We leave the restaurant, strolling down the avenue as the soft golden lamplight bathes the streets.
“The lights in Paris are different than anyplace else,” Joy says, pointing to the lanterns. “There’s almost a magical sort of glow to them.”
“That’s true,” I answer in French.
She shoots me a smirk. “You’re a very strict teacher.”
I laugh, shifting to English so nothing is lost in translation. “Be a good student or I’ll bend you over the desk and spank you.”
Her eyes light up. “Maybe I want to be bad now.”
I nearly groan, wanting that, too. Wanting all of that. Maybe I do still wish she’d made the other proposition, but for now I’ll have to be content with being her friend, her translator, and her teacher.
“When should our lessons begin?” she asks.
“What are you doing tomorrow after work?”
She points at me. “Learning French with you?”
I nod and smile. “You’re correct. And that does sound like an excellent recipe for a perfect Friday evening activity. The only thing that might make it better is where it takes place.”
I slow my pace, and whisper my idea. Joy’s green eyes turn bright and glittery.
“Elise did say I should partake in all the pleasures in life. She says I need more fun.”
As I wander home later, I find myself wondering why she needs it.
15
Joy
If someone were to cross-examine me under oath, before God and country, I could say without fear of perjury that I’ve indeed found heaven on earth.
My always-working-overtime nose has never been happier.
I lean over the display case in the cool, air-conditioned, chocolate-scented bliss known as Jean-Paul Hévin near the Eiffel Tower, and my mouth waters. I will literally drool on the counter if I don’t keep my jaw shut. And I don’t care. Because . . . chocolate.
We’re talking chocolate the likes of which my taste buds have never encountered before.
Forget fancy candy bars from upscale grocery stores back home. This is the Gucci of chocolate shops. This is my Louboutin-loving heart coming home to roost among my favorite things.
Treats.
Luxuries.
Exquisite tastes.
I point at a chocolate square beneath the glass. “What is that?” I ask the perky blonde clerk, like an eager seven-year-old pawing at a delectable goodie.
Griffin admonishes me. “En français.”
I narrow my eyes at him, then direct my question again to the woman in the black linen dress behind the counter. She answers and her words are gibberish to me.
But I find a response. With a satisfied grin, I declare, “Saperlipopette!”
Gadzooks.
Griffin’s hand flies to his belly, and he nearly doubles over in laughter. “Now you’re really loufoquering.”
Honestly, last night I thought we were going to slide right into loufoquering. When he held my hand under the table, I was entranced, utterly swept off my feet by the unexpected physical contact and the intensity of it, too. More so by what that little bit of contact did to me. It sent me soaring. For a few moments at the restaurant, I truly thought he was going to seduce me, take me back to his flat and pin me to the door, cage me in with those lean, ropy arms, and kiss the breath out of me.
I’d have let him.
Despite what a horrid idea it would have been, I’d have given in, I’m sure of that. I’d been on the cusp of falling into him, and then everything shifted when I uttered my proposal. But that’s how humans are. We are designed to be malleable, to change gears quickly when need be. Now, my gear is in feed me chocolate mode.
The woman behind the counter grasps a pair of chocolate tweezers and reaches into the case.
“She has chocolate tweezers,” I say in a stage whisper.
Griffin repeats that in French.
I straighten my shoulders and aim to impress him when I change the sentence the teeniest bit and say to the clerk, “You have chocolate tweezers.”
She smiles. “Very good. Your French is very good.”
She’s lying. She’s telling a bald-faced lie. But she’s so sweet, and she has her paws on the chocolate I want in my belly, so I simply say, “I have a good teacher.”
When the blonde places the dark chocolate ganache in my hand, I step away from the counter, ready to pop it into my waiting mouth and let the chocolate melt on my tongue.
Griffin has other ideas. He closes my fingers over the sweet. I whimper. He says something, and I furrow my brow, trying to understand. He slows down. “I need something from you.”
I nod. “Yes?”
He glances at my hand. “Tell me what it smells like.”
“What?” I ask as if he’s gone nutso. “Why?”
He speaks in English. “You have this amazing nose, don’t you?”
I laugh. “It’s not amazing. It’s just well-exercised.”
He arches a naughty eyebrow. “Like my mouth.”
Tingles spread across my chest. This man. Everything he says can sound dirty and delicious. I’m pretty sure he knows it, too. He does it on purpose. It’s almost as if he loves to remind me that we were once going to have a brief and potent Parisian affair.
“I wouldn’t really know how well-exercised your mouth is,” I say coyly. Then, because he started it, and why shouldn’t I continue it, I tap his top lip with my finger.
A little growl is my reward.
I open my hand, and bring the chocolate in it to my nose, letting the decadent aromas spread to my brain—berries and lime juice. Then, I hold it under his nose. “Do you smell berries?”
He closes his eyes and sniffs. He looks so vulnerable here with his eyes shut in the middle of the store, trying to reconnect with one of his senses. I steal this moment to study his face. Those cheekbones I noticed the first day I saw him, prominent but not too sharp. That square jaw, so masculine. His lips, soft and full. The shape of his handsome face. Sometimes, there’s a faint trace of stubble on
