His head shot up. “Yeah, sure. Yeah, right.”
She didn’t say a word. She merely smiled.
“Me? Afraid of horses?”
Not a word.
Another jerk on the zipper. “A lot you know.”
He was determined to gut it out. He even managed an appropriately belligerent sneer. Her smile passed from sweet to saccharine. Finally he dropped his head. “I wouldn’t exactly say I was afraid,” he muttered.
“What exactly would you say?” she cooed.
“We just don’t get along, that’s all.”
She let out a whoop of laughter and fell back on the bed. “You’re afraid of horses! Bird Dog’s afraid of horses! You’ll have to be my slave forever. I can blackmail you with this for the rest of your life. Backrubs, home-cooked meals, kinky sex-”
He looked hurt. “I like dogs.”
“Do you now?”
“Big ones, too.”
“Really?”
“Rotweillers. Shepherds. Bull mastiffs. The bigger the dog, the more I like it.”
“I’m impressed.”
“Damned right you are.”
“Very impressed. I was starting to think you were more of a Chihuahua guy.”
“Are you crazy? Those suckers bite.”
She laughed and threw herself into his arms.
On their last day together, she lay with her head in his lap and thought about how much she didn’t want to fly home alone tomorrow, but Jake needed to stay in California for a few weeks to take care of all the business he’d neglected while he’d been writing his book.
He made a paintbrush out of a lock of her hair. “I’ve been thinking…” He trailed the curl over her lips. “What about-what do you think would happen…” He painted her cheekbone. “What if we…got married?”
A rush of joy shot through her. She lifted her head. “Really?”
“Why not?”
Her joy bubble slipped aside just enough to reveal a tiny yellow caution light. “I think-I think it’s too fast.”
“We’ve known each other for seven years. That’s not exactly fast.”
“But we haven’t been together for seven years. Neither of us can stand to fail at this. We bruise too easily. And we have to be absolutely sure.”
“I couldn’t be surer.”
Neither could she. At the same time…“Let’s give ourselves a chance to see how we handle the separation of having two careers-how we deal with the rough spots that are going to come along.”
“I thought women were supposed to be romantics. What happened to impulse and passion?”
“They’re opening in Vegas for Wayne Newton.”
“You’ve got a smart mouth.” He lowered himself over her and began nibbling at her bottom lip. “Let’s do something about that.”
His mouth moved to her breast, and she told herself she was right not to leap to marry him. They’d both received important insights about themselves this weekend, and they needed time to adjust.
But there was another reason. Some small part of her still didn’t entirely trust Jake, and she couldn’t handle another abandonment.
His kisses dipped lower, her senses ignited, and the world faded away around them.
Success bred success, and now that it didn’t matter so much, everything she touched seemed to turn to gold. She renegotiated Olivia Creighton’s
ELOPING AT HIGH NOON TOMORROW STOP WILL PHONE AFTER HONEYMOON STOP CHARLIE JUST TOLD ME HOW RICH HE REALLY IS STOP AINT LOVE GRAND
Fleur laughed and leaned back in her chair. Ain’t love grand, indeed.
Jake flew out from L.A. for a long weekend of sex, conversation, and laughter, but he had go back to do some overdubbing. She talked to him two or three times a day, sometimes more. He called as soon as he woke up in the morning, and she called before she went to bed at night. “This is good,” she said. “Since we can’t touch each other, we’re learning to relate on a more cerebral level.”
His reply was typical Koranda. “Cut the crap and tell me what color panties you’re wearing.”
One Friday evening toward the end of February, she returned from the housewarming Michel and Damon had thrown to celebrate moving into their new co-op. Just as she let herself in, the phone rang. She smiled and picked it up. “I said I’d call you, lover boy.”
“Fleur? Oh God, baby, you’ve got to help me! Please, baby-”
Her fingers tightened around the receiver. “Belinda?”
“Don’t let him do this! I know you hate me, but please, don’t let him get away with this.”
“Where are you?”
“In Paris. I-I thought I was rid of him. I should have known-” Her words grew muffled, and she began to sob.
Fleur squeezed her eyes shut. “Tell me what’s happened.”
“He sent two of his henchmen to New York after me. They were waiting in my apartment when I came home yesterday, and they forced me to go with them. They’re going to take me to Switzerland. He’s going to lock me up, baby. Because I stayed away from you in New York. He’s threatened me for years, and now he’s going to-”
There was a sudden click, and the line went dead.
Fleur slumped on the edge of her bed, the receiver still clasped in her hand. She didn’t owe her mother anything. Belinda was the one who’d chosen to stay married to Alexi. She’d been too attached to the limelight his world cast over her to get a divorce, and whatever was happening to her now was her own fault.
Except-Belinda was her mother.
She set the receiver back on the cradle and forced herself to examine the relationship she’d avoided looking at for so long. The memories of their times together slipped before her like the pages of Jake’s manuscript, and she saw with new eyes what she hadn’t been able to see before. She saw her mother for who she was-a weak, frivolous woman who wanted the best from life but didn’t have either the ability or the strength of character to get it on her own. And then she saw her mother’s love-selfish, self-serving, laced with conditions and manipulations-but love nonetheless. Love so heartfelt that Belinda had never been able to understand how Fleur could ever doubt it.
She booked herself on a morning flight to Paris. It was too early to call Jake, so she left a note on Riata’s desk telling her to let him know she had some emergency business out of town and not to worry if she didn’t call him for a few days. She didn’t want either Jake or Michel to discover where she was going. The last thing she needed was for Jake to show up in Paris with a pair of Colt revolvers and a bullwhip. And Michel had suffered enough from Belinda’s indifference.
As she left the house, she played out various scenarios in her head, each one uglier than the last. Belinda might think this was only about her, but Fleur knew better. Alexi was using Belinda as human bait to bring his daughter back to him.
The house on the Rue de la Bienfaisance stood gray and silent in the Parisian winter twilight. It looked as unfriendly as Fleur remembered, and as she gazed out the window of the limousine she’d taken from her hotel, she thought about the first time she’d seen the house. She’d been so frightened that day-afraid to meet her father, aching to see her mother, worried that she’d dressed wrong. At least this time, she didn’t have to be concerned about her clothes.
Beneath her satin and velvet evening wrap, she wore the last gown Michel had designed for her, a wine velvet sheath with tight-fitting sleeves and a deeply slashed bodice embroidered at the edge with a web of tiny burgundy
