Cognac & Couture (The Passport Series Book 2)

by Celia Kennedy

  He expressed his concerns for Chantal. “I worry about this for Chantal, which is why I introduced her to Jean Giroux. I wonder if she feels like I am rejecting her talents. Perhaps John felt you judged him and what he had to offer.”

  “Maybe. Possibly. Finding out that I didn’t ask for his help clearly upset him.” I took a deep breath before diving into my present-day conundrums. I began, “I understand that I know very little about Aksel Pedersen, and I know absolutely nothing about his business dealings with you. And while his son’s actions were absolutely lacking in character, I have to tell you, Aksel was very kind to me.” I described my getting upset at our meeting and how gracious Aksel had been when I declined the offer. “Even after I turned him down initially and then invited myself there, raising his hopes that I might take the job—a lot of people would have seen me as flighty, but I think he really understood I was confused. Tempted, but confused.”

  “Kathleen, grandiose business plans are based on personal relationships and egos. I saw him talking to you, I knew about his new business venture, and I was worried about you getting caught up in it. He can be very persuasive, extremely charming.”

  I took a step closer to him. “I’m sorry that you went through whatever you did. Thank you for wanting to protect me. I am grateful to have you on my side. I just wanted to say, though I have no way of knowing this, something tells me he’s a changed man.”

  He brushed my hair back from my forehead and stared deep into my eyes. “You are an intelligent woman and incredibly respected for what you do, but under no circumstances would I want you to trust him without using every means necessary to find out who he really is.”

  Wow! I blew out a deep breath. “I understand. At least I think I do.”

  My cell phone alarm chirped. “I told my mom we’d be home soon. She’s planning some kind of dinner with John’s family.”

  “Of course, chérie.”

  ***

  Wedding? What?

  “Put your best dress on now, or we’re going to be late! Sébastien, put on your suit.” My mom, whose hair had been stylishly upswept, delicately dashed up the stairs, holding her hair in place. If this hadn’t been so surreal, I’d have been laughing. She paused midway. “Okay, not your best dress. No way does the bride want to be upstaged.”

  Tears glistened in my eyes. “Let me see what you’re wearing.” I trotted up the stairs, leaving Sébastien to deal with the surprise by himself.

  In the judge’s chambers, I stood at my mother’s side, and John’s brother, James, stood at his. The judge, a lovely woman, stood in the center and presided over the wedding. I listened to my mother and John recite their vows, and tried to absorb all that was happening.

  There had been almost no time at the house or on the drive to the courthouse to ask questions. The short version was that, when they found out I was coming, they had decided to get married. They had been organizing flowers, cake, and dinner under my very nose.

  I glanced at Sébastien, who sat next to John’s sister-in-law, Whitney, and saw tenderness in his eyes as he looked at them. Shivers spread across my skin. L’amour.

  ***

  “The girls are going to be surprised.” I took a sip of Champagne, still in shock, and started to laugh hard. I raised a hand in front of my mouth, hoping I wouldn’t spray Sébastien with my drink. I took deep breaths, trying to calm myself. “Forget them. I’m in shock.”

  He wrapped his arm around me. “Not me. I’ve come to expect amazing things from the Ehlers women.”

  I smiled. “I guess so. Wow. They’re married.”

  “It’s been known to happen,” he teased.

  My mind was utterly blown as I looked out the window of the restaurant, through the twilight, across Lake Union to Gas Works Park. Lost. Somehow, I felt blissfully lost in this moment of this remarkable day. Between the laughter and tears, muffulettas and Muscovy duck, the balance of an ordinary day blurred into one that was as miraculous as it was unpredictable.

  “All right, it’s a wedding. Time for a few pictures,” my mom called to us.

  Soon, she had commandeered the maître d, and we all posed in front of a two-story, rough-hewn stone fireplace. We shuffled around in various combinations while the kindhearted man behind the camera clicked away.

  When he passed the camera back to my mother, he asked us all to follow him to our table, where we sat next to cantilevered windows that revealed stars, moonlight, houseboats, and office lights on the water of Lake Union.

  “It’s gorgeous here,” Sébastien said. “Haven’t you been to this restaurant before?”

  “No. But I definitely want to come back.”

  For the rest of the evening, we ate, took more photos, and made it a glorious commemoration.

  ***

  As I lay in bed, staring at the moon, still trying to absorb the day, Sébastien moved against me then settled onto his side, spooning me. When he tried to speak, his voice croaked. He cleared his throat and started over. “What about moving in with me and turning your apartment into some kind of studio? You could see how it goes, and if you like it, we can figure out the next step.”

  I lay, speechless. He was presenting me with an option that I had thought about since he’d asked me to move in, but, since I didn’t have all the pieces figured out, I hadn’t felt like I could suggest it. I rolled over to face him. “So, you’re okay with me having no idea what I will be doing a year from now?”

  The left side of his mouth curled up. “Chérie, if I learned nothing else from losing Gisella, it is that we take each day as it comes and we take love where we find it. Surely your mother and John proved that today.”

  “I think at some point I knew that, but then work took over, and it began to feel like I had to keep juggling, because, if I dropped a ball, everything would come undone, and I wouldn’t be able to fix it.”

  “I know how that feels, too. I’ve just had more time to work on surviving. And I had Chantal. My recovery was different from yours.”

  I admitted, “There are times I wish I was Tiziana, Marian, or Charlotte.”

  He squinted at me. “Why would you wish that?”

  “Marian’s funny. She’s always laughing. Charlotte’s easy-going. Her life is sorted out and settled. She’s really happy. Tiziana is truly in love with life. It’s all a beautiful experience for her.”

  “We are who we are, chère à mon coeur. As are they. Besides, we laugh a lot, and I believe, with time, we’ll laugh more, especially you, when you feel like you have more of what you want in life.”

  Noon, Saturday, February 13

  Book of Revelations

  MY JOB BECKONED, and we were returning to Paris tomorrow.

  John and my mom had just returned from their night at a fancy hotel in downtown Seattle.

  “How was the honeymoon?”

  “Everything a honeymoon should be!” my beaming mother answered.

  I snickered at her response and then laughed out loud when John announced, “I can’t wait for you to leave so that the real honeymoon can begin.”

  Then, she and I got teary-eyed. Instantly regretting his comment, he and Sébastien suggested we wade through our calendars and figure out when they could come to Paris. While John called his store and organized vacation schedules with his employees, the rest of us looked at pictures of the wedding and dinner that we had uploaded onto my laptop.

  Scrolling through, I found many that had turned out quite well. Then Sébastien took over, scrolling through until John announced the dates that worked for everyone.

  They would come visit in the middle of August, right when everyone fled Paris. “Paris will be pretty quiet. People vacation the whole month in France. You won’t see the hustle and bustle, but the cafés and museums will be open and full of tourists!”

  John wore an enormous grin as he shared with us his lifelong dream of being an artist in Paris.

  “I’ll get painting supplies. We can set you up,” I assured him.

&
nbsp; Our dinner plans included one of the few things on Sébastien’s to-do list: dinner at The Space Needle. Our reservation was for 7:00, which seemed a little early for dinner to him. But John had called in a favor for the last minute reservation, and I explained to Sébastien, “Beggars can’t be choosers. He basically promised his left kidney to someone for this.”

  Looking contrite, he apologized. “Sorry, chérie. Since there’s time, I’ll pack, get that out of the way.”

  I went in search of my mother, to find out what she was wearing. I found her in the basement, staring at the pile of boxes I had sorted through a few days ago. I had whittled it down to three.

  “Hi.”

  She waved her hand at the stack, while obviously working a lump out of her throat. “Was it hard?”

  It had been excruciating. I had sorted through papers, photos, and random keepsakes. Memories, good and bad, had flooded me. But, wanting to reassure her, I said, “Not too bad. I was going to ask if you could ship them to me.”

  She nodded. “I know it probably sounds silly, but, with all your stuff gone, it feels like you’re finally moving out.”

  I hugged her. “No, not silly. Maybe that’s why I left so much stuff here for so long, I only just got ready to leave.”

  Before things could get more emotional, I changed the subject. “What should I wear to dinner?”

  “A nice dress. One you’d wear to some dive in Paris would probably be perfect.”

  As we rooted through my dresses, looking for one for tonight, she oohed and aahed over the labels and fabric. When she gushed, “Armani,” I smiled. She really did love clothes as much as I did. Well, maybe. She picked out an electric-blue Armani trench dress with a wide gold belt for me to wear to dinner.

  “What are you wearing?” I asked as her eyes lingered on the glamorous array of clothes and labels.

  She smiled. “I would love to wear that caramel-colored dress. Do you think it’s big enough?”

  I snorted. “Of course. You’re the same size as me.”

  Her eyes lit up. “Yay for me!”

  Leaving the two dresses in the closet, she helped me schlep the rest upstairs. “I’m so glad we have the trip to Paris planned. It does make your leaving so much easier to take.”

  ***

  I paused and listened outside the bathroom. Sébastien’s quiet singing was muffled by the shower. I pushed open the bedroom door and saw his suitcase on the bed, mostly packed. “Let’s just hang these up for now.” I nudged aside his suit jacket, which was hanging in the middle of the closet, hung my load up, and took the rest from her, hanging them up as well.

  Sébastien entered the room, rubbing his chest and wet hair with a towel, and saw what we were doing. He hadn’t seen the clothes downstairs and had had no idea how much I’d brought. “Were you planning on staying forever, mon coeur?”

  “I had other things on my mind when I packed.”

  After my shower, I found Sébastien sitting on the bed, staring at photos he had on his phone, regarding them pensively. “What’s captured your attention?”

  He clicked on one photo and handed his phone to me. A photo of all six of us, standing cheek to cheek. “Nice picture,” I said.

  “Yes, it is. Family is wonderful, isn’t it?”

  I smiled. “It is.”

  Space Age

  As we stood in line for the upward-bound elevator, Sébastien was so excited, I could easily envision him as a little boy. When the elevator operator called, “Next,” we filed into the wood-paneled elevator. As we whooshed upwards, the operator recited interesting facts about the Space Needle, Seattle, and the Puget Sound.

  When he mentioned Seattle hosting the World’s Fair in 1962, Sébastien informed the elderly woman next to him about his purchase at the store in Freemont. I couldn’t tell if it was his accent, excitement, or good looks that charmed her most. She held on to his arm the rest of the way up.

  The doors opened into a romantically lit space, where panoramic windows framed the full beauty of the city and its extraordinary surroundings, including Queen Anne Hill, the distant shimmering lights on boats and barges that floated on Elliott Bay, and the dark outline of the Olympic Mountains.

  John and I sat side by side while my mother sat next to Sébastien. The restaurant slowly revolved, and we were sipping wine as Elliott Bay and Bainbridge Island took center stage. As we pointed out landmarks, I noticed Sébastien studying me. I began to wonder if I had something stuck between my teeth or worse. I ran my tongue over my teeth and dabbed at my lips, self-consciously. I took a big sip of my wine hoping to wash anything away. When he kept doing it, I leaned over to John and asked, “Do I have something on my face or between my teeth?” I smiled wide so he could see.

  He chuckled as he scrutinized me. “No. Why?”

  “Sébastien keeps staring at me, and I wondered if something was wrong.”

  His eyes twinkled. “Maybe he’s just appreciating the view.”

  “Maybe!” I narrowed my eyes and playfully inspected Sébastien. “Maybe you’re in cahoots.”

  Overhearing me, Sébastien asked, “Cahoots? This is a new word.”

  His accent caused him to butcher the word, but he took our laughter in stride and started throwing out challenging French words for us to pronounce.

  Soon, the subject changed to their visit to Paris. They had a long list of things they wanted to see and do.

  “What am I going to do while you paint?” my mother asked when he mentioned painting again.

  Sébastien answered, “Don’t worry, we will fill the time.”

  As more wine and dinner were consumed and the restaurant had slowly rotated so that we faced West Seattle, Alki Beach, and Vashon Island, we planned virtually every day of their vacation.

  “Tiziana and Ted are planning to invite everyone out on their boat for a few days, so we might need to work that in,” I added.

  “How big is this boat?” John asked with a hint of worry. “Are we sleeping in hammocks on the deck or something?”

  My mother, having seen pictures of the yacht, smirked. “No. Their motto is go big or get bigger.”

  I chuckled. What she said was true.

  1:00 PM, Sunday, February 14

  Somewhere Over the North Atlantic

  I CHECKED MY watch and saw that we were halfway home. I felt the need to wriggle, stretch my legs, do something, anything. Sitting still for this long was hard, even in first class.

  “Do you need the restroom, chérie?” Sébastien asked in a tone of voice that implied I was about seven years old.

  “No! I’m just getting restless. Why aren’t you?”

  He shrugged his shoulders. “Perhaps I am just content to sit beside you and have you all to myself.”

  I stopped wriggling instantly. “You say the nicest things.” I gave him a kiss, and, as I moved away, I caught him giving me the same funny look he had the previous night at the restaurant. “What? You keep looking at me that way, and it makes me feel uncomfortable.”

  He squeezed my hand and apologized. “I didn’t know I was looking at you a certain way.”

  I ran my thumb over the end of his and frowned. “Well, you have been. I thought I had suddenly sprouted a monstrous pimple.”

  He chuckled at whatever image he’d conjured in his head. “I cannot imagine you looking imperfect.”

  “That brings me to something. If I move in with you, you’ll be seeing me in all kinds of imperfect states. Are you absolutely sure you want to do this? Move in together? It’s early days.”

  “It’s not ‘early days.’ If we were twenty, it might be. But we are not. I’m looking forward to finding out if you ever look imperfect. Perhaps it is me whom you don’t want to see as ‘all kinds of imperfect.’”

  He was obviously teasing me, but, nonetheless, I sighed from happiness and not humor. “Nope. I’m looking forward to seeing you first and last, every day.”

  “I am, as well, chérie.” He waved to the passing flight atten
dant and asked for water for the both of us then glanced out the window and remarked, “We’re over water.”

  I took in the view, the last of the land far to our west. When I looked back at him, he held up a small black box. “What is that?” I was instantly nervous. A million thoughts ran through my head, but, more than any other, It’s just a little black box. After all, if he was thinking marriage, he would have talked to me. So, it’s Valentine’s Day and a little black box. No big deal. I blew out the breath I didn’t realize I was holding.

  “I know Valentine’s Day is supposed to be romantic, and an airplane is decidedly not romantic. However, I’ve had this for a few weeks and have been waiting to give it to you, and this is the moment.” He made an impish shrug, which suggested everything from, “What do you think?” to “Seize the moment.” The flight attendant arrived with Champagne and two glasses. She saw the box and smiled before hastily disappearing. When I didn’t immediately react, he jiggled the box. “For you.”

  “Sorry, I suddenly feel…” My fingers shook as I reached out and took the box. Champagne. He arranged Champagne. A little black box. Oh fuck. I gently opened the lid and saw the most amazing diamond ring.

  “It’s absolutely gorgeous,” I said at the end of a very long and measured exhalation. “And very… blingy!”

  He laughed enthusiastically at my comment. “Paris is blingy.” He carefully took the ring out of the box. “Have you heard of the designer Jean Dousset?”

  Speechless, I nodded as I stared at the platinum band and slightly rectangular diamond surrounded by smaller diamonds.

  “Let me show you something.” He took the ring and flipped it over, so we were looking at the underside of the stone’s setting. A sapphire was nestled at the base of the diamond. “A sapphire is the precious stone for September. To honor the month we met.”