a cool smile Jean-Louis said, ‘Paige can do what she likes, but I assure you that Angélique will hurry back to me.’
It was a definite challenge, a glove being thrown down. Without any effort Caine accepted the challenge with a smooth, ‘We’ll see, won’t we?’ He turned to Angélique. ‘Where do you live?’
She told him and he didn’t bother to write it down. ‘I’ll collect you at ten tomorrow morning. Please be ready to leave for England.’ Then, with a brief nod, he left the room.
Pulling her against him, Jean-Louis gave her an exuberant hug. ‘We’re going to be rich, chérie. And we still have tonight, just as we planned.’
Putting all her strength behind it, Angélique punched him in his midriff. He doubled up with a groan as she said, ‘If you think I’m going to bed with you tonight after this, then you’re crazy!’ And she, too, marched out of the office.
A long, sleek car with British plates drew up outside her door at exactly ten the following morning, having to double-park in the narrow road. When Milo Caine rang the bell Angélique kept him waiting as long as possible, hoping the blue-capped dragon of a traffic warden who patrolled the area would catch him, but when he rang the bell for the third time she had to open the door.
He gave her a wry look but made no comment on her tardiness, merely saying, ‘Are you ready?’
She nodded ungraciously.
‘You have only the one case?’
‘Yes. I don’t intend to be away for long,’ she told him coldly.
He was driving the car himself; she had half expected a chauffeur. Opening the front passenger door for her, he said, ‘Would you like to take off your coat?’
‘All right.’ She shrugged out of the ankle-length coat and handed it to him. Under it she was wearing a sleeveless knitted top that hugged her breasts and a very short skirt. Her legs, long and tanned, were bare. His eyes ran over her and although his expression didn’t change she could sense his disapproval. Giving him a provocative look, she deliberately crossed her legs, lifting the skirt even higher. Caine’s mouth tightened for a moment but he still didn’t speak, instead closing her door and going round to his own side of the car.
Angélique laughed. ‘How stern you look, Englishman. Don’t you like my legs?’
‘You never used to wear clothes like that,’ he commented evenly.
‘It’s not too late,’ she pointed out mockingly. ‘If you disapprove of me so much you can forget all these crazy ideas you have. Forget me. Go and look somewhere else for the woman who ditched you.’
A slight stiffening of Caine’s jaw was the only sign that her jibe had gone home, and his voice was quite unemotional as he said, ‘On the contrary, I’m quite sure you’re the woman I want. And, now that I’ve found you, I don’t intend to let you go.’
Huffily, she turned away and yawned.
‘You’re tired?’
She gave him a sideways glance. ‘Very. I had to say goodbye to Jean-Louis last night. Remember? So, naturally, I am extremely exhausted.’
He probably didn’t know it, but the tightening of his features gave away his inner anger, and she laughed again in ironical amusement.
The Paris traffic was heavy and required his entire concentration so they didn’t speak again until the car was safely stowed on Le Shuttle and the train was carrying them at immense speed across France towards the Channel Tunnel and England. They sat in the passenger compartment in seats across from one another, the only other travellers were at the far end of the carriage, out of earshot.
‘You said that you were involved in an accident,’ he reminded Angélique. ‘What kind of accident?’
Her eyes shadowed. ‘I don’t remember it. I only know what I was told.’
‘And what was that?’
She hesitated, then said slowly, ‘They told me I was on a bus. It was travelling along the Périphérique in a storm when a container truck jackknifed in front of it and they collided. Most of the passengers were rescued but then the bus caught fire and was destroyed. Two people were killed.’ Her voice faltered a little on the last sentence, and then Angélique said, ‘That’s what they told me when I woke up at the hospital.’
‘Were you badly hurt?’
‘No. Just a bruised shoulder and a bad bump on the head.’
‘How did they know your name?’
“There was a piece of paper in my pocket. It gave my name. It said “Angélique Castet. Born Lisieux.” And it gave the date of my birth.’
‘Nothing else?’
She shrugged. ‘A few scribbled numbers and words that didn’t mean anything to me.’
‘Do you still have the paper?’
‘Perhaps. Somewhere.’
‘You didn’t bring it with you?’
‘No. Why should I?’
Leaning forward and looking at her intently, Caine said, ‘Can you remember anything from before you had the accident?’
Her eyes grew troubled. ‘Sometimes at night—when I dream, I see places that I feel I know, but in the morning...’ She threw open her hands and made a blowing shape with her lips ‘...poof! They’re gone.’
‘Never people?’
Her mouth creased in amusement. ‘No, Englishman,’ she said in open mockery. ‘I have never dreamt of you.’
He wasn’t put out, instead smiling rather wryly. ‘I left myself wide open to that one, didn’t I?’ She didn’t return the smile, and after a moment he said, ‘Look, we’re going to see a lot of each other in the near future. I know you’re angry with me and you don’t want to do this, but couldn’t we try to be civil to one another?’
‘You are being civil to me.’
Again his lips twitched. ‘All right, do you think that you could please be civil to me, then?’
‘How?’
‘You could start by calling me by my name instead of “Englishman”,’ he suggested.
‘Very well, Monsieur Caine.’
‘My name is Milo,’ he reminded her.
Tilting her head, she considered the idea. ‘I don’t think I like it.’
‘Nor do I, but I’m afraid I’m stuck with it, and it would upset my mother if I tried to change it.’
‘You have a mother?’
‘Most
