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‘You can and you have to. I’ll deal with the hospital. If we’re to convince the press we’re together, that this engagement is a true whirlwind romance and not a sham, then you have no choice. That’s if you want me to claim control of the Lefebvre Group and save Rainbow House, of course. What is more important to you? This false sense of pride or Rainbow House?’
He had her. They both knew it. She still quashed the part of her that rejoiced at the knowledge.
‘Then this nonsensical exchange is over?’
She opened her mouth to object but knew she couldn’t. His wry smile still turned her on.
‘Good. So, we shall be staying at Chateau Rochepont—’
‘Your family estate?’ she cut in. ‘The press will have a field day. You’ve never taken any woman back there.’
Her body felt compressed, tight, too small for her skin. It was only intensified by his inscrutable expression.
Had this always been part of the plan? Or had it developed in the last few minutes?
‘All the more reason to make a point of it now, don’t you think?’
‘I can’t—’
‘It’s non-negotiable.’
He was back to his Louis voice. Imperious, inflexible. Part of her didn’t even care. He wanted her with him. Nevertheless, she shook her head.
‘Louis, I can’t... I need more time... I...’
‘The point of you moving in here was to be with me so that I could help you avoid the media after last night at the restaurant. If I’m not around, who will protect you?’
‘I can look after myself,’ she argued. ‘Besides, surely the very fact that you have all this security to get up here makes it safer than my little house. I still have to go to the hospital, carry out my work.’
‘They can replace you.’
‘I owe it to Gordon to give him time to choose a replacement.’ She knew that would halt him. Louis respected her mentor as much as she did. She pressed her advantage. ‘A temporary replacement.’
‘Fine. I’ll give you three days. But don’t say I didn’t warn you that the press would hound you. I’ll trust you not to let them rattle you.’
‘Louis—’
‘Three days, Alex, and then you will join me out there,’ he said, shutting her down. ‘It will be the perfect setting for a public proposal to cement our plan.’
Her throat was suddenly painfully dry.
‘The plan.’ She wasn’t sure how she managed to nod, let alone speak. ‘Right.’
‘And, Alex...’ His voice rasped, pushing down the feeble defences she was frantically trying to reinstate. ‘We will be revisiting what happened here this morning. I can promise you that much.’
She told herself that the gurgling sensation was her stomach roiling at Louis’s highhandedness, and not a bubbling excitement at being alone with him for the next month or so.
She almost believed it, too.
CHAPTER NINE
‘RIGHT, I NOW have your bloodwork results, your MRI and EMG. And I can say that I believe that facial decompression surgery is a good treatment option in your case, since there isn’t any damage to the facial nerve itself.’
He smiled gently as his patient and her partner promptly dissolved into tears of joy. The paralysis that had left one half of her face severely drooped had affected her confidence and quality of life considerably and other less invasive treatments of the paralysis had been unsuccessful.
It was good to be delivering positive news, but ultimately Louis couldn’t help but feel happy today for anything which would keep his mind off the fact that Alex would be arriving in less than a couple of hours. In fact, she would probably be getting ready to board the plane right about now.
It still needled him that he’d had to fight her about taking his own private jet instead of some commercial airline. That she hadn’t just obeyed him. Accepted that the private plane would make her life—and flight—far more pleasant. No doubt she’d been making a point to him. But he didn’t care. She had acquiesced in the end and she was coming, and the latter was what really mattered. The chemistry had been there all along but the fact that, for the first time in his life, he was resisting it had to be the reason Alexandra Vardy got under his skin in a way that no other woman ever had.
