The Accidental Mistress

http://thedivaspen.com

Accidental Mistress

ISBN
9780983052388

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Accidental Mistress © Copyright 2011 Sienna
Mynx

Cover art by M. B. Wright

Electronic book publication January 2011

With the exception of quotes used in reviews,
this book may not be reproduced or used in whole or in part by any
means existing without written permission from the publisher, The
Diva’s Pen LLC.

Warning: The unauthorized
reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal.
No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded or distributed via
the Internet or any other means electronic or print, without the
publisher’s permission. Criminal copyright infringement, including
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).
Please purchase only authorized electronic or print editions and do
not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of
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appreciated.

Special consideration and
research has gone into the depiction of Martinique, however this
remains a work of a fiction, any names, places or persons were
strictly a work of fiction and based on the author's
imagination.
No infringement
intended.

J'ai découvert le
vrai bonheur le jour vous avez marché dans ma vie. -

I discovered
true happiness the day you walked into my life
.

Chapter One

Zuri's gaze switched from her half eaten
filet to the sparkling city lights outside of the restaurant’s
window. The sky had darkened to a deep shade of violet, which
stained the moon pink as the sun slipped away. It was a sky that
reminded her of home.

She could see the wind in the sway of the
leaves extended from the planted trees along the circular drive. A
black car with dark tinted windows slowed to a stop before the
valet’s booth. The driver, tall with an immaculate appearance,
emerged. His hand pressed down on his cap to keep it in place, and
his blazer blew open as he hurried around the front of the limo
ahead of the valet. An even taller man stepped out from the
darkness of the open door.

Zuri's view had been limited by the shadows
covering most of his face so she could only see the basic details.
Big in stature, with shoulders a yard wide, his dark grey trench
opened and closed as he took confident strides toward the
restaurant’s doors.

He possibly could be one of Chicago's elite.
There were few surprises about the rich and famous dinning and
mingling in the prestigious Gold Coast neighborhood. Besides, she'd
seen her share of celebrities growing up on the island resort owned
by her father.

Tonight was special. Her parents had chosen
a really nice French restaurant with velvet chairs and pristine
settings under candlelight over crisp linen. All of this had been
done for her. She should be enjoying herself. She wasn't.

Zuri picked up her fork and pushed her
asparagus into a cross formation on her plate. She dreaded the
conversation that the evening was edging toward.

"Something wrong with your
steak,
ma chérie
?"
her mom asked.

Nanette Baptiste, her mother, was often told
she looked as young as her daughters. She had married young and in
their island customs that wasn't too surprising. Not like here in
America where women aimed for college and much more. Petite in
stature, Nanette’s distinctive feature had been her remarkably
large expressive eyes like Zuri with naturally long lashes. She
blinked and men stopped thinking she was a flirt.

Claude Baptiste preferred she wore her hair
long and flowing. Her mother usually pulled the dark locks back and
neatly pinned it into a chignon in public. But if you ever saw it
freely cascading about her shoulders, you'd be compelled to touch
it. Her French, African, East Indian heritage proved evident in her
speech and her toffee hued skin. Nanette was as gracious as she was
kind, never raising her voice in anger and never indulging in the
island snobbery customary of women of her stature. Zuri loved her
mom dearly.

Zuri decided on a sip of wine rather than an
answer. She forced a smile. Today had been her twenty-first
birthday, and this indeed was her very first official taste of
alcohol.

“
She's okay
mère
,” Joi
winked.

Nanette's motherly concern deepened the
frown lines over her brow.

“
I'm fine, just not that
hungry.”

“
That's because she misses
your cooking. Doncha? Hot and spicy
lambi,
blaff, court-bouillon
filling your
belly
,
” Joi
teased.

“
Conch, boiled fish with
chives or in spicy tomato sauce as opposed to the Chicago treats of
deep dish pizzas and polish dogs smothered in onions and
sauerkraut? Nope, I like my American food just fine."

Grinning, Joi, her younger
sister by two years, bumped her knee with her own under the table.
“Yea, right. Then why did you have me sneak some
boudin
past customs for
you? Ansa me that!”

Her father chuckled, but her mother frowned
at the impropriety of Zuri's request.

“
Guess you got a point.”
Zuri flashed her mother a sheepish smirk.

Her gaze shifted to her sister's rare
beauty. Despite the chill of the night, Joi wore a red halter dress
that their mother kept insisting she pull up. She too had inherited
Nanette's hair but chose to wear it cropped short in a pixie like
style with the tips of her spry curls tinted magenta. This was only
one of the ways Joi rebelled against her mother's attempts to keep
her daughters lady-like. On the island of Martinique, the caste
system had been often upheld. Her parent's story was proof of
that.

“
We're proud of you, Zuri,”
her father said, “I'd like to make a toast.”

Zuri beamed. The Baptiste family raised
their glasses. Her dad cleared his throat. Claude’s eyes shone with
pride and love. Zuri couldn't help but relax under his protective
gaze. He was the glue that held them all together.

Each of the Baptiste women bloomed and
flourished under the watchful guidance of Claude Baptiste. As a
reward, his complete devotion to his children and wife was
unwavering. Her parents were a great example of the type of
marriage Zuri would want to have someday.

No one was prouder than
she. Her father, a man of Haitian descent, had been raised unlike
her mother who was Martinician. A French European family (commonly
referred to as
metros
on the island) adopted her father from a Haitian orphanage at
the age of eight and brought him to Martinique. There was much more
to the story, but Claude never spoke of his time with the
Lefebvre’s.

Even though he inherited their wealth,
including the coffee bean plantation, at the young age of
seventeen, he kept his real father's name with pride. Claude's
strict catholic principles made life as his daughter come with
certain restrictions and rules. But even he saw fit to let Zuri
breach the nest and spread her wings.

“
To Zuri, my daughter the
college graduate. I am so proud of the woman before me and all that
you’ve accomplished. We all are.
F
élicitations
, ma trésor
."

Zuri felt a surge of love
move through her. He congratulated her. “
Merci,
père
.” She said, humbled and thankful.

Glasses clinked. Zuri
savored the sour and sweet blend of her wine. Once the grape taste
dissolved on her tongue, her body warmed. She relaxed.
Is this what wine does to a
person
, she wondered. If so, she would
enjoy the freedoms of being twenty-one.

“
How cool is it that you
graduate on the same day that's your birthday?” Joi
asked.

“
Luck, I guess.”

Zuri looked up when her mother reached over
and tucked a loose curl behind her ear that had fallen in her
face.

“
I like your apartment. You
decorated it very nice and cozy,” her mother said.

Zuri nodded. “I found some
neat things at a little thrift store by my place. My friend at
school helped me upholster the sofa.
Merci
beaucoup
,
mère
.”

“
Is it a he?” her father
queried.

Zuri rolled her eyes, and Joi snickered.

Claude shrugged his shoulders. “I know
you’re a good girl. No way you could finish with honors if you were
chasing boys.”

“
Claude, honey, at her age,
they are men not boys,” her mother chuckled and Zuri’s father
blanched.

“
Whatever they are, she has
no time for those matters.”

“
What matters,
père
?” Joi
teased.

“
Can we change the
subject?” Zuri sighed. The last thing she wanted to discuss was her
virginity, which remained shamefully in tact. It was kind of
embarrassing that she had been in the city for three solid years
and had not even made a guy friend outside of her study group.
Getting kissed by one was still a dream. But her schedule could be
the blame. She piled on the course work and finished ahead of her
peers. The commencement ceremony wouldn't be scheduled until June.
It was just December.

“
Fontaine has asked about
you often, since your last visit home,” her mother tried to
introduce casually.

“
Ew! He's so ashy!” Joi
coughed out.

“
Lower your voice, Joi!”
Nanette admonished. “And he isn't ashy. He has skin
allergies.”

Claude groaned. “I agree with Zuri. Change
the subject.”

“
Well, it's not Fontaine
that's missing you. JP is the one,” said Joi.

Tension seized the reins of the
conversation. Jean-Paul was a trusted employee, family friend, and
he never spoke of his desires for Zuri. To do so would incur her
father's wrath. He was Guadeloupian, six years her senior,
uneducated, even though he was the head chef under her father's
employ. And her father made it really clear he wasn't ready for
either of his daughters to be paired off with a suitor, acceptable
or not. He'd accept nunnery first.

Zuri gave a nervous laugh.
“
Père,
Joi is
just trying to get a rise out of you. JP and I are more like
brother and sister. You know this.”

Her father's tight-lipped
scowl eased. Joi kept grinning, hoping to get her father to fly off
in French and shock her mother into trying to calm him. The mood
softened and Zuri
felt the tension in her
chest release as well. To be truthful, she had missed her family.
She even secretly missed her girlhood crush Jean-Paul. Maybe she'd
email him later to catch up.

She picked up her knife and began to slice
into her medium rare steak. The steamy juices saturated her plate,
turning her mashed potatoes pink. “Do you have to leave tomorrow
evening? I want to take Joi around and do some shopping,” she
said.

“
Yes!” Joi exclaimed, and
her mother shook her head sternly at the outburst.