CHAPTER SEVEN
IT TOOK Ashlyn an age to get to sleep that night. Half of her was still regretting that she had pulled back from Carter the way she had, while the other half was certain that she had done the right thing.
Would Carter have made her his, though? Things had been heading that way, and it hadn’t been him who had backed away, had it? Uncertain if she had been right to come to her room when she had, Ashlyn knew it would be wonderful to be made love to by Carter. But what happened then? Where did one go from there? Back to Landon—and forget it?
She remembered the lovely and, yes, worldly women she had seen him photographed with. They would accept that. They knew the rules. But she—she did not. And, had they lain together, the thought of going back to the way they had been once they were back in London was one she doubted she could have coped with.
Ashlyn got up early next morning, realising that, on balance, perhaps it was better that she had not been any more intimate with Carter. But once she was showered, dressed, and with her hair fixed in a neat chignon, she went into the sitting room, and a mixture of emotions took her, so that a tide of pink warmed her skin.
Carter was there, up, dressed, reading a French newspaper. ‘Good morning,’ she offered as he got to his feet. She had been kissed by that wonderful mouth, had kissed back, clung to him pressed close to him ...
Like a douche of cold water, his cool ‘Good morning’ told her that he had already filed what had been momentous for her under ‘pleasant while it lasted’ and placed it in the ‘dead’ drawer. He checked his watch; a minute ago hers had said seven-fifteen. ‘Your presence isn’t strictly necessary at this morning’s negotiations. If you want to shop...’ With that sentence, he put her firmly in her place.
‘Oh, good,’ she beamed, tilting her chin upwards, hating him, hating him. How dared he treat her like some feather-brained shopaholic? He went over and picked up his briefcase—he didn’t have to be at Luc’s hotel until eight! She knew that for a fact. ‘See you later, then,’ she said offhandedly, already heading for the kitchen. She had a feeling she was going to howl and no dastardly male had the right to make a woman feel that way.
Carter’s voice, however, stopped her mid-flight. ‘You’ll definitely be needed at lunch,’ he stated. She halted, refusing to turn, refusing to look at him, and he went on to tell her where to meet him and at what time.
‘I’ll be there,’ she confirmed, hating him some more because he didn’t want her with him that morning, but considered her all right to have lunch with. ‘Hope your negotiations go well,’ she offered, and went on kitchenwards.
She was still in the kitchen when she heard the outer door close. But she no longer felt like crying. She felt angry. So she’d kissed him—but he’d kissed her first! To the devil with him!
She took a cup of coffee with her back to the sitting room and, taking a seat by a small table, saw that Carter had left her what must be a key to the apartment. Nice of him to tell her about it. What was he afraid of—that he’d get contaminated if their hands accidentally touched as he passed the key over? Oh, Carter, she sighed—and her anger was gone.
Ashlyn had not the slightest intention of going shopping. Then, at eight-fifteen, the phone rang. Her heart somersaulted; she was convinced that it was Carter. He had reached Luc’s hotel and had remembered something.
She strove hard for a cool note when she picked up the phone and said, ‘Hello,’ but her voice was impervious to her brain’s instructions.
But, in any case, it was not Carter who was on the phone, though the call did come from Luc’s hotel. It was Luc’s wife, Solène. Ashlyn had learned last night that Solène was having a few days’ holiday from her work to be in Paris with her husband. ‘Carter has just said that you are going shopping. I so seldom get to Paris,’ Solène revealed, ‘I wonder if I may come with you?’
‘I’d love your company!’ Ashlyn exclaimed, adaptable and not seeing why she should stay moping in the apartment because of him. Love was making a nonsense of her.
Solène was a charming companion and knew exactly where to shop. Ashlyn spotted a suit that screamed out ‘Take me home’, and could not resist it.
By eleven-fifteen they had both purchased a suit. Ashlyn knew by then that Solene would be at lunch with them too, and that it would be quite a big affair.
‘Shall we wear our new clothes?’ Solène suggested.
‘Why not?’ Ashlyn fell in with her. ‘I’ll need to go back to the apartment...’
‘And I’ll need to go back to my hotel...’
Simultaneously they hailed taxis, and parted. Ashlyn was aware that Carter would expect her on the dot of twelve-thirty and knew that she had not a moment to lose.
At twelve twenty-eight precisely, another taxi dropped an immaculately turned out red-headed woman outside a Paris hotel. She wore a light pure wool suit of pastel green. The straight skirt came to just above her comely knees. The jacket had short sleeves and a high stand-up collar which stood away from her neck and showed off the slender, elegant white column of her throat to perfection.
Ashlyn went towards the hotel doors, the thought of seeing Carter causing her insides to churn and making her entirely unaware of the admiring looks she was receiving. A smartly uniformed doorman held the door open for her at once.
She thanked him kindly. Going through the lobby, she searched about for the room where the private lunch party was being held. She found it and went and stood at the entrance, but could not see Carter.
‘If I said before that you’re beautiful, it was an understatement,’ a voice she would know anywhere commented into her left ear.
‘Carter!’ She turned, smiling, all her earlier enmity forgotten.
‘You look stunning,’ he stated softly, and she knew that if he kept this up she was going to melt.
‘You know that salary you spoke of?’ she queried, desperately trying to remind herself that Carter’s manners were such that he wouldn’t make her look small in public, and that she mustn’t get carried away by his compliments. ‘Well, I think I’m going to need it. I—er—bought this suit this morning.’
He smiled, and her legs went like water. He looked into her eyes, and time seemed suspended. She knew her imagination had a lot to answer for when Carter took a step to the side and, placing a hand beneath her elbow, suggested easily, ‘I’d better take you around and introduce you before some of these Frenchmen start to stampede over here.’
It was flattering being introduced to so many males who complimented her with their eyes. But her interest was only for the man she was with. Though, because she’d realised from Carter’s ‘You’ll definitely be needed at lunch’ that her role had to be in her PR capacity, she was friendly with everyone she came into contact with— and that included a thirtyish, fresh sort of man who ogled more than he complimented.
She saw Carter frown, and she tried to cover his displeasure by being extra friendly. They were there to negotiate business but, given that she hadn’t a clue what that business was, it seemed to her there was more chance of a favourable outcome if she was friendly to the opposition.
So she smiled and chatted, and somehow got separated from Carter. She saw Solène, waved, and thought Solène looked absolutely superb in her new outfit. She saw from the sign Solène made that Solène thought the same about her and her new outfit. Then Ashlyn greeted Luc—and spotted Carter in conversation with an animated beauty; she was then able to recognise that peculiar sensation she had last felt in her stomach ages ago for what it was. She was jealous.
‘You will sit by me, Ashlyn, for your lunch, yes?’ enquired the one man whom she wasn’t too keen on.
She looked to Carter; he was hanging on the animated beauty’s every word. ‘I’d love to,’ she smiled at Mr Ogle-eyes, fully aware that if Carter wanted her nearer he would do something about it.
But quite clearly Carter had no need of her. In no time she was seated with Mr Ogle-eyes on one side and a rather pleasant man who reminded her of her cousin Teddy on the other.
Ashlyn strove desperately hard to keep her eyes away from that part of the table where Carter Hamilton was sitting. He was entirely oblivious to the woman he had earlier thought ‘stunning’—fickle swine! She passed her lunchtime trying to make it appear as if she was deeply interested in what the men on either side of her had to say.
She had been introduced to so many people by then that although she usually had a good memory for names her ‘name bank’ was fast being used up. She was in luck, though: both the man on her right and the one on the left were called Matthieu. Sometimes life was made easier—and Carter was still talking to that woman!
‘You are in Paris for long?’
Ashlyn tuned in to realise that Matthieu Ogle-eyes had asked her a question. ‘Regretfully only for a few days,’ she replied.
‘Perhaps I may show you a little of Paris this evening?’ That came from Matthieu on her other side.
‘That was what I was going to ask!’ Matthieu Ogle-eyes protested, clearly put out.
Ashlyn laughed, and it seemed to cool the situation. She looked to see what Carter was doing, and saw that he was looking—no, not looking, but glowering—at her. Now what had she done?
Feeling unnerved, she turned back to her two companions. ‘May I?’ the nice Matthieu persisted—and somehow she remembered he had asked her out that evening.
‘It’s very kind of you to ask me, but I’m here with Mr Hamilton, and I’m not sure what our itinerary is for this evening.’
‘Shall I have your phone number?’ Matthieu Ogle-eyes asked. Not a hope! ‘I will ring you later, and we can arrange—’
‘I’m so sorry, I don’t know what our number is,’ she replied, and just didn’t believe it when both of them dived into their wallets and extracted their personal cards.
‘Perhaps you’ll ring me if you are free,’ the nice Matthieu said.
‘I’ll do my best,’ she responded diplomatically, turning from one Matthieu to the other, and slipping their cards into the tiny pocket of her jacket. ‘Have both of you always lived in Paris?’ she asked, and the remainder of lunch was spent hearing a great deal about what was best to see in the city.
That lunch seemed to be the longest Ashlyn had ever lived through, so that she wasn’t at all surprised, when the party started to break up, to see that it was getting on for five.
Carter was at last on his own—put the flags out! Or, at least, she wasn’t there. He was standing in conversation with Luc and Solene. He looked over to her—and she felt frost in the air!
He made no move to come over, so clearly he expected her to go to him. She was of the opinion that he could go take a running jump—then looked down at her suit. Ultimately he paid her salary—she wasn’t sure how she felt about being ‘employed’—and the nasty Matthieu Ogle-eyes was starting to be a little tedious.
‘If you’ll excuse me,’ she smiled, shaking hands with both Matthieus.
‘I shall look forward to your phone call, Ashlyn.’
‘And I.’
‘Au revoir,’ she bade them, and, determined not to hurry, she went sedately over to where Carter was just saying goodbye to his friends.
She joined them, saying her goodbyes too. Then she and Carter were outside, getting into a taxi, and he was snarling, ‘I take it you enjoyed your lunch?’
Not so well as you! ‘It was superb, wasn’t it?’ she beamed. A grunt was her answer.
When they arrived at their destination she left him paying the taxi driver and went into the apartment block. Was it always going to hurt like this? Loving him like crazy, yet, at the same time, wanting to crash something heavy and painful down on his head?
She had composed her expression by the time Carter joined her in the lift. It was a silent journey upwards. Once inside the apartment she went straight to her room. He did not try to stop her.
Oh, Lord, she was here with him until, perhaps, Friday. Possibly three more days. Three more unbearable days. She was past analysing what had gone wrong and got out of her suit and went and took a shower.
A few minutes later she stepped out of the shower and, with her hair loose down her back, she donned a robe. She wished, and didn’t wish, that she hadn’t kissed him back last night.
She acknowledged that he’d got her so mixed-up she couldn’t think straight. He’d got her emotions into such an uproar that she seemed constantly on a see-saw, wanting to laugh at something he said one minute, feeling like crying the next.
Well, she wouldn’t—A knock suddenly sounded on her door and for a couple of seconds she panicked and wasn’t capable of thinking of anything. Quickly she got herself together. Unmistakably Carter wanted her for something, regardless of the fact that she could be in any state of undress, or without a stitch on for that matter! He wasn’t the sort to wait too patiently—or, in her case, too politely either.
Visualising him coming in at any moment, Ashlyn tightened the belt of her thin robe—her only covering—and went and opened the door. Only then, as she saw him make a thorough if rapid study of her long hair loose about her shoulders, her curvaceous but thinly clad, slender body, before his glance came swiftly back to her face, did she recall that she wasn’t wearing a scrap of make-up. Oh, great! And there was he, dressed up like a dog’s dinner in an immaculate suit, crisp white shirt, showered and shaven.
‘Yes!’ she snapped—why wouldn’t she? Nothing like the man you loved seeing you when you knew you weren’t looking your best!
He was not happy with her tone, she could tell. Tough! ‘I’ve a business appointment,’ he informed her sharply. So that was what they called it! ‘It’s unlikely I’ll be back to take you to dinner.’
As if she’d go! ‘Good heavens, I’ve not long finished lunch—I couldn’t eat another thing!’ she exclaimed.
‘There’s food in the—’
‘Have a good time—with your business!’ she bade him, and closed her door—and wished with all she had that she hadn’t added that last bit. Had there been a note of jealousy there? Had Carter picked it up? Oh, heavens, she did hope not.
Ashlyn went and sat down, aware that if Carter, with his quick intelligence, was not going to glean how she felt about him she was going to have to be much more careful in future.
A few minutes later, however, her pride was up in arms again. If he was truly going out on ‘business’, why couldn’t he take her with him? She was there because he ‘needed a board member’ with him, wasn’t she? Lying toad!
Well, if he thought she was staying home to have a quiet evening in while he was out on the town wining and dining his French lady-friend—she didn’t need two guesses to know that he had fixed that evening’s date with her at lunchtime—he had another think coming! She’d had the offer of a date at lunchtime too. Two of them in fact.
Without more ado Ashlyn went and found the cards the two Matthieus had given her. Matthieu Boirel and Matthieu Litique. Both had suggested she phone them—but which was which?
She recalled the nice Matthieu, the one like her cousin Teddy; but, if she’d heard his surname, she could not remember it. She then thought of the other Matthieu. She hadn’t taken to him at all.
Oh, she wouldn’t go! Yes, she would. She had a fifty per cent chance of getting the Matthieu who had seemed harmless. She wasn’t going to sit in while Carter was out tom-catting!
She shuffled the cards and took them over to the phone. Matthieu Boirel’s card was the top one. She dialled his number. ‘Allô. C’est Ashlyn Ain—’ She did not have to say more.
‘Ashlynl Chérie!’ Matthieu Boirel exclaimed—and she knew at once that she had got the wrong Matthieu!
After her phone call Ashlyn went and took stock of her wardrobe. Matthieu had spoken of them going to a nightclub. Ashlyn, with silent thanks for her mother’s foresight, decided on the gold dress with the narrow shoulder-straps.
Recalling the way Matthieu Boirel had ogled her at lunchtime, she was not, in all honesty, looking forward to the evening she had arranged with him. But each time she thought of putting through an urgent call to cancel she thought of Carter expecting her to stay placidly in the apartment while he went off amusing himself. Besides, she had no idea, bearing in mind she had met Matthieu at a business lunch, if any last-minute cancellation she made might be detrimental to any business Carter had in mind.
Well, she hoped, hoped, hoped that Carter would be at the same nightclub where she and Matthieu planned to be that night. It would give her enormous pleasure to thumb her nose at him—he with his ‘There’s food in the—’ Let him eat it!
In the event she did not see Carter at the nightclub Matthieu Boirel took her to. In fact it was so dark in there, until her eyes became accustomed to what light there was, she felt she could have been sitting at a table next to her long-lost aunt and never have known it!
Not that any aunt of Ashlyn’s would frequent such a place! Ashlyn owned that she had never been to a club quite like it. Matthieu had called for her before time; the concierge had telephoned her to say Monsieur Boirel was there. She’d opted not to have him sent up. Pausing only to drape her matching stole about her, she’d picked up her evening bag and gone down to greet him.
The moment she’d got into his car and he’d ‘accidentally’ placed his hand on her knee, she’d known that she had made a mistake in arranging to see him. But, when she’d firmly removed his hand and he’d murmured, ‘Pardon,’ she’d thought she could handle him.
She began to have her doubts about that, though, as the evening in the dingy little club wore on. He did not offer her anything to eat—not that she wanted anything—but he tried hard to ply her with drink. Ashlyn stuck firmly with the one she had.
They were seated on a bench type of seat. Matthieu moved closer and put an arm along the back. She moved away. Other couples were dancing—at least she could make out outlines of couples moving to the sound of music coming from somewhere.
‘Shall we dance?’ Matthieu asked.
It seemed a good idea. If she moved any further away from him, she’d fall off the end of the seat. ‘That would be nice,’ she consented, thinking that she must try and spread herself away from him when they got back. Encouragement he did not need: it soon became clear that dancing with him was not a good idea after all. He held her too close and she felt she was suffocating.
She took a hold of his waist, intending to push him away. He got the wrong idea and grabbed her more firmly. Business or no business, it was time to tell him to get lost.
Ashlyn then thought that he had got the message anyway, because he breathed in her ear, ‘Shall we go?’
It was the best thing he’d said all night. ‘Please,’ she said—and was never more grateful to be out in the fresh air.
Any feeling of relief she experienced, however, was short-lived, because she soon discovered that, while they spoke each other’s verbal language perfectly, they were on different planets when it came to body language.
For they had been driving less than five minutes back to her apartment, or so she thought, when Matthieu Boirel turned the car into a side-street, stopped the engine and, with an urgent, ‘I can’t wait any longer,’ made a lunge for her.
Ashlyn was just not ready for it. In no time flat he had her pinned beneath him, his loose mouth seeking hers. It was then that she came rapidly to life. Carter’s mouth was the last mouth to touch hers and she wasn’t having that wonderful memory sullied by this oaf.
‘No!’ she yelled. ‘Non!’ But Matthieu Boirel took no notice.
The next few minutes were a complete and utter nightmare as she fought against what seemed to be this man’s maniacal desire for her. He just would not listen to her pleas to leave her alone. Which left her terrified, gulping for air when she had the chance, and fighting and kicking like fury whenever she was able.
His face was near, so she bit it, and kept on biting until, with a yell of rage, he let her go. By some sheer magical good luck she found the door-catch, and she was out of the car while he was still holding his face, out of the car and running, running, crossing streets, and still running.
Ashlyn slowed down only when her frequent glances behind showed her she was not being followed. She had no idea where she was, or what the time was. Then, by sheer good fortune, she saw a taxi heading her way—but she was in such shock by then that she didn’t care whether it was taken or not—or even if it ran her over.
She went swiftly into the street and stood in the middle of the road waving her arms. The taxi screeched to a halt, the driver grumbling like fury. She got into the taxi and, striving for all the dignity she could manage, given that her hair was a mess and Lord knew what her make-up was like, she gave him the address of the apartment.
The taxi moved off and she felt too exhausted to worry that she did not have her bag, which she had left behind in her rush to escape Matthieu Boirel’s car. The concierge could pay; she would pay the concierge back later, or Hamilton Holdings would. She didn’t seem to be thinking straight, and felt like bursting into tears when the taxi driver pulled up outside the apartment block.
Managing to hold back tears, she asked the concierge to pay and give a generous tip. Seeming astonished that this usually immaculate-looking young woman should return in such a state, he assured her that he would.
As well as having no money, she had no doorkey. But that didn’t bother her either. If Carter wasn’t in she would park herself outside the apartment door. At least here she felt safe.
Carter was in. She rang the bell. It was answered immediately. He was still up, dressed in shirt and trousers—and he was furious!
‘Where the hell have you been?’ he bellowed before he’d barely shut the door.
Ashlyn, feeling closer to tears than ever, was afraid to speak lest she break down and start sobbing. Unable to speak, she rushed past him. But, as she might have known, he wasn’t having that.
He followed her to her room, turning on the main light as he came in. In that strong light and not the table-lamp glow of the sitting room, he saw for the first time her ashen face and her shocked look.
‘What happened?’ he demanded to know at once.
‘I went out with Matthieu Boirel; he—’
‘Alone?’ Carter barked, clearly knowing at once who Matthieu Boirel was.
‘Yes,’ she answered wearily, wishing Carter would go. She wanted to forget it; she didn’t need this third degree. She turned away, realising that by some miracle she still had her stole about her. Perhaps she’d straightened it in the taxi; she couldn’t remember. She took it off, wanting to go to bed, wanting to go to sleep, wanting to pretend that it had never happened.
Then she noticed, as Carter at once noticed, that both the straps of her dress were broken and hanging down, and that her arms were red and starting to bruise.
‘What in God’s name has happened to you?’ Carter thundered, enraged—his fury was back with a vengeance!