by Flora Lanoux
THE FRENCHMAN’S SLOW SEDUCTION
FLORA LANOUX
Published by MC Paquin at Smashwords
Copyright 2013 M.C. Paquin
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of M.C. Paquin.
This book is a work of fiction. All the characters are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
ISBN-10: 1927833094
ISBN-13: 978-1927833094 (La Carolina Press)
*** Thanks to those of you who will leave a review of this book at your favorite online store. Reviews are super important to all indie writers. ***
CONTENTS
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 1
“I missed you last night,” Mike murmurs against my cheek, grabbing me from behind. “Why didn’t you come over?” Now he’s kissing my neck.
I turn to face him, afraid that someone from the clinic might walk into the lunchroom and see us. “I was out with a friend,” I tell him. “I only got your message this morning.”
Pulling me close, he says, “Promise me you’ll come over tonight.”
Trying to ignore the effect he’s having on me, I say, “I’ve got a better idea. Why don’t you come over to my place after work?”
With a gleam in his eye, he leans forward and leisurely kisses me. As things threaten to heat up, he pulls away. “I’d better get started on the first surgery of the day.”
Still tasting him on my lips, I say, “That’s probably a good idea.”
With a laugh, he turns and walks away.
Watching him, I wonder about my sanity. What in heaven’s name was I thinking when I jumped into an office romance; and worse yet, with my boss? I can just hear Grams, my dead grandmother, saying, “Rachel, you would give an aspirin a headache!”
Letting out a slow breath, I reach for a clean lab coat. It’s time for another busy day at Village Animal Hospital.
With trademark punctuality, Tim, the veterinary assistant, walks into the lunchroom. Tim is Mike’s ex-wife’s second cousin. His training is in carpentry, but due to the building slump he accepted a job at Mike’s clinic two weeks after I appeared on the scene. Mike trusts him with a lot of clinic responsibilities.
“How’s things?” Tim asks, putting his huge lunch into the fridge. Darla, his wife, makes lunches that reflect their life together: birthday cake, baby crackers, oysters, leftovers.
“Things are looking up at the moment,” I tell him.
“That’s what I like to hear. What’s up first?” he asks.
“We have to clean the abscess on Mr Bank’s Siamese, Big Boy.”
He groans and reaches for a clean lab coat. Often, he has been maimed by cats, and the worst have always been Siamese; I know he must be dreading it.
What a crazy day. There’s been no middle ground. It’s been a day of extremes, alternating between huge successes and huge disasters.
By closing time, I’m desperate to leave the clinic, but Damian, a 16-year-old dog brought in for euthanasia by elderly owners, has vanished, and everyone has joined in the search.
When the phone rings, Albert, the clinic parrot, calls out, “Hello, Village Animal Hospital, can I help you?”
Answering the phone, I repeat the same line.
“This is Irene Johnstone,” a woman says, and my heart sinks. Irene is Damien’s owner. “We have our own little phoenix,” she says. “Damian has come back to us. We can’t understand it. He usually has trouble walking across the room.”
Good grief! The unimaginable has happened. Despite his severely arthritic joints, Damian has managed the four-mile pilgrimage back to his home.
“I’m so sorry, Mrs Johnstone,” I tell her. “We left the back kennel door open and Damian’s cage door must not have been properly closed. He ran away and we’ve all been looking for him. I can come and get him right now if you like.”
“Oh no, dear. Me and John have taken this to be a sign that we shouldn’t have him put down at all. If the old darling wants to be with us that badly, we’ll have him to the end.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive. You should have seen us. There we were, sitting at the table feeling terribly sorry for ourselves when John saw Damian walking across the lawn. He went pale; he thought it was Damian’s ghost coming back to haunt him. When we realized that it really was Damian, we couldn’t believe it. He was exhausted but excited as anything to see us. We feel like we’ve won the lottery.”
Animals have more sense than people: that was a truth told to me by a farmer. Poor little Damian knew to run like hell when he sensed trouble.
I call off the search, relieved at how things turned out.
Finished for the day, Mike and I leave the clinic in our own cars and drive to my place, which he calls the oasis. There are only three floors and sixty apartments in the complex, which is made up of three buildings laid out in a U shape. The center of the complex has a courtyard with a garden and tall trees, creating not only lush scenery but also a lot of privacy. The stairs, corridors, and apartment doors are all on the outside of the building facing the courtyard, giving it a motel ambience.
The instant we get into my apartment, Mike grabs me and kisses me all over. “Let’s go to bed,” he says, tugging me towards the bedroom.
When he throws me onto the bed, I flash back to something my mother said: “Marry a man who’s full of love, Rachel, and you’ll have an excellent lover.”
Having spent the night at my place, Mike and I get to the clinic together in the morning and find Lucy, the receptionist, upset about two hundred dollars missing from the till. A bank deposit is made every day just before bank closing time; whatever money is taken later is kept in the clinic overnight.
Strange things have been happening at the clinic lately. Surgical equipment and office supplies go missing or are found in odd places and small amounts of money have disappeared.
“This is getting serious,” Mike says. “Let’s try a change in routine. Instead of keeping money in the till overnight, why don’t we file it in a folder at the end of the day? We’ll keep the new location between the three of us.”
Seeing how upset Lucy is, he says, “It’s probably just some kid looking for pocket money.”
Walking into my office, I turn on my laptop and check for emails. There’s one from Jean Paul Gaston, a veterinary researcher at Texas A&M University, who I touched base with a year ago.
Dear Rachel:
It was with pleasure that I received your email. I am glad that you liked my most recent paper. I have attached some articles in reference to that which you asked me. Do you not think that anatomy is the only pure science? Kind regards, Jean Paul
There’s a softness in Jean Paul’s manner that I find touching. I found out abou
t his research while reading in the library, his passion for anatomy and surgery leaping out from the pages of a veterinary journal. Although his research is fascinating, it was his writing style that intrigued me: it was lyrical, which, in scientific circles, is highly unusual. After reading his paper, I emailed him some research questions, and we’ve kept up a friendly correspondence ever since.
I print off his email and place it in a tray with his other correspondence. In a month, I’ll finally get to meet the man behind the emails because Mike and I will be going to a veterinary conference at Jean Paul’s university in College Station, Texas.
Lucy walks into my office. “Mail,” she says, tossing several envelopes onto my desk. On top of the stack is the agenda for the Texas veterinary conference. I smile when I see Mike’s and my name on the list of presenters.
The conference talk is really Mike’s baby. He slightly altered a technique for bone surgery in cats, and it’s having good results. Excited about his results, he submitted a paper to a veterinary journal, and it was accepted for publication. Because of the work I’ve done on the project, Mike added my name to his paper. The next thing we knew, a conference organizer asked Mike to present the results and he agreed. The week-long conference is taking place the second week in September, and Mike coaxed me into presenting half the paper. Already, he has a locum lined up for the week we’ll be away. I’m looking forward to the conference. It’ll be nice to meet up with old friends.
At lunchtime, as I’m heading out to lunch at Larry’s, the family restaurant next door, I see Gordon, Mike’s son, walking towards the clinic.
“Hi, Gordon,” I call out.
He glances in my direction and grunts.
Mike has two children from his first marriage: Gordon, who’s nineteen, and Vanessa, who’s twenty-one. Both hate me, which I don’t understand. They liked me fine before Mike and I started dating. I mean, it’s not like Mike’s having a sordid affair or something. And I’m hardly disreputable.
It’s been nine months now since Mike and I have been going out, although I’ve been working for him for over a year and a half. After graduating from veterinary medicine, I did locum work for a few clinics, including a stint at Mike’s clinic when he went on holiday for a month. Pleased with my work and in need of a second vet for his growing practice, Mike offered me a job, and I gladly accepted. After working there for ten months, he and I started dating. It feels great when we’re together, but sometimes I feel like things aren’t quite right.
Determined to have a relaxing lunch, I toss away my gloomy thoughts and open the door to Larry’s. Their homemade soup has never failed to cheer me up.
A half hour later, on my return to the clinic, I see Mike greeting a young couple with a yellow Lab. The dog’s head is hanging low, he barely has the energy to cross the room, and his eyes have lost their glimmer. Dogs with cancer have a certain look, and that Lab has that look.
Since it’s my afternoon for surgery, I pick up the surgery list and head to the scrub room. Tim, who’s assisting with surgery, pokes his head out of one of the treatment rooms.
“Everything’s set up for the first surgery,” he says.
“Great,” I tell him. “I’ll be ready in five minutes.”
“Aye aye.”
Midafternoon, after two castrations and a spay, Tim and I take a break in the lunchroom. While we’re eating and chatting, Mike walks in.
“Has anyone heard from Shane?” he asks.
“Nope,” Tim says, answering for the two of us.
Disappointed, Mike leaves for his next client. Shane has been working at the clinic for two years and he’s always in some kind of trouble. At present, he’s one hour late for work. Why Mike keeps him on is a mystery to everyone. We never know when Shane will be in. On paper, his duties consist of kennel maintenance and running errands. In reality, Shane does as he pleases for which Mike pays him five dollars an hour above the going rate. It’s one of those mysteries I’m happy to ignore.
On my way to the scrub room, I see Shane in one of the treatment rooms squirting Albert with a syringe full of water.
“Why are you so mean to that bird?” I ask.
“You’ll find out one day.”
I find it funny that Shane should so neatly fit into a stereotype: the quintessential bad boy. His light brown hair is always messy, and he has a slight scar down by his chin. It’s a rough, handsome look. He’s the kind of man that mothers busily warn their daughters against. It hurts that my own mother should have married one.
“Doc looking for me?” Shane asks.
“Of course.”
Putting on his white lab coat, he walks towards Mike’s office.
The next time I see Mike, he looks a lot happier.
“Thank God that’s over,” Tim says, as we finish the last surgery of the day. “What a gruelling list. Why are Fridays so crazy?”
I laugh. “To keep us humans humble.” Looking at the clock, I see that it’s almost six, an hour past our usual closing time. In addition to the scheduled surgeries, Mike and I had to perform emergency surgery on a cat badly injured by a fall from a fourth floor apartment window.
Before heading home, I search for Mike and find him in his office, going over test results. He confirms the diagnosis of cancer for the yellow Lab. Tests show that it’s advanced. “I’ve advised the owners, Meg and Tom, to euthanize Nick,” Mike says. “He’s in a lot of pain and it’s only going to get a lot worse. They’re going to think about it. They brought him all the way from Denmark. He was in quarantine for six months, and they only got him back two weeks ago. They blame themselves.”
Unlike many vets, Mike has never desensitized himself to suffering. His compassion lures me to him over and over again.
Smiling, he says, “How about a movie tonight?”
I shake my head. “I can’t. I’ve got an SPCA meeting looming ahead of me tonight and it promises to be a real zonker.”
He laughs. “Better you than me.” With the devil in his eye, he puts down his papers and walks towards me. “Maybe I should give you some encouragement.”
The instant Mike’s lips touch mine, we hear the chime of the clinic door.
“Hey Lucy, is Dad around?” we hear Mike’s son, Gordon, ask.
Mike lets out a slow breath and lets me go. “Call me when you get home from your meeting, Rach, no matter what time it is. I’m dying to be with you.”
Later that night, when I get home after the meeting, I head straight to the kitchen for some lemonade. The meeting was painful in the extreme and lasted until eight thirty. Some committee members just do not know when to stop talking.
After downing a tall glass of lemonade, I phone Mike. “Hi, sweet peach,” I tell him, “I’m home, I’m naked, and I’m waiting.”
He lets out a groan. “You shouldn’t do that to me, Rach. I won’t be able to get that image out of my brain. I might crash the car on the way over.”
I laugh. “I was just thinking about how nice it would be to have your naked body pressed up against mine.”
“Enough, Rachel. I’ll be right over.”
After a shower, I unlock the apartment door and wait in bed. When Mike finds me, he tosses off his clothes and joins me. Driven by forces neither of us truly understands, we devour one another. In the middle of the night, I kiss Mike awake. Semiconscious, senses heightened, we have the kind of sex that leaves you wondering in the morning if you dreamed it. In the morning, it’s Mike’s turn. With his hands under my hips and his mouth against my neck, he makes love to me agonizingly slowly. Neither of us has spoken a word since we started this marathon.
As we’re leaving for work, Mike shakes his head. “We’re going to be wrecks today. Thank heavens it’s Saturday.”
I smile. Saturday is our half day.
Chapter 2
Thursday afternoon, I feel excited as I’m driving towards Northcliff Manor, a seniors assisted care facility. It’s my first day as a volunteer visitor. I’m due at four o’clock
, and I’m right on time.
Mike is really reasonable with work hours. Mondays and Saturdays, I work a half day, and Thursdays I get off at 3:30. Mike believes in quality of life. His work motto is “quality, not quantity”, whereas other vet clinic owners will work you into the ground.
After parking the car in the manor parking lot, I walk towards the building, enjoying the warm sultry breeze.
August is my favorite month; I don’t know why, other than it’s the only month in Michigan when you’re guaranteed to have hot weather—what Grams called the dog days of summer. So easily, I can see her sitting on her porch, fanning herself with the church bulletin, telling all and sundry, “Good heavens, it’s hotter than the devil’s anvil.” But I love that kind of heat. Memories of the dog days are what get me through Michigan’s bitterly cold winters.
The manor isn’t that bad. I’d prepared myself for white walls, plastic chairs, and the air of sterility you usually encounter in these kinds of places: someone here has made an effort. The subdued lighting, muted wallpaper, mismatched wingback chairs, and Victorian floor lamps have created a welcoming homey effect.
The volunteer coordinator has arranged for me to visit with Mrs Beacham, a seventy-five year old woman almost fully recovered from a stroke. Approaching Suite 402, I find the door open. In a chair by a window a woman is reading.
“Mrs Beacham?” I say. “I'm Rachel Wiley, a volunteer. Would you like some company?”
After a few moments, she looks up and says, “Don’t think you’re doing me any favors. I’ve had my fill of volunteers wanting to put something interesting on their resumes and acting like they’re here to do me a favor. I know the routine, and I’m not in the mood.”