Angel Hands (6 page)

***

Mireille studied her reflection in the mirror as she fastened the last buttons on her dress.

She sighed.

She was just a woman, after all. Not a foolish one, but perhaps secretly a weak one. A hungry one.

She sighed again and put on her own mask of hard, unfeminine competency.

The next time he tried to sway her with seduction, she vowed, she'd fight fire with fire. He was clearly trying to seduce her, counting on her femininity to be swayed by his bravado. Well, two could play at that game. He was not the only one with charm. Hers might be a bit rusty, but it was there. 

Her expression brightened slightly as she imagined working him up to a point of feverish need and then letting him know of the ‘commission surcharge’ she would deduct from any transactions he entrusted her with. Oh, he'd be so delightfully angry.

Angry enough to be vulnerable.

Vulnerable to be negotiated with.

Negotiated with for what, though?

She hurried out of the alcove, not sure of the answer that question.

7.
Of Friends and Kisses

"Mireille!"

The relief that flooded Raymond’s heart was nothing compared to his shock at seeing the grayish pallor of her face and the disheveled state of her clothing. At the sound of his voice, she turned but barely seemed to register his presence.

In a flash, he was at her side, seizing the opportunity to hold her gently to him.

"Are you all right?" he asked. "
Mon Dieu
, I was so worried about you!"

She blinked twice then frowned. "How long have I been..."

"Nine hours.
Mon Dieu
, nine hours and no one could find you. Another ten minutes, and I would have insisted on calling the
gendarmerie
. You look so pale. What happened?"

"N...nothing."

"NOTHING?"

"I...went looking for something, and I must have...fainted."

He shook his head. This woman would be the death of herself without someone to take care of her. Carefully, he placed the back of his hand against her forehead, then against her cheek.

"You are cold as ice! When did you eat last?"

"Are you my artistic director or my mother?" Mireille harrumphed, but her attempt at bravado sounded thin and exhausted.

The inexplicable need to watch over her suddenly resolved itself into clarity. He bent his head until his forehead rested against hers. "I...care about what happens to you, Mireille."

He was rewarded by a flicker of vulnerability in her eyes. It was only a glimpse before she reassumed her mask of hard self-sufficiency.

"That is kind of you, Raymond," she replied. "I think I have just forgotten to eat."

He studied her, his heart thudding thunderously in his chest. He now knew why he found himself endlessly fascinated and intensely attracted to this cold, ordinary-looking woman. It was the fact she was so hard, yet her eyes could be so soft. It was the odd moment, now and then, when he caught her looking sad and tired when she thought no one was watching her. She was unlike any other woman he had ever known—smart, steely, wily, tough, and utterly desirable because of it.

She was neither a great naïve beauty, nor was she a painted diva, but those greenish hazel eyes could wreck havoc with a man’s heart, especially when she wasn’t wearing glasses. Wait, he had never seen her without her spectacles.

"Where are your glasses?" he asked softly, lightly caressing her cheek. He was startled to see a look of utter panic flit across her face.

"I must have lost them when I fainted," she replied hurriedly.

She attempted to back out of his embrace, but that was exactly contrary to all his policies.

"You are not well," Raymond asserted, sweeping her up into his arms. "I'm going to take care of you."

"I don't need—"

"I think you do."

"No, I do—"

"Don't argue with me," he said with a smile as he carried her towards the dressing rooms. "I can't have our manager falling ill or fainting when we have a thrice-damned production to get on with."

He pushed open one of the dressing rooms and walked inside. He laid her down on the divan and knelt beside her, brushing a few errant strands of hair off her forehead. He noticed that she closed her eyes at his touch, almost as if she was in pain, but the sadness in the lines around her mouth told him that it was a pain of a more intimate and less physical kind.

“Do you need your spectacles?” he asked. “Shall I send someone to try and find them?”

She chuckled, her eyes still closed. “No, indeed, do not bother. They are not necessary.”

“I’m confused. Why would you wear them, then?”

She sobered, opened her eyes, and tried to sit up. He pressed her back down against the pillows, and she gave in, no doubt too weak to protest more forcibly.

“I find it easier to be taken seriously if I wear spectacles,” she said. “Men are more likely to forget I am a woman, and therefore, they are more apt to heed my advice.”

"There isn't a soul here in this opera house that doesn't respect you for your abilities, regardless of your sex...or your glasses," Raymond said warmly, taking her hand in his and chafing it..

Mireille opened her mouth to protest then shut it and tried to smile.

"You needn't be so nice to me, Raymond."

"I want to be. I...I want to be your friend, Mireille...your dearest friend."

"Don't!"

Raymond pulled back, startled. "I… I'm sorry...I didn't..."

Mireille sat up and looked him straight in the eye.

"No, do not be sorry," she said, her expression gentle but serious. "I tell you that you cannot be more than my colleague because, well, it's for your own good. I cannot be with anyone. There are very good reasons for this. You must trust me. Leave it at that."

At her words, he found himself both stricken and renewed in his resolve to be the one to care for her, to bring her back from whatever land of sorrow that she dwelt in.

She withdrew her hand from his and patted his arm in a maternal manner, saying, "I say this because you are a wonderful man, and you deserve someone as wonderful as you. Not a used-up spinster with a head for business."

Raymond struggled with the aching desire to whisk her away from the opera house and take her somewhere safe where she would be sheltered and loved. He recaptured her hand and tried to speak, but no sound came.

Instead, he leaned forward and kissed her lingeringly.

"I know what I deserve," he whispered, then kissed her again. "And, I will give you all the time you need, if only you will give me a chance."

Mireille sat as still as a statue, her eyes wide with shock. Raymond smiled and cupped her face in his hands. "My dearest friend," he whispered then kissed her again. Each kiss tasted better than the last, and he was quite certain that he would be very happy with a lifetime of such delicacies.

He rose to his feet and said, "Rest for a bit. I am going to go get you a bit of food, and some wine to fortify you. You've been through too much, Mireille, and I won't have you wasting away on me."

***

Once he left, Mireille raised a tentative hand to her lips and swallowed hard, trying to hold back the tears that suddenly sprang to her eyes. It was all too much, too much in the space of one day. Too much...too mu...

She fell into a troubled doze.

An hour later, Raymond escorted her back to her office, satisfied that she had eaten the plate of smoked ham, cheese, bread, and butter he brought her, and that she had drunk at least one glass of the strong red wine that returned a bit of color to her bloodless cheeks.

He left a soft little kiss on her forehead and let her back into her office, then headed back to the rehearsals. Safely inside her modest office, Mireille leaned her back against the door and tried to pull herself together.

The sight of her glasses, cleaned and neatly folded, left on the middle of her business desk did nothing to help with regaining her composure. Shakily, she crossed the room to pick them up and put them on.

"Mireille," the disembodied voice seemed to shiver in the air around her, piercing her with its icy rage. "You are mine!"

"I am no one's!" she spat into the emptiness.

"You belong to me now."

"No, I don't!"

"Yes...you do."

Unable to stand any more, Mireille turned and fled her office, past the startled maids, the confused clerks, and the nonplussed foyer staff.

When she had reached the comfort of her father’s home, she locked herself in her bedroom and threw herself onto the bed.

For the first time in nine years, Mireille Dubienne cried.

8. Of Wishes and Fishes

"This dance number is not quite right."

Mireille said nothing, not even intimating, by a silent sigh, that she had an opinion one way or another. She didn't even glance at Raymond. She didn't have to. She knew exactly what he was thinking at Charles Carcasonne's fatuous critiques.

"And what is wrong with it in your view, Monsieur Carcasonne?" Raymond asked politely. Mireille found herself grudgingly admiring his endless politeness and patience. By that point, after six hours of rehearsals and critiques, she would have had little compunction in calling Carcasonne various names of varying degrees of villainy.

"It needs to be more...sensual," Carcasonne replied, absently flicking a speck of imaginary dust off of the pristine top hat in his lap.

Mireille nearly gagged at the way he said that word, all sorts of malevolent and revolting images of Carcasonne being "sensual" rolling about in her imagination. Still, she neither moved nor showed any sign of caring. She simply sat by herself in the row across from Raymond and Carcasonne, watching one of the first full rehearsals of the most anticipated opera of the season.

"Then again, we must think of the young ladies in the audience," Carcasonne continued. "I wouldn't want to be accused of corrupting their innocence through an opera such as this."

She felt his words sliding in her direction, and at first, she looked up at him to coolly reassure him that this opera was hardly likely to inspire unbridled fucking in the foyer. In the cloakroom, perhaps, but—

She stopped before she could even summon a sound from her voice. The look on Carcasonne's face was so vile and deliberately obvious that she actually felt herself blush. Hurriedly, she looked away.

Had she imagined it? She must have imagined it. Carcasonne was one of her father’s oldest associates, and never once before now had he indicated that he saw her as anything other than the plain, loud-mouthed daughter of his friend.

She risked a surreptitious glance in his direction, instantly regretting it.

He was still leering at her, his ghastly smile widening at her discomfort. Her father and Raymond were deep in discussion and completely oblivious.

Mireille clenched her jaw. That was all she needed, she reflected morosely, one more lecherous enemy to battle within her opera house.

***

"He was right, you know."

Mireille was wending her way down the treacherous stairs and passages that would lead to the phantom's living quarters, the bank statement and requisite cash neatly folded up and tied with a piece of string in the pocket of her dress. These weekly visits had become routine, though the spookiness of entering the cellars never quite faded.

She rolled her eyes at the eerie, disembodied voice that floated around her.

"There is no sensuality in that dance number. The dancers must make love to each other on the stage."

She maintained her calm expression, determined not to let him see her perturbed in any way, shape, or form.

She saw him waiting at the edge of the underground canals, his black gondola tethered to the side, and the only light around them spilling forth from her lantern. He stood perfectly still, his heavy black cloak hanging about his shoulders, and his mask glowing and ghostly.

"You should address your complaints to the dance instructress, then," Mireille said nonchalantly, as if they had been chatting politely over a demitasse of coffee.

She had to hide her inner smile as she saw his eyes flash for a moment. He'd never reveal himself to the dance mistress, never risk it. It was Mireille's pointy little reminder that, as of that moment, she was his sole link to the world above.

He continued to stand still and glare at her.

"My, my. So gloomy. You look like a raven whose dinner just got away," Mireille taunted, keeping her voice blandly pleasant as she fished in her pocket for the documents to hand him. She pulled them out and offered them in her outstretched hand.

She felt a muscle in her face twitch impatiently when he didn't reach out to take it, but simply continued to glare at her. She raised an eyebrow in challenge and simply dropped the packet from her hand, letting it fall to the ground. Then, she spun on her heel and started to walk back towards the corridor she had come from.

What happened next was little more than a blur of movement and sensation. Somehow, in the blink of an eye, he had grabbed her and pushed her up against the smooth stones of the walls that lined the cavern. His gloved hands held her face and gripped her waist. The full weight of his body pinioned her against the wall.

"You leave," he hissed, "when I say you can leave."

"What are you going to do?" Mireille challenged, fighting to ignore her body's response to every searing inch of his mass against her curves. "Beat me? Force me?"

She watched with a sinking feeling as he wet his lips slightly.

"Well?"