Chapter 53
Anton
Itake Gen to the Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc for supper. She’s never been here, which surprises me, and it’s a rite of passage in this neck of the woods. So, although I’m dying to get her back to the villa and fuck her senseless, I get Rix to work her usual magic and procure a booking.
Besides, it’s one of my favourite places, and I want to show Gen off.
We slip back home for a quick shower and change, and she locks her bedroom door so she can complete her toilette in the necessary timeframe without me slipping into the shower with her and derailing everything.
Smart girl.
Still, it’s a move that only serves to feed the beast inside me. The beast that last night and this morning sated short term and riled long term.
Because now I know what it’s like to be with her, there’s no going back for me. What I’ve done with her, to her, so far is the tip of the iceberg.
I’m just getting started.
I walk her down the iconic wide promenade that separates the main hotel from the Eden-Roc section on the sea-front.
She’s wearing a white sundress with large white fabric daisies appliquéd all over it.
It’s chic and beautifully cut while also being sexy as fuck, particularly because she’s not wearing a bra. Again.
This relaxed, holiday side of Gen is a lot of fun.
Her usual immaculate but uptight Hitchcock heroine look may be my kryptonite, but I love seeing her let loose a little.
And as she walks down to the shore with me, her hand clutching my bicep and her laugh cutting through the still evening air like a silver bell, I look down at her, and admire her, and I think you are fucking perfect.
Because she is.
We take our places in the Grill, at a wonderful table that the ma?tre d’, Gabriel, has somehow procured for us at the last minute. For a second, I pity whichever poor sod got kicked off their reservation, but only for a second. Because I’m this guy’s bread and butter.
I love it down here. It’s more my cup of tea than the formal restaurants up in the hotel.
Eden-Roc is built on a low rocky platform that cuts straight down to the sea.
The Grill is nautical in theme, with a teak-and-iron balustrade that prevents diners falling into the water below and a cheerful blue and white theme.
You still have to be richer than God to eat here, but I’m happy to pay any price to enjoy the fresh lobster and ice-cold rosé while being as close as I can get to the Med.
When Gabriel and I have finished our mutual back-slapping and he’s left us to it, Gen surveys me.
Her eyes are hidden by huge vintage-style shades, but her mouth twists in amusement.
‘You have a very nice life, you know,’ she remarks, taking a sip of the sparkling water that’s already found its way to us.
‘Thank you.’ I shake out my thick linen napkin and drape it in my lap.
‘I’m serious. I don’t know why, but I assumed you were a total workaholic. Are you just playing hooky for a few days?’
I lean forward, elbows on the table, and steeple my fingers. ‘It always amuses me that people assume a linear relationship between one’s level of success and one’s work ethic.’
‘Why?’
‘Well, because if you have more and more success and you keep pushing harder and harder, that’s just fucking stupid, in my opinion.
It’s been more like a bell curve for me.
Why the hell would I want to keep on punishing myself when I have more money than I’ll ever need?
What’s the point if I don’t take my foot off the pedal and get to enjoy it all? ’
‘You’re right,’ she says. ‘There is no point.’ Under the table, she runs a bare foot over my ankle. ‘I just hadn’t seen that side of you, I suppose.’
I lower my shades and grin at her. ‘You hadn’t seen the hedonistic side of me? Seriously?’
She makes a face back. ‘I figured out pretty early it was all work and sex for you. But this is neither.’ She gestures at the buzzing restaurant around us. ‘I mean, it’s a Thursday, and you’re in France, getting up to no good with me.’
‘We saw two properties today,’ I argue.
‘Yeah, and you could have had Max or Lara do that easily.’
I sigh. ‘I’ll always find the flimsiest of excuses to come out here.
And honestly, I’ve spent the past four or five years manoeuvring myself out of a job.
I love the big picture stuff, but I don’t want to be stuck in the weeds when I can be taking on passion projects and spending time with my kids—when they’ll let me—and making love to beautiful women. ’
That gets a laugh. ‘Making love? Is that what you call it?’
‘Banging their fucking brains out,’ I amend.
Once the server has dispensed some rosé and olives, she asks, ‘So the Alchemy pop up is a passion project for you?’
You’re a passion project for me, I think. I clear my throat. ‘It’s a bit of fun. It’s also a shameless way to get closer to you. But I honestly think the brand has tonnes of potential. Why on earth haven’t you expanded before now?’
‘A few reasons,’ she says, swilling her rosé. ‘Mainly that I don’t think any of us were in a massive hurry for various reasons. Zach’s wife died a couple of years ago, for one. That was a major shocker. We’d all been great friends with her, so he went into survival mode and, obviously, so did we.’
I grimace. ‘Fuck. That’s terrible. Did they have kids?’
‘Two girls.’ She looks down at her glass. ‘And yeah. It was horrific. Pancreatic cancer—she was gone within a month of diagnosis. But he’s dating Maddy now, our social media manager.’
I nod. I remember those two in our meeting. It was pretty obvious they were together.
‘And there were other reasons, too. Zach and Rafe run a small kind-of hedge fund with some of their friends, and we’re all invested in it.
It makes us far more money than Alchemy.
So no one’s worried about paying the bills.
We’ve been having fun with the club—it’s far more than just a business to us. ’
‘I can believe it,’ I say sternly, and she smiles seductively before her tone turns more businesslike. ‘And it’s not the kind of thing we want to rush. It’s important to get every single detail right with a venture like that. That’s why I’m scared shitless about this pop-up. It all feels so fast.’
I lean across the table and squeeze her hand. ‘I promise you. We will throw whatever money we need to at it so no detail is overlooked.’
‘Thank you,’ she says, squeezing back. ‘But I’m also excited, because it’s an amazing chance to see if the brand travels well.’
‘It will be hot as fuck,’ I forecast. ‘So you’d expand further, if this went well?’
‘It would be crazy not to,’ she says. ‘New York’s the obvious place for a second club, but LA would also be fun, and the opportunity for seasonal resort pop-ups is huge, too.
It’s all I think about, usually. Alchemy, that is.
So it’s good to get a break from it.’ She smiles.
‘Even if we’re supposed to be here for work. ’
‘I’d rather you were here to play,’ I tell her in my most predatory voice as I brush my thumb over her knuckles.
She gives a nervous little giggle. ‘That works.’
‘But it’s going well, overall? Alchemy, I mean. It certainly seems to be.’
She cocks her head, considering the question. ‘Yeah. It is. A competitor has opened up, and they’re causing us a few headaches. Let’s just say their customer acquisition tactics are aggressive.’
‘Rapture?’ I suggest.
Her jaw drops open. ‘Seriously? They approached you?’
‘As a founding member.’
‘Un-fucking-believable,’ she mutters. ‘Did you check it out?’
‘Nope. I know some of the guys behind it, and I don’t like them at all. Slippery as fuck.’
‘Unlike you?’
I grin. ‘Too like me for my liking. No, they’re dodgy. Plus, I found another club whose clientele is more up my street.’ I entwine my fingers with hers. ‘I’m not looking for anywhere else to play.’
We gaze goofily at each other for a moment before I return to the matter at hand. ‘So, are they giving you grief?’
She grimaces. ‘Nothing we can’t handle. But they’re pursuing our members—hard—and they’ve even tried to poach a couple of our members of staff. They approached our concierge, Natalie, this week, but she turned them down flat.’
‘What are you going to do about it?’ I ask point-blank.
‘Not sure there’s much we can do. We stand by our reputation, and word of mouth brings us decent business.
We just have to hope we have the superior proposition, and that people who are looking for that kind of offering realise that.
But it’s definitely been distracting me when I should be focusing on this pop-up. ’
I frown. That’s far too passive. Frankly, it’s naive. If someone gets up in my turf, I don’t sit back and hope the best man wins.
I make sure he does.
By any means necessary.
But something tells me she doesn’t require or desire my input, so I go for a joke.
‘I’m disappointed. I thought I was the only thing distracting you.’
She gives me a beautiful smile, and all is right with the world. ‘Believe me, you’re extremely distracting.’
‘Glad to hear it,’ I say. ‘But, of the two of us, I suspect you work a lot harder than I do. Married to the job?’
‘Probably,’ she admits.
‘How old are you? Mid-thirties?’ I guess.
‘I’ll be thirty-seven in October.’
‘Ever been married?’
She shakes her head. ‘Nope.’
‘Do you want kids?’
She raises her eyebrows so they crest the top of her shades. ‘God, no.’
I laugh. ‘Fair enough.’
‘I mean, I like them, but I’ve never felt the need to procreate.’ She pauses, then shudders a little. ‘No, definitely not. No offence,’ she adds hurriedly.
‘None taken,’ I tell her. And it’s good news, because she could definitely still have children if she wanted to, and that’s the one thing I can’t give her. Four kids are quite enough for anyone. I had the snip a few years ago, and it was the best thing I’ve ever done.
Nope, I can’t give her kids.
But, God knows, I’ll give her every single other thing her heart desires.
The realisation jolts me, because I’ve spent one night with her, for fuck’s sake. I circle back to safer territory.
‘So, what’s the age gap between those two?’
‘Who?’ she asks. ‘Zach and Maddy?’
‘Yeah.’
She considers. ‘Thirteen or fourteen years, I think?’
I smirk. ‘Nice one. And your other friend. Rafe?’
‘Same. All of us are the same age—we were at uni together—and Maddy and Belle, Rafe’s girlfriend, were at school together.’
‘That’s a big age gap.’
‘It’s less than ours,’ she points out as she sips her rosé. ‘I’m thirty-six. You’re, what, fifty-two? That’s sixteen years.’
‘Our gap isn’t that big in percentage terms,’ I retort. ‘Theirs is a lot bigger. There’s nothing wrong with our age gap.’
She sits back, still holding her glass, and surveys me. ‘And what about the age gap between you and Athena?’ she asks sweetly.
Oh, fuck.
I walked right into that one.