a matter of time before Declan caught up with her again. Philip had come forward a month ago after looking for her for years. He was ten years older than her and determined to help her escape and here she was free at last. But for how long?
Isabelle closed her eyes once, then opened them again to find the waiter standing there with the bill. She paid with the money Philip had sent her and wondered when she would finally get her own again. For a moment, she sat back against the plush grey booth and smoothed her hand over its surface. She liked it in there. It was dark, she could hide in it. All around her were elaborate carved black cherubs holding up tulip shaped lights in the middle of the booths and Grecian figure paintings on the walls. It felt gothic, bit Phantom of the Opera.
Huh, too much like reality. Shit, is that the time, must go.
She thanked the waiter for her change and hurried out of the restaurant to find a taxi.
“Rue de Rivoli, s’il vous plait,” she directed the taxi driver.
The car joined the stream of traffic as she fiddled with her seat belt hoping she would get the damn clip into the slot before the driver crashed into something at the speed he was weaving in and out of the traffic. He stopped abruptly and nearly put her through the windscreen. A group of tourists stumbled onto what she and other English people would call a pedestrian crossing, only she’d been to Paris before and knew better. In Paris, it meant try risking your life here to cross, the traffic isn’t going to stop. The people stopped as he shunted the car forward, then they started again. The driver cursed and moved the car forward again and then gave up. Admitting defeat in their duel he let them proceed when the driver next to him stopped to let them go. He shook his head.
Eventually Isabelle could see the wrought iron railings housing the Tuileries gardens and the large grey building, the Louvre, next to it. She loved the Louvre with its erotic sculptures and wealth of paintings.
It would be lovely to forget everything and just go to the Louvre and lose yourself in those paintings. Hide from all of the pain and loneliness.
With a sigh, she paid the taxi driver after he drew the car to a halt right in the middle of two tour buses off-loading tourists going to the Louvre. Squeezing through the slow tourists unsure of where they were going, she found her way to a crossing. Lucky for her, this one actually had lights and
a green figure to say go, otherwise she would never have made it across. All the same, as she walked over the wide road to the covered archways of the Rue de Rivoli she could feel the impatient deluge of traffic snapping at her heels.
Isabelle hurried past the souvenir shops, her favourite salon, de thé Angelina’s, and round the corner to find Christine Morceau’s office. She spied the lift the moment she entered the building.
I hate lifts. Where are the stairs? Things happen in lifts. No way am I taking one after last time. Even if Christine’s office is way up, I am walking up the stairs.
“I am here to see Christine Morceau,” Isabelle said authoritatively at the young receptionist.
It won’t do to look timid.
Isabelle couldn't decide if the woman was experiencing fear or surprise. Maybe both all at the same time. She covered it all with a sudden countenance of unaffected pleasantry that bordered on cooing, making Isabelle suspicious. The young woman asked Isabelle to take a seat while she found out if Christine was available. But she didn’t use the phone and walked off down the corridor, attempting to disguise the urgency in her walk.
Isabelle heard alarm bells ring in her mind.
Stupid idea to come here. Bloody stupid. Typical, loads of intelligence, graduated top for law but no bloody common sense.
They couldn’t know anything. Declan would want to keep her disappearance a secret. He always did when she managed to escape him because he didn’t want to lose face with the families. He would want to find her himself. He would be hunting her now.
She looked at the window, at the buildings across the road, knowing he was out there somewhere searching the streets for her. But they couldn’t even know who she was. Declan had kept her well hidden since Uncle Michael’s death. She wasn’t even using her real name. Isabelle put her unease down to paranoia and sat down on the terracotta sofa, loosening the buttons on her suit jacket. She looked up at the high ceiling and noticed how eerily quiet the room was, the calm before the storm.
No, you are imagining it. I can’t back down now. I have to try and get to Christine or this escape is worth nothing. The risk is worth it.
The woman was coming back. Isabelle could hear her tall heels clicking along the marble floor. A surge of adrenaline pounded up her legs as though someone had just shot her with a dose. She placed her hand across her stomach and involuntarily her stomach muscles contracted into a tight knot.
The pain was sharp and severe. Heat accompanied the pain. She had a very bad feeling about being there. Nervously she glanced down at her fingernails, determined not to look up in case anyone saw the pain and her vulnerability etched on her face. She concentrated on them, trying to distract herself from another wave of pain and heat.
The French manicure Declan insisted she have, no painted nails, was still perfect. But then she had only been free for two days. Vibrant colour made her look like a whore, nasty and cheap, he always said. It had to be perfect, not bitten, or she would be punished with his heavy hand across her face. It was a pain she had experienced on more than one occasion as a nail biter.
Isabelle felt a strong urge to nibble and automatically squeezed her hands between her legs to stop herself from taking a bite. She worried she would look stupid and took them out, running her hands over the top of her white trouser legs. The woman’s heels had stopped clicking, then there was another set joining them as they started up again. They belonged to a man.
It’s Declan. It’s him. Stop imagining, stop imagining.
Isabelle looked up, but she couldn’t see anyone coming into view around the corner in the corridor. Then another set joined the man and woman. They also belonged to a man.
They know, don’t they? They know, they must. Go now, while you have the chance.
Isabelle ran her hands along her knees again and then stood quickly, grabbing her bag from the chair.
Too late.
The receptionist was approaching with two men. Isabelle felt paralysed unable to move with fear. Her index finger began to tap against her leg. It was a habit that manifested every time she was angry or nervous, or both.
The men approached and inside she crumbled. It was all over. One of the men looked at her as though she was a lost child. Suddenly she felt adrenaline come to her aid, and she began walking fast to the door. But the receptionist followed and intercepted her quickly, blocking her passage.
“Isabelle,” she beamed.
The colour drained from Isabelle’s face and her stomach crunched again. It was an effort to stand and not to bend double on the floor and rock herself until it passed.
“I beg your pardon? My name is Miss Carrie Harper. Now is Mademoiselle Morceau available?”
Why are you bothering to keep up the pretence? They know, you fool. They know.
Her legs felt weak, just like wobbly jelly.
“Miss Mayer, you do not look well. Please come and sit down. Mr. Mayer has been worried about you,” one of the men told her.
Isabelle felt sick with just the mention of his name. She couldn’t keep him distant in her head anymore.
“Whom are you talking about? My name is Harper.”
The other man was now standing at her side. He took her arm and guided her forcefully to a chair. Isabelle could hear herself still vainly protesting, but inside she was drowning in fear. The receptionist was locking all of the doors. She gave Isabelle a look of sympathy and then glanced away, quickly dismissing the scene. Isabelle watched the woman sit back down at her desk and get on with answering the phone as though nothing had happened.
Isabelle was suffocating. She tried to shake off the man’s hold, but his friend was helping him to help hold her down in the chair. She struggled for all her life was worth when she saw the man was holding a syringe.
“Let go of me! “What have you done with Christine?” she shouted, finally dropping the pretence.
“She’s gone away, Isabelle. Mr. Mayer has been so concerned and worried for your safety. He thinks you are experiencing some anxiety about your wedding and he wants to reassure you that everything will be all right,” the man with the syringe informed her, grunting with the effort of trying to keep her still, roll up her shirtsleeve and get the syringe into her arm.
“I am not marrying that bastard! Now get the hell off me.”
A loud noise distracted her attention. There was banging on the door. It sounded like someone was caving the door in. All of a sudden, the man holding the syringe was yanked away from her. He landed heavily against the terracotta sofa. The second man flew over the mahogany table in front of her, head first. With a loud gasp, Isabelle looked up from the chair to see Lucien Deschanel standing on the syringe, which had fallen out of the man’s hand. He crushed it hard and moved his black shoe over it to scatter the liquid and the pieces making sure it was no longer a danger.
His hauntingly beautiful dark eyes looked down at her with heavy concern as tears of relief coursed down her hot cheeks. He leaned over her, placing his hands on the arms of the chair.
“Are you all right, Isabelle?” His soft seductive French accent rolled over her like a caress, soothing her raw nerve endings.
She nodded slowly, hurriedly wiping at her eyes. “Thank you.”
Lucien held out his hand as the two men who accompanied him came to pull the dazed would-be kidnappers away. She took Lucien’s hand and allowed him to help her up. The handsome younger man drew her swiftly into his arms. His arms were powerful and protective, surrounding her with the strength she needed to recover from her ordeal.
“Come on. We need to get you out of here before Declan appears. He will be on his way.” Lucien kept hold of her arm and led her towards the lift.
Isabelle automatically dragged her feet and slipped a few steps behind him. Lucien looked at her with confusion. He put his hand gently but firmly in the small of her back and pressed the up button. The doors slid open and Isabelle’s heart pounded uncomfortably. Beads of sweat broke out on her forehead.
�
��Are you all right, Isabelle? ” Lucien asked gently rubbing her back as they walked into the lift.
She couldn’t answer him.
The lift started to move, and Isabelle felt trapped and paralysed. Her pale image of fear reflected around the mirrors. Her arms moved out to her sides to grip at the silver bars on either side of her as she sank to the floor. Lucien lowered himself to his knees and cupped her face, trying to get her to talk, to tell him what was wrong so he could help her. His caress of her face was so gentle and protective, but she felt numb and couldn’t find her voice. Isabelle’s eyes clouded and her present surroundings disappeared from view. She looked far back into her past, remembering and reliving when she was raped in a lift. Declan wasn’t the only man he was protecting her from when he sent her away.
Chapter 8
The next thing Isabelle remembered was being carried outside of the lift and into the warm Parisian air. Lucien sat her down at one of the small restaurant tables under the archway facing the road. As her world came back into view and her mind returned to the present she could hear Lucien ordering her a cognac and some water. The waiter looked at her with great concern and told Lucien not to worry he would attend to his request straightaway. Lucien bent down to her and swept his cool hand around her flushed face.
“That’s better. You are focusing on me now. How are you feeling?” he asked softly, gently.
“I’m sorry, I don’t know what happened. I felt a bit faint.”
“Hush. Rest. Here is some cognac. It will help calm you.”
Lucien took hold of the glass of cognac from the waiter and raised it to her lips to offer it to her like a child. When she tried to reach for the glass, she realised just how much her hands were shaking. She lowered them to her lap feeling overwhelmed and defeated by her emotions and allowed him to help her drink like an obedient little girl.
Protecting Isabelle Page 5