His hot breath blew across my neck as he leaned in to my ear. “So, why did you want to come out with me on my birthday? I didn’t know if I would see you again.”
I gazed up into his handsome chestnut eyes and knew I wouldn't be able to keep my guard up any longer. I had to tell him the truth. “I missed you.”
Luc pinned his serious gaze on me as he lowered his face to mine, and just as I thought he was going to kiss me, he ran his finger down my neck, then picked up my necklace instead. “Your necklace is all tied up,” he said as he rested his hands above my chest and untangled the silver chain.
My body temperature rose. With Luc’s hands so close to my breasts and the alcohol taking its hold on me, I wanted to kiss him. To feel his arms around me. To be naked in bed with him.
I wanted another chance to be with him.
But had I said too much?
“There, all better.” He ran his hands over my shoulders, then smiled at me—that warm, sweet, sexy smile that melted me, that made me lose all my defenses. Then just before his lips met mine, he whispered, “I missed you too.”
He laced his fingers through my hair and held the back of my head as he kissed me in the corner of the crowded bar. I didn’t even notice the noisy crowd yelling and laughing around us. All I could think about was how insanely wonderful it felt to be kissing Luc again. And how I never wanted it to stop.
“Want to get out of here?” he whispered in my ear after letting me come up for air.
I didn’t even answer him. I grabbed his hand and pulled him out of the booth. We raced for the door, and once we were back in the car, Luc kissed me again before we sped off into the Parisian night. As we rounded Place de la Concorde with its tall obelisk lighting up the circle, Luc stopped at a red light and placed his hand on my inner thigh. He massaged it higher and higher until I thought I would explode. It seemed like it took an eternity for us to get back to his room, where he stripped me naked within seconds of walking in the door. I tore off his shirt and pants before he picked me up, wrapped my legs around his waist and slammed my back up against the wall. He pressed tightly into me and began thrusting so deeply that I cried out in pleasure. I didn’t care that my back would be covered in bruises the next day. I needed him inside of me, and the pleasure was almost unbearable.
I gripped Luc’s shoulders as he carried me over to the bed, laid me down, and rolled me over onto my stomach. Then he reached his hands up in between my legs, spread them ever so slightly, and pushed his fingers inside of me. He straddled me and kept pressing his hand deeper as he kissed the length of my back. I felt his hand pull out as he pressed his groin on top of me and entered me from behind. He went so deep, I could hardly breathe.
He lowered his body against my back as he slid in and out of me.
“Charlotte, I missed your body,” he whispered into my ear as his hot breath sent tingles down my spine. “Je veux te faire l’amour toute la nuit.”
There’s nothing sexier than a hot French man telling you in French that he wants to make love to you all night long. I flipped onto my back, pushed him over and climbed on top of him. He grinned as he let me take control. I slid back and forth on top of him until I couldn’t hold my pleasure in any longer. I moaned as I collapsed on top of him. Luc kept pushing deep inside of me as I held on to his shoulders. Finally, I felt him throbbing as he let out a groan and collapsed onto his back.
We lay tangled in his sheets for a while until we caught our breath. I wondered how another man could ever compare to this. I’d never felt so pleased, so deeply satisfied, as I did when I was with Luc.
Then, as if the sex wasn’t amazing enough, Luc reached into his night stand and pulled out a bar of Lindt dark chocolate.
I burst out laughing.
“What, you think eating chocolate after sex is funny?”
“No, I love it. It’s just you. You’re cute, that’s all.”
“Cute?”
“Okay, you’re a sexy, hot man who loves chocolate. You’re not cute.”
“That’s better.” Luc unwrapped the bar of chocolate and fed me square after decadent square until my pleasure meter had hit its max. As I was drowning in delight, the taste of rich, melty chocolate swirling around on my tongue, a thought crossed my mind. Hannah’s DC wedding was coming up in a month, and I still didn’t have a date.
“Luc, I have a question for you.”
“Yes?”
“Would you be interested in coming with me to a wedding back in DC next month?”
“Really? You want me to be your date?”
“Yes, I'd love to have you there with me.”
Luc’s grin widened as he leaned in and planted a kiss on my lips.
“I take that as a yes?”
“Yes, I would love to go with you.”
“Happy Birthday Luc,” I said as I kissed his neck and wrapped my arms around his sexy, naked body.
And just as we were starting to roll around under the sheets again, Luc’s cell phone rang.
He shot up out of bed to answer it while I tried to remain calm. Who in the hell was always calling him this late and why did he have to jump out of bed to answer it? This was bullshit. I started to get up and put my clothes back on, but Luc walked over to me and grabbed my shoulders. “Charlotte, I have to take this call, and then I will explain. Please don’t leave.”
I sat back down on the bed, shaking my head. I thought Luc would put some clothes on and dash out into the hallway to take the call like he had the first time this had happened. But, he didn’t. Instead, he threw on his underwear, sat down at his kitchen table, and answered his phone.
“Coucou Adeline,” he started.
After he said hello in a sickeningly sweet voice, I grew increasingly impatient.
“Oui, tu me manques aussi, ma fille.”
Wait, had I just heard him right? I miss you too, my little girl?
What?
“Tu es allée au zoo? Tu as vu des lions? Ah, des tigres aussi? C’est super, ma petite chérie.”
Oh my gosh. Luc was definitely not talking to a woman.
It was a child—a daughter.
Luc had a daughter.
I wasn’t even sure what to do with this information. So, this is who had been calling him at all hours of the night? This is who he’d been running out on me to talk to? Why was a little girl calling him at one in the morning though? And why did he have to hide it from me?
Before I had a chance to digest what was going on, Luc finished his conversation with, “Je t’aime aussi, Adeline. À demain.”
He gazed up at me with a worried expression on his face.
“So, you have a daughter?”
“Yes, her name is Adeline.”
“So why didn’t you just tell me about her? All this time, that’s who’s been calling you? Why does she call you in the middle of the night? What is going on?”
“Calm down, please. At first, I tried to tell you about her, but you weren't interested in letting me explain.”
Then I remembered all of the times when he’d said he had something important to tell me, and I’d cut him off or kissed him, or did whatever I had to do not to have that conversation.
“I'm sorry for not letting you explain. But what about after the ballet, when you asked me to come home with you for Christmas? I asked you then to explain the calls, and you said you couldn't tell me. That it was complicated. Why wouldn't you have just told me the truth at that point?”
“I wanted you to know about her, but things never went right with us, and then suddenly things became very complicated with my ex-wife. It wasn't something I wanted to drag you into. And also, I was afraid that if I told you the truth, you wouldn't want to see me anymore.”
“Why would you think that?” I asked.
“To be honest, at the time, you didn't seem like someone who would want to date a man with a child.”
He had a point.
“My daughter calls late at night because she lives in Australi
a now, and there is a big time difference.”
“Australia?”
“While I was married, Adeline’s mother cheated on me with another man. An Australian man. Then during the divorce, she got custody of Adeline and took her to Australia.” I noticed the weariness in Luc’s eyes as he told the story. “She is only three years old, and she has been gone for a year. I miss her so much, and I am trying to get her back. The man her mother is with is not a nice man. Adeline is scared of him, and she wants to come home to me. So, all year, I have been going to court, and even traveling to Australia, trying to get her back.”
“Oh my gosh.” I was speechless. Luc had been cheated on too. He’d had his heart broken just like me. And here, all this time, he was simply trying to get his little girl back.
“I am sorry that I didn’t tell you right away. Besides the way things were with us, and besides the complications of the court battle, I have to be careful, you know, about who I allow into my daughter's life. This situation is already messy enough. I hope you understand.”
“I should've let you explain the first time. But I do wish you would've told me sooner.” I ran my hands through my hair, shaking my head. “I can’t believe you’ve been going through all of this.”
“That is why I wanted to take you home for Christmas. Adeline flew home and we all stayed with my parents for a few weeks. I wanted you to meet her in person, but you told me you didn’t want a relationship, so I let it go.”
My gaze dropped the floor, the guilt settling in. “I’m sorry, Luc. I’m so sorry.”
Luc walked over to his bookshelf and grabbed a photo album. “Here, let me show you.” He flipped open to a picture of him holding an adorable little girl in his arms. “This is Adeline.”
“She's beautiful. She looks just like you.”
As we climbed back into bed together, my mind reeled from the revelations that had just been made.
Luc had a daughter. Luc was a father.
I wasn’t just sleeping with some random, sexy French man now. This was a man who had been hurt. A man who had a child and who was fighting to get that child back. A man who had more on his plate than sleeping with a bunch of women and finishing up a Master’s degree.
And then I remembered my article. My article where I had verbally bashed Luc and all of his attempts to be with me. Where I had droned on and on about his stupid phone calls and his sketchy behavior to prove to women that all men are liars and that they can’t be trusted. My article that would be published in a major U.S. women’s magazine in April, right in time for the wedding.
Oh, shit.
Nineteen
vendredi, le premier avril
No amount of primping will prepare you for the first time you lay eyes on the man who broke your heart, and the woman who stole his.
“Bienvenue,” the perky flight attendant welcomed the passengers as Luc and I buckled our seatbelts in the cramped airplane seats. Hannah and Mike’s wedding had snuck up on me, leaving me completely unprepared for what I would have to face.
The April issue of Bella Magazine with my article, “How to Date Like a Man in The City of Love,” had hit newsstands in the U.S. the week before. I had called Beth, the editor, the day after Luc told me about his daughter. I begged her to let me rewrite the article, but she said it was too late for revisions. I pleaded again, but she stayed firm. She said she had no choice.
Once I knew there was no going back, I thought about telling Luc, but I hadn’t been able to build up the courage to just sit him down and spill it. How would I even begin to justify all the hurtful things I’d written about him?
So, I bit my nails, hoping, praying that Luc wouldn’t get wind of the article. I had never worried about my blog because my name wasn’t on it, plus it was a blog specifically written for women. It was the same thing with the article, I reasoned. It was a women’s magazine, so what reason would he ever have to pick it up? I had already warned all of my girlfriends who would be at the wedding to keep their mouths zipped, so it would be okay. It had to be okay.
I downed two of those mini bottles of wine they give you on the plane, because not only was I nervous about the article, but in less than twenty-four hours, I would be seeing Jeff and his girlfriend, Brooke, in person. Katie had confirmed that Brooke was in fact attending the wedding, and she’d promised to trip her or spill red wine on her. What else are best friends for?
Despite the dread that had overcome me the minute we boarded the flight to DC, I had decided that no matter what vengeful feelings I felt when I saw Jeff and Brooke together, I would keep my cool and focus on Hannah. As one of her best friends and as her bridesmaid, I owed it to her to put my feelings aside and to support her on the biggest day of her life. After over eight months in Paris without Jeff, in theory, I should’ve been totally and completely over him. In a way, I was looking forward to seeing him so that I could show him just how over him I was. Having an attractive, sweet French man on my arm all weekend should do the trick. But, the attractive French man sleeping next to me on the plane had no clue that Jeff was going to be at the wedding. And since I wasn’t planning on being all buddy-buddy with Jeff, I didn’t see the need to tell Luc. It would’ve just made him feel uncomfortable and out of place, so I figured that what he didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him.
Hours later, we arrived at a Marriott hotel in Northwest DC, right by the National Zoo. The wedding reception was going to be held at the hotel, following a ceremony on Georgetown’s campus. We didn’t have much time to relax before we had to get ready for the rehearsal, so Luc and I sped up to our hotel room to shower and change. But before I hopped in the shower, I had to find Katie. This was the longest time we’d gone without seeing each other in our entire friendship of twenty years. Plus, she had a copy of Bella Magazine.
While Luc was showering, I raced down to Katie’s room and knocked on the door.
“Is that who I think it is?” Katie said as she peeked her head out. “Charlotte!” she screamed as she hugged me.
“Oh my gosh, it’s so good to see you! You look great!” I stood back for a minute to look at my best friend. She did look fabulous. She was wearing an adorable, blue and white summer dress and her short blonde hair had grown all the way down her back since I'd last seen her.
“Thanks! You look great, too!” she shrieked with excitement.
“Oh, stop. I just got off the plane and haven’t even taken a shower yet.”
“Well you could’ve fooled me, hot lady,” she said with a wink.
“So, where’s your man?” I asked in anticipation. Katie was still dating Joe, the gynecologist, and I was excited to meet him and see what all the fuss was about. Plus I wanted Katie to know that I supported her relationship, no matter how anti-love I'd been all year long.
Katie grinned sheepishly as she led me into their hotel room. Joe stood at the window looking all spiffy in a crisp white shirt paired with a dark red tie. I immediately understood what all the fuss was about—and it wasn’t just about the looks. He was definitely handsome, with his full head of dark brown hair and his muscular physique, but it was his warm personality that shone through right off the bat. Instead of just shaking my hand, he gave me a big bear hug. And at 6’5”, he was definitely a big cuddly bear.
“So this is the wild, single gal in Paris who Katie's told me so much about. It's good to finally meet you,” he said as he smiled warmly at me.
“What has she been telling you? Hopefully not all the bad stuff,” I said jokingly, but I was really a little serious.
“No, no, only good things. So where’s your man? Luc, right?”
“He’s good,” I said to Katie, pointing at Joe. “Remembering names already. I’m impressed.” I turned to Joe. “He’s getting ready back in our room, which is what I need to be doing if I don’t want to be late.”
As Katie walked me to the door, I whispered in her ear, “Do you have the magazine?”
“Um, let’s see. My best friend publishes an article in
my favorite magazine and I don’t have it. Come on lady, obviously I have it.” She walked over to her suitcase, grabbed the latest issue of Bella Magazine, flipped the pages to my article, and handed it over to me. Joe stepped into the bathroom and closed the door, leaving us alone.
Inside the glossy magazine, I spotted my picture at the top of the three page feature article that I had written for women everywhere. I felt so excited at the sight of my byline that I almost forgot about the fact that if Luc saw it, he’d never want to see me again.
“Charlotte, it’s awesome. I’ve talked to all the girls, and everyone loves it. I mean, can you believe it? Your article is in Bella Magazine. It’s freaking ridiculous!”
“Thanks, Katie. Yeah, it does look pretty great, doesn’t it?”
“Yes, and don’t you worry your little butt about a thing. There’s no way Luc will find out about it. This is a women’s magazine for God’s sake. Why on earth would he pick this up?”
“You’re right. But still, after everything he told me, it would just be awful.”
I had filled Katie in on Luc’s evil ex-wife and her Australian boyfriend who’d stolen Luc’s little girl away.
“Yeah, but you didn’t know all of that when you wrote this, or you would’ve written it differently. It’s great the way it is, and it’s not like the whole article is about you and Luc. Only some of it.”
I raised my eyebrows at her.
“Okay, you do relate most of your points back to him. But he’s not going to see it, Charlotte. All of us girls have it tucked away in our suitcases, okay?”
“Thanks Katie.”
“Oh, I picked you up like ten copies. I figured you could sneak them back with you.”
“You’re the best,” I said as I gave her a hug.
“I know,” she said with a shrug. “Just kidding. Alright lady, you better get a move on it so we’re not late.”
“See you in a few,” I said as I jetted out of their room. I so needed more than a half an hour to get ready, but it would have to do.
“Hey, Charlotte, wait!” Katie hissed down the hallway.
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