Free Exposed: Misbehaving with the Magnate by Kelly Hunter Page B

don’t currently cater to. If buyers wanted to source Angels Landing wines through the House of Duvalier, I would take my cut as a distributor.’
    She believed him.
    ‘And then there’s you,’ he said with a sigh that sounded more frustrated than lovelorn. ‘I like to think of my attraction to you as a different problem altogether. I’m attracted to you and don’t see why I should deny it. Our kiss in the garden suggests you’re not exactly indifferent to me. The solution seems fairly straightforward.’
    ‘You want me to become the comte’s convenient mistress?’
    ‘I’m not a comte, ’ he said. ‘All I have is the castle.’
    ‘All right, the billionaire’s preferred plaything, then.’
    ‘I’m not a billionaire either. Yet.’ His lazy smile warned her it was on his to-do list. ‘No, I want you to become my outrageously beautiful, independently wealthy lover.’
    ‘Isn’t that the same option?’
    ‘No, you might have noticed that the wording’s a little different.’
    ‘They’re just words, Luc. The outcome’s the same.’
    ‘It’s an attitude thing.’ He looked at her, his smile crookedly charming. ‘So what do you say?’
    To an affair with the likes of Luc Duvalier? ‘I say it’s dangerous. For both of us.’
    Luc’s eyes gleamed. ‘There is that.’
    ‘Not to mention insane,’ she pointed out.
    ‘Quite possibly. Was that a yes?’
    She really didn’t know what to say. She’d wanted to come back to the village a sophisticated, self assured, successful woman, and Luc was treating her exactly like one. No need to mention what a fake she felt. ‘So how do we start this thing? If I were to agree to it. Which I haven’t.’ Yet.
    ‘We start with dinner. Tonight. No expectations beyond a pleasant evening with fine food, fine wine and good company. And we see what happens.’
    ‘I don’t know,’ she said, reaching for her coffee. ‘It seems a little…’
    ‘Straightforward?’ he suggested. ‘Civilised?’
    ‘For us, yes,’ she murmured. ‘Where would we eat? Somewhere public or in private?’
    ‘Somewhere public,’ he said firmly. ‘The restaurant I’m thinking of is a fine one—excellent food, small premises, and always busy. A man might take his lover there if he was trying to keep his hands off her.’
    ‘Shall I meet you there?’ she said.
    ‘I will, of course, collect you,’ he said, playing the autocrat and playing it well. ‘Shall I meet you there, ’ he murmured in disbelief. ‘What kind of question is that?’
    ‘Says the new-generation Frenchman,’ she countered. ‘Liberated, egalitarian, non-sexist…’
    ‘Helpful, attentive, chivalrous…’ he added with a reckless smile. ‘And very beddable.’
    He was that.
    ‘All right,’ she said. ‘I’ll give you the day—and tonight—to prove that a civilised and pleasurable and manageable affair wouldn’t be beyond us. If you can prove this to my satisfaction, I’ll make love with you. If this gets out of hand, however…’
    ‘Yes?’ he said silkily. ‘What do you suggest?’
    She leaned forward, elbows on the table. Luc leaned forward too. ‘Well, I don’t know about you,’ she murmured, ‘but I’m a clever, outrageously beautiful, independently wealthy woman. I plan to run.’
     
    The real estate agent was not waiting for them when they pulled up at the gate to the Hammerschmidt Vineyard an hour later. Gabrielle glanced at Luc suspiciously, her suspicions turning to resignation as he cut the engine of the rumbling Audi and produced a massive set of keys from the centre console of the car. ‘He was tied up with another sale when I saw him this morning,’ said Luc. ‘He said he might be running a little late.’
    ‘So we wait for him?’ said Gabrielle.
    ‘No,’ said Luc. Clearly, the master of Caverness waited for no man. ‘We start without him.’
     
    The Hammerschmidt vineyard comprised two hundred acres of prime grape-growing countryside of which less than half had been