The Paris Secrets trilogy: includes: Window, Screen, and Skin (46 page)

I pushed two fingers into her tight, enveloping depths.  Hollie shifted on the chair, encouraging me with a guttural sound from her throat to go in deeper.  I pressed my tongue to her clitoris.  Curling my fingers forward, I found the ridged G-spot.  One touch jerked her hips up against my face.  

I controlled her.  And yet she controlled me, because all I wanted was to win her release.  I wouldn't be satisfied without hearing the sound of her surrender. 

The toe of her foot nudged my groin.  I gasped against her pussy.  My breath hushing over her juicy slit must have been the catalyst.  Hollie gripped my hair and cried out.  The leg over my shoulder straightened and then relaxed, dangling down my back.  Her breathy gasp accompanied a shimmy of shoulders to work through her bones.  And her body slunk down the chair to where I had to pull her forward and onto my lap.

She collapsed against me, head falling forward, our foreheads meeting.  Her panting breaths dusted my cheek.  Her body clenched and then she relaxed into me, giggling.

I tucked my face into her neck where vanilla blossomed.  "
C'est bon
," I muttered.

"You're telling me?  Jean-Louis, I..."  She sighed, and didn't say anything else.

She didn't need to.  I still held a hand over her pussy, one finger against her clit.  Her muscles contracted again. 

***

After supper and dessert, I ran home to slip on some boots because Jean-Louis suggested we go for a walk.  I pulled on some leggings and my long, black, wool coat, too.  It was nippy out.  A scarf tucked around my neck repelled the cool kiss of November as I landed on the sidewalk before my building and sought my lover.

He stood across the street from his building, next to an elder gentleman in a beret.  At sight of me, he handed the man back a cigar, blew out the smoke, and gestured for me to come to him.  The air around him wafted sweet tobacco.  He wrapped an arm about my shoulder and leaned in to kiss my cheek as we walked.

"I didn't know you smoked," I said. 

I had a thing about smokers.  I could not stand the smell of smoke on their clothing, in their hair, on their breath.  I had thought Jean-Louis cared for his health, as well.

"I don't.  Well, I did in school.  To be cool, oui?  Never did like to inhale though.  But I never refuse a puff on a good cigar now and then."

Pleased he hadn't hidden an addiction, I hugged him with both arms and we strolled to the Avenue Floquet that paralleled the Eiffel Tower.  A jogger passed by, singing out loud to the tunes piped through his earbuds.

Jean-Louis, surprisingly, picked up the catchy tune.  "We are...wild."

"We are like young volcanoes," I replied, matching him with the next line.  Then I skipped happily.  "I love Fallout Boy."

"So do I."  He squeezed my hand and we shared that thrill of knowing your lover had the same taste in music.  For the one band, at least.  "They are a good band for singing the lyrics loud in the shower."

"Yep.  So is Pink."

"
Oui
, she is another of my favorites."

It was after nine in the evening, and despite the chill air, tourists flocked about the Iron Lady.  Sharing a few more band favorites, we walked along the Champs-de-Mars on the left side facing the Seine.  It was one of the largest open spaces of green in Paris, and I often spent afternoons sitting here, inhaling the scent of grass while I proofread work.

"I can smell what I want," he said.  Gripping my hand, Jean-Louis quickened his steps.

I crossed my fingers he had a craving for the banana and Nutella crepes they sold at the base of the tower.  Even though supper had been delicious and had hit the spot, I hadn't had my dessert yet.

My core still tingled to recall Jean-Louis with his head between my legs, tendering me to a rousing orgasm with such ease.  I had the thought that my dating history since arriving on French soil had been to love them and leave them after a month.  We'd already stretched this beyond a month.  And I didn't want it to end.

Ever.

Did that mean I was falling in love with the guy?  He'd already confessed love to me. 

Nah.  I was still a bit skittish about that word.  It felt so permanent and honest to me.  And reciprocating by saying the word just because a man had said it to you was not smart thinking.  I wouldn't do that to myself. 

But I could admit to serious like.

Jean-Louis stopped before a food stand that sold roasted chestnuts.  Not quite as ooey and gooey as the crepe I'd craved, but I could dig it.  He bought a paper cone of chestnuts and nodded for me to follow him.  We skipped down the stairs leading to the docks where countless
bateaux mouches
waited passengers.  Striding past the boats, he commandeered a bench, and I snuggled up next to him and dipped my fingers into the warm chestnuts.

"These remind me of when I was a kid," he said.  "My
grand-mere
Beatrice had a chestnut tree.  She'd roast them in the evenings over a hearth fire.  Makes me nostalgic, and want to buy a cottage."

"Really?  You want to live out in the country and roast chestnuts?"

"
Oui
!" he said enthusiastically.  "It is a goal of mine.  But perhaps I will find a larger chateau so the children have space to run about."

"And how many children do you intend to have?"  The chestnut was sweet, having been roasted with honey, and it crunched softly between my molars.

"
Un ou deux
?"

"A couple kids?  You have plans, my man."

"I'm not getting any younger."

I turned on the bench, crossing a leg, and studied the side of his face.  The barest hint of gray tufted above his ear and those crazy-sexy laugh lines that crinkled out from the corner of his eyes got me every time.  His prominent brow was a European thing, I think.  And that triangle of stubble beneath his lower lip?  Mercy.

"How old are you?" I asked.

"
Trente-quartre
."

I translated in my head.  "Thirty-four?  Hmm, I suspected you were in your early thirties."

"And how old are you, Mademoiselle?"

"Twenty-eight.  But I don't have plans for marriage and children until I'm in my thirties."

"Seems reasonable.  Get your career established and figure your life, then bring in others to share it with you.  To enhance it."

He made it sound so simple.  And yet, his first attempt at marriage had been a disaster.  If it had been his first attempt.  "You've only been married once, yes?"

He leaned in to kiss me.  "
Oui, mon abeille
.  I am not so terrible used goods."

"I don't think you are used goods.  But so you know, I feel for you.  I can't imagine any woman screwing around behind your back.  But with that said," I added quickly, "I don't want to talk about her.  Your marriage is your business.  I'm glad it's out there, and I know about it, and..." 

I sighed and reached for another chestnut to pop into my mouth before I said something stupid like 'tell me everything about her!'.  I wanted to know everything.  But I sure as hell didn't need to know a single tidbit if I wanted to maintain my sanity.

"I think it better we not discuss it too much," he said.  "With luck, the divorce papers will be signed soon, and I can put that mistake in my past.  But tell me.  You have never made a mistake in the romance department before?"

"Oh, please.  How much time do we have?"

I laughed then, and he joined me, and it wasn't necessary to detail any of those past mistakes.  We were human.  We all struggled and made mistakes, and learned from those mistakes.  The key was in recognizing the lesson and moving on.

Sheesh.  I was starting to think all new-agey and Dr. Phil-like.  Enough of that plunge into Responsible Living 101.

Grabbing Jean-Louis by his coat collar I pulled him to me for a chestnut- and sugar-laced kiss.  He pushed me down and rolled over me on the bench and deepened the connection.  The taste of him was ridiculously sexy.  The feel of his body over mine reassured me of his strength.  The cool night heightened the brisk wind on my face and the tickle of his hair over my forehead.

"Love you," he murmured against my mouth.  "And I mean that."

I knew that he did.  But I couldn't return the compliment.  Like was enough for me right now, and I sensed he wasn't worried that I couldn't say the L word to him yet.

"You should learn French, Hollie," he said, sitting up and offering me another chestnut.  "Would you take a class?"

"I, uh..."  Hadn't the desire to sit in a boring classroom learning whether or not words were masculine or feminine.  I'd read enough Learn To Speak French books to fill an entire shelf.  To no avail.  French words didn't stick to my brain cells.  "You want me to?"

He nodded.  "You live in France.  You have a French lover.  You should learn the language."

"I suppose."  I had a French lover!  I would never get tired of hearing that statement.  "I wonder if there are online courses?"

"I'm sure there are.  But I suspect a classroom approach might be easier to comprehend."

"Maybe.  I'll look it up online and see if there are classrooms in the area."

"Excellent.  Let's go to your place," he suggested.  "I want to make love to you in your bed.  I've not yet been in your home."

"Hmm..."  I made a show of considering the suggestion.  Really, I was trying to decide how messy the place was, and if I'd left any heaps of dirty clothes lying on the floor in the bedroom.  Heck, when weren't there heaps of clothing on the floor?  "I think it'll pass inspection."

"You do not keep your place tidy?"

"I'll leave that for you to decide.  But I'm hoping you'll be so eager to get under my skirt you won't notice the mess."

He pumped his erection against my hip.  Yep, the guy was ready to go.  "Well, if you think it is too messy we can always have sex right here?"

"You and your fantasy about public sex."

Once he'd confessed he wanted to have sex with me in the Louvre.  And I'd agreed because I was pretty darn sure that was never going to happen.

I pushed him up and he relented.  "My place it is."

***

"Let's take
un asenceur
," Jean-Louis suggested as we filed into the lobby of my apartment building.

I tugged him toward the stairs.  "No.  I'm sure it's broken."

He cast a summary glance over the elevator doors.  Heavy iron Art Nouveau curves worked about the small, and deceptively innocuous mechanism.  "There is no sign."

"I like the exercise."

He tromped up the stairs behind me.  "You are afraid of elevators," he stated.  As if he was perfectly correct.

And he was.  Mostly.  Not
all
elevators.  I liked the vast elevators in the States that could fit a car and a half dozen people in them with doors that opened on both ends.  But these tiny little coffins in Paris that often came with a warning that no more than two—sometimes only one—could fit inside? 
Non, merci
.

A roaming hand found its way up the back of my thigh and under my skirt as I reached the second floor (make that third in America).  Jean-Louis pulled me to him and kissed me.  "Why are you afraid?"

"I'm not afraid.  I just...  I don't like the small space.  And walking up stairs is good exercise.  And as a writer stuck behind the desk all day I don't get nearly enough—"

Another kiss silenced my superfluous excuses.  The man knew exactly how to tame me.  He lifted me into his arms with an ease that had me thinking I had recently lost more weight than I'd thought, and carried me to my door.

I wiggled the key in the lock and pushed in the door as he carried me over the threshold.  Which I didn't want to overthink, so I let that one go.

"I am surprised you are not more bold with the lift," he said.  Still on the elevator topic?  "You are so daring, Hollie."

"Me?"  I slid off my coat, took his from him, and...tossed them over the back of the gray chaise.  "I'm not so daring."

"If that is so, then how is it a shy, unassuming woman fucks herself with a vibrator before her bedroom window for the man across the street?  You still have that vibrator?"  He was already unbuttoning his shirt and pulling it from his pants.

"I do."

He pulled me to him by the neckline of my red dress.  Clutching the fabric so it tightened across my nipples, he eyed me with a sensual look that said
obey me if you want to get lucky
.  "Go get it."

The words 'yes, master' formed on my tongue.  But instead of speaking, I nodded and scampered—yes, scampered—into the bedroom.  Toeing off my boots, I parked them at the end of the bed, and then pulled off the dress and the leggings, which rendered me naked.  I shivered, but not from the chill in the air, rather in anticipation of standing before the Frenchman who waited out in the living room.