Chapter Thirty
Cat leaned against the marble island of the kitchen in her chef trousers and a grey V-neck T-shirt making notes.
Notes about flavours. Notes about the canapés in front of her.
Notes about drinks and concoctions. Notes to distract her from the very person who had suddenly appeared in the doorway like a mirage.
Seeing Anastasia Steinherr, a lithe silhouette, her legs coltish, as she leaned against the frame in tight trousers, boots and a fur coat, was so alien, Cat did wonder if she was going mad. Instead she gasped.
‘What are you doing here? Lumi isn’t home and Viktor is in Tokyo.’
‘I came to see you.’
‘How did you get in?’
‘The maid, I said I wanted to see you.’
‘Here?!’ Cat looked through the doorway beyond Anastasia nervously, in case Teresa or Gerard might be listening. ‘I’m at work.’
Anastasia pouted like a child. Her lips were long and full. Cat couldn’t help but remember the best of times kissing them.
Anastasia took a big look around the room, drinking in the details before she walked in nonchalantly, placing her purse on the vast kitchen island.
The Kivvi kitchen looked part chef’s kitchen, part Tiffany New York.
It had pale cream walls and a palatial La Cornue range oven with duck-egg-blue vaulted doors and ornate handles.
Above the white marble worktop streaked with elegant black wisps hung a large oven hood in the same pale blue shade as the oven doors.
Anastasia certainly admired the room as if it contained precious jewels.
She tossed her hair and pulled her most demure of faces, before levelling Cat with a look.
‘I wanted to apologise.’
‘Apologise?’ This was most unlike Anastasia. Cat didn’t think she’d heard her apologise for anything.
‘For bad sex, the other night.’
‘Oh.’
Cat’s hopeless gaze was torn between her lover and the doorway.
‘I was spent. From the night before,’ she quickly clarified.
Cat blushed and looked down. The Montblanc pen in her hand was shaking. She let it drop. Anastasia approached with careful, panther-like steps. Cat got weaker. Someone could walk in on them at any time.
‘Friday night was a dream. Saturday I got greedy. I was too tired, too stressed, I shouldn’t have called you, I’m sorry.’
Cat had hated how different it had been to the night before. The prickly way in which Anastasia flinched when Cat touched her – she wondered if she had been sleeping with her husband again. It had filled her with an uncomfortable, jealous rage on the walk back to Chalet Edelweiss.
Cat smiled appreciatively, but stood firm.
‘Look, I can’t go on like this,’ she said, returning Anastasia’s gaze with a weary look. ‘I told you when I went back for the funeral … it has to end. I can’t handle it. It’s such a mindfuck.’ You’re such a mindfuck, she thought. ‘It’s over.’
Anastasia approached the island, almost purring.
‘It can’t be,’ she whispered. ‘I care so much.’
Cat shot her a look and lowered her voice to an angry hiss.
‘Care? You didn’t even ask me how the funeral went.’
Anastasia looked taken aback. Cat could be so sensitive, but now wasn’t the time to point it out. She put her hand to her chest, to show her concern.
‘It’s just a power trip with you, it’s all about how quickly I’ll come running after you’ve clicked your fingers. You don’t care.’
‘I do care,’ Anastasia pouted.
Anastasia walked around the island and approached Cat from behind. She opened her fur coat and pressed her body into Cat’s back.
‘Please,’ she whispered into Cat’s ear. Her breath was sweet.
‘Let me show you.’ She peppered kisses onto Cat’s neck.
Cat leaned her head away, trying to fight it but only offering Anastasia more skin.
She felt weak at the knees. She could feel Anastasia’s hips pressing into her bottom, she felt Anastasia’s hand slip down into the waistband of her chef’s trousers, lowering into the lace sheath of her knickers.
Cat groaned, with one eye still on the kitchen door.
‘Please,’ she protested longingly.
‘I want you so much,’ Anastasia said, before trailing her tongue up from Cat’s collarbone to behind her ear. Cat supressed a groan.
‘Too risky.’
‘Let me make it up to you …’
Anastasia started circling Cat’s clitoris with a manicured, bejewelled finger as she continued to dot her neck with kisses. Cat could feel her wetness building on Anastasia’s tantalising touch.
‘I want to eat your pussy. Take me to your bedroom.’
Anastasia ran her free hand along the shiny kitchen counter, appraising the finesse of the finish. ‘Or maybe I’ll have you here.’
‘They could be back any time now … the staff are here.’
‘Please, let me make it up to you,’ Anastasia continued to circle, and Cat’s legs almost buckled as her breaths got heavy. She had to lean onto the counter to stop herself crumbling. Anastasia’s touch, the sensation of her kisses, it was pure bliss. Cat closed her eyes and rolled with the pleasure.
‘Ah, Mrs Diamandis,’ the butler said, as he walked into the kitchen with the dry cleaning.
Cat opened her eyes and shoved Anastasia back with a jolt.
‘Gerard!’ Cat said, in a fluster, as he paused, a pile of luxurious coats and dresses slung over his white-jacketed arm. Gerard was impeccably mannered and impeccably tactful.
‘I was just here doing a tasting,’ Anastasia said, flashing a supermodel smile and nodding to the canapés on the worktop. ‘While I was waiting for Lumi, who I understand is out.’
Gerard looked up with a bemused yet professional smile.
‘Yes, ma’am, can I pass on a message for when she returns?’ He wanted to spare Cat her blushes as she put an apron on over her clothes and smoothed it down.
‘It’s fine, I’ll be in touch again.’
‘Very good,’ he said, poised as if he were waiting for her to leave.
Anastasia put her moist finger between her teeth as if she were thinking, but it was just a way of teasing Cat, who shot her a look.
Why the hell had she come?
‘The basil crème was just exquisite chef,’ Anastasia said, as Gerard held the kitchen door open for her with his free hand.
Cat watched Anastasia sashay through it, into the living area, and couldn’t help noticing how much she was studying the décor of Chalet Edelweiss as she saw herself out.