Free The Curvy Waitress and the Billionaire French Count (He Wanted Me Pregnant!) by Victoria Wessex Page A

bills swam before my eyes. The guy didn’t respond. He just stared at me in horror.
    “He’ll be alright,” said a voice from behind the man, and suddenly everything seemed to slow down.
    The voice was low—it almost seemed to make the air throb. And it was smooth like molten gold, with a delicious rough edge in the “Rs” that sent a little tremble down my back.
    I looked up.
    And up.
    I hadn’t paid any attention to the man who’d caught my victim. I realized then why that was: he was tall enough that his face was actually out of my eye line, a good head taller than his friend or me. And while my victim was thin, seemingly composed entirely of bone and joints, his friend had wide, powerful shoulders that slimmed down to a tight, narrow waist. He had short brown hair just a shade darker than mine, but while mine was always frizzing out and tangling, his was tousled. Not many men can do tousled. This one could.
    He was in a light gray suit with a crisp blue shirt—so far, he seemed to have managed to avoid getting any blood on it—and the color set off the cool gray-blue of his eyes. A full, sensual lower lip, kissably soft, and a strong jaw, darkly stubbled… God, he’s gorgeous! Those rough Rs sparked something in my mind…something that traveled rapidly downward and didn’t stop until it was between my legs. I could imagine him growling. Growling things like—
    Stop it!
    --like, “ Get on the bed,”
    Stop it!
    It clicked that he, too, had spoken in French. Oh God, imagine him growling in French!
    I closed my eyes for a second, coughed, and got a grip on myself. “I’m really sorry,” I said again, in French.
    He smiled.
    That doesn’t really describe how it happened, though. It started as a smirk that made a bright little explosion go off in my chest. Then it widened into a smile and it was as if a roller blind had lifted, warm sunlight flooding into me. Suddenly, I saw my whole day so far for how cold and lifeless it had been.
    “Please don’t worry,” the man said in French. “Henri has had much worse, although not often from a woman. I am Erard.” Erard was a double-strength attack of rough Rs that made my head spin. He reached out for my hand and I offered it, thinking he wanted to shake.
    He didn’t. He took my hand in his big, warm fingers and lifted it—
    Wait. Oh God, he’s not really going to—
    He bent his head and kissed the backs of my fingers. Tingles radiated outward from the spot he’d kissed, rushed up my arm and slammed into my brain.
    It should have been cheesy…but somehow, from him, it absolutely wasn’t. I think it was because of how he did it. It wasn’t done in a lascivious way and it didn’t feel like a player’s smooth moves to pick up a girl in a bar. It felt… reverent. As if he was the one who wasn’t worthy, instead of me. Which was so upside down it was almost funny, given that he looked like he’d walked off a movie set and I was…me.
    I blushed and it wasn’t the usual red-faced, hot geyser of shame I felt when someone said my ass was big or commented on my boobs. It was light instead of heavy, if that makes any sense, as if it was lifting me up instead of weighing me down. I didn’t actually giggle, but it was a close-run thing. “Holly,” I managed to say.
    Henri turned and said something in French. At least, I think it was in French. It was so garbled from his bloody nose that it could have been in Klingon.
    “Henri says he’s perfectly alright and will go to the hospital,” Erard told me in French.
    A baleful look from Henri told me that perfectly alright wasn’t really what he’d said, but if Erard wanted to spare my feelings I was absolutely going to let him.
    “That does leave me with a problem,” said Erard. “I don’t speak any English and I’m in town for a meeting. Henri was my translator. Do you think you could take his place?”
    I blinked. No, of course I can’t. I mean, my French is pretty good but it’s a little rusty in