Midnight Wedding

‘Thank you,’ she said. She sounded as if she were being strangled.

His mouth twitched. ‘You’re welcome.’ But he did not let the incident interrupt his real interest. Over the top of the boxes, he said to his companion, ‘Don’t beat up on yourself, Ramon.’

Ramon hardly seemed to notice Holly. He was frowning and clearly full of guilt.

‘I should have let you handle it. I flew off the handle.’

Jack shrugged elegantly suited shoulders. The movement, Holly saw with fury, did not even stir the pile of boxes he was holding.

‘You lost focus. Can happen to anyone.’ He sent Holly a brief, indifferent glance. ‘Where are these supposed to go?’

Holly tried to feel grateful. It was not easy.

‘The front desk said it was the office at the end,’ she muttered.

The tall man turned without a word.

‘They’re for some guy called Armour.’ But she was talking to his back.

Great, she thought. Stand back, you poor creature, and let a big strong man take control. She had a long and justified prejudice against masterful men, too. She could have kicked him.

The man called Ramon pattered along beside him, taking two steps to every long stride.

‘But surely they still can’t keep us hanging about here for forty-eight hours?’ He sounded as if he was about to burst into tears.

‘They can try.’

Jack came to the impressive double doors at the end of the corridor and shouldered his way in without even a token knock. Nor, noted Holly, did he bother to acknowledge anyone in the secretariat that he had just invaded.

He dropped the boxes on the nearest desk and said generally, ‘Is that where you want them?’

Holly was tempted, childishly, to say no it wasn’t. Fortunately, the room’s elegant chief occupant took charge before Holly could go to war.

She rose and rushed forward, flustered out of her professional calm.

‘Oh, Mr Armour. I didn’t realise…Yes, there would be fine.’

Holly realised she knew her. Señora Martinez had ordered in from Chez Pierre before. She was multilingual, super-efficient and famously unflappable.

She did not look unflappable now. One casual look from those fierce dark eyes and she was stammering like a schoolgirl.

‘There are messages…The Director was asking…But I thought you’d still be with the committee…’

Holly watched in astonishment. Gorgeous Jack must be quite something, she thought. Señora Martinez was normally a Madonna of calm.

Now he said cheerfully, ‘The committee threw us out, Elena.’

No sign now of that fury Holly had surprised in the corridor. In fact, he was smiling at Señora Martinez with such conscious charm it set Holly’s teeth on edge.

It worked though. Señora Martinez laughed, blushed and shook her head at him.

‘I’m sure they did no such thing, Mr Armour. I know they were all very impressed by your company’s proposal.’

Holly did not like being ignored. The man had not spared her a glance since that flicker of amusement in the corridor. Now she seized upon the name.

‘Armour, huh?’ She placed herself in front of him and said loudly, ‘Lunch for ten.’

He was blank. ‘What?’

Silently she held the delivery docket out to him.

At least he looked at her then. He was impatient. He did not take the docket. But he looked.

‘Yes?’ If it was possible to sound more indifferent, Holly could not imagine it.

She could have danced with fury.

The trouble was, she knew what he was seeing and it was not impressive. The white buttoned chef’s jacket was grubby after a morning’s rapid deliveries through this busy part of Paris. And the baseball cap that covered her unruly golden-brown hair was frankly tatty.

She stuck her chin in the air and stood her ground. ‘I want a signature for the delivery,’ she said truculently, adding with a respect that was as unconvincing as it was belated, ‘sir.’

The man’s eyes narrowed, arrested. Señora Martinez looked shocked.

‘My good child—’ his voice was a drawling insult ‘—what in hell would I do with lunch for ten?’

Holly’s temper went through the top of her head.

She said sweetly, ‘I don’t care if you take every single piece of quiche Lorraine and feed it to the pigeons. I want my signature.’

He had a long curly mouth. It made him look mocking without even trying.

‘On the contrary. You want my signature. And believe me, no one gets that without working for it.’

Holly ground her teeth.

Señora Martinez intervened fast. ‘Here is a misunderstanding.’ Her perfect English was slipping under stress. ‘The food is for the Committee’s meeting with Mr Armour. It is I who ordered it.’ She grabbed the docket and leaned it against her knee to scribble a signature.

Holly hardly looked at her.

‘Mr Armour’s meeting?’ she said, letting her eyes drift up and down his tall figure with barely disguised scorn. ‘Well, God bless America.’

Señora Martinez and Ramon exchanged alarmed glances. Gorgeous Jack, by contrast, began to look as if he was enjoying himself.

‘Oh? Why?’

‘The only nation in the world,’ said Holly quoting her employer, gourmet chef Pierre, ‘to make eating at the conference table a moral imperative.’

There was a startled silence. Holly pulled the peak of her baseball cap down defiantly.