Chapter One
THEY MET NOT at Fontaine headquarters in Paris, but on the French Riviera, closer to the company’s perfume distillery.
Adam unfurled himself from the sports car and gave his keys to a valet, before a grand Belle Epoque hotel. Self-confident in its domed splendour, it occupied a premier location on the famous Promenade des Anglais, looking over Nice’s Bay of Angels. The sun lit its pale fa?ade, a sea breeze made its flags flap and overhead a blue sky enhanced the scene.
It surprised him she’d chosen this place for their lunch meeting.
The hotel was famous and probably sumptuous, but surely an old-fashioned choice for a woman still in her twenties.
She knew his net worth—it regularly featured in rich lists—and must realise it would take more than a famous venue to impress him. Maybe it was familiar ground for her, somewhere her family had come for generations.
Whatever her thinking, all that mattered was that she understood how much her company needed him. Someone with the funds and business savvy to turn around the House of Fontaine.
Adam rolled his shoulders and turned his back to the hotel. On the other side of the road stretched the deep blue, glittering Mediterranean. But the beach below the promenade consisted of rocks, trucked in to make up for the lack of sand. The place was famous, but it didn’t excite someone who’d grown up with golden beaches and the endless Pacific Ocean.
He turned back. The hotel possibly had a certain charm but he preferred the less grandiose style of the villa he’d rented along the coast.
Is that what had happened with Fontaine’s? Had it stultified under the control of a family that lived in the past instead of looking to the future?
It was time for change and he was the man to see to it.
Besides, the House of Fontaine had something he wanted.
‘Just do the best you can, Gigi. If necessary, stall him and call me.’
Gisèle heard the strain in Julien’s voice and wished she could reassure him. But there was nothing either of them could do. There were no cards left to play. No lucrative avenues that would turn a quick profit and save the company from insolvency. They, and their financial team, had been over the books too often for any doubt.
‘You can rely on me.’ Which didn’t amount to much. Even if she were in a position to negotiate, she was a scientist by training, more at home in the lab or perfume distillery than wrangling deals with tycoons. ‘I’ll do my best.’
‘I know. It’s unfair to put you in this position where you’re out of your depth. Maybe I should—’
‘Nonsense!’ Gisèle looked around the restaurant, glad her table was a discreet distance from the others. The grand room brought back reassuring memories of special lunches here with Grandpère. She lowered her voice. ‘Nothing is more important than you finishing your treatment. Not even the business.’
There was silence for a moment. ‘I feel so guilty at losing it after it was handed down—’
‘I know, I know. From father to son through generations.’
Although their father had never run the House of Fontaine. He’d worked for it but died young. Julien had inherited it from their grandfather and Gisèle was employed there too. The company wasn’t just a business. It was a thread running through the lives of every Fontaine for two centuries. It and their employees were like family.
‘To lose it under my watch, because I wasn’t up to the job—’
‘That’s not true. You were sick. It was natural for you to delegate.’
Unfortunately those he’d delegated to weren’t as clever as they thought, taking too many risks that hadn’t paid off. The company had embarked on an ill-conceived expansion just as economies around the world teetered on the brink of apparent collapse and sales of luxury goods plummeted.
Guilt bit. She’d been no help, absorbed in her own work, and the extra public responsibilities in Julien’s absence, but without the skills to manage the company.
All she’d done was appear as a figurehead from time to time. They both had reason to hate the public spotlight so she could understand her brother’s desire to battle his illness privately.
The need for solitude in which to face life’s ordeals was ingrained in them both, partly from their grandfather’s example and partly as a result of too much press attention early in their lives. She’d done what she could to stand in for Julien publicly, for what was the glamorous House of Fontaine without a Fontaine on show?
‘Look, Julien, I should go.’ She needed to gather herself. ‘He’ll be here any moment.’
‘Okay. I’ll wait for your call. Good luck.’
She could do this, of course she could. It was one more instance of playing a public role. The work for this meeting had been done behind the scenes by people who understood the intricacies of commercial finance, contracts and company law.
Yet her stomach roiled. She straightened, resisting the urge to lift a hand to her hair.
‘Don’t fiddle, Gisèle.’ Her mother’s voice was clear in her head. ‘Never leave your room until you look perfect. After that a lady doesn’t primp.’
That had been easy for her mother, one of the most beautiful women of her day.
But she’d been right. Poise counted. After Gisèle’s early, bruising encounters with the press, she’d learned not to betray uncertainty with nervous gestures.
Not only the press. There was always someone ready to be vocal about the differences between Gisèle and the stunning, petite beauty who’d been her mother.
‘Ms Fontaine.’
It wasn’t a question, nor quite a greeting, and the deep resonance of that voice made something flutter across her skin.
Gisèle looked up and felt the world fade for a second.
A flash of deep-seated emotion gripped her throat and stole her breath.
She recognised the Australian from her research. She’d even broken her rule and read the gossip rags, seeking as much information as possible about the man poised to rip the House of Fontaine from the last of the Fontaines.
Could they trust him when he said he’d save the company rather than dismantle it? He was a corporate shark, renowned for asset stripping or, occasionally, dragging failing companies into profit with his take-no-prisoners demands.
He looked different to his photos. Those images barely hinted at the energy this man radiated. Energy she felt rippling across her skin and electrifying the air.
Gisèle spoke in English. ‘Mr Wilde. How do you do?’ She rose, holding out her hand, and discovered that, tall as she was, he topped her by a head.
Stupid to wish she’d worn higher heels.
Moss green eyes surveyed her from under straight black eyebrows. His hair was black too, long enough to reveal it would curl if he let it grow. His nose had been broken and set askew, giving him a tough edge enhanced by his uncompromising, stubbled jaw.
He looked like a raider. As if he didn’t play by the rules.
His leather jacket and black shirt, open to reveal a V of tanned flesh, emphasised that impression. He couldn’t be more different to the suited businessmen she knew.
She guessed he’d be as much at home astride a growling motorbike as in a boardroom.
A shiver skipped down her backbone as his eyes narrowed on her. She kept her smile easy, even when he folded his large hand around hers and that shiver turned into a blast of sensation. Heat and something that made her pulse quicken and thoughts whirl.
‘It’s good to meet you at last,’ he said, as if he meant it.
Because he wants your company. You’re simply the means to an end.
Gisèle kept her expression bland as she slid her hand free. Was his ‘at last’ reference to the fact she hadn’t met him in Paris a few days earlier? But there’d been no point until Julien and his team had pored over the proposal.
‘Please, won’t you sit?’
She was sinking into her seat when she realised that, instead of sitting opposite, he took the chair at right angles to her. His leg touched hers beneath the table.
As if reading her surprise, he leaned in. ‘Our discussion is confidential. I prefer not to broadcast it to the room.’
It made sense and Gisèle could hardly object, yet the gleam in his eye told her it was a deliberate manoeuvre at her expense.
She repressed a sigh. How she hated the games some men played.
A waiter laid the place setting before him, offering menus and drinks. It was a relief to concentrate on food rather than Adam Wilde. Yet she couldn’t relax. She was far too mindful that, despite his lounging ease, his gaze was keen and, she suspected, his brain too.
Of course it was. He was a self-made man, renowned for his razor-sharp perspicacity. And the ruthlessness needed to build an empire from nothing.
Gisèle ignored her tiny shudder at the thought of Fontaine’s at his mercy as she steered the conversation through safe waters. The long flight from Australia. The delights of Sydney Harbour on a sunny day.
Did she imagine amusement lurking in those green eyes? Her hackles rose at the hint of condescension but she didn’t react. This wasn’t about her, but her family’s legacy and the livelihood of everyone they employed.
Wilde waited until the drinks were brought, sparkling water for her and beer for him, before turning towards her. He was too big for this intimate table for two. His knee brushed her thigh, his broad shoulders imposing in her peripheral vision.
But it wasn’t just his size. The atmosphere had become charged, creating tiny pinpricks of awareness across her body. Her breathing was too shallow and quick.
Only a lifetime’s training stopped her from frowning. Not at the big man who seemed to enjoy discomfiting his opponent in negotiations. That was an old ploy. No, her annoyance was for herself, for reacting to him as a man, not a professional challenge.
The first course was served and as he picked up his cutlery Gisèle spoke. ‘So, Mr Wilde—’
‘Please, call me Adam. And you’re Gisèle.’
He didn’t ask permission to use her first name and, for the first time she could remember, Gisèle wanted to insist he use her surname.
Because, she discovered, there was power in a name. At least when spoken in that deep, slightly scratchy voice that stroked at something unexpected inside her.
The sensation reminded her of the time she’d had a massage on a frozen shoulder. The deep probing was intensely uncomfortable but immediately followed by a melting warmth that she couldn’t get enough of.
Something like fear skittered through her.
‘Unless you prefer Ms Fontaine?’
There was a change in his expression, a tightening around the lips and something hard in his gaze.
She couldn’t offend the man who might save the company, even if it meant she and Julien lost everything.
‘Gisèle is fine.’ She curved her lips into an obligatory smile. ‘I was simply going to say that you didn’t come all this way to discuss travel and the weather. About your proposal–’
‘You seem in a hurry to divest yourself of the company your family built.’ He lifted an eyebrow as he took a mouthful of seared scallop and slowly chewed. ‘Why don’t you tell me about yourself first?’
Incredulity vied with indignation.
She had no desire to divest herself of the company! Her heart broke at the idea. It felt like a betrayal of her grandfather and all the staff, to hand it over to a stranger.
Her happiest childhood memories had been made in the flower fields and perfume distillery. Losing the firm would be like losing part of herself.
‘You’re wrong about that, Mr Wilde—Adam.’ Her mouth flattened as she struggled to rein in her feelings. ‘We’re not in a hurry to have someone take over the House of Fontaine. But we’re here to discuss business. I don’t see how talking about myself is relevant.’
He shrugged, the nonchalant movement of those impressive shoulders reminding her of the power this man wielded. Everything depended on his agreement. Without him there’d be no deal. The House of Fontaine would cease to trade and its employees would be out of work.
‘Humour me, Gisèle. I’m interested.’ His expression turned implacable and she glimpsed the iron fist beneath the velvet glove. ‘We have plenty of time.’
Gisèle regarded him carefully, trying to work out what he was doing. Other than unsettling her. Not that it mattered what he thought of her. Yet she sat straighter, her expression smoothing as she battled not to betray instinctive hauteur at his probing.
‘What do you want to know?’
He gestured to her untouched plate. ‘You’re not hungry?’
Of course she wasn’t hungry. Her stomach was doing somersaults, but it wouldn’t do to make that obvious. Gisèle cut a segment from her dainty vegetable flan and chewed mechanically.
‘I want to get a feel for the company. Since it’s a family enterprise, learning about you will give me a better picture.’
Gisèle repressed a frown. That didn’t make sense. She worked hard for the House of Fontaine, but it had been going for generations before she was born. And while she managed an increasingly important section, he must already have sufficient overview.
Adam Wilde watched her as he devoured his scallops. He ate neatly but with a gusto that emphasised he was a big man in his prime.
Not that that had anything to do with their negotiations. But her consciousness of him as a man interfered with her attempts to treat him with impersonal professionalism.
‘My brother—’
‘I’m interested in your family but your brother can speak for himself.’ His eyes glinted. ‘Tell me about you.’
He scrutinised her so closely.
She was used to being in the public eye and had learned people saw what they expected to see. This man, on the other hand, seemed intent on digging below the surface. As if it really mattered to him what she was like.
She hid an unladylike snort with a cough and reached for her sparkling water. He was amusing himself while he ate.
That he’d choose her as his entertainment rankled. Yet pride couldn’t interfere with this deal. So she’d stick to generalities. She wouldn’t share anything personal with a man who made her so edgy.
‘I was born in Paris. My father worked for the company there.’
‘And your mother?’
‘She was a model, an American visiting France on vacation after college.’
‘That’s when she met your father and stayed.’
He clearly knew the story. It was well known, or at least some version of it. People were always eager for details about her tragic father and stupendously beautiful mother. The pair had been glamorous and gorgeous, seen in all the right places with the rich and famous who patronised Fontaine’s.
These days the press had to settle for concocting stories about Gisèle and Julien, inventing comparisons between them and their famous parents.
Gisèle took her time, eating another mouthful of the tart that smelt delicious yet tasted like cardboard because she was so tense.
‘My father chose her to model in a company promotion and they fell in love so, yes, she stayed. The campaign was an enormous success.’
Her mother had been Fontaine’s most popular model, still working on company campaigns after Julien and then Gisèle were born. Before her husband died in a ball of flame in front of the TV cameras at a famous car rally. Before she left her children with their grandpère while she searched for someone to fill the gaping hole Gisèle’s father had left in her life.
Her relationships with a series of high-profile, extraordinarily wealthy and ultimately uncaring men had provided unending fodder for the media. As had her unexpected death from pneumonia that the press still speculated about.
Gisèle refused to discuss that.
‘I grew up in Paris, spending summers in the south.’ She glanced up to find Wilde leaning back, his tall frame relaxed but gaze intent. She hurried on. ‘The Fontaines were originally farmers but branched into perfume making and then cosmetics. Our main production facility is in the south of France. I’d be down for the lavender harvest, the roses and jasmine. Grandpère taught me about distilling, when essences were taken from the flowers to blend into our signature fragrances.’
Gisèle had been fascinated, and especially by the Nose—the highly talented perfume maker, incredibly attuned to scent—working in his mixing room, devising new fragrance combinations.
‘You sound very enthusiastic about it.’
He looked surprised. Why? Had he thought she’d been forced to work in the company?
She remembered his comment about her being eager to be rid of it. Perhaps he thought her job a sinecure. That she was on the payroll as part of the family. Not because she contributed anything useful. The assumption rankled.
But she had too much pride to set him straight. Besides, what did it matter? Soon she’d be looking for work elsewhere. He wouldn’t let her and Julien remain. He’d have his own team lined up to manage the firm.
Safer to talk about the company. ‘It’s fascinating, the magic of blending.’
‘Magic?’
Both eyebrows slanted up in disbelief. Perhaps he thought she was romanticising to get a better deal for the company. As if that were possible!
After a short time with him she guessed Adam Wilde dealt only in profits and tangible assets. He wouldn’t appreciate the miracles of everyday life. Like mixing essences distilled from mountain flowers to create an utterly new, unique and satisfying fragrance. Like the jewel-studded dark velvet of a mountain sky, away from city lights.
It hit her like a blow to the solar plexus that he wasn’t the sort who should be taking over her beloved company. Her family were realists who’d built a famous brand from hard toil in unforgiving, if scenic country. Yet they’d prided themselves on their vision and appreciation of beauty. How else could they have created what they had?
‘I think of it as magic.’
She turned from his piercing scrutiny and sipped her water, nodding to the waiter who’d appeared, asking if he should remove her barely touched plate. When he’d gone she turned back to Wilde.
‘After school I studied science and eventually joined the company. I’ve been there since.’
He angled his head to one side. ‘But you don’t spend all your time here. You’re at every important gala event across Europe and beyond, the perfect picture of Fontaine sophistication.’
Gisèle tried and failed to read his tone. His words had a hard edge but didn’t sound disapproving.
Instead of trying to puzzle it out she took his words at face value. ‘That’s kind of you. Julien and I have tried hard to present the right image for the company.’
Despite the personal cost. Even after all this time the sight of paparazzi crowding close, the sound of her name called stridently by a stranger wanting her to turn for the camera, chilled her blood. She’d just become adept at hiding it.
‘I’m surprised you find time to work, given your high-profile social life.’
That was definitely a dig. It seemed he believed she spent her time drinking champagne at A-list parties rather than working for a living.
Gisèle’s blood surged with a rush of anger, but she kept her expression placid. It would take more than a jibe from a man she’d never see again to discomfort her. She’d faced worse than him from a tender age and had learned not to react.
‘You’d be surprised...Adam, at what I fit in.’
She almost added that she could even walk and chew gum at the same time, but offending him would be disastrous.
‘Perhaps I would,’ he murmured.
Gisèle smiled at the waiter who’d brought her chicken dish. It smelled delicious yet she wondered how she’d eat when the thought of food turned her stomach.
No. Not the thought of food. Adam Wilde. She’d hoped they’d leave the company in good hands. According to Julien they would, but she hadn’t seen anything to reassure her. She feared he was a self-satisfied corporate plunderer, one who’d never fully appreciate the House of Fontaine.
The unsettling frisson that zipped through her whenever their eyes met had to be distaste. It couldn’t, absolutely couldn’t, be attraction.
Gisèle blinked and took a bite of her main course.
‘You were eager to discuss the deal,’ he said. Surprised, she looked up to see him apparently intent on his fish. ‘I have an additional stipulation. One that wasn’t in the draft contract.’
She swallowed, thinking rapidly. Any change needed to be examined by Julien and the legal team. But this made her position easier. ‘I have an extra condition too.’
Another interrogative lift of that eyebrow. It made him look sardonic, as if ready to find fault with her proposal.
‘Go on. What’s your condition, Gisèle?’
She put down her cutlery, pressing her fingertips into the tablecloth as if to absorb the solidity of the table beneath it. Her throat was parched but she resisted the urge to sip her water.
‘That the current staff are retained.’
‘You want a guarantee of employment?’
‘You said you want the company to continue—’
‘You expect me to give a blanket safety net to everyone, even if they have underperformed? I think not.’
‘I’m not so na?ve, Adam.’ She paused, momentarily distracted by the sound of his name on her tongue. ‘I can’t vouch for every employee but many I’ve known all my life. We had some under-performers but they’ve left.’ The managers who’d brought them to this situation. ‘Our workforce is dedicated and skilled. You won’t find better. But,’ she continued when he looked ready to interrupt, ‘I’m not asking you to accept that at face value.’
‘I’m listening.’
‘The company has an effective performance appraisal system. Underperformance is monitored and can result in counselling, training and, in rare cases, termination of employment.’ She slid her hands from the table, clasping them together under the tablecloth. ‘All I’m asking for is an assurance of job security and the continuation of a system that already works.’
‘You care about them.’
It wasn’t a question but there was something in his tone that sounded like surprise.
And a flicker of calculation in his eyes that made her wonder if he’d somehow use that revelation against her.
How could he? He already held all the power. They both knew it. This meeting was a formality because he’d insisted on meeting a member of the Fontaine family before the deal progressed and Julien wasn’t well enough to attend. But that hadn’t stopped Gisèle and her brother attempting this one last addition.
‘Of course I care about them. And the company.’ Her throat tightened as she swallowed emotion.
‘You want what’s best for them.’
‘Naturally.’
‘Excellent. That dovetails with my own extra needs. We both know that me taking control is all that’s standing between your company and disaster.’
Unfortunately it was true. Yet the knowledge made her sick to the stomach. Julien had said they could probably get other buyers, but not quickly enough, and not with a commitment to keep the company going.
‘Go on. What is it you want?’
A smile unfurled across Adam Wilde’s face, transforming its hard edges into an attractiveness that clotted her breath in her throat.
‘You, Gisèle. I want you.’