“Guillaume, do you have a lawyer I can use for the paperwork?” Ruth asked.
“Of course,” said Guillaume. Marlow gave him a grateful glance, as well.
“I’d love you to finish this plastering and painting. It’d be nice to come back to a place that was ready for me to just dump my luggage and call home. It’s so exciting!”
“It really is,” said Marlow.
“When Lloyd died right after we retired—I mean, we didn’t make it through our first month of freedom—I thought, things never work out. But sometimes you just have to wait.”
Ruth said her goodbyes, and off she and Guillaume went, down the hill.
Marlow and Luc stepped back into his kitchen to eat dinner. He grabbed his wine, leaned against the table, and made a toast. “To Marlow, who has, with success, made her way out of a pickle jar.”
She laughed. “You just say pickle. Not the jar.”
He shook his head. “You cannot make your way out of a pickle, but you can make your way out of a jar. I don’t understand English.”
Marlow held up her glass. “And to you, for all your help. It made the house so much more beautiful. It wooed Ruth. You are a grumpy, difficult, temperamental delight.”
They stood there and let the wine take effect. He looked a little wistful.
“What’s up?” she asked.
“I realize I did this work with you on the house to help you leave, but now I’m used to you.”
“And you don’t want me to go? Luc Celeste. Are you saying you like me?”
“Ah Mon Dieu, non. But apparently, I can now seem to tolerate you.”
She smiled and stepped closer to top up her wine. Then she leaned on the table beside him. “Well, two things can be true at once. You can help me with the house to get me ready to leave and also want me to stay. Just like I’m feeling two things at once.”
“Which are?” he asked, leaning back on his free hand. The edge of his little finger was close to hers but not quite touching. Just the promise of contact made her breath catch.
“Both things. Same.” she said, realizing she was no longer making sense.
His baby finger drifted over hers. That one point of contact sent an electric shock through her. She put down her glass with her other hand and pivoted so that she was standing right infront of him. He put down his glass, too, placing his hands on her hips, and pulled her close so that there was no space between their bodies.
She let her hands roam up his arms. Her fingers traced the ridge of his clavicle, from the outside point to the place directly beneath his throat. Now she watched him swallow, too, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. She let her fingers trace downwards, between his pecs, to the bottom of his shirt. Her eyes met his as if to ask permission. He gave it. And she moved up underneath the fabric, so that her fingers danced over the skin of his chest.
He took that as his permission to inch up her skirt, gathering the fabric slowly, bit by bit. The anticipation nearly killed her. Once it was hiked all the way up, Luc traced his index fingers along the waistband of her underwear, back and forth, as if undecided what to do next. Then he gently hooked his fingers into the elastic so that they touched her skin, and he just let them hover there, tantalizing. A tiny moan escaped her lips.
“Congratulations not congratulations on the sale of Maison Perdue,” he said in a whisper.
“Be nice,” she whispered back.
The invitation was all he needed.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
There was a formidable storm overnight. Marlow got almost no sleep. She knew Sabine was safe in Neufchâteau, but she worried about the newly painted shutters and masonry. The storm had better not rip all that to shreds, or she’d have stern words for the universe.
There was also the matter of a naked Luc sleeping next to her in her bed, spread on top of the sheets, every delicious part of him to drink in as she got up more than once to look at the roiling skies lit up by lightning. Each time it went from dark to illuminated, she could see trees in the valley, branches and leaves pressed in one direction, then wildly in the other—and him, never waking despite the thunder, a scientific miracle unto itself. He’d been athletic, creative, and full of stamina. She hadn’t experienced a night like that in a very long time. Maybe ever.
And she loved losing herself like that. Letting go of all the things she was mentally juggling and just being in the moment. It was both relief and ecstasy. He was good for her brain—and lots of other parts of her too. Very good.
By morning, the storm was over, and Marlow had sobered. She slipped out of bed, leaving Luc asleep. Thank God Sabine wasn’t home. She grabbed her clothes and tiptoed downstairs, testing the lights. The power was out. She got dressed in the living room and headed to the boulangerie. She’d assess any damage caused by last night’s weather—and her sexual foolishness—on the way.
Two shutters had been torn off their hinges, and renovation detritus had been tossed against the side of the house. She’d clean it up later. She couldn’t risk Luc waking and wanting to talk.
