Finding him was of the utmost importance, though she wasn’t sure exactly why—or what she planned after. But she vowed she would find him.
How hard could it be in a country no larger than Texas? That made her think of Lauren-Claire and wonder how she was doing in Texas in her search for a cowboy or two.
A few kilometers down the snaking country road, she passed a weathered sign directing her to a picturesque village. Why, Zoe, I don’t believe we’re in Kansas anymore!
She paid little heed to the speedometer as the sleepy medieval villages whizzed past. There wasn’t a lot of traffic on the road. Hadn’t she read somewhere in the travel literature that in the countryside of France, the clang of cowbells signaled rush hour?
Maybe she could reach Grey before someone offered him a ride. A bicyclist appeared up ahead and waved as she passed by. Misty clouds shrouded the mountains dotting the horizon. The Porsche was eating up the miles when she came up on a rusting camionnette driven by a farmer.
It took all her willpower not to blast her horn as he lurched along in front of her, slowing down her chase. She did, however, use up her knowledge of Anglo Saxon swear words by the time they came to one of the wide spots in the road where she could pass.
Glancing down at the fuel gauge, she saw she needed gas. At the gas station she pulled over to refuel. After gassing up from one of the old-fashioned green and white pumps, she pulled out her credit card.
“Hi, you’re an American, aren’t you?” the attendant asked, writing up the sale.
“You speak English,” Zoe said in surprise.
“My mom’s American. She came over one summer during school vacation and met my dad and as they say, ‘That was all she wrote.’”
Zoe nodded. It appeared that France was a popular place to get lost and find yourself.
“Are you on vacation?”
“An extended one. I’ve been living in Paris for the past six months.”
She returned the charge slip to him and he tore off her copy, returning it to her with a smile. “Funny, you’re my second American today.”
Zoe looked up from putting the charge slip and her card into her wallet. “Really? When was this?”
The attendant shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe fifteen minutes ago, I guess. The guy came in to get a soda and a pack of cigarettes.”
Hurrying to her car, Zoe drove in the direction the attendant said the American was heading. In her mad rush to find him, she almost missed him. She slammed on the brakes, bringing the Porsche to a screeching halt.
“Nice piece of driving there,” he said when she climbed out of the car. He threw down the cigarette and crushed it out.
He stood there with an air of casual confidence, looking devastatingly handsome.
“You forgot something,” she said, reaching into the car. Straightening, she walked toward him with the pair of silver handcuffs dangling from her finger.
His eyes darkened and flashed with memory. “You don’t really think I’ll ever be able to forget these, now do you?”
She swallowed, gulping air.
“Is that all…?” he asked, training his full attention on her, looking as if he were about to move on, if it was.
“No,” she said softly. “You forgot something else.”
“What’s that?”
“Me.”
“Oh, I didn’t forget you. You came along every step of the way, believe me.”
“Then let’s talk about it. Come on, I’ll give you a ride back.”
“Uh-uh.”
She had already turned, expecting him to follow. His refusal stopped her. She turned back to face him, a question on her lips.
He shrugged, stuffing his fingertips into the front pockets of his jeans and rocking back on the heels of his cowboy boots. “I don’t think we can go back… only forward.”
“What are you saying?”
“Come along with me to the South of France,” he offered, “I’ve only got two more days till I have to fly back to the States. I’ve got a flight booked out of Nice.”
“What am I supposed to do when you leave?”
“I thought that’s what we’d talk about….”
She hadn’t been prepared for the invitation. This was the part she had no plan for. She really needed to get better at making plans.
“Look Zoe, I’m confused about what we are to each other. I didn’t know we were going to… to explode together like we did…Maybe if we spend the little time we have left together in the real world, we’ll find some answers.”
“I…”
“I’m sorry about leaving,” he apologized softly.
“Why did you leave?”
“Why did you leave your husband?”
“This is different.”
“Is it? Or is leaving what we do when we’re afraid of losing someone… ourselves, even?”
It was dangerous to want someone so badly, she thought, looking at him and accepting his offer, walking around to take the passenger seat in the Porsche. She wondered when she watched him stow his jacket and duffel if there was some symbolism in the fact that Grey was once again in the driver’s seat.
It began to drizzle shortly after they were underway, and she was glad to have him navigate the hills, curves and switchbacks that were so disorienting that sometimes she couldn’t tell if another car was approaching or heading in the same direction.
Even Grey made a miscalculation, uttering a vehement epithet when he hit a pothole big enough to accommodate a wild turkey.
They drove in silence, exploring their own thoughts as they sped through the Auvergne region with its pretty lakes. Stopping only for lunch, they shared some of the local cheese, as well as a hearty loaf of bread and bottle of wine.
Zoe succumbed to sleep as the Porsche purred along under Grey’s capable hands when they got underway again. She didn’t wake to notice as they drove on through the Rhône Valley past castles, churches and hillsides dotted with vineyards, as the air took on the beginnings of Mediterranean warmth. The shadows of evening were starting to fall when they entered Provence.
WRAPPED IN A SHEET, Zoe stood on the little terrace outside their room. The butter-yellow sunlight greeted her, welcoming her to the intoxicating sensuality that was the South of France…Provence, the home of Paul Cézanne.
She could hear Grey singing an old Motown favorite in the shower.
She smiled at the happiness in his voice. The shower stopped and moments later Grey came out. He undid the towel that was tied at his hip and used it to dry his hair.
Zoe thought the intoxicating sensuality that was Grey could give the South of France a run for its money.
“Where exactly are we?” she asked finally, when he had finished drying his hair and tossed the towel aside.
He came to stand beside her and looked out over the well-tended garden filled with a profusion of lavender flowers.
“We’re in Fontvieille, at an eighteenth-century olive mill that has been turned into an intimate inn,” he answered.
“It’s an improvement,” she said.
“How’s that?”
“Well, I still have my clothes, and you didn’t lock me in.”
“That’s because we aren’t staying. We’re leaving after breakfast. And where you’re going, you won’t be needing much in the way of clothes, chérie.”
“And where is that?”
“The beach at Cannes,” he said with a sexy wink as he trailed his fingertips over the nape of her neck. “You’ll feel absolutely dowdy if you don’t throw inhibition to the wind and go topless….”
“Not me,” she promised.
“Coward,” he challenged. “Come on, get dressed. You can borrow one of my shirts if you like. We’ll have some breakfast and then head on out to—” he waggled his eyebrows lasciviously “—hit the topless beaches of Cannes.”
When she didn’t move, he pulled her sheet away and playfully swatted her
bottom. “Hurry, I’ll order breakfast while you shower and dress,” he said, tugging on a pair of jeans. He’d either run out of underwear or had given it up altogether.
No, the South of France was not a place she was going to be at her best, when it came to decision making. Uttering a resigned sigh, she gathered up her things and headed for the shower.
They ate what had to be the best breakfast in Provence under a parasol on the terrace. The scent of pine trees lingered in the air as they looked out over the olive groves and cypress trees. Their leisurely meal was sweet and unhurried as they enjoyed the sunny golden climate.
By meal’s end they had soaked up a certain joie de vivre that set the mood as they headed for Cannes, armed with information from their genial hosts.
CANNES, like Saint-Tropez, was the forbidden fruit of the Côte d’Azur.
It defined the word hot…The holiday atmosphere was a punch-drunk Mecca of pleasure for the senses. Cannes was a glamour capital, the beautiful and the tacky flourished alongside each other, Zoe noticed as they strolled hand in hand along the rue Meynadier, shopping for bathing suits and suntan oil.
“I’ve got to make a call,” Grey said when they had everything they needed. Using a phone card, he made the call at a public phone.
“Work or pleasure?” Zoe asked when he rejoined her.
He picked up a fringed scarf she’d been looking at and handed it to the salesclerk. “Work.”
Zoe waited while the clerk rang up the sale, but Grey didn’t elaborate. “You’re not going to tell me about it, are you?” she asked when they left the shop.
“This is vacation…. I don’t want to talk or even think about work.”
“What do you want?” she asked as they walked past several palatial hotels lining the famous boulevard, the smell of the sea air luring them to frolic on the beach. Nearby were beautiful pine-covered hills and steep mountains, but the beach was unfair competition on such a sublimely sunny day.
“Let’s go back to the hotel and change into our swimsuits,” he suggested. “And then I want to forget all about work. All I want is to soak up the pleasures of summer and sea, gaze up at the luminous blue sky while lying on the white sandy beach.”
“That sounds wonderful,” she agreed. “But is there life after vacation?”
“For us, you mean? Yes. Well, that is the question, isn’t it?” he asked as they entered the elevator to go up to their room. Once there, he pulled his swimsuit from a shopping bag and tossed her a pair of forties-style second-skin shorts.
She supposed she should be grateful he hadn’t picked out a thong bikini, knowing his penchants. “The top, too,” she said, holding out her hand.
“I don’t think there is one,” he said, grinning wickedly as he gazed into the tissue-stuffed bag.
“Grey…” she threatened.
“Okay, okay. Here it is,” he answered, pulling it from the bag and tossing it to her.
They changed and headed to the beach; he with his jeans over his suit and she wearing the striped, skintight briefs that hit just below her belly button and skimmed her buns. On top was a matching push-up bra. The outfit was the latest fashion and threatened to replace the bikini.
“Let’s go to a beach where it isn’t too crowded, so we can talk….” He tapped her nose playfully and trailed his finger along her cleavage. “And you can take off your top.”
“I told you….” She swatted his hand away from the playground.
“Yeah, yeah.”
“You’re not listening.”
“I thought you wanted me to talk.”
“I give in,” she said as she headed out.
“Admirable quality in a woman, that,” he said, stealing a kiss.
When they arrived at the discreet and slightly out-of the-way beach, she was surprised to find no sand on its long wooden jetty, no beach balls, no noise, no kids.
“I think I love you, lie down,” Grey said, continuing to torment her.
“You’re impossible, you know that.”
“No, just difficult,” he disagreed, pulling her down beside him after shucking out of his jeans.
Lying lazily beside him, she watched sailboards glide by, riding the Mediterranean breezes. This, then, was the Côte d’Azur of her favorite F. Scott Fitzgerald book, she thought dreamily, taking note of the mix of cobalt, turquoise and green in the water.
Were she and Grey fated to end unhappily like Scott and Zelda?
Not looking at Grey, she asked, “What’s important to you in a relationship?”
“I don’t know…. Having someone to cheer me when I’m down, someone to encourage me. Maybe someone to love me unconditionally.”
“You don’t want a lover, you want a mother.”
“Oh, and what do you want…? Someone to take care of you, freedom and commitment…. Is that it?”
“Isn’t there some compromise, some place in the middle where we might meet?”
“Perhaps. What made you unhappy in your marriage?”
“Sex.”
“What, not enough or too much?”
“It had nothing to do with the quantity, except for the fact that he was always the one to initiate it. It had more to do with the level of our sex life. It was okay, but it stayed in a sort of low gear. It didn’t grow more intimate.”
“Maybe intimacy is easier, less dangerous with a stranger. Did you ever show your husband how turned on you were by any of his advances? I’m aroused by an openly responsive woman, but if my wife weren’t into sexual self-expression, I might be hesitant to risk…”
“What?”
“Her opinion of me. I’d never want to be less than her hero.
“I seem to have lost complete control of this whole situation somewhere along the line,” he said, sitting up and frowning as he looked at her. He was pensive for a moment, then his scowl was replaced by the familiar wicked grin. “The least you could do is put some suntan oil on me…”
“Sure,” she agreed absently, her attention caught by a sun worshiper in Day-Glo orange shorts and matching zinc oxide on his nose; not that unusual a sight, except for the fact that he was a senior citizen. He waved as he jogged past.
Turning onto his back, Grey luxuriated in the feel of Zoe’s hands massaging in the suntan oil; his skin felt warm and alive to her touch. He began to relax, the kinks of the long hours of driving melting away. His eyes closed.
Zoe’s thoughts drifted over the days and nights they’d shared. The images were a montage of his hands, his mouth, his body beneath…above her, the sound of his laughter, and his groans of passion.
“You can turn over now….”
He looked over his shoulder at her, clearly confused. He blinked again, obviously having been on the same sort of mind trip she had—the physical evidence was blatantly obvious.
“I must be pretty good with my hands, huh?” she teased, pouring a pool of suntan oil into the palm of her hand and smoothing it over his chest and shoulders.
“You’re enjoying this a little too much. It feels more like revenge than restitution,” he said, grabbing her hand and stilling it. “My turn.”
She had an image in her mind of him as a big old orange cat, pretending to doze outside a mouse hole, just waiting to pounce. The trouble was he had such lovely cheese to bait her with, she thought, giving in to the look of sweet desire in his eyes and his very obvious yen for her… er… soul.
Turning onto her back, she waited for… anticipated…desired his touch. Her body had gotten used to the regular attention, the feel of skin on skin.
“You will be a gentleman, won’t you?”
“Trust me.”
Why had that sounded like a taunt? she wondered.
His fingers, long and expert, started at the nape of her neck, his thumbs rubbing tiny circles. Her willpower was gone by the time he got to her shoulders.
How was she going to survive without this?
What was she go
ing to do? What about her husband? Did her marriage deserve a second chance? Or did she prefer this sexy-as-sin stranger who lived by his passions?
“What are you plotting, sweet witch?” he whispered, leaning forward to nuzzle her ear.
My downfall, she thought in silent answer.
His hands continued their seductive massage, sliding over her back in sensuous arcs.
“Wait a minute! You’ve undone my top!” she said, levering herself up to face him, her hand holding the push-up bra in place.
“Yep.”
“What happened to ‘trust me’?” she demanded, trying hard not to laugh.
He didn’t look the least bit repentant. Instead, he coaxed her further. “Come on, Zoe, live a little. Take it off.”
She looked at him, his fierce gaze urging her on.
“I dare you.”
She looked around them. The scattering of sun worshipers didn’t seem to be paying any attention to them. “Say I do.”
“I do. I did. I will.”
“No, silly. I mean if I take it off, you agree to pay off on the dare.”
“What? You want me to take off my trunks?” he asked, hooking his thumbs into them.
“Wait. No,” she said, stopping him, pretty sure he was teasing her.
“What, then?” he asked suspiciously, his eyes narrowing as if trying to read her mind.
“I’ll think of something,” she promised him.
“I’m not sure I like the sound of that,” he hedged. “Sounds like a sucker play to me.”
“Hey, it’s your game.” She shrugged her shoulders, stringing him along, knowing she was going to reel him in regardless.
“I’m waiting,” she said.
“Aw hell, all right. Though I have a feeling I’m going to regret the payoff.”
She just smiled.
“Yeah, I lost complete control of the whole situation somewhere along the way,” he muttered.
She laughed.
“I’m waiting,” he said.
She dropped her top, feeling bold… adventurous and…weird to let everyone see her half-naked. She couldn’t believe she’d actually done it, but from the moment she did, she felt a thrill of freedom… liberation… of being at one with the sea and sky.
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