He shudders. “I try to stay away from the mad-as-a-hatter ones.”
“Crazy in a good way. Crazy, like, she has this wild sort of energy.”
“Ah,” he says with a nod. “I like wild. Wild is one of my favorite traits.”
“I’ll drink to wild.”
“And you have the hots for the wild woman you translate for. How’s that working out for you?”
“It’s fine. I’m keeping it totally professional.” I take another drink.
He nods. “That’s the only way to do it.”
“Getting involved with a client is a terrible idea,” I say, since it’s something I need to keep telling myself.
“Don’t I know it.” Christian dated one of his clients a few months ago, a fresh out of business school gal. It didn’t end well, since the client basically decided she wanted to have hot Viking babies with him. Fortunately, her attempts to sink her claws into him coincided with the end of the assignment, which also coincided with her returning to Denmark. She tried hard to convince him to return with her to Scandinavia. She even claimed she might be pregnant. She wasn’t.
He’d never been so happy to see a client leave this country.
“And don’t you make the same mistake,” he says, his tone deadly serious as he raises his glass and takes a drink.
“I won’t,” I say quickly.
“You can’t mix business and pleasure. We’re lucky to have the jobs we have. We have uncommon skills. We can’t fuck them up by screwing around.”
“Absolutely.”
He sets down the glass and sweeps his arm out wide. “Besides, we live in a city of beautiful women. And you know what advantage we have over the rest of the blokes?”
“What’s that?”
“Dickhead. You know.”
“Gee, could it be that we speak their language, but we have the cool cachet of being from someplace else?”
Christian offers a wolfish grin. “Women love men who aren’t from where they’re from. They love the other. The outsider. The foreigner. The mystery. And so, we are morally obligated to enjoy the bounty of beautiful ladies here in Paris and to bring them the ultimate pleasure.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Morally? It’s a moral obligation?”
He bangs a fist on the bar. “Complete and total moral obligation. We can’t shirk it. It’d be like a soldier abandoning his regiment.”
“It’s a duty, then?”
“One I’m fully committed to honoring. And you should be, too. Hell, isn’t it an item on that bucket list of yours?”
Item number two, in fact. Sleep with all the French women.
I haven’t followed it to the letter. Or the spirit, either. But I feel Ethan would be pleased that I’ve done my part to carry through on some of his wishes—I’ve enjoyed the hell out of my nights here in Paris over the last year. “My brother clearly thought of everything.”
Christian is one of the few people I’ve shared the details of my brother’s list with. He’s an easygoing guy, and he has a brother, so he gets it. You don’t question their last wishes. You just honor them. “You know I’m happy to pick up the slack on that one. Should you need it,” he says with a casual shrug.
“How noble of you to take on such a terribly burdensome bucket list item.”
“I’m thoughtful like that. Let’s see if we can honor it tonight.”
I flash back on the list I keep close to my body, and my heart. There’s something else on it that Ethan wanted me to do. I tap my chin, as if deep in thought. “Besides, it’ll help me knock out another item for Ethan.”
“What’s that one?”
“Help someone you care about achieve their dream.”
“And who is this person you care about?”
“You, tosser.”
“I love when you both compliment me and insult me in the same sentence.”
“Piss off.”
He raises his chin. “What’s this dream you think you’re helping me with?”
“Isn’t it only your greatest wish? To be a kept man?”
He bats his crystal-blue eyes. “I can’t wait. You’re going to help me accomplish my goal to retire at thirty with a hot, rich woman who wants me to service her all day and night? I fucking love you.” He reaches across to clap me on the shoulder. “You’re a true mate, Griff.”
I laugh, and toss back the rest of the beer. “You already retired once,” I say, since Christian made gobs of money in the markets, which gave him the luxury to do what he wants now. “But you never know. Maybe she’ll walk through the door in a few minutes, and I can say I accomplished that one.”
Honestly, I’ve no idea why helping someone achieve a dream was one of Ethan’s wishes. He never elaborated on it. But he wrote it down, and therefore I must do it.
“Maybe we’ll find one for you, too,” Christian suggests.
Except when a group of pretty women wearing clingy dresses and sky-high heels saunters to the bar to chat up Christian and me, I find myself with zero interest in them.
And an immense interest in texting the woman on the rooftop on the other side of the river.
11
Joy
I should stop. I really should stop. I can’t even blame it on the accent this time. After all, you can’t hear an accent over text messages.
Besides, his texts aren’t even terribly naughty.
They’re funny.
Even when he teases me.
He texted me on Friday night, sending me photos of everyday objects with their French and English translations. A streetlamp. A bicycle. A billboard with the word Saperlipopette.
Griffin: Obviously, this means gadzooks.
Joy: Clearly. What else could it mean?
Griffin: Here’s another. Loufoquerie. It means clowning around.
Joy: Are you trying to teach me French words I’m least likely to ever need? Because the contacts and the croissant translations were helpful, but how do you expect me to use loufoquerie?
Griffin: Oh, ye of little faith. Let me give you an example. “It’s a Friday night full of all sorts of loufoquerie and you should be loufouquering with my friends and me.”
Yes, that one sounded dirty. Very dirty. I might
