When jet-set passion leads to pregnancy!

Escape for

Mother’s Day

Pamper yourself this Mother’s Day with

three breathtaking stories from Abby Green,

Chantelle Shaw and Fiona McArthur

Escape for Mother’s day

The French Tycoon’s Pregnant Mistress

Abby Green

Di Cesare’s Pregnant Mistress

Chantelle Shaw

The Pregnant Midwife

Fiona McArthur

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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The French Tycoon’s Pregnant Mistress

Abby Green

About the Author

ABBY GREEN worked for twelve years in the film industry. The glamour of four a.m. starts, dealing with precious egos, the mucky fields, driving rain … all became too much. After stumbling across a guide to writing romance, she took it as a sign and saw her way out, capitalising on her long-time love for romance books. Now she is very happy to sit in her nice warm house while others are out in the rain and muck! She lives and works in Dublin.

CHAPTER ONE

‘WITH a nail-biting finish like that, I think we can safely say that this tournament is wide-open and set to be one of the most exciting yet. This is Alana Cusack, reporting live from Croke Park. Back to you in the studio, Brian.’

Alana kept the smile pasted on her face until she could hear the chatter die away in her earpiece and then handed her microphone to her assistant, Aisling, with relief once she knew she was off air. She avoided looking to where she knew the man was still standing, his shoulder propped nonchalantly against the wall, hands in the pockets of his dark trousers, underneath a black overcoat with the collar turned up. He’d been talking to one of the French players, but now he was alone again.

He was watching her. And he’d been watching her all through the Six Nations match between Ireland and France. He’d unsettled her and he’d distracted her. And she didn’t know why.

That was a lie; she knew exactly why. He was dark and brooding, and so gorgeous that when she’d first locked eyes with him, quite by accident, it had felt as though someone had just punched her in the stomach. There had been an instant tug of recognition and something very alien and disconcerting. Certainly something that no other man had ever made her feel.

Not even her husband.

The tug had been so strong that she’d felt herself smiling and raising a quizzical brow, but then she’d seen an unmistakably mocking glint in his dark eyes. Of course, she didn’t know him; she’d never seen his long, hard-boned face before, had never seen that mouth, which even to look at from where she sat, had the most amazingly sensuous lips. Immediately she’d felt herself flushing with embarrassment at her reaction to him.

He had to be French, as he shared the quintessential good looks of so many of the crowd today, quite exotically different from the more pale-skinned home crowd of Irish supporters. And he’d been sitting in the seats reserved for VIP’s, situated just below the press area. He looked like a VIP. She’d only had to look once to know that he effortlessly stood out from the rest of the crowd. But her gaze had been inexorably drawn to him again and again, and to her utter ongoing mortification their eyes had met more than once. When he’d stood intermittently with the crowd during a try or a conversion, he’d stood taller and broader than any of the men around him—and in a crowd full of rugby supporters, that was something.

Yet was he waiting now because he thought that she’d been giving him some sort of come-on? Everything in Alana clammed up and rejected that thought. She would never be so blatant.

‘Do you need a lift, Alana?’ Aisling and the others had finished packing up, and Derek the cameraman was looking at her. Suddenly she felt very flustered. She didn’t get flustered. She was often teased for appearing cool, calm and collected at all times.

‘No,’ she answered quickly, aware that the stranger had moved out of her peripheral vision. A sense of panic threatened her—that he might be right behind her, waiting for her. ‘I have to go to a family dinner later, so I have my car here.’

‘So no glitzy after-party to see the French celebrating for you, then?’

She mock-grimaced, secretly relieved that she had an excuse. ‘I’ll only have time to stop in to show my face on my way, just to keep Rory happy.’

He shrugged and was about to walk away after Aisling and the other assistant, with their small amount of gear, when he stopped and turned again, distracting Alana.

‘Good reporting today, kid.’

Pleasure rushed through her. This was so important to her; Derek was practically a veteran of TV. She’d been slogging for a long time to get a modicum of respect. She smiled. ‘Thanks, Derek. I really appreciate that.’

He winked at her and turned to walk away again. With the fizz of pleasure staying in her chest, she checked around for anything left behind and made to follow the others, before stopping and cursing as she remembered that her laptop and notebook were back in the press seats.

Derek’s words were forgotten when that prickling awareness came back. She turned around with her heart beating hard, fully expecting to see the man again. She had a curiously insincere feeling of relief when he wasn’t there. He’d obviously gone, bored with waiting around. Taking the lift back up to the upper level, she told herself to stop being ridiculous, that she’d merely imagined that they’d had some kind of silent communication …

He thought he’d missed her when he’d gone to look at the pitch for a moment, and he didn’t like the momentary sense of panic that thought had generated.

But she was still here.

Now Pascal Lévêque stood back with arms folded and surveyed the enticing sight in front of him. A very shapely bottom was raised in the air, encased in the tight confines of a pencil skirt. Its owner was currently bending over, hauling a bag out from under a seat. His eyes drifted down. Long, slim legs were momentarily bent and now straightened to their full length—which was long, all the way from slim, neat ankles right up to gently flaring hips which tapered into a neat waist. He wondered if she was wearing stockings, and that thought had a forceful effect on the blood in his veins.

He wondered, too, then, what it was about her that had kept him looking, that had kept him here, when he should have long gone. What was it that had kept drawing his eye back again and again, uncharacteristically taking his attention away from the riveting match?

Neat.

That was it. She was neat. Right from her starchy, buttoned-up stripey shirt complete with tie, down to her sensible court-shoes and shiny, straight hair neatly tucked behind her ears, a side parting to the left. It was tied back in a small ponytail, but he could well imagine that if let loose, it would fall ever so neatly into a straight shoulder-length bob, framing her face. And since when had he been into neat? He was famously into seductive, sensual women, women who poured their beautiful, curvaceous bodies into clothes and dresses designed to fire the imagination and ignite the senses. Women who weren’t afraid to entice and beguile, using all their powerful charms for his pleasure.

She was shrugging into a long, black overcoat now, hiding herself, and bizarrely, he felt all at once irritated, inflamed and perplexed. What the hell was he doing, practically slavering over some vacuous TV dolly bird? He knew that any second now she’d turn round, and he’d see that up close her face wasn’t half as alluring as he’d imagined it to be from a distance: with a healthy glow, full, glossy lips and doe-shaped eyes under dark brows which contrasted with her strawberry-blonde hair.

No; she’d turn round and he’d see that she was caked in orange make-up. Her eyes would flare with recognition—hadn’t she already recognised him earlier, and given him those enticingly shy looks? And then he’d be caught. He was already trying to think up something to excuse his very out-of-character behaviour when she did turn round. He opened his mouth and suddenly his mind went blank.

Alana had no warning for what or who faced her. That gorgeous, brooding stranger was right in front of her. Just feet away. Looking at her. They were standing alone in an eighty-thousand-seat stadium, but to Alana in that moment it shrank to the four square feet surrounding them. And it was then that she had to acknowledge that the prickling awareness she’d been dismissing had just exploded into full-on shock. The blood seemed to thicken in her veins; her heart pounded again in recognition of some base appreciation of his very masculinity.

He stood with his head tilted back, hands in the pockets of his trousers. His coat emphasised his broad shoulders, the olive tone of his skin. But it was his eyes that she couldn’t take her own shocked gaze from. They were wide, dark, intelligent and full of something so hot and brazenly sensual that she felt breathless.

Her hands gripped her notebooks close to her chest, and she was absurdly relieved that she was wearing a long coat, feeling very strangely that this man could somehow see underneath, as if with just a look he could make her clothes melt away. She shook her head, unaware of what she was doing, and to her intense relief, she found her voice.

‘Excuse me, can I help you? Are you looking for someone?’ Since when had her voice taken on the huskily seductive tones of a jazz singer? Even though they were alone, Alana felt no sense of fear. Her sense of fear came from an entirely different direction.

‘You were looking at me.’

Pascal winced inwardly at the accusing tone of his voice and the baldness of his statement, but he was still reeling from coming face to face with her. His recent assumption that she would prove to be entirely unalluring was blasted to smithereens. She was all at once pale and glowing. Dewy. Cheeks flushed red from the cold breeze … or something else? That thought had blood rushing southward with an unwelcome lack of control. Her eyes were a unique shade of light green. Her lips were full and soft, not covered in glossy gloop. He’d never seen anyone so naturally beguiling.

‘Excuse me?’ Alana welcomed the righteous indignation that flowed through her, and told herself it wasn’t adrenaline. But since when had righteous indignation made her shake? She’d been right; he was obviously just a tourist looking for a little fun. He’d misconstrued her meaning when she’d smiled at him. Well, she wasn’t on the market for that sort of thing.

‘From what I recall you were doing a fair amount of looking yourself.’ She hitched up her chin. ‘I thought I recognised you, but I was wrong, so forgive me if I led you to believe that something more was on offer. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have work to get back to.’

The man smiled, revealing gleaming, strong white teeth, and Alana felt momentarily dizzy. ‘I am well aware that you are working, after all, didn’t I just see you interviewing Ireland’s manager? I was making an observation, that’s all. And you were looking at me.’

‘No more than you were looking at me.’ She desperately tried to claw back some semblance of control.

He rocked back on his heels and a different light came into his eyes. An altogether more dangerous light. And Alana could see that she was effectively trapped. The space between the seats was far too narrow for her to even attempt to push past him, and the only alternative would be to jump into the next aisle—far too unladylike and desperate. And, in the skirt she was wearing, impossible.

Alana felt unbelievably threatened. She called up her best brisk manner and hitched her laptop-bag strap higher on her shoulder, hoping he’d take the hint. ‘This conversation is getting us nowhere. Now, really, I have to get back to my office, and I’m sure you have somewhere far more exciting to be.’

After a long, intense moment, to her utter relief, he stepped back and indicated with his arm that she should precede him out of the row of seats that led into the press area. Alana gritted her teeth and walked past, but, even though she tried to arch her whole body away as she moved past him, she was aware of his height which had to be at least six foot four, the sheer breadth of him and an enticingly musky smell.

The smell of sex.

Oh God, what was wrong with her? Since when had she ever thought she could smell sex? And since when had she even been aware of what it smelt like? She felt weak in the pit of her stomach, but thankfully she was now past him and hurrying back up the main steps to the lift, which would bring her down to ground level and back to reality.

Her silent prayers weren’t answered when she felt his presence beside her, yet he said nothing as the lift doors opened. When he stepped in with her, Alana punched the button, silently pleading for the journey down to be quick. It was excruciatingly intense, sharing the small confined space, and she practically bolted as soon as the lift juddered to a halt and the doors opened. As she walked towards the main gates at the back of the stand, Alana could see her car parked on the road outside. And then she heard his steps stop behind her.

Of course, he’d kept up with her effortlessly; she had the unsettling feeling that she was on a tight leash. He was like a predator indulging his prey, not moving in for the kill just yet. And knowing that, against all rational thought in her head, Alana stopped, too, and turned round. Her heart was still pounding from the close proximity in the lift, and she just realised then that she must have held her breath the whole way down.

He was looking at her with those intense eyes. And then he said, ‘Actually, I do have somewhere more exciting to be. Maybe you’d care to join me?’

The full effect of his accent washed through her now; it was as if she’d blocked it out when she’d first heard him speak, having been too much to cope with along with everything else. He was absolutely devastating, and he was coming on to her. Alana couldn’t believe it. She knew perfectly well she was nothing special; she looked like a million other girls. What on earth could this man want with her? Anyone could see he was in another league. Alarm bells rang, loud and insistently.

She shook her head and started backing away towards the gate and her car, but the physical pull to stay in this man’s orbit was something she had to actively fight against. Simultaneously a sleek, dark Lexus pulled up beside them. Clearly his car—his chauffeur-driven car—which had of course been parked here in the VIP parking area.

She was shaking her head. ‘I’m sorry, Mr …?’

‘Lévêque.’

‘Mr Lévêque.’ Even his name sounded sexy—purposeful. Important. ‘I have to get back to work.’ She repeated it then, as if to drive a point home. ‘This is work for me. Enjoy your weekend in Dublin. There are plenty of other women out there.’ Who won’t be stupid enough to walk away, the voice mocked her. But as she finally turned and walked towards her car she told herself she was glad. He hadn’t looked put out; he hadn’t even tried to get her to change her mind. He was just a rich tourist over for the match. And she knew all about sports supporters. She used to be part of that crowd, used to be a professional supporter. Not any more.

Pascal refused to give in to the desire to look to where she was getting into her car as his own swept past and away from the stadium. He couldn’t really believe that she’d refused him. A woman hadn’t walked away from him since … he couldn’t remember when. His mouth thinned. She was right: there were plenty of other women out there. She really wasn’t anything special.

So why was it that all he could see were those invitingly soft lips? And those huge, green eyes, full of changing depths? And that alluring body in its veritable uniform that made his hands itch to rip it off and see what it hid?

He was bored. That was it. And he’d been without a lover for some weeks. He was going to a party tonight. If all he was looking for was a quick lay, then he’d get it in spades.

Feeling his equilibrium start to settle again was a welcome relief, because it hadn’t been normal since he’d laid eyes on her. He settled back and relaxed. And then promptly tensed again, all recent justifications out the window. He hadn’t got her name. And he didn’t even know if she was married. He couldn’t remember seeing a ring, but now it glared at him. That had to be it. Equanimity rushed through him again. This time he firmly cast her out of his head as a weird, momentary diversion and looked forward to the fast-approaching evening and the promise of fulfilment that was now a dull, throbbing ache in his body.

‘Alana, you can’t leave yet.’

‘But, Rory, I’ve got to get home, it’s my brother’s fortieth.’

Her boss ignored her and pulled her firmly by the hand, back into the throng of people she’d just battled her way through to get out. She rolled her eyes in exasperation.

‘Alana, you have to meet him, you’re interviewing him tomorrow. He rang in person after the match, specifically asking for you—must have seen you reporting or something, but who cares? Do you have any idea what a coup this is? He’s an important sponsor of the Six Nations … famously reclusive … billionaire.’

Alana was getting bumped and bashed by people along the way as she struggled to keep up with her hyper TV-boss. She couldn’t hear half of what he was saying. Something about an interview? That was nothing unusual; she did interviews most days. Why was he making such a big deal about this one? She cast a quick, worried look at her watch on the wrist not held captive by Rory. The surprise party would be starting in half an hour, and it would take her that to get out to her parents’ house in Foxrock. If she missed the start of it, her life wouldn’t be worth living.

Then Rory stopped abruptly and she careened into him. He turned and gave her a worried once-over. ‘You’ll do; it’s a pity you’re not more dressed up, you know, Alana, you could have made more of an effort. Really.’ His mouth pursed in disapproval.

Irritation rankled; all too frequently people seemed to expect her to be what she had been—before. ‘Rory, I’m dressed for a family party, remember? Not the French team’s celebrations.’

Which she had to privately admit now were something else. Clearly someone had a lot of money to spend. They were taking place in the lavish ballroom of the Four Seasons hotel just on the outskirts of Dublin city-centre. She wasn’t dressed in the glittering half-sheath dresses that most of the women seemed to be sporting, but she was perfectly respectable. And she preferred it that way. She had too many uncomfortable memories of being paraded in fashions that had been too tight, too small, too everything. And not her. She knew she went out of her way in situations like this to draw the line between the woman she had been and the woman she was now.

Rory looked over her head, tensed visibly and then looked back, taking her shoulders as if she were a child. ‘He’s just arrived. Now, I can’t impress upon you how important this man is. Apart from his role in the Six Nations, he’s the CEO of one of the biggest banks in the world. I’ll introduce you and then you can go, OK? No doubt he’s got bigger fish to fry tonight than meeting you, anyway.’

Rory grabbed her hand again, and before Alana could say anything, he was leading her over to where a man stood with his black-suited back to them, surrounded by obviously fawning people and a couple of scantily dressed women. And suddenly Alana’s legs turned to jelly. Even before they reached him she felt her heart start to pound in recognition. It got about a million times worse when Rory hissed in her ear, ‘His name is Lévêque. Pascal Lévêque.’

‘I believe I saw you covering the match earlier, no?’ He said this innocently with that deeply sexy voice, as if they’d never met.

For the second time that day Alana looked up into those eyes. Those eyes that she hadn’t been able to get out of her head. Her mouth turned dry, her hands clammy. Her reaction was alarming; she’d sworn off all men, and had no time for frivolous flirtations, and she couldn’t understand why this man was having such an extreme effect on her. Other men flirted with her and asked her out, and she dismissed them with barely a ripple of acknowledgement or reaction. But this was different. And she’d known it from the moment she had met him, which was why she’d all but run.

Silence lengthened, and Rory nudged her discreetly but painfully. Automatically Alana held out a hand. She spoke on autopilot. ‘Yes. Yes, you did.’

Pascal Lévêque then took her hand in his much larger one, but instead of shaking it he bent his head, his eyes never leaving hers. Alana saw what he was going to do as if in slow motion, but still the feel of his mouth on the back of her cool hand sent shockwaves through her entire body. Immediately she tried to pull her hand away, but he wouldn’t let her go. He straightened slowly. She felt his index finger uncurl to caress the point under the wrist where her pulse beat fast, and then he let her hand go. The gesture was fleeting but utterly earth-shattering.

He broke their eye contact, leaving Alana feeling curiously deflated, and with a brief, succinct question Rory left, muttering something about getting drinks. The rest of the crowd the man had been talking to melted away too. He turned back, fixing on her with that intense gaze again.

‘You’ve had time to change, I see. Tell me, is this still classed as work?’

Alana bristled. Hot, burning irritation was rising. ‘Of course I changed—it’s a party. And, yes, this is still work.’

His eyes swept down, taking in what she knew to be a perfectly suitable albeit very unexciting dress. It was a black shift, high-necked and under a matching jacket. Unrevealing.

‘You’ve changed, too,’ she pointed out, feeling ridiculously self-conscious. But, whereas she felt sure she merged into the background, he was managing to stand out in a crowd of identically dressed men in a traditional black tuxedo, white shirt and black bow tie.

His eyes met hers again. ‘Don’t you want to take off your coat? It’s warm in here.’

Warm!

She could feel a trickle of sweat roll down between her breasts as if his words had just turned the room into a sauna. ‘No, I’m fine.’ But all at once the jacket which had felt positively lightweight now felt like a bear skin. To be confronted with him up close and personal was overwhelming. Her eyes wanted to look their fill of his broad, lean body, wanted to rest and dwell and see if he filled out his suit as well as she suspected he did. Who was she kidding? As well as she knew he did. She didn’t have to look to feel the latent power of his taut body envelop her in waves.

Before she knew what she was doing, she felt her hand come up in a telling gesture to smooth her hair behind her ear. It was a nervous habit. His eyes narrowed and followed her movement, and Alana flushed. Damn. She did not want to look like she was in any way aware of him.

A smile quirked his mouth. ‘Your hair is perfectly … tidy.’

Was he laughing at her? And then she remembered what Rory had said. She glared up at him. Her hand dropped. ‘Is it true that you requested me for this interview?’

He shrugged nonchalantly. ‘It’s tiresome, but every now and then I have to give in to press demands. So, yes, I requested you … in the hope that, perhaps with you asking the questions, it would prove a more diverting experience than I’m used to.’

His eyes were hot and sensual. Everything professional in her reacted to his dismissive and high-handed manner. She smiled sweetly, and something treacherous ignited in her belly when she saw a flare of something in his eyes. She ignored her body’s response. ‘Mr Lévêque. If you think that just because I’m a woman I’m going to confine my questions to what your favourite colour might be, then you’re sadly mistaken.’ At that moment she made a mental note to stay up all night if she had to, to research this man.

His eyes narrowed and cooled, and she shivered slightly.

‘And if you think that because you’re a woman I would dismiss your ability on that basis alone, then you are much mistaken. Any interest I have in you as far as the interview goes is purely professional. I’ve had your work investigated, and you impressed me.’

Alana was completely taken aback, and immediately felt like apologising. But, looking up at him now, she felt that cool wind still washing over her. She could almost believe that she had imagined his hot look of just moments ago. That she had imagined everything leading up to this point. She had an uncanny prescience of what it would be like to be this man’s enemy.

‘Well, I’m … That is, I hadn’t thought that—’

He cut off her inarticulate attempt to apologise. ‘Like I said, my interest in you is purely professional … as far as the interview goes. However …’ He stopped and moved closer. The air around them changed in a heartbeat. Became charged.

Alana sucked in a breath. His eyes were hot again, making her feel very disorientated.

‘I can’t promise that my interest doesn’t extend beyond the professional.’

As with earlier in the stadium, Alana felt as though the huge, packed ballroom had just shrunk around them. Adrenaline pumped through her along with the desire to flee.

‘Mr Lévêque. I’m very sorry, but you see—’

‘Are you married?’ he asked so quickly and abruptly that Alana was stunned.

‘Yes,’ she answered automatically, and saw something dark flash across his face. And then she stepped back and shook her head. What was this man doing to her brain? ‘No. I mean I am, I was, married.’ She bit her lip and looked out to the room briefly, desperately willing Rory to come back and interrupt them. She looked back up at Pascal with the utmost reluctance. His eyes glittered, and a muscle twitched in his jaw. She wondered how they’d got onto such personal territory so quickly, and then his words came back: I can’t promise that my interest doesn’t extend beyond the professional.

A whole host of emotions and memories was threatening to consume her. And the fact that she was here, in an environment so evocative of her past, was quickly becoming claustrophobic. She took a breath, deeply resenting that he was making her talk about this. ‘I was married. My husband died eighteen months ago.’

Pascal opened his mouth as if to say something, and Alana was already tensing in anticipation. But her prayers had been heard, and Rory bounded up at that moment with drinks. He thrust a glass of champagne at Alana before handing what looked like a whiskey to Pascal. And then panic struck. She put the glass on a nearby table, some of the champagne sloshing out over the rim.

She opened her bag to pull her phone out. Ten missed calls. She groaned, ‘I am in so much trouble.’

She turned to Rory. ‘I have to go.’ She looked at Pascal briefly, welcoming the feeling of panic which was distracting her from his overpowering presence.

‘I’m sorry, but I’m already late for another engagement.’

She started backing away, valiantly ignoring Rory’s none-too-subtle facial expressions. She bumped into someone and apologised. She felt her hair come loose from its sleek chignon and pushed it behind her ear. She was literally coming apart.

‘It was nice to … meet you, Mr Lévêque. I look forward to the interview.’ Liar. He just watched her, a small, enigmatic smile playing around that hard mouth, and stuck one hand deep into a pocket. Alana could already see women hovering, ready to move back in again, and something curdled in her stomach.

‘Me, too,’ he said softly, and lifted his glass like a salute—or a threat. ‘Á demain, Alana.’ Till tomorrow.

It was disconcerting to say the least to try and conduct a coherent conversation while the remnants of the hottest lust he’d ever experienced still washed through his body in waves. Even the welcome knowledge that she wasn’t married failed now to impinge on his racing mind. He was still trying to clamp down the intensely urgent desire to know exactly whom she had gone to meet and where. Was it a date?

‘So, what made you decide to ask for Alana Cusack to interview you?’ Her boss, Rory Hogan, the head of the sports division of the national TV channel, laughed nervously. He was beginning to intensely irritate Pascal with his obsequious behaviour—and also by drawing his attention to the uncomfortable fact that, in the space of the short car journey earlier, Pascal had gone from dismissing Alana Cusack from his head to making a series of calls to find out exactly who she was, and then requesting her for his interview the next day.

Following an instinct, he decided not to dismiss this man straight away. ‘I decided to use her because she’s the best reporter you’ve got, of course.’

Rory’s flushed face got even more flushed. ‘Well, thank you. Yes, she is good. In fact, she’s rather surprised us all.’ The other man looked round for a second and then moved closer. Pascal fought against taking a step back; Rory was becoming progressively more drunk.

‘The thing is, you see, she was only given a chance because of who she is.’

Pascal’s interest sharpened. He injected a tone of bored un-interest into his voice. ‘What do you mean?’

Rory laughed and waved an arm around. ‘See all these women hanging on?’

Pascal didn’t have to look; they were practically nipping at his heels. His lip curled with distaste. Situations like this always attracted a certain kind of woman—eager for marriage to a millionaire sportsman, and the platinum-credit-card lifestyle his wages could afford. The women who had achieved that status lorded it over the ones who hadn’t, but it didn’t make them any less predatory.

‘Well, she was one of them. The queen of them, in fact. Y’see, she was married to Ryan O’Connor.’

Pascal sucked in a breath, shocked despite himself. Even he had heard of the legendary Irish soccer-player. That knowledge fought with the mental image of Alana in front of him just now, in that unrevealing black dress that had covered her from neck to knee, her hair as tidy and smooth as it had been earlier.

Rory was on a roll now. ‘When they got married, it was the biggest wedding in Ireland for years. The first big celebrity-wedding. The Irish football team were having back-to-back wins. Alana was seen as their lucky mascot; she went to all the matches. It was an idyllic marriage, a great time … and then she wrecked it all.’ Rory flushed. ‘Well, I mean, I know she’s not personally responsible, but—’

‘What do you mean?’ Pascal was rapidly trying to remember what he knew about Ryan O’Connor, still slightly stunned at what Alana’s boss was revealing.

‘Well, she threw him out, didn’t she? For no good reason. And Ryan went off the rails. Ireland’s luck ran out, and then he died in that helicopter crash just days before the divorce was through. We ended up giving her a job because she was unbelievably persistent, and she knows sports inside out. It’s in her blood; her father played rugby for Ireland.’

Pascal was still trying to reconcile the image he had of Alana with the women around him in their tiny dresses that left little to the imagination. And yet, he could see her now as she’d been backing away just moments ago; she’d been flushed in the face, and a lock of hair had been coming loose. It had been that which had sent his lust levels off the scale. He’d had a tantalising glimpse of her coming undone, of something hot beneath that über-cool surface.

But the thought that she had been one of those women made everything in him contract with disgust. Yet she certainly hadn’t been flirting with him, despite knowing who he was. Unless it was just a tactic. In which case, he vowed to himself now, he’d play with her to see how far she was willing to go and walk away when he’d had enough. One thing was for certain—he wanted to seduce her with an urgency that was fast precluding anything else.

The next day Alana looked at herself in the mirror of the ladies toilet at work. Nervously, and hating herself for feeling nervous, she smoothed her already smooth hair. She’d tied it back in its usual style for work, and now tucked it firmly behind her ears. She leant close to check her make-up. She’d had to put slightly more on than usual today to cover the circles under her eyes. She’d arrived home late last night, and had then stayed up researching as much information about Pascal Lévêque as she could.

The fact that she hadn’t had to stay up long said it all. He rarely gave interviews; the last one had been at least two years previously. He was the CEO of Banque Lévêque, and had reached that exalted position at a ridiculously young age. Now in his mid-to-late thirties, he had brought a conglomerate of smaller archaic banks kicking and screaming into the twenty-first century, turning them into Banque Lévêque and making it one of the most influential financial institutions in the world.

Alana saw the flush on her cheeks and scrambled for some powder to try and disguise it. There had been little on his childhood or family, just one line to say that he’d been born in the suburbs of Paris to an unwed mother. Nothing about his father.

Her mouth twisted cynically. She wouldn’t have been surprised in the slightest to learn that he was married. From her experience, the holy sanctity of marriage was a positive incitement for men to play away. She stopped trying to calm her hectic colour down; it was useless, and if she put any more make-up on, she’d look like a clown. She met her own eyes and didn’t like the glitter she saw.

The wealth of information she’d found on his personal life—quite at odds with the paucity of information on his family or professional life—had put paid to the suspicion that he could be married. Picture after picture of stunning beauties on his arm abounded on the Internet. It would appear that he’d courted and fêted an indecent amount of the world’s most renowned actresses, models and it-girls. However, no woman ever seemed to appear more than twice.

The man was obviously a serial seducer, a connoisseur of women. A playboy with a capital P. And Alana Cusack, from a nice, comfortable, unremarkable middle-class background, with a relatively attractive face and body, was not in his league. Not even close.

He was rich. He was powerful. He was successful. He played to win. He was the very epitome of everything she’d vowed never to let into her life again. She packed up her make-up things and gave herself a quick once-over. Her dark-navy trouser suit, and cream silk-shirt buttoned up as high as it would go, screamed professional. She adjusted the string of faux pearls around her neck. With any luck he’d have met and seduced one of the many women at the party last night, and not even remember the fact that he’d shown any interest in her.

‘Let’s get started, shall we?’

Alana spoke briskly, and barely glanced up from her notes when Pascal was shown into the studio. But she felt the air contract, the energy shift. The excitement was tangible. She hadn’t even experienced this level of palpable charisma from some of the world’s most famous sportsmen. She’d been given a thorough briefing from an attendant PR-person not to stray into personal territory, and above all, not to ask him about relationships with women. As if she even wanted to go there.

She felt rather than saw him sit down opposite her. She could hear the clatter of people getting ready around them with lights and the camera. Derek was with her again today, and he said now, ‘Just a couple of minutes; I need to check the lights again.’ Alana muttered something, feeling absurdly irritated. She just wanted to get this over with.

‘Late night last night?’

She looked up quickly and glanced round to see if anyone had heard. No one appeared to have. She hated the intimate tone he’d used, as if drawing her into some kind of dialogue that existed just between them. It was less than twenty-four hours since she’d met him in the first place. She had to nip this in the bud. She looked at him steadily, ignoring the shockwaves running through her body at seeing him again.

‘No.’ She was frosty. ‘Not particularly. You?’ Why had she asked him that? She could have kicked herself.

He smiled a slow, languorous smile that did all sorts of things to her insides. She gritted her teeth. He was immaculate again today in a dark suit and pale shirt, a silk tie making him look every inch the stupendously successful financier that he was. ‘I went to bed early with a cup of hot cocoa and dreamt of you in your buttoned-up suit.’

Before she could react to his comment, his eyes flicked over her in a brazen appraisal. ‘A variation on a theme today, I see. Do you have a different suit for every day of the week?’

A molten, heated flush was spreading through Alana like quickfire. She was so incensed that he was already toying with her that she couldn’t get words out. They were stuck in her throat.

‘OK, Alana, we’re ready to go here.’

Derek’s voice cut through the fire in her blood. She glared at Pascal for a long moment and struggled to control herself. He hadn’t taken his eyes off hers, and now he smiled easily, innocently. With a monumental effort, Alana found her cool poise. And after the first few questions had been asked, and Pascal had answered with easy, incisive intelligence, Alana began to relax. She’d found a system that was working. She just avoided looking at him if at all possible.

And that was working a treat until he said, ‘I don’t feel like you’re really connecting with me.’

She had to look at him then. ‘Excuse me?’

His eyes bored into hers, an edge of humour playing around his lips that only she could see. ‘I don’t feel the connection.’

Alana was very aware of everyone standing around them and looking on with interest. She wanted to get up and walk out, or hit him to get that smug look off his face. ‘I’m sorry. How can I help you feel more … connected?’

He gave her an explicit look that spoke volumes, but said innocuously, ‘Eye contact would be a help.’

She heard a snigger from one of the crew in the room. A familiar pain lanced her. There was always the reminder that people wanted to see her fail. She smiled benignly. ‘Of course.’

Then the interview took on a whole new energy because, now that he was demanding that she make eye contact with him, she couldn’t remain immune to the effect he had on her. And he knew it. She struggled through a few more questions, but with each one it felt as though he was sucking her into some kind of vortex. The sensation of an intimate web enmeshing them was becoming too much.

In a desperate bid to drive him back somehow, she deviated from her script, and could sense Rory’s tension spike from across the room as she asked the question. ‘How did a boy from the suburbs in Paris develop an interest in rugby? Isn’t it considered a relatively middle-class game?’

Now she could sense the PR-person tense, but they didn’t intervene. Clearly Pascal Lévêque was not someone to be minded, unlike other celebrities. He would stay in absolute control of any situation. For the first time, he didn’t answer straight away. He just looked at her, and she felt a quiver of fear. He smiled tightly, but it didn’t reach his eyes. ‘You’ve done your research.’

Alana just nodded faintly, sorry she’d brought it up now.

But then he answered, ‘It was my grandfather.’

‘Your grandfather?’ She avoided looking down at her notes, but she knew there had been no mention of a grandfather.

He nodded. ‘I was sent to the south of France to live with him when I was in my teens.’ He shrugged minutely, his eyes still unreadable. ‘A teenage boy and the suburbs of Paris isn’t a good mix.’

Something in his eyes, his face, made her want to say, ‘it’s OK; you don’t have to answer’, and that shocked her, as she never normally shied away from asking tough questions. And she didn’t know why this question was generating so many undercurrents. But he continued talking as if the tension between them didn’t exist.

‘He was hugely involved in league rugby, which is a more parochial version of the game. Very linked to history in France. He instilled in me a love for the game and all its variations.’

Alana had no doubt that she’d touched on something very personal there, and the look in his eyes told her she’d be playing with fire if she continued. All of a sudden, she wanted to play with fire.

‘You never considered playing yourself?’

His eyes were positively coal-black and flinty now. He shook his head slightly. ‘I discovered that I had a knack for using my head and making money. I prefer to leave rolling around in the dirt to the professionals.’

Alana coloured. Was he making some reference to the fact that she was playing dirty, straying into the no-go area of questions into his past? She looked down for a moment to gather herself, and realised that she’d asked all the scripted questions. And then some. She opened her mouth to start thanking him and signing off, when he surprised her by leaning forward.

‘Now I have a question for you.’

‘You do?’ she squeaked. His eyes had changed from black and flinty to brown and … decidedly unflinty.

‘Will you have dinner with me tonight?’

Shock and cold, clammy fear slammed into Alana. And then anger that he was asking her in front of an entire crew. The camera was still rolling. She could feel tension snake through the small studio. She tried to laugh it off, but knew she sounded constricted. ‘I’m afraid, Mr Lévêque, that my boss doesn’t approve of us mixing business with pleasure.’

Rory darted forward, while motioning for the crew to start wrapping up. ‘Don’t be silly, Alana, this is an entirely unique situation, and I’m sure you’d be only too delighted to show Mr Lévêque gratitude for taking time out of his busy schedule to do this interview.’

Pascal sat back, fully at ease. ‘This is my last evening in Dublin. I thought it would be nice to see something of the city. I’d like your company, Alana, but if you insist on saying no, then of course I will understand.’

He stood up and looked down at Rory, straightening his cuffs. ‘Can you have the tape of the interview sent over to my hotel? I’m sure it’s fine, but I might take the opportunity to approve it fully if I’ve got some time on my hands.’

In other words, surmised Alana from the tortured look on Rory’s pale face at the possibility of losing their biggest scoop to date, Pascal could turn right round and deny them the right to broadcast it. She stood up then, too, and spoke quickly before she could change her mind.

‘That won’t be necessary, Mr Lévêque. I’d love to have dinner with you. It would be a pleasure.’

CHAPTER TWO

‘I DON’T appreciate being manipulated into situations, Mr Lévêque.’

Pascal looked at Alana’s tight-lipped profile from across the other side of the car, and had to subdue the urge to show her exactly how much she might appreciate being manipulated. He knew she felt the simmering tension between them too. At one point during the interview earlier, when she’d had the temerity to dig so deep—too deep—their eyes had stayed locked together for long seconds and he’d read the latent desire in those green depths even if she tried to deny it.

‘I prefer to think of it as a gentle nudging.’

She cast a quick look at him and made some kind of inarticulate sound. ‘There was nothing gentle about it. Your unspoken threat was very clear, Mr Lévêque—the possibility that you could deny us the right to the interview.’

‘Which is something I could still very well do,’ he pointed out. As if on cue, Alana turned more fully in her seat. Her eyes spat sparks at him, and he felt a rush of adrenaline through his system. He was so tired of everyone kowtowing to him. But not so this green-eyed witch.

‘Is this how you normally conduct your business?’ she hissed, mindful of the driver in the front.

He moved closer in an instant, and Alana backed away with a jerk. She could smell his unique scent; already it was becoming familiar to her. One arm ran along the back of the seat, his hand resting far too close to her head, his whole body angled towards her, blocking out any sense of light or the dusky sky outside, creating an intimate cocoon.

‘There’s nothing businesslike about how you make me feel. And let’s just say that I don’t normally have to use threats to get a woman to come for dinner with me.’

Alana was reacting to a million things at once, not least of which was her own sense of fatal inevitability. ‘No, I saw your track record; it doesn’t appear as if you do.’

‘Tell me, Alana, why are you so reluctant to go out with me?’

And why are you so determined? she wanted to shout. Her hands twisted in her lap, and Pascal caught the movement. Before she could stop him, he had reached down and taken her hands in his, uncurling them, lacing his fingers through with hers. Alana could feel a bizarre mix of soporific delight and a zing of desire so strong that she shook.

‘I … don’t even like you.’

‘You don’t know me enough to know if you like me or not. And what’s flowing between us right now is nothing to do with like.’

It’s lust. He didn’t have to say it.

‘I …’

His hands tightened. She could feel his fingers, long and capable, strong, wrapped around hers. She looked down, feeling dazed. She could see her own much paler, smaller hands in a tangle of dark bronze. The image made her think of other parts of her body—limbs enmeshed with his in a tangle of bedlinen. With super-human effort, she pulled her hands free and tucked them well out of his way. She looked at him, and she knew she must look haunted. She felt hunted. Ryan had never reduced her to this carnal level of feeling, and the wound he’d left in her life was still raw. Too raw.

Pascal was close, still crowding her, his eyes roving over her face, but something had changed in the air. He wasn’t as intense. He reached out a hand and tucked some hair behind her ear.

‘I like your hair down.’

‘Look, Pascal …’

He felt something exultant move through him at her unconscious use of his name, and not the awful, prim ‘Mr Lévêque’. He dropped his hand. ‘Alana, it’s just dinner. We’ll eat, talk and I’ll drop you home.’

At that moment she could feel the car slowing down. They were pulling up outside a world-class restaurant on St Stephen’s Green. She seized on his words, his placating tone. She told herself she’d get a taxi home, and then she’d never have to see him again.

She looked at him and nodded jerkily. ‘OK.’

Alana was burningly aware of the interest she and Pascal had generated as they followed the maître d’ to the table. While the establishment was much too exclusive for the clientele to seriously rubberneck, nevertheless their interest was undeniably piqued.

It was another strike against the man who sat opposite her now, broad and so handsome, that despite her antipathy she couldn’t help that hot flutter of response.

He sat back in his chair. Alana could feel the whisper of his long legs stretching out under the table, and she tucked hers so tightly under her chair that it was uncomfortable.

‘You don’t have to worry, Alana, I’m under no illusions; you’re compartmentalising this very much in the “work” box.’

She just looked at him, and he quirked a brow at her.

‘The fact that you insisted on meeting me at my hotel rather than let me pick you up from your home, the fact that you haven’t changed out of your work clothes.’

Alana felt stiff and unbelievably vulnerable at the way he was so incisively summing her up. ‘I didn’t have time to change. And, yes, for me this is work.’ She leaned forward slightly then. His perceptiveness made her feel cornered. ‘I’ve had the experience of living with a level of public interest that I never want to invite into my life again. Being here with you, being seen with you, could put me in an awkward position. I don’t want people to think we’re here on some sort of date.’ She sat back with her heart thumping at the way his face had darkened ominously.

‘So who do you date, then, Alana?’

‘I don’t.’

‘But you were married to Ryan O’Connor.’

The fact that he’d already found that out made her feel inordinately exposed. Her mouth twisted cynically. ‘No doubt you didn’t have to dig too deep to find that out.’

‘No deeper than you dug to find out about my life.’

‘That was for a professional interview.’

‘Do I need to remind you that your questions didn’t exactly follow the script?’

She flushed hotly. His eyes flashed with that same icy fire she’d witnessed earlier. She said defensively, ‘You must know that if you open yourself up to any kind of press attention, then there’s a risk that you’ll be asked about things that are offlimits.’

He inclined his head, the ice still in his eyes. ‘Of course; I’m not so naïve. But somehow I hadn’t expected that of you.’

Ridiculously, Alana felt hurt and guilty. He was right; with another person who wasn’t pushing her buttons so much, she would never have taken the initiative to ask unscripted questions. It had been her reaction to him that had prompted her to try and provoke a response that would take his intense interest off her, that playful teasing he’d seemed set to disarm her with. Again she wondered what she’d scratched the surface of earlier.

She opened her mouth, but at that moment a waitress arrived and distracted them by taking their orders. Conversation didn’t resume until she had returned with a bottle of white wine. They’d both ordered fish. Once they were alone again, Pascal sat up straight. ‘You can tell yourself that you’re here for work, Alana, but I did not ask you here to talk about work. It’s a subject I have to admit I find intensely boring when we could be discussing much more interesting things….’

‘Such as?’ she asked faintly, mesmerised by the way his eyes had changed again into warm pools of dark promise.

He took a sip of wine and she followed his lead unconsciously, her mouth feeling dry.

‘Such as where you went last night, if you don’t date.’

Initially Alana had felt herself automatically tensing up at his question, but then something happened. She found herself melting somewhere inside, and there was nothing she could do to stop it. Some part of her was responding to his heat, and it was just too hard not to give in just a little. So she told him about her brother’s fortieth birthday. And that led to telling him about her six brothers and sisters. And her parents.

‘They’re all happily married with kids?’

Alana had to smile at the vague look of horror on his face. She knew people sometimes couldn’t get over the entirely normal fact of large Irish families. She nodded, but felt that awfully familiar guilt strike her. She was the anomaly in her family. She tried to ignore the pain and spoke lightly. ‘My family are a glowing testament to the institution. I have a grand total of fifteen nieces and nephews and my parents have been happily married for fifty years.’

He shook his head in disbelief. ‘And where do you come?’

‘I’m the baby. Ten years younger than my youngest brother. Apparently I was a happy mistake. The age gap meant that despite coming from such a big family I’ve always felt in some ways like an only child. For most of the time that I can remember, it was just me and my parents.’

Alana fell silent as she thought of her parents. She was acutely aware of their increasing frailty, and especially her father, who had had a triple bypass the previous year. With her older siblings busy with families and their own problems, the care and concern of their parents largely fell to her. Not that she minded, of course. But she was aware nevertheless that they worried about her, that they wanted to see her settled like the others. Especially after Ryan.

Alana took a quick gulp of coffee and avoided Pascal’s laser-like gaze. They’d finished their meal, and the plates had been cleared. It was as if he could see right through her head to her thoughts. She hoped the coffee would dilute the effect of the wine, which had been like liquid nectar. She’d shrugged off her jacket some time ago, and the silk of her shirt felt ridiculously sensual against her skin. And she found that it was all too easy to talk to Pascal Lévêque. He was attentive, charming, interested. Interesting.

But then he cut through her glow of growing warmth by asking softly, ‘So what happened with you?’

At first she didn’t understand. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Your marriage. You were about to divorce your husband when he died, weren’t you?’

Immediately the glow left, Alana tensed. She could see his eyes flare, watching her retreat.

Unconsciously she felt for her jacket to pull it back on, instinctively seeking for some kind of armour. Her voice felt harsh. ‘I see that whoever your source was didn’t stop at the bare facts.’

Pascal’s jaw clenched. ‘I’m not judging you, Alana, or anything like it. I’m just asking a question. I can’t imagine it was easy to take a decision to divorce, coming from the family that you’ve described.’

Her arms stilled in the struggle to get her jacket on; his perceptiveness sneaked into some very vulnerable part of her. He didn’t know the half of it. Her own family still didn’t know the half of it. They’d been as mystified and dismayed as the rest of the country at her behaviour. Something her husband had ruthlessly exploited in a bid to win as much sympathy as possible.

She broke eye contact with effort and finished the job of putting on her jacket. Finally she looked at him again. ‘I’d really prefer not to talk about my marriage.’

Pascal was tempted to push her, but could see her clam up visibly. She’d become more and more relaxed over the course of the meal. He’d had to restrain his eyes from dropping numerous times to the soft swell of her breasts under the fine silk of her shirt. He still had no idea why she seemed so determined to cover up as much as possible. But, instead of his interest waning, the opposite was true. He had to admit that was part of the reason he’d asked her out—some kind of bid to have her reveal herself to be boring or diminish her attraction—yet she was intriguing him on levels that no other woman had ever touched.

He was not done with this, with her. But he knew that if he pushed her now, he could very well lose her. This was going to test all his patience and skill, but the chase was well and truly on. So now he flashed his most urbane smile and just said, ‘No problem.’ And he called for the bill. The abject relief on her face struck him somewhere powerful.

Pascal wouldn’t listen to Alana’s protests. He insisted on dropping her to her house, which was only ten minutes from the restaurant. Tucked in a small square in one of the oldest parts of Dublin, her house was a tiny cottage. Pascal’s car was too big to navigate past all the parked cars at the opening of the square, and she jumped out. But he was quick, too, met her at the other side of the car and insisted on walking her up to her door.

She turned at the door, feeling absurdly threatened, but by something in herself more than him. Standing close together, her eye level was on his chest, and she looked up into his dark face. The moon gleamed brightly in a clear sky, and the February air was chill. But she didn’t feel cold. She had the strongest feeling that if he attempted to kiss her, she wouldn’t be able to stop him. And something within her melted at that thought. She blamed the wine. And his innate French seductiveness.

But then suddenly he moved back. Alana found herself making a telling movement towards him, as if attached by an invisible cord and she saw a flash of something in his eyes as if he, too, had noted and understood her movement.

Before she could clam up, he had taken her hand in his and was bending his head to kiss the back of it, exactly as he had the previous night in the hotel. His old-fashioned gesture touched and confused her. Her hormones were see-sawing with desires and conflicting tensions. And then, with a lingering, unfathomable look, he started to walk away down the small square and back to his car. Against every rational notion in her head, Alana found herself calling his name. He half-turned.

‘I just … I just wanted to say thank you for dinner.’

He walked back up towards her with an intensity of movement that belied his easy departure just now. For a second she thought he was going to come right up to her and kiss her. She took a step back, feeling a mixture of panic and anticipation, with her heart thumping, but he stopped just short of her. He reached out a hand and tucked some hair behind her ear. It was a gesture he’d made earlier in the car, and she found herself wanting to turn her cheek into his palm. But then his hand was gone. And his eyes were glittering in the dark.

‘You’re welcome, Alana. But don’t get too complacent. We will be meeting again, I can promise you that.’

He turned again and strode back to his car. He got in, shut the door and the car pulled away. And Alana just stood there, her mouth open. Heat flooded her body and something much worse—relief. She knew now that she had called his name and said thanks, because something about watching him walk away had affected her profoundly. She had an uncontrollable urge to stop him.

She had to face it—even though she’d been telling herself she wasn’t interested in him from the moment their eyes had locked at the match, she was. He was smashing through the veritable wall she’d built around herself since she’d married Ryan O’Connor and her life had turned into a sort of living hell. It was frightening how, in the space of twenty-four hours, she found herself in a situation where she was actually feeling disappointed that a man she barely knew hadn’t kissed her. Her famously cool poise, which hid all her bitter disappointments and broken dreams from everyone, even her own family, was suddenly very shaky.

By the time Alana was standing in her tiny galley-kitchen the next morning drinking her wake-up cup of tea, she felt much more in control. She only had to look around her house, in which she quite literally could not swing a cat, to feel on firmer ground. This was reality. This was all she’d been able to afford after Ryan had died. Her mouth tightened. Contrary to what everyone believed, she hadn’t been left a millionairess after her football-star husband had died in the accident.

She was still picking up the pieces emotionally and financially from her five years of marriage. And, while her emotional scars might heal one day, the financial ones would be keeping her in this tiny cottage and working hard for a very long time. The truth was that Ryan had left astronomical debts behind him and, because their divorce hadn’t come through by the time he’d died, they’d become Alana’s responsibility. The sale of their huge house in the upmarket area of Dalkey had barely made a dent in what had been owed to various lenders.

Alana swallowed the last of her tea and grimaced as she washed out the cup. Pride was a terrible thing, she knew. But it had also given her a modicum of dignity. She’d never confided in anyone about the dire state of her marriage, had never told anyone about the day she’d walked into her bedroom to find Ryan in bed with three women who’d turned out to be call girls. They’d all been high on cocaine. He’d been too out of it to realise that it wasn’t even his bedroom. By then, it had been at least three years since they’d shared a bed.

That had been the day that her humiliation had reached saturation point. The pressure of having to maintain a façade of a happy marriage had tipped over into unbearability. She’d left and filed for divorce.

But her wily husband had quickly made sure that it looked as though Alana had coldly kicked him out. She hadn’t suspected his motives when he’d sheepishly offered to move out instead of her. But she should have known. The man she’d married had changed beyond all recognition as soon as he’d started earning enormous fees and tasted the heady heights of what it was to be a national superstar.

Admitting that she’d failed at her marriage had been soul destroying. She hadn’t wanted to confide the awful reality of it to anyone. Even if she had wanted to, her father’s health had been frail, and her mother had been focused solely on him. And, around the same time, one of her elder sisters had been diagnosed with breast cancer. With her sister having three children, and Alana being the only childless sibling and suddenly single again, she had moved into her sister’s home to help her brother-in-law for the few months that Màire had spent getting treatment. Alana’s marital problems had taken a backseat, and she’d been glad of the distraction while the divorce was worked out. She’d kept herself to herself and shunned her family’s well-meaning probing, too heart-sore and humiliated even to talk about it.

It was exactly as Pascal had intuited last night, and she hated to admit that. It had been so hard, coming from a family of successfully married siblings, to be the only one to fail and to cause her parents such concern. Her monumental lack of judgement haunted her to this day. She obviously couldn’t trust herself when it came to character assessment, never mind another man. And Pascal Lévêque was ringing so many bells that it should make it easy to reject his advances.

Alana brusquely pulled on her coat and got her keys. She refused to let her mind wander where it wanted: namely down a route that investigated the possibility of giving in to Pascal Lévêque’s advances. Alana reassured herself that by now he’d have forgotten the wholly unremarkable Irish woman who had piqued his interest for thirty-six hours.

Thirty-six hours. That’s all it had been. And yet it wasn’t enough. Pascal stood at the window of his Paris office and looked out over the busy area of La Défense with its distinctive Grande Arche in the distance.

Alana Cusack was taking up a prominence in his head that was usually reserved for facts and figures. Ordinarily he could compartmentalise women very well; they didn’t intrude on his every waking hour. They were for pleasure only, and fleeting pleasure at that. The minute he saw that look come into their eye, or heard that tone come into their voice, it was time to say goodbye. He enjoyed his freedom, the thrill of the chase, the conquest. No strings, no commitment.

But now a green-eyed, buttoned-up, starchy-collared, impertinent-questioning witch was making a hum of sexual frustration throb through his blood. He had to get her out of his system. Prove to himself that his desire had only been whetted because she was playing hard to get, and only because she seemed to be a little more intriguing than any other woman he’d met. The fact that she’d been married intrigued him too. Her marriage had obviously left her scarred. That had been clear from a mile away. Was that why she was so prickly, so uptight and defensive, so wary? Was she still grieving for her husband?

Pascal ran a hand through his hair impatiently. Enough! He turned his back on the view and called his PA into the room. She listened to his instructions and took down all the details, and she was professional enough not to give Pascal any indication that what he’d just asked her to do was in any way out of the ordinary.

But it was.

‘There’s something for you on your desk, Alana.’

‘Thanks, Soph,’ Alana answered distractedly as she flipped through her notes on her return from a lunchtime interview and walked into her tiny cubbyhole office just off the main newsroom. She looked up for a quick second to smile at Sophie, the general runaround girl, and her smile faltered when she saw the other girl’s clearly mischievous look. With foreboding in her heart, Alana opened her door, and there on her desk was the biggest bunch of flowers she’d ever seen in her life. Her notebook and pen slid from her fingers onto the table. With a trembling hand, she plucked the card free from amongst the ridiculously extravagant blooms.

She cast a quick look back out the door, and seeing no one, quickly shut it. She ripped the envelope open and took out the card, which was of such luxurious quality that it felt about an inch thick between her fingers. All that was written on the card in beautiful calligraphy was one mystifying letter: ‘I …’

She was completely and utterly bemused. Her dread was that they would be from him. But the card was enigmatic. They could actually be from anyone.

Not one person looked at her oddly afterwards, though, not even the junior reporter who covered current affairs who had drunkenly admitted at the office party last Christmas to having a crush on her. It wasn’t her birthday, and she hadn’t done an especially amazing babysitting-stint lately for any nieces or nephews, which sometimes resulted in flowers as a thank-you.

For the rest of the day Alana was like a cat on a hot tin roof. Distracted. She only left and brought the flowers home once she was sure nearly everyone had left the office.

The following day, as Alana walked in, flicking through her post, Sophie again said, ‘Morning! There’s something for you on your desk.’

Alana’s heart stopped. It was like groundhog day. She went into her office with a palpitating heart and shut the door firmly behind her. Another bunch of flowers. Slightly different, but as extravagant as yesterday’s. Her hands were sweating as she repeated the process of opening the envelope and taking out the card. This one read: ‘will …’

By the end of the week Alana sat at the wooden table in her sitting room and felt a little numb. The smell of flowers was overpowering in the tiny artisan-cottage. A vase sat in the centre of the table abundant with blooms. And also on the table in front of her, neatly lined up in a row, were the five cards that had accompanied a different bunch of flowers every single day of the week.

All together, they now made sense: ‘I will see you tonight’.

But of course she’d known what the full meaning of the cards was when she’d received the fifth one that morning. All day she’d experienced a fizzing in her veins and a sick churning in her belly. She’d vaguely thought of going to the cinema, or seeing if friends wanted to go out, anything to avoid being at home where she was sure he was going to call. An awful sense of inevitability washed over her. She wasn’t ready for this. She would just have to make him see that and send him on his way. But still … the gesture, the flowers, and his obvious intention to fly all the way back to Dublin just to see her, was nothing short of overwhelming.

Her phone rang shrilly in the silence and she jumped violently, her heart immediately hammering. Her mouth was dry. ‘Hello?’

‘What’s this about you and Pascal Lévêque?’

Alana sagged onto the arm of her sofa. ‘Ailish.’ Her oldest and bossiest sister was always guaranteed to raise her hackles. Twenty years separated them, and sometimes Ailish came across as a little overbearing to say the least. She meant well, though, which took the sting out of her harsh manner.

‘So? What’s going on? Apparently one of the world’s most eligible bachelors took you out for dinner last weekend.’

Tension held Alana’s body straight. ‘How did you hear about it?’

‘It was in the tabloids today.’

Alana groaned inwardly, wondering how she’d missed that. Someone at work must have leaked the story. God knew, enough people had heard him ask her. And it wouldn’t have taken a rocket scientist to work out who the flowers had been from, either.

‘Look, I interviewed him and he took me for dinner, that’s all. Nothing is going on.’ The betraying vision of her house full to the roof with flowers made her wince.

Her sister harumphed down the phone. ‘Well, I just hope you’re not going to be gracing the tabloids every day with tales of sexual exploits with a Casanova like that. I mean, can you imagine if Mam and Dad saw that? It was bad enough having to defend you to practically the whole nation after you threw Ryan out—’

Alana stood up, her whole body quivering. The memory of her parents’ lined and worried faces was vivid. And her guilt. ‘Ailish, what I do and who I see is none of your business. Do I comment on your marriage to Tom?’

‘You wouldn’t need to,’ replied her sister waspishly. ‘We’re not the ones being discussed over morning coffee by the nation.’

Alana heard her doorbell ring and she automatically went to answer it. ‘Like I said, what I do is none of your business.’ Her sister’s ‘judge and jury’ act made anger throb through her veins, and she knew her voice was rising. She struggled for a minute with the habitually stiff lock, and tucked the phone between her neck and shoulder to use both hands.

‘I am a fully grown woman and I can see who I want, go where I want, and have sex with who I want whenever I please.’

The door finally opened. Her words hung on the cool evening air as she took in the devastatingly gorgeous sight of Pascal Lévêque just standing there, turning her inner-city enclave into something much more exotic. Her heart-rate soared. She’d forgotten all about him in the space of the last few seconds, and the high emotion her sister had been evoking. In her shock she lifted her head and her phone dropped to the ground with a tinny clatter.

Pascal swiftly bent and picked it up.

An irate voice could be heard: ‘Alana? Alana!’

Alana couldn’t take her eyes off Pascal. She took her phone back, lifted it to her ear and said vaguely, ‘Ailish, someone’s just arrived. I’ll call you back, OK?’

Words resounded in her head: too late to escape now.

CHAPTER THREE

BY THE time Alana had stepped back into her house, followed by a tall, dark and imposing Pascal Lévêque, the shock was rapidly wearing off. She crossed her arms and rounded on him with a scowl on her face. Once again he was demonstrating that ability to suck in the space around him and make everything seem more intense—dwarfed. She tried to block out the fact that he was quite simply the most handsome man who’d ever stood feet away from her and looked at her with an intensity that bordered on being indecent.

‘That phone call was a conversation that shouldn’t have had to happen. And it was all your fault.’

He inclined his head slightly. He looked huge in her tiny sitting room. ‘I apologise, but, as all I heard was the intriguing last sentence, you’ll have to forgive me as I don’t know what I’ve done. And we certainly haven’t had sex yet.’

Alana flushed when she recalled what she’d been saying to her sister as she’d opened the door. ‘Did you know that apparently our dinner date was in the papers today?’ Defensive, angry energy radiated off her in waves. She could almost see them, like a heat haze.

He shook his head, his eyes never leaving hers, hypnotising her. ‘No. I wasn’t aware of that. But of course, there were people at the restaurant, and I would imagine that one or two people heard me ask you at the studio; perhaps it was leaked.’

Alana laughed out loud. ‘One or two? Try the whole crew standing in the room. It’s recorded on tape, for God’s sake.’

He started to shrug off his big, black overcoat and proceeded to whip out a bottle of wine from somewhere, like a magician. Panic flowed through Alana. She put out her hands as if that might halt him. ‘What do you think you’re doing? Stop taking off your coat right now.’

She shook her head emphatically. ‘No way; you are not coming in here with a bottle of wine, and we are not going to be having a cosy chat.’

For a big man he moved swiftly and gracefully. His coat was already draped over one arm, the bottle of red wine in one hand, long fingers visible. She remembered him holding her hands, entwining those fingers with hers. A pulse throbbed between her legs.

She looked up at him and knew she must look slightly desperate—she felt desperate.

‘I don’t mind where we go, Alana, but I’ve come all this way to see you, so you’re not getting away.’

His voice was like deep velvet over steel. He meant what he said.

She gulped. ‘What do you want?’ she asked weakly. He was threatening and invading every aspect of what had been up till now her impregnable defence.

Pascal restrained himself from telling her exactly what he wanted. He didn’t want to frighten her off. But what he wanted very much involved a lot less clothes and a flat, preferably soft surface. She was dressed all in black, her hair tied back. Not a stiff shirt this time, but a roll-neck top that effectively concealed everything. And yet the material had to be cashmere or something, because it clung to her torso and chest, and for the first time he could see the proper shape of her. The thrust of her breasts against the fabric was sensual torture. They were perfectly formed, high and firm. He could imagine that they would fill his hands like ripe, succulent fruits, their tips hardening against the palm of his hand … He slammed the door on his rampant imaginings. His arousal was springing to life. He forced himself to sound reasonable, calm.

‘What I would like is to share this bottle of wine with you and to talk. We can go somewhere else if you’d prefer.’

Alana looked at him suspiciously, hating this invasion of her space. He was as immoveable as a rock. If they went somewhere else that would involve more time. If they stayed here, he’d be gone sooner. She made her reluctant decision and reached out a hand.

‘We might as well stay here. It’s a Friday night; most places in town would be like cattle markets by now.’

Despite her obvious lack of delight at the prospect, Pascal carefully masked the intense surge of triumph he felt and handed over the wine, even being careful to make sure their hands didn’t touch, knowing that could set him back. Dieu! This woman was like an assault on his every sense. He hadn’t imagined her allure, she was more vivid, more sexy, more everything, in the flesh.

As Alana went into the galley-kitchen, she was aware of him moving into the sitting room, hands in the pockets of his trousers and looking around. She sent him a surreptitious glance. He was dressed smartly—dark trousers and a light shirt, top button open as if he’d discarded a tie somewhere. He must have come straight from work—on a private plane? Somehow she couldn’t imagine him queueing up with lesser mortals for a scheduled flight. He was the kind of man who would stride across the tarmac and climb into a sleek, snazzy jet.

‘You got my flowers, I see.’

Alana’s hand stilled on the bottle opener for a moment. She looked at him. ‘Yes, thank you.’ She cringed inwardly. Had he seen the cards all laid out in a row on the table as he’d come in? ‘You shouldn’t have, though. It caused no amount of speculation at work, and I’d really prefer if you didn’t.’ God, she sounded so uptight. And what was to say he’d ever send her flowers again anyway?

‘As you can see, this house isn’t exactly big enough to take them.’

Pascal looked around and thought privately that this was hardly what she must have been used to, as Ryan O’Connor’s wife. It made her even more enigmatic. She was fast proving that, whatever scene she’d been a part of in the past, that was not who she was now. ‘No, I guess not. I’m sorry if I embarrassed you, Alana, I merely wanted to show you that I meant what I said, about seeing you again, and I didn’t have your number, so …’

Alana stabbed the cork with the bottle opener. ‘It’s fine; forget it. The old-folks’ home around the corner were delighted, as they got the other half of the flower shop you sent.’

She sent him a small, rueful smile then, unable to help herself. She didn’t like being ungrateful for gifts.

Pascal was looking at her with an arrested expression on his face, his eyes intent on the area of her mouth. Her lips tingled. Alana’s hands stopped on the cork. ‘What is it?’

But then his eyes lifted to hers as if she’d imagined it, and he went back to looking at her books and prints. ‘Nothing.’

Eventually she pulled the cork free with a loud pop and got down two glasses from her open shelves. She poured the wine and handed him a glass, keeping one for herself.

He stood looking at her for a long moment and then held his glass out. Her heart thumped at what he might say, but all he said was, ‘Santé.’

She clinked her glass to his and replied with the Irish, ‘Sláinte.’

They both took a sip. She couldn’t quite believe that he was standing here in front of her. The wine was like liquid velvet, fragrant, round and smooth. Clearly very expensive. Alana indicated for him to sit on her couch. He did, and dwarfed the three-seater. She sat in the armchair opposite. The lighting was soft and low. The space far too intimate. This was her sanctuary, her place of refuge. And yet, having him here wasn’t generating the effect that she would have expected. She was still angry, yes—but more than that was something else, something like excitement.

She thought of something then as her stomach growled quietly. ‘Have you eaten?’

He took another drink from his glass and shook his head. ‘No.’ He just realised then that he’d hardly eaten all day; he’d been so consumed with getting out of Paris and over here. It made him feel uncomfortable now.

Alana put down her glass and stood up. ‘I was going to make myself something to eat … that is, if you want something, too?’

‘That would be great, I’m starving.’ He smiled, and the room seemed to tilt for a second.

Alana picked up her glass and backed into the kitchen, which was just feet away from where he now sat with an arm stretched out over the back of the sofa. At home, as if he dropped in all the time from Paris. She couldn’t think of that now.

‘It’s just fish, lemon sole, nothing too exciting. But I have two …’

He nodded. ‘That sounds perfect. Thank you.’

Alana busied herself turning on the oven and putting potatoes on to boil. When she looked back over to the sitting room, she could see that Pascal was looking through her CDs. She had a moment of clarity. What was she doing? She was meant to be rushing him out of the house, not cooking him dinner! But, she had to concede, it had been easy to ask him. And he had sent her all those amazing flowers. If she was never going to see him after tonight, then what was the harm in a little dinner?

Happy that she’d justified her actions to herself, and not willing to pay attention to the hum of something in her blood, when she heard the strains of her favourite jazz CD coming from the sound system, she found it soothing rather than scary.

‘I hope you don’t mind?’

She looked over to where Pascal was hunched down at the system, the material of his trousers and shirt straining over taut, hard muscles in his thighs and back. She shook her head, her mouth feeling very dry.

‘No … no.’ She took another hasty gulp of wine. Oh God.

By the time Alana was taking his cleared plate from him, and apologising again that their dinner had been on their knees, she was smiling at something he’d just said. As she’d been preparing the dinner, they’d started up an innocuous conversation, and in the course of eating had managed to touch on films, books, French politics, the Six Nations and rugby. She’d found herself telling him about her father’s career playing for Ireland, unable to keep the pride from her voice. And she hadn’t mistaken the gleam of something unfathomable in his eyes. Even though he’d told her he hadn’t wanted to play, had he harboured ambitions?

She came back and sat down, tucking her legs under her. She’d slipped off her shoes. She felt energised, zingy, as if she could stay up all night.

To her surprise, she saw Pascal look at his watch and then he drained his glass of wine. He stood up and Alana felt unaccountably disorientated. She stood too. The space between them was electric.

‘I’m afraid I have to go.’

Alana immediately felt crushed, silly, exposed. She should have been grinning from ear to ear, racing to hand him his coat, saying good riddance—so why did she feel her stomach hollowing out at the thought? The old pain of past misjudgements rose up like a spectre.

‘Oh, well. I can imagine you must have some business here. Somewhere else to be?’

He shook his head and came close. Alana couldn’t back away as the chair was just behind her legs. Her heart was thumping so hard she felt it must be visible under her top.

‘I’ve got important meetings at home all weekend. It’s too boring to go into. But I need to make my flight slot tonight, otherwise I’ll miss my first meeting in the morning.’

Alana’s jaw dropped. ‘You’re going back to Paris? Now?’

He nodded.

The knowledge was having trouble sinking into her brain: he had come all the way to Dublin just to see her for a few hours; it was too much for her to take in.

‘I … I …’

Her shock was obviously transparent.

He pulled a quirky, sexy smile. ‘It was worth it, Alana. Just to see you again. I’ve been thinking about you all week. I can’t seem to get you out of my head.’

‘I …’ Her powers of speech had been rendered null and void. He was coming closer, making speech even more elusive and unlikely.

He was now so close that her head was tipped back to look into those dark, dark eyes. She felt a warm finger come under her chin, stroking the smooth skin, his thumb on her chin. She couldn’t move.

His scent enveloped her in a haze of desire, desire that she’d never felt before. She fancied that she could hear his heartbeat too. Then he spoke and his voice was harsh. ‘I told myself I wouldn’t do this now. But … I can’t not. You’re more intoxicating to me than anything or anyone I’ve ever known. And all week I’ve been imagining what it would be like.’

She swallowed, ‘What what would be like?’ But she knew. And heaven help her but she’d been imagining it too. She knew she had; she’d just been denying it.

He said the words and something awful like relief flowed through her.

‘To kiss you.’

With his finger still under her chin, no other parts of their bodies touching, he bent his head to hers. Past, present and future collided in the moment that her eyelids fluttered closed, and she felt his mouth touch hers. It was a brief press of his lips to hers, a testing, tasting. But it ignited a flame of raw desire along every one of Alana’s veins.

When he drew back slightly, she made a treacherous sound in her throat. She wanted more than that brief all-too-chaste kiss. And so did he evidently.

This time it wasn’t chaste and benedictory, this time it was forceful, both their mouths pressing together, tasting, experiencing. The finger at her chin was gone. His hand slid round to the back of her head, flicked away the band tying her hair in a ponytail and threaded through the soft, silky strands to cradle her skull in his hand. His other arm slid around her slim waist and pulled her into him. Her arms automatically went to his shoulders and clung for support.

The feel of his body pressed up close to hers was short-circuiting her system. He was hard all over, and so strong. She could feel his chest muscles flex against her soft curves when his arm tightened around her, pulling her even closer.

While their bodies melded together, their mouths remained fused. Pascal pulled back briefly and Alana looked up into those amazing eyes that were burning, reflecting a fire she felt deep in her belly, where a very hard part of him was making her want to move restlessly. She was stunned by everything. She felt confused; she could feel herself tremble with reaction. She frowned slightly, her mouth opened.

Pascal pressed a finger to her mouth. The softness of her lips and her warm breath made him harder, and he almost groaned out loud with the need to take her now, to sink into her yielding, silky warmth. But he knew that she wasn’t far from letting her head take over, from possibly pushing him away. ‘Don’t think. Don’t speak. Just feel.’

This time when his mouth touched hers it was slightly open. Breaths mingled and wove together, and for one split second neither of them breathed. And then Pascal slid his tongue between her lips and Alana’s hands clutched at his shoulders. She’d been kissed like this before; of course she had. But whenever Ryan had kissed her, it had always been rough and with no finesse.

But this was in another league. Pascal’s tongue danced erotically with hers, advanced and retreated, inviting her to follow him. And she did. Winding her arms tight around his neck, pressing even closer, she slid her tongue into his mouth and was rewarded with a low guttural moan. It was the sexiest feeling, and she was controlling the pace, the movements. She savoured his full lower lip, felt it with her tongue, let it glide across the surface before allowing their tongues to duel again.

When she felt him snake a hand under her top, to feel the skin above her trousers, the curve of her waist, her legs trembled in earnest. Their kisses stilled for a second, as if he was waiting to see what signal she would give. She nipped his lower lip gently and she could feel him half-smile against her mouth.

His hand slid higher over her smooth back, to just below the clasp of her bra. His hand was so big she imagined it could span her entire back. With a practised flick of his wrist and fingers, he opened the clasp. Alana felt her bra loosen, but she was lost in a maelstrom of lust so strong that she wanted nothing more than for him take the weight and fullness of her breast into his palm—which he promptly did, sliding his whole hand around her ribs as if loath not to caress every part of her. The sensation was so shockingly electric that she gasped and wrenched her mouth from his, breathing jerkily.

His other hand still cradled her head; their bodies were still fused at every conceivable point. She was on her tiptoes to try and keep his hardness there, at the apex of her thighs where a loud, heavy beat of blood called to her. She couldn’t do anything but look up into his glittering, aroused gaze as his hand cupped her heavy flesh and his thumb moved back and forth over the tingling, tight peak of her nipple.

She bit her lip, and he bent his head to whisper hotly in her ear, ‘I want to take it into my mouth until you come apart in my arms … until you’re so wet that sliding into you will be the easiest thing in the world.’

A million things were hurtling into Alana’s head. Past experiences, warnings, wants and confusion reigned. What was happening to her? She should be shocked, but she wasn’t. She’d never thought in a million years she could respond like this, and yet they had done little more here and now than she’d already experienced at teen discos years ago. Or during her marriage.

Pascal could see the way her eyes were clearing, the way those green depths were starting to swirl. He had to pull back, even if it was going to kill him. Gently he closed her bra again and stepped back slightly to pull down her top. He’d been right; her body with its gentle curves was infinitely more alluring than he’d ever expected it to be, her breasts fuller. It was a crime that she hid under those structured tops and dark colours.

He put his hands on her shoulders and stepped back completely, and tried to ignore the inferno raging in his pants.

‘I have to go. I wish I didn’t, but I do. You could come with me?’ he asked then, but already he could see her start to tense, stiffen.

‘No,’ he answered for her. ‘It’s too soon.’ He castigated himself for his lack of control.

He walked over to get his coat which was draped on the back of a chair, and pulled it on. He saw the cards that had accompanied the flowers neatly lined up to show the sentence they’d spelt out. Something forceful struck him then. He’d never gone to such trouble before. Women always said yes; it was always easy. But recently his experiences with women had always proved somewhat unsatisfactory. And now merely kissing Alana was making him feel like a randy teenager again.

Alana welcomed the distance as she watched him put his coat on, accentuating his shoulders, his broad back. His shoulders that she’d just been clutching with complete abandon, because if she hadn’t, she’d have dissolved at his feet. What had he done to her? What the hell did he think he was doing, waltzing in here for just a few hours only to mess up her carefully controlled world? She crossed her arms over still tight and sensitive breasts.

He turned around and saw her look immediately. ‘Don’t look at me like that.’

Alana’s jaw tensed so hard she felt it might break. ‘I don’t want this. I don’t want you.’

He covered the paltry distance between them in a couple of steps, floorboards creaking under his weight.

‘I think I’ve just proven that you do want me. And I want you. Badly.’

In a shocking move he took her hand and brought it down to where she could feel his agony for herself. Hectic colour flooded her cheeks.

‘There’s something rare and powerful between us, Alana, and I won’t let you shut me out just because you’re scared.’

She snatched her hand back from where the hard evidence of his arousal was threatening to overheat her brain again. ‘I am not scared.’ Liar. ‘I just don’t want this. I really don’t want this.’

His stance was strong, legs planted wide, face implacable. ‘It’s already happening. We can’t go back now. You could have sent back the flowers, or thrown them out.’ He flung out a hand. ‘But you didn’t. You could have refused to let me come into your house tonight, but you didn’t.’

Humiliation coursed through her. He was right. She’d put up absolutely no fight whatsoever. What was she doing? Had she learnt nothing?

‘You’re covering the match in Italy next weekend in Stadio Flaminio?’

His abrupt change of subject caught her unawares. ‘Yes. Yes, I am.’

‘I have an apartment in Rome. Come over on Friday night and stay with me for the weekend. I have to go to the match, too, and my bank is sponsoring a charity ball on Saturday night—you could come with me.’

Alana automatically shook her head and quailed slightly under the harsh light in his eyes.

‘My flight on Saturday morning is booked already. I’m going with colleagues. And I’m due back on Sunday morning. It’s all organised.’

‘And do you always do what you’re told?’ he asked softly, softly enough to disarm her for a second. It made a poignant memory rise up. She hadn’t always been so conventional, so careful to stick to the rules. There had been a time when she’d been very much a free spirit. That was how she’d met Ryan; she’d fallen for the passionate free spirit she’d seen in him. But she’d had it all wrong. His passion had never been for her or even life. It had been for money, fame and adulation. And then he’d slowly killed any such impulse in her, reducing her to a shadow of her former self.

Alana looked up. Caught between two worlds and painful memories, she found herself instinctively clinging on to something in Pascal’s eyes.

‘I will have my plane at your disposal.’

‘But that’s crazy.’

He shushed her. ‘At your disposal. It will be at Dublin airport on Friday evening, ready to take you to Rome to meet me. I would like you to use it, Alana. I would like you to stay with me. I won’t force you into anything you’re not comfortable with. Or ready for.’

She would have laughed, but the intensity in his face stopped her. He was holding out a card. She took it warily.

‘Those are all my numbers, and my assistant’s numbers. If you’re going to come on Friday, just call her and give her your passport details and she’ll give you all the information and arrange for a pick-up to deliver you to the plane.’

To deliver her to him like a gift-wrapped parcel.

Everything in Alana rebelled at the thought of being so easy, so compliant. But another part of her was beating hard at the thought of how easy it would be to just … do this. Had she really envisaged living her entire life celibate? While she knew well that Pascal took women for just a finite amount of time, perhaps that was what she needed—a no-strings affair. He was already smashing the awful, soul-destroying belief that somehow she’d been frigid. But then, if Pascal discovered the extent of her lack of experience, would he be turned off? Doubts crowded her mind again. How could she even be seriously contemplating this?

And now he really was leaving, opening the small hall door, ducking his head to go out through the front door.

She forced her stricken limbs to move, and followed him. When he turned round, she was on her step. Before she could move, he’d pulled her into him and pressed his mouth to hers, sliding his tongue between her lips, making her heart beat fast and her blood turn to treacle in seconds. She could already feel herself melting. And then he pulled away and set her back.

‘See?’ was all he said, was all he had to say. He backed away and then turned to walk down the square. As if by magic a sleek, dark car pulled up at the bottom of the square and then he was getting into the back and was gone. Alana’s hands curled into fists at her sides, her emotions and hormones in chaotic turmoil. Every carefully erected piece of defence was crashing and burning. There was no way she would take him up on his offer. No way.

Those very words came back to mock Alana as she sat in the back of a very familiar, luxurious Lexus which was speeding through the usual tangled Dublin Friday-night rush hour like a hot knife through butter, almost as if Pascal had decreed it. Not even the traffic was giving her a chance to stop and think, to change her mind. Her small weekend-bag was in the boot. And she couldn’t even reassure herself that it had been a last-minute decision; she’d packed her bag last night as if on autopilot, as if somehow it hadn’t really been her doing it.

And then she’d brought it to work that morning, and had coolly informed her boss that she’d made alternative arrangements for getting to Rome. And then she’d rung Pascal’s assistant, and told her that she’d be on the plane that evening. His assistant had been brisk and efficient, ringing back within ten minutes with the details of who would be picking her up, leaving her no time to think about backing out.

And now here she was.

On the way to becoming Pascal Lévêque’s newest lover.

And her only reaction was one of intense anticipation. She’d finally had to give into it. She’d vacillated each torturous day that week, from vowing absolutely that she would do no such thing, to staring into space, remembering what it had been like to have him kiss her, and wanting him with a hunger that shocked her.

He’d called to speak to her every evening, too, having made sure to take her number, but had never mentioned Rome. He’d ask her about her day, and tell her a little about his. He was a master tactician, slowly but surely wearing down her defences. She’d found herself looking forward to speaking to him. It was when she’d woken in the middle of the previous night, to find herself in tangled sheets damp with sweat after an intensely erotic dream, that she’d got up and packed. It was only after she’d done that, she’d been able to go back to sleep.

Another dark, sleek car with tinted windows was waiting on the tarmac at the airport in Rome. She’d seen it out of the window as they’d landed. Now she took a deep breath, her case in a white-knuckle grip as the air steward waited for the door to open. Alana straightened her short jacket over her dress. She hadn’t changed from her work clothes, her armour. A black pinafore dress, complete with shirt and tie, stockings and high-heeled shoes.

The clunking noise of the steps being wheeled to the aircraft made her jump, and she smiled nervously at the steward, wondering in a fleeting, scary moment how many women he’d escorted to meet Pascal like this. All of a sudden she wanted to go, leave. She’d made a huge mistake.

But then the door opened and there was nowhere to go but forward.

And there he was. It was too late to turn back now.

It was dark and slightly chilly as she walked down the steps. Pascal was waiting at the bottom, dressed casually in jeans, looking relaxed, vibrant and beautiful. He didn’t move to touch her, and he didn’t look triumphant. And she was grateful, because if he had she might have scuttled back up the steps and ordered the pilot to take her back home.

‘Here, let me.’ He took her case and the driver transferred it to the boot of the car. Pascal indicated for her to get in. And then he shut the door and walked round to the other side. The door closed and they were moving.

Enclosed in the intimate space, Alana felt as if she were on fire. Suddenly her shirt and tie were ridiculously restrictive. She couldn’t look at Pascal. Silence thickened, but it wasn’t awkward. As they approached the city, Pascal started pointing out landmarks in a neutral, deep voice. Just that alone had an effect on her body, the fine hairs standing up all over her skin. Yet it was also calming, as if he were trying to soothe her. She still hadn’t looked directly at him, but then she felt his hand, warm and very real on her chin and jaw, turning her head towards him.

Did she have any idea how beautiful she looked? Did she have any idea what her effect on him was in those clothes? That damn shirt and tie had featured in every fantasy that had kept him awake, tossing and turning, all week. Her eyes were huge, staring at him with a mixture of fear and trepidation.

‘Thank you,’ he said huskily.

She swallowed, and he could feel the small movement. He couldn’t take his hand from her chin. He wanted to smooth and caress the silky skin all over her body.

‘I’m still … not sure that I’m doing the right thing.’ She looked for a second as if she were gearing herself up for something, and then she said in a rush, ‘How many women have you had delivered to you by plane like that?’

Her honesty hit him between the eyes. He knew this was important. This could determine the weekend—them. He didn’t have to lie. ‘No one. I have travelled on that plane with women, but I’ve never sent it especially for someone before. Alana, you wouldn’t be here if you didn’t think this was right. Don’t you trust your own judgement?’

The minute he’d said the words he could feel her tense, could see her withdraw mentally and physically. What had he said?

She reached up and took his hand down. ‘That’s just the problem,’ she said with a sterile voice. ‘My track record when it comes to judgement leaves a lot to be desired.’

Her husband—she had to be referring to her marriage. It made him want to quiz her, ask her what she meant. But he wasn’t in the habit of wanting to know extraneous personal details of his lovers’ past experiences, and he rejected the desire now. Pascal wanted her attention back with him with an urgency that bordered on the painful. He found her hand and wound his fingers through hers, not letting her pull away.

‘Alana, this thing between us is too important to ignore. Trust that, if nothing else.’

She knew that it would have been the height of naïvety to assume that Pascal had never taken another lover on his plane. She gave up trying to pull her hand away and let it rest in his. She also gave up trying to avoid his eyes. They glowed with dark embers of sensual promise.

A hum of electricity flowed between them. He wasn’t exaggerating; she’d never ever thought anyone would make her feel this way. She’d once foolishly and romantically thought that this was the way she’d feel with her husband.

But she hadn’t.

And she’d blamed herself for that—but for the first time she could see more clearly that it had been just as much Ryan’s fault as her own.

Perhaps this was her chance to start living again, to stop closing herself off to the world in some kind of misplaced penance she felt she owed. Her husband had taken enough of her life and soul. It was time to take some back for herself.

‘We’re here.’

Alana’s hand tightened reflexively in Pascal’s. He didn’t rush her. He let her take a look outside the car. They were on a quiet street. Old stone steps led up to a foliage-covered walkway through which Alana could see a massive, ornate door.

When the driver had taken out her case and walked round to open her door, Pascal finally released her hand and she got out. The Rome night air was cool and fragrant. Pascal picked up her case and took her hand, leading her up the garden path; she wasn’t unaware of the metaphor. He let go of her to open the door. All was darkness when they walked in at first, but then Pascal flicked a switch nearby and lights came on, low and intimate. Alana gasped. It was stunning.

A huge, lofty high-ceilinged room with massive windows led in one direction into a large kitchen, and the other direction into a huge open-plan living area. It was all decorated in white, prints on the walls and dramatic cushions on the couches adding splashes of colour. Inexplicably, this heartened Alana. She wasn’t sure what she had been expecting, but she knew that if Pascal had shown her into some kind of sterile bachelor-pad all her misgivings would have returned with a vengeance.

‘Come; I’ll show you upstairs.’

Wordlessly, she followed him up a wide staircase to the side of the living area. Upstairs were huge windows. He showed her into a big bedroom. The feel of deep, luxurious carpet underfoot made her instinctively bend to take off her shoes. She saw him look and grimaced slightly, holding her shoes in her hands. ‘I hope you don’t mind. My feet are killing me.’

He shook his head. ‘Not at all.’ He put her case down at the bottom of the king-sized bed that was dressed in Egyptian cotton. ‘This is your room, Alana.’

He walked to the door and gestured across the hall to where she could see in through an open door to another dimly lit large room, dressed in more masculine tones. ‘That’s my room.’ He turned then and stuck his hands in his pockets. ‘Obviously I would prefer you to share my room with me, but it’ll be your move to make.’

Alana bit her lip. He couldn’t know how important it was to her that he wasn’t pushing her. ‘Thank you. I appreciate that.’

He held out a hand. ‘Leave your things there. You must be hungry; I’ll prepare us something to eat downstairs.’

Alana shrugged off her jacket to lay it over the back of a chair, and felt the energy zip up her arm when she took his hand.

‘You can cook?’ she asked a little breathlessly as he led her out in her stockinged feet.

He glanced back with a smile. ‘I can just about manage to burn some pasta and tomato sauce. Are you hungry?’

Just then her stomach rumbled. She smiled too. ‘Starving.’

With a full stomach and a languorous feeling snaking through her bones, Alana walked around the downstairs living-area with a glass of wine in her hand, looking at Pascal’s prints and sculptures. She was transfixed by one photograph; something about it was very familiar. It was black and white, an old man’s face, gnarled and lined, very dark, even a hint of some other exotic lineage. His eyes were remarkable, deep set and black, holding such a wealth of emotion that Alana could feel it reach out and envelop her. There was everything in that expression: regret, pain, love, passion, disappointment, hope.

‘That’s my grandfather.’

She turned round. Pascal was a few feet behind her, looking at the photograph. She could see the resemblance now, except Pascal’s eyes were unreadable.

‘Did you take it?’

He shook his head. In an instant Pascal knew instinctively that Alana had seen the same things he saw whenever he looked at the picture. No one else had ever stood transfixed by it before. It made something feel weak in his chest. He avoided her eye, his voice gruff. ‘No; my talents lie solely in facts and figures. This was taken by an American photographer who was travelling around the south of France. After my grandfather died, I tracked him down and got a print.’

‘You must have been very close; you mentioned that you spent time with him.’

Pascal just nodded. She didn’t probe any more. She understood the need to keep things back. She knew he was watching her as she continued to walk around, taking sips of wine, feeling the surface of a smooth Roman bust beneath her fingers.

Every one of Pascal’s senses was pulled as taut as a bow string as he watched her hand smooth over the head of the bust, wanting her hand to be smoothing over him. He had to wonder if perhaps her air of vulnerability, her apparent lack of experience, was all an act, designed to entice, tease, seduce. She’d let her hair down, and it was slightly tousled from where she’d run her hands through it, but it wasn’t tousled enough for him yet.

She turned then, and he could see that her glass of wine was empty. He made as if to get the bottle and top her up, but she shook her head jerkily. She was going to make him wait; he knew it. She wasn’t ready. His desire, already at boiling point, would have to settle to a simmer for now.

Alana had turned with every intention of asking for some more wine, but she could already feel the effects. Desire hung between them, heavy and potent. Too much too soon. Pascal stood just feet away, but when he moved as if to give her some more she shook her head. She couldn’t do this now. She wasn’t ready, and she could see that he’d already read that in her expression before she’d known it herself. That disconcerted her. She wasn’t used to people intuiting her intentions.

‘You must be tired.’

She forced a smile. She was anything but. ‘I was up early. Would you mind if I went to bed?’ ‘Alone’ hung between them along with the desire, but it seemed to make it even heavier, denser. Was she doing the right thing? Her body told her no, her head said yes.

He shook his head, jaw rigid, eyes black. ‘Of course not. What time do you have to be in work tomorrow?’

Such banalities.

Alana glanced at her watch, but didn’t even register the time. ‘I have to meet the crew in Stadio Flaminio at midday; the kick-off is at 3:00 p.m.’

He nodded. ‘My car will take you in and come back for me.’

‘If you’re sure? I could get a taxi.’

He shook his head almost violently, and Alana knew the sudden urge to leave, get away now. It was as if his control was barely leashed.

He took the glass from her hand. ‘Dors bien, Alana.’

CHAPTER FOUR

WHEN Alana reached her room, she was breathing hard. She went straight into her en suite bathroom and looked in the mirror. Her cheeks were flushed, eyes over-bright. Her body was too sensitive, and an ache throbbed down low in her belly and between her legs. She dropped her head, hands gripping the edge of the sink.

She went back out into the bedroom and fooled herself into believing that she was doing what she wanted by unpacking her clothes and taking out her toiletries. A silk dress slithered out of her trembling hands to the ground. She picked it up. She’d pulled it out of her wardrobe on a whim. It was one of the very few dresses she’d kept from her days with Ryan, and she hadn’t worn it since her marriage had ended. Ryan had derided her when she’d worn it first, as it hadn’t been revealing enough for him … or, more accurately, for the press, who he’d constantly wanted to impress. But in actual fact it was plenty revealing, and way more than Alana had been comfortable with. Up to now.

She hung it up abruptly, refusing to think about why she’d brought it.

As she was about to start undressing, she stopped and sat on the edge of the bed. Her heart was thumping slow, heavy beats. She was shaking. Adrenaline washed through her system. Her body already knew what was inevitable. She couldn’t deny it to herself. It was as if the centre of her being had become magnetised and could only go in one direction.

She walked back over to the door and opened it. The only light came from downstairs. She paused at the top of the stairs. He was still down there, sitting on the couch, long legs splayed in front of him, in bare feet, the dregs of a glass of wine in his hands into which he was staring broodily. Fear assailed Alana again, and she almost fled, but then he looked up.

Tension snaked up from him to her and an unspoken plea: don’t go. She realised that she couldn’t, even if she’d wanted to. She came down the stairs, clinging onto the rail as she went. She was melting inside as she came closer and closer. Her clothes felt restrictive.

She got to the bottom. Without taking his eyes off hers, he carefully placed his glass on the small table at his feet and stood up. She concentrated on his eyes—dark, molten.

‘I couldn’t sleep.’

He didn’t smile, but she heard the smile in his voice. ‘You were only gone ten minutes.’

‘I know I won’t be able to sleep.’

‘What do you want, Alana?’

She shook her head. ‘I want … I want …’ Her face flamed. ‘You know what I want. Don’t make me say it, please.’

‘Show me what you want.’ His voice was soft, silky, heavy with erotic promise.

He was making her come to him all the way. Making sure.

Alana stepped forward jerkily until she was standing right in front of him. She could barely breathe. They hardly touched, and now she lifted her hands to his shoulders. They were so much wider and higher than she remembered. She took another couple of awkward steps. He was making no move to help her.

She looked up at him, a hint of desperation on her face; she could feel sweat on her brow. ‘Can’t you just …?’

‘You want me to take you? To take the decision out of your hands—so on some level you don’t have to actually make it clear what you want?’ He shook his head. ‘No. I need to know that you really want this. I won’t indulge regrets and recriminations in the morning.’

Damn him. Since when had he become a psychoanalyst? But Alana’s need was too great.

She moved even closer and wound her arms around his neck, bringing her whole body flush against his, leaning into him. Her breasts were crushed into his chest, and she felt him suck in a deep breath. It made her exultant. He might be displaying control, but she guessed it was shaky.

She pulled his head down to hers, her fingers threading through dark, silky hair. She lifted her face to his and angled it to try and kiss him. She felt so awkward. She aimed for his mouth, but ended up bumping his nose, his chin. She pulled back, letting him go. This was ridiculous. No doubt he’d expected her to sashay up to him, throw him down on the sofa and seduce him into mindless ecstasy. Well, he’d be waiting.

Her voice was stiff with humiliation. This was exactly what she’d feared. ‘I’m sorry. I haven’t … done this in a while. I think you expect me to be something … more than I am.’

She turned to go but he caught her wrist and pulled her back. She fell against him, caught off-balance. With the practised ease which she lacked and so envied, he immediately cradled the back of her head with a big hand, the other holding her close against him.

‘Not at all. I just wanted to be sure you were ready for this.’

‘Maybe I’m not, after all,’ she breathed up, mesmerised by his eyes.

‘I think you are.’ And then he bent his head and kissed her, exactly how she’d been aching to be kissed since the last time. Both hands now threaded through her hair, messing it up, cradling her head. Her hands rested on his chest and wound higher until they were tight around his neck. They barely paused for breath; there was no awkwardness now. First their kiss was slow, sensual, a tentative touching of tongues, tasting. Then it developed into full-on passion, igniting an inferno between them.

Somehow, Alana didn’t know how, Pascal had manoeuvered them and now her back was against a wall. He lifted his head. One hand was high on the wall behind her, the other resting on her hip. She felt as boneless as a rag doll. She looked up, her eyes glazed, her lips plump and tingling.

His index-finger traced around her jaw and down to the top button of her shirt. Her heart stopped and kick-started again. Faster.

‘Do you have any idea what this outfit has been doing to me since I saw you arrive in it?’

She shook her head. All she knew was that she wanted to be out of it. As soon as possible.

He started to undo her tie. ‘As much as this turns me on,’ he said gruffly, ‘I think I’m going to have to burn it.’

‘I have ten more at home,’ Alana said matter of factly, distractedly.

He threw it aside and it landed in a sliver of dark colour on the wooden floor. ‘Then it’ll be a bonfire.’

His fingers were at her buttons now. She tipped her head back to give him access, and she felt him drop his head and press a kiss to the exposed, delicate skin of her throat. Alana moaned softly. She was in a sensual land that she’d never thought she’d experience. She’d heard other women talk of lust and chemical attraction, and had always secretly disbelieved them or thought it was overrated. Now … she knew.

She could sense Pascal’s growing impatience when he couldn’t undo any more buttons as the dress got in the way. He growled, ‘How do you get this thing off?’

Alana stood and turned around to face the wall. ‘The zip. At the back.’

She could feel it whisper down, and then he turned her round again. Bending to take her mouth with his, she could feel his hands go to the shoulders of her dress and push it down; it snagged on her hips, and then his hands were there and pushing it off completely until it fell at her feet, a pool of pleated black.

She brought her hands to the bottom of his sweater to pull it up. He lifted his arms and pulled it off the whole way, and then he stood in front of her, bare chested. She could feel her eyes widening as she took in the bronzed magnificence. Whorls of dark hair dusted his pectorals and then met in a silky line that descended down and into the waist of his low-slung jeans which barely clung to lean hips.

Heat. All Alana could think of was heat.

He pulled her into him and she gloried in the sensation of his bare chest, running her hands round his back, feeling the satin-smooth olive skin, warm beneath her fingers. He gathered her close and his mouth closed over the beating, throbbing pulse at her neck; his hands travelled down to her bottom and caressed it before searching further and finding the bare skin at the top of her thighs over her stockings. He jerked back and looked down, eyes glittering, breath coming harshly.

‘Mon Dieu.’

‘What?’ she asked uncertainly, feeling exposed.

He just shook his head and a huge grin split his face. ‘Stockings. Proper stockings. And suspenders.’ What was turning him on even more was the suspicion that she dressed like this all the time, that it hadn’t been just for him.

He looked at her then. ‘I knew that underneath all that starch was someone earthy, sensual …’

He kissed her, and she felt his hands undoing the rest of the buttons on her shirt, the slightly cooler air hitting her torso as he pulled it apart. He looked at her for a long moment before pushing it off, down her arms, until it too joined her dress on the floor.

The carnal appreciation in his gaze made her throb in response. She was glad now that bizarrely she’d always had an instinctive desire for nice underwear, although she hadn’t indulged it while married, as Ryan had mocked her for trying to be sexy whenever she did. Her breasts were straining against the satin cups of her bra, peaks tingling painfully. Pascal pushed one strap down over her shoulder and dragged down the cup, baring one pale breast to his gaze … and mouth.

He whispered in her ear, ‘Remember what I said before?’

She nodded jerkily, anticipation lasering through her veins.

Then he bent his head and blew softly and enticed, before flicking out his tongue to taste and then drawing that tight, extended peak into his mouth. Alana’s head fell back. She couldn’t stop the moan, and wondered at this woman she didn’t recognise.

As Pascal suckled, a tight spiral of intense sensation connected directly with Alana’s groin. She found herself pressing closer, seeking, wanting more, arching her back. He had taken down the other cup, so now both her breasts were bared, upthrust and framed by the satin black material.

He was torturing her with his mouth. She couldn’t breathe. He reached down, lifted one leg and hooked it around his thigh. His other hand was on the leg that was barely able to keep her standing. His fingers danced over the suspenders; she felt him snap open the ties, then smooth around to cup the cheek of her bottom before slipping his hand between her legs.

She stopped breathing entirely for a long moment as he pushed her panties aside and slid his finger into her, into a caress so intimate that she would have closed her legs if she’d been able to. He was relentless, his mouth on her breasts, his finger sliding in and out, until finally, as if he’d been teasing her, he found the centre of where she throbbed unmercifully and, with one flick of his thumb, she came violently. She could only cling to him as the sensation ripped through her body in case she’d be swept away too.

Her leg that was lifted fell. She couldn’t quite believe what had just happened. A bit like chemical attraction; she’d read about it, heard about it. But amazingly …

‘Alana, was that your first orgasm?’ He sounded slightly stunned, and Alana cringed inwardly at how gauche she must seem.

He stood upright and let her settle against him, cradling her with a disconcerting level of tenderness. As if he could sense her turmoil, he tipped her head back. ‘No, don’t do that. You’re amazingly responsive, but it’s nothing to be embarrassed about. It’s a compliment.’

She looked at him shyly, mortified. ‘I’m—’

‘Don’t say it.’ He shook his head. His expression was enigmatic. ‘You were married; did you never …?’

She shook her head quickly, her body still pulsing in the aftermath, making her feel a little out of this world. Spaced out. ‘My husband never … made me feel like that. We didn’t sleep together for the last three years of our marriage.’

‘And you were married for …’

‘Five years.’ Unwelcome reality was trickling back in. Alana resented the questions now; she didn’t want to think of Ryan. This was her new start for herself. Ryan was in the past.

‘Alana—’

She pressed a finger to Pascal’s mouth and could feel his breath feather there, could feel a delicious tightening in her belly. ‘Please. I don’t want to talk about it, OK?’ He didn’t say anything for a long moment, and then finally he nodded.

Alana gave a huge sigh of relief, and then yelped as Pascal lifted her into his arms against his chest.

‘Time to go somewhere more comfortable, I think. Much as I could take you standing against that wall right now, I’ll resist the temptation.’

She buried her head in his shoulder as he climbed the stairs and shouldered his way into his room.

A part of her wanted nothing more than that carnality, but another part of her was grateful that he was being so considerate.

He looked down at her briefly, his face tight with need. ‘Is this OK?’

She nodded. She knew one thing for sure for the first time in ages. ‘Yes.’

Alana woke to a delicious sensation of someone running a finger up and down her bare spine in a tingling caress. Pascal. Warmth flooded her even as she registered aches and pleasurable pains all over her body. She opened one eye to see him smiling at her, looking clean, vital and very awake. He smelt fresh, delicious. And sexy. Heat flooded her belly.

The previous night came back in Technicolor: the pathetic fight she’d put up before giving in, the amount of times they’d made love, the amount of times she’d reached ecstasy because of him.

He bent his head and his mouth hovered near her ear. ‘No regrets and no recriminations. We agreed, remember?’

Alana turned her face into the pillow so he wouldn’t see her blushing. She just nodded into the pillow. She heard a soft, sexy chuckle and then felt a playful swat on her bottom. The bed dipped and she could feel him standing up.

‘Come on; my car will be here for you in half an hour, and if you’re anything like the rest of your species, you’ll be struggling to get ready in time.’

Alana lifted her head with a squeak. ‘Half an hour?’ She cursed under her breath and went to get up, and realised that she had no cover, as her clothes had practically melted off her last night in the heat of passion that had consumed them. She was stuck. Pascal stood between her and the door from where she could get to her own bedroom. She was not ready to parade around naked in broad daylight.

He watched, amused, as she pulled the sheet from the bed and wrapped it around her before getting up and trailing it after her.

Before she was clear of him, he caught her and pulled her against him. He pressed a hot kiss to her mouth. ‘Take the sheet for now, but I’ll have you walking around naked in no time.’

‘Never …’

He kissed her again, and suddenly the vortex was opening up around them, and in a shamingly small amount of time Alana knew she would be saying yes to anything, even going to work naked. But then he drew back, showing her that ultimately he was in control, whereas she was not. He pushed her gently towards her room.

Under the powerful spray of her shower, Alana hugged her arms around herself and gave into the stream of images. She groaned out loud as she remembered one moment, half in mortification, half in a state of arousal, even now. Pascal had been poised above her, skin gleaming, slick with sweat, his erection nudging her moist entrance. As if he’d been testing her again, he’d waited until her nerves had been screaming for release. She’d arched up to him, willing him to impale her, but he’d waited until she’d brokenly begged him. And then he’d slid into her slowly, deeply.

With a curt flick of her wrist Alana turned the shower to cold and endured it for a minute. Anything to dampen her flaming hormones.

* * *

At the match later Pascal came and found her at half time, and took her by the hand. She was distracted; she’d been trying to set up an interview for after the match with the England manager.

‘Pascal, I’m working, you can’t just walk up and drag me away,’ she said with a mixture of reproach and breathless anticipation.

He ignored her and took her down into long corridors before ducking into a room full of equipment. He closed the door behind them.

Still holding her hand, he pulled her to him. She was helpless not to respond, her body welcoming his heady proximity. How quickly she’d become consumed by him. Alarm bells weren’t just ringing, they were now joined by sirens and flashing lights.

With quick hands, he undid her ponytail and pocketed the band.

‘Hey!’

Then he put two hands in her hair and mussed it up. He looked at her critically. ‘Much better. And now …’

‘Now what?’

‘Now this.’ He hauled her into him and kissed her deeply, with barely checked passion. She wound her arms around his waist and found her hands lifting his shirt from his trousers, searching for and finding that smooth, taut flesh where the small of his back curved out to firm buttocks. Warmth flooded her. He was opening the buttons of her shirt; she’d tried to put on her tie that morning but he’d kept taking it off her. She could feel the air on her heated skin as he opened her shirt and palmed her breast, her nipple aching against the confines of her bra. She pressed a feverish mouth against his throat.

And then suddenly the spell was broken as someone tried to come in the door behind them. Pascal said something quickly in Italian and started to do up her buttons again. Alana didn’t know how she was going to be able to go back out there and string two words together.

Her brain was mush for the rest of the match and the ensuing interviews, but somehow she managed to keep it together. Pascal was waiting for her, exactly like he’d been waiting and watching that first day in Dublin. Only now … A wave of heat engulfed her … only now it was totally different. She was different.

Her crew feigned extreme lack of interest in the fact that Pascal Lévêque was hovering like a bodyguard. But once the last interview was done, and she’d been given the all clear from the Dublin studio, effectively the rest of the weekend was hers.

In the back of Pascal’s car a short time later, he pulled her over so she was practically on his lap. She’d given up trying to pull away and retain a more dignified position for the sake of the driver. He pressed a kiss to the underside of her wrist and looked up at her.

‘Are you glad to be here now?’

Alana looked down at him and felt the earth move bizarrely beneath her feet even though they were in a moving vehicle. Something very suspicious tightened her chest. She nodded, because she had to admit it. ‘Yes. I am glad.’ She bent her head and pressed a kiss to his mouth, revelling in the freedom she had to do this. They’d achieved an immediate level of intimacy that would be frightening if she thought about it too closely.

She was embarking on an affair with a world-renowned playboy and that was going to be her protection: at no point would she be deluded. At no point would there be talk of love, marriage. It would end when it would end. And she’d take the gift of herself that he’d given back to her, like a guilty, delicious secret. That was all she wanted. This was all she wanted.

Later that evening Alana took one last look at her reflection and turned to leave the room, but just then her door opened. Pascal stopped dead for a moment, his gaze raking her up and down, and then he clapped his hand over his eyes. ‘I can’t believe it.’

Alana felt like a fool. She knew she shouldn’t have worn the dress—it was ridiculous, too tight, too revealing. ‘Look, I can change, I’m not even that comfortable.’

Pascal wasn’t moving.

She took a hesitant step forward. ‘What, what is it? Is it really that bad?’

Alana tried to look back at the mirror self-consciously when she heard something suspiciously like a grunt coming from Pascal.

He’d taken his hand down and was laughing. Then he stopped and walked towards her. ‘I’m sorry. I couldn’t help it. It was the shock of seeing so much exposed flesh at once.’

Alana all at once felt like laughing and angry. She picked up a small cushion from the chair beside her and threw it at him, but he caught it deftly and kept coming. Dressed in a tuxedo, with his hair still damp from the shower, he was magnificent.

She had to speak to try and negate the effect he had on her, the way his teasing wound through her and impacted a place that was so deep, so vulnerable.

‘I’m going to change right now; I knew this dress was a mistake.’

She went to undo the zip that was under her arm, and Pascal reached her and captured her hand. ‘Don’t you dare. That dress is beautiful.’

Alana’s face flamed. ‘It’s not. It’s too—’

‘So why did you bring it, then?’

She couldn’t answer. He walked her over to the full-length mirror and stood her in front of him. His hands rested on her hips. She could feel him, tall and hard and lean behind her, and it was so seductive.

‘Look at yourself.’

Alana closed her eyes, her cheeks still scarlet. She shook her head. ‘I hate looking at myself.’

‘Alana, look at yourself.’

Something in his voice made her open her eyes, and she immediately looked at him through the mirror. She could feel him sigh behind her.

‘Not at me, at yourself.’

With extreme reluctance, she did. She saw the black silk dress that was cut on the bias and fell to just below her knees in an asymmetric line. She saw one shoulder, pale and bared, and just a hint of a curve of her breast. She saw the strap that held the dress up over her other shoulder with its flamboyant red-silk flower, a splash of vibrant colour.

‘Now, what’s wrong with this picture?’

Alana groaned inwardly. This was so embarrassing. She would bet a million dollars that not one of his previous lovers had had to be reassured about a dress before.

She tried to turn. ‘Look, it’s nothing, I’m sorry. Let’s just go, shall we?’

He wouldn’t let her. He held her fast, and something in the air changed. It became electric.

‘You’re beautiful, Alana. This dress is beautiful on you. It’s not too revealing. In fact,’ he growled with mock lasciviousness, ‘it’s not revealing enough.’

He turned her then to face him, his hands warm on her shoulders. She could feel her breasts peak against the silk of the dress.

He tipped up her chin so she couldn’t avoid his eyes. ‘What did he do to you, Alana? I bet you weren’t always like this.’

Alana struggled not to let the tears brighten her eyes, but there was a lump in her throat. She shook her head. ‘No, I wasn’t. He just … he just made me feel cheap. That’s all.’

She pulled free of his arms and looked at her watch. ‘We should really go.’

He heard the emotion in her voice and watched her precede him out of the room, the dress emphasising her gently curved shape, the jut of her rounded bottom. He could recall only too clearly the thrust of her breasts against his chest.

He stalled a moment before following her out. She was so totally different from any woman he’d known before that he couldn’t quite begin to rationalise how she made him feel. Physically, he burned for her. Earlier at the match he’d quite literally had to see her, touch her at half time or he’d felt he would have gone insane. She’d been preoccupied. First of all, he wasn’t used to any woman being preoccupied around him, and secondly, he wasn’t used not to being in complete control with his lovers. They turned him on, yes, that was what he chose them for, but never to the extent that he felt with this woman. This was something different.

He straightened his cuffs before walking out, uncomfortably aware of his near-constant state of arousal. She was just different because she wasn’t one of the polished socialites that littered his social scene, who threw themselves at him, that was all. It was still just an affair, and he’d no doubt that he’d soon look at her and wonder what he’d been hot and bothered about.

A little later, in the exclusive hotel which was hosting his bank’s lavish charity-ball, Pascal felt extremely hot and bothered. Alana was generating a veritable tsunami of attention in her sexy dress. After having spent the last two weeks trying to get her out of her buttoned-up uniform, now he wanted to march her right out of there and make her change back into it.

Clamping her to his side was a need born out of a violent emotion that he’d never felt before as acquaintance after acquaintance came up under the pretext of talking business, whereupon they did nothing but stare at Alana. She seemed oblivious, but Pascal was too inured to women and their wily ways. And he was all too aware of how beguiling her natural beauty was to these men, who were jaded and cynical. As jaded and cynical as he was. Was he no better than these men? He’d just seen her first. All sorts of conflicting, unsavoury thoughts were being unleashed within him. Not least of which was the sensation that perhaps he’d been fooled, fooled by her act, her apparent vulnerability. How could she really be so different?

He dragged her attention back from where she was looking in awe at the room around them, and muttered something about getting drinks. He saw a flash of uncertainty in her eyes and ignored it, and the feeling it generated through him. He needed space.

Alana looked to where Pascal was cutting a swathe through the glittering crowd. She couldn’t help but notice the intense interest he generated among every cluster of women in the room, who also followed his progress with avid attention. Some of them turned then to look at her, and she felt extremely self-conscious. Trying to shrug off the immediate insecurity that their looks generated, she walked to where ornate doors led out to a small, idyllic garden. Even though it was cool, one or two people mingled outside. The hotel was pure opulence, one of the oldest and grandest in Rome, situated with a view of the Spanish Steps.

She couldn’t help but think of similar situations with Ryan. He’d always dumped her as soon as they got in the door and made straight for the bar. Invariably she’d be left on her own all evening and would return home alone, only to wake up in the morning and find that he hadn’t even returned. She’d stopped worrying about his whereabouts soon into the marriage when it had become clear he’d never seemed to miss her.

She rubbed her arms distractedly, as she had that sensation of someone walking over her grave.

‘Bella.’

Alana jumped and turned to see a tall man standing beside her, looking her up and down. She looked nervously over his shoulder back into the room, but couldn’t see Pascal. She smiled tightly. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t speak Italian; I’m just waiting for someone, actually.’

‘Then it’s lucky that I speak English. You are a very beautiful woman.’

Alana blushed. ‘That’s very … nice of you to say.’ The man was attractive in a heavy-set kind of way, but there was something faintly menacing about him. He’d moved subtly and now he effectively blocked her from the room. In order to move, Alana would have to push past him or go into the garden. She didn’t want to retreat to a dark area where he might follow her.

‘Please.’ He held out a hand. ‘Can I know your name?’

Alana sent up a silent prayer for Pascal to find her. Where was he? She couldn’t ignore the man, as that would be unaccountably rude. So she shook his hand very perfunctorily and whipped hers back before he could clasp it. ‘Alana Cusack; I’m very pleased to meet you. Now, please, my friend will be looking for me.’ Except patently he wasn’t. A very familiar feeling of pain clutched her deep down inside.

She went to move past the man, but he stopped her with an arm. Alana flinched back from the contact.

His voice now held a distinctly threatening tone. ‘But I haven’t told you my name yet, and your accent—where are you from? It is so pretty.’

Alana was beginning to feel desperate. Even though Ryan had never physically harmed her, the latent threat had always been there, and now the memory was making her feel panicky. ‘Look, I don’t mean to be rude, but I don’t really want to know your name, OK? Now, I’m sorry, but would you please get out of my way?’

After a long, tense moment, he stepped back with hands held high and spread. ‘Go then, if you want, it’s your loss.’

Alana seized the opportunity and fled. Her heart was hammering, and she had an awful, sick feeling in her chest, an overwhelming sensation of foreboding. She pushed through the crowd and then she saw Pascal, and the whole room tilted crazily, the chatter dulling to a faint roaring in her ears.

He was at the bar, talking to a woman. He didn’t look as if he was in a hurry to go anywhere, much less to look for Alana. The woman was stunningly beautiful—blonde, tall, slim, in a sparkling gown with a thigh-high slit that was being provocatively displayed. She had a hand on Pascal’s waist and was leaning in, her whole body arching seductively into his. His head was bent towards hers as if she were telling him something intimate.

It all hit Alana at once, and again she felt acutely self-conscious in her revealing dress. She hated the compulsion that had led her to wear it now. But, worse than that, she’d let herself be taken in again by a man who lived his life searching for the next thrill, the next pleasure-point. The next adoring female. She could see all too well, in a room like this, how she must have been such a novelty. The innocent Irish cailín. And then, like watching a car crash in slow motion, she saw Pascal’s hand go to where the woman’s rested on his waist. He was about to thread his fingers through hers, lift her hand to his mouth. Alana knew it. But just before she could turn away her humiliation became complete. They both turned, as if they could sense her watching them.

The glittering, too-bright icy-blue gaze of the woman was mocking, triumphant. Pascal’s was … She didn’t wait to find out. Turning, Alana stumbled and pushed through the crowd until she was finally free of the room and burst out into the spacious and hushed lobby. She walked quickly to the door on jelly legs, where a doorman rushed to open it for her.

CHAPTER FIVE

ALANA stood on the steps, shivering.

‘You would like me to get you a taxi, madam?’

‘Yes, please,’ Alana said gratefully to the nice doorman. She had no idea where she would go—all her stuff was at Pascal’s—but she just wanted away from here.

‘She doesn’t need a taxi, she’s with me. Can you send for my driver, please?’ a familiar deep voice, throbbing with anger, came from behind her and she stiffened in rejection.

A harsh hand on her arm pulled her round. She met furious dark eyes, and everything in her rebelled against his anger. The fact that the doorman had already scurried off to do his bidding made things even worse.

‘I believe that I just ordered a taxi; thanks all the same for the offer of the lift.’

‘What the hell just happened back there?’

‘Why, I believe what just happened is that you saw a better option and decided to pursue it, leaving me at the mercy of a … a creepy, slimy lounge-lizard.’

His hand tightened on her arm. ‘What are you talking about? Did someone come on to you? Did someone do something to you?’

‘No,’ she dismissed him furiously, while trying to shake him off unsuccessfully. ‘Not that you would have noticed anyway. But, thanks, you’ve saved me going back in to look for you. If you could give me the keys to your apartment, I’d appreciate it; I’ll get my things and be gone by the time you get back. No doubt you’ll be wanting the place to yourself tonight?’

‘And why would that be?’ His voice was arctic, but Alana was on fire.

‘Do you really need me to spell it out, Pascal? I thought you were more sophisticated than that.’ She berated herself bitterly now for having allowed herself to be seduced by him.

‘Apparently not so sophisticated that I can go to the bar to get a drink for my date and turn around to find she has disappeared, only to find her again and have her run from the room as if I’d chased her out myself.’

He’d been looking for her? A reflex to stop, to apologise, was quashed as she remembered the woman. They’d looked far too cosy. She’d only known Pascal two weeks. Did she really think she could trust him? Her astounding naïvety mocked her mercilessly.

‘Your companion might have another impression. She seemed to think that you were quite interested in what she had to offer.’

Pascal could recall only too noxiously what the British model Cecilia Hampton had been offering. She’d all but wrapped herself around him like a clinging vine, and had spoken in an absurdly quiet, jarring little-girl voice—a well-worn ploy to get a man to come closer, whereupon she’d all but thrust her enormous fake bosom in his face. He’d been feeling foolish ever since he’d stalked away from Alana to get drinks, and had turned back to get her, imagining all the predatory males in the room moving in on her, but she’d disappeared.

His car drew up at that moment and, heaving a sigh of relief, he hurried Alana down the steps and into the back, making her slide along the seat and getting in beside her, not giving her a chance to get out. Or say a thing.

In the back of the car Alana ripped her arm from Pascal’s grasp, her skin hot and tingling. ‘How dare you? I want you to let me out this minute. I’ll get a cab.’

She sat forward and opened her mouth to speak to the driver, but Pascal hauled her over and she lay sprawled inelegantly against him. With his other hand he flicked a switch and the privacy window slid up with a hiss.

The air was electric around them. Alana was very aware of how she lay practically across his lap, in a pose of supplication that galled her. His body was tense and taut, and unmistakably hard. It made her feel sick, that he could so easily transfer his desire from one to another.

‘Isn’t there something wrong with this picture?’ she gritted out, holding herself as tense and as far away as possible.

‘Yes,’ Pascal ground out. ‘You’re wearing far too many clothes for my liking and I want you now.’

Alana tried to pull free, but he was remorseless and held her still. ‘You don’t want me, you want her.’

In an instant Pascal had shifted and lifted Alana with an ease that shocked her. She found herself straddling his lap, knees pressed either side of his powerful thighs. His hands were on her waist, holding her captive. A wave of anger and humiliation at her own helpless response, her lack of strength, drove her to try and move but she couldn’t.

Her arms were rigid, either side of Pascal’s shoulders on the seat behind them. With his hands firmly on her waist he shifted her slightly so that she could feel where his erection strained between them against the confines of his trousers. A rush of desire made her suck in a betraying breath. And then his hands came up to her dress, to undo the clasp hidden underneath the flower. If he undid that, her dress would fall to her waist.

‘Don’t you dare.’ She caught his hands, but he swatted hers away with ease. He undid her dress and it fell. Alana caught it. The motion of the car made her fall against him, and made the apex between her legs grind into Pascal’s hardness. She could hear his breath coming harshly, see the colour slash across his cheekbones. She felt sick inside, knowing that he could just as easily be doing this with any other woman.

She heard him sigh, and he looked up at her with a curiously unguarded expression. She was caught by it.

‘Alana, please believe me: if I were in the unfortunate position of having Cecilia Hampton straddle my lap right now, I can assure you that she would not be feeling what you’re feeling.’

He snaked a hand around the back of her neck. Alana tried to hold herself stiff, but it was too difficult. His voice was low, reasonable, and oh, so sexy. ‘You’d disappeared when I went looking for you, so I went back to wait at the bar, thinking you’d come find me there. Cecilia approached me. If you’d watched for another few seconds before running out, you would have seen me extricate myself from her extremely unwelcome embrace.’

Alana looked down at him. He looked sincere. Had she read it wrong? She found herself wanting to believe him so much. And that was beyond scary in its implications. But right now she could avoid thinking about it without a huge amount of effort. The need consuming her, consuming the air around them, was too great. Desire flowed, hot and urgent, between them. This was all-encompassing, and she had to give into it and deal with the fallout later.

Pascal slowly moved his hand from the back of her neck, over her shoulder and down to her hands. He exerted a little bit of pressure and Alana let him pull her hands away, giving in to a need too great. Her dress fell to her waist, baring her breasts. She put her hands back onto the seat behind Pascal. He took her face in his hands and kissed her softly, reverently. It made something hard melt inside her. She sank into him, found her hips moving sinuously against his. Urgency rose. His kiss became more forceful. He dragged his mouth away and held the weight of one breast in his hand before flicking out a tongue and laving the distended peak. Alana’s back arched.

She pressed kisses feverishly to his face, mouth, neck, her hands seeking to rip open his shirt. Buttons popped and his bow tie disappeared down into the cracks between the seats. She blindly sought his belt buckle and opened it impatiently.

‘You’re like a fever in my blood, Alana. There’s no one else I want.’

His words set her aflame even more, and she bent to kiss him again. He lifted her slightly and she braced her hands against his shoulders. She bit her lip as she heard his zip come down, and as he pulled his trousers down with a rough urgency. Then he settled her back and she almost cried out at the sensation of his hard, virile, unsheathed heat, right there.

He lifted her dress at her waist, and she heard fabric rip as he brought two hands to the side of her knickers and pulled. He pressed a kiss to her throat as she felt the material being pulled away. ‘I’m not sorry and I’ll buy you new ones.’

She didn’t care. She wanted him inside her, right now. The ache was killing her.

As if he heard her silent plea, he lifted her again, and she could feel his hand on himself as he guided his rigid length to the apex of her thighs. He slid in easily, and as Alana sank down onto him, he surged upwards. She was so turned on, and the sensation was so shockingly thrilling, that she came right there and then, her inner muscles clamping around him in a series of minor convulsions.

She dropped her head into his shoulder. He was still rigid within her, filling her. ‘Oh God, I’m sorry …’ She was breathing heavily.

He pulled her back, tipped her head up, pressed a kiss to her mouth, slid his tongue between her soft lips. She could feel him stir within her, and inexplicably she could feel herself start to respond again, not being allowed to fall back to earth; she was kept on a high plateau of sensation that threatened to go even higher.

‘We’ve only just started.’

With a slow, burning intensity, Pascal moved within her like a devil magician. He brought her to the edge only to stop, then start again. In a fever of prolonged ecstasy, skin slick with sweat, it was only when he knew he couldn’t hold back that he allowed free rein to his movements, which became urgent. His big hands moulded her back, held her hips steady. Alana was beyond words. Everything in her was reverent, the orgasm that broke through her just before his was so powerful that she had to keep her eyes locked on Pascal’s or she would have disintegrated into pieces.

Pascal had never felt anything like it. He’d almost have believed that she hadn’t climaxed, if he hadn’t felt her body contracting powerfully around his. But she’d done it with such quiet intensity that it had made his own completion burst up in a never-ending stream of exquisite pleasure. Only her biting her lip at the zenith of sensation had shown any of her internal experience.

Alana shook all over. Pascal pulled her into his chest and cradled her against him. They were still joined intimately, and at that moment she couldn’t ever imagine being separated from this man. She’d never felt like this with her husband, not even in the early days of their marriage when she’d had so many hopes and dreams of a happy future.

Something extraordinary had just happened, and she hated to admit it.

* * *

When they reached his apartment, Pascal carried her straight up to his bathroom and ran them a bath. Then they made love. Again. And now she lay here, blissed out. Replete. Complete.

She heard a movement and looked up. Pascal was holding out a big robe.

‘Come on, or you’ll turn into a prune.’

Something in his eyes made her hold back a quick, joky comment. She stood up and reached for the robe, only to have him pull it back from her reach.

‘Pascal, come on.’ She groaned and immediately went to cover her breasts. She was totally exposed in the low lighting of the intimate bathroom. And it was silly to feel this way when they’d just made love, first in the back of his car and then in the bath. She flushed.

‘Let your hands down. Please.’ His voice sounded rough. ‘I want to look at you, Alana—will you let me look at you? As you are?’

Fear and embarrassment gave way to something else. The desire in his eyes emboldened her. She carefully and slowly climbed out of the bath and stood beside it. She dropped her arms and watched as his eyes travelled down, resting and dwelling on parts of her body that she’d certainly never inspected so intensely herself.

After a long, long minute his eyes met hers again. They were dark. He stepped forward and put the robe around her, drying her, before slipping her arms into the sleeves and tying it securely around her waist. He smoothed back her damp hair and ran a finger down her cheek.

‘I could quite easily have you again right now, on the floor … And all sorts of other images came into my mind as I looked at you.’ Pascal wrestled for a moment inwardly with the very real and disturbing reality that he could take her again right now. The knowledge made him cautious. ‘But there’s time …’

‘Time,’ Alana said stupidly, suddenly wanting very much instead that they could make love on the floor right now. She had an erotic flash of an image: kneeling at his feet and taking him into her mouth. The shocking heat that inflamed her made her feel weak. Where had that desire come from? She’d never even done that with Ryan. She’d never even thought that she found it sexy. But the thought of driving Pascal to the edge of all endurance was intoxicating in the extreme.

‘Yes, time. Let’s eat and have some wine.’ He cut through the fevered images in her wanton imagination and pushed her towards the bathroom door, and then out and down the stairs to the sitting room. A bottle of wine sat open with two glasses. Alana felt stone-cold sober all of a sudden, which wasn’t surprising as she hadn’t drunk all evening, but bizarrely she also felt drunk, heady … something very nebulous and disturbing.

He poured wine into their glasses and busied himself with something at the oven. Although Alana was in a robe, Pascal wore faded jeans and a plain shirt that was haphazardly buttoned, showing the light smattering of hair on his chest and a sliver of hard-muscled, olive-skinned belly. Alana took a quick sip of wine. He really did have the honed body of an athlete—again something niggled at her about that, but it was wispy and eluded her.

‘Look,’ she started nervously. ‘I’m sorry about … running out like that. I’m not normally so dramatic.’

Pascal closed the oven door and slanted her a look before taking a sip of wine from his own glass.

Alana flushed. ‘We should still be there. Didn’t you have to make some kind of speech?’

Pascal shrugged noncommittally. ‘My assistant did it. It’s no big deal, really; I wouldn’t have even been here necessarily if it hadn’t been for the match happening on the same day. It was an opportunity to drum up publicity and kill two birds with one stone. But, no.’ He smiled disarmingly. ‘I would much prefer to be here with you.’

She flushed again, unused to being flattered. ‘Well. Thank you. Next time—’

She stopped abruptly, her eyes flying to his with a sickening feeling as she realised what she’d been about to say—she’d been about to imply that there would be a next time.

‘That is, I don’t mean—’

Pascal hushed her and came round the counter, pulling her into him. ‘Next time I’m not going to let you out of my sight, so there will be no room for any confusion or misinterpretation, OK?’

Her mouth was dry and she just nodded.

He let her go and moved back, smiling easily, charmingly, and her world tilted all over again. ‘Now, how about you tell me about this lounge-lizard of yours?’

Alana shuddered delicately at the memory, realising that it had shaken her more than she cared to admit, but talking about it would lessen it. She told Pascal and acted out his slimy manoeuvres, and by the time she’d finished they were both laughing, and Pascal admitted that he knew exactly who she was talking about. Apparently the man was famous for pouncing on vulnerable-looking women. Their easy intimacy and Pascal’s ability to make her feel protected, to make her feel like she could trust him, was sucking Alana into a veritable whirlpool that she feared it would be nigh impossible to climb back out of.

The following evening, as Alana looked at the Italian capital grow smaller and smaller beneath her, she got hot in the face again thinking of the previous night. The erotic fantasy she’d had in the bathroom had become a reality. Pascal had let her push him to the edge of his endurance. She groaned inwardly; she seemed to be in a permanent state of heat since she met him.

She was alone on his private jet on her way back to Dublin. He was taking a commercial flight back to Paris, and he hadn’t taken no for an answer when she’d objected. He’d flown her to him, and now he was flying her home. Just like that. As if flying someone on a private jet was banal, ordinary. Easy. And she had to concede, for someone like him who strode through life and got what they wanted with a click of their fingers, of course it was easy. Accolades, money, women, beautiful houses—easy come, easy go. And she’d put herself firmly in that category, made no bones about the fact that she was fine with that.

She finally turned away from the view and recalled the stern set of his features as he’d sent her off, having insisted on accompanying her to the airport. They’d had their first row, of sorts. Except it had been more like a non-row. Alana still couldn’t quite figure what had happened but all she knew was that he hadn’t been happy.

They’d woken late, well into the early afternoon. Pascal had insisted that she see something of Rome, and had taken her to the nearby Trevi Fountain and then to a tiny restaurant tucked away from the hordes of tourists. The food had been sublime, authentic Italian cuisine at its best. The experience had been intimate, the table so small that their legs had been all but entwined underneath, and it had been easier for their hands to stay linked, too, separating only when the food arrived.

It was when they’d got back to his apartment so that Alana could pack; they’d been standing in the kitchen and she’d been watching Pascal percolate some coffee. He’d turned round and said easily, ‘There’s so much more you should see. But we can do it again.’

Alana had immediately reacted to his words at a very deep, visceral level, an instant negation of something very fleeting and wishful rising up inside her. ‘Oh, well, yes. I’m sure I’ll be back at some stage.’

It was the way she’d said ‘I’ that got his attention, and she knew it. Even though he said nothing—at first. And then he did say, ‘I meant when you come back here with me.’

Alana took the coffee he handed her and walked away into the living room, holding the cup between suddenly chilled hands. She schooled her features and turned back round to face him, forcing her voice to sound as casual as she could. ‘You really don’t have to say that, you know.’

He took a sip of coffee, his eyes narrowed disconcertingly on her face. She was glad that he was still behind the island in the kitchen.

‘And what’s that supposed to mean?’

Alana gave a little laugh, which sounded fake to her ears. ‘I mean, you don’t have to do this … reassurance thing. I really don’t expect you to make me feel like you want me to come back …’ Her words trailed off, diminishing some of the vehemence with which she’d started the statement.

He walked round the island, ridiculously small coffee cup in one hand, his other in the pocket of his jeans. He looked astoundingly gorgeous in a dark sweater. Unconsciously, Alana backed away.

‘Believe me,’ he said throatily, ‘the only thing I want to make you feel right now involves a soft surface and no clothing in our way.’

Alana gulped and took a quick swig of coffee.

‘Look,’ she said weakly, ‘all I’m saying is that I know what this is and I’m fine with that. Really.’

‘And what would that be?’

She shrugged one shoulder; they were still doing a bit of a backward dance around the room, she backing, and he advancing.

‘It’s an affair. A fling.’

His eyebrows raised high. ‘Oh, so that’s what this is?’

Alana winced. No doubt his other lovers were far too experienced and suave to put a name on their experience with him. Suddenly she felt anger rise up. Why was he being so obtuse? Surely she was doing him a favour? She stopped backing away and put her coffee cup down carefully on the low table by the sofa.

She straightened and folded her arms. ‘Look, that’s exactly what it is. We both know that. I’d prefer if we could just be honest about it. What I’m saying to you is that I don’t need to be given any kind of platitudes. I’m not going to be clingy or want anything more. If you said to me right now that this is over, and thanks but goodbye, I’d have no problem walking out of here.’

Pascal had gone very still, his eyes very black. No doubt he wasn’t used to lovers calling the shots, Alana thought cynically. And why did her flip words cause an ache somewhere in the region of her chest? She pushed it aside. The truth was this: Pascal was not a man she could trust in a million years. And she’d vowed to herself never to trust again. Never to be so silly, naïve.

Pascal put down his coffee cup, too, and walked towards her slowly. Alana stood her ground, but had the impression that she’d woken a sleeping dragon.

‘I’ll admit that your honesty is both tantalising and refreshing.’

‘It is?’ she asked.

Pascal nodded. He was close enough to touch now.

‘Yes. We both know that when the time comes, we’ll walk away without a backward glance, happy with what we’ve had.’

‘Exactly.’ Alana nodded vehemently. ‘I don’t mean to sound … crass, it’s just that I’ve been married. I’ve had that experience and I never, ever want to go near it again. Not even in the form of a tenuous commitment—and I know you’re not even offering that.’ She stopped and cursed herself; she sounded like a bumbling idiot. ‘What I’m trying to say is that I’m not looking for anything. I know you’re a playboy.’

His eyes flashed, and Alana’s insides clenched painfully but she ploughed on. ‘I’m not expecting anything more. I can’t begin to tell you how comfortable I am with that.’

‘A no-strings, no-consequences affair—we both walk away when we get bored.’

She nodded. She knew that time wouldn’t be far off. A man of Pascal’s voracious tastes wouldn’t be content with someone like her for long. Not when there were other, more beautiful women waiting in the wings.

He came very close and snaked a hand round the back of her head. His eyes were still dark, unreadable, and his jaw had a rigidity to it that made Alana instinctively want to smooth it, relax it.

‘Well, then, seeing as how it’s doubtful you will ever be back here with me, now that the sands of time are slipping away from us, we should make the most of here and now, n’est-ce pas?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘What I mean, Alana—’ his voice had a hard edge ‘—is that we’re wasting too much time talking when we could be saying goodbye to Rome and this weekend in a very satisfactory way.’

He kissed her for a long, drugging moment, hauling her whole body against his. When he pulled back, and Alana fought to regain her breath, she said, ‘But your plane … we have to leave.’

He shook his head, eyes flashing dangerously. ‘That’s the beauty of being a playboy—my crew are very used to last-minute changes.’

Alana felt a knife skewer her inside, so hurt for a moment that she felt winded. And yet this was exactly what she’d asked for. Demanded. And when he bent his head to kiss her again, and started to open her shirt, she couldn’t stop him because if she did he’d know that all of her proclamations were built on a very flimsy foundation.

With the lingering heat of their recent impassioned love-making still in her blood and heavy limbs, Alana’s focus came back to the present. The earth below was an indistinct mass of brown mountains seen through breaks in the cloud. She sighed and let her head fall back against the seat, closing her eyes. She was playing with fire; she knew it. And all the trust issues in the world weren’t going to keep her safe from harm.

As his private jet winged Alana home in style and comfort, the novelty and charmlessness of commercial travel was quickly reminding Pascal how far he’d come. Although, he could never forget his upbringing; it was branded onto his skin like a tattoo. He could remember how close he’d come to being one of the lost youths of the Parisian suburbs: lost to a life of crime and drugs, hopelessness. Until his mother had died and had thus saved him, by ensuring that he would go to live with his grandfather. She had redeemed herself and her woeful mothering by making sure he’d take another path, despite the fact that he’d been a representation of everything that had failed in her own life.

Pascal strode free of the gnarled mass of human traffic in Charles de Gaulle airport and sank into the back of his car which was waiting just outside the doors. Why was he thinking of such things now, when he hadn’t thought of them in years?

Alana.

A woman was making him think of these things, when no other lover had ever done so. He had to concede that no other lover had taken him by the scruff of the neck and rattled him so completely. No other lover had evoked within him a compelling need to obey instinct over intellect. He hadn’t lived like that for a long time. She connected to something within him, primitive and long-suppressed, deep and visceral. He searched desperately to justify this feeling, to rationalise it, but his brain wouldn’t cooperate.

When she’d stood there earlier and had coolly informed him that she was fine with their temporary affair, that above all she didn’t expect commitment, he should have been rejoicing. Wasn’t it a man’s ultimate fantasy? For a man like him, happy to take lovers for a short time until they bored him, or until they started looking for more.

Here he was, being offered this fantasy on a plate, and he well knew that she meant every word she’d said. It wasn’t some kind of devious reverse-psychology. So why had he felt anything but relieved? Why had he wanted to challenge her? Why had that instinct not to let her go felt so strong? He’d certainly never aspired to the empty heights of marriage, either; he’d learnt at an early age that searching for that elusive happiness only bred disillusionment and pain. His parents had both proved in their own ways to be prime examples of that. His father had seen him as nothing but a threat to his own marriage, and had rejected him outright because of it.

Yet Alana was making him question the very bedrock on which he’d built his life. His sluggish brain finally kicked into gear: attraction. That had to be it. A rare form of lust. He just hadn’t met a woman who’d taken possession of his body and mind before, that was all. That had to be all. OK, so she wasn’t into anything permanent—well, neither was he. He just wasn’t used to being on the receiving end of the ultimatum, that was all. He relaxed. Their affair certainly wasn’t over yet. Not by a long shot.

‘You know we’re just concerned, love.’

‘I know, Mam, I know.’ Alana sank into her couch, still wearing her coat.

‘He seems like a very nice man. He’s awfully important, isn’t he?’

Alana bit back a rueful smile. ‘Nice’ hardly did him justice. ‘Em, yes, he’s quite important. But, Mother, don’t go getting any ideas, now. It’s nothing special.’ Liar.

Her mother trilled a laugh down the phone. ‘I might not quite understand these new relationships, but, love, I know how hard it was for you when Ryan died. It’s OK to move on now, it’s been long enough. No one would expect you to mourn for ever.’

Alana felt a wave of isolation come over her. Her parents had never really acknowledged the fact that she’d been divorcing Ryan; it had simply been too painful for them to admit that one of their children had failed in their marriage that way. So, when Ryan had died so tragically just before the divorce had come through, Alana had known that in some awful way, it had allowed her parents to believe in the myth of her fairy tale. Was it any wonder she hadn’t been able to confide in them?

After a few more words they finished the conversation, and Alana was relieved that her mother hadn’t mentioned Pascal again. She shook her head and then resolutely turned off her phone before she could get another acerbic call from her sister, Ailish, who would no doubt have seen the same gossip rags as her mother. She and Pascal were all over the press; the reporters had been waiting at Dublin airport. She knew she’d been naïve to think for a second that perhaps people wouldn’t be interested.

Why did she have to go and meet someone who made her feel alive again, someone she couldn’t resist? Someone in the public eye on a level that made Ryan O’Connor seem as if he’d been in the Z-list celebrity pile? It was as if she’d had a list of things to avoid and had blithely ignored each and every one of them. Alana just hoped that she could look at Pascal one day soon and not feel that burning desire rip through her entire body like a life-sustaining necessity.

CHAPTER SIX

THREE heady, passion-filled weeks later, that day was eluding Alana spectacularly as she looked down from her position in the press box to the VIP area in Croke Park. Déjà vu washed over her as she caught Pascal’s eye and made a face before turning her attention back to the game between Ireland v England. Her heart was singing, her breath was coming fast, and her blood was zinging through her veins. She put her intermittent feelings of nausea down to that see-sawing feeling and tried to forget that she’d been compelled to buy an over-the-counter pregnancy test that morning on her way to work after Pascal had said goodbye to her from her own modestly sized double bed.

She wouldn’t think about her late period or the pregnancy test now. It couldn’t be possible. And yet, a small voice niggled, it could. But in the years of her marriage to Ryan, while they’d still been sleeping together, she hadn’t had one scare despite not having used contraception. It had been the source of some of their main problems, and, while Alana had got checked out and been told everything was fine, Ryan had refused, clearly unable to deal with the fear that it could be something on his side.

The match picked up in pace just then and Alana let it distract her. At the end, Pascal found her as the usual scramble started.

‘I’ve agreed to go on the post-match analysis panel to give my opinion on how I think the tournament is going to go. They’re doing it in the press centre here.’

‘OK,’ Alana said, feeling slightly breathless and hating herself for it. ‘I’ve some interviews lined up, and then I’ve got to head back to the studio, so I’ll see you later.’

He nodded and bent close to her ear for a moment. ‘I want to kiss you so thoroughly that you’re boneless in my arms, but I don’t think you’d thank me for that in front of the entire pressbox.’

Alana felt boneless already, and fought the rogue urge to let him do exactly that. She just shook her head swiftly, alternately disappointed and relieved when he stepped away with a cool look on his face.

His tall, powerful frame disappeared down through the seats, taking a little piece of her with him. She sighed. She was in so much trouble, and she was potentially in a whole lot more trouble too. The kind of trouble that Pascal Lévêque wouldn’t thank her for. And yet … She placed a hand on her belly. Right at that moment she thought that, if she was pregnant, it was something she’d always have for herself. A baby, a child.

Just then the cameraman signalled that they were ready to go with the first interview, and Alana gathered up her stuff and hurried down to the pitch.

By the time they were onto the last interview with one of the Ireland players, Alana was feeling exhausted. She glanced up and her stomach contracted painfully when she saw who it was—Eoin Donohoe, one of her late husband’s partners in crime. He was a huge, intimidating presence, one of the biggest players on the team. Like Ryan, he, too, was married, but that hadn’t stopped his own hedonism. Waves of old mutual antipathy flowed between them as Alana prepared to ask the questions. Eoin smiled at her, but it held a nasty edge which she ignored.

They were almost done with the live interview when Eoin said quietly, ‘So, we see that you’re moving on with your life. Poor Ryan’s barely cold in the grave.’

The air went very still around them. Alana fancied she could hear a pin drop. ‘Excuse me?’

‘Everyone knew you couldn’t wait to get rid of him and suck him dry so you could move on, but you’ve got the best of both worlds now, don’t you? You’ve got all of Ryan’s money, and now you’ve got one of the richest men in the world eating out of your—’

‘I beg your pardon, Eoin,’ she cut in quickly, having no doubt he’d not stop at saying something unbelievably crude. ‘My husband has been dead for a year and a half, and it’s no business of yours and never has been what I do with my personal life.’ The vitriol in Eoin’s eyes made Alana quail inside, but something else was starting to rise up, too, something she’d held down for a long, long time—the truth.

Eoin continued with ugly menace in his voice and face. ‘Except that it’s your fault he died, your fault the Irish team never recovered from Ryan’s death. If you hadn’t thrown him out when he was so vulnerable—’

It came up from somewhere deep and reflexive. Alana laughed. She actually laughed. And it felt so good that she kept laughing. She knew it was verging on hysteria, but the truth had risen so far now that she couldn’t help it coming out. She’d had enough of being the scapegoat for Ryan O’Connor.

She stepped forward and pushed a finger into Eoin’s massive chest, emboldened by the fact that he looked distinctly nervous now at her reaction.

‘Let’s get a few things straight here and now, shall we?’ She didn’t wait for an answer; everything was forgotten as she was borne aloft on a wave of something like mad euphoria.

‘My husband was a lying, cheating, womanising, gambling, pathetic excuse of a man. And I’m not the only one who knew it. My only sin was that I helped to perpetuate the myth, that I helped the world to see and believe in Saint Ryan. He made my life a misery. And you were part of that. I know all about you, too, Eoin Donohoe; don’t you think people or even your wife would like to hear about your drunken, whoring binges in—’

‘Shut up, you little bitch.’

His stark language, the threat in his tone and the way his face had twisted, made Alana step back in fright. Someone jumped in and physically restrained Eoin, he looked so angry.

The world came back into focus and Alana was stunned. Had she really just said all that? She looked around at the cameraman wildly. It wasn’t Derek, it was a new guy, young and scared-looking. Derek would have had the sense to stop filming. Her stomach went into free fall.

She said through stiff, cold lips, ‘Please tell me you stopped filming?’

He gulped and went puce, lowering the camera. ‘I—’

Alana raised a shaky hand to her face; her other one was still wrapped around the microphone. ‘Oh God.’

A low, threatening voice sounded near her ear, turning her blood cold. ‘Well done, Cusack. You’ve done it now; you’d better be prepared for the fallout.’

She took down her hand and watched as Eoin sauntered away. He hadn’t even tried to stitch her up. She’d done it all by herself. The minute he’d come out with his first provocative comment she should have wrapped up the interview and that would have been that. It was no worse than some of the barbed comments people had thrown at her since Ryan had died. Yet she’d never felt the need to defend herself till now.

In the temporary studio set up at the other end of the pitch for the after-match analysis, there was a deathly lull as the panel absorbed what had just happened. Luckily they had just cut to a commercial break, but the damage was done. Pascal’s face was like granite.

When she finally let herself into her house later, Alana felt shell shocked, as if she’d been put through a wringer and left flat and limp on the other side. When she’d walked back into the newsroom, she’d been summoned immediately to Rory’s office and had been fired on the spot. The entire slanging match had been aired on national television, in front of the country and in front of the panel of experts discussing the match. And Pascal. Apparently he’d held his tongue on air, but afterwards had voiced his concerns for the image of the tournament, and the image of his bank’s involvement in the face of the rapidly escalating scandal. That was what Rory had told her as he’d all but flung her contract at her.

‘I knew you were liable to be a problem when I hired you!’

‘And yet,’ Alana had pointed out in a desperate bid to try and save herself, ‘I proved myself to be reliable, well informed, and you even told me last week that I was the one you trusted most to do the hard-hitting interviews.’

‘Yes, Alana,’ he’d replied wearily, sitting down behind his desk. ‘But you brought your baggage with you, didn’t you?’

She’d kept it together and had just said quietly, ‘I guess I did.’ Even from the grave her husband was having the last laugh.

As Alana sat on her couch now and thought of everything that had just happened she couldn’t stop the nausea rising. She just made it to the bathroom in time and emptied the contents of her stomach. As she washed her face, she thought of something, and with a fatal air went back out to her bag and extracted the chemist’s bag. She went back into her tiny bathroom.

The day couldn’t get any worse.

And then it just did.

* * *

She tried to ignore the doorbell which was ringing persistently, the door-knocker banging violently. But the thought of her neighbours hearing the commotion finally made her move off her couch and out of the state of shock that had held her immobile for the past few minutes. She opened the door and didn’t wait to see who it was. She knew.

Pascal came in and towered over her, the door shut behind him.

‘What the hell was all that about?’

Alana moved around to her armchair and sat down, because she was afraid she might fall. ‘That was me, finally airing my dirty laundry. In front of the nation, no less.’

Pascal had moved to the centre of the small sitting-room, and glared down at her. ‘And in front of the entire Six Nations public too. I believe the news is hitting the airwaves as we speak. The hotel where the after-match party is being held has had to call for police assistance in dealing with the hordes of paparazzi already camped outside.’

Alana winced.

Pascal grunted something unintelligible and sat down on her couch. She was still a little too numb to react.

‘So? Are you going to tell me what happened?’

Alana shrugged. She looked at him, but didn’t really see him. ‘He pushed me too far. For months people have been making snide comments about how I was so cruel to Ryan—how could I have thrown him out?—and the truth was exactly what I said.’

Pascal drove a hand through his hair. ‘But it’s crazy. The things you said—’

‘Were all true.’ Alana felt life-force coming back into her bones, the shock wearing off. This man and his concern for appearances was the reason she’d just lost her job, and the reality of what that meant was beginning to sink in.

She stood up and crossed her arms. ‘I’m not really in the mood to discuss this actually, would you mind leaving? I think you’ve done enough for one day.’

He stood, too, bristling. He pointed at his chest. ‘Me? I’m not the one that has just ripped the rose-tinted glasses from a nation of mourners. Whatever your husband might have been, Alana, surely there was a more decorous time and place to tell the truth?’

She stepped up to him, shaking. ‘Do you really think I thought it through logically for one second Pascal—and then went ahead thinking it would all be OK?’ She stepped back again, breathing heavily. ‘Of course I didn’t. It just came out. And in all honesty, I probably couldn’t stop myself if it happened again. He provoked me.’

Pascal recalled what Eoin Donohoe had said, and recalled, too, his urge to go and lift Alana bodily out of his way so that he could shield her. He’d been genuinely concerned for her safety as he’d watched her confront the huge man. She’d looked so tiny and fragile, standing up to him. The protective instinct had caught him unawares as the events had unfolded in front of him, but then he’d also had to assess the potential damage as a barrage of calls had immediately jammed the phone lines in the studio.

Pascal couldn’t keep the censure from his voice. ‘He may have provoked you, but you’ve unleashed a storm now.’

He saw how Alana paled dramatically. But his own head was still ringing from the board of his bank wanting to know what on earth was going on, why a storm in a teacup was threatening to reduce the famous rugby-tournament to the level of a sideshow. And what it was already doing to their reputation on Europe’s stock markets.

Alana felt a wave of weariness. ‘It’ll die down soon enough. It’s not as if people are going to be faced with me, anyway; I’ve been sacked.’

Pascal’s head reared back. ‘Sacked?’

She nodded and looked at him, hardening her heart and insides to the way he made her feel, even now. The weariness fled and anger rose, hot and swift. How could he be so cavalier about her life? Her independence was gone, everything she’d built up destroyed. ‘Rory sacked me as soon as I got back. And as it was in part to do with your reaction, you needn’t act so surprised.’

Pascal’s face darkened ominously, features tight. ‘I didn’t know he’d done that.’

‘Well, he did.’ Her hands were clenched into fists at her sides.

‘I would have never have advocated that you lose your job over this. To suggest that is ridiculous.’

His words rang with conviction, and he seemed affronted that she thought he would be so petty. She knew she couldn’t blame him for the fact that Ireland was so small that the merest whiff of scandal could run for weeks and weeks and wreck a career overnight. The immediate future lay starkly ahead of her, especially with the brand-new knowledge that she held secret in her belly. The anger drained away and she felt weary again; it was too overwhelming to try and get her head around it. And at the centre of everything stood this man who was turning her upside down and inside out.

She sat down again when a wave of dizziness went through her. Immediately Pascal was at her side, bending down, a hand on her knee. She tried to flinch away, but he wouldn’t release her.

‘What’s wrong?’ he asked harshly.

‘Nothing,’ she answered quickly, restraining the urge to place a hand on her belly. Then hysteria rose again. ‘Unless you count the fact that I’m now jobless and about to be homeless, too.’

‘What are you talking about, Alana? You’re not making sense.’

‘Sense! If I had sense I wouldn’t have opened my mouth earlier.’ She was already hoping he’d forget what she’d just said. But of course he didn’t; his logical brain was sifting through everything.

‘What do you mean, homeless?’

She wished he’d move back. He was crowding her, exactly as he’d done that first time they’d met and had been in the car on the way to the restaurant. She cursed her runaway mouth inwardly.

‘What I mean is that, without a job, I’m going to be homeless. I have this month’s mortgage paid, and after that … nothing.’

He stood up again and she looked up.

He was remote, more remote than she’d ever seen him. ‘How is that possible? You must have been left a fortune.’

Alana felt his coolness touch her deep inside. She stood up, too, moving back towards her galley-kitchen as if seeking refuge. This was the first time she’d ever contemplated telling anyone the whole truth. She grimaced inwardly, apart from her recent exposé.

She shook her head. ‘That’s just it. It’s a myth. Ryan gambled everything away with people like Eoin, on stupidly lavish expensive weekends to places like Las Vegas. They’d hire private jets, stay in the best hotels—drink, drugs, girls, gambling. They did it all. When Ryan died, he had debts to the tune of millions, and no one knew. He kept up the pretence all along. If we hadn’t had the house to sell in Dalkey, I’d have had to declare myself bankrupt. Thanks to my own savings, which didn’t amount to much, I was able to buy this house and set up a loan agreement with Ryan’s debtors to pay the rest of the money back. Without my job, the repayments will fall behind immediately. This house is the least of my worries; the minute the repayments stop, they’ll come after me.’

Alana didn’t glean any comfort from Pascal’s shocked look. She knew well that on some level he’d still had her cast in the role of an ex-WAG—the derogatory term for the wives and girlfriends of sports stars. She couldn’t blame him; she’d seen the way he’d look at her sometimes, as if waiting for her to trip herself up, reveal herself to be the silly bimbo that most of those girls were.

‘I’ll talk to Rory.’

Alana shook her head vehemently. ‘No, that’ll make things even worse. The last thing I need now is to be pushed to the forefront of everything again.’

‘But maybe he can keep you behind the scenes for a while.’

‘It wouldn’t work.’ She could just imagine the snide comments, the looks.

‘What about your family? Don’t they know about this?’

A spasm of pain clenched Alana’s insides. She hated admitting this, knowing it would be hard to understand. ‘No; they don’t know. I was as guilty as Ryan for keeping up the pretence.’ She avoided Pascal’s eye. ‘They just … they don’t have the kind of resources I needed. They had their own things going on, and my parents are old, frail. They didn’t need to hear about my problems.’

Pascal’s tone was frigid. ‘It sounds to me like it was a problem worth sharing.’

She looked at him, feeling defensive. ‘It was my decision, OK? My family aren’t that wealthy, my parents certainly aren’t any more. They live comfortably, but they’ve earned that. I couldn’t burden them with the mistake I made.’

‘Is that how you saw your marriage?’

The way Pascal asked the question so softly made Alana feel even more vulnerable. She had to push him back; she knew well it was only a matter of time now before he ran as fast as he could from her car wreck of a life.

‘For a long time, yes I did, which is why I’m determined not to make the same mistake twice.’

He started advancing towards her, and Alana backed away further.

‘Is that what you see happening here—a mistake in the making?’

Alana shook her head, confused. Did he mean them? ‘I don’t … What are you talking about? This isn’t anything like that.’ It’s worlds apart.

He was still advancing into her kitchen, making the space become tiny. Alana was starting to feel desperate. She felt so raw and vulnerable right now that if he so much as touched her … She stopped abruptly as her hand that had been sliding along the counter hit something. Instinctively, she covered it. She knew immediately what it was; she’d left it there in her shock and confusion just minutes before. Pascal’s eyes darted to where her hand had made the betraying, concealing movement. Alana gulped as he looked back to her. She felt guilty. She looked guilty.

‘What’s that, Alana?’

‘Nothing,’ she said, almost hopefully.

‘So why are you trying to hide it?’

‘I’m not.’

‘Show me what it is.’

‘It’s nothing, just rubbish.’ Desperation tinged her voice, and in a rising surge of panic and rejection at the thought of confronting this, too, when so much had just happened, she whipped it off the counter top and whirled around to put it in the bin. But before she could a strong arm wrapped itself around her midriff and pulled her back into a hard body. With effortless strength, Pascal reached round and pulled the object from her hand. She closed her eyes. Their breathing sounded harsh in the small space, and she could imagine him trying to make sense of what he was looking at.

Alana could feel the tension come into Pascal’s body. His arm grew even more rigid around her. She knew it wouldn’t take long for him to make sense of it. These days pregnancy tests were idiot proof and the results immediate—the word ‘pregnant’ wouldn’t have taken a six-year-old long to figure out.

And then abruptly, so abruptly that she stumbled a little, Pascal released her. She turned round to look up but he wasn’t looking at her, he was looking at the pregnancy test. After a long, tense moment he finally looked at her and she fought not to wince under his almost-black look.

‘It’s pretty self-explanatory.’

He nodded. ‘Yes, crystal-clear.’

He turned and walked back into the sitting room, holding the test in his hand. Alana followed warily. He turned then, and she stopped in her tracks at the harsh lines on his face.

‘And were you planning on keeping this little secret to yourself, too, shouldering this as another burden? Another mistake?’

Pain lanced her. ‘I did the test just before you arrived. My period is late … I’ve been feeling a bit sick, so I bought it this morning on my way into work. Of course I would have told you.’ Eventually.

‘Oh, really?’ His voice could have turned milk sour. ‘I find that hard to believe, when you were about to throw it in the bin as nothing more than a piece of rubbish. Perhaps you’ve already decided what you want to do with our baby.’

Our baby.

The simple words of acknowledgement and acceptance rocked through Alana like an atom bomb. She put her hands instinctively on her still-flat belly. ‘Of course I haven’t decided anything, and certainly not what you seem to be implying. And I was going to tell you. It’s just … I’ve barely had time to take it in myself. I think you can agree that today has packed more than its fair punch.’

Hating herself for feeling so weak as another wave of dizziness washed over her, she couldn’t help swaying slightly. Words resounded in her head: jobless, homeless, pregnant. She’d really made a mess of things this time.

With a muttered curse Pascal was by her side and made her sit down on the couch.

‘When was the last time you ate?’

Alana had to struggle to recall. Pascal cursed again colourfully. ‘Don’t tell me you haven’t even eaten all day?’

He threw off his coat and went into her kitchen and started opening the fridge and looking on her open shelves. Feeling totally bemused and numb, Alana watched as he took out bread, butter, cheese, tomatoes and made a sandwich. He brought it back over on a plate and handed it to her, watching her until she’d eaten the whole thing, even though it was the size of a doorstep.

When she was done, he took the plate and set it aside, then he stood up and started to pace. He ran a hand through his dishevelled hair. He looked dishevelled all over, and Alana could feel her pulse stirring to life. His shirt was coming out of his trousers, the top button of his shirt undone. He rounded on her then, taking her by surprise. Her eyes had been on his bottom, and she coloured guiltily. How could she be thinking of that at a time like this?

But it seemed as if she was not the only one. Pascal dropped down onto the couch beside her, coming close, and before she could stop him he was undoing the top button of her shirt.

‘That’s better. I can’t concentrate when you’re all buttoned up.’

Alana backed away into the corner of the couch. Pascal’s brows rose. ‘It’s a bit late for that, don’t you think?’

She was beginning to feel stifled, threatened—sensory overload. She shimmied out from under him and stood up. Pascal sat back and looked up from under hooded lids. Alana’s insides clenched.

‘So when do you think it happened? I thought we were careful.’

‘We were,’ she said crisply, and then remembered the back of the car that night in Rome. Colour washed through her cheeks again. She looked down and caught his eye. She couldn’t read his expression. But it seemed as if he could read her mind.

‘Yes, there was that time. Or the bath afterwards.’ Pascal had known well he was being careless, but for the first time in his life that concern had assumed secondary place to fulfilling his physical needs. And in the intervening days he hadn’t even thought about it. More fool him. Yet, even more astounding to him right now was the equanimity he felt in the face of this news. In fact, what he was feeling was an inordinate sense of rightness. A sense of something his grandfather had passed onto him, something he’d never realised he possessed before: a sense of family.

Along with it came the memory of what it had been like to be shunned, rejected, and surging up within Pascal now was a zealous desire to give this child, his child, the kind of acknowledgement he’d never had. The revelation stunned him.

Alana started to pace, anything to avoid looking at him, wanting him. She had to sort her head out. She couldn’t let him distract her.

‘Look. This has happened. It was reckless and silly, but we both know where you stand on this kind of thing.’

He stood up and was immediately dangerous, towering over her. ‘Oh, we do?’

Alana felt like stamping her foot childishly. ‘Yes! I can’t imagine you’re happy to be faced with a pregnant—’

‘Mistress?’ he asked equably.

‘I hate that word. I’m not your mistress.’

‘Then what are you? Go on—say it, Alana.’

He was goading her, teasing her, even now. She glared up at him, arms crossed. ‘I’m your latest lover. The one in between your last one and your next one.’

His expression hardened, his eyes flashed. ‘Yes. But now you’re my pregnant lover, so that changes things somewhat.’

‘Are you trying to tell me that you’re seriously happy with this?’

‘Not happy, exactly, no,’ he bit out, feeling defensive. ‘But how do you know that I haven’t always wanted a child someday?’

‘Have you?’ she shot back.

Now Pascal was the one backing away, feeling a little poleaxed again. His recent revelation was too new, too raw to articulate. This whole afternoon was taking on an unreal hue, as if he’d stepped into some mad time-warp. He was in a tiny house in the middle of Dublin with a woman who’d stepped into his life and turned it upside down. She’d just told him she was pregnant, and he was still there. He wasn’t running as fast as his legs could carry him away from her, which was how he’d always envisaged reacting to such a scenario.

He looked at her steadily and tried to ignore the way her hair was escaping the confines of its neat bun, the way he could see the hollow at the bottom of her throat where he’d opened the button. Even now, more than ever, he wanted her. He answered almost distractedly, ‘Yes … of course I did. On some level.’ Someday.

His mind cleared and fixed on Alana. ‘What about you?’

He saw her hand go to her belly again; she’d done that a few times, almost as if to protect the unborn child from something—their unborn child. Something in his chest felt tight.

Alana turned away from Pascal’s gaze for a moment. He was looking too deeply, seeing too much. When she turned around, his expression had lost that intensity; it was more innocuous.

‘Yes. I always wanted children. We … myself and Ryan … tried, but nothing happened. And I was always grateful then that we hadn’t. No child deserved to be born into our sham of a marriage.’

‘And what will this be, Alana?’

She looked up into his eyes, panic trickling through her. He was so powerful, a million times more powerful than Ryan ever had been. He was cold, remote, and she had that prescience again of what it would be like to cross him—she wouldn’t win.

‘This will be just us, having a baby. I’m not going to marry you, Pascal.’ She was shaking her head, moving away. He advanced.

‘I wasn’t aware that I’d asked you,’ he said silkily.

She flushed. ‘Well, isn’t that … how you people operate?’

He threw back his head and laughed, but Alana knew he wasn’t amused. ‘What do you think I am, a masochist? Why would I want to marry a woman who doesn’t want to marry me?’

And who I don’t want to marry, he should have added. Alana shrugged, feeling silly now. ‘So that you can have control over our baby. Child.’

He was very close now.

‘Oh, I’ll have control, Alana, as much as you do. We don’t need to be married for that. It’ll be my name on the birth certificate, and I expect to be involved every step of the way.’

‘But …’ Alana’s throat was dry. ‘But how is that going to work?’

Pascal’s hand reached out and she felt his finger trail from her jaw down to her neck, to the hollow where her pulse beat fast and unevenly.

‘It’s simple—for now you’ll come back and live in Paris with me. We can sort things out from there.’

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