Page 4 of A Royally Fake French Menage
Sylvie rolled her eyes at him and winked at me. "Move, Beau." She stepped into him, resting her hands on his abdomen. Her fingers slid down to drift across the top of his leather belt as she peered up at him through her lashes. "Don't we have other things to do?"
Beau swallowed. His larger hands cupped the back of her head, drawing her up onto her toes so he didn't have to bend down to kiss her. "Don't test me, Toy. "
He only had eyes for her. A pit of absolute nothingness opened inside me for all sorts of the wrong reasons.
Taking the opportunity Sylvie granted me with her brand of distraction, I dragged my chest to armor around the soon to be snogging couple and down the hall. The strain killed my shoulders but I didn’t stop, not until I made it to the top of the stairs. Only then did I glance back in time to see Beau back Sylvie into his room and had the pleasure of experiencing a second hand moan not meant for me before he kicked the door shut with a bang that reverberated across the top of the Kingsman frat house.
My exodus outside was accompanied by the sort of music I wanted to play myself, rather than witness. My mind drifted to Genie and what might—if we were lucky—awaited us in France in my ancestral home.
Or what might not.
CHAPTER TWO
GENIE
“When are you coming back to Europe to see me? You haven't picked your shade for this season’s run. You need to send your feedback for my newest line. Oh, and I need your signature on theGenie in a Bottlerange. It’ll be in gold and silver across the front, so make it pretty. I’m sure Lydia sent you the paperwork.”
I pretended to smile at my phone even though my mother hadn’t requested a video call. “I’m sure she did. It’s not like you’d handle something as basic as paperwork yourself, is it?”
My roommates rolled their eyes.
“Distraction required?” Molly mouthed at me.
I shook my head. “Got it,” I mouthed back.
I’d been putting off the monthly mother call for well, a month. And she was right. I had been delaying choosing colors for the new line for way too long. But also, I’d had a lot of other distractions over the past weeks. College took on a life of its own. Exams, assignments and life in general.
“I’ll pick a shade,” I promised. “Send me the email again, and you’ll have the signature,”From the email that was likely never sent in the first place.
Lydia wasn't half as efficient as my mother thought her golden girl of a PA was. The personal assistant badge of honor to the world’s most amazing luxury brand female CEO sat all too well on the executive’s shoulders. At least, that’s how Lydia saw herself as she swanned around most of her day, shopping and having lunches on my mother’s time. And having seen my mother flounder financially more than once in the past, I wasn't sure how any of that added up. Thankfully, I had my own accounts unattached to hers, and my side of the business was secure.
If a little behind this year.
I flicked through my emails quickly as I chatted. Nope, no email as predicted.
Just how often Lydiaworkedfor my mother was up for debate. But seeing as I hadn’t exactly been pulling my end of the load, I wasn't in the ball park to whine. Then again, my mother didn’t pay me a high six figure salary, either. My personal income came from my own investments or any joint projects we worked on together.
She did, however, expect me to perform on demand.
“And I'll be traveling this weekend. For a…date.”
Barclay wasn’t the only one who could play the fake relationship game. Pity it wasn’t a real one. The European lordling would be a fun toyboy, if only for the weekend.
“Oh, Genie. Can you stretch your trip out to London? That's where the gala is this Sunday night.”
My lips pulled back from my teeth in mock horror. “Who set that date? It’s not even a brunch.” I grew up in this world, and no one.No. One.Set gala dates for a Sunday night. “Wait, letme guess. It was Barnacle Bob, wasn’t it? That man can sniff out charity money like tomorrow isn’t actually coming.”
“Tomorrow might not come for him, dear. He’s ninety-three next month. I’m sure we’ll all be back for another turn about the sun with his apparently immortal behind. Be a love and pick something devastating to bring in his new season with. We need to charm the socks off him.”
I frowned at the phone, suddenly wishing I’d made it a video call after all. “Why?”
Mom hesitated, and my vision tunneled in. Because my motherneverhesitated. Ever. I could count the amount of times that woman paused for breath in my life on one hand, and once was giving birth to me. The other three times were when she was caught out cheating on various husbands, and not in the order she married them.
“Why?” I asked coyly, twirling the blue dress with red trim that Molly passed between my fingers. I shook my head. “Too patriotic,” I whispered, wrinkling my nose.
“What?” snapped Mom.
“Nothing. Just picking out my dress for the weekend.” I waved at the black one with sequins. LBD. An oldie but so trustworthy.
