The Virgin's Debt to Pay

Nessa nodded, her eyes gleaming. ‘Yes, but not like this. It’s magical.’

He led her around to the front and then down the steps to the lookout points. Nessa sucked in an audible breath. Paris was laid out before them like a glittering carpet of jewels.

Luc realised how long it had been since he’d been here.

‘This is stunning. Thank you.’

Luc was ridiculously pleased, which was ironic because over the years he’d presented women with far more tangible and expensive trinkets and had felt nothing when they’d expressed gratitude.

He gestured towards the view. ‘I used to come here when I was younger, around age ten, eleven. We’d come in from the flats during the summer, peak tourist season. We used to take advantage of people’s absorption with the view to pick their pockets, steal watches, that kind of thing.’

She turned to face him. His coat making her look even more petite, her hair a dramatic splash of red against the night sky.

‘Were you ever c

aught?’

He shook his head. ‘That’s why they sent us in at that age. We were small and fast, able to disappear in seconds.’

‘Who would send you in?’

‘The gangs, older kids. We’d bring the haul back to them and if we’d creamed anything off for ourselves they’d know immediately.’

‘So you grew up in the suburbs?’

Luc looked out over the city that had been witness to his single-minded ascent out of his grim circumstances. He nodded. ‘Where I grew up is about as far removed as you can get from this view. It was a basic existence in not very pretty surroundings. School was a joke and gang life on the streets was our education.’

He looked at her, expecting to see that gleam women got in their eyes when they spied an opening to invite further intimacies but she just looked at him steadily. ‘Is that when you got your scar?’

Luc’s insides clenched when he remembered the stinging pain. He nodded. ‘A rival gang surrounded me, and knives came out. I was lucky to escape with just a scar.’ That had been the moment he’d realised that if he didn’t get out, he might die.

‘You said before that you had no family—did you really have no one?’

Luc’s chest tightened. ‘My mother died of an overdose when I was sixteen, and my father appeared for the first and last time to get a handout once he saw that I had money. I had no brothers, no sisters. No aunts, uncles, or cousins. So, no, there was no one.’

‘Except for Pierre Fortin,’ Nessa said quietly.

The tightness in Luc’s chest increased. ‘Yes. Pierre saved me. He died shortly after I’d received the beating that led to the scar and I took his advice to get out and contact Leo Fouret. If I hadn’t done that, I think I might be dead by now.’

Nessa shivered at that. She could tell he wasn’t being melodramatic. ‘I’m sorry he’s gone.’ Her voice was husky.

He turned then to face her and for a second there was an expression of such rawness on his face that she was surprised he was letting her see it. And then he reached out and rubbed his knuckles along her jaw. Her breathing quickened in an instant.

‘You’re very sweet, Nessa O’Sullivan, or else you’re a better actress than I’ve ever seen in my life.’

A sharp pain lanced her to think that even now he still distrusted her. She took her chin away, afraid of the emotion clogging her throat. ‘I am sorry for your loss. You deserved to have someone in your corner and I’m glad he was there for you.’

Nessa felt exposed but refused to break eye contact. She was determined to show Luc her sincerity even if she had to brand it onto his brain through sheer will.

And then he reached for her, hands sliding under her arms and tugging her towards him until their bodies were flush and she could feel his arousal pressing against her.

Instantly words were forgotten. She got a sense of how much he’d been leashing his desire all evening and bizarrely felt comforted. Because he’d seemed completely in control and unaffected. But he hadn’t been. He was just better at disguising it.

He said, ‘I think we’ve talked enough. I’ve wanted to do this all evening.’

Before she could ask what, he’d started taking the pins out of her hair, until the heavy mass fell down around her shoulders and he dropped the pins to the ground.

He ran his hands through her hair and then cupped her face, tilting it up to his. In the split second before their mouths met, Nessa felt something incredibly poignant move through her as she realised she was one of those kissing couples she’d been so envious of earlier. And then Luc’s mouth was on hers, his tongue was mating with hers and she could only clutch at his shirt to try and stay standing. She wasn’t even aware of his jacket falling to the ground from her shoulders. She was burning up.