When You Defy Me (When I'm With You Part 2) (5 page)

Besides, Lucien had no reason to angle for her money. He had his own, and what’s more, he was supremely aloof when it came
to monetary greed.

Wasn’t he?

There
was
that odd obsession he seemed to have with Ian Noble. But
no
, she scolded herself irritably, Lucien wouldn’t do anything sleazy for financial gain. How many other people on the planet
would abstain from a massive fortune that was their birthright?

No, Lucien was the one. She trusted him with her body and her well-being, despite all this bewildering domination business,
not to mention her unprecedented sexual reaction to it.

Even though she’d agreed to this thing with him, she didn’t want him to know about her vulnerability . . . her relative naïveté.
Especially since he’d proposed such a sophisticated sexual arrangement. First of all, he’d never believe her, given all the
hyped-up press about her. His disdain would hurt. Second of all, the idea of giving herself wholly when he knew of her weakness
made her feel too raw. Too exposed.

Lucien had his secrets. It was only fair that she have one of her own.

Lucien stalked through the empty, hushed interior of Fusion, feeling particularly energized at the prospect of his upcoming
meeting. A switch had been flipped in him recently. He’d discovered a newfound purpose here in Chicago, and it had nothing
to do with Ian Noble.

He was considering buying a lovely vintage building ideally located in the South Loop near the once venerable, still atmospheric
Prairie Avenue District. The location would make it the perfect spot for a restaurant and elegant boutique hotel. It was unusual
for him not to have several new business ventures going at once. He’d restrained himself in the past year, however, unsure
how long his business in Chicago would take. He still had several restaurants in Paris and one in Monte Carlo, along with
four thriving European luxury resort hotels. He’d learned the hotel business firsthand from his father years ago. Each of
the businesses he owned today had been acquired and cultivated completely on his own, however, without his father’s money
or assistance. The only debt he owed his father was the excellent training Adrien had provided by allowing him to manage several
of his hotels. Lucien figured he’d repaid that debt amply in hard work and lucrative business decisions. Elise may have called
him an heir the other night, but in truth Lucien had never touched a cent of his inheritance. He’d built a respectable fortune
of his own, and he’d be damned if he ever pocketed dirty money.

The decision to begin a new business signaled a change was in the offing for him. It felt like a breath of fresh air flowing
over the dark oppression of the past few years.

The thought of fresh air made his head turn toward the kitchen.

It was three thirty in the afternoon, the calm between the lunch and dinner bustle in the restaurant. In the distance, he
heard the metallic sound of cookware and pictured Elise in the kitchen, her lovely face sober as she focused her entire attention
on her culinary task. The memory of how she’d tasted when he’d spontaneously kissed her the other day sprung into his mind
in vivid detail. The taste of maple syrup had lingered on her tongue, but the flavor of her—Elise—had been sweeter still.

It’d been a week since he’d caved and hired her as his interim chef, seven increasingly brutal nights since he’d come to
a decision about her. He’d kept his distance with the exception of that regrettable kiss, all too aware that he must wait.
She was his employee, after all.

For the time being.

He’d kept close tabs on her. All reports about her cooking from his staff and patrons had been stellar. Sharon had expressed
her amazement yesterday when she’d come into his office, announcing the arrival of another chef candidate for Lucien to interview.

“Are you unhappy with Ms. Martin’s work?” Sharon had asked.

“Not at all. Should I be?”

“No, everyone is raving about her food. And she’s very pleasant to work with. Have you ever noticed everyone smiles when
she’s around? There’s certainly a new pep to Evan and Javier’s stride.”

“I pay her to cook, not perk up my male employees,” he’d muttered dryly.

“It’s not just the male employees,” Sharon had continued, undeterred by his frown. It was one of the reasons he liked Sharon.
She had a mind of her own. “She’s a nice change for all of us. Do you know Maryanne won tickets to the symphony but couldn’t
go because of her kids?” Sharon asked him, referring to one of their waitresses, a single mother. “Elise volunteered to watch
Allie and David so Maryanne could go. That meant a lot to Maryanne. It meant a lot to me, too,” Sharon added thoughtfully.
“And she’s doing a marvelous job of cooking. Why do you need another chef?”

“Ms. Martin isn’t a fully qualified chef yet,” Lucien had said briskly as he cleared his desk in preparation for the interview.

“Tell that to your elated customers,” Sharon had said wryly before she left to retrieve the chef candidate.

He’d pretended to be brusque, but in truth he’d been pleased that Elise had won Sharon over as a protector. Sharon was no
pushover, and all of his employees looked up to her.

Another part of him was tense, however, waiting for the other shoe to drop. A calm atmosphere and Elise did
not
go together.

She was a storm waiting to break
.

The thought flew into his head as he opened the smoked-glass doors of Fusion and saw Elise standing in the lobby of the Noble
Enterprises tower wearing her chef’s smock and talking to Francesca Arno, Ian’s lover. She was several inches shorter than
Francesca, although he doubted most people would notice the inequity of the two women’s heights. Elise was so vibrant and
animated, like a flickering flame. As he watched, several casual passersby turned to look at her, and not just men. Her strength
of character and palpable charm had always amazed him, even when she’d been a child.

Elise’s expression shifted when she took notice of his approach, but she kept chatting amiably until he arrived by her side.

“Mr. Lenault! You know Francesca, don’t you?” she asked, pink lips curving.

“Of course I do,” he said, leaning down to give Francesca a brief kiss of greeting on the cheek.

“She just told me she’s a runner,” Elise said. “I’m going to start training with her for the Chicago Marathon.”

“You run?” Lucien asked Elise, disguising his surprise.

“Yes. I started a year ago. It’s good
discipline
,” she emphasized, the defiant spark in her sapphire eyes meant solely for him.

“I hadn’t realized you two had met,” he added mildly, ignoring her stab at him.

“I introduced myself last night after experiencing the ecstasy of her Essaouira chicken and strawberry crepes,” Francesca
said, grinning up at him. “She’s brilliant. Ian and I asked for you at Fusion last night, but they said you weren’t in the
restaurant. We had very important news to tell you.”

Francesca was always a lovely woman, but he’d never seen her look quite so radiant as she did when she lifted her left hand.
Lucien laughed and gave her a heartfelt hug. He reexamined the exquisite triple-diamond platinum ring on her finger after
they’d stepped back from the embrace.

“Ian is a very lucky man,” he told her sincerely. He bounced her hand teasingly. “Are you strong enough to handle such a
heavy ring?”

“I’m strong enough,” Francesca told him archly, and he knew she’d precisely understood his double entendre.

He smiled, pleased yet again by Ian’s choice. “I believe you are.”

“Thank you. Ian picked it out himself,” Francesca said amusedly, her eyelids narrowing. “And if you know any different, don’t
tell me.”

“He most definitely picked it out himself.”

Francesca beamed at his steadfast answer. “We’re throwing a little get-together at the penthouse Sunday night to celebrate.
I hope that you’ll come. You too,” she told Elise irrepressibly.

“Oh, that’s so nice of you to ask, thank you. But . . . I don’t think I can,” Elise prevaricated, her hesitant, meek manner
completely unbelievable to Lucien.

“Of
course
you can,” Francesca insisted. “You told me just now that you hardly know anyone in the city. You’ll love my friends Davie
and Justin and Caden. . . . Well, Justin and Caden will love
you
, in fact, but they’re relatively harmless. And Fusion is closed on Sundays and Mondays, so I know you’re not working. Isn’t
that right, Lucien? Tell her.” Francesca glanced at him for assistance. He held Elise’s gaze as he spoke.

“Of course you should go, Ms. Martin. It will do you good to make some friends in a new city.”

Elise’s eyes widened in surprise at his agreeable tone. Clearly she’d thought he’d signal for her to decline the invitation,
but Francesca’s sincere request had blocked that option.

“Will you be there Monsieur Lenault?” Elise asked, eyes wide and innocent.

“I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

Her slight frown told him she’d understood his subtext. Allow Elise to run wild in the Noble penthouse without supervision?

Not likely.

The following day, Elise glanced up when Sharon walked into the kitchen.

“Lucien would like to see you in his office, Elise.”

The knife she held in her hand stilled at the news. It took her a moment to recover, something she hoped Evan and Sharon
didn’t notice. It’d been a seemingly innocuous announcement, after all.

“You can take over here, Evan. You have it down perfectly,” she said with a reassuring smile as she set down the knife. She’d
been instructing and assisting Evan in the dressing of a capon. “I’m sure I won’t be long,” she added over her shoulder after
she’d washed up.

She coached herself to ignore the butterflies she felt as she walked down the long hallway to Lucien’s office. He couldn’t
be requesting the meeting because she’d done anything wrong. Her work ethic had been unquestionable. In fact, she was usually
the first one there in the morning, eager to begin cooking. Part of that motivation might have been the depressing dreariness
of her hotel room—not to mention a desire to pass Baden Johnson’s room before he awoke from his nightly intoxication—but the
point was, she’d
been
here, ready to work. She’d become an expert at avoiding her leering, malodorous neighbor at the Cedar Hotel.

Her stomach fluttered with anticipation as she knocked on the carved wood door, graphic memories of her former meeting with
Lucien in his office flooding her consciousness and mounting her anxiety.

“You wanted to see me?” she asked a moment later when Lucien opened the door. Today he was dressed in black jeans, a simple
black crew-neck shirt, and an ivory blazer that highlighted his broad shoulders and the smooth, beautiful color of his skin.
He was such a sinfully gorgeous man, some rare, magical blend of unknown origins, the mystery of his existence somehow perfectly
fitting the magnetic enigma surrounding him. She recalled how once during her fourteenth summer, she’d bluntly asked him about
his ethnic heritage. They’d been fishing off the dock, a pastime they’d both gravitated toward that summer, a simple, wholesome
activity that stood in such contrast to the complex machinations of their parents’ business and social lives. It was obvious
to anyone that Lucien couldn’t be the natural child of his blond, painfully thin mother, and Lucien towered over his paunchy,
balding father. Lucien hadn’t taken offense, probably because he’d sensed her childlike sincerity and simple curiosity.

“I never knew or saw my biological parents. My mother and father adopted me when I was still a baby,” he’d replied, nodding
at her fishing line. She’d obediently lifted it, and sure enough, a fish had stolen her bait. He took it from her without
comment.

“I’m adopted, too,” Elise had told him. She’d thought it a thousand times before. It must be true. How else to explain how
she felt as if she were interacting with a different species when she related to her parents? Lucien’s smile had struck her
as a little sad.

“You are the spitting image of your mama.”

“I am?”

“Yes, but you will surpass even her beauty one day,” he’d said as he rebaited her line. He’d glanced aside and noticed her
expression. “You
look
like her
. What is on the inside is whatever you make of it.”

She’d stared at the sunlight dancing in the azure Mediterranean Sea, not wanting him to know how much his words meant to
her. “Don’t you ever wonder about your true mother, though? Don’t you ever miss her?”

She recalled how he hadn’t answered immediately.

“I wonder about her once in a while,” he’d said, handing back her pole. “But it’s hard to miss what you’ve never had.”

What you’ve never had
. Neither Lucien nor she had known much about what it meant to have a nurturing, available mother.

Lucien waved her into his office, snapping her back to the present. “Come in. Elise, I’d like you to meet Denise Riordan,
Fusion’s new chef.”

Elise’s startled gaze flew to the other occupant of the room. A tall, auburn-haired woman with a stern expression that was
softened by kind brown eyes stood to greet her.

“I hadn’t realized Lucien had gotten so far along in the hiring process. It’s a pleasure to meet you, Ms. Riordan,” Elise
managed, despite her surprise.

“I understand from Lucien that you’re a talented chef. I would be glad to take you on as my stage, if my qualifications are
suited to your school . . . and to you, of course,” she said.

“I’m sure that anyone Lucien would hire has the best qualifications,” she said, glancing sideways at the distraction of Lucien’s
tall form when he approached.

“I’ve already taken the liberty of sending off Ms. Riordan’s applicant information along with an explanation of the alteration
in plans to your school in Paris. We should be hearing back quickly,” Lucien said.

“Thank you,” Elise replied, dumbfounded by the fact that he’d taken pains to smooth the path with her school.