Reach for the Stars Read online

  He shook his head. ‘I’m pretty sure we’re off the press radar. And I’m not delusional. I don’t imagine she’s going to tip off a paparazzo to come and hang about on the street corner just because some actor who used to be in a TV series is eating dinner at her restaurant.’

  ‘Not just any actor,’ she remarked. ‘And MOTV isn’t just any series.’

  ‘How would you know?’ he mocked. ‘You’ve hardly watched any of it!’

  Her feelings bounced around like a ping-pong ball. She should be relieved, but nonetheless it stung a tiny bit that he was tactfully saying the celebrity gossip mags weren’t interested in photographing him with her. She studied the menu in her hands and all the unfamiliar French words swam before her eyes.

  ‘At the end of the day I’m a pretty shabby follow-up to dating a princess.’

  ‘Why would you say that?’ He closed the menu, which he wasn’t reading anyway, and set it on the table. Underneath his cutlery jingled.

  ‘What I’m trying to say is that it’s good that nobody’s taking photos of us together. And if you’re at all worried about the selfies on my phone you needn’t be. I’m not going to stick them up on the internet and make you look uncool.’ She opened her clutch bag and pushed her phone across the table to him. ‘You can delete them if you like.’

  ‘I don’t care about how you make me look.’ His lips set in a solemn line. ‘For what it’s worth, I happen to think you look pretty cool. Sure, I’d prefer to keep a low profile while we’re in Paris. But that’s not about me. That’s for you. After what happened with Joe I didn’t think you’d want to find pictures of …’ He glared across the table at her, a deep furrow carved in his brow. ‘… Us plastered all over the internet, or anywhere else for that matter.’ He hesitated. ‘Of course, if you want to post a selfie or two to get back at him, I completely understand. At the end of the day that’s what this – you and me – is all about, right?’

  ‘Do you want me to use you to get at him?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘Me neither.’ Between them sat a small vase containing fresh summer flowers and a glowing, flickering tea-light in a glass holder. She pressed the palms of her hands together, and wrapped her head around what he’d just said. ‘So,’ she began. ‘This isn’t about Joe. I’m not sure it ever really was. It’s you and me. Nobody else. And. Well. I won’t take any more selfies anyhow.’

  The corners of Nick’s mouth twitched into a half smile that promised to erupt into a full on devilish beam. ‘You can take as many selfies as you like. Knock yourself out. In fact. Let’s take one now.’

  He twisted in his seat so that he could take the picture. Grinning, happy that he was okay about her taking photos of them together in Paris, she leant across the table to get closer. A wisp of green chiffon from her dress dangled dangerously into the tea-light holder. Unnoticed, it smouldered and in a microsecond an acrid whiff rose from the table centre. Layla shrieked as she realized that the beautiful dress was singed.

  In a flash Nick blew out the candle, leapt from his chair, removed the champagne from the ice bucket and dumped its entire contents of frigid water and ice cubes all over Layla. When she shrieked again with the shock of being doused in ice, he frantically clutched for the tablecloth, yanked hard, and like a magician performing a spectacular fail, sent a clatter of cutlery, side plates, and glasses smashing onto the carpet. Kicking the flower-strewn mess away he rugby tackled her to the floor and rolled her over and over until she was wrapped up in the tablecloth like an Egyptian mummy.

  The raven-haired woman ran over from where she’d been polishing glasses behind the bar, flapping her dishtowel and brandishing a fire extinguisher. Without further ado she proceeded to blast Nick and Layla with a whoosh of foam.

  At the bar, a portly elderly customer who’d been hunched on a stool and swirling amber Armagnac around a balloon glass, whistled through his teeth and muttered, ‘Oh là là là là’ over and over like he’d never seen anything quite so entertaining in all his days. To top it off the mynah bird launched into a full and uninterrupted rendition of Je Ne Regrette Rien.

  The old gentleman guffawed with laugher, knocked back his drink and hopped down from his perch. He winked at Layla and Nick and snapped a couple of photos on his phone, posing for a final selfie. ‘No Regrets!’ he shouted. ‘C’est bien vous? L’un des frères télé-vampire?’ He reached down to shake Nick by the hand.

  ‘Yep! It’s me alright, the telly-vampire!’

  With a wave of his wooden walking stick the man pocketed his phone and exited the restaurant, still chuckling.

  ‘Great,’ Layla spluttered, struggling to stand up. ‘What did you do that for? Bit of an overreaction don’t you think?’

  ‘That’s gratitude for you.’ He got to his feet and pulled her after him. ‘I thought you were on fire.’

  She unwrapped herself from the tablecloth and looked down at the bedraggled dress. ‘It’s totally ruined.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’ His face was ghostly pale. ‘The point is – are you okay?’

  ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘You’re not hurt?’

  She gently touched his face and wiped away a blob of foam. ‘Nick, I’m okay. Honest. I’m sorry I scared you.’

  The small gaggle of other customers in the restaurant cheered as he pressed a soft kiss to her lips and there was a ripple of applause.

  ‘So much for romance!’ The cold damp dress clung to her body and her teeth chattered.

  ‘You’re freezing. I’ll ask if they’ve got anything we can change into.’

  While a waiter cleared up the mess, the bustling owner relocated the couple into the storeroom where she produced two pairs of black and white checkered chef’s trousers and t-shirts with Le Plein Soleil scrawled across the front in loopy letters and the restaurant’s address on the back.

  They changed sheepishly. Stuffing their wet clothes into a plastic bin liner Layla whispered, ‘This is going from bad to worse. Do you think she’s going to make us wash dishes?’

  Nick smiled. ‘I’ll try a charm offensive. Promise I’ll pay for the damage.’

  Admiringly, she watched as he diplomatically smoothed things over with the restaurant owner. A frisson rippled along the length of her spine. She felt like someone had pushed her into the middle of the River Seine in a rowboat without any oars. Paris had taken her out of her comfort zone and Nick had stolen her heart. She had fallen in love with him.

  Installed at a different table with a fresh bottle of champagne, they whizzed their way through snazzy starters followed by a traditional main course.

  While Nick read the dessert menu she picked up the salt pot and spilled some onto the table. Absently she swirled her finger through it.

  ‘Isn’t that bad luck?’

  She looked him hard in the eyes. ‘It’s salt. Anyway, I’m getting better about that stuff.’

  He nodded, took a pinch of salt between his finger and thumb and threw it over his shoulder. ‘Just in case.’

  Layla’s heartbeat skipped. She pinched some salt, and did the same. She didn’t care that the night had turned into a fiasco. She was deliriously, irrationally, head-over-heals happy and she didn’t want anything to change that.

  Nick poured her some more champagne and clinked her glass with his. ‘Cheers.’ He passed her the menu. ‘What are you having for dessert?’

  ‘You!’

  ‘No, really,’ he said, plainly not taking her seriously. ‘What would you like?’ He pinned her with his gaze and she blushed. Heat spread up her neck, rose into her cheeks, and burned. ‘How about Crème Brulée to share, two spoons, one plate?’

  ‘You know the way to a girl’s heart.’ The cheesy line was out before she could stop it.

  ‘I have another irresistible suggestion. When we’re done here let’s take a tour of Paris by night.’

  ‘Fab.’

  When the waiter brought the Crème Brulée she tucked in. Its deliciousness didn’t sweeten the
fact that Nick had sidestepped her attempt at skipping dessert and going back to the hotel. The direct approach was an epic fail. After a couple of mouthfuls, she set her spoon down. ‘Beaten by dessert,’ she confessed.

  ‘In that case.’ Nick pulled the plate that had been sitting between them closer. He loaded his spoon with another mouthful.

  She raised an incredulous eyebrow. ‘The words “photo” and “shoot” come to mind.’

  ‘The hotel has a gym.’ He shrugged. ‘I’ll work it off.’ He scoffed the lot, ‘That was fantastique.’ He kissed the tips of his fingers flamboyantly into the air. ‘Mwah!’

  A tight knot twisted beneath her ribs. ‘Do you think the pictures that man took are up online already?’

  ‘Almost certainly.’

  ‘Don’t you mind?’

  ‘For myself?’ He gave a shrug. ‘Not really. I’ve gotten used to it.’ He reached across the table and touched her hand. ‘For you though? Yes. I mind.’ He sighed. ‘The thing is I can’t protect you the way I’d like to.’

  ‘From what?’

  ‘From my not-so-stellar reputation.’

  ‘I don’t care about your reputation. I know the real you. Anyway, I’m mainly interested in your stellar body.’

  He reached across the table and his hand covered hers. ‘I liked having you to myself – without people snooping and taking pictures.’ He paused, gauging her reaction. ‘Being together without …’ He paused, hooked his fingers in the air and pulled a mocking face. ‘… The “celebrity” magnifying glass was the most fun I’ve had in …’ He stopped abruptly and looked down at the table for a second. Raising his gaze to catch hers he added, ‘I was going to say in a hell of a long time, but actually it feels like forever.’

  A lump of emotion clogged her throat. She was a million miles from resembling the sophisticated women he was used to. She steeled her heart to prove that she could be the cool take-what-I-want-and-walk-away woman she had claimed she wanted to be.

  ‘This is a moving on thing, right?’ She leaned towards him and rested her palm against his smooth jaw. ‘Short and sweet?’ Her instincts tripped her up. She was saying one thing and feeling something different.

  ‘I don’t want to you to regret that I brought you to the “city of romance” without the romance.’

  ‘I don’t have any regrets.’ He was a man in a million, so much more than a man-shaped sticking plaster and moving on sex. ‘About any of this. Today has been brilliant. I loved being at the opera with you tonight. But if it’s alright with you I’d like to concentrate on what we’re really good at.’ She fixed a smile on her face. Did she have to spell it out? She wanted to hide away with him in their fabulous hotel suite.

  He narrowed his eyes and looked at her for a long moment, his face muscles taut. He was about to reply when the restaurant lady who’d been scrutinizing them from behind the bar whilst making a production of polishing an already sparkling clean glass approached the table and interrupted, ‘C’est terminé?’

  ‘We’ll have two espressos, s’il vous plait.’ His sexy smile pierced her heart. ‘We’re not quite finished yet.’

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  ‘Once upon a time my mother drank herself into a stupor and fell asleep in the bath with a lighted candle on the windowsill. It set the blinds on fire. If I hadn’t smelt burning and woken her up I don’t know what would have happened.’ He paused, sliding into the back of the limo next to her. ‘Well. Actually. I do.’

  ‘Nick, that’s dreadful.’ Her hand touched his. ‘How old were you?’

  He swallowed as if to dislodge the lump in his throat; these memories were dangerous territory. He’d said more than enough already. It was becoming a habit. ‘Nine or ten. I don’t really remember.’

  He heard her sharp intake of breath. ‘I hate to think of you having to cope with that when you were so young.’

  ‘Anyway, I’m sorry about going into panic mode back there at the restaurant.’ His heart had nearly stopped when she’d screamed. He’d smelt smoke, feared the worst, and reacted on automatic. He tapped on the glass between him and the driver. ‘Take a detour, please,’ he said. ‘We’d like to see the lights of Paris, before we go back to the hotel.’

  With the flick of a button he closed the limo’s privacy screen.

  It was time to get his act together. And he couldn’t see a way for her to be a part of that. What they had was red hot and combustible and on course to burn out. There was a slight irony in that. He’d wanted her to have a wonderful time tonight, but after the restaurant incident, he feared Paris had fallen short of her expectations.

  He turned away, absently observing the sights outside the tinted windows. The car crawled past the spectre of Notre Dame, and then sped up, whizzing along the banks of the Seine where blurry strings of white lights punctured the darkness, circumnavigating the Place de la Concorde, and driving along the Champs Elysées to the Arc de Triomphe.

  ‘Layla?’ The lump in his throat swelled some more. He turned his head and watched for her reactions as she took in Paris by night.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘What would you say if I said I’d like to keep you here, forever in this moment?’

  Their eyes locked, the fire between them so far from burnt out that he ached. He needed to hear that she wanted him until the end of the week, or the end of time, or anywhere in between.

  ‘Same. But that’s just not possible. Right?’

  ‘Right,’ he agreed. The pull of attraction that buzzed between them couldn’t be any stronger.

  She snapped her gaze away. ‘Apart from anything else, cruising around Paris in a limousine on a permanent basis might be a bit impractical.’

  ‘Very.’ He blocked out false hopes.

  ‘I’m sure we could find ways to make it fun.’ From beneath her lashes she sneaked a sideways glance at him. The car crossed a bridge and the Eiffel Tower stretched high above them, a pillar of light in the night sky. ‘Wow!’ The lights on the tower started to sparkle in the darkness. ‘Paris by night is très romantique.’

  In an instant she’d unsnapped both their seatbelts and was astride him blowing his mind with the burningly sultry look she was giving him, and her confusing contrariness. Her thighs pressed against him, her hands cradling his face, her lips gently crushing his, craving a reaction. His mouth sought hers and he nipped at her bottom lip.

  She ruptured the kiss, breathed hot against his skin. ‘Have you ever fantasized about sex in the back of a limo?’

  ‘You have?’

  She shook her head. ‘Before tonight? No. You?’ Biting her bottom lip she slid her hands inside his shirt, and as she flattened her palms smooth against his skin, her nails lightly grazed his chest. His heartbeat quickened under her hand. It felt as if her fingers were drawing on his skin, tracing like pencils, leaving their imprint – only it wasn’t on the surface, it was deep within.

  ‘Me neither.’ She was like nothing he’d experienced before.

  ‘That’s good to know.’ She pressed her lips to the skin below his Adam’s apple and traced her mouth ever so slowly up over his throat, kissing along the line of his jaw, giving him such intense pleasure it was all he could do to stop from tipping her backwards onto the cool grey leather and taking her fast.

  For a split second she pulled back and waited. That was it. Urgent for the feel of her, he trapped her mouth and she returned his kiss with matched passion. Straddling him she pressed in tight and he swelled and strained between her parted thighs. The tip of her tongue touched his and his fever to be inside her, to give her pleasure, climbed higher. Heat. Desire. Aching hard. He was lost, luxuriating in her sensuality.

  ‘If you make me wait any longer I think I’ll melt. Let’s …’

  He groaned, desperate. Liking her sudden brazenness, he ached to do as she asked, be inside her. Now. She drove him wild.

  A blur of headlights and lit-up shop fronts dragged him into a drain of reality. Along with the sounds of the night – blast
on a horn, distant siren – everything he felt for her was amplified. ‘No.’ He wouldn’t exploit the moment for kicks. ‘Not here.’

  The atmosphere inside the limo felt dangerous. Like she might break him. Or he her. Or both. She’d been pure temptation and she’d turned into something more, someone so special, different. This was something he hadn’t been afraid of failing at, until now. He wasn’t playing games. His fear might be irrational, but he wouldn’t risk her public humiliation by having sex in a chauffeur driven car no matter how badly he wanted to ignore the protective notion that drove him to hold back. After the scene at the restaurant he didn’t trust anyone not to turn amateur-paparazzi with their smartphone, especially not an unknown driver with only a screen between them.

  ‘You don’t want me?’

  ‘Don’t think I’m not tempted.’ Restraint had made his voice angry and she slipped from his lap and settled on the seat beside him tucking her legs under her as if she were curled up on the sofa in her cottage.

  Fighting the aching in his groin, he took control and spoke to the driver. ‘The hotel, please.’

  She spiked her hands into her disorderly hair, unclipping and redoing the clasp that held it at the back of her neck. She’d possessed him and he couldn’t put what he was feeling into words. He reached across and massaged the nape of her neck.

  ‘Don’t hate me,’ he said, resolute that failing to fulfill her fantasy was the right thing to do.

  Inside the hotel suite the door banged closed heavily behind them and he locked it. He reached out, spun her around and pulled her into his arms. His mouth crashed on hers. Holding her tight with one arm, he secured the bar that would prevent anyone on the outside with a keycard from entering.

  Walking away after the weekend would be a struggle going by the strength of her feelings. Her emotions had soared when he’d said he wanted to make the moment in the car last forever. She hadn’t known what to make of it, so she’d brushed it off and gone into femme fatale overdrive – not something she had previous experience of. She’d have to try supremely hard to be the wild woman she’d set out to channel at the beginning of this whole fling thing. Because right now it wasn’t working out so well.