by Jones, Gwen
He laughed in that low, throaty baritone of his. “Tu me rends fou. Qu’est-ce que je ferais sans toi?” he whispered, his tongue trailing little circles around her breasts.
Now she was as surprised as he. What would he do without her? “Je ne sais pas.” She supposed he’d find out soon.
He lifted his head. “Don’t you?” he continued en français.
“You’ll wither and die,” she said in kind. “You’ll miss me so terribly you won’t know what to do.”
He rested his chin on her belly, looking up. “I don’t know what to do now, my love.” He grasped her hips, kissing his way from one hip to the other. “All I know is I want you badly, more than any other woman I’ve ever been with.” He kissed her navel, his tongue trailing around it and down. “I want you now and every second of the day. And just like now, I can’t get enough.” He trailed lower and lower, until his tongue deftly flicked her clit.
She arched up, startled, still moist from where he had come inside her. The very idea was almost too erotic and she squirmed, her hands at his shoulders, his grasp only tightening.
“Don’t move,” he ordered, pressing her hips to the mattress, his tongue pleasuring her in such rapid succession her breath became uneven. His hands slipped around to her backside and he lifted her up, his fingers delving in between, one rimming her before sinking deep inside.
“Ahh!” She gasped, yanking his hair, her hips bucking with the force of her rising. Rex probed deeper and deeper while she rose even higher until all at once he let go and slid up and sank into her. Before she could take another breath she was going off again, her head thrown back in a wordless yowl. A moment later his face contorted and he joined her, going rigid as he climaxed deep inside her. When he was spent he collapsed atop her. Charlotte, indescribably sated, flinging her arms around him.
“My—God,” he choked out, still en français, “that just about cost me my—”
“Shut up,” she said in English, turning her head to kiss him, so deeply he growled from the back of his throat.
“Coquette,” he said, his eyes flaring. “A kiss like that demands another fuck but I regret I’m down and out for the duration.”
“Good,” she said, kissing him lightly. “I don’t think I could survive it.”
“Oh you would, you’d have to.” He slipped from her, sliding to her side. “I couldn’t bear it if you didn’t,” he said, caressing her cheek. “Not when I’ve finally found you.”
She stared at him, barely able to speak. “Rex—what are you saying?”
He didn’t answer. He just looked at her, his eyes dark and fathomless. Then he turned and climbed out of the bed. “Come here,” he said, gathering her up.
He took her to the shower where they wordlessly soaped each other down. When they were finished they simply stood under the warm rain, locked in each other’s arms.
“What do you want from me, ma petit?” he murmured against her mouth. “Am I saying what you want to hear, and if I am, why won’t you believe me?”
“Why do you have to even say anything?” she said, laying her head against his shoulder. “Why make this more than what it is—what you know it is.”
“And what’s that?”
It pained her to admit it, but she was veering too close to dangerous territory to even hope it was more than what it was. “A wonderful way to pass the time until the inevitable takes over.” She looked up. “You know that’s all it is.”
“No I don’t. I can’t tell the future like you.” He regarded her, his eyes heavy-lidded and unreadable. “How about for now we don’t waste any more time talking about it. I want you and I want to be with you, and I’m fairly certain you feel the same about me. Plus I have you naked in my arms. How can I ask for anything better?”
“I suppose you couldn’t,” she said, sliding her hands down his slippery back, storing the memory for later.
WHILE CHARLOTTE DRIED her hair Rex ordered big, thick steaks and pommes frites for dinner, along with a salad of mixed greens, a cheese plate with bread, an assortment of petite French pastries, and coffee.
“And a big bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon,” he said, putting down the house phone. He padded over in the hotel robes they were both wearing, leaning into the jamb. “Do you think that’s enough?”
“I think I’ll explode if I even eat a third of it,” she said, reapplying her mascara. “And that’s coming off hardly touching the food we got for lunch. I’m starving.”
“So am I. They said it shouldn’t take that long.” His mouth crooked. “They always take care of me fairly quickly.”
“No doubt,” she said, sliding on her lipstick. “As much coin as you probably drop here.” She stood back, fluffing her hair.
“I could watch you do that all day, ma belle,” he said.
She didn’t follow. “Do what?”
He crossed his arms over his chest, watching her. “Making yourself beautiful for me.”
“For you?” She laughed. “Oh sweetie, this is just maintenance. If I didn’t, you wouldn’t even want to see me in the dark.”
He came up behind her, resting his hands on her hips. “Why is it the loveliest of women are always the most disparaging of themselves? Chérie, I only want to see you in the dark now,” he said, kissing her neck. “Because that would make it night and that would mean you’d be under me.”
She groaned, arching into him, his hands hot as they snaked under the robe to her breasts. It was almost incredible how much she craved him, even again, even if it were only his touch. But someone had to be sane in this relationship. She pulled away, going for her clothes.
“I’d better get dressed,” she said, reaching for her bra.
“Non,” he said, his hands at her waist. “Not yet.”
“Oh really,” she said, turning in her arms. “You are indeed a T-Rex. But I think we’ll wait for dessert, okay?”
“Très bien.” He leaned in, smiling wickedly as his hand slid to her belly. “Why do you think I got the French pastries?”
“Éclairs?”
“Oh, very astute, Charlotte.”
Twenty minutes later they were at the dining room table tucking into their steaks, each large enough to feed a small country. Or so Charlotte thought. Not that she was complaining.
“God, this is awesome,” she said, slicing into the beef. “This is just what I needed.”
“Right,” he said, as if it was obvious. “What woman doesn’t need a big slab of beef now and then?”
“Or two,” she said, eyeing him salaciously, “you big beefsteak, you.” She chewed, savoring each bite.
He glanced at the clock. “It’s eight now. I think we’ll wait a couple hours and then we’ll make our way back. How’s that?”
She eyed him speculatively. “That’s a good idea. I’m surprised she hasn’t tracked us to the hotel by now.”
“She doesn’t have to.” He set down his fork, reaching for the bottle of Cabernet. Charlotte pushed over her glass and he poured them each one. “She knows where to find me.”
“You mean with me.”
“Oui, and I expect she’ll pay us a visit before too long.”
The mere mention of Marcel’s mother seemed to set his teeth on edge. “And how do you feel about that?”
He swirled the wine, regarding it, before he took a sip and set it down with a wince. “Well, what do you expect from Sonoma. Anyway, I would say we’ve been due for a confrontation for a long time now. She’s never forgiven me for thwarting her Machiavellian ambitions and siding with her son.”
Charlotte thought a minute. “But what about Andy? Wasn’t he the one who came up with the plan?”
“You know, I think he’s the only person in the world who gives her pause, though I seem to have come in a close second. We’ve both had to bear the brunt of her wrath.” He picked up his k
nife and went back to the steak. “Though all she tried to do was break up his marriage. How much worse could you get than getting someone accused of sexual assault?”
“I don’t know.” She tossed her hand. “Murder?”
His brow arched. “Now who’s going to volunteer for that? Call me self-centered, but I can envision much worse scenarios than compromising yourself with me.”
She grinned salaciously. “I’ll attest to that.”
“Exactly.” He slid a piece of steak into his mouth, chewed, swallowed. “Anyway, what better way to get a bill killed than by having it benefit a sex fiend like me? Even a vague association would be anathema.”
“But Lilith couldn’t know that when she sponsored the bill.”
“Non, of course not. I think she came into it with honest intentions. Remember, it would benefit her constituency as it would mean jobs, so it could only help her in the election. And that’s precisely why someone got to her.”
“Marcel’s mother.”
“That’s what I’m thinking.”
“So Lilith’s not so innocent after all.”
“Lilith is for Lilith, but I knew that going in.”
“Metaphorically speaking, of course.”
“Chérie,” he said, coloring, using his fork for emphasis, “I will allow that one time and one time only.”
“Hey, I’m only your straight man. You thought that up all on your own.”
“Don’t remind me. I’m usually much more obtuse than that.”
Charlotte sipped the wine. “What are you talking about? This is good. But then again, I’m not a wine snob like you.”
He took exception. “When France starts making cheese steaks and root beer then you can become as big a snob about them as I am about our wine.”
“Not setting the bar too high, are you? Anyway, so what you’re saying is that perhaps Viviane got to the congresswoman and bribed her to string you along and kill the bill.”
“I was gone for two months, remember. Anything could’ve happened in that amount of time. Which was when either Viviane or Hitchell probably got to her.”
“So he was always the fly in the ointment, wasn’t he?”
“The what?”
“It’s an old American expression.”
“Oh. Like, on n’apprend pas aux vieux singes à faire des grimaces.”
“What’s that?”
“You cannot teach old monkeys to make faces.”
“That’s a rip-off on you can’t teach an old dog new tricks.”
“Variations on a theme.” He leaned into the table. “But we digress.” He took one more sip, this time frowning. “Mon Dieu, that wine is dégueulasse.” He shoved the glass away, tippling it.
“Rex!” Charlotte cried, catching it before it fell over. “For Christ sake, it’s not from Provence, but it’s hardly Boone’s Farm.” She downed a good portion from her own glass. “I think it’s very good, but then again, I wasn’t born with your silver spoon.”
He looked up sharply. “You have no idea what I was born with.”
“No I don’t,” she said, irritated he was acting this way. “You’ve kept most information about yourself very well hidden. As a matter of fact, the only things I really know about you are you hate this wine, you ride Percherons, and you like to fuck me.” She took another swallow. “Well, I like this wine, and as far as I’m concerned you probably think you’re slumming.”
“Is that so,” he said, rising, turning toward the bar. He poured himself a finger of scotch then came around to Charlotte. “Would you like to know a little about my upbringing?”
“I think it would help to understand you a bit more.”
He sat back at the table, his legs spread, his drink between them. “Do you think that’s important?”
There was a strange kind of hunger in his eyes. “Yes, I do,” she said.
“Why?”
Why was he pressing her? Was he trying to make her say she loved him? Because she couldn’t, not now. Maybe never. “Maybe I’m just a little bit curious about what it’s like to get everything you want right from the start.”
“Is that what you think my life’s been like?” He tossed back the shot. “Then let me enlighten you. My epicurean and oenological tastes come from a long line of sausage makers and grape pickers. Les bouseux, they’re called back home—the cow pies. Then along about the later part of the twentieth century some members of the family decided to get ambitious and trade their clogs for boat shoes. So my father left the farm and went to the big city, to work for a shipping company called—”
“Mercier,” Charlotte finished.
“Exactly,” Rex said. “He was to start off as an ordinary seaman, the lowest of the low on a ship. But it was a good job, and it paid steady. And after a while, he’d have enough money for a nice big apartment in Marseille. So one morning before I left for school, I remember seeing him at the door with his suitcase, my mother in his arms. She was crying so hard he had to hold her up, and they spent a very long time kissing. After a while he came and told me to be a good boy and take care of my maman, then he kissed me and left. I was nine years old, and I never saw him again.”
“What happened?” she said, transfixed.
He looked down into his glass. “About three months later he was helping to repair a winch when he got caught in it and it snapped his head off.”
“Jesus . . .” Charlotte whispered.
“They sent his body home in a leak-proof box and the company gave my mother a pension for life. Everyone thought it was fair, especially since we wouldn’t have to worry about money anymore. But that didn’t stop my mother from hanging herself in the basement on the day the first check arrived.”
She brushed her hand down his arm. “Is that when you went to live with your aunt?”
He set the glass to the table, sitting back. “She was responsible for me, but I never lived with her. She went back to Mercier and demanded they do more for me, since I was now an orphan. They thought they had done enough, but she was relentless, demanding they take care of my education. So the next thing I knew I was shipped off to boarding school, and a trust fund was set up in my name. I did so well I eventually went on to Cambridge, then Harvard for my MBA, finding out I had an unusual penchant for business. You see, I was the original wunderkind, way before they started calling Marcel that. By twenty-eight, I had risen up through the corporate ranks to become a vice-president in charge of finance for Andele Chemical. By thirty, I was chief operating officer for Sinclair Aero. Then a year later I was lured away to Richette. And that,” he said, pulling her into his lap, “is the story of this simple boy’s rise to riches.”
“Oh, I’m sure there’s much more to it than that,” Charlotte said. “You’re way too complicated for simplicity.”
“You should know,” he said, tilting her back in his arms.
IT WAS CLOSE to six-thirty by the time they made it back to the Margate beach up the street from Charlotte’s house. The sun had nearly risen over the rim of the ocean, the horizon streaked with reds and golds.
“I’m glad I wore this coat,” Charlotte said, walking faster. “It’s pretty chilly out here.”
Rex pulled her closer, his arm around her. “Thank God for body heat. Shall we throw a log in your fireplace?”
“There’s a lot of seasoned wood out back. My grandmother was big on fires at holidays. Why, every Christmas we would—” She grabbed Rex’s arm, stopping him. “Rex—look. Someone’s sitting in my backyard.”
He peered through the twilight. “What the hell?”
“Do you think it’s someone from Philly?” she said as they picked up their pace. “Or maybe even the cops?”
“I don’t know. But if it is the cops, we’ll just say we spent the night in Atlantic City. There’s no law against that, and they’ll have me playing on
camera.”
“As well as that big wad of cash you still have in your pocket. Good idea.”
Suddenly, he stopped. “Wait a minute. That’s no cop.”
“How do you know?” she said, squinting to see.
He looked at her wryly. “Not in those shoes.”
Charlotte looked at him. “It’s a woman?”
Rex took her hand as they approached the steps from the beach. “Come on.”
By the time they turned the corner into the yard they could see a woman in a black coat and very high heels, her head covered in a scarf. She was just crushing out a cigarette when suddenly she saw them, her eyes a striking shade of blue, even in the thin light.
“Rex!” Charlotte whispered, grabbing his arm. “You were right, weren’t you?”
“Good morning,” the woman said in French, reaching into her pocket. When she pulled her hand out, a phone was in it. “Looking for this?”
Rex laughed, looking to an astonished Charlotte as he said in English, “Charlotte, this is my aunt, Viviane Mercier.”
Chapter Nineteen
Femmes Fatale
CHARLOTTE LOOKED FROM Rex to his aunt to the phone in her hand, at a loss for what was most incredible. “Viviane Mercier is your aunt?”
“Only by blood, Charlotte, and most definitely not by affection. Bonjour, Viviane. Comment allez-vous?” Then he was on her, holding his hand out as he continued en français. “Now give me my fucking phone.”
“Oh do cut to the chase,” Viviane said in their own language, throwing it at him. “I wouldn’t want you to mince words, you ungrateful ass.”
“And I wouldn’t want to wring your neck,” he said, catching it. “At least not for all the neighbors to see.” He went straight to the voice recorder, tapping it. “It’s there,” he said, letting out a visible sigh of relief. “How the hell did you get my phone?”
“It wasn’t that difficult. Policemen still take bribes, you know.” She rubbed her arms, shivering a bit. “I’ve been sitting out here for over an hour. You could at least offer me a coffee.”
