“I’m just trying to make a life for myself, Lucien. A good life . . . an honest one. I’m willing to work hard. Have you truly grown so callous that you would turn your back on a friend?”
“Friend? You never had friends. You had sycophants that thronged around society’s aristocratic darling; you had the bucks lining up, panting to be the next one or two or three you chose for your bed—”
“How dare you!”
“You probably had the most elite drug dealers in the Corsican mafia at your beck and call—”
“I never used illegal drugs—or legal ones, for that matter.”
“My point is, you never had friends, Elise.”
She flung herself out of her chair.
“Well maybe I need one now.”
For a few seconds, they faced off in silence, her breathing slightly escalated. She listened to her heartbeat throb in her ears. He pinned her with his stare.
“I didn’t ask you into my office just now because I want to be your friend.”
She found herself staring at his hard, gorgeous mouth, wondering if she’d imagined what he’d said . . . his tone. She thought about what he’d proposed last night, when he’d dared her to stay there with him. Her gaze skittered to the door he’d locked and back to his face. Her heartbeat grew impossibly louder, until it felt like the thundering drum of it became her whole world. Was he saying what she thought he was saying?
“You . . . you want to be more than friends?” she asked weakly.
His gaze looked hungry as it flickered over her face. “You must know I find you attractive. If you recall, at one time, our parents even wanted us to marry.”
She couldn’t believe she was hearing him say this. Of course she recalled it. “My mother told me you completely dismissed the idea.”
“Naturally, I dismissed it. I was twenty-six when they first mentioned it. You were nineteen. I hadn’t seen you in five years. Do you really think I’d do anything but shoot down the idea before they got too far in spinning their web?”
Elise thought of the four people who were Lucien’s and her parents and his reference to them as calculating spiders.
“No. Of course not,” she said, perfectly seeing his point. If she recalled correctly, she’d been equally as dismissive when her mother oh-so-casually mentioned the topic. Her blood had quickened at the idea of seeing Lucien again—of something happening between them—but as in all things, she would never consider letting her mother notice that something mattered to her. She routinely downplayed romantic interests to Madeline, knowing the firsthand consequence of putting her heart on her sleeve when it came to her mother. It’d happened once, when she was very young, that she’d confessed her childish hopes to her mother about a beautiful teenage boy named Aaron. The day she’d accidentally witnessed Aaron’s body twined around her mother’s voluptuous curves like an adolescent boa constrictor had silenced Elise forever in that regard.
Besides, the scions of old, wealthy families were always contemptuous of their parents’ territory-building through arranged marriage. Defiance was the only defense they possessed. She’d said something flippant and hard every time her mother brought up the topic of Lucien again.
“Why are you bringing up our parents’ ancient wishes now?” she asked slowly.
“Not because I’m proposing marriage,” he said, a slow, sardonic smile shaping his mouth. Damn those dimples.
She blinked. “No, of course not. I realize that,” she assured quickly, embarrassed.
“I just bring it up because the concept of us having a relationship isn’t all that far-fetched, although what I’m proposing is hardly something our parents would have condoned. No. This is just about you and me and our needs.”
You and me and our needs.
For a moment the silence seemed to press down on her until she felt as if she couldn’t breathe. She’d wanted Lucien for so long, but he’d remained an impossible, elusive fantasy. Was all that about to change?
“Did you know what you were doing when you walked in here today, pretending to be my chef?” he asked quietly.
Her mouth fell open in surprise at his question. “I was fighting for something I want. Very much. I was hoping to convince you.”
“I don’t think that’s what you were doing. Not entirely anyway.”
She laughed at his absolute confidence. “Please, enlighten me then.”
“I think you came here because of what I said last night. You’ve always run like an out-of-control wildfire, Elise. You knew I would give you a limit to your world, a measure of control that you sorely need. You threw down the gauntlet when you walked in here today and pretended to be my new chef. Well, I accept your dare. If you play by my rules.”
His quietly spoken words roared in her ears.
“I’m not sure what you mean.” She meant it, but something about the hard edge to his voice and the dangerous glint in his light eyes caused her skin to prickle with heightened awareness. Was it fear that mingled with her confusion, or was it excitement?
His gaze flickered over her face thoughtfully. “The wild child of the European social circuit, partying with the royals, flitting from one career to another . . . from one man to another. You’ve been the very embodiment of self-indulgence,” he mused.
“That part of my life is over,” she stated with much more confidence than she felt. It was her greatest fear that she wasn’t strong enough, that her lofty goals and aspirations were a façade draped over a hollow center. Ever since her friend Michael had been found dead, she’d vowed to change. But what did she really know about taking control of her life, of making it worthwhile? Precious little.