“Drop dead.”
Dree punched the red circle on her phone screen, ending the call.
Her hands were shaking because she wanted to wrap them around Francis’s throat and slam his head into the ground. The terrifying things he had said kept sticking in her mind.
She took a few deep yoga breaths to calm herself down, then a few more.
She wouldnotburst into tears. She wouldnot.She hated him, and he deserved it, and her broken heart was the least of her damn worries right now.
Francis couldn’t find her. She was on a whole ‘nother continent. By virtue of the fact that his phone number had worked, he was still in the States somewhere. And from what the bank lady had said, Francis must still be at his house because he’d logged into her computer from his Wi-Fi’s IP location.
She was safe there in Paris with Augustine.
Her breathing came easier. Air reached farther into her body with each breath, and her shoulders descended from up around her ears.
But if she ever saw Francis Senft again, she was going to mete out some country justice.
Augustine walked out of the bedroom shirtless and with a towel slung low around his hips. One bead of water that had been resting in his collarbone slid between his heavy pectorals and trailed down the line that separated his abs.
Dree thanked God for distracting her so that she would not continue to commit the sin of wrath, although she was currently committing the sin of lust and thoroughly enjoying that.
She needed to concentrate on the lust if she was going to retain her composure. Losing it again would just add embarrassment to everything else that was wrong in her life.
Augustine raised one eyebrow at her. “Something wrong?”
She didn’t want to tell him that she been so stupid as to allow Francis to steal the money that Augustine had been so kind to advance her. “Nope. I set up that new bank account like you asked me to.”
“Excellent.”
Dree handed him the paper with the banking numbers on it, and he typed a bunch of numbers into his phone. She saw him move his finger around to the back of his phone at one point and press it to the fingerprint sensor.
She deliberately looked elsewhere, lest she seem greedy or ill-mannered.
Augustine said, “All done.”
Her next breath felt like it had oxygen in it, and her arms and legs relaxed. She could get money to Mandi, and she would be all right, someday. “So, it’s all transferred?”
“Again, my bank will probably take a bit to transfer the money over, but it’s at least a Tuesday afternoon rather than a Sunday evening this time. It should be there in a matter of hours.”
Dree sighed, her relief exhaling from her body. “Thank you. You have no idea how much this means to me.”
“Dree,chérie,don’t think I’m too kind. This isnothingfor me.”
How rich did someone have to be to think that a six-figure amount of money wasnothing?“Okay, but it’severythingto me.”
“Are you going to leave me now that you have the money?” He was grinning as he said it.
“Yep!” Dree sprang up from the couch and made a beeline for the door, running with a silly, rolling gait to make it obvious she was kidding around. Her shabby old phone was still lying on the gilded coffee table.
Augustine laughed and chased her, catching her around the waist and flinging her over his shoulder in a fireman carry. “Not so fast. You’re mine for another forty-eight hours to debauch in any way I want and slake my lust upon you.”
She paddled his rock-hard bottom with her hands as he carried her into the bedroom. “Where do you even learn stuff like ‘slake my lust?’ Y’all Monagasquayans must be reading different books than we do.”
Augustine cracked up at that one. “Yes,Monagasquayanliterature is a highly evolved art form, as it is written in theMonagasquayaneselanguage.Besides, I ordered two moreMerveilleux de Fredfor after supper. I got the toffee ones this time.”
From this vantage point with her head hanging down his back, tattoo ink stained Augustine’s skin to where his fluffy white towel encircled his waist and continued below, but she was upside-down and too close to make out what it was. There were long lines and intricate shading, though.
Instead of patting his butt, Dree reached down and squeezed the round, rigid muscles of his ass. “Geez, Augustine. Why didn’t you lead with the dessert? You can do anything you want to my body if those nifty mousse-filled meringues are part of the deal.”
