The Temptress

by C. J. Fallowfield

  ‘I’m a fan of Peter Smith actually,’ I replied, going with the truth. It was hard enough sitting here with him so close, trying to squash my urges and desire for him, listening to Mike and Henry and focussing on the plan that was being carried out, without the addition of lying on top of it all. I jolted violently forwards as Mike elbowed me hard in the back of my shoulder, my champagne sloshing over the rim of my glass. Luc cursed under his breath and I quickly spun around to glare at Mike, using my turned body to hide me sliding the card from under my bag and into his hand. Mission accomplished, but I was going to bruise he’d been so forceful.

  ‘I’m so sorry, did I spill your drink? Let me get you another,’ he offered, as he quickly tucked the card into his pocket, following Henry’s prompt in our ears.

  ‘Not necessary,’ Luc replied from behind me, ‘I have it covered.’ I quickly looked around to see him reaching for his pocket, for the card that was no longer in there. I reached out and grabbed his hand, making him jerk his head up in surprise, as I felt that surge of sexual electricity again.

  ‘Please, that’s not necessary. I should buy you one for being so kind, looking after my things and inviting me to join you.’

  ‘I’ll get you both one, for the inconvenience,’ offered Mike behind me, at Henry’s insistence. Thank God Henry was part of this, or it would have been a complete disaster.

  ‘That’s very kind of you,’ I smiled over my shoulder, then looked back at Luc, my fingers still wrapped around his as he sat motionless, staring at them. He slowly lifted his head, looking slightly dazed and nodded his consent. I reluctantly let go of his hand and sat back as Mike asked the barman to replenish our glasses. That was usually the hardest part, the swipe, but I had a feeling the distraction was going to be even harder. ‘So, Luc. You know of Peter Smith?’

  ‘I do not,’ he replied, as he drained the last of his cognac and ran his tongue over his lips.

  ‘Then let me show you,’ I offered, grateful for something to detract from my reaction to being so close to him. I opened the book, an actual favourite of mine, the spine creases showing which pages I loved the best. I went straight to the section in question and slid the book over to him, to let him look.

  ‘Thank you,’ he nodded at Mike, as our new drinks were placed in front of us.

  ‘Yes, thank you,’ I smiled, looking round at him and giving him my best please hurry look. I wasn’t sure how much longer I could do this.

  ‘You’re welcome,’ he nodded and knocked back his water, with a grimace, then headed out. I tried to focus on Luc, instead of the noise of Henry directing Mike and telling him where he should dip his head or face a certain way to avoid the cameras. It had been a long time since I’d had to focus on two conversations at the same time and make sure not to react to the one going on in my ear.

  ‘He is very … quirky,’ Luc nodded, as he studied my picture. ‘An almost childlike quality in the characters he has created.’

  ‘I think that’s why I love them so much, they’re light hearted and fun, but with a clear message,’ I replied. I’d put a few in Tristan’s bedroom, as well as my own and the lounge.

  ‘And you are light hearted and fun too?’ he asked, as he closed the book and slid it back to me. I felt like his eyes were burning right through me, that he could see exactly who I was beneath my disguise. But if he did, what would he have to gain by not saying anything? ‘The choice of art can say a lot about its owner.’

  ‘I suppose I am light hearted and fun sometimes, aren’t we all? Aren’t you?’

  ‘Maybe, once upon a time,’ he smiled sadly, his adorable dimples appearing, dimples I’d kissed. Dimples I longed to kiss again.

  ‘What changed?’

  ‘I got married,’ he stated factually, with no emotion as he shrugged. He picked up his third drink and swirled it around the glass. He was definitely rattled by something. Was it me? His wife had said he usually sat with one cognac for the night. Three at most. In half an hour he’d drunk two already.

  ‘And here I was thinking marriage was the epitome of happiness.’

  ‘So it should be, with the right person,’ he agreed with a nod.

  ‘And you’re not with the right person?’ I didn’t need to ask, I already knew. Mrs. Le Grand wasn’t the woman for him. I’d never met a more mismatched couple in my life. What had she done to suppress his fire and passion?

  ‘Will it sound like a cliché if I tell a beautiful woman I met in a bar, that no, I am not with the right person and that my wife doesn’t understand me?’ he smiled sadly again, but this time a little warmth appeared in his eyes. Well he may not have had me up against the wall, telling me what he wanted to do to my body, but he’d called me beautiful. It was a start.

  ‘Even if it is a cliché, it doesn’t make it any the less true, does it?’

  ‘No, it does not, but as you English say, I have made my bed, I must lie in it.’

  ‘Is France really that backwards that you don’t have divorce over there?’ I smiled.

  ‘What makes you think I am French?’ he queried, as he did that sexy frown I loved so much, the one that creased his dark brows and furrowed his forehead.

  ‘Please, your English is impeccable, but while you may not be able to hear your own accent, trust me, we can.’

  ‘That bad?’ he chuckled, with a shake of his head.

  ‘That good, it’s very sexy,’ I replied, without thinking. I blushed as he laughed.

  ‘You find the French accent sexy?’ he asked, his lips curving up into a smile. Now I was getting somewhere, this was beginning to look like the man that I’d met.

  ‘Show me a woman who doesn’t,’ I replied, pleased to hear that Mike was in Luc’s room at work already. ‘That and the fact that you’re not totally repulsive makes for quite a heady mix, as can be attested by the daggers being thrown my way by all of the other jealous women in the bar, who wished they were sitting here talking to you right now.’

  ‘There are other women in the bar? I can’t say I’d noticed,’ he murmured, as he looked at me intently over the rim of his glass.

  ‘Very smooth,’ I replied with a blush and a flutter of my heart, remembering that was what Coco had said about him the day he sent over the Champagne. Smooth. He frowned again and tilted his head to the side.

  ‘Have we met before?’ he asked in a suddenly serious tone, making my heart race a little faster.

  ‘Do you think we’ve met before?’ I replied, evading the use of a lie.

  ‘Honestly, I’m really not sure,’ he responded as he gazed at me. There was a long uncomfortable pause and I had to fight the urge not to fidget under his scrutiny. ‘There’s something about you, something incredibly familiar, yet not at the same time. I feel like I recognise you, like I know you, yet I don’t.’

  ‘Maybe we met in a former life,’ I offered, as I quickly grabbed my champagne and forced myself to sip, not to knock it back, or knowing my chivalrous Frenchman, he’d be ordering a bottle and finding he didn’t have a card to pay for it.

  ‘A former life,’ he sighed. ‘Yes maybe this is it. Enough of me, Isabelle. What of you?’

  ‘What of me?’ I enquired.

  ‘You’re a beautiful young woman, you should not be alone at a bar talking to me.’

  ‘And you’re a good looking married man, who should not be alone at a bar full stop, let alone talking to me. Why are you here in London, is this your home now?’ I asked. I needed the conversation on him, I didn’t want to lie any more than I had to and to be honest, I just wanted to hear him talk. It may not be the crude, hot, sexy and dirty things he’d once whispered in my ear, but his voice was like treacle, French treacle if such a thing existed. I just wanted to smother myself in it, to soak up the potent pheromones he was emitting without him even realising it. I wanted to understand what had made him change so much. To have been so sexually aggressive, raw and passionate, to becoming this man. He still exuded confidence, masculinity and raw sex appeal, but his fire was
missing. It was like someone had extinguished his very core.

  ‘I am a businessman, I live in Paris, but come to London every Monday to see clients.’

  ‘Clients?’ I enquired. So if he only saw clients on a Monday, why did he spend an entire weekend here too? Either he was that desperate to not spend time with his wife, or he really was having an affair. A thought that hurt me more than it should have done.

  ‘I am an investment manager, I play with people’s portfolios and make them grow, earning both of us a very healthy profit. I’m very good at what I do.’

  ‘Then maybe I should book an appointment with you,’ I replied, thinking of my nest egg that I’d been building up.

  ‘Maybe you should. Why don’t you meet me here next Monday, at seven-thirty?’

  ‘Strictly business?’ I teased.

  ‘It can’t all be business, there should be some pleasure in spending time in your company.’

  ‘So you’re asking me on a date?’ I was so confused, part of me wanted him to, I needed that affirmation that he felt something for me, part of me didn’t want him to. I wanted him to prove to his wife that he was the honest man she’d implied he was.

  ‘A date? Non, not a date I’m afraid,’ he replied with a shake of his head and another sip of his drink.

  ‘Because you’re married,’ I nodded, liking that he obviously did have a sense of decency. That said a lot about a man’s character. For a sexual being like Luc, to stay faithful to a wife like that? I’d truly underestimated him in Paris. And whatever regrets I thought I’d had up until this moment, they were nothing compared to the ones I was having now. I’d told myself for years that he was just a one night stand, but he wasn’t, he was so much more. He could have been so much more and it was my fault that he wasn’t. I faked a smile as he looked back up at me, while the biggest wave of regret and hurt was ravaging my insides.

  ‘In part, because I’m married, I took a vow to be faithful and I aim to honour that vow. But the main reason is simple. It’s because my heart belongs to another, Miss Isabelle and sadly not my wife. Whilst I may often wish it were not the case, point of fact is that it is. Please will you excuse me, I won’t be long and I’d like for you to stay, so we can talk some more. You have made a usually dull Monday evening far more entertaining.’ He stood up, his long fingers, fingers that had been inside me, fingers that had brought me to violent orgasms again and again, doing up his jacket button. ‘I’ll be back in a moment.’

  ‘I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable.’ I looked up at him, at the sad look on his face, hoping it wasn’t reflected on mine. I just wanted to grasp his messy dark hair and pull him down to me, to let my lips taste the warmth of that cognac on his, to feel the heat of his breath as he kissed me the way that he’d kissed me all that time ago. I’d never felt such longing. He frowned as he looked down at me and I gulped as he reached up and held my chin, then slowly and lightly brushed his thumb across my lower lip. O my God. Such a delicate touch that meant nothing to him, but so much to me.

  ‘You have not made me uncomfortable, you just remind me so much of someone I knew once, it saddens me that I will never see her again.’

  ‘How can you be so sure?’ I whispered, my chest heaving as he just stood there, holding my chin as his eyes glazed over. Could he be talking about me? Surely not. ‘If you miss her this much, then you could find her.’

  ‘Trust me, I have tried. But as my investigator advised, how does a man find a woman in another country when he knows nothing but her first name? How could I explain how her lips and skin tasted, how her hands felt on my body, how our passion and desire for each other was perfectly matched? How could I convey that I’d only recognise her perfectly formed naked body, her heated cries in the throes of unimaginable passion, calling out my name in a high pitched tone, or the brightest fire, like molten lava, in her eyes as she came? Non, this is not a description that would lead me back to her,’ he sighed, dropped his hand and strode away. I reached for the bar with my right hand, my fingers curling tightly around the granite as I struggled to breathe. He was talking about me. I was the woman he’d never forgotten, the woman with the amber eyes like molten lava. I was the woman that he’d been broken hearted over when he agreed to marry Mrs. Le Grand. Would you want to fall in love with a man who barely registered your very existence? Who was fixated on the past, on the memory of a love that never was? his wife had asked me. Luc had never got over our one night together, just as I hadn’t. I reached up and quickly wiped the tears that threatened to flow over my lashes and down my cheeks.

  ‘Please tell me you’re done?’ I pleaded to the two men still listening to my conversation. ‘I can’t do this anymore, I need to go. Now.’

  ‘You can’t go,’ Henry shot back. ‘You have to put his card back in his pocket, he’s in the men’s room washing his hands, he’ll be back in a moment. Mike’s just wrapping up. The cameras and microphones are in place and working. A few more minutes Lulu and it’s over.’

  ‘I don’t know if I can last a few more minutes,’ I replied, my stomach twisting nervous knots, raw emotion taking hold of me. ‘You have no idea what you’re asking of me.’

  ‘I think I do,’ he said quietly. ‘I see it clearly now. But you started this, you have to finish it. Mike’s already nearly knocked over the same vase in the suite three times, he’s too damn clumsy to replace the card without being noticed.’

  ‘I’m not a bloody field agent,’ he muttered. ‘I’m a highly skilled mechanic, car thief and getaway driver, who can take a stolen car and turn it around with a new custom paint job and number plates faster than you two could drink a cup of hot coffee. I’m not cut out for this covert crap.’

  ‘I so didn’t need to know that,’ I sighed, as I pinched the top of my nose. This is why I didn’t want to know too much about how my employees got things done.

  ‘Well given we’re getting to hear some of your very personal history, I felt it only appropriate to reciprocate,’ Mike replied. ‘Your turn Henry, tell her something personal too, take her mind off this snail.’

  ‘If you’re referring to the fact that he’s French, I think you mean frog, but the more appropriate and frankly less slanderous term, would be Frenchman,’ I replied, grateful for at least something to take my mind off how nervous and upset I was feeling.

  ‘I’ve just confessed to auto crime, I’m hardly worried about discrimination against the bloody French to my boss. I’m in the lift.’

  ‘He’s on his way out,’ came Henry’s voice. ‘You seriously had sex with him? I mean so not gay here, but for him even I might turn. Was it the hair? He has great hair, though his body’s … phew. You can tell he definitely works out. I bet he looks amazing naked.’

  ‘Not helping, Henry,’ I sighed, knocking back a large mouthful of my champagne. This was torture. The man I wanted so badly felt the same about me. He was here, about to be inches away from me again and I couldn’t do anything about it. Sitting here as Isabelle I had a feeling, much as he was drawn to me, he wouldn’t offer to take me up to his suite. As Lulu, he probably would, but there’d be no faking it, no ending with me disappearing at the last possible moment. Once I kissed him I’d never be able to quit and I knew he’d never let me leave until he’d fucked me again. But then if I did that, the recording that Mrs. Le Grand required, the shots needed to break his “affair” to the press, could contain my face. Hazardous to my business, as well as to my personal life, did I want my son to grow up knowing his mother slept with a married man? Equally if I was pictured and it came out Mrs. Le Grand had paid me to seduce him, her attempts to come off as the wounded wife would fail too. Damn it, this was so screwed up. Throw in the fact that he’d want to know why I was disguised and had said nothing, or that I now knew that my target was Luc, a man whom I had such a connection to, I couldn’t do it to him. Not him.

  ‘Are you ok? You look a little pale,’ came his deep voice, as he put his hand on my shoulder.

  ‘Probably too
much champagne.’

  ‘You’re not a big drinker?’

  ‘Not anymore, no,’ I replied with a shake of my head, trying to avoid eye contact. Since I discovered I was pregnant and had Tristan, my drinking days were pretty much over. I needed to be a responsible parent. Other than the odd night out, or wedding reception, like the one coming up this weekend, at which I had a feeling I was going to need lots of alcohol to numb the nightmare of tonight.

  ‘I’m very sorry for earlier, when I touched you, it was inappropriate. I don’t make a habit of talking to women in bars, let alone touching their lips,’ Luc advised, as he took his seat opposite me again. I kept my eyes off his face, focussing on his hands instead, remembering them caressing my body, holding me to him in the breaks between the sheet clawing sex.

  ‘You’re an unhappily married man. I’d be insulted if you hadn’t tried to touch me,’ I responded.

  ‘You’re the first woman I’ve touched in such a way in a very long time,’ he sighed, as he reached for his cognac and drained it.

  ‘Then what’s so special about me?’ I replied, forcing myself to look up at him.

  ‘I told you that you remind me of someone. The resemblance is uncanny.’

  ‘Does that line work on all of the ladies?’ I asked, attempting a smile, while inside I was dying. I wanted to tell him who I was, to see how he reacted. I wanted him to clutch me to his chest, to kiss me, to whisper those dirty things in my ear again, to drag me up to his suite and fuck me six ways till Sunday.

  ‘I don’t use lines anymore. I told you that I’m married, I’m not the kind of man that would want to cheat, no matter how unhappy I was, but this woman …’ he closed his eyes for a moment as he sighed. ‘For this woman, I would break every vow I ever made. You may think me foolish, to feel so strongly for a woman that I had a one night stand with, many years ago, but she has never left my mind or my heart. You may also think that this is a ploy, to make you feel sorry for me, to pity me enough to let me take you to my suite for the night, but I shall prove that I’m not lying.’ He reached for his wallet inside his jacket, as I choked back the tears of hurt that I wanted to shed over his confession of his feelings for me. Feelings I reciprocated.