Angel Hands (5 page)

He smiled, narrowing his eyes and turned to leave the bedroom.

"Wait. Damn you!"

He turned back and allowed his half-lidded eyes to roam lazily over her body, knowing she would see it, as she stood up and crossed the room to where he was standing with the robe. The shirt barely covered her hips and fell open over her chest to reveal tantalizing outlines of her bosom. He found himself reluctantly admiring her slender legs and little bare feet. Her deathly glare amused and reassured him that his tactic of trying to seduce her was absolutely the right way to go about this business.

Gracefully, he helped her slide on the robe, but instead of allowing her to tie it herself in the front, he pulled her to him so that her back was pressed against him and his arms were wrapped around her waist, tying the belt for her. Calculating for the best effect, he let his lips brush her ear and his breath tickle her neck. He was rewarded with the sensation of a suppressed shiver running through her body against him.

Oh, damn!

His own thrice-damned body liked that. Struggling for control over himself and Mireille, who was standing strangely still and silent, he splayed his hands over her belly, allowing them to roam over her waist and hips and pulling her more tightly against him.

"So," Mireille said in a voice that sounded harsh from her effort to control it, "what is it you want?"

He stood silent for a moment, aghast that the first word out of his mouth had very nearly been
"You."
Reining in his suddenly raging lust, he pressed his lips to the shell of her ear and whispered, "You need an untroubled production, and I need a business agent I can trust."

"Ha! You can't trust me."

He chuckled at the half-crack in her voice as his lips brushing her ear had its due effect on her.

"Oh yes," he purred. "Yes, I can, Mireille Dubienne. Because if I can't trust you, you'll be very...very...sorry."

"Are you-are you threatening me?" she demanded squeakily, sounding more like a shy, uncertain young woman than a hard, worldly woman of business.

"Yes."

"Go fuck yourself."

“Language, Mireille.” He let the tip of his tongue trace the contours of her ear as he nibbled it and felt her swallow hard. "I can think of something else I would much rather..." he started to whisper.

"Don't you even-!"

"Why not, Mireille?"

"I'm not going to—"

"To be my business agent?" he chuckled, deliberately letting his hands caress her ribs, straying tantalizingly close to her breasts.

"Piss off!"

He heaved a melodramatic sigh and released her quite suddenly, watching as she stumbled and seemed to shrink and shiver. She wheeled around to face him, eyes blazing with fury.

For a moment, he felt his own breath desert him at the sight of her, and his own traitorous body urged him to take her back in his arms and finish the job the monster dreamed of.

"Perhaps," he said, resorting to coldness to douse the fire in him, "a stay in the lair of the phantom will change your mind."

"You're trying to frighten me again. I told you once it wouldn’t work, and I tell you again. So, go fuck off! I will find my way out of here."

"No...you won't."

"Yes...I will," she bit out, lifting her jaw defiantly.

He smiled enigmatically at her and bowed mockingly. She seemed about to say something else—no doubt something else unpleasant and profane—when he moved. It was quickly done, snatching her back into his arms and applying a pinch to the right pressure point so that she sank unconscious again in his embrace.

He carried her over to the bed and gently placed her in it. He went to a small cabinet and withdrew a length of rope and came back to stand over her.

"No...you won't, Mireille," he whispered.

6. Of Wants and Words

Mireille awoke feeling oddly sensual. The powdery linen of a shirt whispered against her skin, and her limbs slid around underneath insanely soft sheets. Unconsciously, she stretched languorously, enjoying the feeling of her skin growing taut over her bones. She wiggled her toes experimentally as she decided whether or not to wake up—a habit from childhood.

Suddenly, small bits of information began to assemble like a well-trained regiment in her increasing awareness.

Point #1: She did not have silk sheets at home.

Point #2: She never woke up feeling...well...aroused because of...well...see Point #1.

Point #3: The pleasant smell she had been inhaling deeply wasn't her own modest perfume. It was some kind of foreign incense.

Point #4: That pleasant smell belonged to the shirt she was wearing.

Point #5: That shirt was not hers.

Point #6:
Merde!

Mireille sat up, remembering everything in a horrid rush of lucidity. She looked desperately over at the chair next to the bed. No robe.

Suddenly, she became aware of a curious weight on her legs. Turning her eyes slowly and in dread, she found herself gazing upon a rope, tied in the form of a noose and coiled like a lasso.

"
Nom d'un nom
!" she swore breathlessly, swallowing her heart repeatedly, as its frantic pounding kept making it jump into her throat.

The rope was a warning. She remembered the ‘Phantom's’ words of warning earlier.
Mon Dieu
! How long had she been here? Was she going to make it out alive? Should she take the rope? How was she to find her way back?

It was only later that she realized the one thought she hadn't had was that of assembling a team of roughnecks to eradicate the "ghosts" of the opera house. It was as if she had unconsciously taken for granted that he had the right to live here, and that they were going to have to battle it out as equals for possession of the field. This fact would eventually irritate her greatly. But, for the moment, survival and escape were the order of the day.

Mireille listened closely, straining to hear the sounds of movement in the lair. She heard nothing, but reminded herself that was no reason to let her guard down. As quietly as she could, she swung her legs over the side of the bed and gathered up the lasso and noose in her hands.

She peered stealthily out from the alcove to see if he was moving about. She didn't see him. Somehow, that made her more nervous. But though Mireille Dubienne might be nervous, she was certainly no coward. A coward would never have survived what she had endured at the hands of Parisian society. A coward would never have turned the ultimate failure into a success of sorts...transforming a ruined existence into a semblance of a life.

She stepped out of the alcove, only to find herself choking and yanked to her knees by a noose firmly around her neck.

Blearily, she caught sight of a tall, dark figure holding the end of a lasso, identical to the one that now lay useless on the floor beside her.

***

He had watched her steel herself as she prepared to make an escape attempt. The only thing that marred his pleasure was the distracting shapeliness of her legs...legs that appeared from beneath the brief hem of his shirt.

Certainly, he had seen the dancers' bodies. He had seen more than he had ever wanted to see of those muscular ballerinas. The only other body that had somehow roused such confusing, confoun
dingly coital feelings in him was...no! This was no time to think of that.

Still, he forced himself to admit that Mireille had an intriguing little body, for all that she was plain of face. Shaking his head silently, he tried to focus on watching her moves and picking his time to strike.

Strike he did, easily capturing the woman and bringing her to her knees with a sickening thud that he knew meant her knees had met the stone. Even he could wince in sympathy with the pain that she undoubtedly felt.

"I trust you slept well?" he purred, coiling up the lasso as he approached the kneeling, choking figure. He almost smiled at her glare, but held his amusement in check, remembering the part he was to play.

"Some children are given dolls to ward off the monsters that live beneath their beds," he whispered, pulling her to her feet roughly by the noose and holding it up so she was forced to stand on her tiptoes in order not to suffocate. "I thought I would leave you a token that would remind you of the true monster that lives beneath your opera house...and that you will never be free of, so long as you are within this building!"

"Go…to…ungh…hell!"

"Such language. I've noticed before that you have a most un-ladylike vocabulary."

"Piss…off!"

He yanked the noose a bit tighter and snaked an arm around her to steady her and keep her from sliding down, not wanting her to die by accident. This was a lesson, not a capital punishment.

"There are so many things I need that you could provide me...Mireille," he murmured, training his voice to its rumbliest, most seductive pitch.

He picked her up by the waist, not releasing the hold on the noose, and brought her back to rest against the stone wall, his body pressing relentlessly against hers. Damn! She was soft. Even her bones felt buttery soft. His body screamed to rip the shirt from her and take what he had been so long denied. She was naked under the shirt. His hands had but to stray a few inches and he would touch velvety flesh. Reason still held sway, but the thread was thin and tenuous.

"I need a business agent," he said thickly, lowering his head so that his lips almost brushed her parted, gasping mouth. "I have ideas for the operas that should be obeyed—how else do you think the Opéra de Paris knew such success before?"

He sensed her body growing weak and more pliant in his arms. He loosened the noose and heard her take great choking gasps of air and slid the hand that had been holding the noose down along the side of her body.

"I need a sweet little body in my bed," he continued huskily as his fingertips brushed her bare thigh. His hips found themselves naturally cradled by hers, and the harder he pressed himself against her, the harder he became. His mind grew wild for a moment with images of hands on flesh, breathy sighs, and arms and legs, tangled and glowing with the faint sheen of passion's sweat.

"No."

Mireille's blunt answer, rasped out, was like a bucket of cold water to his senses. Of course it was no. He had meant for it to be no. That had been his plan. He didn't want such a plain thing in his bed, anyway. He just needed a competent business agent. He was only trying to manipulate her.

He pretended to chuckle and forced himself to lower his lips to her neck, careful not to touch her skin, but simply letting his breath caress her skin. It was a technique, nothing more.

"You're not in much of a position to bargain, mademoiselle," he growled, hoping he didn't sound too bitter or frustrated. He needed to be intimidating, not pathetic. Damn!

"You wouldn't dare force me," Mireille replied, lifting her chin defiantly. "You're just trying to manipulate me by making it seem the lesser of two evils to be your agent."

The lesser of two evils? Oh, how little she knew about evil. He could show her evil, horror and demons that would strip her of her sanity. But, he found himself burning to show her a different kind of evil, one that would have her wailing in his arms, writhing against his body, her slender legs wrapped around his waist as he –

"If I agree to be your agent, do I have your word that you will not disrupt any of our productions?" she said crisply, breaking into his unwelcome, desire-drenched reverie.

"Yes."

"May I have it in writing?"

"The Opera Ghost does not sign contracts."

"The Opera Ghost does not have bank accounts, either."

"You have my word."

"That is not good enough."

"You take your life in your hands with such obstinacy, foolish woman!"

He was totally unprepared for the stinging slap across his face. Astounded, he actually let go of Mireille, who stood in all her petite stature, quivering with rage.

"You will NEVER call me a foolish woman again!" she hissed, taking a menacing step towards him, at least it would have been menacing if she hadn't been wearing only his shirt and nothing else. "How dare you? You know nothing of me! Nothing! If I were foolish, I wouldn't be here now. If I were a foolish woman, I'd be..."

Suddenly, she stopped and bit her lip, glaring at him. He couldn't help but stare back, fascinated. It would only be later that he realized that for all her ranting at him, she had never once referred to him as a monster, a criminal, a demon, a corpse, a bastard...despite the obvious truth of it all. No, he was forced to agree later in a brandy-soaked moment of reasoning, she was not just a woman. She was a good woman.

"Are we agreed or not?" he said icily, not wanting to pursue the confrontation to places he knew she didn't want to go, and he wasn't sure he was ready to go.

She hesitated a long moment, her eyes coldly measuring him up. Then, to his utter, infinite surprise, she extended her hand for a man's handshake. Allowing himself a faintly sardonic smile, he shook her hand, silently sealing their unorthodox bargain.

"Your clothes are dry now," he said, adopting a formal, normal demeanor, as if she wasn't standing in the cellar of an opera house with a masked man, wearing only a shirt and a noose around her neck. "They are hanging in the wardrobe in your room. Go and dress, and I will guide you back to the surface."

She looked at him a long moment, an unfathomable expression in her eyes, then deliberately removed the noose from around her neck, dropped it on the ground in disdain, and turned and went back into the bedroom alcove. He turned to walk away, but found himself loath to give up the game just yet.

"You know, things might have gone a lot better before if the former managers had had legs like yours, my dear," he called out as he descended the stairs back to his organ.

He could hardly suppress a laugh as he swore he heard a china pitcher and washbowl being smashed.