by Sarah Morgan
Lorelei put the menu down.
He pocketed the cell.
‘I take it that was for me,’ she observed, lifting a finely arched brow.
The wine had arrived. He poured her a glass himself, then lifted his tall glass of sparkling wine and touched the flute in her hand.
He didn’t smile, but his eyes caught and held the part of her fighting to get free, and in that instant Lorelei stopped struggling.
His voice was deep and affectingly roughened, as if coming from a part of himself he usually held in check.
‘Consider me all yours for the afternoon.’
CHAPTER FIVE
WITH the Bugatti long dismissed from his mind as a fake and the over-the-top theatrics she had engaged in difficult to reconcile with the poised woman sitting opposite him, Nash found himself entertaining what would have seemed outrageous a mere couple of hours ago.
She was a huge distraction, but he would make the time.
As he had led her to their table he’d appreciated for the second time today the graceful dip of her long, slender back before it gave way to the small curve of her hips, and the subtle sway of those hips as she walked with ease on deathtrap heels. She possessed an innate old-style grace and a hint of athleticism he couldn’t quite link up with the sybaritic lifestyle she seemed to embrace.
She intrigued him.
He hadn’t been able to get her out of his head since he’d left her on the highway. In the past if he’d wanted something he’d gone after it. But this something had turned up at exactly the wrong moment.
In a week’s time his re-entry into racing was going to hit the media like a virus. Everything he did would be scrutinized—the places he went, the parties he attended, the women on his arm. Crazy drama-queen blondes were not part of the package. He intended to keep a low profile and wait out the blood in the water period until the media moved on to the next high-profile sportsman and hounded his private life.
Any woman he was seen with now needed to be low-key, and preferably without her own media circus. He’d broken off an on again/off again sexual relationship with a well-known British actress earlier in the year for just that reason. He knew the press would dig something out and air it in the months to come, but he also knew she was soon going to be announcing her engagement and that should put paid to any rumours. He wanted his re-entry into the sport to be as low-key as possible—the opposite of the media circus he’d been caught up in during his twenties.
The woman sitting across from him was exactly what a PR team would order. Cool, classy, understated. Not that he had any interest in involving anyone else in his decision. This was between him and his libido...and the lovely Ms St James. Although he didn’t intend to give her much say. Action, in his experience, was a far more direct method.
His gaze lingered on her uncovered shoulders.
There was something about the delicacy of her throat and collarbone and the quiver of those bare shoulders that made him think about her naked under a sheet.
‘All mine?’ She echoed his words. ‘You should be careful what you promise, Nash.’
It was the first time she had used his name and her accent curled enticingly around it. His body tightened.
But those amber eyes were direct.
‘Are you planning a long lunch?’ she enquired sweetly.
Quiet amusement tugged at his mouth. ‘Isn’t that a requirement of your job description?’
‘Pardon?’
‘Public relations.’
She looked genuinely surprised. ‘Mais, non, I am not in public relations.’
He leaned back in his chair, enjoying looking at her, enjoying the game. After spending the last two hours fine-tuning contracts this was a nice reward. Lorelei was certainly easier on the eye.
‘What do you call it, then?’
‘A favour.’
He lifted a brow.
‘I’m on the board of the Aviary Foundation,’ she explained. ‘The usual publicist broke her ankle and I was deputised as her stand-in.’
It fitted. Yet he was disappointed. The idea that she actually worked, held down a career, had weighted those glamorous blonde looks of hers in something concrete. He studied her fine boned face, looking for something else beyond the undeniable beauty.
‘It’s an influential charity,’ he said finally. ‘How did you get involved?’
‘My grandmaman set up the foundation some years ago. I have her seat on the board.’
In other words she came from money. She hadn’t lifted a pretty manicured fingertip to earn it. He glanced down at those hands, checked for a ring, then looked again. Her nails were unvarnished and worn down.
But a seat on the board? She’d merely stepped into the niche carved out for her. Broken nails aside, perhaps there wasn’t anything here beyond the eyes and the smile and the sexy accent.
He shifted in his chair.
‘Do you do a lot of charity work?’
‘I do my share. If one is in a position to do so I think there’s no excuse not to.’
‘Agreed.’
‘About this morning...’ she said slowly.
He shook his head. ‘I think we’ve moved on from that, don’t you?’
Lorelei picked up her champagne and sipped it. Had they? She was grateful not to have to apologise or explain, because, really, how did she explain? She didn’t want to look too closely at how out of control things had become.
He had that lazy, contented male look about him—as if he had her exactly where he wanted her and was sizing up his options with her. It was time to do a little sizing up of her own.
‘I did some research on you,’ she said, knowing it was only half a white lie—because couldn’t Simone be counted as research?
He didn’t look disturbed.
‘You’ve got quite a reputation.’
Those blue eyes glimmered.
‘As a competitor,’ she added with a little smile.
He drummed the fingers of his left hand on the table. ‘I don’t like to lose.’
‘It must make you hard to live with.’
‘I wouldn’t know.’ He almost smiled. ‘Not having to live with me.’
‘I guess it’s a question to ask your girlfriend—or wife.’
She didn’t know why she’d phrased it that way. It was hardly subtle.
‘There isn’t a woman in my life.’
Lorelei knew she’d be a fool to believe that. Look at him—big, rugged, rich, sex appeal to burn.
‘Oh, really? I heard you were quite busy in that department.’
‘Did this come up in all that research?’
Lorelei ran her thumb over the stem of her glass. She realised he was watching her hand and that her gesture might be interpreted as quite provocative. She picked up her glass, intending to drink, then put it down again.
She’d had quite enough to drink last night.
‘And you?’ he prompted. ‘Easy to live with?’
‘Me?’ She was no longer entirely sure what they were talking about. ‘I’m a pussycat.’
‘According to your husband?’
‘No husband.’ She met his eyes and saw satisfaction with her answer.
This time she did take a sip of her drink, and another.
She didn’t get involved with men like this. Yet here she was, walking straight on in.
Whatever he said, he was probably seeing someone. Maybe not today, but certainly yesterday, and probably tomorrow. Girls were probably lining up around the block.
Her father in his heyday had always had two or three women on the go. One to pay the bills, another in reserve and a third he actually enjoyed sleeping with. Some young starlet or tourist passing through.
Lorelei frowned. Sh
e didn’t like to think about that side of Raymond.
She preferred the side he’d thought she saw. He’d made an effort for her to see. The charming bon vivant, lavish with money and affection, especially with his darling daughter.
But she’d always been aware he romanced older women up and down the coast to keep the wolf from the door.
Her grandmaman had been the one with the real money, doled out sparingly.
Raymond had never complained, and his phone calls from the low-security prison where he was currently serving out the last months of a two-year gaol term were always full of jokes and cheer. She loved him for it, but she wished sometimes she could speak seriously to him.
She never had been able to breach that gleaming surface. Raymond didn’t want to hear about the difficulties of life. And under the current circumstances she felt guilty even raising the subject of the villa.
Alors, she was back to thinking about the villa.
‘Lorelei.’ A deep voice said her name almost gently.
‘Oui?’ She blinked, took a breath.
Nash was watching her with an intensity that hadn’t been there before, as if he knew something had changed.
‘Sorry.’ She made a forgetful gesture with one hand. ‘You were saying?’
‘Nothing that won’t keep.’
He continued to watch her, a quiet smile conveying so much more than words. In that moment Lorelei knew she was in trouble.
Oh, she knew how to deflect a man, how to make it clear that despite sitting across from him, sharing a meal with him, she was not on the menu.
But right now she felt she was every dish he might like...
Finally Nash spoke.
‘We’ve got a lot in common.’ He settled back, angled in his chair, all shoulders and lean, muscular grace.
He seemed to be saying, Take a good long look. It could all be yours.
But for how long? she wondered.
‘How do you gauge that?’ she asked aloud.
‘I like to compete. You’re a serious trophy.’
‘Pardon me?’
He gave her a lazy once-over she should have found insulting after the “trophy” description. Instead she felt it like a direct hit to her sleeping libido.
‘You’re smart and seriously sexy and I haven’t been bored since I sat down with you. Like I said, you’re a serious trophy.’
Lorelei inhaled sharply.
She knew this was how some men saw an attractive woman. She had just never met a man who had the nerve to say it to her in so many words.
‘Nash, a trophy is an inanimate object you sit on a shelf.’
‘A trophy can be anything you want to win,’ he countered, sitting forward.
Lorelei had to remind herself not to edge back. He fairly emanated thumping male entitlement.
‘I don’t get in the race, Lorelei, unless I’m fairly confident of the outcome.’
For a breathless moment she considered asking him exactly how confident he was of her. But deep down she feared the answer.
Another Lorelei—the one who could hold men off with a death stare at a hundred paces—would have stood up and thrown the contents of her drink all over him. This Lorelei—the one clutching her glass like a life jacket and breathing in the spicy, earthy scent of him like oxygen—found herself asking, ‘Is that a problem for you? Women boring you?’
He sat back, his hand resuming its drumming action. ‘On occasion.’ His head dropped a little to the side, as if he were considering her. He smiled slowly. ‘Most of the time.’
Arrogant bastard.
She couldn’t help smiling back.
‘Perhaps the better question is, do you think you’ll bore me?’ she asked sweetly.
‘How am I doing so far?’
Lorelei paused long enough to take another sip of her drink.
‘Oh, I think you’re in the race.’
* * *
Nash weighed up two options: dinner and dancing here in Monaco, or would he fly them to Paris? He was leaning towards the latter, because something about this woman made him want to impress her. She was beautiful, but she was also clearly highly intelligent...and wasn’t that a turn-up for the books? He hadn’t exaggerated when he’d told her he hadn’t stopped thinking about her. But what if she hadn’t turned up this afternoon? On the strength of her undeniable physical appeal would he have hunted her down? Until now he hadn’t seen her like this—elegant, restrained...witty. Good company. Yet deep down he knew he would have gone looking, asked around, put in the legwork. There had been something about her from the beginning.
But this...the woman in full...was a revelation that made his body’s unreasonable attraction to her no longer a betrayal of his common sense.
The chemistry between them was pretty much a flame to an oily rag, and if in the end she proved not much more than a spoilt rich girl it would be a disappointment, but it wouldn’t stop him bedding her.
* * *
‘Ms St James?’
Lorelei looked up. It was one of the waiters. She recognised him from the several other occasions she had dined here this year. He glanced nervously at Nash.
‘I thought you should know your car is being towed away.’
‘Pardon?’
‘Your beautiful car, Ms St James. The authorities are taking it away.’
For a moment Lorelei didn’t know what to do. Towed? Her lovely Sunbeam was being towed? But why...? This time she’d paid all the insurance and registration and...
She looked at Nash.
‘I’m so sorry. I have to handle this.’
She scrambled to her feet, scooping up her handbag. Nash was getting to his feet too, frowning.
She wanted to see him again, but in that moment she knew it wouldn’t work. She’d forgotten for a time just how bad things were for her out there. If circumstances were different in her world... But they weren’t, and they seemed to be getting worse every day.
Without counting the cost of her actions, only knowing she would regret it if she didn’t do it, Lorelei stepped up to him, put her hand gently to his jaw and lifted to kiss him. She inhaled man and aftershave, felt the heat of him and the surprising gentleness of his mouth because he hadn’t expected this.
His momentary hesitation gave way to the sudden surge of his body against her own and his hand spread possessively across the back of her head. She tasted him fully as he moved to take over the kiss, giving her a moment’s glimpse of exactly how overwhelming his sensual expertise could be.
Mon Dieu, this was what she was giving up...
But she was already pulling free, turning away, because she’d allowed herself to be seduced by the solidity and masculine certainty of this man when there was nothing here for her in the long run. All the while she was sitting here her problems were still out there, mounting up, waiting for her return, and now she had to deal once more with the chaos in her life.
She took off across the restaurant, as fast as her ridiculous heels would let her, knowing only one thing: she had to save the car. She wouldn’t be letting anyone take away the last damn thing she owned.
Lorelei was across the Place du Casino and about to cross the road when a heavy hand curled possessively over her shoulder. She swung around, hitting out reflexively with her handbag, eyes wild with anxiety.
‘Let me go. I’ve got to get to my car.’
Nash steadied her with both hands. ‘I want you to wait here. Are you listening, Lorelei? Let me handle it.’
Responding to the authority in his voice, she blinked up at him. He was going to help? There was a scraping of metal on asphalt and, confused, she whirled around to see what was happening across the road. She saw the tow truck backing up in front of her car and automatically stepped out onto the road.
Nash swore and reached to grab her.
Of all the suicidal...
She took off across two lanes of traffic.
He wouldn’t have believed it if he hadn’t seen it, yet somehow she made it across unharmed.
His heartbeat slowly resumed normal strength.
Amidst the blare of car horns her high-decibel wishes were being made very clear in vitriolic French.
‘Get away from my car!’ she shrieked. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’
Nash was not often left speechless, but at that moment he might still have been in the courtyard at the old villa this morning. The sophisticated, sexy woman he had pushed back a busy afternoon’s schedule for was gone. In her place was a reckless wild woman who was clearly out of control.
Adrenalin levels surging, he crossed the street more circumspectly, all the while watching as Lorelei stormed up to the guy supervising the removal of her car. She was waving her hands about as she remonstrated with him in typical Gallic fashion, but the guy was pretty much ignoring her.
Hell, for all he knew they were on a first-name basis and that car of hers was towed every day of the week...
Lorelei had her hands on her hips and was gathering quite a crowd. Ice-queen blondes losing their cool on a lazy afternoon in Monte Carlo had pulling power, and now Lorelei was... Was she taking off her shoes? She was taking off her goddamned shoes! What in the hell?
She slung first one and then the other stiletto heel at the guy. The first one missed but the second one caught him in the groin.
The bloke said something crude and headed for her, and Nash dropped amusement and swapped it for street-level aggression. He made a direct line for the problem, collared the ape so fast the guy didn’t see it coming and shoved him hard up against the side of the truck.
‘You want someone to lay into, mate,’ he said, low and with deadly menace, ‘try me.’
The man’s face fell, then turned an apoplectic red. Nash realised he had him in a chokehold. He eased off. But Lorelei was suddenly right up beside him, stabbing her slender index finger within inches of the guy’s face.
‘You listen to him and you listen to me. I want my car back. Pronto!’