Belle Pearl Read Online Free

she really is very beautiful. She has an angelic face. Really, she looks like an angel in a Botticelli painting. There’s an innocent soulfulness about her eyes. There is something special about her. I just wish she wanted to be my friend.”
    “Give it time, Sophie. Pearl’s like a cat. You have to let her come to you; not be pushy or she’ll run away.”
    “By the way, speaking of felines, Claudine called me,” Sophie told me. “She says she’s left several messages and you haven’t got back to her. She’s very upset. I mean, really upset. Hurt feelings. You’d better get in touch.”
    Oh no. “What does she want?”
    “Well, she split with her boyfriend recently.”
    “Oh God.”
    “She’s doing well, though. She’s just been offered a campaign by L’Oréal. You know, the glamorous older model, the over thirty type of thing. She looks amazing for her age. She’s quite a stunner.”
    “If you’re into bones that look as if they can snap in two and skin paler than alabaster, yes, she’s a beauty.”
    “Anyway, you’d better call her because she’s been really bugging me about seeing you. She says she misses you and wants to hang out. She sounded very depressed, very doomsday about everything, despite her modeling success.”
    I could feel my insides churn. Would there never be an end to this slew of exes battering at my door?
    “I’m getting married, Sophie. I don’t want to see Claudine. Nor Indira, nor Laura. Nor any other beautiful ex that might pop out from under the fancy wood paneling.”
    Sophie laughed again and said in English, “It never rains it pours. I love that expression.”
    I felt my lips tighten. Bloody Claudine. I thought I was off the hook. “I’m in love with Pearl,” I enunciated—to myself as much as to my sister. I won’t be roped into a guilt trip noose about my neck again. Claudine needs to sort her own fucking issues out with men. There is no way I’ll partake in any more mercy fucks for Claudine.
    Sophie dabbed her lips with a hint of gloss. “Alessandra will be all over her, I just know it.”
    “Who?”
    “Alessandra will be all over Pearl.”
    “That’s right, you met Alessandra Demarr, that time backstage after we’d been to see her in that play. I’d forgotten about that. What’s she like?”
    Sophie turned her face away from me and said, “Oh look, our table’s ready. I’m starving, aren’t you?”
    At the time I didn’t put two and two together.

    The dreaded phone call came the next day.
    “How did you get my number?” I asked Claudine. She hadn’t even spoken but I suspected it was Claudine because of the weighty silence that I knew I was expected to fill. Responsible, as I was, for her misery. Not .
    “Alexandre, I’m so down. My boyfriend and I—”
    “I know,” I cut in. “Sophie told me. I’m sorry it didn’t work out but don’t lose hope—there are plenty of other men out there who would be delighted to date you.” Delighted until enlightened…to the psycho side.
    “You’re the only man I’ve ever known who knows how to fuck me properly, Alex.”
    Uh, oh. “You’re being dramatic. Don’t be silly.”
    “I’ve been on a binge. I’ve fucked eight men in eight days and not a single one of them has gotten me even close to feeling turned on, let alone having an orgasm.”
    “Claudine, that’s not the way to go about things. Men usually don’t care if a woman comes or not. They’re in it for themselves. That’s why you need to develop a real relationship with someone. So he cares about your needs.”
    “I tried. You think I didn’t try? My last boyfriend. But it was a disaster in the end. Even he was crap in bed.”
    I sucked in a deep breath. “Look, I’m sorry but I can’t help you. What I can do is pay for you to see someone. A psychiatrist or a counselor—someone you can discuss all this with you in depth.”
    “All those bloody book boyfriends don’t help.”
    “What?”
    “I feel so inadequate. All