He nods intensely. “Yes, my boss mentioned your concern. And now you have Blaze Dalton, Male Model turned Translator turned Kick-ass Fixer of Problems with Furnished-Flat-Leasing Agencies, at your service.”
I quirk up my lips, giving him a challenging stare. “But can you say that in French?”
“Mais oui.” He rattles all that off, and I don’t know if he said peas and carrots or that ridiculous title, but either way it sounded hot.
Except “hot” is precisely how I can’t think of Griffin anymore.
I take a look at the handsome man who’ll be spending many of my days with me. Shame that he won’t be my French booty call, since I quite enjoy chatting with him. Since the moment I met him in the bakery, we’d begun an effortless repartee. That kind of banter is hard to give up. But, I don’t have to let go of that side of him, since he’ll be in my life in this professional role. Maybe he can become something else, too. Something I need even more than a lover. “I have an idea, Griffin.”
“I happen to be quite fond of ideas,” he says.
This feels even riskier than flirting. This is exposing my true heart. “Would you be interested in being friends with me?”
When his smile spreads, nice and slow, it warms me from the inside out. “I would very much like that, Joy.”
8
Griffin
Friend is such a loaded word. It can mean all sorts of things. Cover all manner of relationships. It’s a blanket term that can suggest something deep and abiding, or something casual and relatively meaningless.
It can apply to the most important relationships. My brother was my best friend, no question. Since I’ve lived in Paris, I’ve made plenty of new friends. Christian is a good mate. Always up for a drink, a laugh, a night out. We share a common background—both of us have English dads and mums from other countries. Mine’s French, his Danish. I have plenty of other friends here, too—some French, some English, some from many other places.
Most—wait, make that all—I didn’t want to shag first.
I’m not saying men and women can’t be friends.
It’s just harder to be friendly when you start wanting one thing, and then you need to press the brakes. Actually, slam on the brakes is more like it with this woman.
But I can no longer think of Joy as the stunningly hot American with the quick tongue and fantastic tits. Instead, I have to reroute all brain circuitry to consider her as not only a client, but also the direct route to getting the very thing I want most—money for a ticket out of town. I suppose a friend is precisely what she should be.
What she should only be.
It’s a good thing she wants that. It’s a great thing we’re setting clear boundaries now. They’ll help us as we work together over the next few months.
“Friends,” I say, rocking back and forth on my toes. “Like a good mate.”
She blinks, then smiles. “Sure, I’ll be your mate.”
Even though it’ll be hard to think of her that way, I’ll soldier on. “Before we go in, tell me more about why you think they’re trying to screw you over.”
She fills me in, telling me she placed a deposit for a one-bedroom flat on the third floor on a road near the river, but the rental agent now insists her place is a studio on the second floor. Her eyes narrow as she tosses out possibilities. “Did he rent mine to someone else? Is he trying to swindle me? Does the third-floor flat have a better view, and now he’s thinking because I’m a foreigner that he can pull the bait and switch and give me the crappier one?” She raises her index finger. “Most of all, what would Blaze Dalton do?”
“Hmm,” I say, stroking my chin, sliding into my role as the model turned PI. “Do you think it’s possible something was lost in translation?”
She rolls her eyes then pokes my chest. “What’s lost in translation is my money for my flat. I don’t want him to take me because I don’t know the language.”
“Got it. Basically, you want me to go in guns blazing, full-on male-model investigation style?”
Her eyes crinkle as she laughs. “Yes. But wait, I can’t just be the helpless gal.”
I arch a brow. “I thought you wanted me to do the talking?”
“Of course. But I don’t want to roll over like a doormat.” She shudders, like that thought is abhorrent. She stops outside a small yellow boutique peddling little pencil cases and makeup bags with French sayings that draw Joy’s attention. Tapping her finger across one, she translates the words out loud. “Life is a dream.”
“Well done. You hardly need me.”
“Ha ha.” She swivels and faces me, her eyes fierce. “Here’s the plan. I go in first, and you wait, say, across the street.”
I narrow my eyes. “Explain the part where that’s helpful.”
She waves her hands animatedly as we resume our hunt for twenty-eight, the number of her building. “Because I’ll get the lay of the land. Assess the situation. Determine if he’s still trying to pull a fast one. If I get the apartment I want, great. Then I’ll pat myself on the back for not being a damsel in distress. If I don’t, then I give you a signal, and you strut in and do that thing you do.”
“And what’s that thing I do?” I ask curiously.
“You know. That vous veux pépé le peu je ne
