Hot Basque: A French Summer Novel 2 Read Online Free Page A

felt tired, then they’d be off again, just managing to make it to the bedroom and collapse on the bed, their bodies joined in the age-old rhythm, rocking, arching, never wanting to let go, murmuring their private words of love.
    She could feel herself getting flushed, pulse quickening.
    Cool down girl, there are things to do. Important things to do. Such as studying for your exams which are due to start in...she glanced at the calendar...just over two months time. Horror, horror, panic and sweaty palms. She hadn’t sat an exam for...nine years?
    It was when she’d been trawling the internet last August that Caroline had finally found an answer to the job question. Clicking on a site for one of the big French Business Schools in Toulouse she’d found herself reading about teaching opportunities. Practically all subjects were now being taught in English. Her Business degree and work experience made her admirably qualified for such a job, except for one vital thing. The schools also required teachers who had a specialisation in language teaching, more precisely the Teaching of English as a Foreign Language. Otherwise known as TEFL.
    Leaning back in her chair, staring at the screen, she had tried to imagine herself in a classroom. Would she like that? Interacting with young people who were starting a career in business studies? She’d thought how well she got on with Claudie and Jean-Paul, how Claudie was always moaning about her English lecturers at the Hotel School where she was training, how out of touch they were, ‘from the last century’. Surely Caroline could relate to the interests and aspirations of people in their early twenties? Leaning forward again, she’d read the description more carefully. OK. If she liked the idea, she needed to get a TEFL qualification. Feeling her excitement mount, she’d begun to click, to follow other links. The more she read, the more fired up she’d become. She had made notes, calculations. When she had finally pushed back her chair, she had a good feeling, a feeling that this was the way to go. But she’d have to move fast. The TEFL courses started mid-September. Tapping a pencil against her teeth, she’d taken the decision not to say anything to Edward just yet. In a couple of days he’d be over in the UK. They were going to spend the weekend with her Aunt and Birdie, at Willowdale. They’d also be seeing Edward’s parents, Julie and Adam Rayburn, who were neighbours. She would put the proposal to all of them, at the same time. If the Willowdale Approval Committee thought it was a good idea, she’d call the different Universities immediately about a September enrolment.
    And then–her imagination had taken a giant leap forward–then, by this time next year she would have her certificate in hand. She would be a trained English teacher, fully qualified to teach in a Toulouse Business School. She’d be living with Edward in his city-centre flat.
    A new life, a new career.
    Caroline’s eyes re-focused on the calendar. The months had flown by. And now the day of reckoning was drawing nigh. Quick. She left the terrace and shot into the bedroom, ready to haul out books, laptop and course notes. It was time to start getting serious.

3 FRANKFURT, GERMANY. MARCH
     
    Annabel Courtenay stood on the balcony of the penthouse in Frankfurt, smoking a cigarette. She shivered and pulled her cashmere wrap more tightly round her shoulders. There was a biting wind up here, in spite of the pale blue skies and sunshine. She’d take a nice long bath before going out this evening. Their spacious bathroom, with its German hi-tech fittings, was like a luxury spa. Palatial shower, bath with hydro jet massage, gleaming Italian marble, an enormous heated towel rail running across an entire wall. The purple sofa which sat in one corner, flanked by a palmetto palm was so comfortable she often spent hours curled up on it, flicking through magazines, Vogue, Tatler, Cosmopolitan. Sometimes Klass, the