was so disbelieving Holly laughed out loud. ‘I’m not a push-over,’ she qualified. ‘And I haven’t met a man yet who could soft-soap me into doing something I didn’t want to do.’
‘Ah, but you hadn’t met Jacques Querruel before.’ Margaret gave a wise-owl nod of her head just as the telephone in her office began to ring, causing her to bustle back into the other room.
Dear Margaret. Holly sat for a moment, nipping at her lower lip with small white teeth. It was true, they had hit it off right away at the interview for the job, which Margaret herself had conducted, and she had enjoyed working with the other woman the last weeks. She’d thought she was really set up here; with Margaret backing her there had been no reason why she couldn’t have worked herself up to a prime position in a few years with a nice fat salary to boot. She wasn’t afraid of hard work—in fact, she thrived on it—and with no home commitments she could work as late as she liked when necessity commanded.
Margaret’s warning continued to whirl round in Holly’s head as she tidied her desk and turned off the word processor. She locked the filing cabinets—her last job of the day—with the spare set of keys Margaret had given her in her first week at Querruel International, before walking through into the other room.
This office was spacious, as befitted the managing director’s secretary, holding two easy chairs and a small coffee-table along with Margaret’s huge L-shaped desk. In one corner a bookcase held a selection of Querruel International brochures and magazines where their furniture had been advertised, and in another stood two filing cabinets holding material of a confidential nature. It was as different from Holly’s little cubby-hole as chalk from cheese.
Margaret was still talking on the telephone as Holly emerged, and in the same moment Jacques Querruel strode through the open doorway of the other office. ‘Ready?’ he asked abruptly, and as Holly nodded he took her arm, calling goodnight to Margaret as he whisked Holly out into the corridor, whereupon the lift doors opened immediately he touched the button.
They had never done that for her, Holly thought bemusedly. She normally had to wait for at least a minute or two before the lift graciously consented to answer her call.
Once inside the lift Holly found herself tongue-tied. She searched her mind feverishly for some light comment to relieve the tension but it was a blank. She blessed the years of harsh training when she had learnt to disguise her feelings and appear calm and collected, however she was feeling inside, as she glanced at her reflection in the mirrored wall of the lift.
It showed an averagely tall, slim young woman with cool blue eyes and a composed face; an image she had carefully cultivated and took pleasure in. It was her wall of safety, her security, and part of her distress this morning had been because first Jeff Roberts, and then Jacques Querruel—in quite a different way from the former—had broken through the deliberately constructed barrier.
‘The taxi is waiting for us.’ She had been aware of his overt inspection as the lift swiftly took them downwards, but it wasn’t until the doors opened in Reception that he spoke. She turned her head and looked at him then as he added, ‘Your apartment is in Battersea, yes?’
‘Yes.’ How did he know that? Had he asked Margaret where she lived or had he checked out her personal file? The latter; she’d bet her boots on it.
‘And our restaurant, Lemaires, is in Chelsea, so that is most convenient, is it not?’
She didn’t know about that. The thought of Jacques Querruel sitting in the tiny bedsit which was her ‘apartment’ was an absolute no-go—there wasn’t room to swing a cat—and the thought of him waiting outside with a taxi clocking up every minute she took to get ready wasn’t an option either. As they stepped out of the smart, air-conditioned building into a pleasantly warm May evening Holly took a deep hidden breath and said steadily, ‘If you would like to go on ahead to the restaurant after you’ve dropped me off that would be fine, Mr Querruel. I’ll join you as soon as I can.’
‘This is the polite English way of stating what you would prefer, I think.’ The hand which was gripping her elbow felt as cool and hard through her thin cloth jacket as his voice, but as they crossed the pavement and he opened the taxi door for her he continued, ‘I will send the taxi back for you, Miss Stanton. Is that acceptable? And, please, take time to refresh yourself.’
Refresh herself! As Holly slid into the taxi she had to bite back the desire to laugh out loud. She would be rushing around like a whirling dervish!
She barely noticed the taxi pull away as she began a mental list of all her clothes, desperately trying to pull an outfit worthy of Lemaires from her limited wardrobe. She’d heard of Lemaires before, of course—it was one of the very ‘in’ places and frequented by clientele who never had to look at the prices on the menu—but never in her wildest dreams had she imagined she’d set foot on such hallowed ground, and certainly not without at least a few hours’ grace to rush out and buy something fabulous.
‘…and take it from there?’
‘I’m sorry?’ Too late she had become aware Jacques Querruel had been speaking and she’d been miles away.
She turned to him quickly and saw he was frowning. ‘I am sorry to interrupt your thoughts, Miss Stanton,’ he said icily, ‘but I was just outlining the way I saw the evening progressing. I suggested we could enjoy a cocktail or two as I explain my proposal, which you could think over whilst we eat, and then we will take it from there.’
Touchy, touchy. Holly got the impression it wasn’t often Jacques Querruel didn’t have a woman’s full and undivided attention. ‘Yes, of course,’ she said quickly, becoming acutely aware of the close confines of the taxi for the first time as her anxiety about the clothes was put to one side for a few minutes.
He wasn’t touching her—in fact there was at least six inches of space between them—but never had she been so fiercely conscious of another human being’s body. She could feel the heat which had begun in the core of her spread to her throat and face as she met the amber eyes, and then, as his gaze became curiously intent, she forced herself to break the piercing hold and turned her head to look out of the window.
‘It’s a beautiful evening, isn’t it?’ she murmured quietly, managing a tone which was just offhand enough to appear genuine.
He didn’t reply for a moment, but now her senses were open the subtle and delicious smell of him teased her nerves before he said softly, ‘Indeed it is. Too beautiful to waste in the city streets. It is a night for breathing in the aroma of a thousand flowers as the sky slowly turns to silver. A night for watching the moonlight shimmering on a mother-of-pearl lake, and hearing the call of the wild swans as they marshal their newly fledged little ones to sleep.’
She was surprised into looking at him again, and he answered her quizzical gaze with a slow smile. ‘My château.’ He replied to the unspoken question very quietly. ‘It is very lovely on a night like this.’
There were enough panic buttons going off in Holly’s head to deafen the whole of London. ‘Is it?’ She smiled brightly. ‘Lucky you.’
‘You have been to France, Miss Stanton?’
She shook her head. She hadn’t been anywhere but she wasn’t about to tell him that. No doubt he was used to being in company where the merits of Switzerland or Monaco or the Caribbean were discussed with a wealth of experience.
‘It is a very diverse country,’ he said quietly. ‘I have an apartment in Paris, close to my offices, but my real home is
