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He nodded, and if Leila had had the time to appreciate how out of place he looked against the backdrop of delicate perfume bottles she might have smiled.
She suspected that she knew what was in the box.
She ducked into a small anteroom behind the counter and opened it to reveal layers of expensive-looking silver tissue paper. Underneath the paper she saw a glimmer of silk, and gasped as she pulled out the most beautiful dress she’d ever seen.
It was a very light green, with one simple shoulder strap and a ruched bodice. The skirt fell to the floor from under the bust in layers of delicate chiffon. On further investigation Leila saw that there were matching shoes and even underwear. Her face burned at that. It burned even more when she realised that Alix had got her size spot-on.
She felt tempted to march right across the square and tell him to shove his date, but she held on to her temper. This was how he must operate with all his women. And he was arrogant enough to think that Leila was just like them?
* * *
‘What do you mean, she wouldn’t accept it?’
Ricardo looked exceedingly uncomfortable and shifted from foot to foot, before saying sotto voce, mindful of the other men in the room, ‘She left a note inside the box.’
‘Did she now?’ Alix curbed his irritation and said curtly, ‘Thank you, Ricardo, that will be all.’
Alix had been holding a meeting in his suite, and the other men around the table started to move a little, clearly anticipating a break from the customarily intense sessions Alix conducted. He dismissed them too, with a look that changed their expressions of relief to ones of meek servitude.
When they were all gone Alix flicked open the lid of the box and saw the plain piece of white paper lying on the silver paper with its succinct message:
Thank you, but I can dress myself.
Leila.
Alix couldn’t help his mouth quirking in a smile. Had any woman ever handed him back a gift? Not in his memory.
He let the lid drop down and stood up to walk over to the window of his suite, which looked out over the square below.
For a large portion of his life, ever since his dramatic escape from Isle Saint Croix all those years ago, he’d felt like a caged animal—forced into this role of pretending that he wasn’t engaged in an all-out battle to regain his throne. The prospect of being on his island again, with the salty tang of the sea in the hot air... Sometimes the yearning for home was almost unbearable.
Alix sighed and let his gaze narrow on the small shop that glinted across the square in the late-afternoon sunlight. He could see the familiar slim white-coated shape moving back and forth. The caged animal within him got even more restless. The yearning was replaced with sharp anticipation.
It would be no hardship to pursue Miss Verughese and let the world think nothing untoward was going on behind the scenes. No hardship at all.
* * *
Leila looked at herself in the mirror and had a sudden attack of nerves. Maybe she’d been really stupid to send Alix’s gift back to him? She’d never been to the opera—she wasn’t even sure what the dress code was, except posh.
The scent she’d put on so sparingly drifted up, and for a moment she wanted to run and wash it off. It wasn’t her usual scent, which was light and floral. This was a scent that had always fascinated her: one of her mother’s most sensual creations. It had called to Leila from the shelf just after she’d locked up before coming upstairs to get ready.
It was called Dark Desiring. Her mother had had a penchant for giving their perfumes enigmatic names. As soon as Leila had sprayed a little on her wrist she’d heard her mother’s voice in her head: ‘This scent is for a woman, Leila. The kind of woman who knows what she wants and gets it. You will be that woman someday, and you won’t be foolish like your mother.’
She felt the scent now, deep in the pit of her belly. Felt its dark sensuality, earthy musky notes and exotic floral arrangement. It was so unlike her...and yet it resonated with her. But she felt exposed wearing it—as if it would be obvious to everyone that she was trying to be something she wasn’t.
The doorbell sounded... Too late to remove it now, even if she wanted to.
She made her way downstairs, her heart palpitating in her chest. She thrust aside memories of another man she’d let too close. It had been as if as soon as her mother’s influence had been removed Leila had automatically sought out proof that not all men weren’t to be trusted. But that had spectacularly backfired and proved her very wrong.
Walking through the darkened shop, Leila forced the clamouring memories down. She’d learnt her lesson. She was no fool any more. She still wanted something different from her mother’s experience, but Alix Saint Croix was the last man to offer such a thing. So, if anything, she couldn’t be safer than with this man.
She sucked in a big breath and opened the door. The sky was dusky outside and Alix blocked most of it with his broad shoulders. He was dressed in a classic black tuxedo and white bow tie under his overcoat. Leila’s mouth went dry. That assurance of safety suddenly felt very flimsy.
She wasn’t even aware that Alix’s eyes had widened on her when she’d appeared.
‘You look beautiful.’
She stopped gawking at him long enough to meet his eyes. And those nerves gripped her again as she gestured shyly to her outfit. ‘I wasn’t sure... I hope it’s appropriate?’
Alix lifted his eyes to hers. ‘It’s stunning. You look like a princess.’
Leila blushed and busied herself pulling the door behind her and locking it to deflect his scrutiny.
The outfit was a traditional Indian salwar kameez with a bit of a modern twist. The tunic was made out of green and gold silk, with slim-fitting trousers in the same shade of green. She had on gold strappy sandals that she’d bought one day on a whim but never worn. A loose chiffon throw was draped over her shoulders and she’d put her hair up in a high bun. She wore ornate earrings that had belonged to her mother—like a talisman that might protect her from falling into the vortex that this man created whenever he was near.
The driver of the sleek car parked nearby was holding the door open, and Leila slid into the luxurious confines as Alix joined her from the other side. She plucked nervously at the material of her tunic as they pulled away.
Alix took her hand and she looked at him.
‘You look amazing. No other woman will be dressed the same.’
Leila quirked a wry smile, liking the feel of Alix’s hand around hers far too much. ‘That’s what I’m suddenly afraid of.’
He shook his head. ‘You’ll stand out like a bird of paradise—they’ll be insanely jealous.’
Leila gave a small dissenting sound and went to pull her hand back, but Alix gripped it tighter and lifted it up, turning her wrist. He frowned slightly and bent to smell. Leila’s heart thumped, hard.
He looked at her. ‘This isn’t your usual scent?’
Damn him for noticing. Leila cursed her impetuosity and felt as if that scarlet letter was on her forehead for all to see. She pulled her hand back. ‘No, it’s a different scent—one more suitable for evenings.’
‘I like it.’
Leila could smell his scent too. The one she’d made him. She knew that it lingered on his skin from when he’d put it on much earlier that day—it didn’t have the sharp tang of having been recently applied. She thought of their scents now, mingling and wrapping around one another. It made her feel unbearably aware of the fact that they were so close. Aware of the warm blood pumping just under their skin, making those scents mellow and change subtly.
It was an alchemy that happened to everyone in a totally different way, as the perfume responded uniquely to each individual.
She finally looked away from Alix to see that they were leaving the confines of the city and heading towards the grittier outskirts. Nowhere near the Paris opera house.
She frowned and looked back at him. ‘I thought we were going to the opera?’
‘We are.’
‘But we’re leaving Paris.’
Alix smiled. ‘I said we were going to the opera. I didn’t say where.’
Flutters of panic made her tense. ‘I don’t appreciate surprises. Tell me where we’re going, please.’
His eyes narrowed on her and Leila bit back the urge to lambast him for assuming she was just some wittering dolly bird, only too happy to let him whisk her off to some unknown location.
Alix’s voice had an edge of steel to it when he said, ‘We’re going to Venice.’
‘Venice?’ Leila squeaked. ‘But I don’t have my passport. I mean, how can we just—?’
Alix took her hand again and spoke as if he was soothing a nervous horse. ‘You don’t need your passport. I have diplomatic immunity and you’re with me. The flight will take an hour and forty minutes. I’ll have you back in Paris and home by midnight. I promise.’
Leila reeled. ‘You said flight?’
Alix nodded warily, as if expecting another explosion.
‘I’ve never been on a plane before,’ she admitted somewhat warily. As if Alix might be so disgusted with her lack of sophistication that he’d turn around and deliver her home right now.
He just frowned slightly. ‘But...how is that possible?’
Leila shrugged, finding to her consternation that once again she was loath to take her hand out of Alix’s much bigger one. ‘My mother and I...we didn’t travel much. Apart from to other parts of France. We went to England once, to visit a factory outside London, but we took the train. My mother was terrified of flying.’
‘Well, then,’ said Alix throatily, ‘do you want to go home? Or do you want to take your first flight? We can turn around right now if you want.’
That was like asking if she wanted to keep moving forward in life or backwards. Leila felt that fire reaching out to lick at her with a tantalising flash of heat. Alix’s thumb was rubbing the underside of her wrist, making the flash of heat more intense. Leila thought of the car turning around, of returning to that square and her shop. She felt nauseous.
She shook her head. ‘I’d like to fly with you.’
Alix brought her hand to his mouth and kissed it lightly before saying, ‘Then let’s fly.’
Leila might not be half as sophisticated as his usual women, but even she knew that they were talking about something else entirely—just as the flames of that fire reached out to consume her completely and Alix moved close enough to slant his hard sensual mouth over hers.
She’d been kissed before—by Pierre. But his kiss had been insistent and invasive. Too wet, with no finesse. This was...
Leila lost any sense of being able to string a rational thought together when her mouth opened of its own volition under Alix’s and she felt the first electrifying contact of his tongue to hers. She was lost.
CHAPTER FOUR
THE ONLY THING stopping Alix exploding into orbit at the feel of Leila’s lush soft mouth under his and the shy touch of her tongue was the hand he’d clamped around her waist. He was rock-hard almost instantaneously. He’d never tasted such sweetness. Her mouth trembled under his and he had to use extreme restraint to go slowly, coaxing her to open up to him.
He felt the hitch in her breathing as their kiss deepened and he gathered her closer to feel the swell of her breasts against his chest. Right at that moment Alix couldn’t have remembered his own name. He was drowning in heat and lust and an urgent desire to haul Leila over his lap, so that he could seat her against where he ached most.
She pulled back suddenly and he cracked open his eyes to look down into wide green ones. Leila had her hands on his chest and was pushing at him.
‘Please—don’t do that again.’
Alix was on unsure ground. Another first. He wasn’t used to women pushing him away. And he knew Leila had been enjoying it. She’d been melting into him like his hottest teenage fantasy, and he felt about as suave as a teenager right then. All raging hormones and no control.
Drawing on what little control he did still have, Alix moved back, putting space between them. He looked at her. Cheeks flushed, chest rising and falling rapidly, eyes avoiding his. Mouth pink and wet. It made him think of other parts of her that might be wet. He cursed himself silently. Where was his finesse?
He reached out and cupped her jaw, seeing how she tensed. He tipped her chin up so that she had no choice but to look at him. Her eyes were huge and wary. There was an edge of something in her eyes that he couldn’t read. He felt a spike of recrimination. Had he been too forceful? But he knew he hadn’t. It had nearly killed him to rein himself in.
‘Did you have a bad experience with a previous lover?’
She pulled his hand down. ‘That’s none of your business.’
She avoided his eyes again and he wanted to growl his frustration. But they were pulling into the small private airport now, and staff were rushing to meet the car.
Alix got out and pulled his coat around his body, not liking that he had to conceal his arousal. He glared at the driver who was about to help Leila out of the car and the man ducked back to let Alix take her hand. When she stood up beside him, the breeze blowing a loose tendril of dark hair across one cheek, he had to forcibly stop himself from kissing her again.
Gripping her hand, when he usually avoided public displays of affection like the plague, he led her over to the waiting plane: a small sleek private jet that he used for short hops around Europe. He realised then how much he took things like this for granted. Leila had never even flown before.
He stopped and turned to her. ‘You’re not frightened, are you?’
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