That Weekend in Paris
Inglath Cooper
That Weekend in Paris Copyright © by Inglath Cooper. All Rights Reserved.
Contents
Copyright
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Map of Paris
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Dillon
Dillon
Klein
Dillon
Josh
Dillon
Dillon
Dillon
Dillon
Klein
Dillon
Dillon
Riley
Klein
Klein
Dillon
Riley
Dillon
Klein
Dillon
Klein
Klein
Josh
Dillon
Dillon
Klein
Dillon
Klein
Dillon
Klein
Dillon
Dillon
Klein
Riley
Dillon
Klein
Dillon
Klein
Dillon
Riley
Klein
Dillon
Josh
Dillon
Klein
Riley
Klein
Dillon
Klein
Dillon
Epilogue
If You Enjoyed That Weekend in Paris. . .
That Birthday in Barbados
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Copyright
Published by Fence Free Entertainment, LLC
Copyright © Inglath Cooper, 2020
Cooper, Inglath
That Weekend in Paris / Inglath Cooper
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher at the email address below.
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Publisher’s Note
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.
Books by Inglath Cooper
That Weekend in Paris
That Birthday in Barbados
That Month in Tuscany
Swerve
The Heart That Breaks
My Italian Lover
Fences – Book Three – Smith Mountain Lake Series
Dragonfly Summer – Book Two – Smith Mountain Lake Series
Blue Wide Sky – Book One – Smith Mountain Lake Series
And Then You Loved Me
Down a Country Road
Good Guys Love Dogs
Truths and Roses
Nashville – Book Ten – Not Without You
Nashville – Book Nine – You, Me and a Palm Tree
Nashville – Book Eight – R U Serious
Nashville – Book Seven – Commit
Nashville – Book Six – Sweet Tea and Me
Nashville – Book Five – Amazed
Nashville – Book Four – Pleasure in the Rain
Nashville – Book Three – What We Feel
Nashville – Book Two – Hammer and a Song
Nashville – Book One – Ready to Reach
A Gift of Grace
RITA® Award Winner John Riley’s Girl
A Woman With Secrets
Unfinished Business
A Woman Like Annie
The Lost Daughter of Pigeon Hollow
A Year and a Day
Map of Paris
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Dillon
“Don’t spend time beating on a wall, hoping to transform it into a door.”
―Coco Chanel
STAND BY YOUR MAN.
The title from the country song my mama used to play in our Smith Mountain Lake kitchen on Saturday mornings pings through my head, Tammy Wynette’s gold-standard Nashville voice attached to the melody. She had loved her classic country, and no one hit the notes for Mama like Tammy.
But the song in my head scratches to a sudden halt, as if the needle’s been dragged across the record. My eyes fly open.
Most of the passengers around me in the first-class cabin of the Air France flight are sleeping, blankets tucked up around their shoulders, eye masks in place.
I glance at my watch, see that we have three hours to go before landing in Paris.
I close my eyes again, remembering how many times I tried to talk Josh into taking a second honeymoon to Paris. Tried to convince him it was the perfect city for two people in love.
I guess he finally believed me. That it was the perfect city for two people in love anyway. The kicker? I wasn’t the person he was in love with. Or the person he wanted to take to Paris. No, he’d opted for a newer, undamaged model instead of me.
Exhaustion tugs at me. I wish I could sleep like the people around me. I envy the fact that they will arrive relatively refreshed. But I hear Mama’s voice again, clear as if she were sitting on the seat beside me. Men mess up, honey. It’s just a fact of life. What are you gonna do?
Leave his ass. That’s what I did. My subconscious offers up the response, and I already know what Mama’s going to say.
Did you give him two arms to cling to?
No. I gave him a stiletto in the kneecap.
I hear Mama’s indulgent laugh. Not saying he didn’t deserve that.
Yeah, but it didn’t fix anything.
Sometimes, forgiveness is the only thing that will.
I don’t have it in me to forgive him.
Yes, you do.
No. I don’t.
I raised you to have a forgiving heart, Dilly.
That was before sexting, and iCloud, and a husband too arrogant to remember he shared an account with you.
You shouldn’t have been poking through his messages.
I wasn’t poking. Okay, I was. But I had cause.
And who did you end up hurting the most?
Me, I guess.
Right.
You’re the one who taught me to listen to my gut.
Yes, but did your gut tell you something was wrong in the marriage long before you found those messages?
Maybe.
Diillllly?
Yes. Yes.
I also taught you not to ignore things that need your attention.
That was the problem though. He hadn’t wanted my attention. Not for a long time. I’d tested my theory with enough bait from the Neiman Marcus lingerie department to be sure of my conclusion. Hard to deny stone-cold not interested.
A collage of shots flip through my mind, each one set against the backdrop of the bedroom I’d shared with my husband. I watch myself i
n one scanty getup after another try to reignite my husband’s attraction to me.
Staring out the window of the plane, I see the indulgent patience on his face, as if he is trying very hard not to glance at his watch or pick up the phone on the nightstand by the bed. I realize now there was probably a text message from her hiding behind the screensaver photo that still featured a picture of Josh and me accepting my songwriter of the year award.
I linger on that for a moment. Remember that night and how incredible it had been to reach a milestone I never imagined I’d reach.
To his credit, Josh had always believed I would.
From the moment I’d brazenly walked through the front door of Top Dog Publishing in Nashville and asked if I could personally hand my CD of original songs to Josh Cummings, he’d said I had what it took. Guts and talent. Not sure I ever agreed with him. But then desperation can look like guts when it comes to taking a risk.
As for the talent, I’d been writing songs since I was seven, picking out tunes on the pink guitar Mama gave me for Christmas. She had also believed in me, and it was her love for country music that fostered my own. Her voice behind many of the lyrics that flowed through my pen to the yellow notepad I still write on.
My phone dings with a text message that comes through the plane’s Wi-Fi.
I glance at the screen. My stomach drops at the all-caps message blaring back at me. I tap in, read it fully.
WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING, DILLON? THE TRIP TO PARIS WAS IMPORTANT BUSINESS FOR THE COMPANY. I COULD BRING CHARGES AGAINST YOU FOR FALSIFYING THE CANCELLATION OF MY TICKET.
I roll my eyes and shake my head. As far as I know, there’s no law against canceling an airline ticket.
I’VE JUST SEEN THE CHARGE ON THE AMEX FOR A TICKET TO PARIS. I REPEAT. WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?
I consider this question. I suppose Josh deserves an honest answer, even though he did precipitate my actions with his decision to put aside our marriage vows. I’m pretty sure this isn’t the time to point that out though. We can save that for the attorneys.
I tap into the reply box, hit the all-caps key, and start texting.
CONSIDER IT A SMALL PRICE TO PAY FOR MY WILLINGNESS TO GO ALONG WITH A NO-FAULT DIVORCE. ALL THAT MONEY I WASTED ON A PRIVATE DETECTIVE, AND I DIDN’T EVEN USE THE PICTURES.
I can see that his response will be nearly instant because the little thingamajig indicating that he is typing rotates furiously as if it can’t spit the message out fast enough. I can practically hear him fuming from across the ocean.
YOU’RE THE ONE WHO WANTED THE DIVORCE. WE COULD HAVE WORKED IT OUT.
I type an emphatic:
WHAT? A THREESOME?
YOU KNOW THAT’S NOT WHAT I MEANT.
IT WAS OVER THE DAY I STOPPED BEING ENOUGH FOR YOU. I GUESS, IN FACT, WHEN YOU DECIDED YOU NEEDED PERFECT.
AND NOW YOU’RE GOING TO TRY TO WRECK MY BUSINESS?
WHY WOULD I DO THAT?
WHAT ELSE WOULD YOU CALL CANCELING MY MEETING WITH KLEIN?
WHO SAID I WAS CANCELING IT? I HAVE EVERY INTENTION OF MEETING WITH HIM.
WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU PLAYING AT, DILLON?
IF YOU RECALL, HE WAS MY DISCOVERY.
WHAT DO YOU MEAN HE WAS YOUR DISCOVERY? IT’S MY COMPANY. IF I HADN’T AGREED TO SIGN HIM, HE WOULD BE NOTHING.
This is arrogant, even for Josh. We both know Klein could have been signed by just about any house in Nashville.
But then Josh’s arrogance has been pointed out to me many times. In the early days, when I was starstruck with a head full of the flattery of his belief in me, I preferred to see it as confidence.
It did take confidence to build the kind of publishing empire Josh had built in Nashville. It didn’t come easy. I should know that. And he’d started twenty years ago from the ground up with one writer.
So I would be the first in line to give him credit for the success he had achieved in a town where no one threw it at you without the substantial recognition you had something worthwhile.
But on this subject, the subject of Klein Matthews, he’s wrong.
He was my discovery.
Dillon
“A good country song takes a page out of somebody’s life and puts it to music.”
―Conway Twitty
Seven years ago
I OFTEN WENT TO the Bluebird Café for inspiration, finding a quiet table in the back where I could observe the singer-songwriters playing on any given night. That was where I first heard him play.
He’d gotten in on a fluke, a cancellation at the last minute by one of the well-known writers who’d had an accident on the way to the round.
I would later learn that Klein had been new to Nashville, and in the audience to absorb whatever he could to learn about breaking into the business. The panicked manager had approached me that night with a request to jump in the round. And although I’d appreciated the request, I no longer sang my songs in public.
And so, she’d put out a plea for a singer-songwriter in the audience willing to act as a stand-in. There were a few hands, but to her credit, the manager’s gaze had fallen on Klein, where he’d been sitting near the back of the room. She walked straight over to his table, which happened to be only a couple away from mine, and said, “Are you up for this?”
He’d responded as if the opportunity were no big deal, when everyone around him knew differently. The Bluebird Café was well-known for bringing to light up-and-coming talent in Nashville. And the waiting list to play on a night like this was longer than long.
“You have any original songs?” she asked him, meeting his gaze with a clear understanding of what she was offering him.
“I do, ma’am,” he said in a quiet, South Carolina drawl.
“All right, then. What’s your name?”
“Klein Matthews.”
“Well, Klein Matthews, someone else’s misfortune has made this your lucky night. You got a guitar?”
“Yes, ma’am. In my truck.”
“Best go on out and get it then. We’re starting in less than five minutes.”
He stood, unfolding a surprising height of six-three or better. I wasn’t the only woman in the room whose gaze hung right there in a freeze-frame of awareness. He was stunningly good-looking, dark brown hair with a slight wave, longer at the front, shorter at the sides. He had an athlete’s build, broad shoulders that tapered to a narrow waist, his black T-shirt stretched tight against a well-hinted-at six-pack. He wore faded jeans in the way they were meant to be worn, close-fitting, the legs tapering to a pair of worn biker boots.
He weaved his way through the tables and out the front door, a gaggle of admiring female gazes following him. I told myself the observation had nothing to do with anything other than the realization that he looked like a country music star, whether he already was one or not.
Josh wasn’t with me that night. I do remember glancing at the wedding ring on my left hand. Since meeting Josh, I’d never had any reason to look at another man. I was as content being married as I had ever imagined being. Josh and I had a pretty great relationship, all things considered. It wasn’t easy to combine marriage with work, but we’d somehow managed to do it.
Having said that, I don’t know what made me look at my ring. Some ping of awareness I suppose my body must have recognized on a cellular level. I wasn’t proud of it. Vows meant something to me. I had never taken them lightly.
But I do believe we have an innate ability to immediately recognize attraction when it presents itself. Acting on it, however, was another thing altogether. That was something I had never done.
Even so, from the first line of the first song Klein Matthews played during his turn in the round that night, I knew immediately I was witnessing the birth of a new star in Nashville.
His obvious gift was a rare thing. That combination of the ability to put words into a song that would move its listeners almost immediately. And a voice with the kind of delivery that made women want to go home with him after the sh
ow.
I turned on my phone recorder halfway through the first song, knowing I would send the recording to Josh as soon as Klein finished. I listened, rapt, lifted up and carried away by every word that gave me an instant visual into a small-town South Carolina life that no doubt had made him who he was.
The words to that song made me, like every other female in the audience, wish to be the girl in the back of that truck with him on a summer night. Before the last note of the song faded away, I had texted the recording to Josh. It wasn’t five minutes later that he replied back, “Did he write that?”
I tapped back a quick, “Yes.”
Two seconds later: “Sign him.”
I took an empty seat at the table closest to the front to give me the advantage of speaking to him as soon as the round was over. I knew without a doubt, there were other scouts for competing houses and labels in the room that night. And that I would not be the only one wanting to sign Klein Matthews.
Almost two hours later, the round ended, and I quickly stood, weaving my way to the front. Out of the corner of my eye, I recognized my competition and their equal intent to reach him first. Anyone in the know would have found the scene a little ridiculous, all of us scurrying toward him as fast as we could without outright sprinting. But if I knew one thing, it was that opportunity didn’t present itself very often. The ability not only to recognize it, but to act on it was what made the difference between winners and losers.
I made it to him first, sticking out my hand and saying, “Hi, Klein. That was amazing. Truly amazing. I’m Dillon Blake. Do you have a couple of minutes to talk?”
He raised an eyebrow, clearly surprised by my approach. “Hey. Yeah. I know who you are. You’ve written some amazing songs.”
“Thank you,” I said, a little taken aback by the recognition. But then I’d never gotten used to that part of it, people actually knowing my songs. “Do you think we could go outside where it’s a little quieter?”
That Weekend in Paris (Take Me There(Stand-alone) Book 3) Page 1