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She walked out of the restaurant without another word. But as she hailed a cab to take her back to the station for her noon train, her breasts continued to throb in time with the timpani drum of her pulse.
And it occurred to her there was one key element of their relationship she hadn’t factored into her decision to accept his proposal.
And perhaps she should have.
‘Elle est très belle,’ Jean-François commented wistfully as the café’s door swung shut in Halle’s wake.
‘Oui, très belle,’ Luke replied, not at all wistfully.
And très pissed off with me, still, even after more than a decade and a half.
Enough to piss him right off in return.
She’d offered him money. As if he were some cap-doffing toady whose silence she could buy with a few bob. As if his life story had no import whatsoever compared to hers.
Not that he was actually writing his life story. But that was hardly the point.
Who did she think she was? Did she actually believe just because she could rustle up the perfect soufflé in ten minutes and mould a working carousel cake topper out of marzipan she was better than him?
‘Ça c’est bien?’ Jean-François indicated the untouched plate of pastries. ‘Votre reunion importante?’
Not exactly. His important meeting had come close to being a complete bust.
‘Yeah, très bien.’ He stuffed a miniature chasson aux pommes into his mouth to sweeten the sarcasm.
So much for his cunning plan. Because what had seemed perfect twenty minutes ago wasn’t looking quite so perfect any more.
Perhaps he should have figured out the extent of Halle’s hatred. Given that her temper tantrum had lasted sixteen years.
Then again, what he had really underestimated was his own reaction.
He thought he’d come to terms with all the choices he’d made, good and bad, all those years ago. But seeing her again, in the flesh, instead of on TV or in some papped snapshot in a magazine, had proved what a whopper that was. Because despite the gloss and the glamour and the Carolina Whatever-her-name-was designer suit, all he’d been able to see for a moment was the girl he had once fallen arse-over-tit in lust with.
The lush curve of her hips in the fitted skirt, the peaks of her full so-sensitive breasts beneath the silk blouse, the rich honey-blonde hair, which looked soft and tactile despite the ruthless updo, and even the sparkling intelligence behind the brittle contempt in her golden brown eyes.
He’d been reeling from that shock when she’d delivered another sucker punch to the gut. That not only wasn’t his infatuation with her as dead as it should be, but he wasn’t as sorted about the rest of it, either. All the stuff he’d had years of therapy to overcome.
Because if he was, how could the misplaced pride and the defensive anger that had screwed him up so royally as a kid have popped out of hiding like a demented jack-in-the-box as soon as she’d slapped him with that insulting offer?
Jean-François left him to finish his lukewarm espresso and full plate of pastries on his own—and reconsider his plan.
Getting Halle to come to Tennessee with him had seemed like a no-brainer when he’d thought of the idea a month ago.
Having Halle in tow at Monroe’s resort would not only mean he could finally force her to talk to him about Lizzie, but the resulting article—which he planned to be a clever exposé of exactly why Monroe’s eccentric methods didn’t work—had the potential to be huge.
The guy had come from nowhere to end up with endorsements from a host of Hollywood A-listers within a year. And was causing a storm with his bestseller, The Extreme Path to Love and Reconciliation. Getting the goods on the celebrity charlatan could even win him an award, if he pitched it right.
He stirred another sugar into his coffee, topped up the cup from the fresh pot the waiter had deposited on the table and took a fortifying sip. But the sugar-loaded caffeine hit did nothing to disguise the unpleasant taste of apprehension beginning to clog his throat.
Unfortunately, after his first merry meeting with the new, improved ball-busting Halle, he couldn’t help wondering about the advisability of getting stuck for two whole weeks in the Tennessee wilderness with a woman who had looked at him—when she actually bothered to meet his gaze—as if she wanted to stuff his reproductive organs through an industrial-grade mincer.
Chapter 4
‘I can’t believe it. You got Mr Perfecto to babysit us both? That is so humiliating.’
Trey Carson sawed the tuna sandwiches he was making for Aldo’s packed lunch in half while attempting to tune out the argument raging in the hall. He wasn’t having much success, given that he had become the subject of Lizzie Best’s latest spat with her mother—and her shrill angry tone could slice through lead.
He heard the muffled conciliatory tones of her mother’s reply, and even though he couldn’t make out the words, he had to give his employer points for patience. Halle Best never raised her voice to her children. Especially Lizzie. He often wondered if she had a secret stash of weed in the house to keep her so calm in the face of so much provocation. His own mother would have given him a backhander if he’d dared to speak to her the way Lizzie spoke to her mum. Before she got sick that was …
