Revealing Us
Page 3
I comfort myself with the fact that they don’t have my Paris address, though; I don’t even have that yet.
Then I look up at Chris, feel that familiar punch of inti-macy between us, and correct that statement. Yes, I do know my address. It’s with Chris.
Three
After an hour of being drilled by the border police, Chris and I have our bags on a cart and we’re ready to leave the airport. We halt at the sliding doors under a “taxi” sign.
“I’ll go ind us a private car and driver,” Chris informs me.
“You stay with the bags.”
I purse my lips. “Yes, Master.”
He arches a brow. “Why is it that I can only get you to say that sarcastically?”
“Because according to you,” I remind him, “you don’t want me to call you Master.”
“Are you saying you would if I wanted you to?”
“Absolutely not.”
Chris laughs, a sexy rumble and it is a soothing balm on my nerve endings. “On a totally diferent subject,” he says, pulling me close, a light in his eyes I see too rarely, “the area we’re headed to is the Times Square of Paris. You’re going to love it.”
He leans down and kisses me. “I’ll be right back.”
I stare after him, watching his sexy swagger and warming to the idea that I am here. And I know that no matter how much he fears the ultimate outcome of my being here, he’s also excited to show me Paris. I’m excited to see it with him, too.
I wait eagerly for his return, ready to share my excitement with him, disappointed when it becomes apparent that he’s going to be a few minutes. With a sigh, I snag my cell phone to set up an international plan. I’m almost done when Chris rushes back inside with a man I assume is the driver. Just watching the way Chris moves, all lean muscle and power, my heart skips a beat. I doubt if I’ll ever stop reacting to the irst moment I see him, and I smile.
“Ready?” he asks as I try to inish up with the cell company. The driver takes over our baggage cart and we follow him outside. I end my call and wait for Chris by the car door while he helps the driver it our bags inside the trunk.
When Chris joins me and holds the door open for me, I hug him, then tilt my chin up to meet his eyes. “I just want you to know that I understand why you needed to do this the way you did it, but I would have come anyway. I’m glad I’m here with you.” I kiss him, planning on a quick brush of my mouth over his, and, to my shock, considering how private a person he is, Chris slides his hand beneath my hair, around my neck, and slants his mouth over mine. I moan as his tongue caresses mine, stroking deeply into my mouth.
“I’m glad you’re here, too,” he assures me, pulling his mouth from mine and setting me away from him, as if he has to do it right now or he won’t be able to. As if he might take me right here. And only he could make this once-conservative school-teacher wish that were possible.
I wet my lips and his hot gaze follows, and just that easily I’m tingling all over, hot inside and out. Someone shouts out something in French and Chris’s head jerks toward the speaker, mine following.
I see the driver’s head above the roof of the car, as if he’d gotten inside and popped out to get our attention. Chris answers him in French and then shifts his attention back to me.
His lips quirk and his eyes dance with amusement. “He wants to know if we’re ready.”
We both start laughing. “We are deinitely ready,” I say and duck inside the car.
Forty-ive minutes later, I’ve canceled my credit cards and our driver has navigated us through morning traic to Avenue des Champs-Élysées, a famous street lined with imposing old white buildings illed with stores and cafés. When we drive past the Arc de Triomphe, I take photos with my cell phone. Its spectacular carvings are illuminated, aglow against the darkness of Paris’s shorter winter days. And while I’d swear I’m not a structure kind of person, much preferring paintings to steel towers, I gape as the Eifel Tower comes into view, twinkling with lights in the inky gray sky. There was a time when I thought I’d never see . . . well, much of anything.
We turn down a narrow side street lined with brownstone buildings and I frown at all the tiny cars lining the sidewalks. I cringe at how unsafe they look.
“Please tell me you don’t drive one of those,” I say.
“No,” Chris assures me with a bark of that rich laughter I adore so much. “My Harley is as close to that small as I’ll ever get.”
A sudden lashback of him showing up, after weeks of shutting me out of his life, and ordering me onto the back of his Harley, in a skirt of all things, is an unwelcome memory I shove away. I won’t let myself worry about him doing that to me again. Especially not today.
I’m alive, which is a gift I value more than ever before.
I’m with Chris.
I’m in Paris, which I’m experiencing because of Chris, when everyone else in my life has always kept me in a box.
I lean over and kiss his cheek.
“What’s that for?” he asks, his strong arm wrapping around my waist.
I can think of a million ways to answer, and a million things I want to say to him. I simply say, “For being you.”
The tenderness in his face melts the last remnants of my bad memory. “If this is the reaction I get to a little sightseeing, I can’t wait to see how you react when you see the art galleries.
You’re going to go nuts, baby.” His cell phone rings, and with the obvious reluctance I love, he lets go of me.
“It’s Blake,” he announces after glancing at the caller ID.
The name is like a cold splash of water on the warm, wonderful adventure we’re sharing. Since Blake has been investigat-ing both Rebecca’s and Ella’s disappearances, I’m not sure if I should expect good or bad news.
“Easy, baby,” Chris murmurs, running his hand up and down my arm as if he feels my sudden chill. “Everything’s okay.”
But I don’t know that. Who would have imagined that the missing Rebecca was dead, murdered by someone we all knew?
How can I ever assume anything to be okay after that?
Chris’s hand settles on my leg as he answers his call, and his protectiveness raises a lump in my throat. I’m supposed to be here for him, yet he’s still acting like my Prince Charming.
And he is my Prince Charming. My dark, damaged Prince Charming. My idea of perfect. Now I just have to make him believe that.
“Tell me you have good news on Ella,” Chris says, listening before he glances at me, his sensual mouth thinning. “Nothing good or bad,” he tells me.
Nodding, my gaze drifts blindly to the window. There was no news on Rebecca for months, either, and her ending was murder. The only ending Ella is supposed to have is a “happily ever after” with a new husband.
An idea hits me, and my lips part at the obvious part I’ve missed. A wedding—Ella had a wedding! There would be proof at the courthouse. Has Blake thought of this?
I touch Chris’s arm to get his attention before he hangs up.
“Check your messages,” he tells me before I can ask my question. “See if you have one you missed.” His tone is noncha-lant, but the subtle tension in him creates tension in me.
I frown, reaching for my phone, unable to read his expression in the lickering shadows of the dark car. Glancing through my calls, I note an unfamiliar San Francisco number in my history. “Actually, yes. I didn’t get an alert, so I didn’t see it.” I start to hit the playback button, but hesitate, hoping to listen in on Chris’s call and igure out what is going on.
“She’ll do it right away,” Chris assures Blake. “And yes, I’ll let you know.” He ends the call. “The lead detective on Rebecca’s case wants to ask you a few more questions.”
I have no idea what I expected him to say, but certainly not this. I shake my head in instant rejection and start to put my phone away. “I can’t think about that right now. I’ll call him tomorrow, after I rest.”
“Apparently it’s urgent. The detective stopped by our place and talked to Jacob. Jacob tried to call us, but kept getting a fast busy signal on our phones. He and Blake have been trying to reach us for hours.”
I wet my suddenly parched lips. “What could be this urgent? They interviewed me less than a day ago.”
“This isn’t unusual; they’ll want to deal with Ava as quickly as possible. And the charges against her won’t be just about Rebecca. They’ll charge her with the attack on you, as well.”
I knew this, of course, but I haven’t let myself think about what it all entailed. It’s all too raw, too much, right now.
Thankfully the car pulls up to a towering steel gate, a welcome distraction from the conversation about Ava.
Chris rolls down his window to punch in a code on a security box, then he rolls it back up and continues the conversation. “You’ll most likely have to testify at Ava’s trial, and the police need to compile a solid case to ensure a conviction.”
“Right,” I reply. “Yes. Of course. And I want that, too. I’ll call.” I glance at my world clock and hope for another reprieve.
“It’s almost eleven at night in the States, isn’t it?”
“They’re eight hours behind us, so yes, it’s late, but apparently the detective works the night shift.”
I sigh in defeat. “I’ll call when we get inside, I promise.” My attention moves to the window as the car pulls forward, and the glow of a new day allows me to see rows of white Haussmann-style buildings.
“We have a private residence,” Chris explains as a large stone arched doorway with ive steps leading up to it comes into view.
“There are multiple homes in one building, but they aren’t connected and there’s no doorman. We own loors eighteen through twenty, along with a private garage that has a gym connected to it.”
We. I love how he includes me. How he makes us “we.”
“Twelve-twelve Foche Avenue,” I read in the center of a black-etched circle on the concrete wall by our door, just before the car pulls into a private garage.
“Our address,” he says softly.
An automatic light lickers on in the garage, casting us in a pale glow, and I look at Chris, search his face, and ind the message he wants me to see. He knows how much I need to feel I have a home and stability. And he knows I’m still feeling the efects of our breakup, and feeling I didn’t have a home in the not-so-distant past.
“Our address,” I repeat, letting him know I’m as eager as he is to start fresh.
His lips curve slowly, approval sliding across his face, before he leans forward to talk to the driver.
He’s telling me in every way possible that he wouldn’t have brought me here if he weren’t deeply committed to making us work, no matter what price there is to pay. And there is always a price to pay, I can almost hear Rebecca say in my mind. What is that price for Chris?
“Ready, baby?” he asks, and I am jolted to realize I was in such deep thought that he’s already outside the car, ofering me his hand.
Gathering my purse, I let Chris help me out of the car and he pulls me to my feet and against him, his ingers splaying possessively on my back. “No in between,” he reminds me in a low, rough voice that tells me he feels what I do. He knows we’re opening a door we can’t close again.
My hand lattens on the hard wall of his chest, and I can feel the rapid heartbeat that tells me he’s as afected by this moment as I am. “No in between.” Our eyes lock and the warmth I’d felt when he took my hand is now heat simmering between us, wrapping us in anticipation. We are inally about to be alone.
“Pardon, monsieur, madam.”
Our spell is broken by the driver, who is exiting the door of the garage, and I assume he’s taken our bags inside.
“Oui, monsieur,” Chris says, the French rolling of his tongue. “Je vous remercie de votre aide.”
Thank you for the help, is my guess on that one, and when the two men shake hands, I’m certain I’m right. Maybe French won’t be so hard after all. After some sleep, I might actually be able to learn some.
With a departing remark, the driver climbs into his car. As the sedan backs away I can now see the other side of the garage, where three classic Mustangs, two Harleys, and a silver Porsche 911 are parked.
I shake my head at Chris. “Diferent place, same obsessions.”
“You’re my obsession,” Chris replies huskily, nuzzling my neck. “Addictive in every way, and that comes with rewards. You get one of the Harleys.”
I laugh. “Not a reward I’d choose, but okay.” I point to the one that looks the most expensive. “I’ll take that one.”
The doors to the garage shut and Chris twines his ingers with mine and walks backward, leading me toward the building, mischief lighting his eyes. “You can ride with me, baby.”
I roll my eyes. “You always have to be in control.”
“You like it when I’m in control.”
“I should deny that,” I reply without hesitation. I’m way beyond censoring my thoughts with Chris.
He pulls me into the small foyer of the garage and punches the elevator button before wrapping me in his arms. “Should I prove how much you like it when I’m in control?”
“If you think you can,” I taunt, melting just thinking about all the ways he might go about proving he’s right.
The doors to the elevator slide open. “Shall we go upstairs and see if I can?”
Then I look up at Chris, feel that familiar punch of inti-macy between us, and correct that statement. Yes, I do know my address. It’s with Chris.
Three
After an hour of being drilled by the border police, Chris and I have our bags on a cart and we’re ready to leave the airport. We halt at the sliding doors under a “taxi” sign.
“I’ll go ind us a private car and driver,” Chris informs me.
“You stay with the bags.”
I purse my lips. “Yes, Master.”
He arches a brow. “Why is it that I can only get you to say that sarcastically?”
“Because according to you,” I remind him, “you don’t want me to call you Master.”
“Are you saying you would if I wanted you to?”
“Absolutely not.”
Chris laughs, a sexy rumble and it is a soothing balm on my nerve endings. “On a totally diferent subject,” he says, pulling me close, a light in his eyes I see too rarely, “the area we’re headed to is the Times Square of Paris. You’re going to love it.”
He leans down and kisses me. “I’ll be right back.”
I stare after him, watching his sexy swagger and warming to the idea that I am here. And I know that no matter how much he fears the ultimate outcome of my being here, he’s also excited to show me Paris. I’m excited to see it with him, too.
I wait eagerly for his return, ready to share my excitement with him, disappointed when it becomes apparent that he’s going to be a few minutes. With a sigh, I snag my cell phone to set up an international plan. I’m almost done when Chris rushes back inside with a man I assume is the driver. Just watching the way Chris moves, all lean muscle and power, my heart skips a beat. I doubt if I’ll ever stop reacting to the irst moment I see him, and I smile.
“Ready?” he asks as I try to inish up with the cell company. The driver takes over our baggage cart and we follow him outside. I end my call and wait for Chris by the car door while he helps the driver it our bags inside the trunk.
When Chris joins me and holds the door open for me, I hug him, then tilt my chin up to meet his eyes. “I just want you to know that I understand why you needed to do this the way you did it, but I would have come anyway. I’m glad I’m here with you.” I kiss him, planning on a quick brush of my mouth over his, and, to my shock, considering how private a person he is, Chris slides his hand beneath my hair, around my neck, and slants his mouth over mine. I moan as his tongue caresses mine, stroking deeply into my mouth.
“I’m glad you’re here, too,” he assures me, pulling his mouth from mine and setting me away from him, as if he has to do it right now or he won’t be able to. As if he might take me right here. And only he could make this once-conservative school-teacher wish that were possible.
I wet my lips and his hot gaze follows, and just that easily I’m tingling all over, hot inside and out. Someone shouts out something in French and Chris’s head jerks toward the speaker, mine following.
I see the driver’s head above the roof of the car, as if he’d gotten inside and popped out to get our attention. Chris answers him in French and then shifts his attention back to me.
His lips quirk and his eyes dance with amusement. “He wants to know if we’re ready.”
We both start laughing. “We are deinitely ready,” I say and duck inside the car.
Forty-ive minutes later, I’ve canceled my credit cards and our driver has navigated us through morning traic to Avenue des Champs-Élysées, a famous street lined with imposing old white buildings illed with stores and cafés. When we drive past the Arc de Triomphe, I take photos with my cell phone. Its spectacular carvings are illuminated, aglow against the darkness of Paris’s shorter winter days. And while I’d swear I’m not a structure kind of person, much preferring paintings to steel towers, I gape as the Eifel Tower comes into view, twinkling with lights in the inky gray sky. There was a time when I thought I’d never see . . . well, much of anything.
We turn down a narrow side street lined with brownstone buildings and I frown at all the tiny cars lining the sidewalks. I cringe at how unsafe they look.
“Please tell me you don’t drive one of those,” I say.
“No,” Chris assures me with a bark of that rich laughter I adore so much. “My Harley is as close to that small as I’ll ever get.”
A sudden lashback of him showing up, after weeks of shutting me out of his life, and ordering me onto the back of his Harley, in a skirt of all things, is an unwelcome memory I shove away. I won’t let myself worry about him doing that to me again. Especially not today.
I’m alive, which is a gift I value more than ever before.
I’m with Chris.
I’m in Paris, which I’m experiencing because of Chris, when everyone else in my life has always kept me in a box.
I lean over and kiss his cheek.
“What’s that for?” he asks, his strong arm wrapping around my waist.
I can think of a million ways to answer, and a million things I want to say to him. I simply say, “For being you.”
The tenderness in his face melts the last remnants of my bad memory. “If this is the reaction I get to a little sightseeing, I can’t wait to see how you react when you see the art galleries.
You’re going to go nuts, baby.” His cell phone rings, and with the obvious reluctance I love, he lets go of me.
“It’s Blake,” he announces after glancing at the caller ID.
The name is like a cold splash of water on the warm, wonderful adventure we’re sharing. Since Blake has been investigat-ing both Rebecca’s and Ella’s disappearances, I’m not sure if I should expect good or bad news.
“Easy, baby,” Chris murmurs, running his hand up and down my arm as if he feels my sudden chill. “Everything’s okay.”
But I don’t know that. Who would have imagined that the missing Rebecca was dead, murdered by someone we all knew?
How can I ever assume anything to be okay after that?
Chris’s hand settles on my leg as he answers his call, and his protectiveness raises a lump in my throat. I’m supposed to be here for him, yet he’s still acting like my Prince Charming.
And he is my Prince Charming. My dark, damaged Prince Charming. My idea of perfect. Now I just have to make him believe that.
“Tell me you have good news on Ella,” Chris says, listening before he glances at me, his sensual mouth thinning. “Nothing good or bad,” he tells me.
Nodding, my gaze drifts blindly to the window. There was no news on Rebecca for months, either, and her ending was murder. The only ending Ella is supposed to have is a “happily ever after” with a new husband.
An idea hits me, and my lips part at the obvious part I’ve missed. A wedding—Ella had a wedding! There would be proof at the courthouse. Has Blake thought of this?
I touch Chris’s arm to get his attention before he hangs up.
“Check your messages,” he tells me before I can ask my question. “See if you have one you missed.” His tone is noncha-lant, but the subtle tension in him creates tension in me.
I frown, reaching for my phone, unable to read his expression in the lickering shadows of the dark car. Glancing through my calls, I note an unfamiliar San Francisco number in my history. “Actually, yes. I didn’t get an alert, so I didn’t see it.” I start to hit the playback button, but hesitate, hoping to listen in on Chris’s call and igure out what is going on.
“She’ll do it right away,” Chris assures Blake. “And yes, I’ll let you know.” He ends the call. “The lead detective on Rebecca’s case wants to ask you a few more questions.”
I have no idea what I expected him to say, but certainly not this. I shake my head in instant rejection and start to put my phone away. “I can’t think about that right now. I’ll call him tomorrow, after I rest.”
“Apparently it’s urgent. The detective stopped by our place and talked to Jacob. Jacob tried to call us, but kept getting a fast busy signal on our phones. He and Blake have been trying to reach us for hours.”
I wet my suddenly parched lips. “What could be this urgent? They interviewed me less than a day ago.”
“This isn’t unusual; they’ll want to deal with Ava as quickly as possible. And the charges against her won’t be just about Rebecca. They’ll charge her with the attack on you, as well.”
I knew this, of course, but I haven’t let myself think about what it all entailed. It’s all too raw, too much, right now.
Thankfully the car pulls up to a towering steel gate, a welcome distraction from the conversation about Ava.
Chris rolls down his window to punch in a code on a security box, then he rolls it back up and continues the conversation. “You’ll most likely have to testify at Ava’s trial, and the police need to compile a solid case to ensure a conviction.”
“Right,” I reply. “Yes. Of course. And I want that, too. I’ll call.” I glance at my world clock and hope for another reprieve.
“It’s almost eleven at night in the States, isn’t it?”
“They’re eight hours behind us, so yes, it’s late, but apparently the detective works the night shift.”
I sigh in defeat. “I’ll call when we get inside, I promise.” My attention moves to the window as the car pulls forward, and the glow of a new day allows me to see rows of white Haussmann-style buildings.
“We have a private residence,” Chris explains as a large stone arched doorway with ive steps leading up to it comes into view.
“There are multiple homes in one building, but they aren’t connected and there’s no doorman. We own loors eighteen through twenty, along with a private garage that has a gym connected to it.”
We. I love how he includes me. How he makes us “we.”
“Twelve-twelve Foche Avenue,” I read in the center of a black-etched circle on the concrete wall by our door, just before the car pulls into a private garage.
“Our address,” he says softly.
An automatic light lickers on in the garage, casting us in a pale glow, and I look at Chris, search his face, and ind the message he wants me to see. He knows how much I need to feel I have a home and stability. And he knows I’m still feeling the efects of our breakup, and feeling I didn’t have a home in the not-so-distant past.
“Our address,” I repeat, letting him know I’m as eager as he is to start fresh.
His lips curve slowly, approval sliding across his face, before he leans forward to talk to the driver.
He’s telling me in every way possible that he wouldn’t have brought me here if he weren’t deeply committed to making us work, no matter what price there is to pay. And there is always a price to pay, I can almost hear Rebecca say in my mind. What is that price for Chris?
“Ready, baby?” he asks, and I am jolted to realize I was in such deep thought that he’s already outside the car, ofering me his hand.
Gathering my purse, I let Chris help me out of the car and he pulls me to my feet and against him, his ingers splaying possessively on my back. “No in between,” he reminds me in a low, rough voice that tells me he feels what I do. He knows we’re opening a door we can’t close again.
My hand lattens on the hard wall of his chest, and I can feel the rapid heartbeat that tells me he’s as afected by this moment as I am. “No in between.” Our eyes lock and the warmth I’d felt when he took my hand is now heat simmering between us, wrapping us in anticipation. We are inally about to be alone.
“Pardon, monsieur, madam.”
Our spell is broken by the driver, who is exiting the door of the garage, and I assume he’s taken our bags inside.
“Oui, monsieur,” Chris says, the French rolling of his tongue. “Je vous remercie de votre aide.”
Thank you for the help, is my guess on that one, and when the two men shake hands, I’m certain I’m right. Maybe French won’t be so hard after all. After some sleep, I might actually be able to learn some.
With a departing remark, the driver climbs into his car. As the sedan backs away I can now see the other side of the garage, where three classic Mustangs, two Harleys, and a silver Porsche 911 are parked.
I shake my head at Chris. “Diferent place, same obsessions.”
“You’re my obsession,” Chris replies huskily, nuzzling my neck. “Addictive in every way, and that comes with rewards. You get one of the Harleys.”
I laugh. “Not a reward I’d choose, but okay.” I point to the one that looks the most expensive. “I’ll take that one.”
The doors to the garage shut and Chris twines his ingers with mine and walks backward, leading me toward the building, mischief lighting his eyes. “You can ride with me, baby.”
I roll my eyes. “You always have to be in control.”
“You like it when I’m in control.”
“I should deny that,” I reply without hesitation. I’m way beyond censoring my thoughts with Chris.
He pulls me into the small foyer of the garage and punches the elevator button before wrapping me in his arms. “Should I prove how much you like it when I’m in control?”
“If you think you can,” I taunt, melting just thinking about all the ways he might go about proving he’s right.
The doors to the elevator slide open. “Shall we go upstairs and see if I can?”
