Duty At What Cost?

by Michelle Conder

  She was breathing so hard when she’d finished she nearly missed Wolfe’s soft grin.

  ‘Oh, you are horrible!’ she spluttered. ‘You were playing devil’s advocate with me!’

  ‘You have a fire in your belly I guess you would never show your father.’

  It pained her to acknowledge he was right. She had built a wall up where her father was concerned and she used it to keep him out. To show him that she didn’t need him. More than that, she was afraid he would shoot her down in flames if she tried and failed in replacing Frédéric.

  She was a grown woman who had never got over wanting her father’s approval. She’d moved to Paris so she could avoid facing that.

  Feeling dismayed by her unexpected realisations she shook her head. ‘He doesn’t respect me.’ And, boy, did that hurt.

  ‘So make him.’

  Ava’s startled gaze connected with Wolfe’s.

  ‘And if you stop pretending you’re not sensitive about things when you are, that might help.’

  She felt her mouth fall open at his gentle ribbing and quickly snapped it closed. She wanted to argue that she’d mastered that unwelcome aspect of her nature years ago, but just looking at Wolfe made her awash with a certain type of sensitivity she couldn’t deny.

  She turned away, only to have him grasp her shoulders and turn her back before she’d taken a single step. He reached out and secured her chin lightly between his fingers, his eyes glittering down at her in the glow of the mood lighting. ‘Maybe you need to think of your duty as being to your people now, Ava, not your father.’

  Her breath caught. He hadn’t called her Ava since that morning at Gilles’s. Trying to hold on to her equilibrium, and reminding herself that there was nothing intimate behind his unexpected tenderness, she gave a rueful quirk of her lips. ‘I never looked at it like that.’

  ‘Because you’re focusing on the past. That’s gone. It’s only the future that counts.’ His tone was firm, the words delivered with such a resounding sense of resolution she knew he had said them before.

  ‘You’re right.’ She let the silence build between them as her head spun with ideas. His words ‘make him’ settled inside her. Perhaps if she stopped reverting to the recalcitrant teenager she had once been that would be a start. ‘I cannot keep fighting my father. It is not only futile, but he’s sick. And I do have obligations now that require my full attention.’ She released a noisy breath and smiled wearily. ‘Do you think perhaps I have felt sorry for myself for long enough?’

  Wolfe’s head came up, surprise lighting his gaze, as if he hadn’t expected her to admit to such a flaw. Then he laughed. ‘You’re one out of the box, Princess.’

  She smiled back at him, warmed by the admiration in his voice. Warmed by the fact that he somehow made her feel valued.

  She was instantly transported to the single night they had shared together. As much as the passion between them had shocked her, it had also thrilled her. She wondered— No, Ava. Not only was Wolfe not interested in fostering a long-term relationship with a woman, he had said himself that their ‘ship’ had ‘definitely sailed’.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  ‘WE ARE NOT stopping, Ava, and that’s that.’

  Ava knew her father’s face had taken on the stony hue that had used to scare her as a child, but she steadfastly kept smiling at the sea of people waving flags along the tree-lined boulevard as the royal coach trotted slowly down the centre of Anders.

  Every year citizens and tourists came out in droves to celebrate Anders Independence Day, with a plethora of sumptuously themed floats and gaily designed costumes. This year there was a more sombre mood to the proceedings, with many of the floats carrying her brother’s picture. It made Ava want to reach out to her people to make up for Frédéric’s loss. After her conversation with Wolfe three nights ago she knew that she could either let her insecurities control her or...try.

  So she had.

  And it felt like a blessed release finally to make some of the hard decisions she hadn’t realised she’d been actively resisting. One had been to inform her artists that she would be helping them find new representation when her gallery closed down the following month, and the other had been to start sitting in on business meetings with her father’s advisors. The workload was intense, and there were aspects of ruling her country that made her head spin, but she felt as if she was making inroads. Slowly.

  Slow inroads into everything except her relationship with her father. Just this morning he had been lecturing her about making a decision on the five ‘expressions of interest,’ as he referred to the marriage proposals he had already received on her behalf, without even considering her view. As far as he was concerned she should bow down to her destiny, and he saw nothing wrong with the fact that one of those proposals had arrived from a man she hadn’t even met!

  But Ava wasn’t ready to compromise on that point. And with Wolfe sitting opposite her, sublime in a designer suit, his gaze scanning back and forth over the joyous crowd, she didn’t even want to think about it.

  Instead she marshalled her determination to make her father respect her and kept a calm smile on her face as she addressed him. ‘I need to walk some of the way.’

  Her father nodded benevolently to his people. ‘I won’t repeat myself, Ava.’

  ‘I know it’s not the way we’ve traditionally done the avenue ride,’ she said. ‘But if I am going to rule Anders it’s important to me that our people don’t see me as a distant figure. Especially since I have lived in Paris for so long.’

  Her father glanced at Wolfe. ‘Tell her it’s too dangerous.’

  ‘The King has a point,’ Wolfe conceded. ‘It is never a good idea to make last-minute changes to your itinerary.’

  Ava felt her stomach plunge as he sided with her father, instantly recognising the emotion that gripped her as a feeling of betrayal. After the gala ball she felt as if they had formed a friendship of sorts. She had enjoyed his company as he had escorted her to and from meetings, had enjoyed him sitting in with her to ensure her safety, and been surprised and thankful when on a couple of occasions he’d offered some keen business insights that had been beyond her understanding at the time.

  Most of all, though, she loved how when everyone else had left for the day he brought her a cup of her favourite tea without her having to ask. Nobody, she had realised that first time, ever did anything for her without her having to ask first.

  She looked across at him, willing him to understand. ‘But it can be done.’

  Her father’s face tightened. ‘Why are you always so determined to defy me?’

  ‘This is not about defiance, sir,’ Ava insisted, holding back her tendency to disconnect from her father in order to keep her goal in sight. ‘If you can give me one good reason why I shouldn’t walk amongst our people then I’ll listen.’

  ‘It’s a break in tradition.’

  ‘Why can’t I start a new one?’

  ‘A safety risk, then.’

  Of course Ava knew he was right, but she also recognised that fear was debilitating. ‘Is it important to rule safely, Father?’ she asked softly. ‘Or with integrity?’

  Her father turned from the window and stared at her, his expression pained. ‘You always were a smart child, Ava, but you’re still not leaving this carriage. Wolfe—’ he spoke while still smiling and waving ‘—stop her before she does something stupid.’

  Ava hated the fact that yet another man held something so important to her in his power. She lifted her chin, wondering how she would react when Wolfe sounded the death knell to her idea. It was important to her on so many levels...

  Fortunately her determination wasn’t to be tested on this as Wolfe, his expression stern, broke her steady gaze to address her father. ‘My job is to keep her safe, Your Majesty, not to stop her.’

  * * *

  ‘Thank you.’

  Wolfe turned from the narrow window that had once formed part of a parapet when he heard Ava step into
the small room he was using as an office. He’d thought she would want to make an early night of it, worn out after walking for miles that day and thrilling her people with handshakes and good wishes. On the contrary, she looked fresh and still buzzed, dressed in some sort of yoga outfit that left little to his hyperactive imagination.

  He knew why she was thanking him, but she’d put him in an impossible position with her earnest request and he was still fuming about it. ‘It was a foolish thing to do.’

  ‘Maybe.’ She threw him a brief smile. ‘But I needed to do it and you understood that.’

  ‘I understood you had a crazy idea and it came off okay this time. Next time it might not.’

  ‘Life’s a risk, no?’ She cocked her head. ‘I would have thought your job was full of them.’

  ‘Calculated risks are different from spontaneous reactions.’

  ‘It wasn’t a spontaneous reaction,’ she said indignantly. ‘I’d thought about it all morning.’

  ‘Next time you might want to share that,’ he said dryly.

  ‘Okay.’ She shrugged. ‘I take your point, but it doesn’t stop me from being happy that I did it.’

  Wolfe grunted in response and made the mistake of moving to stand behind his desk. He’d had to train himself to ignore her delicious scent all week, but this close, in the confines of this suddenly overheated room, it was nearly impossible to do.

  When she didn’t make a move to leave he glanced at her. ‘Was there something else?’

  ‘Yes. Do you have any news on who might have killed my brother?’

  ‘No.’ He had some leads to go on but he had no intention of telling her that. Keeping a client apprised of his intel was not the way he operated.

  ‘Okay, then.’

  Her slender fingers trailed over the top of his desk, but just when he thought she was going to give him a break and leave she swung back towards him.

  ‘I’m going for a walk outside. Just in case you need to know.’

  Of course he needed to know.

  ‘If you go I’ll have to go with you.’

  Her eyes met his. ‘Okay.’

  Her voice had a husky quality, and all he wanted to do was haul her across his desk and push that stretchy top up her chest. ‘I suggest you get a jacket. It’s cold outside.’

  ‘I don’t know where you get your weather information from,’ Ava said ten minutes later, her sneaker-shod feet crunching the gravel footpath underfoot. ‘It’s not cold at all.’

  She shrugged out of her lightweight jacket and draped it loosely over her shoulders. ‘I love these cloudless summer nights in Anders. The cicadas singing and the mountains in the background. When I was small I used to lie on the grass with my mother and count the stars. It’s not possible to do that in Paris.’

  ‘No stars?’

  ‘It’s not the stars; it’s the grass. If you so much as look the wrong way at the lush lawns in a Parisian park a gendarme will come over and slap you with a misdemeanour charge.’ She wagged her finger playfully. ‘One can look but never touch.’

  Wolfe knew exactly how that felt.

  ‘Even princesses?’

  She threw him an impish grin. ‘Afraid so. The only people who get special treatment in Paris are the Parisians.’

  Wolfe laughed, finding himself relaxing under the vast velvet sky, intrigued as Ava relived her time in Paris and made comparisons between France and Anders. He’d found himself making similar comparisons between Australia and Anders during the week. It was most likely because it had been years since he’d spent so long in one place, but as much as he would have said he was a beach lover he found the small mountainous nation of Anders surprisingly serene and peaceful.

  ‘How do you feel about being back?’ he asked.

  Ava stopped walking and turned to face the mountains, their high peaks barely discernible in the night sky. ‘Two weeks ago I would have said I hated it, but now...now it’s growing on me again.’

  She hesitated, and he could see her wrestling with herself about whether to continue. Surprisingly he wanted her to. He liked listening to her talk.

  ‘Because?’

  ‘Because I’ve missed the fresh scent of pine in the air and the tranquillity of being surrounded by every shade of green. It feels like home, and being here has made me realise that I miss that more than I allowed myself to think about.’ Her hand trailed a clump of lavender and she raised her fingers to her nose and inhaled the sweet scent. ‘The only fly in the ointment is my father,’ she continued, almost to herself. ‘He’s so determined that he’s always right it becomes exhausting trying to deal with him at times. What about you?’ she asked lightly.

  ‘No. I find him easy to get along with,’ Wolfe deadpanned.

  She stopped in the middle of the path and arched her brow. ‘You know what I mean.’

  He did. He just had no intention of talking about his parents.

  Stepping off the path onto the well-tended lawn, he walked a short distance and laid his palms against the trunk of an ancient pine tree. He wasn’t sure if she would follow, but then he heard her soft tread on the pine needles and felt glad that she had. ‘They say if you hold your hands against the trunk like this you can feel its secrets.’

  ‘Really?’

  She spread her fingers wide against the trunk beside his and stirred up all sorts of unwelcome responses inside his body.

  ‘What do you feel?’

  Wolfe paused, quite sure she didn’t want to hear what he was really feeling. ‘Bark.’

  She laughed and shook her head. ‘And for a minute there I thought you were going to go all deep and meaningful on me.’

  ‘Mmm, not me.’ Wolfe caught her lingering gaze and moved back to the worn path.

  ‘You grew up on a farm, didn’t you?’

  ‘Yep.’ He hoped his short answer gave away just how little he wanted to talk about his past.

  ‘What was it like?’

  No such luck...

  ‘Dusty.’

  ‘Pah!’

  He glanced at her and couldn’t help chuckling at her disgusted expression.

  ‘Do you know you close up like a crab whenever I ask you anything personal?’

  ‘Clam.’

  ‘That’s what I said.’ She studied him as if she was trying to work him out. ‘Why do you make it so hard to know you?’

  Wondering what to say to that thorny question, Wolfe was relieved when his cell phone vibrated in his pocket. He pulled it out and saw that it was his brother. ‘Excuse me, but I have to take this.’ He pressed the answer button. ‘Ad-man, what’s up?’

  His brother hesitated on the other end of the line. ‘Oh, sorry, bro. Have I caught you in the middle of a run?’

  It took Wolfe a second to understand his brother’s comment, and then he became conscious that his breathing was tense and uneven. Great. ‘Just work. Don’t tell me you’re still in the office, too?’

  ‘With you living it large in a European castle, guarding a beautiful maiden, where else would I be?’

  Wolfe told his brother he’d trade places with him in the blink of an eye but even as he said it he knew he was lying. Quickly changing the subject, he tormented his brother a little more and then ran through a few work-related issues before ringing off.

  ‘Well, that was convenient.’

  Wolfe lifted his gaze to the woman who was slowly driving him mad and realised that other than his brother she was the only person who had ever teased him about his behaviour.

  Feeling overly hot, even though the air temperature had dropped a couple of degrees, he focused on the small cluster of flowers she held in her hands, not unlike a bride waiting to walk down the aisle. Shaking off that disconcerting image, he made his voice curt when he spoke. ‘We should head back inside.’

  ‘Okay.’ She sniffed the small posy and fell into step beside him. ‘Was that your brother?’

  He thought about changing the subject, but knew if he did her interest would only grow, not wane
. ‘Yes.’

  ‘You sound close to him.’

  ‘I am.’

  ‘So, no sibling rivalry?’

  He shook his head. ‘We’re less than two years apart so we did everything together.’

  ‘Does he travel around like you?’

  ‘No. He’s based in New York.’

  ‘Does he have a wife? Kids?’

  Wolf stopped so abruptly she’d taken two more steps before she noticed.

  ‘This is starting to feel like an inquisition.’

  She shrugged one slender shoulder. ‘I’m just trying to know you a little better.’

  ‘By asking questions about my brother?’

  ‘You won’t answer questions about anything else.’

  That was because he had never seen the point in talking about himself. And, if he was completely honest, because he was starting to like her in a way that transcended the physical and that scared him. It was dangerous to bond with a client. It caused sloppy work and unrealistic attachments to develop.

  ‘Look, don’t worry about it.’ She gave him a half smile that seemed paper-thin. ‘When you’re like this...’ She gave another one of those Gallic shrugs that drove him bonkers. ‘I forget you work for my father.’

  If she had tried to wheedle information from him, or tried to make him feel guilty, he would have held his line. Faced with the stoic indifference he now knew she used to mask her true feelings, he caved. Or perhaps it was just that she looked so beautiful in the light of the crescent moon.

  ‘What do you want to know?’ he asked, not a little gruffly.

  ‘What do you want to tell me?’

  Wolfe blew out a breath. It was so typical of her to make him work for something he didn’t even want.

  ‘My father died ten years ago.’

  Ava stopped and looked at him. ‘I’m sorry. Were you close?’