“Focus, Knightley,” I said. “Why are you here?”
He glanced at me and squinted as if trying to remember what he was doing. Then he kicked off his shoes and shucked his wool coat, draping it over one of the chairs. He moved past me and grabbed the bright-green throw off the back of the couch.
“I’m here because you went off the grid and there’s been a change of plans,” he said.
“What change?” I asked. I stared at him over the back of the couch.
“Severin wants to meet here in Paris at Le Cinq. We couldn’t get in touch with you, and Aidan freaked out, so here I am.”
“What?” I shook my head. I couldn’t decide if I was more hurt or angry. “We’re supposed to meet in Italy next week at the wine festival.”
“Well, Severin changed the plan, which you’d know if you’d bothered to check in, which you didn’t, causing Aidan to be rightly concerned. The guy has a lot going on, Martin. That was uncool.”
He stretched out on the sofa, which was too short for him, letting his feet hang over the armrest while he tucked the decorative pillow under his head. He tossed the blanket over his body, but it didn’t fully cover him.
I stared down at him. I was the most reliable person in the department. I would have checked in again tomorrow from the café if I hadn’t gotten my phone back. If I said I’d do something, I’d do it. How could Aidan think . . . Wait just one second. Suddenly, Knightley being here, wagging the proverbial finger at me, made sense.
“Oh, I see how it is,” I said.
He had his eyes shut but opened one to look at me. “And how is that?”
“You engineered this whole thing, didn’t you?” I asked.
“Because I wanted to go twenty-four hours without sleep?”
“Admit it. You talked Severin into dinner in Paris, knowing I’d lost my phone and this was your chance to swoop in and save the day, showing me up.”
He folded his arms behind his head and looked at me as if he thought I was a few slices shy of a ham sandwich. “Do you hear yourself? That’s crazy talk. Why would I do that?”
“Because you’re threatened by me,” I said. “You think I’m going to steal your glory, Knightley.”
“Oh man, I do not need this shit.” He grunted and rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands as if he could grind the sleep out of his eyes. “Listen, Martin, since the Severin ask isn’t a done deal, there’s really no glory to be had.”
“Which just proves my point,” I said. “If I nailed down a commitment from Severin in Italy next week, how bad would that make you look?”
“Are you kidding me?” He spread his hands wide and then clasped his fingers together as if to keep himself from strangling me. “You disappear without a trace when you’re traveling alone in Europe, and you don’t think people are going to worry? And now you’re twisting it around to make it seem like a work thing where I’m the one at fault for being too ambitious?”
“I didn’t disappear. I lost my phone,” I said. My phone! I hurried to my suitcase and unzipped the side pocket. I reached in and felt around, relieved when I felt the familiar rectangle. My phone! Praise the cellular gods—I was back. “I accidentally put my phone in my suitcase, and then when I landed in Paris, my bag took the scenic route.” I checked the tags. “To Greece, apparently. I did not go off the grid on purpose, and I explained all of this in an email to Julia.”
“Right. She’s been out of the office with the flu for three days. In fact, half the department has been out, and Aidan hasn’t been able to come in, because he can’t risk the contagion,” he said. “I had to get in touch with your dad, who thankfully had gotten a text from you before you left Ireland, telling him where you were planning to stay in Paris.”
“My dad?” I asked. “You called my dad? Did he tell you I sent him an email from here? Because I did.”
“No, when I talked to him right before jumping on a red-eye, he hadn’t heard from you as yet,” he said.
“You didn’t make him worry, did you?”
“Of course not,” he said. “I told him I’d lost the name of the place where you were staying. What do you take me for?”
“A man who’s made himself at home on my couch,” I said. “You can’t sleep here.” I whisked the pillow out from under his head and made to grab the blanket, but he was too quick and grabbed a corner and wouldn’t let go.
“Oh yes I can,” he said. “Trust me—flying all night, wedged in an upright seat between a snorer and a squalling baby, I can absolutely sleep here. In fact, I’m pretty sure I could sleep on the pointy end of a thumbtack if need be.”
“No, I mean you’re not sleeping in my apartment,” I said.
“Oh my god, Martin, re-freaking-lax,” he said. He snatched the pillow out of my hand. “Even if I wanted to jump your sudden hotness, I simply don’t have the energy. Go to bed. We’ll talk in the morning.”
“But I . . . You . . . This.” I flapped my hands to encompass the entire situation. I was so vexed, I was surprised I didn’t achieve liftoff.
A deep breath interrupted my protest. Just like that, Jason Knightley was dead asleep on my couch. I wanted to kick him. I wanted to grab him by the ear and haul him out the door. This was my chance to reconnect with Jean Claude. I simply could not have Knightley messing it up for me. I grabbed my phone charger and stomped up the ladder to the loft.
Jason said we’d talk in the morning. Fine. But it was going to be me doing the talking and him doing the packing and leaving. Honestly, how was I supposed to give all my time and energy to finding my happiness again with him underfoot? Jason was the bane of my existence, a complete pain in the ass, and I knew if given half a chance, he would ruin everything!
* * *
• • • •
I AWOKE TO the smell of fresh coffee. Was there a greater scent to be greeted with in the morning? Well, maybe chocolate cake, but coffee was a solid number two.
Again, it took me a moment to remember where I was. Paris. The ceiling above my bed was low, and the light from below was dim. There was no window in the loft, giving it the feel of a snug cocoon. I didn’t want to leave the warmth of my blankets, but the lure of the coffee was too potent to ignore. The café downstairs must be open for business and brewing up a storm. Then I heard the whistling.
It was a tuneless melody, but it was most definitely coming from downstairs. There was someone in my apartment! I clutched my covers in a moment of panic. Then I saw a man, the one who was whistling, crossing the living room to my balcony doors. He held a coffee in one hand and opened the door with the other. He strode outside and made himself at home on my veranda. I immediately recognized his loose-limbed walk. Knightley!
I shoved my covers aside. I finger combed my hair, then snatched my silk bathrobe from the foot of my bed. I shrugged it on and belted it tight. I hurried down the ladder to the floor below, striding across the living room and poking my head out the door.
“Martin,” he said. “You’re up. Excellent. I picked up coffee and pastries from the café downstairs. Have you met Zoe, the owner? She’s something else, isn’t she?”
I blinked. He bought coffee and pastries? My opposing desires to rip him a new one or shove a pastry in my mouth and wash it down with fabulous French coffee went to war. Coffee and pastry won before the battle lines were even drawn. Shocker.
“We need to talk,” I said. I gestured to the balcony. “Don’t move—unless it’s to jump.”
Jason grinned. “You’re all heart, Martin.”
I examined the contents of the bag he’d left on the counter. He’d gotten the swirly pastry with raisins. Damn it—that was my favorite. How was I supposed to present a formidable front while stuffing my face with pastry? I grabbed the paper cup of coffee. It was warm in my hand. The bitter aroma made me salivate. Clearly it would be considered bad manners to ignore what he�
��d bought for us, and I certainly didn’t want to be rude.
With my pastry lust justified, I took a paper-wrapped Danish and my coffee and joined him on the balcony, taking the seat on the other side of the very small café table, which was just big enough for our coffee cups. The balcony was in full sun, so even though the temperature was in the low sixties, it was pleasant to be outside in the sweet Parisian air. Jason had his phone out and was taking a picture of the street and the top half of the Eiffel Tower, which could just be seen off in the distance, beyond the buildings. He turned to me once he’d snapped the photo.
“Good morning,” he said. His thick dark hair was mussed, and he was wearing jeans and an unbuttoned plaid shirt over a plain white T-shirt. His gaze moved over my cow pajamas and pink silk robe. His lips twitched, but he didn’t say a word. The restraint was probably killing him.
“Thanks for the coffee and the pastries,” I said. I didn’t want to start the morning with a spat. “That was nice of you.”
A slow grin moved across his lips, and he raised his own cup and took a long sip. “That hurt, didn’t it? To thank me?”
“More than a pulled tooth but less than a broken arm,” I said.
He laughed. It rumbled up from deep down in his chest, and I found myself chuckling in return. Okay, so maybe he wasn’t that bad. Still, I was the sort of girl who valued her privacy, especially when prepping for a big date, so I needed him gone by midafternoon in order to make it to my salon appointment and give myself a solitary moment or two to get in the right headspace.
I pulled my phone out of my robe pocket to check the time. There were about a million texts from my sister and dad. Oh boy. They’d have to wait. I’d overslept. It was already eleven in the morning, and Jean Claude was arriving at seven that evening. I’d been a charity case when he saw me yesterday, so tonight I was absolutely determined to wow him.
“When is this dinner with Severin supposed to happen?” I asked.
“Tomorrow night.”
“I take it we’re going together?” I asked.
“We’re doing this now?” he asked. “I haven’t even finished my coffee.”
“Yes, now. I have other things to do today,” I said.
“Like what? It’s my first time in Paris. I thought we could hang out.”
“Sorry, you’re on your own,” I said. “In fact, you need to find your own place to stay.”
“Am I cramping your style, Martin?” he asked. He wagged his eyebrows at me, but I refused to play.
I bit into my pastry. The flaky, buttery heaven momentarily distracted me from the man in my space. I closed my eyes and savored the way the pastry melted in my mouth as the cinnamon burst on my tongue and the plump, chewy raisins added just the right amount of gooey sweetness.
“Ahem.” Jason cleared his throat. “I don’t want to interrupt your amorous moment with your pain aux raisins, but about tomorrow night’s dinner, I won’t go if it’s a problem for you.”
I opened my eyes. I saw him watching me and self-consciously licked the excess sugar off my lips. Jason hissed out a breath. Then he frowned.
“Aren’t you supposed to have your hair pulled back and be wearing a suit with your collar buttoned up to here?” He put his hand at his throat. “This tousled-hair thing you’ve got going . . .” He paused and waved his hands in my direction. “It’s like I don’t even know you anymore.”
His discomfort made me laugh, and I intentionally tossed my hair over my shoulder, enjoying being the one of us who was at ease for a change. I sipped my coffee, glancing at him over the rim. It hit me then that I could see what our office mates saw in him. He was handsome, in a rebellious way, and he was always smiling. As far as I knew, he never lost his temper or had tantrums, unlike so many of the men we worked with, and he paid attention to the people around him.
He knew everyone’s name, what they liked to eat or drink, what their hobbies were, if they were married or had kids. I’d always thought he was just manipulating everyone into doing what he wanted by pretending to be nice, but now I wondered if perhaps he was, quite simply, a nice guy.
“I don’t see why having you join me would be a problem. In fact, since I don’t know when I’ll be returning to the ACC and you’ve already connected with Eleanor, this would be a great opportunity for you to meet Severin and line you up to take over the account.”
“Last night you seemed to think I had ulterior motives,” Jason said.
“Upon reflection, I might have been a bit out of order,” I said. “I’m sorry about that. The control freak in me is struggling with letting work go. I think this is a good opportunity for you to build a rapport with Severin, since you’ll be taking over the account.”
Jason’s eyes went wide. “You’re really not coming back.”
I shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“All right. Should we do some prep now so we can wow Severin with our ideas?”
I glanced at my phone. “I have a couple of hours free that I can spend going over my proposal so you’re caught up.”
“Great,” he agreed. “And I can just tell you what I’ve been thinking, since I don’t have a fancy PowerPoint or anything even written down.”
“Fine,” I said. I finished my pastry and picked up my coffee. “I need to take a shower before we start. I can’t think until after coffee and a shower.”
“Reasonable,” he said. “What about this afternoon? Want to hit a museum or, even better, tour the catacombs?”
“I can’t,” I said. “I have plans.”
“Another date?”
“None of your business.”
“Aw, come on,” he wheedled. “You can tell me.”
“No.”
“What was his name again? Pierre?” he said.
“If you can’t remember, why do you want to know?”
“In case you go missing again, I’ll know his name if I have to track you down.”
“I have my phone again,” I said. “I’ll be all right.”
“So you do have a date! Is Gaston hot?”
“That’s not his name, and he’s French—of course he’s hot. All Frenchmen are hot. It’s in their DNA or something.”
“So, this date with Louis, how’d it come about?” he asked. “Did you track him down?”
“Louis isn’t it either, and again, it’s none of your business.”
“No, it’s not,” he agreed. “But I’m curious about the sort of man you’d like.” He looked at me from beneath his surprisingly long eyelashes. “Come on, Martin. Enlighten me.”
“No. Don’t you think you should use this time to see if you can find a place to stay? I have to make some calls to my family. We can meet back here in an hour, okay? Great.”
I rose from my seat and left to go make my calls without waiting to hear his answer. Not that it stopped him from shouting after me, “So, was it Henri’s sense of humor that lured you in? I feel like you’d go for a guy who makes you laugh.”
A smile curved my lips at his relentlessness, but I ignored him. I had to get mentally prepared, as I knew tonight was going to be significant. I was good at corporate parties, because at those gatherings I was on a mission. But this—this was a fashion-industry party where I didn’t know anyone except Jean Claude, and I didn’t speak the language very well. The potential for disaster was huge, and I wanted to run possible scenarios through my head to be fully prepped.
“Oh, Martin.” Knightley poked his head into the apartment from the veranda. “A package was dropped off for you earlier. It’s on the coffee table.”
Package? That had to be the dress! Excited, I rounded the couch to find a large white box with a navy bow sitting on the low glass table. In cursive the name Absalon was scrawled across the top. There was a tiny card attached. In a man’s bold handwriting, it read, For mon chou with love.
; I felt my heart do a giddy cartwheel in my chest. Jason stood in the doorway, watching me, so I kept my face expressionless. I refused to open the box in front of him on the off chance Jean Claude had sent some sexy lingerie along with the dress. Knightley was hard enough to deal with without giving him that sort of ammunition. I made a shooing gesture with my hands. He heaved a put-upon sigh and headed toward the front door.
“Spoilsport,” he said.
I ignored him, waiting for the door to shut behind him before I lifted the lid. Tucked inside blue-and-white polka-dot tissue paper was the most exquisite dress I’d ever seen. I gently lifted it out of its nest as if it were made out of moonbeams and gossamer. A sleeveless gown that was high in the front but so very low in the back, it had a thigh-high slit on the right side. It was bright white and delicately embroidered with tiny silver beads along the neckline and hem. It was the sort of gown that looked demure until the wearer moved, and then it became a sinuous, sexy sheath that made people stop and stare—at least, that was what I would do if I saw a woman in it. I didn’t even want to know what a gown like this cost. In fact, I refused to think about it, hoping it was a reject from the collection, a castoff no one wanted. Otherwise I’d get so nervous wearing it, I’d leave sweat stains.
Realizing the clock was ticking and I needed to call home, I took the gown upstairs to hang it up properly. Slipping it onto a hanger, I let my fingers run over the beads at the neckline. It was gorgeous, and I was awed. I was going to feel like Cinder-freaking-ella tonight, and I couldn’t wait.
* * *
• • • •
ANNABELLE DIDN’T ANSWER her phone. Not a big surprise, as she let everything go to voice mail when she was creating. My call to my father was even less successful. Not because no one answered his landline—yes, the man was the last person in the free world to have a landline, because ever since he’d lost power during the January blizzard of 2015, he’d refused to discuss having only a cell phone. No, unlike at Annabelle’s, someone did answer. Sheri.
Paris Is Always a Good Idea Page 18