Miss Prim and the Billionaire

by Lucy Gordon

  When she entered the office he was deep in a phone call, his manner agitated. He waved for her to come in, then turned away. He was talking French but she managed to make out that he was about to go away. The idea didn’t seem to please him, for he slammed down the phone and snapped, ‘Imbécile! Idiot!’

  ‘Somebody let you down?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes, he’s made a mess of a deal I trusted to him, and now I have to go and rescue it. It’ll take a few days. Come here!’ He hugged her fiercely. ‘I don’t want to leave you. You should come with me and—’

  ‘No,’ she said firmly. ‘I’d be a distraction and you’ve got to keep your mind on business.’

  ‘I’d planned such a day for us. I was going to take you over Paris—’

  ‘Paris will still be here when you get back.’ She added significantly, ‘And so will I.’

  His brow darkened. ‘Your word of honour?’

  ‘I told you, I have no reason to leave now.’

  Reluctantly he departed, giving her one last anxious look from the door. She saw him go with regret, yet also with a faint twinge of relief. His possessiveness was like a reproach to her. She couldn’t blame him for it, but she sensed that it could be a problem, one to which he was blind.

  Knowing herself better than Marcel could, she sensed that Mrs Henshaw was more than just an outward change. Her businesslike appearance really did represent a certain reality inside. For the moment Cassie and Mrs Henshaw must live side by side, each one taking the spotlight according to need. But which one of them would finally emerge as her true self? Even she could not be certain about that.

  She’d hinted as much to Marcel the previous evening, but she knew he didn’t really understand. Or perhaps didn’t want to understand. That was the thought that made her a little uneasy.

  For the next few days she was Mrs Henshaw, deep in business and thoroughly enjoying herself. Vera introduced her to the chief members of the staff, who had clearly been instructed to cooperate with her. She went through the books and knew she was impressing them with her knowledge of finance.

  Then there were the builders who had renovated and extended La Couronne, and who spoke to her at Marcel’s command. The more she listened, the more she understood what he’d been trying to do, how well he’d succeeded, and what he wanted in London. Ideas began to flower inside her. She would have much to tell him when he returned on Thursday.

  He called her several times a day on the hotel’s landline. Wryly she realised that in this way he could check that she was there. Just once he called her cellphone, and that was when she was out shopping. He managed to sound cheerful but she sensed the underlying tension, especially when he said, ‘Don’t be long getting back to the hotel. There’s a lot to do.’

  ‘I’m on my way back now,’ she assured him.

  Vera greeted her in a flurry of nerves. ‘He was very upset when he called and found you not here,’ she said.

  ‘Don’t worry; he tried my cellphone and I answered at once.’ She added reassuringly, ‘So when he calls, you can tell him that I’m not slacking on the job.’

  Not wanting to embarrass the secretary, whom she liked, she got straight back to work. A few minutes later Vera’s phone rang and she shut the door to answer it discreetly.

  Poor Marcel, Cassie thought. I suppose I can’t blame him for expecting me to vanish in a puff of smoke. He’ll understand, in time.

  By now everyone knew who she was, and the power she possessed, and they would scurry to give her only the best. On Wednesday evening the cook and head waiter joined her at the table for a few minutes, urging her to try new dishes.

  They were both attractive men, middle-aged but with appreciative eyes, and they enjoyed talking to her about Paris, which they insisted on calling ‘the city of love’.

  ‘You work too hard, madame,’ the cook told her. ‘You should be out there exploring this magical place, becoming imbued with its spirit. Then you would know what to do for the hotel in London.’

  ‘I’m afraid London lacks Paris’s air of romance,’ she mourned, and they solemnly agreed with her.

  Once, long ago, Marcel had whispered in the night, ‘I will take you to Paris and show you my city. We will walk the streets together, and you will breathe in the atmosphere of love that is to be found nowhere else.’

  ‘You sound like a guidebook,’ she’d complained.

  ‘Actually, I got it out of a guidebook,’ he’d admitted sheepishly.

  She began to laugh, and he’d joined her. They had clung together, rocking back and forth in bed until the laughter ended in passionate silence, the way everything seemed to end in those days.

  He never did take me to Paris, she thought now, sadly. And it would have been so wonderful.

  Suddenly he seemed to be there in front of her, laughing joyfully as he’d done in his carefree youth, before cares had fallen on him in a cruel deluge.

  ‘Ah, Monsieur Falcon,’ the waiter called. ‘How nice to see you back.’

  She blinked in disbelief. It wasn’t a fantasy. He really was there, standing before her, as though he’d risen from her dreams.

  ‘Good evening,’ he said cheerfully. ‘I needn’t ask if you’ve missed me. Clearly you haven’t.’

  ‘I’ve been so well looked after that I’ve barely noticed you were gone,’ she teased.

  His employees greeted him respectfully before rising from the table and leaving them alone.

  ‘Come with me,’ he said, drawing her to her feet.

  ‘But the chef has spent hours preparing—’

  ‘I said come on.’

  He was laughing but also totally serious, she realised, as she felt herself drawn across the floor and out of the restaurant.

  ‘Where are we going?’ she asked breathlessly.

  ‘Wait and see. Taxi!’

  When they were settled in the back seat she said, ‘You weren’t supposed to come back until tomorrow.’

  ‘Sorry to disappoint you. Shall I go away again?’

  ‘No, I think I can just about put up with you. Hey, what are you doing?’

  ‘What do you think? Come here.’

  ‘Mmmmmmm!’

  Suddenly the boy she’d loved long ago was in her arms again, banishing the severe man he’d become. Eventually that might prove unrealistic, but right now she was too delighted to care about anything else.

  Especially being realistic.

  ‘Where are we going?’ she asked when she could breathe again.

  ‘Sightseeing. Look.’

  Gazing out, she could see that they were driving along the River Seine, with the Eiffel Tower growing closer and closer, until at last they turned over a bridge, heading across the water, straight to the Tower. There they took the elevator up higher and higher, to a restaurant more than four hundred feet above the ground, where he led her to a table by the window.

  From here it seemed as if all Paris was laid out for her delight, glittering lights against the darkness, stretching into infinity. She regarded it in awed silence.

  ‘I think it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,’ she whispered.

  ‘We dreamed of coming here. Do you remember?’

  ‘Oh, yes, I remember.’

  She didn’t speak for a while, but gazed out, transfixed by the beauty.

  ‘I’ve always wanted to come to Paris. I kept hoping that the next modelling job would take me there, but I was always unlucky.’

  ‘So now I can show it to you, as I promised.’

  ‘And every girl in Paris will envy me the attention of Marcel Falcon, famous for his harem.’

  ‘Nonsense!’

  ‘It’s not.’ She chuckled. ‘After we met that first night I researched you online, and discovered a lot of interesting things.’

  ‘Don’t believe everything you read,’ he said wryly.

  ‘Oh, but I’d like to believe it. It was so fascinating. I looked in a web encyclopedia and the entry under “Personal Life” went on for ever. I c
ouldn’t keep up. Josie and Leyla, Myra, Ginette and—now, who was the other one? Just let me think.’

  ‘All right,’ he growled, ‘you’ve had your fun.’

  ‘After what I read, I don’t think you should lecture me about having fun. Tell me about that woman who—’

  His scowl stopped her in her tracks. ‘Have you finished?’ he grunted.

  ‘I’ve barely started.’

  ‘What would you think of me if I’d had no social life?’

  ‘That you were honest, virtuous, shining white—and the biggest bore in the world. Of course you’ve had women, lots of them. So you should.’

  ‘Now you sound like my father.’

  ‘I take it that’s not a compliment. I only saw him for a moment that night in London, but I thought you seemed tense in his company. Do you dislike him?’

  ‘Sometimes. Sometimes I admire him.’

  ‘Not love him?’

  ‘I don’t think he’s bothered whether anyone loves him or not. If he was he wouldn’t alienate them as he does. All he really cares about is making people do what he wants.’ Seeing her wry smile, he ground his teeth, ‘OK, fine! Say it.’

  ‘You have been known to want your own way,’ she teased. ‘And to go about getting it in a way that’s—shall we say, cunning and determined?’

  ‘If you mean cheating and bullying, why not say so?’

  ‘I didn’t want to insult you. Or would it be a compliment?’

  ‘My father would certainly take it as a compliment. A chip off the old block, that’s what he’d call me.’

  ‘Were you at odds with him when you were living in London, that time?’

  ‘I resented him, the person he was, the way he lived, the way he treated people. He seemed to think he could do exactly as he liked, and everyone would just have to put up with it. When I was a child I thought he and my mother were married. They seemed like a normal couple. He wasn’t at home very much but I thought that was just because of his work. Then suddenly it all changed. It seemed he’d had a wife in England all the time. At last she’d found out about his other family and divorced him, taking Darius and Jackson.’

  Cassie had heard some of this before, from Freya, but Marcel’s own view of his colourful childhood had a new significance.

  ‘So then my mother married him and we went to live in England. After a couple of years his first wife died and Darius and Jackson came to live with us.’

  ‘That must have made for a tense situation.’

  ‘It could have been, but Darius and I got on better than you might expect. We were both naturally rebellious and we used to team up against Amos, be co-conspirators, give each other alibis when necessary. I really missed the fun of being wicked together when it was all over.

  ‘Of course the marriage didn’t last. He got up to his old tricks and she was expected to put up with it because he was Amos Falcon, a man with enough money to do as he liked.’

  ‘That would be enough to put you off money for life,’ she mused.

  ‘That’s what I felt, disgust with him and everything he stood for. We found out about his other sons, Travis in America, and Leonid in Russia. I often saw my mother crying, and there were times when I did hate him. I might be his son but I wanted to be as different from him as possible.

  ‘Mama and I came back to Paris and tried to forget him. But he wouldn’t let us. He kept turning up on the doorstep. Once his property, always his property. Especially me. I was his son so I was bound to be like him. It was no use telling him that I didn’t feel at all like him and didn’t want to.’

  He made a wry face. ‘I guess he knew me better than I knew myself. I fooled around in London, pretending I wasn’t connected with him, not using his name, but when the crash came I fled back to my mother in Paris. At first I told myself the future was open, all paths were open to me. I didn’t have to take the one that led to Amos.

  ‘But in the end I faced reality. There was only one road, and he stood at the end, waiting for me to admit the truth. I called him in Monte Carlo, where he was living for tax reasons. After that I took lessons in being Amos Falcon.’ He assumed a flourishing air. ‘I passed them with flying colours.’

  ‘Or you think you did,’ she said gently.

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘It means I don’t think you’re as like him as you believe.’

  ‘Maybe. I’m not sure any more. I was certain in those days because I thought he and his way of life was all I had left in the world. Nothing mattered but money, so I went after it because it could fill all the gaping holes.’

  ‘And did it?’ she asked.

  He shook his head. ‘Nothing could. But I wouldn’t face it. I told myself it was all your fault. Every bad thing that happened, every cruel disappointment was your fault. That was the only way I—’ His hand tightened on his glass.

  ‘Steady, you’ll break it,’ she said.

  ‘If you only knew—’

  ‘But I do. I had a bad time too, but I don’t think I suffered as much as you did. I missed you and grieved for you, but I never had the pain of thinking you’d betrayed me.’

  ‘Didn’t you? After what I called you when I saw you at the airport? Didn’t I betray you when I tore up that letter?’

  ‘Marcel, stop it,’ she said firmly. Taking his hands in hers, she went on, ‘You mustn’t obsess about that.’

  ‘How can I help it? I could have made it right and I made a mess of everything. I could have spared us ten years of suffering. Why don’t you blame me? Why don’t you hate me?’

  ‘Would that make you feel better?’ she asked softly. ‘Shall I beat you up and then say, “Fine, now we’re even”?’

  ‘It’s what you ought to do.’

  ‘Yes, but I never did do what I ought to do. You said so a hundred times. I never hated you, and if anything good comes out of this it will be that you won’t hate me any more.’

  ‘If anything good—? Can you doubt it?’

  ‘I hope for a thousand good things, but we don’t know what they are yet.’

  ‘But surely we—?’

  ‘We have to be patient. We’re strangers to each other now.’

  ‘You’ll never be a stranger to me.’

  ‘That’s lovely, but it isn’t true. It can’t be. We know the people we used to be, but not the people we are now. We have to discover each other again before—’

  ‘Before we can love each other? Don’t you want us to?’

  Before the intensity of his eyes she looked away. ‘I don’t know,’ she admitted. ‘It frightens me. I guess I’m just easily scared these days.’ She clasped his hands again. ‘I need a friend.’

  ‘Friend,’ he echoed, as though trying to believe what he’d heard.

  ‘Someone who understands things that nobody else in the world understands. Please, Marcel, be my friend. Be that first, and then maybe—if we’re patient—and lucky—’

  ‘You know what you’re telling me, don’t you? You can’t love me and you don’t want me to love you.’

  ‘No!’ she said fiercely. ‘It isn’t that. But I’m scared. Aren’t you?’

  ‘I wasn’t before. I am now. I thought the other night—’

  ‘The other night we found each other again, but only in one way. And—’ she gave a reminiscent smile ‘—it was so lovely.’

  ‘But not enough,’ he said.

  ‘Would it be enough for you, always? Won’t there come a time when you’re lying in my arms wondering if you can really trust me?’

  He didn’t answer, and she followed his thoughts. She’d hit a nerve, leaving him shocked and appalled at himself. He’d had as much as he could stand, she decided, and she must bring this to an end.

  ‘I want to look at the view again,’ she said, rising and going to the window. ‘I’ve never seen such beauty.’

  He made a suitable reply, and they left the dangerous subject behind. For the rest of the evening they kept carefully to indifferent subjects, presenting the
appearance of a conventional couple, with no sign of the turbulence whirling inside them.

  She knew that she must face the fact that there was a sad but crucial difference between them. With the truth finally revealed he’d become open to her, as though he was hers again. It was she who was holding back.

  The feeling of detachment was painful. She longed to throw open her arms in welcome, vowing that everything was good again and all suffering would be forgotten. But the lessons of the past few years couldn’t simply be unlearned. Most piercing of all was the fear of hurting him again.

  Returning to the hotel, he saw her to her door but, to her relief, didn’t try to come in. He’d read the signal she’d sent him and accepted it, however reluctantly. He would give her time, but his eyes told of his turmoil.

  ‘I’ll see you tomorrow, then,’ he said. ‘There are some figures we must go through. Goodnight.’

  ‘Goodnight,’ she whispered.

  He touched her cheek, then departed quickly.

  He had to be away several times in the next couple of weeks. When he returned they would dine together and talk, just as she’d hoped. On those evenings he kept his distance both physically and emotionally, making her wonder if he was following her lead or if he’d really decided against her. That thought filled her with irrational dismay.

  You’re mad, she told herself. You don’t know what you want.

  Which was true.

  One afternoon, working together in his apartment, they had a bickering disagreement which threatened to turn into a quarrel. Afterwards she could never remember exactly what it had been about. Or if it had been about anything except the fact that a final separation might be looming.

  ‘I should never have taken this job,’ she sighed. ‘Let’s end it now. I’ll go back to England and we need never see or think of each other again.’

  ‘Do you imagine I’ll allow that?’

  ‘I don’t think you could stop me leaving.’

  ‘I could stop you any time I want to. You won’t leave me, Cassie. I won’t stand for it.’

  ‘Don’t,’ she said harshly. ‘That’s the sort of thing Jake used to say. I can’t bear it when you talk like him.’