The Chocolate Kiss

by Laura Florand

  Magalie choked. Damn French pronouns. They could be a little more precise. Tu l’as aimé? Anyone who was completely obsessed with an abortive sexual encounter could have made the same mistake.

  “Unless there was some sex life with Christophe, too?” Aja suggested.

  “No! Tata!”

  Aja shrugged. “Well, that’s what you choose when you keep your barriers up. Either you can have no one, or you can have lots of superficial someones. If you want to have something more than that, you have to make room for the person. And trust that person to make room for you.”

  Magalie hunched her shoulders, feeling sullen. Only Aja and Geneviève could make her hunch her shoulders. “It’s not so easy. We’re like ganache; when you make room in yourself, and then the other person is gone, your shape is all—funny.” Her hands worked the air uneasily as she remembered the many times she’d ended up with that funny, unbalanced shape. Trying to get her chocolate ganache of a soul, long since cooled and hardened into what she had thought was its right shape, to lose the imprint of those missing others and return to a nice, smooth whole. Unfortunately, her soul seemed to be really lousy at melting again and stayed misshapen for a pathetically long time.

  “Haven’t we made room for you?” Aunt Aja said gently. “The way Geneviève and I make room for each other?”

  “Of course you have!” Magalie said on a rush of love she didn’t even know how to express, except by always being there, being the heir and apprentice they so wanted. Their needs and hers suited each other perfectly. If only she could keep this place safe.

  “But it’s true the spot could close, I guess, if any of us chose,” Aja said wisely.“If you love someone, you have to make room for that person every single day.”

  Magalie shook her head involuntarily. She had often thought that Aja and Geneviève’s relationship was like a fairytale, out of this world, those nearly forty years of constant, supportive life together. Aja’s experience of couplehood didn’t match what Magalie had seen of it elsewhere at all.

  “Don’t you think you are worth room in others’ lives?” Aja went on.

  “Of course!” Magalie’s jaw went out stubbornly. For some reason, her own affirmation made her eyes prickle. She had been making room for herself, over and over, for so long, only to lose it again, it was like a bruise on her heart.

  She couldn’t stand prickling eyes.

  “You’re our heir, Magalie. In our wills, this shop and this building go to you. Didn’t you know that?”

  She had known it. And long been grateful for it. Her aunts had given her a permanent home. A place in the heart of Paris that would always be hers, if she didn’t lose it. There were so many ways she could lose it, though. For instance, a small witches’ shop could lose its economic viability.

  “Do you think if you left, that room we’ve made in our lives for you would be gone?”

  Well, of course. That was human nature. Magalie set her jaw, not willing to insult her aunt with the truth. Besides, she wasn’t going to let the space for her here close over, because she was never going to leave it.

  Aja studied her for a moment and sighed. “It’s true that if friends can never count on you being there the next time they need you, the place they leave for you might be very small. That’s self-defense. If you abandon people—even if it’s not your fault—they will eventually get over you and find someone else. Good for them. But you’re an adult now, and you can build things as deep and as long-lasting as you want to. I wish you wouldn’t underestimate your ability to make people love you.”

  If her pride hadn’t prevented her, Magalie would have wrapped her arms around herself protectively. “I think I’d almost rather talk about my sex life.”

  “Really, Magalie. I wouldn’t want to invade your privacy.” Aja dumped the water off the grapefruit peel, taking a layer of bitterness away, and half filled the pan again with cold water, still more bitterness to go. “Philippe left something for you, by the way.”

  She moved, and only then did Magalie see the pink box Aja had been blocking from view while she said what she needed to say.

  Magalie’s whole body kicked into overdrive, longing sweeping her. And fear. What would it be this time? What would she have to resist?

  She took the box out into the little table in the entrance area and sat down to make sure she was stable. And very slowly opened it.

  Oh, Magalie thought, as if she had been hit in the stomach. Oh, oh, oh. It was his most beautiful one yet. Exquisite shells of pale pink closed around some secret heart of ganache or buttercream, she couldn’t tell. Couldn’t tell because raspberries, pure deep red, circled whatever secret was inside, hiding it from view. One raspberry crowned it, beside one exquisite rose petal, beaded with a tiny drop that suggested dew but had to be glucose syrup. It was February, after all. The dark, perfect reds of the fruit and petal rested against paler pink, the surface of the macaron so glossy and smooth, not a grain of sugar left visible in the meringue that had made it.

  Just for a moment, it was as if someone had brought an exquisite rose in the heart of winter into her dark, warm cave. She was having trouble breathing. It looked so utterly beautiful. She wanted so badly to sink her teeth into it. Slowly, carefully, with all due respect, letting her mouth linger over every instant of the pleasure: the delicate bite of the macaron shells between her teeth, the tart-sweet juice of the raspberries spilling out, the unctuous cream inside . . .

  It was a rose. It was a heart. It was a princess’s crown, studded with red jewels. It was the treasure box that the third son brought back from his quest to win the fair lady’s heart.

  It was a trap.

  If she ate it, she might never be herself again.

  And being herself was all she had.

  If she ate it, he would win. He would know he had won.

  He was flaunting his skill. He was gloating over her as he so easily dismissed her chocolat chaud.

  It looked so beautiful.

  Maybe she could let him win.

  Maybe she could let him make her into something else.

  Was it really more important to her to stay Magalie than to eat a bite of this?

  She sat staring at it.

  The silver doorbell chimed, and her head jerked up, but it was only Madame Fernand, exquisitely dressed in clothes that had gotten too big for her thinning body, with her bouncy poodle pulling at the leash. Magalie ducked behind the counter and bent down to pull out the package of tea Aja had made for her.

  It took her only a second to find it, but while she was down there, she heard Madame Fernand make a soft exclamation.

  She lunged up, hitting her head on the counter. Madame Fernand was fighting with her poodle, its paws up on the table. Magalie dove for the box, her body brushing past the dog’s as she caught it. She tripped over the chair legs, tangled with the dog, and fell sideways, catching the rose-heart just short of the floor. The raspberry fell off and rolled across the wood.

  The poodle scarfed it up and tried to snatch the pink macaron from Magalie’s hands.

  Magalie growled.

  The poodle faltered.

  “I’m so sorry!” Madame Fernand tugged ineffectually at the leash. “She was at it before I could stop her. I’m so sorry, ma petite. Was it from that young Lyonnais? He does make beautiful things, doesn’t he?”

  Magalie came to her feet, shaking. She couldn’t believe the stupid poodle had eaten that raspberry. Her raspberry.

  You’ve already touched it. Eat it now before something else gets it. Can we please just find out what it tastes like?

  In private. She did not dare taste this gift in public view. She recovered the box and closed the macaron creation very carefully inside it, then set it on the top of the display case, out of reach of poodles. Madame Fernand kept excusing herself in her high, failing voice, as Magalie held the door open for her.

  All at once, the dog jerked, sending the old woman careening. Magalie caught Madame Fernand as the dog yan
ked its leash free and darted down the street.

  “Oh, dear!” Madame Fernand exclaimed. “I just don’t know what I’m going to do with her.”

  Magalie righted the woman, making sure she was steady on her feet.

  “Sissi!” Madame Fernand cried, in vain. Down at the end of the island, the poodle trotted across the street into the park.

  “I’ll get her,” Magalie said.

  Her boots weren’t the best for running, but she found the dog at the tip of the island, down on the lower quay.

  She stood still at the sight, her face flaming in outrage and humiliation. For the poodle had apparently run with a purpose. Gérard’s rangy German shepherd was humping her enthusiastically, the poodle standing still for it, panting happily.

  And all that from one raspberry.

  Chapter 23

  Magalie stalked through his kitchen, in pursuit. Philippe, caught off guard while correcting some apprentice’s touch on a Taj Mahal of sweets, looked up, and his eyes flared. Bright, vivid. Hungry and supremely triumphant all at once.

  He probably thought she was about to throw herself at him, wrap her legs around his hips, and kiss him for all to see.

  “Those . . . those dogs.” She could barely speak. “After the poodle ate that—that perfidy of yours, she—she . . . What do you think you’re playing at? You obscene bastard.”

  “You gave my Coeur to a dog?” Philippe’s voice built until the last word was a roar that knocked down a fantastical castle of spun sugar, macarons, and rose petals three counters away. His apprentice flinched, the ganache spurting out of his pastry bag in a jagged blob.

  Philippe reached out and grabbed her, too hard, by the upper arm. He had never grabbed a woman like that, in pure fury, in his life, and when she nearly hauled off and hit him, her hand coming up, he shook his head, shook himself, and gentled his hold. She didn’t hit him. Which he rather regretted. He didn’t give a damn if she beat him at this point, as long as she took out something physical on him.

  “Let’s take this somewhere else,” he growled between his teeth. He had a reputation for not exploding in his laboratoire, at least not with anything other than laughter. Or, fine, an occasional, “Non, non, non, non, non!” if an apprentice insisted on doing something carelessly again.

  He swept her into his tiny office. She let him. She grinned savagely, as if he were inviting her to caged combat.

  “What did you do while you were making it?” She turned on him as he shoved the door closed behind her, her shoulder rubbing under his arm. He took a hard breath and kept his arm right where it was, caging her. If she didn’t mind him looming over her, caging her, he sure as hell didn’t mind doing the looming. She was feral, dangerous. Any minute now, she would leap at him. Please. “Did you imagine me crumbling at your feet, begging, with every drop you put into it?”

  His hand clenched against the door behind her. His voice went rough, as if she’d dragged it raw. “I imagined”—he brought his other arm up, both locked now on either side of her head—“superfine sugar spilling like dust over your bare shoulders. I made the shell of the macaron silk, such perfect, glossy silk, like the silk I rubbed over your skin last night.”

  The flame of a blush ran over her face.

  “I imagined you turning just exactly that shade of rose.” His eyes swept her face, and his pupils dilated further at what he saw. His voice got rougher still. “I didn’t get the color dark enough.”

  Her hands flinched to cover her cheeks. She forced them down. She was probably battling that blush with everything in her. And failing.

  “I imagined closing my teeth so gently around that raspberry, in the middle of that silky pinkness, that I didn’t even break the surface of it.”

  Her nipples peaked; he could see them through her silk top. So she knew what he was talking about. And she liked it.

  “I imagined touching it with my tongue. Still just texture. Still so careful that I didn’t even have a taste of its tart, sweet juice. And then I imagined sucking it into my mouth . . .”

  Magalie’s head fell back against the door, her lips parted. Her anger seemed to be fleeing, melting. Like the flimsy excuse it had been in the first place. But his anger wasn’t.

  “The rose petal was because even I couldn’t make from sugar something soft enough for your skin.”

  Her eyes were so dilated, so hungry. He hoped hunger for his touch ran over her everywhere, the way hunger for hers did him. He hoped she was starving.

  “And what’s inside it”—his face was so close, his lips were almost brushing hers when he spoke—“you’ll never find out, because you fed it to a putain de chien.”

  He shoved himself away from her and walked out.

  Chapter 24

  Magalie sat in her room, high above the island, ensconced in creamy white.The radiator was on high, but she was cold. They were predicting snow.

  Outside her window, the night sky was as dark as Paris got, the lights from the city flushing up on the underside of the snow clouds that tantalized it. Would it snow, or wouldn’t it?

  Magalie wrapped her bathrobe tighter around herself and curled her toes in her fluffy socks against the comforter and stared at the raspberry-bereft macaron sitting in her lap.

  She brought the lid down over it to hide it and studied the name Lyonnais until it seemed branded somewhere inside her. As if he had laid claim to her soul.

  She opened the box and gazed at the work of sensual art inside it again. The missing raspberry was like a blasphemy, an accusation of her cowardice. If she hadn’t hesitated so long . . .

  The drop of glucose still balanced perfectly on the rose petal, like a tear.

  She curved her hands under it, the macaron shell glossy against her palms. I made the shell silk . . . like the silk I rubbed over your skin. She lifted it up to the level of her mouth.

  It begged her to eat it. Just one bite.

  She kept seeing Philippe’s face. You gave my heart to a dog?

  That was just a play on words, of course. He must have named this new creation Coeur, the way he named others Désir or Envie.

  It looked so exquisitely beautiful, she couldn’t understand how anyone could have made this for her.

  She set it back into its box and got up suddenly, pulling clothes back on, an extra sweater, and snow boots instead of her usual heels because . . . well, it was cold, and they were predicting snow. And she felt . . . humbled. She bundled up in her heaviest coat, because it was a way of cuddling herself even as she ventured out, and went back outside into the evening.

  The lights at Lyonnais were all out. Grégory was just locking the door.

  Magalie stopped, burying her hands in her pockets. A plastic sack from a shoe store hung from one of her wrists.

  Grégory turned away from the door and saw her. He paused, clearly surprised, then came toward her. “Philippe’s gone home.”

  Oh. Magalie buried her hands deeper, fisting them so that she scrubbed her knuckles against the bottoms of her pockets. “Where—” Her voice was rough. She cleared it. “Where’s that?”

  The address he gave her was in the Marais. Not too far. She could walk it in under ten minutes. But over the bridge and across the water, off her island.

  She rubbed her knuckles into her pockets again as Grégory said bon soir, his mouth twisting regretfully, as if he was saying adieu. The street was quiet. On the island, it grew quiet at night. In the Marais, there would be more noise. A lot more noise. It was Friday night, la Saint-Valentin, and couples would be filling the restaurants and bars and walking close together against the cold.

  She stood still, there in the middle of her silent street for a while. The cold ate into her, and that teasing promise of snow.

  She swallowed, lifted her chin, and set off.

  Couples strolled, laughing and romantic, all around her as she stood in front of Philippe’s seventeenth-century building, and for once no part of her felt as if she needed to brace herself a little, keep he
r chin up. For once, all these other people just made her feel . . . quiet. She thought they were charming, and she wished she was one of them, walking along with her hand tucked in someone else’s. One particular someone else’s.

  She took a deep breath and pressed the button by apartment 3B and realized as a brusque “Oui?” came back through the intercom that she should have cleared her throat first. “C’est”—she paused and tried to swallow her hoarseness away. “C’est Magalie.”

  She heard a rough indrawn breath. And then a clicking sound as the door released beside her, and she pushed it open.

  He met her at the first landing, running down the stairs in a T-shirt and jeans. Barefoot.

  He stopped very still when he saw her. “Magalie.”

  She gazed back at him mutely.

  A couple came out of the apartment on the same landing and nodded at Philippe politely and, by extension, her, although not without discreet glances at his bare feet. The couple was dressed for an evening out. She was reminded of how early it was for a city like Paris. Did she and Philippe both start getting ready for bed so early? Him, well, presumably because the work in most pâtisseries started around 4:30 in the morning. Her . . . because she liked to curl up in her own space.

  Philippe hadn’t even remembered to nod back at the couple. He had a way of focusing that shut out everything else, and right now he was focused on her. He held out a hand. “Come up.”

  It took her a second to realize that he wasn’t going to lead the way up the stairs.

  Of course, he wouldn’t. Her mouth trembled between wryness and understanding. He was a prince. It was bone-deep in him to climb stairs behind the woman when she went up and before her when she went down. In case she fell.

  His hand reached again, angled lower, starting to curl around the handles pulling at her wrist. She realized he was offering to carry her sack. She shook her head, climbing the stairs before him, conscious of his presence so close at her back.