“It runs very smoothly,” Mrs B answered. “He’s been the one to run things even before he took over as Seigneur and he used to do it all from his office in London. But now that he lives here, people defer to him more. There’s always a long queue of people waiting to see him.”
“Busy man,” Gabriel observed.
“You’d never know it because he always seems to have time for anyone. The man has a steady hand on the tiller. You should ask Pierre.”
She had the oddest feeling that Gabriel had been hoping for an excuse to turn towards her.
“I haven’t met him. What’s he like?”
Did he really care what she answered?
“He is…”
Gabriel was giving her very steady eye contact which made her voice unsteady.
“Well, the kind of man who can solve ten crises at once, but he does it like a…well…like…” Her words had deserted her this morning. She who wrote pretty and eloquent lines that customers paid money for. Ha.
“Like?” Gabriel prompted.
“He does it without ever raising his voice.”
“There were raised voices aplenty between him and his father in the old days,” Nurse Ann observed.
Everyone around the table agreed; everyone laughed. They were happy, Laura and Adam kept exchanging secretive little smiles. Pierre wished she could stay to enjoy the atmosphere. But in her mind words played, probably from a Selena Gomez song.There’s a million reasons I should give you up, but the heart wants what it wants.
If she had any hope of keeping her feelings secret, she had better get out. Lord M was probably a good person to take her mind off things.
Please God, let him be well this morning. Adam had given him a morphine injection last night so that probably meant the old man had had a good night’s sleep and would be in a good mood this morning.
He wasn’t.
Nicole was with him. God only knew how long she’d been there, leaning close as if confiding secrets to a close friend.
As soon as Pierre walked in, he glanced up at her, face like thunder. “Pierre.”
Not Persephone or Loony Bint this morning either. She braced herself.
“Please ask Mrs B to come here.”
Pierre paused half-way to him. “Now?”
“No, after the fall of the Byzantine Empire.” He snapped. “Yes, now.Immediately.”
Nicole stood up smoothly. “It looks like you’re going to be busy. I’d better leave you to it.” She glided out of the room.
She wore a red tailored suit, Valentino. Pierre recognised it as a sample sent to Nicole a month ago for her project to dress everyone at the wedding. She certainly was leveraging this job for all kinds of perks.
At the door, she paused for a second, cast a look over her shoulder at Pierre and smiled before walking out.
The smile made Pierre cold inside.
“Now, Pierre,” Lord M barked.
“Sorry. I’ll just go find her.”
“Don’t waste more of my time while you wander around the house. Use that thing you carry with you.” He glared at the iPhone in her hand.
She dialled, aware of his eyes hard on her. If she’d been a betting woman, she’d lay all her money on the fact that Nicole had complained about Mrs B.
