Avoiding Mr Right
Sophie Weston
Man of mysteryChristina Howard has always believed that a girl should pay her own way. So when a handsome stranger offers to help her out, she can only be suspicious.And her suspicions grow as she starts working for a royal princess and the mysterious Luc Henri reappears. Is all his charm and flattering attentiveness genuinely directed toward her? Perhaps he just means to use her to get close to the royal family. But what if the man she's so determined to avoid turns out to be the one man who's right for her?
“What are you doing here?” (#uc9c5338a-ca86-5e58-9d57-fa0b65da21b9)About the Author (#u2b099e4d-8944-5582-abc8-ccc6c90aad0c)Title Page (#u27be96aa-b4b2-534b-8606-92f653f27470)CHAPTER ONE (#u397574e9-ebab-5fe9-9f63-15f83be0ea9e)CHAPTER TWO (#u8d787ee9-2d57-59cc-b1a7-d70dd82e4e3a)CHAPTER THREE (#u47a622a0-5bc6-504f-b362-bddb9470565b)CHAPTER FOUR (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
“What are you doing here?”
Luc’s eyes found hers. He smiled suddenly, brilliantly. “Reconsidering my strategy,” he said. His voice was full of that infuriating secret amusement again.
To Christina’s complete astonishment, he leaned down and slid the sunglasses down her nose so that he could speak straight into her suspicious eyes.
“Don’t look so alarmed, Christina Howard.”
He bent his head before she knew what he was about and gave her a light, searing kiss full on her startled mouth.
Then he was gone, slipping like a shadow among the shadows of the waterfront buildings. Christina stared after him. The kiss had been so brief that she was not sure whether she had conjured it up from her fevered imagination. But then she touched her throbbing lips. It was not her imagination. God knew who he was or what he wanted but, whatever it was, he was there.
Irrationally, recklessly, her heart began to sing.
Born in London, Sophie Weston is a traveler by nature who started writing when she was five. She wrote her first romance recovering from illness, thinking her traveling was over. She was wrong, but she enjoyed it so much that she has carried on. These days she lives in the heart of the city with two demanding cats and a cherry tree—and travels the world looking for settings for her stories.
Avoiding Mr Right
Sophie Weston
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
CHAPTER ONE
‘I DON’T believe it.’
Christina glared impotently at the man on the other side of the bank’s glass barrier. Behind her, she was conscious that the queue was getting impatient. Her opponent looked bored. He even shrugged.
‘It’s crazy,’ she protested.
He was adamant. ‘You should have made an arrangement. It is the rules.’ He permitted himself a complacent smirk. ‘The rules are for your own protection, Miss—er—Howard.’
There was no need for him to squint down at her cash withdrawal form like that. He and Christina had been arguing about it for fifteen minutes. He must know her name as well as she knew it herself by now.
But he was a petty official with a point to make and he was enjoying himself. He was having fun pointing out that she was thoughtless and inefficient. Still, what else could you expect from a girl? his manner said. More important, his manner also said that he was the one in control here. And that he wasn’t going to bend the rules even a little. Christina had strong views about men who liked to be in control and this man was reinforcing all of them.
‘You certainly don’t get your kicks out of helping your customers, do you?’ Christina said sweetly.
She was beaten and she knew it. But she was not going to slink away without telling him exactly what she thought of him. Her self-respect demanded it.
He looked wary. This was where, in a perfect world, the bank manager would come out of his office and say, ‘Christina, my dear girl, why didn’t you tell me?’ and sweep her off triumphant, leaving the petty clerk quaking. She sighed, shaking out her soft brown mane of hair. This was not a perfect world. She had never known any bank managers.
‘Do you want me to put in a request for the money or not, Miss Howard?’ he said sharply. No groping for her name this time, she noticed. Her indignation had rattled him that much at least. It was not much of a victory but it was something.
The shuffling feet behind her were beginning to sound like the percussion section of an orchestra.
‘Oh, very well,’ she said.
‘Then fill out this form. And this.’
‘More forms? But I’ve already...’
He was back in control. He smirked. ‘We have to check. It is in your own interest. It—’ He stopped under her withering stare.
‘Don’t tell me,’ Christina said drily. ‘It’s the rules. OK, then. Give me the beastly form.’
He gave her two. She bent to fill them out, scribbling with swift efficiency. The woman behind her sighed in resignation, but the clerk looked briefly impressed at the speed with which Christina completed the task.
‘Thank you,’ he said.
He took them back, applied stamps of various sorts to every conceivable space and handed her back a small sliver of paper with two—or was it three?—stamps on it.
‘Come back tomorrow.’
Christina surveyed him cynically.
‘You must think I’m a fool. If you’re going through this rigmarole, the money won’t be here inside a week.’
He had the grace to blush. But he shrugged again. ‘You never know.’
‘Oh, I know,’ Christina said bitterly. ‘I’ve met bureaucrats before.’
Hurriedly he pushed some more paper at her. These looked like brochures of some sort. She picked them up absently, still glaring at him.
He tried a winning smile. ‘You could always transfer your account to this branch.’
Christina gave him an incredulous look. His smile faltered. He shuffled papers importantly and tried to sound efficient. ‘Yes, well, we’ll contact you when your money comes through, Miss Howard.’
‘You won’t,’ she said positively.
He looked affronted. ‘I assure you—’
‘You won’t be able to. If you’d read one of those eighteen forms you’ve just made me fill out in triplicate, you’d see I haven’t got an address in Athens yet,’ she pointed out. ‘So I’ll contact you.’
‘I look forward to it,’ he said with patent untruth.
Christina did not deign to reply. She turned away from the counter. The queue came to life again. The woman behind her went up to the glass barrier but the clerk was still looking after the long-legged English girl with the fly-away, sun-streaked hair and the Mediterranean tan.
‘Oh, Miss Howard,’ he called.
Christina turned. Another form? But no. He had remembered his courtesy code, at last.
‘Have a nice day.’
‘Grr,’ said Christina.
She stormed out of the bank.
In fact she stormed so comprehensively that she let the revolving door swing hard, almost into the face of the man following her. The polite official accompanying him leaped to field the door. He looked shocked.
The man’s eyes, however, contemplated the departing Christina with amused appreciation. Both men had witnessed the end of her altercation with the clerk.
‘Monsieur!’ exclaimed the official. He was clearly anxious to defuse the honoured customer’s justified indignation.
But the honoured customer was not paying attention. He was still looking after the slim figure storming through the crowd. His expression was a curious mixture of appreciation and regret. The official, who had known him a long time, felt a twinge of sympathy. He wiped all expression from his face, however, and bowed his customer through the door.
Christina was oblivious as she steamed out into the diamond-hard light of an Athenian morning. She was furious.
The money was hers, not the bank’s. It represented hours of hard work, sometimes backbreaking work. She was proud of that. And now the bank would not let her get at it! She went to the edge of the pavement and stared across the gleaming, steaming, evil-smelling ribbon of metal and fumes that was Athens’s morning traffic jam. The fine temper which had sustained her so far drained away abruptly. If she admitted it, Christina thought wryly, she was as much worried as angry.
The honoured customer, strolling out of the bank, caught sight of Christina hesitating on the pavement. On the point of summoning a car, his hand fell. He looked at her tense figure quizzically.
Christina remained unaware. She pushed the soft, straight hair back from her brow with fingers which shook a little. The man saw that tell-tale tremor. His eyes sharpened.
He hesitated for a moment. Then, with a shrug, he strolled across to her.
‘Are you all right?’
Christina jumped at the voice. The words were pleasant enough but the tone was impatient. She turned, her brown hair swinging.
She found that she was being addressed by a tall man in an immaculate biscuit-coloured suit. She did not know anyone who wore suits of that faultless cut. Or who spoke to her with that abrupt harshness, as if in spite of himself.
‘What?’ she asked blankly.
The man raised an eyebrow, unsmiling. ‘You seem a little agitated.’
He was definitely a stranger. From his quick, impatient tones, he seemed as if he could hardly wait to get away from her. And yet... Christina took off her sunglasses the better to see him in the dense shadow of the building behind them. She scanned him candidly.
It was a powerful face rather than a handsome one. He was taller than Christina, who counted herself a tall woman. He was so dark that his skin was almost swarthy. His hair was equally dark. In the brilliant morning it looked black, springing back from a wide, proud brow. Added to that was a strong, imperious nose, a firm jaw, a sculpted mouth in which discipline warred with sensuality, and steeply lidded, sleepy eyes.
He was a seriously sexy man, Christina thought. The attraction blasted out at her like heat from the open door of a furnace. For a moment it took her breath away.
Christina was startled. She did not normally think in those terms. In fact, though she had been good friends with a number of men in the last six years, she could not remember her first reaction to one ever being that little jump of the pulses that acknowledged his masculinity. It immediately made her feel feminine and, somehow, vulnerable.
Her cornflower-blue eyes widened. The thought was not a welcome one. Vulnerability meant weakness, and Christina was not weak. She had worked very hard to win strength and independence and, as she was of her bank balance, she was proud of it.
‘Agitated?’ she echoed faintly.
He smiled suddenly. It was a dazzling smile.
‘Well, you nearly ruined my Roman profile with the revolving door back there,’ he told her. He indicated the fashionable offices of the bank they had both just left.
Christina jumped. She even blushed faintly. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t realize. I mean, I didn’t see you.’
She was floundering under his gaze. Now she came to look at him, she saw that he did not look impatient at all. He looked sleepy—and appreciative. She pulled herself together.
‘I was a bit preoccupied,’ she admitted, trying to sound cool and unmoved. “They said I couldn’t have my own money. I’m afraid I lost my temper.’
The man gave a soft laugh. ‘I saw. Or, at least, I caught the end of it. You seem to have justification.’
Christina was rueful. ‘Justification possibly, but I am sure I would have done better to keep my temper. After I started banging the counter that man lost any faint interest he might have had in helping me.’
The man’s mouth twitched. ‘Understandable,’ he murmured.
Christina raised her shoulders in an impatient shrug. ‘Yes, I suppose so. Doesn’t help me, though. The bank will make damn sure that the whole beastly, bureaucratic process takes as long as possible now. I could see it in that clerk’s eyes.’
The man smiled again. It packed a charge, that smile, Christina thought, startled. She blinked.
‘Maybe he just wanted to make sure you keep coming back,’ he suggested. ‘You certainly brighten the place up.’
Christina shook her head. She was feeling a little dazed.
She said in some confusion. ‘Oh, I don’t think so. He just thought I was being unreasonable.’
‘You were,’ he told her with brutal frankness. ‘The clerk behind the counter doesn’t make the rules, you know.’
Christina sniffed. ‘He didn’t have to gloat over hitting me with them.’
The stranger looked amused. ‘How do you know he was gloating? Perhaps he was just embarrassed.’
‘He didn’t look embarrassed.’
He raised his brows. ‘No, maybe not. He has his dignity to consider. But, believe me—’ his voice was full of irony ‘—the last thing a man wants to do is to say no to a beautiful woman. It goes against nature.’
Christina blinked. Beautiful? The compliment was faintly challenging. She met his eyes, bewildered, and saw that they were dancing.
Hurriedly she said, ‘I needn’t have shouted, I suppose. Anyway I’ve paid for my bad temper. It means I now have twenty dollars to last me the week.’
This time the man’s brows hit his hairline. ‘Good grief.’
Christina gave a sudden laugh. It was a warm, bubbly laugh and it was infectious. A woman passing with a small child sent her a harassed smile in response. But the stranger did not smile. Instead his eyes narrowed. For a moment the handsome face was completely blank.
‘Can you survive on that?’ he asked, shooting the question at her like an accusation.
Christina shrugged. ‘I don’t know,’ she said frankly.
He seemed to take a decision.
‘I want to know more about this. I will buy you a coffee while we discuss it.’
Christina did hesitate at that. She looked at him assessingly. In spite of his invitation, in spite of the blazing charm of his smile, she had the sense that he was behaving out of character, and that he was, at some level, almost angry with himself.
It was oddly reassuring. Not that the stranger looked like a cruising Romeo. If he had, thought Christina, she would not have wasted a minute on him. Even if appearances proved deceptive, she could handle it. She was a modern girl and she could keep the masculine desire for flirtation well under control. Still, desire for coffee warred with her habitual dislike of doing what someone else ordered her to do. Coffee won, but only just.
‘Thank you,’ she said. She could not disguise her faint annoyance.
He had observed her debate.
‘Although you don’t usually take coffee with perfect strangers?’ His lips twitched suddenly. ‘I feel I should thank you,’ he remarked. ‘A salutary experience, believe me. This way, I think.’
He took her by the elbow. It was a light hold, barely more than the touch of his fingertips on her bare arm, but Christina was conscious of it through her whole body. She looked at him sideways, startled. The man seemed unaware of the effect he was having on her. Perhaps it was the effect he had on every woman and he was used to it. That tingle certainly did not seem to be mutual, Christina thought wryly. He looked completely unmoved.
He took her to one of the fashionable cafés that Christina would never normally have gone to on her own. Even when she had plenty of cash in her money belt, she restricted herself to the places where students and young, footloose travellers went. But the man looked as if he had never strayed off the wide boulevards in his life. He had the air of one to whom luxury was commonplace.
Watching him from under her eyelashes, Christina realised how right she had been about his elegance. The light-coloured, lightweight suit was virtually creaseless, in spite of the city battering it must have taken this morning. His shirt looked crisp and fresh and the tie he wore was, from its stained-glass colours, real silk.
Final confirmation, if it were needed, was provided by the waiter. The cafe was full of smartly dressed women with shiny, exclusive carrier bags and besuited men in groups, clattering sugar spoons and worry beads with equal vigour.
Nevertheless, Christina and her unknown companion were led immediately to the best table under the striped awning. It was close to a small orange tree in a pot, whose perfumed flowers almost succeeded in masking the fumes of combustion engines.
At first Christina thought that this was simply the waiter’s professional recognition of a wealthy man. But when he addressed her companion as ‘Monsieur’ she realised that he did, indeed, know him.
Her companion seated her, before sitting himself in the comfortable basketwork chair at right angles to her.
He looked up at the waiter and spoke in quick, idiomatic Greek. He did not speak it like a Frenchman. Christina, whose command of the language was still imperfect even after five years of summer jobs in the country, listened with mixed admiration and dudgeon.
The waiter wrote down the order and left with a small bow. She noted it particularly. Waiters at pavement cafés, even on the fashionable boulevards, seldom bowed to their customers. She would have demanded an explanation but there was another matter to be dealt with first.
‘How did you know I wanted coffee and croissants?’ she demanded as soon as the waiter had gone. ‘You didn’t ask. I am old enough to do my own ordering, you know.’
The man leaned back in his chair, very much at his ease, one arm resting negligently along the curved basketwork arm. Oh, yes, this was a man to whom comfort was an automatic expectation, unworthy of comment. He looked amused at her belligerence.
‘But why should you? It was my pleasure.’ His tone was suave. ‘You had already said yes to coffee. And I assume, if funds are low, that any sustenance will be welcome.’ He flicked a glance at his heavy wrist-watch. ‘At this time you will not get a full English breakfast, I’m afraid, even here. And it is too soon for lunch. I thought croissants and pastries would fill the gap acceptably while we discuss what to do next.’
She had to admit that she could not fault his reasoning, or withstand that look of wicked amusement which invited her to share it. But Christina went down fighting.
‘If they bring me Greek coffee as sweet as barley sugar, I’ll get up and leave,’ she threatened.
He laughed aloud then. ‘It’s a deal.’
But when it came the coffee was filtered Colombian with an aroma that was a sensual experience all on its own. Christina closed her eyes and inhaled a scent of wood smoke, she tasted walnuts and heard the chink of brandy glasses at the end of a cordon bleu meal—and all from the warm fumes that wafted up from the cup between her palms.
She sighed in pure, sensuous appreciation. She opened her eyes and met his glance across the table. The brown eyes were dancing.
‘Leaving?’ he asked softly.
Christina sighed. ‘Coffee is possibly my greatest weakness,’ she said in resignation.
His mouth slanted. ‘I wish I enjoyed my weaknesses with such abandon.’
For no reason she could think of, Christina found her eyes falling away from his. ‘I’ll stay,’ she said hurriedly.
She thanked the waiter in careful Greek. It made him smile as he placed iced water at her elbow and put a basket of freshly baked croissants wrapped in a linen napkin in the middle of the table. It also, she saw out of the corner of her eyes with some satisfaction, raised her companion’s eyebrows.
‘So coffee’s your greatest weakness. That seems a waste.’ He pushed an elegant cream jug and sugar bowl across the table towards her. ‘It doesn’t leave much opportunity for sin,’ he observed softly.
Christina decided that she did not want to explore the implications of that. She pushed the hair back from her brow, running her fingers through the newly washed softness absently.
‘Enough,’ she said, eyeing him warily.
His smile grew, but he did not answer. It left her feeling slightly uneasy.
She helped herself to cream. He took his own coffee black, she saw, with several spoonfuls of sugar. She raised her brows as the third spoonful went in. He chuckled.
‘An old Latin American habit,’ he murmured. ‘My Brazilian uncle used to say coffee should be black as night, hot as hell and sweet as love.’
‘Oh,’ said Christina taken aback.
She pushed the sugar bowl away from her hurriedly. Without knowing why it did, she felt the warm blood rising under her tan. She was not normally given to blushing and it annoyed her. She took a cooling sip of the ice-cold water that the waiter had brought with her coffee and struggled to appear unmoved.
‘Is that where you come from? Latin America? I thought you were French,’ she said, determined to shift him out of dangerous territory into polite conversation.
She suspected that he detected her ploy. His eyes crinkled a little at the corners with what might have been secret laughter, but she could not be sure.
He said gravely, ‘Oh, I’ve got French uncles as well. My ancestry is a complete cocktail. It’s a long story. I won’t bore you with it.’
So it was not a subject open for conversation. That made Christina even more uneasy, for some reason. She allowed her dissatisfaction to appear.
He hesitated briefly she thought, before adding, ‘I suppose I should introduce myself. I am Luc Henri.’
There was an odd, loaded pause. He looked at her expectantly, even challengingly. Christina was surprised. Was she supposed to know his name? It meant nothing to her—except that it was obviously French.
She wondered suddenly if any of the other people in the busy café knew him. She looked round. There had been several covert glances in their direction from the elegantly dressed women shoppers.
They were envious glances, Christina realised now. So she was not the only one to rock back on her heels under the impact of that electric attraction. It was a small comfort.
She considered him anew. With a little shock, it was borne in on her that her companion had to be the most attractive man she had ever seen. Certainly he was the most attractive man in the café by a fair margin.
She said slowly. ‘Luc Henri? Should that mean something to me?’
The sleepy eyes laughed at her. ‘I hope not.’
That startled her. ‘What? Why?’
He leaned back in the chair, the morning light glinting on the blue-black hair, turning it into the sleek pelt of a jaguar. It also glinted, Christina saw wryly, on the heavy watch, which was probably gold, and the discreet cuff-links which certainly were. His mouth curved as he looked at her.
‘It is a rare experience to talk to a woman whose greatest weakness is coffee,’ he said smoothly. ‘I think we should keep this encounter of ours out of space and time. Then it can retain its rarity.’
Christina put her head on one side.
‘You mean we won’t meet again so we can afford to be honest with each other?’ she interpreted.
He looked startled. ‘You’re very acute.’
She gave a bubbling laugh. It made his lips twitch responsively.
‘I just like to know where I stand.’ She put her elbows on the table and steepled her hands, propping her chin on them while she considered him. ‘Of course, I could tell you a complete fantasy. You would never know.’
Luc Henri looked entertained. ‘Are you going to?’
Christina looked mischievous. ‘It’s a temptation,’ she admitted. She let her blue eyes go dreamy. ‘I could be—oh, a coffee planter’s daughter.’
He put back his head and laughed aloud at that. It was a deep, warm sound, like a cello. It seemed to set up some deep echo in Christina. She tingled with it. It was not unpleasant but it gave her an unexpected sense of danger, as if she had walked round an ordinary corner and found herself standing on a precipice.
Startled, she sat upright and stopped playing a game she did not understand.
‘On second thoughts, it’s probably better not to get carried away,’ she said wryly. ‘I’m Christina Howard.’
She extended her hand briskly across the table. Luc Henri took it and, to her astonishment, turned it over and inspected its ringless state. His fingers were long and cool. Christina gave a little private shiver at his touch.
Fortunately he did not seem to notice. He shook her hand equally briskly and returned it to her.
‘And what are you doing in Greece, Miss Howard? Apart from waiting for funds, of course.’
She acknowledged the dry comment with a smile. She sipped her coffee.
‘A tourist?’ he prompted.
Christina was affronted. Her Greek was not that bad. ‘Of course not. I work.’
There was a small pause while he surveyed her. An odd little smile played about his mouth. ‘I see I have offended you. Should I apologise?’
He did not look as if he often apologised, Christina thought. She did not say it. She did not have to. Luc Henri laughed softly.
‘There are so many of the young, beautiful and indigent in Athens. All students who think they can live on air and the classics while they see the sights of Ancient Greece. You seemed to qualify.’
Their eyes met. Christina had the sudden sensation that the precipice had begun to fall away under her feet. And he had called her beautiful again!
She said breathlessly, ‘I’m not such a fool.’
He looked sceptical.
She insisted, ‘I’m not. I’m short of money because my bank has messed things up, nothing more. I’m not a student. I’m a practical woman. I’ve never tried to live on air and—and whatever it was in my life.’
‘The classics,’ he murmured.
His eyes were crinkling up at the corners most decidedly now. He looked as if he was enjoying himself. ‘I apologise. What do you—er—work at?’
Christina grinned suddenly. ‘I’m a deckhand.’
That shook him as it was intended to do. He blinked.
‘A—?’ He shook his head and took a mouthful of his coffee. Then he shook his head again. ‘It’s no good. I thought you said a deckhand.’
‘I did.’
His jaw did not quite drop but the blank look on his face was rewarding. Well pleased with this reaction, Christina helped herself to a buttery croissant, pulled the corner off and chewed with enjoyment.
‘But—why?’
‘Now that’s as long a story as your ancestry,’ she said demurely.
The dark face showed brief incredulity, as if he was not used to being denied what he wanted to know. His brows twitched together. ‘Are you suggesting a trade, Christina Howard?’
She looked innocent. He was not deceived.
‘My family tree for your extraordinary career choice?’
‘Well, I don’t tell people normally. And you obviously don’t talk about your family,’ she pointed out.
He seemed amused—suddenly, deeply amused. ‘So it would be a fair trade? Well, I see your point. And certainly I don’t normally talk about my family. You are quite right about that.’
His shoulders shook a little. Christina’s faint suspicions grew.
‘Are you sure I shouldn’t know you?’ she demanded.
He shook his head, his eyes brimming with that private laughter.
‘Then—’
‘Your career,’ he interrupted firmly. ‘Tell.’
Christina set her jaw. ‘You first. You might chicken out.’
‘O ye of little faith,’ he mourned. But his mouth still looked as if he was laughing inside. ‘Very well. My mother was French. My grandfather was a mad explorer and he dragged his family along with him wherever he went. My aunt Monique married a Brazilian tennis player who lived half his life in the jungle with remote Indian tribes. Very dashing and just possibly a touch madder than my grandfather. At least, that’s what my father used to say.’
‘And what is he—your father I mean?’
A brief sadness touched his face. ‘Was, I’m afraid.’
‘I’m sorry,’ murmured Christina.
It was clear that he had liked his father.
‘Was he an explorer too?’
‘No.’ He seemed to bring himself back out of the past. ‘No, he was more of—well, you would call him an administrator, I suppose.’
‘Civil servant,’ interpreted Christina.
Luc Henri looked startled. Then his lips twitched. ‘You could call him that, certainly.’
‘And you? Explorer or civil servant? Or neither?’
‘That wasn’t in the bargain,’ he protested. But he answered readily enough. ‘Civil servant, definitely. Explorers have horribly uncomfortable lives. I like to be comfortable.’
But there was something about the way he said it—to say nothing of the broad set of his muscular shoulders—that made Christina suspect that she was being teased again. She was not sure she liked it.
He turned compelling eyes on her. ‘And you? How did you become a deckhand?’
‘Oh; that’s easy. It was a bid for freedom.’
He looked astonished. ‘I have heard much about sailing but I’ve never heard that anyone but the owner of the boat had much freedom.’
Christina looked at him with new respect. ‘You’re right there,’ she agreed.
‘But it was still freedom for you? Were you escaping from a convent?’
She shook her head, laughing. ‘Very nearly. A polite girls’ school. Have you ever been to one?’
His eyes danced. ‘I’m afraid not.’
‘Don’t be afraid. It’s not an experience to be envied.’
‘If it was so bad why didn’t your parents take you away?’
‘Parent,’ Christina corrected him swiftly. ‘She thought I was jolly lucky getting a scholarship to a school where the girls passed lots of exams. She could never have afforded to send me there without it. And I didn’t tell her. Anyway it wasn’t bad. Just boring.’
‘More boring than a deckhand’s life?’ he asked, a cynical note in his voice.
Christina gave him a straight look. ‘Deckhands travel. Until I came out here all the travelling I ever did was the journey to and from school.’ She took another mouthful of croissant. ‘But school was a long time ago.’
‘Not that long,’ he said drily.
Christina shook her head. ‘Don’t be deceived,’ she said calmly. ‘I’m older than I look.’
‘That’s just as well. You look about twelve at the moment,’ he said.
He leaned forward and brushed a flake of sweet pastry from her chin. Christina choked. He sat back, his eyes glinting.
‘There. Back with the adults again.’
She was blushing. ‘Thank you. Very kind of you,’ she said furiously, not meaning a word of it.
He did not pretend to misunderstand. He laughed. ‘My pleasure. So you ran away to sea twenty years ago. How have you lived since then?’
Christina sniffed. ‘I earn a decent living.’ She scowled at the sweet roll in her hand. ‘At least, I do when the bank lets me get at my money.’
Luc Henri shook his head. ‘Who on earth is mad enough to employ a girl like you as a deckhand?’
‘I’m perfectly competent,’ she flung at him, annoyed.
His eyes caught and held hers. He had extraordinary eyelashes, she saw now—thick and dark, defining those brilliant eyes like a painter’s charcoal line.
‘And perfectly beautiful,’ he returned softly.
Christina caught her breath. Again! She stiffened slightly. Her eyes slid away from his.
‘You should see me in my working clothes,’ she said, her voice a little strained.
‘I am imagining it.’ His voice was dry. ‘I’d be amazed if the rest of the crew do any work at all.’
Christina sat even straighter. ‘I don’t have affairs with colleagues,’ she said bluntly.
He looked amused. ‘Then who do you have affairs with?’
‘I don’t—’ she began heatedly and stopped herself at once, but it was too late. She had given herself away. He made no attempt to hide his triumph. His eyes gleamed with it.
‘Don’t you? I find that very interesting.’
Christina fought down a blush and regarded him with exasperation. ‘If you say I ought to, a beautiful girl like me, I shall scream,’ she told him.
His lips twitched. ‘I’m not that unsubtle.’
‘You surprise me,’ she said sarcastically.
Luc Henri’s slim brows lifted. ‘Because I pay you compliments you’re not used to?’
‘How do you know—?’ She bit the sentence off—too late again. This time she was furious with herself.
The look he gave her was almost tender.
‘Women who are used to receiving compliments don’t ignore them,’ he explained kindly. ‘You aren’t and you do. At least you try to. How old are you, Christina?’
‘Twenty-three,’ she flung at him.
He smiled. ‘You surprise me,’ he mimicked.
Christina ground her teeth.
‘Now tell me about these boats you work on.’
Christina tossed her head. ‘Private yachts mostly. Or tourist boats taking people scuba-diving. I’m good. I can get as much work as I want.’
‘And you earn enough to keep yourself?’
She gave her bubbling laugh suddenly. ‘When the bank lets me get at it.’
He looked at her curiously. ‘But surely it’s seasonal? What do you do in the winter?’
Christina gave a small, private smile. Here was an opportunity to get some of her own back at last. “That’s my business.’
She found that he was watching her; a frown between his brows. He did not seem to have noticed that she had balked him. He looked as if he was in a quandary—and that he was not going to tell her about it.
‘You’re an odd girl,’ he said abruptly.
‘Woman,’ she corrected him.
His mouth twisted suddenly. ‘An even odder woman. I wonder—? No.’
She was not going to ask. She was not even going to think of asking.
She took a mouthful of croissant. ‘Not that odd,’ she said calmly. ‘I work, I eat, I sleep like everyone else.’
The steeply lidded eyes lifted. ‘How wrong you are,’ he said quietly. ‘Not like anyone else I’ve ever known.’
It was not said provocatively but Christina straightened sharply. Her eyes locked with his. Challenge sizzled in the air between them. Luc went very still.
After a long moment she said, almost at random, ‘You don’t know me.’
His eyes still held hers. ‘Do I not?’
She shivered suddenly. ‘No.’ Her voice was sharp. ‘No, you don’t. This is an encounter out of space and time. Remember?’
He said softly, ‘You’re scared of me, Christina.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous. Of course I’m not. I can take care of myself. I’m not scared of you or anyone.’
Luc looked at her for a moment. ‘If you’re not scared of me, what does scare you?’
She seized another mouthful of croissant and chewed it, avoiding his eyes. ‘I told you, I’m not scared.’
‘Then why won’t you look at me?’
Christina choked. ‘You’re imagining it.’ She met his eyes with a candour which cost her a lot of self-control. ‘Look, I’m not scared of being alone in the city with nowhere to stay tonight. What makes you more scary than that?’
There was an odd look in his eyes. ‘You tell me.’
‘You’re imagining it,’ Christina said again, too loudly.
Several of the other customers looked up, startled. The man at the next table was so surprised that he knocked over his glass of water. He dropped his Wall Street Journal and the liquid began to soak into it. He looked wretchedly uncomfortable as the waiter ran to mop the table.
Christina, who had been aware of the man’s gaze on them for some time, was not displeased. ‘Now he’ll have to find something else to pretend to do while he eavesdrops,’ she said.
Luc Henri’s eyes passed over the dark-suited, middle-aged man without interest.
‘Eavesdrops? I think you must be mistaken. He’s probably waiting for someone.’
She shook her head.
‘No. He came in not long after us and chose this table deliberately. He’s just been pretending to read that newspaper. He didn’t turn the pages once.’
A shade of annoyance crossed Luc Henri’s face. But all he said was, ‘Then he can’t have had a very entertaining morning.’
He looked at his watch, then raised a finger at the waiter for the bill.
‘Thank you for my breakfast,’ Christina said at once, retreating into formal manners. ‘I ought to be going.’
At once he said imperiously, ‘No.’
She paused, one eyebrow raised at his tone.
He smiled faintly. ‘At least let me lend you some money to cover tonight’s lodging.’
Christina looked at him levelly. ‘Lend? You mean give, don’t you, if we’re not going to meet again?’
Luc stared at her, his brows twitching together. He said something explosive under his breath. It did not sound polite. ‘I can afford it.’
‘Ah, but can I?’ she retorted.
His look was quizzical suddenly. ‘No strings.’
Christina’s heart missed a beat. She shook her head decisively. ‘Thank you, no. I should be able to crash on someone’s floor tonight. It won’t take long to get a job. I’ll ask around the waterfront cafés tonight.’
He said quickly, ‘Think of me as a brother. I would hope someone would do as much for my sister—or my niece when she’s older.’
Christina looked at him levelly. ‘I don’t feel like your sister. Or your nice.’
A little flame leaped into his eyes. She saw that she had made a mistake. She pushed her coffee-cup away from her and stood up quickly.
‘I’m grateful for the offer, truly I am. But when I set out on my own I promised myself I’d pay my bills as I went. I always do. So, thank you, but no.’ She held out her hand. ‘It’s been interesting meeting you. Have a nice life.’
He stood up as well. His face was thunderous suddenly. If she had been his employee she would have quailed at that expression, she thought. She was grateful that she did not work for him.
Luc’s face darkened. He flicked open his wallet and pulled out a thick sandwich of notes.
‘Don’t be stupid,’ he said curtly. ‘Take the money.’
The man at the next table did not know where to look. Out of the corner of her eye Christina caught his expression—half wretchedly embarrassed, half fascinated. She found that she sympathised with him. Luc Henri clearly was sublimely unaware of the scene he was making, or did not care what people thought of him. In contrast, the poor man at the next table was acutely aware of both. It made her all the more furious with Luc Henri.
She leaned forward across the table, glaring. ‘Try listening. I am not your sister,’ she hissed.
‘If you were I would have drilled some sense into you by now,’ Luc Henri flung back between his teeth. He was clearly in a right royal rage and saw no reason to curb his temper.
‘You don’t surprise me in the least,’ Christina said with poisonous sweetness. ‘“sense” being anything that agrees with you, I take it?’
He drew an angry breath. Then, even as she watched him, she saw him catch hold of his retort and wrestle it down like a man struggling with a wild animal. He closed his lips tight on whatever it was he had been going to say.
‘You are an education, Miss Howard. My powers of argument seem to be deserting me,’ he said thinly at last. ‘Please be sensible...’
Christina stood her ground. ‘Don’t patronise me,’ she said quietly.
They stood sizing each other up over the table like duellists. Then he smiled. It was not one of his dazzling smiles. It was more like an insult.
‘You needn’t worry that I’d expect payment in kind,’ Luc Henri drawled. ‘Women come to me of their own free will.’
The man at the next table gasped. So did Christina. She felt her face flame. It did not sweeten her temper one iota. But it made her forget briefly that they were in a public place and that, unlike her arrogant opponent, she minded making a spectacle of herself. The anger coursed through her like a forest fire, but she wiped the expression off her face and gave him her most demure smile.
Leaning forward, she twitched the notes out of his hand. The man at the next table shuddered and backed his chair away with a scream of steel-tipped legs across the concrete.
Luc Henri’s eyes had narrowed to slits.
‘Not me,’ Christina said gently.
The narrowed eyes dared her, blatantly. Christina smiled. She stepped back and, with a quick little movement, tossed the notes high, high up into the air.
They were still falling on the startled patrons as she threaded her way between the tables and left.
CHAPTER TWO
CHRISTINA plunged along the street, her heart beating furiously. How dared he? Oh, how dared he? Interfering! Ordering her around! Lecturing her as if he were the head of the family and she a tiresome teenager! Pressing his money on her as if she were some scatterbrain who did not know where she was going to sleep tonight! As if he had the right!
Here her outraged musings brought her up short. The interfering Mr Luc Henri might not have any right to lecture her but there was no doubt that in one way he was right. She had not got anywhere to stay tonight. Christina grinned suddenly. She would end up on a bench in the bus station if she did not start making some calls right now.
In spite of Luc Henri’s patent scepticism, it was not difficult. Christina was a girl who took friendship seriously and people responded in kind.
Sue Stanley was waiting, the door already open by the time Christina arrived at the top of the steep stairs to her studio. They hugged. She yawned widely.
‘Oh, hell,’ said Christina in quick comprehension. ‘Night shift last night?’
She was a nurse. She nodded and led the way inside.
‘I’m sorry.’ Christina was remorseful. ‘I didn’t mean to get you out of bed.’
Sue chuckled. ‘Somebody has to. Mr Right still hasn’t put in an appearance.’ She hefted Christina’s bag squashily onto a rough wooden chair and led the way to the small kitchen. ‘What about you?’
Christina made a face. Her mother had spent half her life waiting for Mr Right to come and rescue her from the problems of everyday life. Meanwhile it had been her young daughter who had tried to manage their disorganised life, until her mother had died. The experience had given Christina a strong distaste even for joking about that mythical beast.
Sue knew her very well. She grinned. ‘No guy made a dint in the armour yet?’
‘And not likely to.’
Sue shook her head. ‘You’ll find out one day,’ she prophesied.
For no reason at all that she could think of, Luc Henri’s imperious face slipped into Christina’s mind. She remembered that odd, intent look in his eyes. Involuntarily she shivered a little. It was not an unpleasurable shiver.
That startled her. Luc Henri had nothing to do with her, she reminded herself. She would never see him again. She did not even want to see him again. Did she?
She said with less than her usual calm, ‘That’s nonsense and you know it.’
The balcony was a blaze of coral and scarlet geraniums in terracotta tubs. Sue led the way outside. Christina sank down onto the top step of the fire escape and looked round with pleasure.
She found Sue was looking at her measuringly. ‘Who is he?’
Christina stiffened faintly. ‘Who is who?’
She had first worked with Christina three years before on a boat attached to an archaeological expedition. All through the summer they had shared their confidences, their crises and their nail scissors. As a result they knew each other very well.
Now Sue was looking at her shrewdly. ‘Whoever kicked you out this morning.’
Christina relaxed again. ‘You’re on the wrong track, Sue. I came off a boat, that’s all. Then I found the bank wouldn’t let me have any cash until the weekend.’
She stared. ‘You? But you’re always so efficient about money.’
‘The bank seems to be less so—some administrative hitch,’ Christina said drily.
Sue could believe it, though she was less convinced that a man was not the cause of Christina’s present predicament. She said so.
To her own, furious incomprehension, Christina blushed. Sue did not even pretend not to notice. ‘I knew it,’ she said gleefully. ‘Tell me, what’s he like?’
‘You’re not exactly tactful,’ Christina complained.
Which of course convinced Sue that her deductions were correct. ‘Oh, tact,’ she said dismissively. ‘No fun in that. Tell me about this dangerous heartthrob of yours.’
In spite of herself Christina laughed. ‘Why would he be dangerous?’
‘If he wasn’t dangerous, you wouldn’t notice him,’ Sue told her with brutal honesty.
Christina was a little shocked. Disturbed too at how well Sue seemed to know her.
‘What do you mean?’
Her friend sighed. ‘Chris, I’ve seen it too often. Most of the time you just don’t seem to notice. Strong men paw the ground with lust and you treat them like brothers. Or another girlfriend.’
Christina was moved to protest. ‘Nonsense.’
‘It isn’t, you know. A man is only going to get you to notice him if he picks you up by your pigtails and hauls you off to his lair.’ She sighed. ‘You’ll get it too.’ She sounded envious.
It did not amuse Christina. Sue saw it and, good friend that she was, stopped teasing.
‘Nothing to do with me if you like your men dangerous. Anyway, I can’t sit out here in the sun all day. I’ve got to get to the market before all the decent vegetables go. Make yourself at home.’
She went. She left Christina restless and uneasy.
Was Sue right? And if so, why had she never said it before? Had the encounter with Luc Henri, brief as it had been, awakened something dormant in Christina which Sue, who knew her so well, recognised? It was not a palatable thought.
It had to be nonsense, of course. He was a high-handed man who was used to having his own way. She hardly knew him. What she did know she didn’t like. It was a relief to know that she was highly unlikely to meet him again. And yet...
There had been something, hadn’t there? Something between them, tense but unspoken. Something she had never felt before. It had made her tingle when he’d looked at her, so that she’d been aware of him to her bones. Christina’s mouth dried as she thought about it.
This would never do. Life had to be managed. It was no good letting yourself be distracted by fantasies of a man you did not even know.
She armed herself with a pen and her address book, installed herself at the pay-phone in the dark little hall and began the business of managing her life again. Nobody offered her a job on the spot but she got enough tentative interest to restore her spirits. It almost succeeded in banishing Luc Henri’s disturbing image.
When Sue came back with her purchases the evening breeze was beginning to stir the hot city air. Christina was on the balcony. She had pulled on a cotton top and her long, bare legs were already turning to their habitual summer gold. Sue came to the French window and looked down at her.
‘You look wonderful.’ She sighed, flopping onto the sill. ‘I wish I was a natural blonde with legs to my eyebrows.’
Christina scrambled up. ‘No, you don’t. It wouldn’t go with your wardrobe. Coffee?’
‘I’d sell what’s left of my soul for some.’
‘You’ve got it.’
She went inside and busied herself with the ancient percolator.
Sue called out, ‘Any luck with jobs?’
‘There’s a four-day tour to Ancient Sites that needs a guide. Not really my scene but if I can’t get anything else...’
‘Did that take all day?’
Christina took Sue’s coffee out to her and sank onto the fire escape, cross-legged.
‘No. I did a few sketches.’
‘The Christina beachwear collection?’
The teasing was affectionate. Sue knew all about Christina’s Italian course in design and how seriously she took it. She worked at it in the winter, using the proceeds of her summer jobs to pay the substantial fees and her modest living costs.
Now Christina grinned. ‘Maybe. The sun out here is certainly inspirational.’
Sue stretched. ‘Mmm. I love this place. With sun like this who needs to work?’
‘Those who like to eat,’ said Christina prosaically. ‘Speaking of which, I ought to go down to the harbour tonight. I might pick up a job from one of the captains.’
She looked at Sue apologetically. They both knew that that was where masters looking for crews were likely to be found. Yet it seemed rude to go out and leave her friend the first night she was staying with her. Sue read her mind easily. She grinned at her over the rim of the mug.
‘Fine. I’ll even come with you. As long as you’re not on your own, the harbour’s fun. I can do with some fun to set me up for my next stint at the hospital.’ She stretched again. ‘I need to shower and change. Then, look out, Athens.’
They did not get to the harbour area till ten. The night was clear but crisp this early in the season. A few of the fiercer stars shone through in spite of the competition from neon streetlighting and the smog bubble engendered by the city. The cafés were loud with talk and recorded music. The smell of barbecued meat, garlic, wine and humanity filled the dusty streets.
‘Mmm,’ said Christina with pleasure. ‘Costa’s first, I think. Lots of the captains hang out there. Aldo Marino may be looking for a crew, Jackie said.’
Christina was well-known in Costa’s busy little café. As they threaded their way between the wooden tables, several of the diners raised a hand in greeting. Costa himself interrupted his work to greet Christina with a smacking kiss.
‘Aldo? Don’t think so,’ Costa told them. He went back to shovelling Greek salad busily into individual bowls without stopping. ‘There’s always Demetrius.’ He nodded in the direction of a morose-looking man at a corner table. ‘If you’re desperate,’ he added frankly.
‘You’re not that desperate,’ Sue said firmly. ‘The man’s a cheapskate. Skimps on everything.’
At the back of the café a bouzouki player was looking at Christina with undisguised appreciation. He flashed her a brilliant smile and began to sing a love song with distinctly suggestive lyrics. Christina laughed at his bold eyes but she shook her head.
It was not like the way Luc Henri had looked at her, she thought involuntarily: that had turned her still and watchful, had caused some small, cold excitement to unfold. The bouzouki player was never going to be able to make her blush in a month of Sundays. Luc had done it with a word.
What’s happening to me? she thought, startled. Do I take the man with me everywhere I go?
Sue plucked at her arm. ‘Come on. Let’s try the Blue Taverna.’
Recalled to the present, Christina jumped. ‘Oh, OK.’
‘Good evening,’ said a soft voice.
Christina whirled, her heart pounding as if a deadly enemy had suddenly caught up with her. Luc Henri was standing there studying her. A small smile curled the handsome mouth. It was another of those smiles that did not reach his arrogant eyes.
Christina’s heart sank like an anchor in still water. She had not the slightest idea why. She straightened her shoulders and tried to pretend that she did not care.
‘Oh,’ she said. ‘You.’
He gave a little bow.
From the far side of the room, a cheerful Australian voice called, ‘Sue. Where’ve you been hiding? Over here, gorgeous.’
‘Geoff,’ said Sue. She hesitated, took in the quiet elegance of Luc Henri’s appearance, and decided that Christina did not need a chaperon with such an eminently respectable personage. ‘I’ll see you at the flat,’ she muttered, and disappeared among the crowded tables.
Christina, who had never in her life thought that she needed a chaperon, felt suddenly, alarmingly alone. The friendly crowd and the noise somehow made it worse. She swallowed.
Luc Henri was looking at her with a cynical expression that she did not like at all. He did not speak. Christina cleared her throat.
‘Time and place seem to have caught up with us, then,’ she said flippantly. ‘What are you doing at Costa’s?’
‘I could ask the same. Except that it’s obvious.’
His tone was pleasant enough. There was nothing she could take exception to in the words themselves. So how did she know that he was insulting her, and that he was coldly, furiously angry? Was it the cold glitter of his eyes? Christina glanced round. No one else showed any signs of noticing anything untoward. In fact, no one else was paying any attention to them at all.
‘I’m sorry, I don’t understand,’ she said.
He gave a bark of laughter. It did not sound amused.
‘Cruising. Isn’t that what they call it?’
Christina’s brows knitted. ‘What?’
He made an angry gesture with his hand, embracing the whole café-the bouzouki player, Costa’s beefy geniality and even the harassed waiters.
‘You make the most of your natural assets, I’ll say that for you. A smile, a lot of long, bare leg and the odd promise of a kiss. It’s a potent inducement, even if I can see that. Is that what you meant when you said you could look after yourself?’
For a moment Christina was so stunned that she did not think she was understanding him properly. When she realised that he meant exactly what she thought he meant, she went white with temper.
‘I think you’re calling me a tart.’
He gave that harsh laugh again. ‘Oh, no. I respect tarts. They’re honest working women in their way.’
‘What the hell do you mean by that?’
His eyes looked her up and down in a brief, insulting flick which considered and then dismissed her. She took a step backwards as if he had hit her. Her face flamed. He saw it and smiled.
‘I mean that they deliver what they contract for,’ he drawled. ‘Or so I’m told. Whereas you—’ He shook his head. ‘No, no, my dear.’
Christina took a hasty step towards him. His derisive smile grew.
‘Thinking of slapping my face? You couldn’t do it, you know. You’re much too nicely brought up.’
‘You know nothing at all about how I was brought up.’
‘Oh, I think you’re wrong there.’ He put his head on one side and pretended to consider. ‘I know the signs. I can’t think how I missed them this morning.’
She was trembling with anger. ‘What signs?’
‘Lovely manners. Minimal morals,’ he said succinctly.
They might have been alone. Christina was hardly aware of the crowded café. Neither of them had raised their voice but their argument was too intense to escape attention. They were beginning to attract the occasional sideways look, but she did not notice that either. She could not remember ever being so angry in her life.
‘What right have you got to talk about my morals?’
‘Right?’ He shrugged. ‘None.’
‘Or to sit in judgement on me on the basis of ten minutes’ spying? Or was it as much as that? I didn’t see you when we came in. Maybe you’ve only just arrived. Maybe we’re talking about ten seconds’ spying here.’
‘Call it five minutes,’ Luc Henri said negligently.
‘Well, then—’
‘Five memorable minutes.’
Christina stared.
‘I watched. Fascinating. You kissed the owner. Well, I suppose ownership of a waterfront café brings some perks.’
Christina gasped but Luc did not appear to notice. He swept on, itemising her actions with precision, and putting the worst possible gloss on them.
‘You swung what passes for a skirt at the group at the corner table. And it only took one bat of your eyelashes at the boy who plays that noisy substitute for a guitar to gain his devoted attention.’
She was so angry that she did not even think of defending herself. In fact, after a brief moment of blank outrage, she decided to prove to him that she was every bit as bad as he thought her—and worse. So she gave a careless laugh and shrugged. Her crocheted top slipped off one bare brown shoulder.
Christina felt rather than saw his eyes follow the falling fabric. He could not repress his reaction and it was not disapproval. She. registered it with a glow of something like triumph.
It was utterly unlike her. Anger must have made her reckless, she thought. Resisting the instinct to pull the top back into place, she shook back her hair and lifted her chin defiantly. She met his eyes with a look quite as contemptuous as his own.
‘So?’ she said softly. ‘What business is it of yours?’ For a moment he did not answer. Then he looked deliberately at the sagging top. ‘So you like to play with fire,’ he mused. ‘Now why didn’t I pick that up before?’
Her eyes narrowed to slits. ‘I said, What business is it of yours?’ Her voice rose.
‘Oh, come on, lady. You’re not that nicely brought up.’
She knew he was going to reach for her but she still did not quite believe it. Not now, not here, with a crowd of evening diners looking on. It was not the sort of thing that happened to her. It was not the sort of thing that ultra-civilised men like Luc Henri did.
There was nothing civilised in the way he jerked her off her feet to bring her hard against him. For a moment he held her breast to breast, looking down into her defiant eyes with a curious expression, almost as if behind the anger he was in pain. But the impression of pain was gone in an instant and he was laughing. ‘Burn, fire, burn,’ he said cynically.
And she was engulfed.
The thought flashed across Christina’s mind: well, he is certainly not treating me as if I were his sister now. It was her last coherent thought for some time.
For all the cynicism, he was not playing games. His hands were hard on her slim frame—mercilessly hard. And his mouth was hungry.
The crowded café, the smell of spiced meats and hot bread, the sounds of talk and laughter and wine being poured from rough glass carafes all receded as if they did not exist. Christina’s head fell back under the onslaught of his kiss. Her dazed eyes drifted shut. She felt as if her bones were melting. She had no strength in the powerful circle of his arms, no wish for strength, no resistance at all. All she knew was that her blood was pounding in her veins, driving her deeper and deeper into his embrace. And that she had never felt like this before.
Luc’s arms tightened.
He was giving no quarter, she realised dimly. He was so angry that neither the public place nor her blank astonishment was holding him back. In fact, she had a faint suspicion that they normally would have done and he knew it; so the fact that this uninhibited sexual demand was out of character was adding fuel to his anger. Of the anger there was no doubt at all. Nor of the demand.
His mouth ravaged the softness of hers until she could hardly breathe. She felt the blood beating frantically at his pulse points, battering at her. She felt his breath in her throat, her lungs. She smelled a faint, unfamiliar, woody scent which seemed to come from his light jacket. It failed entirely to mask the darker, stronger smell from his heated skin. It half repelled her, half fascinated her.
It was a wholly new sensation. It set her trembling even as it made her feel gloriously alive. The relentless kiss relaxed at last. Christina made a small animal noise and turned her head blindly to seek the hollow between his throat and shoulder with her lips.
Luc gave a sharp exclamation. He flinched as if he had burned himself. He pushed her to arm’s length almost savagely. Christina swayed and opened her eyes. She blinked. He looked murderous. She could feel the tremor in the hands clamped on her shoulders, holding her away from him. He looked as if he wanted to shake the life out of her.
‘That seems to answer your question.’ His voice was uneven. He was breathing hard but otherwise the iron self-control was back.
Christina shook her head. She did not recover so quickly.
‘Question?’ she echoed blankly.
‘What business it is of mine,’ Luc reminded her. There was an edge to his voice.
Christina stared at him in gathering disbelief. ‘Are you saying that makes me your business?’
‘Of course.’
‘You’re out of your mind,’ she said heatedly.
His mouth quirked. ‘Quite possibly.’
She ignored that. ‘Just because you have the gall to force yourself upon me...in front of everyone—’ She broke off, lost for words.
Instead she looked eloquently round the café. The diners seemed to be making too big a thing of being totally absorbed by their food. Christina was fairly sure that a minute earlier they had been mesmerized by the scene between the tall dark stranger and the English girl they had never seen behave like that before. It made her want to scream with rage.
He said softly, ‘I didn’t hear you calling for help.’
‘What?’
He repeated it. His voice was quiet but his eyes were dangerous.
Christina was not intimidated. She was shaking with justified temper. At least, she told herself it was temper. At his contemptuous words her rage hit boiling point. She stepped back out of his hands.
‘Then hear me now,’ she said grimly. She turned her head and shouted at the top of her voice, ‘Costa!’
Luc winced, but the dangerous glint went out of his eyes. It was replaced by surprise. Then, astoundingly, came amusement and even a hint of admiration. Or so Christina thought, viewing him from behind a red mist of fury.
The proprietor appeared so quickly that she suspected he had been waiting for such a summons. He did not look like a righteously vengeful protector of insulted innocence, however. He looked hugely amused and was not trying very hard to hide it.
‘Throw this jerk out,’ Christina said in a choked voice.
‘I can’t do that, Christina.’
She turned astounded eyes on Costa. ‘You saw what he did.’
Costa chuckled. ‘I’m not a policeman, Christina. As long as the clients pay their bill and don’t break the crockery, they can do what they like.’ He thought about it. ‘They can even break the crockery if they pay for it.’
‘What if they offend other clients?’ she flashed.
‘Don’t worry your head about it. They enjoyed it,’ Costa said soothingly.
Luc gave a choke of laughter. He suppressed it but not quickly enough.
Christina was outraged. She stamped her foot. She made a noise like Sue’s elderly kettle coming to the boil. ‘I didn’t enjoy it.’
‘Then I’m sorry, of course. But I don’t see what you expect me to do about it.’
‘Throw him out,’ she yelled.
The diners began to look interested again. She subsided, rather flushed.
Costa smiled at her paternally. ‘Look at it from my point of view. I can’t throw a man out just because you don’t think he kisses very well,’ he said in a reasonable tone. ‘Besides—’
Christina gave him a steely glare. ‘Besides?’ she prompted dangerously.
He shrugged his beefy shoulders. ‘To be honest, my dear, I’ve seen worse.’
This time Luc did not even try to disguise his laughter. ‘Poor Christina. I don’t think the US Marines are going to speed to the rescue this trip,’ he said when his mirth subsided. He nodded at a table. ‘Why don’t you sit down? Costa can bring us a bottle of his best ouzo and we’ll talk things over.’
Luc and Costa exchanged a look of pure masculine complacency. Christina saw it and recognised an unspoken conspiracy. They thought that she was beaten. She would show them.
Across the café tables Sue was already half out of her seat. Christina bit back her smile. Oh, she would certainly show them. She looked away quickly before Luc could follow her eyes. She had to buy time.
It went against the grain but she said meekly, ‘Oh, all right. I have to go to the cloakroom first, though.’
Neither of the men demurred. She met Sue’s eyes compellingly and turned deliberately. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Sue murmur an excuse to her companions and follow her.
In the poky little cloakroom Christina ran her wrists under cold water. She peered in the cracked mirror. Her eyes were wide and a little wild. Her skin felt cold and sensitised, as if someone had coated it with ice. Damn that man. Damn him. How dared he make her feel like this? The door opened.
‘Wow,’ said Sue. ‘That was really something. I take it he’s the “administrative hitch” from this morning?’
Christina glared at her unflattering reflection. ‘No, he isn’t. And he’s not going to be any sort of hitch at all,’ she said firmly. ‘I’m not having a stranger order me around.’
Sue blinked. ‘Have you told him that?’
‘Several times.’
Sue gave a gurgle of laughter. ‘I thought he didn’t look the type to give up easily.’
‘Well, he’s going to have to learn a new skill,’ said Christina with resolution. ‘He’s not pushing me about any more.’
Sue sighed. ‘He could push me about any time he liked.’
Christina turned away from the mirror. ‘You wouldn’t enjoy it,’ she assured her.
‘Oh, yes, I would. He’s gorgeous. If he looked at me the way he looked at you, I’d just lie down and die for him.’
Christina was startled. ‘How he looked at me?’
‘I know you usually ignore the effect you have on men but you must have noticed that,’ Sue said in disgust. ‘From the moment you came in, he couldn’t take his eyes off you. I thought he was going to eat you.’
Christina remembered that devouring kiss. She put up a hand to ease the sudden constriction in her throat.
‘So did I,’ she said in a low voice. She shivered. Instantly, Sue was all contrition. ‘Sorry. I’m a fool. No matter how gorgeous he looks, if he keeps after you when you’ve made it clear he doesn’t turn you on, he’s a heel.’ She patted her friend’s shoulder. ‘Count on me.’
It wasn’t that he did not turn her on, exactly... Christina dismissed it. It was too complicated to explain to Sue, especially when she didn’t entirely understand it herself. And she certainly wanted to escape from Luc Henri as far and as fast as she could.
‘I want to get out of here without him seeing me. And get away before he can follow.’
Sue was thoughtful. ‘Hmm. You can’t go through the kitchen because Costa’s on his side,’ she said shrewdly.
Christina looked surprised at her perception.
Sue nodded. ‘All that machismo. Costa just loves it. He’d tell. Unless he didn’t know.’ She paused. ‘Dustbins,’ she said suddenly.
Sue shot out of the door. Christina stared after her. In less than a minute she was back.
‘That yard is disgusting,’ she said with feeling. ‘No one would eat here if they saw it. Still, that means no one is going to search it too carefully. Go and lurk behind the cabbage stalks and I’ll go and get Geoff. We’ll get some transport from somewhere and come and pick you up. Just keep out of sight for ten minutes.’
Christina went. The yard was quite as foul as Sue had said. She held her breath for as long as she could. After that she breathed through her mouth.
There was a commotion in the kitchen behind her but she could not make out whether it was an irate Luc Henri turning the place upside down in search of her or just normal family give and take. She tensed and held her breath with even more resolution than before. Her heart beat faster. Someone opened the door to the yard, muttered a startled imprecation and shut it hurriedly. Christina breathed again.
Sue and Geoff turned up a few moments later. Geoff’s amused face appeared over the edge of the wooden fence that surrounded the yard and he reached out a hand.
‘Phew. That guy really scared you, didn’t he?’ he said, hauling her out into the road. ‘I wouldn’t have spent three minutes in there on a bet. You’ll probably start to go mouldy.’
‘I’ll watch out for it,’ Christina assured him solemnly. ‘And he did not scare me. I just chose not to argue in public any more. Thanks for the help,’ she added belatedly.
‘Any time. Any friend of Sue’s...’ he said largely. He sounded entertained. ‘What are you going to do now? Get out of town?’
‘Don’t be silly. He’s a civilised man.’ She paused and added with a certain amount of relief, ‘Anyway, he doesn’t know where I’m staying.’
‘He could find out. Looks the kind of guy who wouldn’t have trouble doing just that.’
Geoff had hired a rickety Citroën. It was parked on the corner of the dark lane, Sue hunched anxiously over the wheel. He opened the passenger door and pulled the front seat forward to let Christina scramble into the back.
‘Better crouch,’ he advised, still amused.
Christina disposed herself on the cramped back seat with dignity. ‘He’s not going to send out search parties—’ she began.
Sue said sharply. ‘Don’t be so sure of that. What’s that behind us?’
A stretched limousine had come into the driving mirror. They all looked over their shoulders. It had headlamps like searchlights. It was inching along the kerb as if it was looking for something. It looked horribly purposeful.
‘Duck,’ Geoff said.
Christina abandoned her dignity and flung herself on the floor. Not a moment too soon. Geoff grabbed Sue into a comprehensive embrace, so the headlights of the limousine only illuminated a courting couple totally absorbed in each other. It slowed briefly, then, seemingly satisfied, passed on without stopping. In the grateful darkness, Geoff released Sue.
‘Chris,’ Sue said in a shaken voice, ‘I take it back. You’re right. I wouldn’t enjoy it.’ Geoff hugged her comfortingly.
‘Changed your mind about getting out of town?’ he asked Christina with a hint of steel in his pleasant voice. ‘Bearing in mind you’re staying with Sue.’
‘As soon as I can,’ said Christina. The limousine had looked menacing. Suddenly, acting as a tour guide to the classical sites seemed immensely attractive.
‘Good,’ he said.
Sue did not say anything but her relief was none the less clear for being unspoken. She let the car into gear and began to back into the metalled road.
‘What I want to know,’ she burst out at last, ‘is who the hell is this man?’
‘Luc Henri,’ said Christina in a small voice.
‘I’ve never heard of him.’
‘No—well, nor have I.’
‘That limo did not belong to the sort of man we’ve never heard of,’ Geoff said.
Christina bit her lip. She remembered that challenging look Luc had given her when he told her his name. Should she have recognised him? Was it a false name? It was an oddly chilling thought.
‘What do you think?’ she asked Geoff.
‘Well, that car belongs to someone powerful. Or someone whose job takes him among the powerful. I got a good look at him in the café. I didn’t recognise him. So I’d say he’s either a security guard or a businessman.’
Sue said suddenly, ‘Whatever he is, he wants you. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was down at Costa’s looking for you tonight.’
‘Don’t be so dramatic,’ Christina protested. ‘He didn’t know I’d be at Costa’s.’
But I said I’d probably go to the waterfront cafés, she remembered. She shivered.
Sue said, ‘I don’t think he’s going to give up.’ She sounded scared.
Christina could not really blame her. She hoped that the tour left Athens soon.
‘I’ll go first thing tomorrow.’
CHAPTER THREE
SHE did. And for a week Christina’s mind was in two places at once.
One part of her brain was organising hotels and describing antiquities, the other was locked in a timeless embrace with a man she hardly knew—a man who had made sure she hardly knew him. A man who had given her a carefully edited account of himself which had left out all the essentials, possibly including his real name. A man who had said they would never meet again and then, for some unfathomable reason, had changed his mind.
Except that the reason was not unfathomable, however much Christina pretended to herself. It had all been there in the kiss—intensity, anger, need. Christina had never felt that she needed anyone before, not in that immediate, physical way. Nor had she felt the same driving need coming back at her, plucking her out of normality and onto a plane where all she could see or touch or taste was him.
‘Sex,’ she said to herself. ‘That’s all it is. Strong attraction, sure, but nothing more than a passing thing. Ignore it and it will go away.’
Only it didn’t. There were times when she barely noticed her pleasant church group from the American Midwest. They were in Europe for the first time and endearingly enthusiastic about the sights at Mycenae and Delphi. Christina tried hard to share their enthusiasm. She even succeeded sometimes. But the dark, magnetic figure of Luc was always there, always lurking. And all too often he just swamped the rest. It was not like any sexual attraction she had ever felt before.
It’s not real, she told herself.
But it felt reat—horribly real. More real than anything else she could remember. It was almost frightening. That stopped her dead in the shadow of a classic column. He had said that she was afraid of him, hadn’t he?
‘Ridiculous,’ she said aloud.
But on the long, hot coach journey back to their hotel Christina was remembering all too vividly every word he had said. It was nonsense that she was afraid of him. Of course it was. She was self-possessed and independent and she was not afraid of anyone.
But, if she admitted the truth, there was something in that dark, demanding presence that sent little chills through her. Not fear, naturally, but something uneasy that told her she had no defences against him. Or anyway, none that seemed to work.
The unwelcome truth was that Luc Henri overwhelmed her. He had.only to look—let alone touch—and she started to vibrate like a musical instrument played by a master. And she did not even know who he was!
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