Page 13 of All Mixed Up

“Rush hour?” A sharp cock of his head—but amazingly, the bright blue wig stayed perfectly in place. “Babes, that was hours ago.”

I jerked up straighter. “Hours?” Yanked out my phone. The display told me it was nine o’clock. As in, p.m. “Oh my God. This—uh—this can’t be right.”

But my plummeting belly and racing heartbeat told me otherwise—along with fifteen missed calls from Gigi, an equal number from Milo, and twice that many from an unknown Paris number.

Okay. Maybe it could be right.

As if to drive in the point, the device suddenly vibrated in my hand. My brain, still struggling between deep sleep and shocked consciousness, sent a jolting reaction straight to my grip.

Correction. My nonexistent grip.

The phone bounced once on the seat next to me, showing that unknown Paris number again, before my blue-haired friend leaned scooped it up. Again, in those heels, impressive. After I nodded my consent, he tapped the green button and issued a throaty “Bonjour?” Two seconds in, his shiny lips pursed. “Pardon-moi? C’est Sapphire Roulette, chéri. Qui est-ce?” His false eyelashes almost slammed against his gorgeously arched brows. “Lucien Paget? Well, in that case, my name is Princess Adrianna, lover!”

I ripped the phone back. “H-hello?”

“Juliette.”

Holy. Crap.

My stomach dropped even farther. My blood throbbed in my ears…and yes, between the sudden trembles of my thighs. I rubbed my free hand against my jeans, hoping the friction would return me to some kind of linear thought processes. Some kind of thought, period.

“It…is you.” Beyond the silken savagery of his voice, tearing me open and sewing me up in the same instant, I managed to blurt it.

“And it’s you.” His rush of breath, sounding like relief, filled the line.

“H-How’d you get my phone number?”

“I coaxed it out of Gigi.”

“Coaxed?”

“Maybe that is not the right word. Sometimes, my English is—how do you say?—sketchy.”

“Oh, I think your English is fine.” I sat up a little straighter. Struggled to get a full breath of air. Not a chance in hell for that. “Wait. You didn’t hurt her, did you?”

A strange grunt roughed the line. “I am a rake, Juliette; not a barbarian.”

“And so the ‘coaxing.’”

I huffed out a little laugh.

He was silent.

“You were scheduled to have dinner with her and Arista.”

“H-How did you know th-that?”

“I might have overheard it while meeting with Milo today.”

“You mean you eavesdropped? Or is your English ‘not so good’ on that one, either?”

A sound resonated from his end, like a growl pinched short. “There was no need for subterfuge. You have not been answering your phone for hours. I am not the only concerned one here, Juliette. Milo has all but phoned the police.”

“The police?” I gulped. It hurt. “Oh, God.” I dug a finger into my hair and started twisting. Hard. “Shit.” My ear was filled with the grate of him clearing his throat. The disapproval in his “tone,” or whatever it was called when it sounded like a man was into role-playing the stern professor to his naughty student, was obvious—and arousing as hell.

Oh, dear hell.

Was I really and truly in trouble here?