Wronged (The Cuvier Widows Book 1) (10 page)

Today for the first time she’d even felt like
there was progress between the two of them. Though part of her
wondered if it was because of Philip, the other part just wanted to
accept Louis’s behavior at face value. Maybe he was softening
toward the idea of her working in the business? Or maybe he thought
Philip needed a man’s influence. Whatever the reason, he certainly
seemed congenial and she’d enjoyed the time they spent
together.

“There you are,” Claire said, coming into the
room. “I wondered where you’d gone to.”

“After I said good night to the children, I
decided to sit down and relax a bit,” Marian said opening her eyes
to look at Claire.

“Hard day working with the men of Cuvier
Shipping?” her sister asked, smoothing her skirt as she sat on the
fainting couch in Marian’s sitting room.

Marian chuckled. “Actually, today went rather
well and that surprised me.”

“What was different about today?” she
asked.

“Louis was nice to me and to Philip.”

Claire raised her brows at Marian. “Not our
Mr. Fournet? The one determined to rid Cuvier Shipping of you?”

“Yes. He brought Philip and me home when he
realized that Philip had come from school. Then he took us to
Tony’s for an Italian ice. He even offered to take Philip on a tour
of Cuvier Shipping, which excited the boy.”

“What’s the man after now?” Claire asked, a
frown wrinkling her forehead. “Maybe he’s decided if ignoring you
doesn’t work, that he’ll go through Philip to convince you to stay
away.”

“No, I don’t think so, he was quite different
when Philip was there,” Marian said, remembering the way Louis had
reacted to her son.

“I’d be very careful letting him get near the
boy. Philip is much too vulnerable right now.”

Marian didn’t pay her sister any mind. “I
caught Louis standing in the doorway, watching me doctor Philip. He
looked almost sad as he gazed at the boy. Maybe I imagined the
look, but he seemed different today. He went out of his way to
treat Philip and myself nicely. He seemed genuine. Almost a
different person.”

“You must be careful, Marian. He’s going to
try a new tactic to get to you. If you’re not careful he’ll use his
charm to try and persuade you to stay home where ‘women belong.’
“

Marian laughed. “Oh Claire, you’re such a
cynic. I realize I need to be careful of Mr. Fournet. He’s already
tried several different tactics. Why, just this week, he kissed me,
in an effort to frighten me away!”

“What?” Claire asked, her eyes growing
wide.

“Don’t worry, I handled him and his penchant
for creating trouble. I don’t think he’ll try that one again.”
Pity, she thought. His kiss had been intriguing and Marian couldn’t
help but wonder if she might enjoy a second chance at a taste of
his lips. Just one more time to see if the first kiss was a fluke
or if there was something about a man’s kiss she’d never noticed
before. Certainly she couldn’t remember reacting so pleasantly
before.

“You’re going to bring even more scandal down
on this house, if you don’t give up this foolish notion of working
alongside those men,” Claire admonished.

Marian gazed at her sister, peeved at
Claire’s attitude. She was so concerned with what society thought
“I’m accustomed to scandal. It’s poverty that frightens me.” Marian
paused. “Unless you want me to start taking in sewing or become
some man’s kept woman?”

“Hardly. I’m not against what you’re doing,
I’m just worried about the effects on the children.”

“I worry about them too. But food and shelter
are a priority,” Marian said realizing that since Jean’s death,
they all depended on her to take care of them, even her sister in
some ways.

For a few moments only the sound of the
mantel clock ticking its soothing rhythm could be heard as Marian
sat, her mind returning to Louis’s kiss.

Marian sighed and leaned her head back,
gazing up at the patterns on the ceiling. “Do you remember when we
were little girls and we dreamed of the day we would many?”

“Yes,” Claire replied, wistfully.

“Do you think marriage ever turns out for
anyone the way little girl’s dream of weddings and husbands?”

Claire stared off into space a moment “Can’t
think of anyone I know who has one of those storybook kind of
marriages. I don’t think I took into account a man’s need for
nights at the club or their sweaty feet. Not to mention the fact
that love seems to last for only twenty minutes a week for most
men.”

“Where did we get such idealistic dreams of
marriage?” Marian asked, with a laugh.

“For the answer to that question, I think
you’d have to go all the way back to Eve.” Claire gazed over at her
sister. “Why so pensive suddenly? Did Louis’s kiss make you long
for marriage?”

Marian laughed. “Hardly. Though I must admit
to being quite shocked. It’s been years since any man has kissed me
like that. It was naughty, but oh, so nice.”

“Marian! You sound as if you need to
reconsider marriage.”

“Why? What’s the purpose of me marrying at
this stage in life? I can have all the benefits of living alone and
if I should desire a man—I’m a widow. Old enough to know the
consequences, young enough to still take chances.”

“You wouldn’t!” her sister said, shocked.

“Depends on if the right man came along,” she
proclaimed, sitting up and gazing at her sister. “With all the
poems and love songs that have been written, don’t you wonder if
there is something to love that we may have missed?”

“I don’t know.” Claire stretched her legs the
length of the fainting couch and leaned her head against the
cushion. “Love that’s fresh and new is exciting. It’s only when you
cease to be a person and are merely a wife, that suddenly it’s no
longer any fun. It’s not that I’ve missed out on love. It’s just
been so long since a man kissed me and held me in his arms.”

The image of Louis wrapping his arms around
her suddenly appeared and Marian felt her breath quicken. Their
kiss had been awkward and he hadn’t really held her. So how would
his full embrace feel?

“I know,” Marian acknowledged with a soft
sigh. “I know. I had forgotten about passion until Louis’s
kiss.”

“Well, it looks like he left a lasting
impression,” her sister said.

“It’s been so many years.”

She sighed and wondered if she could feel
that way again.

***

Marian sat at her desk, gazing at the empty
office across from her. A week had passed since Louis kissed her in
an attempt to run her off and still they were at a stalemate with
neither one of them winning out.

Well past noon, Louis had yet to show up for
work and she wondered what he could be doing. While she knew his
whereabouts were none of her concern and she should not worry, she
could not help but wonder where the man could be hiding.

The thoughts went round and round in her
head, while she tried to trace back journal entries to see who the
company was paying. This week she’d learned that shipping manifests
were long and incredibly dull, and her mind kept wandering back to
the image of the man across the hall.

Feeling his mouth covering hers, his hands
gripping her, feeling his lips moving against hers, intruded more
often in her thoughts than they should. And now along with that
image came the burning question of how would she feel with his arms
wrapped around her? Would it be comforting and soothing? Or wild
and wanton? Or was it possible to have wild, wanton, and soothing
all in the same embrace?

Doubtful. And she shouldn’t really consider
the question. After all she would never experience his embrace, so
why torture herself with wondering? But still, the thought
intruded.

The sound of shouting startled her and she
jumped from behind her desk. What was that?

“Get him in here, now!” yelled a man, the
silence when he finished deafening.

Hurrying to the door, she glanced out,
half-afraid of what she would find.

“What do you mean Mr. Fournet is not here! I
told him if this happened again, we were through! I mean to tell
him just how much he’s cost my company with this damn lost
shipment!” shouted the man.

An irate customer wanted Louis and she was
here alone!

Marian walked down the hall, her feet
carrying her toward the counter, while her thoughts seemed rattled
and she shook nervously. She didn’t know what she would do, but she
must face this customer.

What if he refused to speak with her because
she was a woman? Ridiculous, she could convince him. For the sake
of Cuvier Shipping and Philip, she had to.

As Marian approached the reception area, she
felt like she was headed to the gallows. Her heart pounded inside
her chest and her palms sweated, but she knew she could not stand
by and do nothing.

As the co-owner, she was the one to take this
man’s complaint, but she didn’t know what she would tell him.

“Sir, I promise you I would not hide Mr.
Fournet from you,” Henry Chatham said, his voice rising with
growing frustration. “I wish he were here to handle your
complaint.”

Marian reached the counter, her gaze taking
in a red-faced man who towered above her. Brown eyes snapped in
anger, his pupils were large and dark. She swallowed the
butterflies that seemed to rise from her stomach.

“You tell that French bas—”

“Excuse me, is there a problem?” Marian
asked, her voice soft, but firm.

The large man halted, seeming almost ready to
explode with rage, as his face turned an even darker shade of red
at the sight of her.

“Damn yes, there’s a problem. Just who the
hell are you?” he demanded.

Marian swallowed, drawing on a reserve of
strength she hadn’t known she possessed. She pulled back her
shoulders, lifted her chin, and met his angry gaze.

“I’m Marian Cuvier, part owner of Cuvier
Shipping. Can I be of service to you?” she said politely.

“If you weren’t a damn woman, I’d give you
the chewing that Fournet deserves,” the man bellowed.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name,” Marian
said, ignoring his comment about women, though she wanted to kick
him in the shin. Somehow she felt like he was still swearing at
her, though only in polite tones.

“Morgan! George Morgan of the St Martin Sugar
Refinery.”

Marian recognized his name from the
ledgers.

This man was no ordinary customer, he was
their largest account He controlled one of the largest sugar
plantations in Louisiana, not to mention the fact that he also had
a business that moved coffee and bananas around the United
States.

Somehow she to calm down the customer and
retain his business.

“Nice to meet you, Mr. Morgan. Would you like
to come back to my office where I’d be happy to discuss any
problems you may have with your shipments?”

Her even tone and offer of help took the
sting right out of his anger as he stared at her, stunned.

“Ma’am how’s a woman going to help me?”

She smiled, thinking a woman could do so much
for him. “I’m Jean Cuvier’s widow. I own half of this business. You
have my guarantee that I will work out some plan that will make you
happy with Cuvier Shipping again, Mr. Morgan.”

Where moments ago there had only been the
sound of shouting, now silence filled the room as he stared at her,
along with all the other men in the room. For a moment she thought
he was either going to yell at her or laugh, she didn’t know which.
The fear that they were about to lose their biggest account almost
overwhelmed her.

Mr. Morgan glanced around at the men who
stood gazing at them. “Well one thing I can say for you, you’re the
only one who has offered to help me. The rest have been scurrying
out of my way, including this swamp rat behind the counter.”

“Then you’re willing to sit down and discuss
the problems?” she asked, putting her shaky, perspiring palms
together to hide them.

“Hell yes, I’ll discuss them with you. But
I’m going to expect some improvement. You’re not going to just
mollify me with talk and no action,” he bellowed.

“Fair enough. Let’s see what we can agree
to.” She held open the gate for him. “Shall we?”

Marian could feel every eye in the room on
them as they walked down the hall toward her office. For the first
time since she’d started working at Cuvier Shipping she felt like
she was in a position of power. For the first time she was going to
actually do something beneficial for the company.

***

A bird squawked overhead at Louis as he
looked over the ship’s manifest before they departed. He had spent
the morning down at the docks speaking with several of his boat
captains hoping to resolve some issues before he came into the
office. The process had taken longer than he’d expected and several
times, quite unexpectedly, the image of Marian had crossed his
thoughts.

Yesterday, he’d seen her as a mother and
realized just how important her children were to her. Hearing her
say the words didn’t have the effect that watching her with Philip
had. She brought to mind his own mother and he’d been reminded of
what he was missing in life. Once he’d had his own family. Now he
only dreamed of having a son or daughter again.

Spending the afternoon with Marian and her
son, Philip, had been enjoyable. Watching her spoon Italian ice
into her mouth had been quite a sensuous experience, one that
wakened his senses and left him feeling a little unsettled.

The widow Cuvier was an attractive woman, who
he was learning had a will of iron and packed a powerful kiss that
startled him.

For some reason he’d held the notion she
would be easy to get rid of, and now he was beginning to doubt that
even dynamite could loosen the woman from her grip on Cuvier
Shipping. She could still be sitting across the hall from him while
he tried to arrange the sale of the shipping company without her
knowledge; because he was determined to sell the company, with or
without her.