LITMIR.BIZ

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estimate yourself highly, mignonne. I am not speaking of a lifetime’s devotion, you understand, but perhaps a year out of your life. What price would you place on that?’

      Something inside Samma snapped. Her free hand closed round the stem of her glass, and threw the remains of her cocktail straight at his darkly mocking face.

      She could hear the sudden stillness all around them as her deed was registered at the adjoining tables, then the subdued, amused hum of interest which followed. And, out of the corner of her eye, she saw Clyde bearing down on her, bursting with righteous indignation.

      ‘Have you taken leave of your senses?’ he stormed at her, before turning deferentially to the Frenchman who was removing the worst of the moisture with an immaculate linen handkerchief.

      ‘I can’t apologise enough,’ he went on. ‘Naturally, we’ll be happy to arrange any cleaning of your clothes which is necessary, Mr—er …?’ He paused.

      ‘Delacroix,’ the Frenchman said. ‘Roche Delacroix.’

      Clyde’s mouth dropped open. ‘From Grand Cay?’ he asked weakly, and at the affirmative nod he gave Samma an accusing glance. ‘You’d better get out of here, my girl. You’ve done enough damage for one evening.’

      ‘Don’t be too hard on your belle fille, monsieur,’ Roche Delacroix said. ‘She has been—provoked, I confess.’

      ‘I don’t need you to fight my battles for me,’ Samma flared hardily. ‘And nothing would prevail on me to stay in this place another moment.’

      Her legs were shaking under her, but she managed to walk to the door, ignoring the murmured comments and speculative looks following her, then she dashed for the comparative refuge of the dressing-room.

      Margot, one of the other hostesses, was in there, sharing a cigarette with Cicero the barman. They looked up in surprise as Samma came bursting in.

      ‘What’s the matter, honey?’ Cicero asked teasingly. ‘Devil chasing your tail?’

      Samma sank down on the nearest chair. She said, ‘I’ve done an awful thing. I—I threw a drink over a customer.’

      ‘That old Baxter man?’ Margot laughed. ‘I wish I’d seen it.’

      Samma gulped. ‘No, it was a stranger—or nearly. I—I had a run in with him this morning, as a matter of fact.’

      ‘That’s not like you.’ Margot gave her a sympathetic look. ‘What do they call this man?’

      Samma frowned. ‘He said his name was Roche Delacroix and that he came from Grand Cay.’

      There was an odd silence, and she looked up to see them both staring at her. ‘Why—what is it?’

      ‘I said the devil was chasing you,’ Cicero muttered. ‘It’s one of those Devil Delacroixes from Lucifer’s own island.’

      ‘You—know him?’ Samma asked rather dazedly.

      ‘Not in person, honey, but everyone round here knows the Delacroix name. Why, his ancestor was the greatest pirate who ever sailed these waters. Every time he left Grand Cay, a fleet of merchant ships went to the bottom, and he didn’t care whether they were English or Spanish, or even French like himself. He’d had to leave France because he’d quarrelled with the King, which was a mighty bad thing to do in those days, and he figured the whole world was his enemy. So they called him Le Diable, yessir.’ Cicero laughed softly. ‘And they called his hideout Lucifer’s Cay.’

      ‘Did they, indeed?’ Samma said grimly. ‘Well, I hope they caught him and hanged him from his own yardarm.’

      ‘Not on your life,’ said Cicero. ‘He turned respectable, got a free pardon, and took up sugar planting. But they say every now and then the breeding throws up another Devil—a chip off the old block, like that old pirate.’

      He paused. ‘This Mr Roche Delacroix now, why, they reckon he’s made more money than old Devil Delacroix himself. He owns the casino, right there on Grand Cay, and he has a boat-chartering business as well. He’s one rich guy, all right.’

      ‘And he’s here in this club right now?’ Margot asked huskily, her full lips curving in a smile. ‘This I have to see. Maybe when he’s dried off, he’d like some company.’

      ‘Perhaps—but I think he’s more interested in playing poker.’ Samma forced a smile. ‘Maybe I should have found someone else to pour a drink over.’

      ‘You sure should,’ Cicero agreed sombrely. ‘Why, honey, you don’t ever want to cross anyone from Lucifer’s Cay—specially someone by the name of Delacroix. That was one bad mistake.’

      Margot rose, pretty and sinuous as a cat. ‘Then I’ll have to try and make up for it,’ she said, her lips curving in an anticipatory smile. ‘Wish me luck, now.’

      She drifted out, and Cicero followed a moment or two later, leaving Samma alone.

      She tore off Nina’s dress and bundled it back on a hanger. Never, ever again would she work at the Black Grotto in any capacity, although Clyde was unlikely even to ask her again, after tonight’s performance, she reminded herself wryly.

      She dragged on her T-shirt and jeans, and walked back through the grounds towards the small bungalow she shared with Clyde.

      She felt restless—on edge, and it was all the fault of that foul man. In just a few hours, he’d turned the quiet backwater of her life into some kind of raging torrent, she thought resentfully.

      And nothing Cicero had told her had done anything to put her mind at ease. It was no wonder Roche Delacroix had been annoyed at her sketch, she thought restively. He probably considered she knew who he was, and was taking a petty swipe at his family history.

      Well, let him think what he wanted. He would be leaving soon and, anyway, his opinions were of no concern to her. Indeed, she didn’t know why she was wasting a second thought on the creature.

      But, at this rate, she wasn’t going to sleep tonight. Some hard physical exercise was what she needed to calm her down, and tire her out. She turned down the path which led to the hotel’s small swimming pool. She rarely got the chance to use the pool during the day, but that wasn’t too much of a hardship when she could come down here at night, and have it all to herself. And there was the added bonus that she didn’t have to bother with a costume.

      She collected a towel from one of the changing cabins, stripped and plunged into the water. But, as she struck out with her swift, practised crawl, she couldn’t seem to capture her usual sense of wellbeing.

      Oh, it wasn’t fair, she thought with a kind of desperate impatience. Of all the men who’d passed through Cristoforo, there had never been one who’d come even close to touching her emotions. Yet, in the space of a few minutes, Roche Delacroix, of all people, had given her a swift, disturbing insight into what it might mean to be a woman—even though he’d treated her for most of the time like a child, she thought stormily, as she turned for another length.

      And then—paradoxically—had come that cynical—that abominable offer.

      ‘A year out of your life.’ His words seemed to beat a tattoo in her brain. How dared he? she raged inwardly. Oh, how dared he? And it was no comfort to tell herself that he’d simply been amusing himself at her expense. After all, a man like that could have no real interest in an inexperienced nineteen-year-old. Margot, or even the absent Nina, would be far more his type.

      But soon Allegra would be gone, she tried to console herself, and she would never have to see Roche Delacroix or think about him again.

      She hauled herself out of the water, and began to blot the moisture from her arms and body, then paused suddenly, a strange prickle of awareness alerting her nerve-endings as if—as if someone was watching her.

      She stopped towelling her hair, and glanced over her shoulder, searching

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