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EIGHT
Cosette
I truly feel nauseous,and I’m not sure the pregnancy is helping at all, so when he leads me to the room under the assumption that I’m nauseous from pregnancy, I don’t correct him.
There’s no way…no.
I hate Paris because of my father.
He hates Paris because of politicians.
The man who got my mother pregnant—by all definitions, myfather—lives in Paris.
François Montague will never admit that I’m his daughter. It looks good to the press that he has a wife he’s been married to for thirty years, two picture-perfect children at university, and a modest home in the suburbs. Montague would never recover from the admission that he cheated on his wife and had a child with her. Better for him to pretend it never happened.
Some politicians would’ve paid my mother off to keep her silent, but that was too good a choice for Montague. Maybe he feared she’d better herself or make a spectacle of him. So instead, he threatened to ruin her, to have her put in jail on trumped-up charges and have me taken away. Instead of providing for either of us, he chose to pretend it never happened. That we never existed. To Montague, we don’t exist.
For years, my mother wouldn’t tell me who he was. She said we were better off without him.
I’ve spent the past few years of my life trying to figure out who he was.
The irony of Lyam asking for a paternity test…
If Montague ever asked for one, it would be loud and clear.
I don’t want to know who it is that Lyam’s after.
I don’t want to know anything.
I can’t deal with that now. Not when I have a baby to bring to term. Not when I have my own life to worry about. Not when Lyam’s lack of trust runs so deep in his veins, it takes everything I’ve got to rebuild what we had.
And I know the chances are so slim—
I’m always looking for excuses to run. This time, I won’t. I can’t. If I spend the rest of my life running every time I draw close to anyone, where will I end up?
My thoughts come to a screeching halt when the elevator door opens, bringing us back to the most high-end penthouse I’ve ever seen. It’s more than a hotel room, more than anything I even saw at Le Luxe.
I have a question, though. “Lyam, how is this place possibly secure? How do youhideit?”
He shrugs. “Camouflage, to begin with. That forest of thick trees? The outside of the building was intentionally designed to disappear into the surroundings. Remember how we didn’t even see it when we first drove here?
I nod, wordless. This is amazing.
“So the structure blends into the forest, making it harder to see from a distance. That only keeps the most basic viewers from finding it, though. We planted natural barriers, some extra vegetation and a rooftop garden which makes it a lot harder to see from above.”
Brilliant.Anyone flying over would see the spread of green and colors of vegetation. From a distance, it would look like the ground below.
“The entrances are secret and hidden, but the most high-tech methods involve blocking radar and jamming systems with electronic countermeasures. We don’t want aircraft finding us.”
“And this is all legal?” I blurt out. “Like… there are military planes and—”
He only smirks.
Yeah. I forgot who I was talking to there for a minute.
“We’ve got surveillance cameras, motion detectors, alarms, and security teams around the clock. Biometric access panels keep out unwanted guests.”
