“You had everything to do with that,” I said, because it was true.
“You would have found it eventually.”
I disagreed but I decided to leave it at that because we were having a moment. I knew there would be more trials in the future so I thought it was important to luxuriate in the peacefulness, the absolute rightness, of our togetherness while I could.
Our phones buzzed simultaneously on the table beside Sin and he reached for them.
“The day has officially begun,” he murmured drily as we both checked our notifications.
“You were the one who wanted me to have a phone,” I pointed out. “I was happy without one for twenty-four years.”
“You needed one. How else can I send you orders to ready yourself for me before I get home at the end of the day? You also need a camera phone to send me pictures of all this gorgeousness while I am away on business trips. A phone was a necessity.”
I laughed, the sound trailing off as I read the email from Stefan.
“Sin, Stefan is in town,” I crowed, delighted for the opportunity to see the Greek shipping magnate again.
“Joy.”
“Sin…” I giggled. “He is a very nice man. And, as I told you, he was the one who encouraged me to go after you that night when you had blatantly tossed me aside.”
His lips flattened at the memory. “I am so fucking lucky you have the patience of a saint.”
I laughed and snuggled closer. “You make it all worth it.”
“You read the email and I’ll be right back. I have a meeting in an hour but I want to have a bath with you before we leave for the day. You must be sore from last night.”
He pressed a sweet kiss to my forehead. I watched him get out of bed, his naked body gilded with weak winter sunlight as he walked into the bathroom. My throat was tight with emotions but I swallowed them back and turned my attention to my phone.
“He wants to meet for lunch,” I called so Sin could hear me as I read the note. “He has a proposition for me.”
My words were met with a heavy silence and I bit my lips against my stupidity.
“I think it is something to do with my art,” I amended.
No response.
“I still haven’t found my pills so I’m going to head to the clinic I used to go to in order to get a new prescription,” I said again, hoping to distract him.
He didn’t say anything so I took the time to quickly send off a response to Stefan agreeing to meet him at noon at Le Cinq in the George V Hotel off the Champs-Elysées.
When I entered the bathroom, I took a moment to love the rich wood paneling and the emerald green tiles that encased the deep bathtub that Sinclair was filling with steaming water and a plethora of lavender scented bubbles.
“Get in,” he ordered, moving away to press play on the music system.
The smooth jazzy refrain of Melody Gardot’s music flooded into the room.
I was naked already so I just swept my hair up into a messy bun and stepped into the nearly painful heat of the soapy water. I sunk down, hissing from the sting and closed my eyes to absorb the heat.
When I opened them, Sinclair was sitting on the side of the tub with a soft white washcloth that he dunked into the water. We locked eyes as he leaned forward to softly run the fabric from my neck down over my shoulders and arms, firmly around each finger, releasing tensions that I hadn’t even known I harbored.
“That feels so good,” I murmured.
“It feels good to care for you,” he responded, sweetly.
I opened one eye to make sure he was real before closing them again to better feel the friction of cloth against my heat sensitized flesh.
“I don’t want you to wear panties to your meeting with Stefan today.”
My eyes flew open. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me. I want you to go without panties.”
“Ugh, I would have thought you would want me as clothed as possible.”
A smile tugged at the edge of his mouth. “You would have thought wrong. I want you to go feeling the breeze tease your bare cunt under your skirt, knowing that the moment you get back, I will have my mouth on you and that you will already be wet, knowing that is what I have in store for you.”
“Oh,” I said, because that seemed really nice even though it was a little possessive.
Maybe because it was a little possessive.
He grinned fully at me. “Now, lean back and close your eyes again. Let me take care of you.”
There was something about the George V Four Seasons that was both horribly and magnificently cliché. It was a beautiful, quintessentially French decorated building and the temporary home of many rich and famous visitors who came exactly for the cliché Parisian experience. Despite the triteness of that, the hotel was still a joy to strangers and locals alike. It was an institution in Paris, something that might have been hated once but was now embraced, much like the Eifel Tower.