The Virgin's Proposition Read Online Free PDF Page A

in no mood to deal with paparazzi. Know any place quiet?”
    She nodded. “For dinner, yes. A little place in Le Soquet, the old quarter, that is basically off the tourist track.” She looked at him speculatively, an idea forming. “You don’t want to talk to anyone?”
    A brow lifted. “I want to talk to you.”
    Enchanted, Anny smiled. “Flatterer.” He was amazingly charming. “I was thinking, if you’re really not hungry yet, but you wouldn’t mind talking to a few more kids—not paparazzi, not journalists—just kids who would love to meet you—”
    “You have kids?” he said, startled.
    Quickly Anny shook her head. “No. I volunteer at a clinic for children and teenagers with spinal injuries and paralysis. I was there this afternoon. And I was having a sort of discussion—well, argument, really, with one of the boys…he’s a teenager—about action heroes.”
    Demetrios’s mouth quirked. “You argue about action heroes?”
    “Franck will pretty much argue about anything. He likes to argue. And he has opinions.”
    “And you do, too?” There was a teasing light in his eye now.
    Anny smiled. “I suppose I do,” she admitted. “But I try not to batter people with them. Except for Franck,” she added. “Because it’s all the recreation he gets these days. Anything I say, he takes the opposite view.”
    “He must have brothers,” Demetrios said wryly.
    But Anny shook her head. “He’s an only child.”
    “Even worse.”
    “Yes.” Anny thought so, too. She had been an only child herself for twenty years. Her mother had not been able to have more children after Anny, and she’d died when Anny was twelve. Only when her father married Charlise seven years ago had Anny dared to hope for a sibling.
    Now she had three little half brothers, Alexandre, Raoul, and David. And even though she was much older—actually old enough to be their mother—she still relished the joy of having brothers.
    “Franck makes up for it by arguing with me,” she said. “And I was just thinking, what a coup it would be if I brought you back to the clinic. You obviously know more about action heroes than I do so you could argue with him. Then after, we could have dinner?”
    It was presumptuous. He might turn her down cold.
    But somehow she wasn’t surprised when he actually sat up straighter and said, “Sounds like a deal. Let’s go.”
    The look on Franck’s face when they walked into his room was priceless. His jaw went slack. No sound came out of his mouth at all.
    Anny tried not to smile as she turned back toward Demetrios. “I want you to meet a friend of mine,” she said to him. “This is Franck Villiers. Franck, this is—”
    “I know who he is.” But Franck still stared in disbelief.
    Demetrios stuck out his hand. “Pleased to meet you,” he said in French.
    For a moment, Franck didn’t take it. Then, when he did, he stared at the hand he was shaking as if the sight could convince him that the man with Anny was real.
    Slowly he turned an accusing gaze on Anny “You’re going to marry him?”
    She jerked. “No!” She felt her cheeks flame.
    “You said you had to leave early because you were going to meet your fiancé.”
    Oh God, she’d forgotten that.
    “He got delayed,” Anny said quickly. “He couldn’t come.” She shot a look at Demetrios.
    He raised his brows in silent question, but he simply said to Franck, “So I invited her to dinner instead.”
    Franck shoved himself up farther against the pillows and looked at her. “You never said you knew Luke St. Angier. I mean— him,” he corrected himself, cheeks reddening as if he’d embarrassed himself by confusing the man and the role he’d played.
    Demetrios didn’t seem to care. “We just met,” he said. “Anny mentioned your discussion. I can’t believe you think MacGyver is smarter than Luke St. Angier.”
    Anny almost laughed as Franck’s gaze snapped from Demetrios to her and back again. Then his spine stiffened.