The Forbidden Touch of Sanguardo

Madeline. Madeline Walters. Self-made multimillionairess and the woman Rafael Sanguardo had once been involved with. Belatedly, into Celeste’s head came the thumbnail sketch of him that her fellow model Zoe had given her all that time ago at the charity fashion show...

The rich, carrying tones came again. ‘The company, Rafael,’ she riposted, ‘that is now a global brand, with sales that are twenty times what they were, whose stock price has quadrupled, and whose product range is—’

‘Is a travesty of what it once was,’ he cut in.

Celeste saw Madeline’s head go back.

‘They sell, Rafael!’

Her voice was not a purr any more. There was a harsh note in it that sounded ugly to Celeste’s ears. ‘They sell in their thousands—their tens of thousands! And with the Chinese market opening up even more they’ll sell in their hundreds of thousands!’

Without consciously realising it, Celeste felt her feet start forward again. She walked up to the group.

‘I think this will sell,’ she heard herself saying as she held up the sapphire-studded clutch with a little gesture of display. In the same movement she turned to Lucien Fevre—who was still looking terrified, she realised. ‘I’d buy it,’ she said, speaking directly to him but knowing her words could be heard by everyone present—as she’d intended. ‘It is, quite simply, one of the most beautiful and exquisitely crafted handbags I’ve ever been fortunate enough to carry.’ She spoke sincerely, for what she said was true.

Lucien Fevre’s stricken face broke into a smile, and she could see appreciation for her simple compliment in his face.

‘I don’t suppose,’ Celeste asked him, ‘they come in other colours as well, do they?’

Lucien Fevre lifted his hands, turning his attention exclusively to her. ‘The spectrum of the rainbow!’ he said, with enthusiasm in his accented voice. ‘Every hue! But that is just one of my collection—over here...’

He started walking away and Celeste followed him to where he was going, which was to a large silk-swathed table with a lavish display of his designs.

‘Here,’ he went on, indicating with a flourish, ‘I have tried to capture the sea. Look.’ He picked up a blue-green clutch, made of silk shot with pale mauve. ‘Here is the pearlescence of the ocean—and the ornamentation is nacre, which I have also used for the clasp, with Tahitian pearls to enhance it.’

‘It’s beautiful!’ Celeste breathed.

‘And here,’ he went on, ‘is fire! It is the elements, you see—’

She could see immediately, and listened and looked while the designer went through his designs with her. As he did so he became more animated, the stricken look gone completely.

Until, that was, two figures approached them. One was Rafael, and the other was Madeline Walters. As if a spell had been cast Lucien Fevre froze. But it was Rafael who spoke.

‘Go on, Madeline, say it.’

He spoke pleasantly, but Celeste could hear the steel in it. She looked at Madeline Walters’s expression. She could not read it. But she could hear what she said very clearly.

‘I made a mistake,’ she said. Her voice was clipped, and she addressed the designer directly. ‘I did not understand the fashion design industry as well as I thought I did. And I...I regret the decision I took.’

‘Well done,’ said Rafael.

His voice was dry—as dry as the look he bestowed upon Madeline. For a moment Celeste could see her eyes glittering, as if she’d swallowed poison. Then it was gone.

She put her hand out to Rafael, resting it on his sleeve. ‘There,’ she said, ‘may I come off the naughty step now, pretty please?’ She spoke humorously, as though the toxic expression on her face had never been, and her glance at Rafael was teasing.