PENNY JORDAN - Blackmail

‘Isn’t that how one normally addresses a fiancée?’ Gilles murmured smoothly.

‘A … You mean …’

‘Lee and I are engaged to be married,’ he agreed silkily, obviously realising that while Louise had grasped the meaning of his words, she was, as yet, incapable of vocalising her reaction to them.

‘She is not wearing the Chauvigny betrothal ring.’

‘A small omission,’ Gilles said coolly. ‘It has been an understood thing between us for many years that we should marry, but on my last visit to England I found her so grown up and … desirable that I could not wait to … seal our betrothal. Since I do not carry the Chauvigny emerald around with me—which I am sure, my dear Louise, you will have already marked, will match Lee’s eyes exactly—I had to make do with this small trifle.’

Drew’s diamond was removed from Lee’s finger before she could protest, Gilles shrugging aside Louise’s impatient questions as though he found them both boring and impertinent. After a long tirade in French which Lee was mercifully relieved that she could not understand, the redhead got up and stalked over to her, eyes venomous as they stared down into her oval face.

‘You may have made this innocent your betrothed, Gilles—do not think I do not know why. The woman who gives birth to the Chauvigny heir must of course be above reproach, but she will never bring you the pleasure in bed that I did. She will have milk and water in her veins, your English bride, not blood. And as for you …’ her eyes swept Lee’s pale face. Events were moving much too fast for Lee. She ought to have denied Gilles’ statement right from the start, but she had been far too stunned, and he, taking advantage of her bemusement, had spun a tale around them which pointed to him being a skilled and resourceful liar.

‘Do you really think you will keep him?’ Louise demanded scornfully. ‘How long will it be before he leaves your bed for someone else’s, in Paris or Orléans, while you are left to sleep alone? Look at him!’ she insisted. ‘He is not one of your cold, passionless Englishmen. He will take your heart and break it as he did mine, and feed the pieces to the vultures. I wish you joy of him!’

Gilles, looking unutterably bored, held open the door as she stalked towards it, and through it, leaving a silence behind her which could only be described as deafening.

‘AND what,’ Lee asked dangerously, when the front door had slammed behind the furious Frenchwoman, and Michael had discreetly left them to it, ‘was all that about?’

Far from looking ruffled, Gilles appeared enviably calm—far calmer than she was herself. He lit a thin cheroot with an expensive gold lighter, studying the glowing tip for a few seconds before replying coolly,

‘I should have thought it was obvious. You are not, I think, lacking in intelligence. You must surely have observed that Louise considered her position in my life far more important than it actually was.’

His sheer arrogance took Lee’s breath away.

‘An impression which you of course did nothing to foster!’ she smouldered, too furious now for caution. Of all the hypocritical, arrogant men! To actually dare to use her to get rid of his unwanted mistress!

‘Louise knew the score,’ he replied emotionlessly. ‘If she decided she preferred being the Comtesse de Chauvigny, rather than merely the Comte’s mistress, it is only natural that I should seek to correct her erroneous impression that she may step from one role to the other merely on a whim.’

‘Her place is in your bed, not at your side, is that what you’re trying to say?’ Lee seethed. Really, he was quite impossible! ‘She was good enough to sleep with, but …’

‘You are talking of matters about which you know nothing,’ Gilles cut in coldly. ‘In France marriage is an important business, not to be undertaken without due consideration. Louise’s first husband was a racing driver, who was killed during a Grand Prix; for many years she has enjoyed the … er … privileges of her widowhood, but a woman of thirty must look to the future,’ he said cruelly, ‘and Louise mistakenly thought she would find that future with me. A Chauvigny does not take for a bride soiled goods.’

Lee made a small sound of disgust in her throat and instantly Gilles’ eyes fastened on her face.

‘You think it a matter for amusement?’ he demanded. ‘That a woman such as that, who will give herself willingly to any man who glances her way, is fit to be the mistress of this château?’

‘She was fit to be yours,’ Lee pointed out coolly.

Hard grey eyes swept her.

‘My mistress, but not my wife; not the mother of my children. And before you say anything, Louise was well aware of the position. Do you think she would want me if it were not for the title, for this château?’

‘Possibly not.’ Now what on earth had made her say that? Lee wondered, watching the anger leap to life in Gilles’ eyes. What woman in her senses would not want Gilles if he owned nothing but the clothes he stood up in? The thought jerked her into an awareness of where such thoughts could lead. What woman would? she demanded of herself crossly. Certainly not her, who knew exactly how cruel and hateful he could be!

‘I am not interested in your emotional problems, Gilles,’ she told him firmly. ‘What I want to know is why you dared to drag me into all this, or do you still enjoy inflicting pain just for the thrill of it?’

There was a small silence when it would have been possible to hear a pin drop, had such an elegant room contained so homely an object; a time when Lee was acutely conscious of Gilles’ cold regard, and then, as the silence stretched on unnervingly, she held her breath, frightened, in spite of her determination not to be, by the hard implacability in Gilles’ face.

‘I will forget that you made that last remark. As to the other—’ he shrugged in a way that was totally Gallic, ‘because you were there, because we are known to one another; because you were already wearing a betrothal ring which made things so much easier.’

‘Well, as of now,’ Lee told him through gritted teeth, as she listened in appalled disbelief to his arrogant speech, ‘our betrothal is at an end!’

‘It will end tomorrow,’ Gilles told her arrogantly, as though she had no say in the matter. ‘When we marry.’

‘Marry?’ Lee stared at him. ‘Have you gone mad? I wouldn’t marry you if you were the last man on earth! Have you forgotten that I’m engaged to another man? A man whom I love, and who loves me …’

‘But who does not trust you,’ Gilles drawled succinctly. ‘Otherwise he would not have telephoned here this morning to ask if you had arrived, and if you were to share a room with Michael Roberts. I confess I was intrigued to meet you again; you must have changed considerably, I told myself, to arouse such jealousy.’

Lee ignored the subtle insult. He had known she was coming, then. Had that scene with Louise all been planned? She didn’t want to think so, but knowing Gilles, it was just the sort of Machiavellian action he would delight in.

‘Sit down,’ he instructed her coolly, grasping her shoulders with cool hands, tanned, with clean, well cared for nails. Hands which held a strength that bruised as he forced her into a brocade-covered chair, which alone was probably worth more than the entire contents of her small flat. ‘Before you lay any more hysterical charges at my feet, allow me to explain a few facts to you.

‘Louise’s father is a close friend of mine, and a neighbour, whom I greatly respect. Louise has completely blinded him as to her true personality, and out of charity his friends keep silent as to her real nature. He owns lands which borders mine, fine, vine-growing land, which will eventually form Louise’s dot should she remarry, but Bernard is growing frail and can no longer tend this land himself. I should like to buy it from him …’