But for someone like her, who had fought for every scrap of dignity and respect, and against people’s low opinions for most of her life, how could she not be compromised by such an arrangement? Not just compromised but owned. Because without a job, with no way of paying her own way, she would be not just completely dependent on him but little more than his property.
‘Yes,’ he replied, his puzzled frown only making her feel more compromised, more undermined. ‘Ma maîtresse... Is mistress not the correct word for this in English?’ he added.
‘I... Yes, but I can’t... I don’t want to be your mistress,’ she said, feeling desperately exposed, and even more ashamed than she had when she’d been lying naked under him, with the orgasms he’d given her still echoing in her sex.
‘Why not?’ He seemed genuinely confused.
Couldn’t he see how belittling, even insulting such a suggestion was? Especially given the names he had called her earlier.
Downstairs, he had accused her of being a whore and a slut. She’d dismissed those insults, once she’d figured out his connection to Pierre and why he was so determined to own the de la Mare vines. Those cruel words had been said in the heat of the moment, while he was processing the reality that his father had rejected him again, even from beyond the grave. And if there was anything Cara understood it was how that kind of rejection made you feel—insignificant, angry, vulnerable, hurt—because she’d felt every one of those emotions herself as a child, when she’d waited for her father to visit her, or to at least call, until she’d finally figured out what his si
lence meant... That the promises he’d made to her on the steps of the Westminster children’s centre had all been convenient lies to get her to go with ‘the nice lady’ without a fuss.
But the names Maxim had called her haunted her now. Was that what he really thought of her?
‘We have a rare chemistry, Cara. We would be foolish not to enjoy it while it lasts.’
Taking her hand, he tugged her off the toilet seat. Wrapping his arm around her waist, he pressed his lips to her neck. She shuddered with a need she couldn’t disguise, but found the strength this time to place her hands on his bare chest and push him back.
‘Maxim, please don’t,’ she said.
He let her go but then he smiled, the twist of his lips as cynical as it was amused. ‘Why not? When I can smell how much you still want me?’
She tightened the belt on her robe, aware of her nakedness beneath it, and his nakedness beneath the towel—and the ease with which he could turn her own body against her.
But she didn’t just feel hurt and insulted now, and compromised, she felt foolish. He was laughing at her naïveté. She got that. She had been naïve—to fall into bed with him without a thought to the consequences, and to give him her virginity without realising how much power that would give him. She had also been foolishly optimistic a moment ago, probably because she had been scared and desperate after what she’d done. Foolish to think the solution to a situation which had been decades in the making could ever be solved by him offering her a job.
‘I think you should leave,’ she managed, straightening her spine and welcoming the spike of anger because it helped steady her nerves.
His smile died. ‘What foolishness is this, Cara?’
It hurt to hear him say her name with such gruff intimacy, the desire still thick in his voice. Because a part of her wanted to sink into that intimacy, to take anything he wanted to offer her. But she knew from grim experience there was always a catch to taking that easy road. And if this evening had taught her one thing it was that instant gratification was not the answer.
He lifted his palm to her cheek but she jerked her head out of his reach. ‘Please, Maxim,’ she said. ‘I need to think.’
‘What is there to think about?’ he said. ‘You are mine now, you need medical attention and a new home. This is the best solution.’
A spark of anger burned under her breastbone.
‘The best solution for you, you mean.’ The flush rose into her cheeks but she’d be damned if she’d be embarrassed about it. She wasn’t the only one who had given in to their desires. ‘I don’t want to be your...your kept woman.’
‘What is this ridiculous term?’ he said. ‘Kept woman? What does that even mean?’
‘It means you’d own me.’
‘I would support you—not own you,’ he said through gritted teeth, clearly holding onto his temper with an effort. ‘You would live at Château Durand, but you would be free to leave whenever you wished.’
‘But this is my home, Maxim, and I don’t want to leave it,’ she said, trying to make him understand. If he couldn’t see that him supporting her was the same as him owning her, maybe he would understand this. ‘And I don’t want to let you destroy it, just because you can. I realise your situation with Pierre was complicated, but he left La Maison to me. You can have the vines, there must be a way to get past Pierre’s will there. But I owe it to him not to let you destroy his home.’
She’d said the wrong thing, she knew it as soon as she mentioned Pierre’s name. Maxim’s expression became stormy, but what disturbed her more was the steely determination in his eyes.
‘You owe that bastard nothing. He used you to get to me, if you cannot see this you are even more naïve than the evidence suggests. And I will not change my mind about La Maison. I told him I would destroy this place as soon as he was cold in his grave and I will.’
‘You...you told him?’ Shock came first. ‘When did you tell him?’ she asked, her voice thick with horror as a sickening understanding of what was really going on here took root. Maxim’s determination to destroy La Maison had nothing to do with his business and everything to do with his need for revenge against a dead man.
‘Years ago,’ he said dismissively.
‘How many years ago?’ she asked, the horrifying truth becoming a knot of anguish in her stomach. Had Maxim seduced her deliberately? Had the heat that had flared between them even been real? Or had sleeping with her, in Pierre’s house, only hours after his funeral been just another way for Maxim to get revenge against the man who had rejected and exploited him? Had she been used, not just by Pierre but also by his son? ‘Was it ten years ago? Five? Two?’