COUNTERPOINT
An original romantic serialFrom Alina Adams the author of "When a Man Loves a Woman" (DELL 4/00), "Annie's Wild Ride" (AVON 8/98), "Inside Figure Skating" (METROBOOKS 11/00 & 9/99), "Thieves at Heart" (AVON 12/95) and "The Fictitious Marquis" (AVON 6/95)
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CHAPTER SEVEN
On a tethered yacht, inside a harbor along the French Riviera, Nicole Simonge was enjoying the perks of being Mrs. Robin Cooper -- when Mr. Robin Cooper was, characteristically, nowhere to be found.
She wore a strapless vermilion dress with a plunging neckline, slit up both legs to her thighs, and strung from thousands of ruby beads. Not beads threaded into cloth, but beads held together by silver, silk string and clinging to every curve of her body for a sheer, almost see-through effect. A man tilting his head just the right way, could get quite an eyeful between the beads. Which was what the fifteen year old nephew of her Moroccan tycoon host was trying to do as he pressed his sweaty palms against Nicole's bare back and ground his pelvis into her hip, pretending to dance while, from the waist up, he leaned further and further back, hoping to leer down her cleavage.
Yet, his kiddie attempts to cop a feel or, at worst, score a cheap thrill, didn't bother Nicole in the least. Although barely a decade older than her juvenile pervert, she'd worked this circuit for so long that such clumsy pawing barely registered. She let him do whatever he wanted because she refused to make waves in front of his uncle, a man whose income equaled that of several medium-sized nations. She was having too much fun at his soiree, mingling with men and women who, only six years ago, barely noticed her as she escorted them to their tables inside a Monte Carlo restaurant and groveled for the change they deigned to pitch her for a tip. Now, these same men and women had to at least pretend to tolerate her.
Because she was Mrs. Robin Cooper.
Till death do them part.
Nicole gracefully wriggled out of the teen's slippery clutch, remembering to offer him a dazzling smile as she went, to insure no hard feelings in either him or his uncle, and stepped straight into the arms of the next waiting customer, a cousin, or perhaps another nephew, but definitely older and definitely interested in more than a playful ogle. The music being played was heavily Middle Eastern, reminding Nicole of a snake slowly being charmed out of its basket, and prompting her dance partner to writhe in what she presumed was supposed to be a lithe and seductive manner. She attempted to keep up with him, but, just when she thought she'd finally decoded his unusual rhythm, the cousin passed her to another, equally gyrating, relation.
It seemed to be a game of some kind, the men gathering around her in a circle, all of them clapping, trying to over-shout each other and gesturing for Nicole to dance in the middle.
She obeyed their summons, fully aware that every woman on the yacht was looking at her in a combination of disgust and I-told-you- she-was-nothing-but-a-whore smugness. Nicole didn't care. She was in her element. Those stuck-up, frigid bitches were probably just jealous of the way Nicole could steal any man's attention. It was a skill she'd cultivated since she first ran away from home at the age of thirteen. A skill even trust-fund money couldn't buy.
Of course, it didn't hurt that nature at least, had been kind to Nicole, gifting her with luxurious mink-black hair, a mouth made for pouting, smoke-filled, gray bedroom eyes promising all sorts of pleasures, and a body guaranteed to deliver. But, Nicole had known girls almost a gorgeous as she was, who still couldn't generate her level of attention. Because they didn't know the secret. Or maybe they knew it, but just didn't have the guts to follow through. The secret to being the girl who, at the end of the night, every man's balls throbbed to go home with, was to be... nothing. To have no thoughts, no desires, no needs. To be a blank slate. No man could resist a woman whose every smile, every wink, every gesture, broadcast her willingness to do anything she was told.
Nicole laughed, flitting from man to man inside her Moroccan cage, her movements quickening to keep up with the music, spinning gaily, oblivious to the subtle change of temper in the room, until the musicians abruptly quit playing, and a voice she could identify even in sleep sliced the subsequent hush to inquire sarcastically, "Am I too late for your dance of the seven veils?"
Robin stood in the doorway, dressed casually in slacks and a tan, vicuna sweater; ounce for ounce, the most pricey cloth on the planet. He walked towards her, parting the suddenly still revelers with no more than a glance, and stopped short in front of the two-inch, elevated stage that made up Nicole's dance floor. His eyes swept from the men who, only moments earlier, had been grabbing at his wife, and then over Nicole. From the day they met, he'd had a way of looking at her that made Nicole feel like she was wearing a layer of sewage. Or, worse, like she was wearing nothing at all.
Robin reached into his pants-pocket, and, withdrawing a wad of bills, stuffed them down the open front of Nicole's dress, two tens slipping out and crumpling by her feet. "Is that enough to buy me your attention for a couple minutes, darling?"
Nicole glanced down, plucking cash out of her decolletage and making an exaggerated show of counting it slowly. She looked at the money, she looked at the Moroccan tycoon, she looked at Robin. She smiled wickedly, rolled the bills into a tube and, tucking them between her breasts, innocently propositioned her host, "Care to go bobbing for dollars?"
Watching anger consume Robin's face, Nicole knew her arrow had struck its mark. Her husband, apparently, had forgotten that his taste for humiliating her in public was exceeded only by Nicole's ongoing attempt to turn that humiliation back on him.
Robin leapt on the stage, the ball of his foot balancing along the edge of the platform only long enough for him to grab Nicole's wrist and tug her off. Stunned by both the unexpectedness of the assault and the force Robin used to carry it out, Nicole stumbled, losing her balance, and hitting the floor with both knees. Fingers still locked around her arm, Robin yanked Nicole upright, dragging her out of the room, off the yacht, and into his car.
He flung Nicole into the passenger-side, gunning the engine. Only once they'd hit the open road, did he compose himself enough to take a deep breath, and brush the bangs falling down his face off his forehead. "Nice show," Robin snapped.
"I thought you'd enjoy it." Nicole smoothed her dress, noting where a silver strand had snapped, sending dozens of beads rolling under the seat. She straightened up, asking Robin, "What are you doing here, anyway? I thought you were going to San Francisco for that Fund -- grant -- whatever it is, of your mother's."
"It's over." Robin's lips were set in a pursed line, meaning he didn't wish to discuss it. Which, of course, meant it was now the only topic Nicole longed to pursue.
"And you didn't stay a few days extra to... see the sights?"
Without taking his eyes off the road, Robin raised a finger of warning in her direction. "Don't start with me."
Oh, good, she'd hit a nerve. This was going to be fun.
"Losing our touch, are we, lover?" She snuggled her shoulders against the seat's kid-soft leather. "Don't tell me the debutantes have stopped falling at your feet?"
"One more word, and you can use your feet -- or whatever part of your anatomy gets the job done best -- to find your way home."
Nicole shrugged, "Fine with me. You're the one who dragged me out of that glorious party. I'd have been happy to stay forever."
"I wanted to talk to you." Robin pulled his Ferrari into the garage of their high-rise, and climbed outside, slamming the door loudly enough for the walls to reverberate. "About our divorce."