No; Pierre, even lovelier — if possible — in her grief, was not pleased. Not at all! Neither the rank odour of decay nor the full knowledge that her fate was now sealed impressed her, and it was all because he wasn’t there. Intellectually, she realized that the ‘Parisian Pirate’, Alicia, the godless, ebony, instinctive man she had belonged to so completely, had a full life in which he was away again on safari, and he could not be expected to hold any consideration for the pleasure of one pagan girl. Intellectually, she knew this. And yet…
   Truly, it had been a most brightest day when father had brought him to her attention.
   At that moment an inrush of cool air as the door was flung open shattered her composure into a million dangerous, immortal pieces! She felt her heart suddenly beat with a new, wild rhythm. Surely it could not be — but it was! At the door, the byzantine and masculine face she had come to know so well! “I couldn’t stay away,” he stated while he slid the little ring onto her finger. “I need you, my darling!”
   Suddenly, as the glow of renewed love gradually overcame her mounting desire for dinner, she knew that life without him was unthinkable, if not bloody. Wthout him, could she ever have woke up. Incredibly enough, it had all been a dream?