Chapter Twenty

“I’ll kill him, Xav. I swear I will!” His sister Natalie spit the words faster than driving rain. In his inebriated state, it took a second for his ear to get tuned back to French. “You need to get home as soon as possible or I can’t be held responsible for my actions. Murder is completely justifiable.”

“How are you doing?” Xavier deadpanned and cleared his throat, sinking into the sofa in his hotel suite. It hurt his head to do the mental arithmetic to figure out what time it was in Paris. Ten in the morning on a Monday, too early for anything he couldn’t fix by the end of the day as long as he got some sleep between now and then.

“Did you hear me? He just came into the auditions and refused every single model three agencies sent us. I’m telling you, he’s gone mad. He refuses to move on. I can’t deal with this now. Three weeks until fashion week. That is all I have.”

“What did he say was wrong with the models?” He tucked the phone between his neck and shoulder, propping his feet on the coffee table in front of him and toeing off the wingtips.

“They aren’t starving. I publicly committed to using healthy models this year. You know that. The entire couture line is designed for it. We agreed that was where we were taking Marie-Chloe. If you don’t back me up our entire show will be ruined.”

Goodness, Natalie talked fast. He closed his eyes and rubbed at them, wishing he hadn’t thought drinking would help when Jaime ducked out of the reception early. He wanted to talk with her, get her to agree to meet with him again, if not in Paris than in New York, but she’d disappeared as soon as she caught the damned bouquet.

“Xavier! You have to fix this.”

“Why?” He rubbed his temples, waiting for the solution to come to him the way it always did.

Natalie groaned. “I knew it. You are just like him. If you think letting Marie-Chloe stagnate is some kind of homage to her, you are wrong. Staying on the edge is the best way to honor her memory, and if you think about it you’ll realize that.”

“What are you talking about, I’m just like him?”

“When you said you were taking this trip, I hoped it was your way of starting to move past her death. You’ve refused to make any new memories since she died, and so has he, and I for one draw the line. You can mess up your own lives, but Marie-Chloe is bigger than both of you, and I won’t let you turn it into a shrine. Maman would roll over in her grave.”

His head pounded at the tirade, wondering where it all was coming from. He and Natalie had agreed to make this a transition year for everyone. He was taking over the reins on the business side and she was coming into her own as lead designer. Though, to be fair, their mother had been sick for years, and more and more had fallen on Natalie. There had been a slow evolution in the designs from the straight, simple cuts and fabrics his mother favored to Natalie’s more fluid look.

“Do you know which models you’d like to book? Did you get that far?”

“Yes, but I’d need to do call-backs. Some of the models might not want to work with us. He tore into me, and then into them.”

“He yelled at you in front of models?” That would make the tabloids. Hell, there would likely be flashbulbs to blind him the second he arrived home.

“Models, designers and the agents. You need to come home. It will make the afternoon papers.”

“I’ll move up my flight, but I can’t make it in today.” He’d have to call and get the jet here, get the car to Jaime and say goodbye. “Hire your models, steer clear of him and stop worrying about Marie-Chloe. I won’t let anything happen to the company.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of. Things must change around here, Xav. We have to make some bold statements to ensure we maintain our reputation. And with the two of you refusing to accept―”

“Hold on. Stop grouping us together. I said you could have your models, and I said I’d deal with the press. You have to understand where he is coming from, what he lost.”

“You think she would have wanted him behaving this way? Canceling orders and firing models? He was never involved in any of that while she was alive. And you? Do you think she would want you to stop moving forward just because she is gone?”

“What are you going on about now?”

“You moved back home, Xavier.”

“So did you, Natalie. She was sick, we rallied together. Besides, it is an enormous house. I don’t know the last time I saw you at home.”

“I moved out two months ago, back to my flat. I wondered when you would notice. I guess you didn’t. Always out at every party, having your picture taken with every model, just the way you were before she got sick, as if you never can grow up from the moment we found out she had cancer.”

“Natalie, you don’t know what you are talking about. I have to go to other shows and parties to network. Models are at runway shows, and I don’t need to justify myself to you.”

She sighed. “I’d hoped taking this trip was your way to find closure. You and Maman both loved America. I thought… I guess it doesn’t matter. Just like him, you don’t want to make any memories she can’t be a part of.”

His mind flashed to seeing Trent walk towards the chuppah with his father. Xavier’s first thought had been that he didn’t want to be in the same place without his mother.

“Listen, Natalie, I’ve had a wonderful time in the States. Made lots of memories. I’ve been emailing you pictures of all the places we saw. Lots of memories, so your theory doesn’t hold water.”

“We? You said Jaime was Trent’s sister-in-law, nothing more.”

“She is Trent’s sister-in-law.” Jaime had been so intent on keeping their relationship private it had seemed normal not to mention things to his sister. But that had been Jaime’s idea, and he wasn’t sure he’d been so smart to agree to it. “I hope I can coax her to visit Paris, so maybe you’ll meet her and she’ll complain about how I dragged her to a dozen Frank Lloyd Wright homes.”

“You’re involved with her? What does she do?”

“She’s a teacher, and we’re not together.”

“Does she want to be a designer?”

“No. Why in the world would you ask that?”

“We have a family tradition of new designers marrying in, remember? Maman did it, Grandmere before her…”

“No one said anything about marriage. I can barely get her to say two words to me.”

“Why? What did you do?”

“Asked her to come to Paris with me.”

“Oh God.”

His head throbbed. “We had a wonderful time together. What is wrong with wanting to see if we still enjoy one another outside of the confined space of a car?”

“You asked her to leave her job, her family and her country so you could see if you still liked her? Reality and you don’t get on, do they?”

“Excuse me? What am I supposed to do? You called me to hurry back home because I have a company and a family that needs me there. For the record, J’aime doesn’t have a job, her family is moving and half of them live in Mexico, not in the States. She has no reason not to come with me, if that’s what she wanted to do. Either she wants to explore this or she doesn’t.”

“You are a complete idiot.”

“And you’re so delightful.”

“She’d be a fool to follow you back to France like a puppy. I’m embarrassed by the way you are treating this poor woman. Why do you want her to come here? Are you in love with her or is she merely good in bed?”

“Watch your mouth.”

“So you fell in love in America. You best tell her before you leave.”

“You can’t fall in love with someone in three weeks.”

“Since you hardly ever have even a second date, three weeks is an eternity. Especially being together the entire time.”

“You make me sound like a cad. There is no point in seeing someone a second time if there is nowhere for the relationship to go. They might read something into it and that wouldn’t be fair.”

“But you think a relationship with Jaime could go further if given the chance. You should at least tell her that. Poor thing, you are very charming you know. It’s not fair for you to use that against her.”

“Believe me, she can handle herself. Why are you taking her side?”

“I’m not really sure. Instinct I guess. You’ve never cared about one woman more than the next. I trust you know what you are doing.”

“You trust me about this where I have no experience, but when it comes to a business I can run with my eyes closed―”

“You certainly are arrogant. I see that gene didn’t skip a generation.”

“Look who’s talking, it’s the brightest fashion designer to hit Paris this century.”

“Maman said that, not me.”

“You believe her. But to be fair, so do I.”

“Since I’m so bright, I say you invite Jaime to come here again. Give her an open-ended ticket to return so she won’t feel trapped. And if she isn’t interested, well, she probably doesn’t deserve you anyway.”

…

Cancelled. The position at one of the high schools she was set to interview at had been given to an internal candidate. When things didn’t go her way, they really didn’t go her way.

Jaime should have known better than to get ready for the interview before checking her messages, but she’d woken up late and bounded into the shower. With as early as she climbed into bed and pulled the covers up over her head last night, she should have been up at the crack of dawn. But maybe her body was trying to rebound from the cyclone that was Xavier.

She might have spent a fair amount of time in bed during their trip, but little of it had been sleeping. And after the emotions of the wedding, the weight of everything crushed on her shoulders had sent her home to regroup. Having a good cry had helped, but she still felt out of sorts.

Not wanting to think about where he was, whether he was still in town or already airborne, Jaime concentrated on packing. Thank goodness she’d be staying at Trent’s where she’d have privacy. If she stayed here she’d have to put on a happy face and pretend she was glad to do the right thing when she really wanted to be young and impulsive and hop a flight to Paris.

Jaime growled at herself, making silly faces in the bathroom mirror as she collected her things. It made her laugh and reminded her she needed to think long term. She wanted the same things Allison did.

Not in the same way―she’d never invite the organizing it took to pull off that kind of wedding―but she wanted a stable family that was hers fully, not something she had one foot in because she was part of another family somewhere else. Maybe that’s why she wasn’t willing to risk his non-committal offer. She knew what it was like to only halfway belong to something and she didn’t want to settle for that anymore.

The doorbell chimed through the house and she nearly jumped out of her skin. She should be used to it by now. Deliveries had been coming all day as more wedding gifts arrived. With the rest of the family running one relative or another to the airport, she was home alone manning the inventory.

If it was bigger than a breadbox she’d end up having to make two trips to tote everything over to Trent’s. She’d borrowed Allison’s car while they were gone, but it was looking like she might need to trade it for her mom’s minivan.

She made her way to the door and blinked. In Washington she’d had three locks, a peephole and a sliding chain. Here they had a deadbolt. She needed to get out of the suburbs and back to a city. Portland, Seattle, it didn’t matter as long as the streets were buzzing so loud she couldn’t hear her own thoughts. The quiet must be what made it feel like she was in mourning for something she never really had.

She tugged open the door, her eyes widening in surprise as she took in the vision before her. Xavier stood there, looking confident, self-satisfied and very handsome. The sandalwood and cedar of his cologne wafted to her, filling her lungs with one last breath of him.

“Good morning, J’aime. You look nice.” The honeyed sound of his voice weaved around her.

“Thank you.” Glancing down at herself, she realized he’d never seen her trying to look professional. The fitted white blouse and brown pencil skirt were a complete departure from the stylish clothes she’d borrowed from Carla.

“Job interview?” He leaned against the doorframe, his green eyes glinting mischief at her.

“Canceled.” She tried not to sound disappointed.

“Their loss. Invite me in?”

“I’d better not. I’m not having an easy time with this.” She kept one hand on the door, using it to steady herself.

“Then perhaps you are making a mistake and should be getting on a plane with me in an hour.”

She shook her head, a smile lifting her cheeks. “I have to admire your tenacity, but I don’t have it in me to flee the country at a moment’s notice.”

…

“I asked you three days ago.” Xavier met her gaze, pinning her in place. He wasn’t accustomed to dealing in nuance, preferring to be blisteringly honest in all things. But as much as he wanted Jaime’s head next to his on the pillow in Paris, he couldn’t bring himself to beg.

“I’m not interested in what you’re offering.”

His gut clenched at her words, his hand fisting around the keys. Thank goodness he’d called a town car to take him to the airport. He’d hoped they’d need it to get there together, leaving the car for Trent.

No matter. He didn’t have time to waste trying to convince her to believe in something he couldn’t explain. He lifted his hand, dangling the keys in front of her.

“I can’t accept a car from you.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. You need a car, I don’t need it anymore. Besides, you already got a ticket in it. I think that makes it more yours than mine anyway.”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “I’m not taking it.”

Pulling the envelope from his pocket, he held it out to her. “What you do with the car is your business. I’d like for you to have it. If you want to insult me by not taking it, that’s on you. I signed over the title. You can fill in whomever as the new owner. He dangled the keys, dropping them as soon as he knew they caught her eye. He tried not to grin when she reached out and caught them on instinct.

“Wait, I can’t accept something so extravagant.” She held out the keys, but he heard the purr of an engine on the quiet street behind him. A glance over his shoulder confirmed the town car had arrived.

“The proper thing to do is say thank you.” He handed her the envelope. A million things he wanted to say ran through his mind, but none of them mattered. Instead he did the only thing he had time for.

He pulled her flush against him, his lips hungrily coming down on hers and kissing her with a yearning he feared would never be sated. Her soft mouth opened for him, sending flames shooting through his body. He tightened his arms around her, pressing his body into hers.

The key he’d given her bit into his chest. He decided to ignore it, but then Jaime pressed it harder against him, her body stiffening as she pushed free of him.

“We can’t keep doing this.” She wiped her lush mouth with the back of her hand.

“No.” He took a step back. “We can’t. Please take care of yourself, Jaime. Have a life, a full life.” When his throat tightened he turned and marched to the waiting town car.

…

“Jaime? Whose red sports car is in the driveway?” Her mother’s voice broke the silence echoing in her brain. She checked the watch on her wrist. She couldn’t have sat here in the living room for more than five minutes, but it felt like days.

“It’s a wedding gift.” She turned the envelope over in her hand, hoping he hadn’t put her name on the title. She’d dodged a bullet with no one finding out about her impetuous fling, and she didn’t want to start explaining now that it had ended.

“A car? Who gave them a car?”

Jaime pulled a few papers from the envelope. He’d signed the title over without designating to whom. Lucky. But there was also a small folder and half a dozen pictures. Her hands shook in recognition. She’d been staring at airplane boarding passes since she was five and had to make her first solo flight to Mexico.

“Honey? What is it?” Before she knew what was happening, her mother was beside her on the couch, an arm around her shoulders. “Are you upset about the car? Since they got a new one I’m sure Allison will loan you hers.”

“Xavier gave them the car. It’s the one we drove out here from DC.” If she opened the ticket her mother would surely know something. There was no way of knowing which pictures he’d printed, yet she gambled on them anyway.

The serious expression on her face at Lake Michigan matched how conflicted she felt today. Her mother laid a hand on her arm.

“You look gorgeous.”

“You can have it.” She handed the picture to her mother and looked at the next one. She saw herself standing on one leg like a flamingo at Carhenge and had to smile. Next came a shot of the horses, so vivid they looked as if they might leap off the paper.

“Did he take that?” he mother asked.

“He’s a fabulous photographer. He took pictures everywhere we went.”

“How nice of him to share some with you.”

Jaime nodded, a lump in her throat forming at the shot of her sitting on a rock with Mt. Rushmore in the background. She knew the next would be of them kissing in Salt Lake City, but she showed it anyway.

“That looks like a postcard.” Linda’s voice held no trace of chastisement or judgment. She must not realize the silhouette was her fool of a daughter.

The shot she’d taken of Xavier in the slot canyon hurtled her back to that moment, where she’d been both powerful and vulnerable. And loved it.

Loved him.

Maybe that’s why her interview had been cancelled. She was supposed to go with him, take the biggest risk of her life even if it meant calling home for plane fare when it all went down the drain.

She flipped open the ticket, her heart stalling as she deciphered the code. He’d bought her a return ticket, open-ended, first class from Paris to Medford.

“Do you need a ride to the airport?”

Jaime turned to her mother, her eyes heavy with tears. “You knew? How did you know?”

“A mother knows things without her child having to say a word.” Jaime melted into her mother’s arms, letting the tears fall for a moment before she pulled back.

“You’re not disappointed in me?”

“Honestly, Jaime? I’ll be disappointed if you don’t go. He looks at you as if you set the universe spinning.”

“But I’ve only known him a few weeks. What if it all falls flat?”

A silly grin quirked her mother’s features. “You know what your grandmother told me once? It takes a long time to go from a roaring boil to ice. If you keep the heat on, you can keep up a slow simmer forever.”

Jaime blinked then started to laugh. “When did she say that?”

“When I had to tell Keith about you. I thought for sure he’d run, but twenty-five years later, we’re still simmering.”

“Mom! I don’t want to know that.”

Her mother stood, offered a hand and pulled Jaime to her feet. “I know. Ever since you turned twelve all I’m good for is a shoulder to cry on and rides. Let’s go to the airport.”

…

Xavier looked down at the tiny journal, amazed by how many of the items he’d been able to check off the list. He’d expected to feel something, closure maybe at having done so many. Instead he was wistful for a childhood that could have been, and for the first time in his life he was actually thinking that someday he’d have a child of his own.

Next summer he’d come back, finish the list and try again with Jaime. The items blurred in front of his eyes. Xavier tried to focus, but nothing seemed to work. His mind volleyed between Jaime’s refusal to accept anything he offered and Natalie’s advice to beg her if he had to.

He couldn’t do that. He wanted her to see as much potential in them as he did, and if she didn’t… Well, obviously she didn’t. Xavier stood, dropping the journal into the recliner. He made his way through the cabin of the jet, back to the stateroom.

He opened his traveling case and stared at clothes he hadn’t worn since he’d ended his driving adventure. Unbuttoning his shirt, he’d never felt more ridiculous. He was a grown man getting sentimental about the I left my heart in South Dakota T-shirt she’d bought him as a joke.

He shrugged off the dress shirt and pulled on the tee. It was a long flight back and he might as well be comfortable. Next he traded the shoes for bare feet and the slacks for a pair of cargo shorts, the one’s he’d worn the day he picked up Jaime in that rundown DC neighborhood. He rubbed his hair for good measure. Sometime during the trip it had grown long enough to comb, but he didn’t care to look put together when he felt like his life was falling apart.

Closing the case, he slid it back into the closet and sank down onto the bed. He should have picked up some sleeping pills and dozed his way back home. It would beat the hell out of wallowing in self-pity while the plane was fueled up and stocked with provisions.

The minutes had crawled by since he’d walked away from Jaime, each one tugging at him to think of another way. With fashion week less than a month from now, he really couldn’t be away from Marie-Chloe any longer. As the first season without his mother leading the design team and his father’s retirement imminent, it was imperative he and Natalie present a united front.

The decision to use curvier models was a bold one, garnering a lot of publicity. Thanks to their father’s tirade yesterday, not all of the press was good. The business was bigger than him. Too many people depended on him to set things right. He couldn’t check out so he could get his personal life in order. Still, he didn’t take no for an answer in business and he wasn’t comfortable doing so now.

When he came to New York for fashion week in November, he’d figure out a way to work in a few days in whatever city Jaime ended up. What he felt for her wasn’t a lustful infatuation. It was something bigger, deeper. Something he was unwilling to be without for a moment longer than he had to.

Out of sight, out of mind was not something he would let happen. No, he’d make sure to fly in every few months and tilt her world a little. Enough so that by next summer she’d be willing to come to France. Once he got her there he knew he could convince her to stay.

With the outline of a plan set in his mind, Xavier opted to get some work done. He crossed the room and stepped into the cabin just as the outside doors opened and natural light flooded the space. Thank goodness the hostess was back with the provisions for the trip. One step closer to getting off the ground.

Except behind the hostess with her cart of food was the last person he expected to see, and the only person he truly wanted to. She seemed intent on helping the hostess push the cart into the galley and talking about coffee of all things.

He cleared his throat. “I’m glad you changed your mind.”

Jaime turned, smiling as she walked to him. “I haven’t yet. Thank you for leaving my name at the gate. The whole drive here I wondered how I was supposed to get on the plane.” She stopped a few feet from him and ran her hand along the back of one of the recliners. “I hate flying. Usually I have to take something to get through it.”

“I have something I could give you.” He leaned a shoulder against the doorframe of the stateroom, silently willing her to come to him.

Jaime rolled her eyes. “I’m sure you do. But before we take off and I start having a panic attack, I have some things I should say.”

“Something you couldn’t have told me earlier?”

“Earlier I still had my pride.” She stepped to him with careful slowness. “Now I’m thinking if there is something I really want, I should stop at nothing to get it.”

“I agree.” Tension slid from his shoulders, loosened the tightness in his chest. “I was planning to come to you every few months to remind you of what you were missing out on, or maybe to remind myself.”

She stood in front of him, her body trembling. He reached for her hands, damp and cool. He lifted them and placed her palms flat against his chest. The contact soothed him. He hoped it did the same for her.

“I know you don’t like ultimatums and strings, but I’m coming to Paris to be with you. I’m not staying in an apartment you’re not in.”

“I’m glad. I’d hate for you to come all that way and sleep alone. I have a penthouse in the city. We’ll live there.” Her body relaxed at his words and he wrapped his arms around her. She sank deeper against him and rested her head on his shoulder.

“I’m not going so we can continue our fling. I’m here because somewhere along the way I started to fall in love with you and I don’t want to stop.”

Emotion surged through him at her words. He framed her face in his hands and lifted her gaze to his. His stomach tensed and he felt as if he were about to jump off a cliff without a bungee cord. “I’m falling in love with you too.”

Her eyes sparkled with fresh tears, and he couldn’t wait another second. He lifted her off her feet and carried her into the stateroom, kicking the door closed behind them. He set her down on the bed and then lay beside her.

“This can’t be safe.” Jaime inched back on the bed until her head found the pillow, her brown hair spilling around her in waves.

“I have condoms. Somewhere,” Xavier said, his mouth hungry on hers, saying everything he’d tell her someday, when he trusted his emotions more.

“Wait.” Jaime squirmed free from beneath him. “I mean the plane. Don’t we need to be in seats, with seatbelts and learn the emergency procedures?”

“Jaime, the only emergency we’ll have is if you try and get off this bed.”

He took her lips again as their bodies sank into the mattress. He might be about to fly back to Paris, but he’d finally found his way home.

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