“It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“You are supposed to be a scrawny brunette,” Daniel asserted as he quickly took my hand in his.
Even though the connection was brief, desire vibrated through my core. Irritated, I took a step forward and fought the urge to bare my teeth. I couldn’t believe this was happening.
Things like this didn’t happen in real life.
My heart crashed against my ribs and I gritted my teeth as I said, “When I was eighteen maybe.”
He plucked a framed photo off the windowsill behind him, demonstrating a familiarity with Mama’s house that unnerved me.
Thrusting it into my hands he said, “Eighteen?”
It was a picture of me from two years ago, the last time Elena had visited me in Paris. We stood before the Eifel Tower and I had to admit, it was easy to mistake me for someone else. My first few years in Paris, alone, after everything that had happened, were hard on me. Though somehow the family had scrounged up enough money to send me to school, there was little else to spend on food or good clothing. As a result, the twenty two year old me was undernourished, pallid and adorned with hair dyed an unnatural shade of black.
“Twenty two,” I demurred, unable to look up into the blue eyes bearing down on me.
“She went through an awkward phase, Daniel.” Elena took a fresh glass from the cupboard and poured wine as if she was completely oblivious to the tension between us. “All girls do.”
She and Cosima hadn’t, but I didn’t bother to say that.
“I’ve never seen a picture of you,” I spoke quietly, desperately wanting this to be a private conversation. “I don’t have Facebook.”
“Who the fuck doesn’t have a social media account,” he growled, his voice low and dangerous.
Shame flared through me, because it was an omission that my mentor at L’École des Beaux-Arts had harped at me about but growing up in Italy hadn’t instilled a great love of technology in me and honestly, the current social media frenzy kind of freaked me out.
I opened my mouth to snap at him defensively when I noticed that we were close, only a step away from being pressed up against each other, as if we couldn’t stand the space between our bodies even as we reeled from the shock. My heart was fluttering madly but I wasn’t sure if it was with desire or some heady mixture of anger and fear.
I raised my voice and felt it lique
fy with rage. “So, Daniel, you’ve been with my sister four years. What an amazing commitment.”
Suddenly, he loomed over me and I lost my breath when I saw the electricity in his eyes. Thrilled to be sparring, I looked up at him, ready to volley a return when Elena came between us. She pressed a wine glass into Daniel’s hand, frowning at him when he didn’t immediately take it. Finally, with a scowl, he took the glass, put it deliberately down on the table and poured himself a tumbler full of the brandy Mama kept hidden behind the flour in the pantry.
Elena watched him with concern but didn’t say anything. Instead, she tilted the bowl of her wine glass around and around so that it caught the light and cast a red tinted glean against the white wall.
“So, you’re back for good,” he muttered over the rim of the crystal glass as he came to stand before me once again.
I nodded, even more sure of it than I had been before this exchange. I was giddy with nerves, hot with shame and lingering desire for the man who had been my sister’s for the last four years.
“And you are going to help make that happen,” Elena reminded him with a gentle hand on his tense arm and steel in her tone. “You promised to introduce to her to Rossi, remember?”
Daniel’s features softened when he looked down at her, as did hers and I was struck by how perfectly compatible they seemed. It was obvious that they shared a powerful ambition and an iron hard exterior that was impenetrable to most but the very, very lucky.
I swallowed hard; I knew Sinclair better than that.
“I’m sorry, Lena.” He patted her hand and smiled tightly.
Her smile was wider, and I noticed how full her mouth was. “Mexico was hard?”
He nodded and ran a hand through his thick russet mane. Just last night my hands had pulled on those silky strands as I climaxed around him, hoarsely calling his name. “It was necessary.”
“Well, I’m glad it’s finished.” She turned to me and stepped closer against his side for comfort. “It’s so good to have you home after so many years, Giselle. But I have a case going into mediation tomorrow and I’m afraid I have to be off.”
We embraced each other again, and Daniel snared my gaze over her shoulder. We stared intently at each other with my heart thrumming against Elena’s, as if we could somehow discern the beginning of our inexplicable bond and severe it at the base.
“It really is nice to have you home,” Elena murmured once more as she moved away and I caught the flicker of insecurity in the quirk of her lips.