Wrenching the tie from her ponytail, she speared her fingers through her hair. She had no business feeling sorry for Bastien. Feeling sorry for the fact that he wouldn’t let himself feel, or want, or need. And she absolutely had no business wishing he would feel for her, or want or even need her.
CHAPTER SEVEN
BASTIEN PUT THE phone down and scrubbed a hand over his face. Three days and his investigators had come up empty. Whoever had framed Ana had covered their tracks very well. The police had reported no fingerprints on the inhaler. Not even Ana’s...
He frowned.
He’d seen first-hand the extraordinary measures to which people would go to gain wealth and power. How ruthless and determined people could be.
Sixteen years ago Lily Duval had set her deadly sights on his father and employed an almost obsessive single-mindedness in order to seduce him away from his wife and rip his family apart.
And she’d succeeded. That last day in Verbier was for ever etched in his memory—and not just because of his mother’s blotched, tearstained face as she’d pleaded with his father, nor the roar of his father’s car as he’d driven off, a triumphant Lily Duval by his side.
It was the day his parents had rejected him completely. The day he’d learned to shut off his emotions once and for all.
The silence especially was what he remembered most. He’d retreated to the icy-cold gazebo, his sanctuary, where he’d known no one would disturb him. He wasn’t sure how much time had passed and then he’d heard his father’s hoarse, frantic call. Seen his ashen face. Watched Lily Duval’s manic rage as she’d seen the life she’d almost attained disappearing.
Ana’s serene composure had been most shocking of all. She hadn’t even blinked when she’d been been instructed to fetch her things. As if she was used to it...
The library door opened, wrenching him from his thoughts.
Ana saw him and faltered. ‘Oh, I thought you were in your study—’ She turned to leave, her willowy figure silhouetted perfectly in the hallway light.
He’d relocated to the library because of her. The layout of the château had never troubled him until he’d heard her speaking to her father in Spanish in the sitting room next to his study, her smoky voice hypnotic...enthralling.
Although aware she was half-Colombian, he knew very little about that side of her heritage. Hearing her speak the foreign tongue, the unmistakable excitement in her voice, had made him lose concentration more than once.
‘Come in. I need to talk to you.’
Her trepidation as she stepped into the room grated. Was he that unapproachable?
She sat and crossed her legs, and he tried not to let his gaze drop. He failed. Her long, shapely legs, bare and lightly tanned despite the time of year, made Bastien’s blood rush a little faster through his veins.
Get a grip!
He picked up the file on his desk. ‘My investigators have drawn a blank.’
Her eyes widened. When she bit her lip, Bastien forced himself not to groan.
‘They found nothing at all?’
‘It seems not.’
A look flitted across her face, one she tried hard to mask. Bastien’s suspicions prickled.
‘One thing puzzled me, though.’
Her wary gaze shot to his. ‘What?’
‘The police found no fingerprints on the inhaler. Not even yours.’
She shot up out of her chair, the movement causing her breasts to bounce. His hand tightened on the file.
‘What does that mean? You don’t still think I’m lying about this, do you?’
The hurt in her voice caught him on the raw.
‘Calm down. I didn’t say that. What aren’t you telling me, Ana?’