Satin Dreams (16 page)

Nine

“But I don’t want to have lunch!” Alix cried.
 

Nicholas Palliades was a major investor in the Maison Louvel, not just an important client; that much she’d understood in those few brief moments in the corridor outside the salon doors. It ws unbelievable, a horrendous, unforeseen turn of events. After she’d gone to all the trouble to quit her job at Rudi’s, she’d fallen into a trap at the Maison Louvel that was worse!
 

The chauffeur held open the door to the long black Daimler. Nicholas Palliades’s hand, in the small of her back, propelled her inside.
 

Alix fell against the limousine’s gray velvet cushions, understanding now why Gilles had wanted her to come to the Maison Louvel. Because that was what Jackson Storm wanted. And Jackson Storm wanted her because that was what Nicholas Palliades, his
investor
, wanted!
 

Did anyone really care if she was a top-flight model or not? she wondered despairingly. Or was she even expected to work at all? Remembering the morning’s spools of ancient thread, she began to doubt it.
 

The bottom line, of course, was that after the disastrous evening in the avenue Foch apartment, after his wild rage when he thought she was blackmailing him, Nicholas Palliades now had all sorts of power over her! Her eyes slid to him hesitantly as he dropped his long body into the seat beside her.
 

“Please let me out.” Alix reached for the door handle. “I really don’t want lunch. I don’t think I can stand another sleazy restaurant.”
 

He pushed her back into the seat with one hand. “It’s not a sleazy restaurant,” he said stiffly. “It’s l’Escargot Montorgueil near Les Halles, run by a friend of mine, Kouikette Terrail, the sister of the Tour d’Argent’s owner.”
 

“I don’t care, I’m not hungry!”
 

It was useless. As the car pulled away from the curb, he kept his hard, sculpted profile rigidly to her, only a tiny vein in his temple throbbing.
 

He didn’t
look
deranged, she thought, openly staring. On the contrary, Niko Palliades maintained an image of perfect, icy control. He was impeccably dressed in a gray business suit, black melton Chesterfield overcoat, and carried his usual homburg. She had to admit he was exceptionally handsome in all his dark, muscular virility; he looked like a romanticized movie version of a young Greek shipping heir. But, she told herself, he could still be crazy.
 

“We’re going to lunch,” he insisted, staring straight ahead. “I want to talk to you.”
 

They sat in frigid silence for the rest of the journey. When the Daimler rolled up in front of L’Escargot, Alix could see that the hundred-year-old restaurant was completely different from the tawdry La Veille Russe. Nicholas Palliades was taking her to lunch in an elegant setting of velvet banquettes, brass rails, spectacular Second Empire mirrors, and a fabulous painted ceiling.
 

But as far as Alix was concerned, Nicholas could just as well have taken her to the Burger King on the Champs Elysées. She sat down at their table without removing her coat, and stared at her plate. She couldn’t cope with what was happening to her these days—and certainly not with Nicholas Palliades. She still couldn’t believe he was Jackson Storm’s all-important European backer for the Maison Louvel!
 

Alix wondered if she could appeal to Jack Storm, explain to him that she couldn’t work for him if he expected her to entertain investors.
He knows about it
, she told herself. Jackson Storm was not only a part of this, he would probably fire her if she did anything to antagonize his millionaire investor.
 

Numbly, Alix took the menu the waiter handed her. She knew Rudi was too angry to take her back. And modeling jobs weren’t that easy to get in the spring market. It would take weeks, maybe even months.
 

With trembling hands, she put down l’Escargot’s parchment menu and stared at the man across the table. After all, this was Europe, not America; a rich man could pursue a young, comparatively powerless woman in any way he wanted. Even better, if he had a lock on her job.
 

Alix glared at Nicholas’s bent, curly dark head. He’d also made a fool of her in front of Christopher Forbes. She’d let Nicholas Palliades steer her to the Maison Louvel’s elevator, while Christopher watched her being led away like some sort of pet on a leash.
 

Across the table, Nicholas was silently studying l’Escargot’s elaborate menu. Her eyes dropped to his long-fingered hand holding the folded parchment and the tiny blue anchor tattoo at the base of his thumb. Nicholas Palliades belonged to a family that counted its wealth in billions, and yet he’d worked on one of his grandfather’s tankers as an ordinary seaman. Sitting there across from her now, he looked enigmatic, self-absorbed in his sleekly tailored suit. But why in God’s name was she meekly having lunch with him when she didn’t want to? Was he beginning to have some strange hold over her?
 

Alix remembered him pacing like a tiger in the avenue Foch apartment, ranting about blackmail plots. Certainly it was some wild dream that he’d been naked, in bed with her. That they’d ever made love!
 

He lowered the menu to look at her. “Are you all right?”
 

With a shock her violet eyes met his gaze.
 

Alix gripped the edge of the table with both hands. How in the world was she going to get out of this? Why wouldn’t Nicholas Palliades leave her alone?
 

He seemed to be feeling something of the same thing.
 

“Why do you torment me?” he said hoarsely. He looked exasperated, as though it was the last thing he meant to say. He went on in a grimly controlled voice, “I’m waiting for your demands, you know. You have to give me more information than I’ve gotten so far. I can’t act without it.”
 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Alix glared at him. “But then, I never do.”
 

“Don’t be ridiculous.” He bit down on each word. “You went to bed with me, I took your virginity. It was,” he said even more huskily, “a valuable experience. That is, I know there’s a price on all of this. I’m waiting.”
 

It was her turn to be exasperated. “But losing my virginity had nothing to do with you.” She saw his black eyes widen, incredulously. “I—I mean, it was nothing personal!”
 

“
What?
” The menu crumpled into a ball in his hands.
 

“Oh well, yes, we made love,” she blurted. “Actually, it was just
sex.
” Around them people were craning, staring; Alix lowered her voice. “But I didn’t mean for you to get so
obsessed
with it.” She could never tell him that she’d picked him because he was perfect for her revenge—a notorious playboy, outrageously, flamboyantly, undesirable. “It wasn’t
you.
I mean, it was just supposed to
happen
, that’s all!”
 

His expression was savage. “Are you playing with me just to see me sweat? Whose idea is this? Per Ammussen? North Sea?” He was suddenly barking names at her. “Takimoto? Holveig Oil?”
 

Her mouth dropped open. “Who are
they
?”
 

He reached across the table to seize her hand. “Come on, it’s either the Japanese or the Norwegians. There’s no other competition for Greek tankers. Or is it,” he said, squeezing her fingers painfully, “more complicated than just a move to discredit me and make me look bad just as I’ve taken over my grandfather’s company?” His eyes narrowed. “The scheme’s bigger, isn’t it?”
 

“
Scheme?
” Alix tried to pull her hand away. “What scheme? You’re the one who asked Rudi Mortessier for permission to take me out. Until that moment I’d never laid eyes on you!”
 

He made a derisive noise. “Come on, you’ve heard of Iranscam, the war in the Persian Gulf, the arms deal—” He stopped abruptly. “The intrigue that goes on in international oil. You’ve already made one blunder,” he reminded her. “You’ve admitted you went to bed with me for some reason other than because you wanted to.”
 

“But I wanted to,” she protested. He finally released her hand. “You don’t understand.”
 

“I understand they paid you,” he flung at her. “You’re on their payroll, that’s what I understand.” His black eyes blazed at her. “I’ve put you under professional surveillance. Having someone watch you twenty-four hours a day will flush out your associates. They’ll have to come forward with their demands, or back off.”
 

“Associates?” Alix pushed away the menu the waiter offered. “You can’t mean you’re having me followed!”
 

His mouth flattened disapprovingly. “You never eat,” he observed. “Why aren’t you ordering? Are you starving yourself for this cover of yours, the modeling job?”
 

She’d never dreamed Nicholas Palliades would have her followed. She was already being watched. The last thing she needed was another set of spies on her tail.
 

Alix opened her mouth, then shut it again, quickly. She couldn’t explain. That was the trouble. This terrible mess was growing more and more complicated, and it was her fault.
 

“Where are your clothes?” he demanded.
 

“Clothes?” She looked down at herself, baffled. “I’m wearing them.”
 

“I mean
clothes.
” He motioned to the waiter to give her the menu again. “Real clothes, not these things you have on.”
 

She was wearing her ski jacket from Levaux, the Parisian students’ version of the army-navy store. Her silk scarf dangled around her neck.
 

“It’s deliberate, isn’t it?” he said, staring at her broodingly. “The beautiful glittering mannequin, then Cinderella, after work. A subtle metamorphosis, in case I’m turned off by too much glamor.”
 

“These are my clothes,” Alix snapped “I’m
not
Cinderella!”
 

A dark eyebrow lifted sardonically. “I think you’re doing everything you can to hook me until your associates make their next move. And you’re doing a good job.” His voice became a rough growl. “I’m going to take you to bed again. We haven’t even started on this thing.”
 

Alix pushed back her chair. Any attempt at conversation with Nicholas Palliades was futile; they had nothing to discuss. “I’m sorry, I can’t stay. Besides, the last thing I want to eat right now,” she told him, referring to l’Escargot’s specialty, “is snails.”
 

He sat back, the hand with the tattoo clenched into a fist against the tablecloth. “I want to talk to you,
talk,
do you understand? Not have a scene. Do you know what it was like for me to find that you were—” He stopped, his expression strained. “—That no other man had had you? My God, even that I had probably hurt you?”
 

She stared at him. “Look, you didn’t have to go to bed with me. Don’t worry about it.”
 

He got to his feet, too. “If they are who I think they are,” he said, leaning across the table tensely, “the people who are using you put a cheap price on such things. They deal in human misery. It means nothing to them—a beautiful girl’s innocence. They wouldn’t consider that a man wants to—” His jaw clenched. “It’s a man’s obligation to make the first time a—a memorable experience for a woman. It’s his duty.”
 

Her mouth fell open. It was a preposterous statement, resembling a platitude from a sex manual. “You have to forget about going to bed with me. For goodness sake, just wipe it out of your mind!”
 

“That is,
Greek
men,” he ground out. The waiter had come up rather hastily with a bottle of Poilly fume. Nicholas pushed it violently to one side. “Greeks feel this way about sex. Naturally, I don’t know how you Americans feel about it. From what I’ve heard, Americans are lousy lovers.”
 

“I don’t care what you heard,” Alex fumed. “And as for what happened the other night—it was a mistake!”
 

“Mistake, hell! There are no mistakes in this game. How much are they paying you? It’s nothing compared to what I can offer you.” His lip curled. “I can give you nearly anything.”
 

“Nobody’s paying me. And there’s no
plot
against you! If you’d just—”
 

“I want you to come back to the avenue Foch flat with me.” At her stunned look he went on, “It’s not necessary to explain to Jackson Storm. He will understand.”
 

It took a moment for his words to register. “You can’t mean that you want to take me back to your apartment to have
sex.
” Her temper sputtered. “
In the middle of the day?
When I’m supposed to be working.”
 

He smiled coldly. “What does that have to do with it? I told you, Jackson Storm is taken care of.”
 

“That’s obscene!” Heads were turning in their direction, but Alix didn’t care. “That’s the worst thing I ever heard of. You’re treating me like a hooker!”