“None other,” he said. He made an excellent impression of a well-heeled Parisian: gray suit, gray waistcoat, gray felt hat, gray suede gloves—even a gray necktie, appropriately loosened in the manner of the locals. He looked expensive and sophisticated and, thanks to the dark circles beneath his eyes, utterly debauched to boot: a man who enjoyed his nights as thoroughly as his days.
He gestured toward the empty chair opposite her. She nodded. What else was she to do?
As he sat down, the cramped quarters forced his knee into her skirts. He gave her a startlingly broad smile. Perhaps his temperament changed with the country, just like his wardrobe. She tried to look away from his throat, but the sight drew her back again. Since her arrival to Paris yesterday, she’d witnessed a hundred gentlemen with ties thus draped. But on Alex, the effect was . . . startling. As if he’d been interrupted while undressing.
It occurred to her that the last time she had seen him, he’d just finished kissing her with expert skill. She felt her face warm.
He threw one long leg over the other and glanced around, utterly at ease, as though he had not just ambushed her in a foreign country. She held very still, overly conscious of her breathing, of the way her fingers itched to fidget. His cheekbones had a dramatic slope to them.
Loose ladies probably had fever dreams about his lips.
Those lips showed no signs of moving in speech.
“What are you doing here?” she burst out.
He lifted one brow as he looked back to her. “What a disingenuous question. I told you I was coming to Paris.” The smile that curved his mouth seemed to weigh a variety of improper possibilities. “Perhaps I should ask if you were following me.”
“What a silly question that would be,” she said irritably, “as I had also already expressed my intention to come here during our last conversation.”
His eyes narrowed. “I believe I stated mine first.”
“Yes, but my idea was born separately. It had nothing at all to do with you.”
“You—” He ran a hand over his face and muttered something beneath his breath which she could not make out. Then he sat back in the chair and pasted on a lazy smile. “Ah, what does it matter. Paris is big enough for the both of us.”
“Then why are you here at my café?”
A muscle ticked briefly in his jaw. “An excellent question,” he said finally. “My sisters have no faith in your chaperone, and apparently their suspicions are correct. She is napping beneath cucumber slices while you are wandering about collecting wine carafes.”
“So there’s my answer,” Gwen said triumphantly. “You found the note I left her.”
The corner of his mouth lifted, but it did not appear to be a sign of good humor. “Yes,” he said. “I found the note.”
“Well, I hope you haven’t come to harass me back to London. I believe I made my opinion very clear with regard to that ridiculous plan on being married by autumn.”
“Yes,” he said. “I have no intentions of inflicting you on anyone, Miss Maudsley. I only wish my sisters felt the same. I’ve come to Paris strictly on a holiday.” As if to illustrate this, he tipped his face up to the sun. A breeze swept over the table, and he closed his eyes and slid lower in his chair, stretching out like some giant, basking house cat.
“Hmm,” she said, wanting him to take note of her skepticism. To her knowledge, Alex had never gone anywhere for a motive as profitless as holidaying.
But his lashes did not so much as flicker at the sound. He covered a yawn with his palm. Perhaps he was telling the truth, then. Certainly she’d never seen him look so . . . carefree.
Indeed, this unusual repose freed her, for once, to look as closely as she liked at him. She decided that his lower lip should give her hope. It looked full enough to pull off a good pout—far too sensitive to belong to a bully.
Despite herself, she leaned forward. Really, his mouth was remarkable. Were men supposed to have such lips? They were a shade darker than his tanned skin, the upper a fraction longer than the lower, but not quite as full. The edges were so precisely defined that she could have traced them, given rice paper and a pen.
He spoke without opening his eyes, his sleepy voice giving her a dreadful start. “Have you found the viscount?”
She jerked back in her seat. “Not yet.”
His eyes opened directly on hers. “I told you I would find him for you. Do you think me incapable?”
Strange that she did not recall being unnerved by his eyes in the past. But they were a startling light blue and seemed to catch her like a fist around the throat. “I don’t doubt your skill,” she said. “And I know my brother would have appreciated your offer. But as I said, I have come to Paris for a variety of purposes, one of which is to make known to the viscount my immense distaste for his actions.” She paused. “I had written a letter about it, but somebody rudely intercepted it and forbade me to mail it.”