Two months later
"The French President is stepping down!" D.'s PA had for once lost her habitual poise and restraint and had burst into his office without waiting for the answer to her brief knock. Natasha was too smart and had too long worked for D. not to guess the implications of such news.
Since the blasting success of his alliance with the Italian tycoon, all D.'s business relatives had been prompting him into a political foray. D. was wavering, his ambition driving him forward while the complications and constraints to his freedom made the prospect less attractive. His ideal would have been to make it to the top without alienating his pride and caving in when confronted to the petty compromises one had to make in that courtesan world.
As a result, he'd been irresolute for some time now.

"My task here has been completed", N. announced as she had asked for an impromptu private meeting with D. "so I wanted to wish you best of luck with Eole". Her voice was formal, but she was smiling in a rather malicious way. "Before you ask, and as it will be in the press any time now, I am running for the presidential election". "You..." D. gasped in surprise.
"I waited some time to see whether you would go for it, but working with you and seeing you so devoted to your business made me understand it would be heartbreaking for you to give it away. Plus France is a traditional country, and someone having pledged to remain single and uncommitted would not appeal to the female and familial electorate."

A flash of memory brought D. back to Amsterdam, as they were wandering along the docks the evening before leaving the city after the windmill campaign was done with. The sunset caressing the tidal waves produced a soft glow which made the whole picture look like a Van de Velde painting.
The intimacy of the situation combined with their still being in a public place, had made him more daring and he had started talking about his brilliant college years, shadowed by his introversion. At that time, he would shy away from approaching girls he felt attracted to and resolved to a mutual admiration community which had become the standard way he dealt with the opposite sex.
Until he had met N. All that prudently built scheme had crushed. At that point, he had stopped talking and N. leaning towards him, had placed a soft kiss on his cheek. "Yet another friendship" he had thought, not knowing whether relief or disappointment prevailed.

Today he knew, and he was wishing he would have been bolder back then in Amsterdam. He should have turned N.'s friendly kiss into something more commensurate to his feelings.

Was it too late? Was she challenging him? She did seem to, and he was not self-centred enough to see all she did as construed to influence him.  She was ambitious all right, and able to go for what she wanted, and get it. Thinking about it, he had been her only failure, and she seemed to be far beyond it already. Was she ?

to be continued