Silhouette Intimate Moments 1393, November 2005
Suspense Romance
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It was silent as Roxie crossed the landing, as if someone had turned the sound down on a TV. Roxie put her ear close to the door and heard nothing. Not a sound.

It could be the wrong apartment. She knocked lightly. Nothing.

About to reach for the handle, she hesitated, thinking it could be very awkward if she was wrong. Then told herself, don't be a coward. All you have to say is you're looking for Madame Billaud the seamstress who's doing some specialized work for Charles Fortier, the couturier.

Everyone had heard of Charles.

Yes, if she made a mistake, she would simply ask them to redirect her. She tried the handle.

The door to the apartment opened easily. She took a deep breath and called loudly, "Bon soir. C'est Roxie...."

The rest of her announcement stuttered to a halt in the face of a deadly looking gun. She blinked in the bright lights for a few seconds, and still none of the men facing her spoke a word.

It was she who broke the ominous silence by blurting out, "Bloody hell!" in English, the second of the languages she'd grown up speaking.

The gun never wavered an inch.

Not even when the thin, hollow-cheeked man grabbed the shoulder she was desperately trying to ease back through the open door. He pulled her into the room.

Her eyes winced at the sudden transition from dark to light. But all the same, it looked as if she'd stumbled into the middle of a home invasion.

Four strange men and one solitary woman. Latent instincts stirred in her brain, telling her that the danger she felt could come from more than just a gun.

At first, Roxie's shocked eyes merely grazed the others in the room. Now her gaze lit on the largest man, who held it with the fierce, glittering-gold intensity of his own.

She drew a shuddering breath to still the mind-numbing fear crawling under her skin.

The Kincaid family never showed weakness and Grand-mère's bred strong women. Yet she doubted if they'd ever met anyone like the huge, broad-shouldered man dominating the others.

Not with physical force, but by the leashed power of his expression and the glittering light in his eyes.

Consumed by a frantic need for survival, she latched onto the notion that this was the man to deal with. The one who could mend the faux pas she'd made by barging in without permission.

Might this be the time to mention her muddle with the directions?

As though in a dream, she watched the big man's lips purse, a wry expression softening the sharp angles of ruggedly blocked features. Handsome features.

She felt hypnotized, compelled to react, though her intense response to the fiery shimmer in his eyes lost its impact when she felt the thin guy holding the gun tighten his grip on her.

It was as if she was caught in limbo, between sheer unadulterated terror and bewilderment. Pick one.

Her intuition told her it was entirely reasonable to expect the big guy to take her fear in the palm of one large hand and crush it into extinction.

But what did he want, expect, from her in return?

Yet, he was the antithesis of everything she'd built her career around. Miles away from the tailoring that made her designs work and had caught Charles's eye at her grandmother's funeral.

Madame Fortier accompanied Charles to Père-Lachaise, the old Paris cemetery where Grand-mère had been buried. It was then Roxie discovered that Grand-mère and Charles's mother went way back, even before they fought together in the French Resistance.

That meeting had changed Roxie's life.

And though she had left the London School of Design for Charles's workroom to a chorus of it's-not-what-you-know-it's-who, Grand-mère had brought her up to be practical, not stupid.

A survival trait she'd always managed to adhere to until now. She stared at the guy with slicked back hair, designer stubble and a black leather jacket that shouted "Biker!"

She must be mad. Her normal reaction would be to run a mile, not beg for this huge stranger's help.

"Roxie." When he spoke, none of the softness she had noticed before lingered in the rasp of his voice, but he knew her name!

It took a second to remember he'd heard her call out.

"Didn't I tell you I would be out tonight and not to bother me?" Once he'd spoken her name, each dry consonant that followed cut her hopes into rags with the sharpness of a knife.

Through the mists of apprehension clouding her mind, she perceived he expected something in return for the verbal lifeline he had thrown her...but what?

She metaphorically reached out with trembling hands, certain beyond all reason that her future depended on her response. "I saw the light from the courtyard...and, I thought...that, well I would surprise you."

He strode lazily toward her, as she desperately tried not to cower while watching him pocket a gun that hadn't registered with her before.

And though her every instinct screamed it was a bad move, her hand flew to her lips as her stomach somersaulted nearer to her mouth.

Behind him, the narrowest hand on the utilitarian clock counted out what might be the last seconds of her life.

His long legs covered the distance in half the steps it would have taken her. But she wasn't fooled by the perception of indolence; this big man was more dangerous than the razor-jawed creature holding her shoulder.

"So, Chéri," he drawled as he halted in front of her, "I guess I surprised you instead?"

His fingers prized her hand away from her mouth as she nodded, unable to deny the obvious. Then her head whirled as the man she hoped was her savior grabbed the wrist of the one holding her.

Without effort he sent both clinging hand and its owner spinning back a few feet. "Your kind of help we can do without."

Such blatant force was alien to Roxie. In fact, she'd never encountered even a suggestion of the energized enmity circling, gathering, waiting to ambush them all without provocation.

Her hopes took a dive as the shortest man of the group barked out, "Who is this woman? Why is she here?"

She hoped the big guy had a good explanation up his sleeve, for she was too frightened to see past her blunder, or to worry how annoyed her boss was going to be with her when she reported back, if ever.

With his leather-covered arm casually circling her shoulders, Roxie's heart raced out of control.

Her designated protector gave the appearance of nonchalance, yet she wasn't too dumbstruck to notice the hand closest to his gun was kept free, as she stared at the broad palmed hand cupping her shoulder.

Dark gold hairs softened the wide sinewy shape. His fingers were long, blunt-tipped, more like a carpenter's than a gunman's.

As she glanced across at the other armed men, she wondered if his hand was large enough to hold his life as well as her own.

"This is ma petite amie." Girlfriend. He directed the conversation to the fat man. "If you'd waited where we originally arranged, her being here wouldn't be a problem. But if it bothers you, Zukah, speak up."

Roxie was scared out of her wits, yet as she was pressed close to his side as he uttered his unequivocal statement, and though the situation more closely resembled a funeral than a wedding, she wanted to say, "Or forever hold your peace."

Though trembling inside, she felt grateful this man had ranged his overwhelming presence on her side.
By the tension in the air, she could tell the game they'd been playing when she arrived hadn't been going too well.

She mentally crossed her fingers.

Dear God, please let her be on the side of the angels.

The Algerian made a grudging concession. "As long as she doesn't interfere in matters that aren't her concern, she'd better stay."

Angels, she decided were in a minority of one.

She looked up, hoping for reassurance as the big guy's fingers squeezed her arm to attract her attention.
"You've always known what I was, Chéri," he said, "Though you tried to ignore it. Now, the blinkers are off, tell me once more."

Utter confusion made her stammer, "T-tell you what?"

"Say, I still love you, Mac." Wow, she knew his name.

Her heart climbed back to her throat, fluttering in panic.

Uh-uh, this wasn't the time to be chickenhearted. She would say the words as if her life depended on it.

Which it just might?

Fear of failure sent her pulse thundering in her ears as his face lowered to hers. Massive shoulders loomed, shaded her.

Unpredictably, his open jacket seemed like a place she could hide. Her throat felt bone-dry, unused. "I still love you, Mac."

"That's better," he murmured.

The touch of his mouth was cool, dry and almost impersonal. Yet too much to ask of synapses scattered by feeling herself being lifted as if she were no bigger than a doll.

Her hand clutched a fistful of supple leather to make it look real as well as for support. They were being watched.

She clung as she'd never clung to a man before, praying her association with this man named Mac wouldn't make her continue the wild, scary ride that had begun with staring down the muzzle of a gun.