Someone knocked on the half-open door.
“Oiu?” Alexandre stopped his swiveling and placed both booted feet on the floor.
Miss Hiccups walked toward him in her seductive scarlet stilettos. She thrust out her hand. He noticed it was a very small and delicate hand; the shoes transformed her into a much taller woman than she really was.
Deciding a dash of French charm was called for he stood and enclosed her little hand in his own much larger one, raised it to his lips and kissed her fingers.
“I bet you do that to all the women,” she said.
“Not the very ugly ones.” He arched a dark eyebrow for good measure.
Miss Hiccups grabbed her hand back, produced her business card and took a deep breath. Alexandre’s eyes zeroed in on the pale upper slopes of her breasts, framed by the lapels of her black suit jacket. His groin buzzed.
No blouse. A silky camisole maybe? A lacy scrap of a bra? Anything at all?
He cleared his throat, averted his gaze, and eased the little card from her outstretched fingers.
“I’m very pleased to see you’ve made a full recovery, Miss...Kerrigan Lush.”
“It takes more than a coughing fit to wipe me out,” she said, dredging up a business-interview smile.
“And those extraordinary hiccups? Quite the most impressive I’ve ever seen or heard.”
“Are you trying to wind me up?” she demanded, smile waning. “I’m here to write a nice flattering story about you, but if you want a nasty one I can always oblige.”
Alexandre suppressed his answering grin and waved her into the other chair.
“As fierce as a tiger,” he said, shaking his head.
She drew another sharp breath, which gave him the pleasure of her breasts rising between the black lapels again. Then she slapped the mini-recorder down just a little too hard on his desktop.
“Please, not until I’ve finished complimenting you,” he said, eyeing the small machine.
“If that’s your idea of being polite, you’re on the wrong track.”
“You look more a tiger than a meek little pussy cat.”
“Damn right! You’re a control-freak. I don’t like being bossed around in front of other people. Who said you could grab my neck and force my head down when I had the hiccups? I almost overbalanced.”
“In shoes like those, I imagine it would be easy...” He cast an admiring glance down to her ankles.
“Try being five-foot-three. I bet you wouldn’t like it,” she said, running her scorching gaze down his very long legs in return.
Alexandre imagined he felt the leather burn and crisp around his thighs, his knees, his calves, and ankles in turn. Did those gorgeous big brown eyes have built-in lasers?
“Miss Lush,” he began.
“Ms.”
“Ms Lush. I was perhaps hoping you were single?”
She rolled her eyes at that. “I just bet you were.”
“You do a lot of betting, Ms Lush. In less than sixty seconds you’ve bet I kiss the hand of every woman I meet...that I wouldn’t like being five-foot-three, and that I was hoping you were single.”
Another sharp breath. Another delightful lift of her outraged breasts.
“No, I wasn’t betting you hoped I was single. I was being...facetious.”
He hid a further smile. “But you’re still a betting woman?”
“I like a little flutter,” she allowed. “A few dollars each way on the horses, a lottery ticket now and then. Normal Kiwi stuff.”
“And that’s where the danger lies,” he couldn’t help inserting. “So many people get swept up in the excitement of gambling they take ever more unwise chances. You’re not one of these unwise people, Ms Lush?”
“Oh for God’s sake, call me Kerri. Ms Lush sounds like an old-fashioned school-teacher.”
Alex leaned back in his chair and finally allowed his grin to show. “A very curvaceous one, possibly. So you prefer Kerri to Kerrigan? And yet Kerrigan is pretty and most unusual.”
“My mother’s maiden name. Her surname. I was supposed to be a boy.”
“Which would have robbed the world of a beautiful woman.”
“Oh puh-lease...” She reached out and clicked the little recorder on.
“So the flirting really is done and now it’s on to business?” he asked, enjoying the faint flush staining her cheeks. Enjoying more than that, if he was honest. Kerri Lush looked like a firecracker about to explode. Small but delightfully dangerous. Her eyes sparkled with intense tawny fire. Her hair swirled around her head in a bouncing dark cloud. It appeared to have very fine bright streaks running through it at least as red as her sexy shoes.
“Yes, business,” she snapped. “This is scheduled to appear in the Saturday morning paper. We run a lift-out called ‘People’—feel-good stories and so on.”