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shifting her efforts to Hugo. Starstruck enthusiasm always worked on the older men on the island.
    â€œMy kitchens are your kitchens,” Luc said courteously, turning back to her.
    Well, that was true, but . . .
    â€œI was being polite.” His eyes narrowed again.
    He made her brain dizzy. As if she was breathing out carbon dioxide but only breathing in him.
    â€œI’ll be happy to show you around as long as you can stay out of the way,” Hugo told her roughly.
    Her father gave both men a sharp look and glanced at Summer to see how she would reinforce her ownership of the hotel. “I’m pretty discreet,” she promised Hugo humbly.
    Her father frowned in severe disappointment at her lack of backbone, amusement leaped suddenly in Luc’s dark eyes like a secret, and Alain Roussel stared at her as if she was insane.
    Look, the indiscreet part of last night was his fault, she barely stopped herself from saying, then sent Luc a grumpy look. He had gotten her all over the Web again. Her first damn night.
    Her breath whooshed out of her as silk and a fine edge of soft wool slid over her bare arms and closed her in warmth and scent. A waiter straightened away from her, his face politely neutral, as she looked straight at Luc.
    He smiled at her urbanely, and she must be imagining that hungry, satisfied edge to him like a cat watching a mouse wander well past its safety zone.
    She rubbed the edge of the coat between her fingers. Dior, maybe, the texture very fine. It had to be Luc’s, she could tell by the labyrinth of scents: chocolate, butter, spice, stinging bright scents, and secret, mysterious warm ones. She wanted to get lost in them and never come out until morning.
    â€œWhat the hell is that?” her father asked, since apparently that rule about keeping Luc happy didn’t apply to him. Her father had ambitions for a son-in-law with a brilliant financial mind.
    Luc gave her father a cool look. Her fingers stilled on the coat. The chef pâtissier looked at one of Forbes ’ top five hundred, who had just bought the hotel where he worked as a Christmas present for his spoiled daughter, as if he had the potential to be a headache and inconvenience and not much more.
    She pulled his coat more snugly around herself, without even realizing she was doing it.
    â€œBetter?” Luc asked gently, reaching out to button the jacket near her throat, so that she wore it like a cape. Her heart beat so hard as his fingers grazed her throat that she was sure he would feel her pulse there.
    What was wrong with her? What had she started with her stupid exhausted carelessness the night before? “Was I not up to the dress code?” Her quick grin invited everyone into the joke. “Coat and tie only?”
    â€œYou were perfect,” Luc said calmly. “But you looked cold.”
    Her father’s critical look made her want to tuck herself up against Luc and thumb her nose at him.
    â€œAnd you’re welcome in my kitchens any time you choose,” Luc told her, with exquisite manners that reinforced his possession of those kitchens. “You won’t get in my way.”
    Damn it. She really hated men who didn’t let her get in their way.
    â€œWelcome to the Leucé.” And he walked off and left her. Again. Draped in his coat, his scent twining all around her.

C HAPTER 4
    S ylvain Marquis stared as Luc approached, reflected back on himself in a vast gold-framed mirror that glinted with the lights from the chandeliers. In it Luc saw Summer forget him almost instantly, turning that sweet smile on the first man to take his place. “How did you manage to do that? ” the chocolatier asked.
    â€œDo what?” Luc pretended to sip his wine again. He was damned if he would get any alcohol into his system tonight. That half glass of champagne the night before had clearly left him far too vulnerable to being . . . cracked like a raw egg.
    â€œWalk out on