The Last Princess (47 page)

He was too impatient to bide his time. Hiding behind the ski chalet, he saw a large party of people tilting their skis against the side of the building and going inside. As soon as they had disappeared to sit by the fire and boast of the day’s exploits, Jean-Paul was gone with a pair of skis and poles.

Possessing no ticket and no money to buy one, he crowded onto the gondola with all the others and sidled up to a couple who looked old enough to be his parents.

At the top, he was the first one off, dragging the long skis to an open space. He watched the others to understand the technique, then strapped the skis to his stolen boots as best he could. Duval felt a surge of self-confidence. He could do this!

He dug in his poles and launched himself. As he felt the wind whip against his face and the snow surprisingly firm under his skis, he almost laughed aloud. It
was
like flying!

But the heady sensation lasted only a long, glorious moment before abruptly he knew something was wrong. He was going too fast…. He couldn’t seem to turn his skis….

A tree suddenly loomed up ahead of him, and he swerved with a sure, catlike instinct, but in the process he caught his edge in a rough spot and tumbled head over heels in a spectacular cartwheel. When he had finally come to a halt, half-buried in a drift, he felt as if he were choking on snow. His skis had come off in his headlong fall, and as he struggled to his feet and looked around, he saw them lying broken behind him.

Well, he thought philosophically, he could always steal another pair.

Leaving them where they lay, he decided to walk down the hill, but he found that his ankle burned with pain every time he put his weight on it. He wanted to cry, but stoically he gritted his teeth and began limping toward the chalet.

The next day, the contessa sent for her little page and was startled when he limped in heavily.

“What is wrong,
bambino?”

“I fell on the ice outside, Contessa, and twisted my ankle.”

The contessa exclaimed when she examined the boy’s ankle; it was swollen to twice its normal size.

“You should not be walking on this,
bambino!
Go up to bed now, and I will send the doctor to you.”

“Thank you, Contessa.” He smiled up at her winsomely. “Your kindness is all I need to recover.”

Trying to hide her smile, the contessa replied, “Nevertheless, I will send the doctor. Now go!” As he disappeared, she looked after him with a fond twinkle. The little devil. He knew just how to get around her.

The doctor’s report was encouraging. No bones broken, but he would have to stay off the ankle for a week. Jean-Paul shrugged philosophically. In a week they would be gone from Chamonix, but next winter they would come here again. And the next time he was on a pair of skis, he was going to be a little less cocky—and a lot better. Despite his first fiasco, he remained enchanted by this new world of skiing. He determined to make it his own.

They spent the warm, balmy summer sailing on the Adriatic, while Jean-Paul dreamed of skiing. By the fall, he had developed a new plan for the tactics he would employ to become not just proficient but expert.

He realized it would not be enough to steal a pair of skis and struggle along by himself. He took advantage of the count’s absence—he was away on business—to put his plan into action. Jean-Paul waited until an afternoon when the contessa had gone to the village and would not be returning until dusk; he lit a single birthday candle and placed it in his window, knowing that when the contessa returned she would see it. His birthday had actually been a month before, but she would not know that, and he was sure that when she saw the candle she would come by to wish him a happy birthday.

Watching intently, he finally saw her come into the courtyard. She looked up, hesitated, looked back, and then started toward his wing.

Inwardly he exulted. It was going to work! Her interest in him thus far had been maternal; he guessed shrewdly that one of the true sorrows of her life was the fact that she had no children of her own. But the time had come to effect a change in that attitude.

The contessa knocked, then opened his door—and stopped short. Jean-Paul was completely nude. He appeared to have been changing from his day clothes to the suit he wore to serve at the table. Simulating confusion and embarrassment, he clutched his shirt to him, but not before he had made sure that the contessa had had a good look at him.

The contessa blushed as she stared at him. Her cute little Jean-Paul was almost a man. In spite of herself, she felt a stirring of desire.

Turning away, trying to hide her burning cheeks, she murmured, “I’m sorry—I had no idea…. I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

“It’s all right,” he said with feigned shyness.

“Yes, well—come to see me as soon as you’ve changed, please.”

After that episode, their relationship underwent a subtle transformation. They never spoke of it, of course, but once or twice Jean-Paul caught her giving him the eye. And she had stopped calling him
bambino.

As he had hoped, just before they started for Chamonix the contessa was easily persuaded to give him an old pair of skis they had in the storeroom. Once there, it soon became taken for granted that whenever he was not needed by the contessa, Jean-Paul was free to go skiing.

This time he started on the gentler slopes, but with his natural athletic ability he rapidly improved. By December he skied from the summit for the first time.

Duval was apprehensive as he surveyed the long, steep slope from the mountaintop. But through iron will, natural confidence, and determination, he barely paused before pushing off.

He took one bad fall that day, but luckily his slender hickory skis didn’t crack. He picked himself up, took a deep breath, and went on with renewed abandon.

When he finally skidded to a halt in front of the chalet, he tore off his cap and shook his head, laughing in exultation. He had done it: conquered the highest peak at Chamonix!

Now it was time to impress the contessa. Catching sight of her, he hid himself at the top of the gondola. Then, as she took off down the slope, he followed. After skiing behind her for a minute or two, he increased his speed and drew up alongside her, then dropped back, then came forward again, weaving in and out, carving the arcs at which he was fast becoming proficient.

The contessa didn’t know who the graceful boy was and Jean-Paul played up the mystery, allowing her just a glimpse of him on one side before veering off to the other.

At the bottom he waited for her as she skied up and stopped in front of him. Then he ripped off his sunglasses and smiled at the shock reflected in her face.

“Jean-Paul! It can’t be! How on earth did you learn to ski like that?”

And in truth it was not just his extraordinary ability that stunned the contessa. The hours of skiing were quickly developing his physique. He had acquired a tan, which well complemented his blond locks and only enhanced his powerful sensuality.

Ever since that day she had seen him nude, the contessa had not allowed herself to think about the way his body had looked in the candlelight, but at this moment the memory came back.

“You must have the finest instructors,” she said finally, still staring at him. “You could be a champion, you know.”

“With your inspiration, Contessa,” he said, summoning up all the precocious sexuality of his Mediterranean heritage.

More than once, he had let his gaze wander appraisingly over the contessa’s full bosom and the rounded bottom so appealingly revealed by her clinging ski pants. It was impossible for her to be in love with the conte; he was old and fat and balding.

As a young boy in the streets of Marseilles, he had witnessed the act that went on between women and men, and he knew that he was ready. Indeed, he had been from that day when he had felt the contessa’s eyes on his nude body.

When they went back to the villa in Tuscany, Jean-Paul was given a room in the family quarters, just down the hall from the contessa’s own suite. The count never even thought twice about it; his contessa must have her little whims. Even though there was a thirty-year difference between his age and that of his wife, he never imagined that she would look elsewhere—and certainly not to a boy of barely fourteen.

The contessa herself could not have explained her compulsion. To take a lover was one thing, but a mere child … yet somehow Jean-Paul had never been a child.

The first time he came to her room, she looked into his eyes wonderingly, for they were experienced eyes, wise far beyond his years. When they made love it was extraordinary. She had had lovers before, but never one with Jean-Paul’s innate sexual knowledge. It seemed to spring from an endless inner source, as he showed her things she had never experienced before.

He broke through all the barriers and somehow, despite the guilt that plagued her, she could not bring herself to break off their affair.

Meanwhile, she saw to it that he had unlimited funds for his lessons and equipment. Under the top Swiss and French instructors, he was rapidly climbing the ladder of junior racing.

Then, abruptly, at eighteen, he vaulted to the top. He entered his first big-time race—one of the more important on the European circuit—and won. It was one of the most stunning upsets in ski racing history, and the contessa rejoiced for him.

But that night, as she saw him surrounded by a knot of adoring young girls, she knew despair, for she suddenly realized that she had lost him. He was no longer a poor young boy, but a grown man. And as the newest star in the skiing world, he would have women—hundreds of them. Young, beautiful, unencumbered.

The only reason he had stayed with her so long was that he had needed her financial support. That suddenly became clear. But now that he could earn his own way through prize money, he would no longer be beholden to her largesse. She could only bow out of this inauspicious affair as gracefully as possible.

The World Cup circuit was not to be conquered overnight, but by the time Jean-Paul was twenty, he was a figure to be reckoned with, both on and off the mountain. He had already forgotten how many women had offered him their hotel-room keys, and then themselves, and how many of those he had accepted.

At twenty-four, he reached the pinnacle: He won the World Cup. Wealth and fame—the destiny he had dreamed of so long ago on the yacht in Marseilles—were no longer dreams, but reality. He was the darling of fate—until the day he almost literally stumbled across a pretty young girl on the slopes of St. Moritz.

His first reaction was irritation, but as he began to berate her, he was wrenched to a halt. Gazing up at him from where she had fallen was a petite brunette with the most intriguing violet eyes he had ever seen.

“Sorry,” she announced. “But you should have looked where you were going.”

And with such an unpromising introduction began an affair that would blossom into one of a passion and intensity that neither of them had known.

Jean-Paul was the most handsome man Melissa had ever seen, but he, for his part, couldn’t quite fathom the instant attraction he felt toward her. After all, he had known some of the most extraordinary beauties of Europe.

But something about her piquant little face—a certain untouched quality, a youthful arrogance—filled him with an irresistible urge to make her his.

“You’re right, I should have,” he replied, smiling down at her. “Come on, let me help you up.”

As Jean-Paul skied alongside Melissa toward the bottom of the hill, he couldn’t help but imagine her trim, petite figure under the bulky ski clothes. Jaded though he had become from his many dalliances, he felt a sudden thrill of anticipation as he watched her. It had been a while since the last time a woman had affected him so.

At the foot of the hill, he turned to her and smiled. “Are you ready to quit for the day? Shall we go into the chalet and have a Pernod?”

He listened with half an ear as she talked. She was a model, she explained, from New York by way of Switzerland. She was sharing an apartment in Paris with two other girls.

Despite her attempts to sound sophisticated, her ingenuous chatter suddenly made him wonder. “How old are you?” he asked.

Unruffled, Melissa lied calmly, “Almost twenty-one.”

Jean-Paul relaxed. No fear of the
flics
coming to haul him away for seducing a child.

“And your family?” he asked casually. Better to be certain they were not nearby, poised to interfere.

“My father is Harry Kohle, the novelist.”

“Interesting,” he mused. “I’ve read a few of his novels.”

No need to tell her that Harry Kohle bored him stiff—too little sex in his fiction. Jean-Paul infinitely preferred Henry Miller to writers like Kohle.

“What did you say your name was?” Melissa asked him. “I feel as if I’ve seen you before.”

“My name is Jean-Paul Duval.”

“Jean-Paul Duval—the skier! Of course!” she exclaimed excitedly. “No wonder you look familiar! You were on the cover of
Paris Match
last month.”

He shrugged deprecatingly. “
C’est moi.”

Melissa’s face was glowing. “I can’t believe it! Wow!”

He laughed aloud. She was amusing, this little American girl. He was surer than ever that she would be more than amusing in bed.

Unfortunately, he was not going to be able to pursue this quarry immediately. He and the rest of the French team were leaving at four-thirty for Val-d’Isère for three days of racing. Her face fell when he finally told her that he would have to be going. “Oh, no! I was hoping we could see each other tonight.”

“
Je suis désolé, mademoiselle,”
he said, shrugging slightly. Deliberately tantalizing her, he drew out his wallet and idly leafed through it. Then, lazily, he took out his card, scribbled a number across the back, and tossed it across the table with a flick of his wrist. “This is my private number in Paris. Call me there next week.” He leaned over unexpectedly, brushing his lips across hers in a lingering caress, and was gone.

Melissa just sat there, at first stunned, then wistful. She touched her lips, almost unable to believe that he had kissed her. None of her various escapades had ever given her even a hint of this kind of thrill—not even the affair with the music teacher at Miss Parker’s, whom she had lured into the cloakroom and made her first lover. Melissa giggled at the memory. The poor man had been so nervous, thinking that they would be discovered at any moment.