“I’m not worried about being safe.” She started down the steps, her head bent, her gaze on the carriage. “I just think you should—”
“Look at me.” Jean Marc’s hand grasped her arm. “I want to see your face. You’re being entirely too subdued.”
She lifted her head and he saw tears swimming in her eyes. “She needs you, Jean Marc.”
He shook his head. “She has you and I’ll come to Vasaro in a few months’ time. It’s best,ma petite. I can’t go on this way much longer. You’re still wounded and I’m not accustomed to walking the virtuous path.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
He smiled crookedly. “I know you don’t. But, if I went with you to Vasaro, you’d find out inside a few days. I might even decide to borrow Philippe’s Cottage of Flowers.”
She avoided his gaze. “I’m not wounded.”
“Is that an invitation?”
The blood scorched her cheeks as she started down the steps again. “All this has nothing to do with Catherine. You speak in riddles.”
“But a riddle you could easily decipher if you cared to make the effort. You’ve known the answer all along, but you chose to ignore it.” He followed her and stopped beside her as she reached the carriage. “And I chose to let you ignore it. By permitting you to leave Paris without me, I’m letting you ignore it again.” He lifted Juliette into the carriage onto the seat next to Catherine. “I’ve no doubt you’ll manage quite well without me at Vasaro.” He smiled faintly.“Au revoir, Juliette.”
“Au revoir.” Juliette’s gaze clung to his with desperation. “I didn’t mean I couldn’t manage without you. Ionly meant it was your responsibility and not mine to care for Catherine. I think you should—”
“Au revoir, Juliette,” Jean Marc repeated as he slammed the carriage door and motioned to the driver.
Juliette stuck her head out the window and he was astonished to see the tears that had been brimming were now running down her cheeks. It was completely unlike Juliette to allow herself to display weakness. “You never listen to me. I’m trying to tell you—”
As the carriage lurched, Jean Marc stepped back to avoid its wheels. Juliette sank back in the coach; Jean Marc stood in the street looking after them.
All would be well. Etchelet would send him a message as soon as they had passed the barriers. Nothing should go wrong. Still, he had a nagging sense of anxiety and unease as he remembered Juliette’s desperate expression. He suddenly wished he had gone with them.
He was being foolish. His place was not at Vasaro with Juliette, but here in Paris attending to his own business concerns.
Dark was falling when Robert came into the study where Jean Marc was working at his desk and began to light the candles. “A message has just come from Monsieur Etchelet.”
Jean Marc stiffened. “Yes?”
“The carriage was permitted through the barrier.”
The tension uncoiled within him. “Thank God.”
Robert nodded. “Shall I tell Marie you’ll have your supper now?”
Jean Marc picked up his pen. “Soon. I have some work to finish. Perhaps in an hour.”
Robert stood hesitating as he reached the door. “I wondered what I should do with the painting, Monsieur?”
Jean Marc looked up. “Painting?”
“The painting Mademoiselle Juliette was doing of me. She left it on the easel in the garden. She must have forgotten it.”
“Yes.” Juliette cared too much about her work to treat it so carelessly—and for her to forget a painting in progress was extraordinary. She must have been even more upset than he’d supposed. “You’d better put it in her chamber.”
“Yes, Monsieur.” Robert closed the door.
Herchamber? Juliette had been a guest in this house for only a short time, and yet everything she touched seemed stamped with an indelible impression. Stubborn, exasperating, willful, she managed in some way to touch him as no woman ever had. The house seemed oddly silent without her vibrant, demanding presence, and he was experiencing a restlessness out of all proportion. He heard the door open.
“I’m hungry. Will you tell Marie to fix supper?”
Jean Marc froze and slowly his gaze lifted from the document on the desk in front of him.
