The Englishman cried out, tumbling onto the ground, his arms and legs flailing in the air in all directions before he landed with a loud thud.
Paul smiled, wiping his cane on the ends of his black cape with the tips of his fingers. The dirty hands of the Englishman would never touch the girl, he swore, sweeping the cane under his cloak with little effort. It disappeared like grains of sand caught on the wind.
“You tripped me, monsieur,” the Englishman accused, struggling in his drunken state to stand up. “I should call you out for that, except I’ve already sent my bodyguards home for the night. And I refuse to dirty my hands on the likes of you.”
“Me, monsieur?” Paul couldn’t help but snicker. The man resembled a pot of jellied consommé, dumped onto a saucer. “I am but a poor artist.”
“I don’t believe you, monsieur,” demanded the Englishman. “You’re a magician. What have you got in your hand?”
“Nothing, monsieur—” The artist feigned a look that clearly said he was insulted. Adding to the effect, a muscle in his neck twitched and his eyes loomed large in his handsome face, casting a surrealistic, dangerous twist to his features. Smiling, he threw open his cape, his muscular chest straining against the thinness of his white shirt, “—but this!”
With a grandiose gesture he pulled out a faded handkerchief and waved it under the man’s nose. The Englishman reeled backward, caught off balance by the heady smell of patchouli, a minty perfume from India that spoke of long nights of exhaustive pleasure.
Paul bowed slightly. “Your servant, monsieur.”
The Englishman shook his head in disgust. “You and your magic don’t fool me. You helped that girl to escape.”
“You are mistaken, monsieur.”
“You have insulted the Duke of Malmont, monsieur. Next time we meet, it won’t be under such unsavory circumstances in front of peons. And when we do, I swear I will kill you,” the Englishman threatened, squaring his shoulders and wiping the dust off his coatsleeves. He stalked off in another direction, his battered British pride flattened in front of the market jammed with porters, commissionaires and wholesale and retail buyers stocking food on their hand carts.
Paul tapped his cane on the sawdust-strewn floor in an uneven rhythm, a mental fear engulfing him. He was rid of the Englishman, his threat meaningless to him, but the redhead wasn’t safe with Monsieur Renard looking for her. He must get her out of here, this goddess who couldn’t be more than nineteen, not yet a woman.
Where did she come from?
He often frequented the back doors of the cabarets and theaters where the women he met were victims of lascivious upper-class diversion long before he stroked their feminine egos with compliments and money. These women had succumbed to a living death on the silken sheets of sexual perversion and greed. One fed off the other. He merely provided a way out for them, indulging in their fantasies, giving them the joy of his cock for one night.
Unless he helped her, he had no reason to believe the future for this redhead would be any different. He tried to imagine her life on the streets. Begging for a sou might buy bread, but the day would come when her pitiful plea would buy nothing but an offer to take from her the one thing she could sell but once: her virginity.
He wondered what hope she would have then when she lay on her back with languid eyes turned away from the stranger thrusting inside her so deep, the walls of her cunt grabbing for him hungrily, betraying her. Hope that died with each thrust, each sweaty moan, each careless fondle. Paul knew the darkness of perversity came next. It always did.
He rubbed the handle of his cane between his fingers. Sticky sweat imprinted his fingerprints on the smooth ebony. He must save her from that darkness.
CHAPTER FIVE
Running from the beast they call Monsieur Renard, I’ve never been so scared as when I saw him spring toward me like a wild animal. I swear I saw him pull out his dick, dark and meaty, and wave it at me. The pungent smell of his sweat overwhelmed me. Repulsive. Because of him, I’ve lost Paul Borquet.
You fool.
Okay, so the artist is sexy, gorgeous, and has a cock that lives up to his reputation, if it’s as big as it felt pressing against my hip. And when he spanked me, I squealed with both surprise and pleasure, arcing my back up toward him. I’ll never snicker at those SM personal ads again. There’s something about a little whack on the butt that sets off a girl’s libido like a vibrator on autospeed.
But if you think I’m going to tell you what he whispered in my ear when he was playing with my cunt, dream on. I can’t think about it now. I gotta haul my butt outta here before that creepy Monsieur Renard finds me and turns me into his own private peepshow. Why do I get all the corpulent creeps? Why don’t I get the Disney dream with the dorky dwarves and cute little elephants?
You got the handsome prince, kiddo. What more do you want?
Yeah. I can’t keep a smirk from crossing my lips. What hands that artist has. Stroking, rubbing my clit in perfect rhythm. I imagine him licking the insides of my thighs until I can no longer stand up; then I collapse into his arms and he catches me; before I can think of the right French idiom for fuck me hard, he kneels and puts his mouth on me and makes me climax un, deux, trois.
Yes, I’m willing to believe I’ve traveled back in time, if that will keep this scenario going and help me find Paul Borquet.
First, escape.
Inside the Black Beau bistro I’m surprised to find it so small it has no table. And no customers. Only a bar and a couple of chairs stacked in the corner. Heavy steam pours out of the big pots cooking on the stove. I pull back to escape the hot vapors before they scald my exposed skin. I hear the angry stomping of leather boots outside. Close, too close. I take one step backward, then a second, and find myself flattened against the back wall of the tiny bistro.
Crazy. I’m hiding out in a deserted restaurant in a market demolished long ago, the dark, worn wooden chairs and dented pots casting distorted images of a past where I don’t exist.
Until now.
My heart races; my body is flushed.
“Where’s the girl with the red hair?” I hear a man’s voice yell, the crack of his whip cutting through the still morning air. I peek through the tiny hole in the door. It’s Monsieur Renard.
“She went into the Black Beau,” someone says.
I look around. Where can I hide? There’s no back door, and no one attending to the steaming pots of hot liquid boiling on the stove. Talk about lousy customer service. I wish I knew what to do next, but I don’t. I’ve used up my smart chick trick quota for today. A wave of fear washes over me as I grab a big, heavy broom to defend myself. I’m not going down without a fight. I will never allow that thug to snatch me, grab my breasts, his yellow teeth closing around my nipples, biting hard.
I begin whacking a big pot of boiling soup across its belly, sweating and grunting, until the kettle starts wobbling back and forth on the stove and the steaming hot liquid splashes out onto the floor. One more push. I strain with a loud grunt and over goes the pot, crashing and splashing over the worn, wooden floor.
“Attention! Watch out!” someone yells outside as the flood of scalding liquid spills out of the tiny bistro.
I protect my face from the hot steam with my hands, peeking through my fingers to see what’s happening. Outside I see the angry crowd, including the black-bearded man and another man, jumping and bumping into each other, shrieking and cursing. A melody of yells, then accusations.
“It’s your fault, monsieur!”
“Not so, monsieur—you started it.”
I’ve got to make a run for it. I take a deep breath, lower my head, gather up the soft