Pride After Her Fall

He reached for her hands, turned them over in his. She let him.

‘Dinner?’

‘Oui.’

To his surprise her lashes swept down and for a moment she looked almost demure, rather old-fashioned.

‘Paris?’ He cleared his suddenly husky throat. ‘There’s a restaurant in the fifth arrondissement.’ He named a legendary chef.

Her lashes swept up in surprise. ‘Can you get a table at such short notice?’

He shrugged.

Lorelei was impressed. She’d forgotten. Not only did he have money to burn, he was famous. She wished he would stop stroking her hands. She didn’t want him turning over her palms, finding those calluses again.

She also wished he hadn’t said those words to her in the restaurant: I don’t get in the race if I’m not sure of the outcome. Although forewarned was forearmed.

She tugged her hands away. ‘I’m afraid not tonight, non. Not Paris.’

She didn’t want to wake up tomorrow morning in a hotel room on her own, or with a man who had taken his fill and was only going to transport her home.

He had clearly set the tone of what this was all about for him. This was a race and she was the trophy. No doubt he’d collected a lot of trophies—possibly had a shelf for them, she thought snappishly.

Lorelei had no intention of sitting on a shelf. She had seen too much of it growing up with Raymond. Womanisers left her cold. If Nash wanted to pursue her, he was going to have to do just that.

No? Nash looked long and hard at that unexpected negative. No?

‘Can I ask if it’s personal, or Paris?’

‘I’m fond of Paris,’ she demurred. ‘But not tonight.’

Nash regarded her bright curls, her glossy slightly parted lips, her guarded eyes watching him.

‘I’d be happy to go to dinner with you here in Monaco,’ she suggested slowly.

So much for the disappearing hot blonde.

He almost smiled. Almost.

For some reason he didn’t really mind.

She had the brakes on. He could almost see the marks on the road.

He didn’t have to think about it. Any intention he’d had of fast-forwarding this evening suddenly seemed crass, and in his mind’s eye he’d already put it aside in favour of a long, slow build-up. Lorelei, clearly, would be worth it. Given the slightly haughty look on her face, she set a high value on herself—and who was he to argue with that?

‘Monaco it is,’ he said. ‘I’ll pick you up at eight.’

CHAPTER SEVEN

‘THAT woman, she’s got a media profile.’

John Cullinan’s voice came stridently over the speakerphone.

Nash strolled naked across the bedroom of his penthouse apartment, towelling his hair dry.

He had left Lorelei’s home only a few hours before and felt comfortable that he’d dealt with his unlooked-for attraction to her. He was old-style enough to appreciate her definite No, not tonight, not Paris. It showed her to be discriminating, which pleased him, but he was confident a few dates would suffice and she’d let him into her bed. It was the primary goal.

He liked to set goals.

At his non-response Cullinan continued, ‘Her da’s banged up in one of those low-security places out in the countryside. There was a celebrity trial a couple of years back. He defrauded a washed-up French actress out of her savings. But the star turn was the daughter. She turned up every day at the trial in a different outfit, stole the show. Seemed to enjoy the limelight.’

Nash threw down the towel and checked the time by his watch sitting on the bedside table.

‘She doesn’t even work for that goddamned charity.’

Nash stilled.

‘Who doesn’t work for the charity?’ he asked, nice and low.

‘Lorelei St James. And, get this: there’s a string of high-profile men she’s been linked to. That dot-com billionaire who dropped a fortune on the casino last year, a Hollywood producer, the financier Damiano Massena—pretty much any guy with a bit of a name and she’s there. She targeted you today, boyo.’

Nash was caught off guard.

‘You’ve got an overactive imagination, John.’

‘Just doing my job. You can’t afford the press. This woman likes the press.’

‘Don’t they all?’ Nash muttered under his breath. ‘The press conference is all you need to worry about, mate. Are we clear?’