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‘That wasn’t the point of the exercise,’ Bastien traded harshly. ‘The point is that, for once, I wanted you to do exactly as you were told.’
‘Sorry, sir, I’ll have to try harder,’ Lilah quipped.
‘Have you always found it this hard to follow instructions?’
‘When you’re issuing them...yes,’ she admitted ruefully.
‘You should want to please me,’ Bastien told her as blue eyes bright as sapphires met his critical gaze.
With her dark hair framing her triangular face and her eyes sparkling above her neat little nose and her full rosy mouth, she looked amazingly fragile and feminine—as well as fizzingly alive.
‘Why?’
‘It puts me in a better mood.’
While Lilah tried to imagine Bastien’s moods influencing her in any way, the limo nosed back into the traffic.
The Durands lived in an imposing eighteenth-century townhouse on Ile Saint-Louis. A maid ushered them into an airy salon, where introductions were performed and drinks were served.
Keenly aware of Marielle Durand’s scrutiny, Lilah struggled to relax. Marielle was even more beautiful in the flesh than she had looked in her photographs, and Lilah was surprised to realise that the other woman was English.
Bastien surprised Lilah by closing his hand over hers to keep her close while he chatted to François. The conversation was solely in French, until Marielle addressed Lilah in English and asked her about her home town. Relieved not to be forced to stumble out any more stock phrases in her schoolgirl French, Lilah relaxed a little over the light lunch that was being served.
Over a glass of wine, the beautiful blonde invited Lilah to walk round the garden with her.
‘How long have you been with Bastien?’ Marielle asked with unconcealed curiosity, as soon as the men were out of earshot.
‘Only a few days,’ Lilah admitted wryly. ‘Am I allowed to ask when you...?’
‘Years and years ago—soon after I first made my name in the modelling world. He was probably my most exciting affair,’ the other woman confided with an abstracted laugh. ‘I adore my husband, but I’ve never felt anything like the excitement I once felt around Bastien. He’s a heartbreaker, though, too damaged to ever trust his heart to one woman and settle down.’
‘Damaged?’ Lilah queried with a frown.
‘Oh, I don’t know any details, but I’ve always been certain he must come from a challenging background. No man’s that hard to hold, and no man finds it that impossible to trust a woman without good reason,’ Marielle opined. ‘He was too complicated for me.’
And then Lilah made a discovery that disconcerted her: she liked complicated—actually enjoyed the challenge of wondering what made Bastien tick. He was like no other man she had ever met. Incalculably clever, impatient, volatile and unpredictable. He was an unashamed workaholic, evidently unfulfilled by the huge achievements he had already made. What had made him like that... Who had made him like that? What drove him? And why did she care?
* * *
‘You charmed the Durands very effectively,’ Bastien pronounced on their journey back to the airport. ‘You don’t have a jealous bone in your body where I’m concerned, do you?’
‘Why would I?’ Lilah parried, quickly overcoming her surprise at that unexpected stab. ‘I can’t think you’d welcome a possessive woman.’
That was certainly true, Bastien acknowledged grudgingly, and yet when he had glanced out through the patio doors standing open to the sunlight to see Delilah smiling and laughing, seemingly on the very best of terms with Marielle, he had been surprisingly riled by Delilah’s complete indifference to his past history with the beautiful blonde.
The faintest colour warmed Lilah’s cheeks, because although she had not been jealous or possessive she had felt uncomfortable in Marielle’s company—and positively nauseous at the knowledge that Bastien had been sexually intimate with her hostess.
‘Where are we going now?’ she asked, purely to change the subject.
‘I have a chateau in Provence...’
CHAPTER SIX
THEY LEFT THE airport in a rough terrain vehicle, with Bastien at the wheel and his security team following in another car.
