Once in Paris

He silenced her with a raised hand. “You don’t understand how I’m placed!” he said angrily. “I can’t afford to upset him in any way! Everything I have is invested in his country’s oil exploration and development. I’m risking all of it!”

“You shouldn’t have let him talk you into the investment in the first place,” she pointed out.

He glared at her. “I talked him into it,” he corrected her, “because I saw the chance to triple my investment. My finances are not what they once were,” he said coldly. “If I do nothing, I will lose what little I have left. This is a perfect investment opportunity, absolutely foolproof. But in order to make it work, I must remain friendly with Philippe. I cannot afford to antagonize him—or permit you to do so.” He cleared his throat, aware of the building resentment in her young face. “It is time you married,” he said harshly. “Philippe has said that he wishes it. It will be the best way to cement our business partnership.”

“Marry…him!” she burst out, appalled. “Listen, I am not marrying your friend Philippe! He scares me to death! You must surely have heard the gossip about him, about what he does to young girls!”

He turned and looked at her down his nose. “Your mother is quite happy here, ja?” he asked slowly. He smiled. It wasn’t a nice smile. “She and the child. You wouldn’t want anything to…upset her, now, would you?”

As veiled threats went, it was a masterpiece. She felt her body going numb as she considered what he was hinting at. She knew that her mother was afraid of him and that she was deeply regretting her marriage. Brianne also knew that her mother was vulnerable with the new child. She couldn’t really afford to make Kurt madder than he already was, for her mother’s sake. But there was no way on earth she could marry that repulsive man, even to save her mother and half brother!

She stood there, defiant but frightened, uneasy, searching for the right words. Pierce could save her. She couldn’t tell her stepfather that; her words might inflame him to the point that he would do something desperate to her poor mother. For almost two years she’d blamed her mother for her hasty marriage and equally hasty pregnancy, but blood was thicker than water. She couldn’t cause her only remaining parent to come to harm, regardless of her feelings of betrayal.

“You understand me, Brianne?” Kurt continued slyly. “You will do as I say?”

“Do I have a choice?” she replied quite calmly.

He smiled, not a pleasant smile at all. “No,” he returned. “So I think we might discuss plans for the wedding. Your mother will be happy to assist you, I am sure.”

“Not today,” she said, and searched desperately for an excuse. She squared her shoulders and came up with the perfect one. “I’m meeting a girlfriend for lunch at the Lobster Bar downtown.”

“A girlfriend?” He was immediately suspicious. “Who is she?”

Her mind would barely cooperate. “My friend Cara, from school,” she invented. “She’s on a cruise and will only be in town this afternoon. I haven’t see her since graduation.”

He hesitated, still not quite trusting her. He pursed his lips and thought for a minute. “Very well. But Philippe has sailed to one of the outer islands and is to arrive back here tomorrow. I will expect cooperation from you.”

“Certainly.”

She was pale and not as confident as she sounded, but she forced a smile for him and went to dress.

Brianne’s mother, Eve, having left the baby with the live-in nurse, slipped into her room as she was changing into jeans and a green silk shirt that matched her eyes.

“Has he spoken to you?” the older woman asked quickly.

“Yes,” Brianne replied. She stared at her mother, seeing the new lines in her pretty, soft face, the new haunted look in her pale eyes. “Indeed he has.”

Eve twisted her hands together. “I had no idea that he was going to take it this far, Brianne,” she said miserably. “I know you don’t like Mr. Sabon. I know what people say about him. But he’s very rich and powerful—”

“And you think money is the most important thing in the world,” she replied with cold eyes.

Her mother averted her gaze quickly. “I didn’t say that. He could give you anything you wanted, though. And it would make Kurt happy.”

“Making your husband happy isn’t my main goal in life, Mother,” Brianne said with an unfamiliar iciness in her tone. “And if you think I’m going to marry that man to keep Kurt Brauer happy, you are sadly misinformed.”

Her mother looked horrified. “You…you didn’t say that to him?” she asked with real fear.

“Of course not!” she replied quickly. “Mother, I’m not a fool. He did make certain threats about you, and the baby,” she added reluctantly. She and Eve had never been close. At times like this, it was sad, because they could have confided in each other, comforted each other. Eve had always lied about her age. Brianne’s very presence, not to mention her age, was a visible contradiction. Like many pretty women, she had a hard time accepting the advance of her years.