Inside the Galeries Lafayette, we allot ourselves a thousand euros each and split up to buy stuff. I get two pairs of pants, three shirts, a cashmere sweater, and loafers, all more adult than anything I’ve ever worn. Then again, I’m not the same person I was a year ago or even twenty-four hours ago, so why should I dress the same?
“No suitcases?” asks the well-dressed woman in a gray pantsuit behind the desk at our hotel.
“Traveling light,” says Kate, holding her own purchases in one shopping bag.
An elevator the size of a phone booth takes us to the third floor, where our antiques-filled room overlooks a tiny triangular square called La place de Léon.
I tip the porter way too much, lock the door, and turn around in time to catch Kate skipping naked into my arms.
Chapter 113. Kate
TRY NOT TO hate us, but here’s our Parisian routine. Tom gets up at eight, buys the International Herald Tribune, and heads to the café. I come down an hour later and help him finish off what’s left of the croissants and Jumble. Then Tom closes his eyes, cracks open our guide, and lets fate pick the day’s destination.
Monday it was the Musée national Picasso in a neighborhood of cozy winding streets called the Marais. Tuesday we climbed the steep streets to the top of Montmartre. This morning we’re walking to an eighteenth-century hotel converted into a museum for the French sculptor Rodin.
We see the powerful black-granite figure of the writer Balzac and, mounted on a podium, the famous, hulking The Thinker, who looks awfully buff for an intellectual.
And behind them both, in a corner, is the epic The Gates of Hell, on which Rodin spent the last thirty-seven years of his life. It consists of two massive black doors crawling with more than two hundred writhing figures, each living out his excruciating eternal punishment, and for some reason, Tom can’t take his eyes off it.
He’s so transfixed, I leave him to stroll the garden’s stone pathways, which are lined with as many varieties of rosebushes as, I suppose, hell has sinners. There’s an empty bench in the sun, and I’m watching a young mother breastfeed her infant when Tom finds me.
“So how many of the deadly ones have you committed, Tom?”
“All of them.”
“Busy boy.”
We have a sandwich and a glass of wine in the garden café, then wander into the surrounding neighborhoods, many of whose stately homes have been converted to foreign embassies, with armed sentries posted out front. As beautiful and new as everything is, the wine and ripped, writhing sinners at the Gates have gone to my head, and I drag Tom back to our little room.
Actually, I can barely wait that long. As Tom fumbles with the key, I stick my tongue in his ear and tell him how hot I am, and as soon as we’re inside the door, I pull him into the bathroom and undress him in front of the long mirror. I get on my knees between his legs and begin to suck his perfect cock.
“Is this a sin, Tom?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Really? Am I doing it wrong then?”
“No, you’re not doing anything wrong. You’re doing everything just right.”
“Don’t look at me, Tom. Look at us in the mirror.”
A couple hours later in our bed, Tom moans in a different way, then mumbles, “No blood, no blood.”
I shake him, gently at first, then harder, and his terrified eyes blink open.
“You’re having a nightmare, Tom.”
“What did I say?”
“You were talking about blood, Tom.”
“Whose blood? What blood?”
“You didn’t say.”
“Did I say anything else?” asks Tom, his eyes still full of panic.
“No,” I tell him, and he smiles so sweetly that I need him inside me again.
Chapter 114. Tom
I DON’T DARE fall asleep again, but Kate does.
By the time she wakes, we’ve missed our reservation for dinner, so we head out into the night to see what we can find. As we pass various brightly lit windows, Kate seems unusually quiet, and I can’t stop thinking about my nightmare and what I might have said in my sleep.
We leave crowded St. Germaine for the quieter, darker streets along the Seine. The whole time Kate is clinging to my arm and not saying a word.
If something truly incriminating-about Sean or the others-had slipped out of my big mouth, she wouldn’t have fucked me again like that, would she? But if I didn’t say anything, why is she acting so squirrelly and tense?
We’re both starving, but Kate rejects one promising-looking restaurant after another.
“Too touristy.”
“Too trendy.”
“Too empty.”
She’s not herself. Whether I want to or not, I can’t ignore the mind-numbing possibility that I’ve given myself away.
And if I have, how can I clean up my mess in a city I barely know?
We finally stop at a simple bistro packed with natives. The swarthy maître d’ leads us to a red banquette in back, but even here Kate won’t look me in the eye. Then, staring at her hands on her lap, and in a cracking voice, she says, “Tom, there’s something I need to talk to you about.”
Not here. Not in front of everyone-where there’s nothing I can do.
“There’s something I’ve been meaning to say too,” I say. “But my head feels like it’s going to explode in here. Too noisy. Can we go someplace quieter, where it will be easier to talk?”
Apologizing to the maître d’, we step back onto the curb and walk toward the Jardin de Luxembourg.
But even at 11:00 p.m., it’s jammed with tourists. Every twenty yards or so there’s another street musician strumming a Beatles song, or a juggler tossing burning sticks, and the benches that are empty are too visible from the pathways.
Finally, I spot an empty bench in the shadow of some tall trees. After a quick check to make sure we can’t be seen, I pull her onto my lap. Still not quite believing that it’s come to this, I look into Kate’s eyes and put one hand at the bottom of her thin neck.
“Tom?”
“What is it, Kate?”
My heart is pounding so loud I can barely hear my words, and I look quickly over her shoulder to make sure no one is coming from the main path.
All night Kate could barely look at me. Now her eyes are like lasers, and she won’t take them off me, as if she’s studying my eyes to read my reaction to what she’s about to say.
“What, Kate? What’s the matter?” I ask, and bring my other hand to her throat.
“I want to have a baby, Tom,” she says. “I want to have your baby.”
I don’t know whether to laugh or cry, but Kate, desperate for an answer, stares at me like a deer caught in headlights.
“Only one?” I whisper, kissing the tears on her cheek and lowering my trembling hands to her waist. “I was hoping for three or four.”
Chapter 115. Tom
HOURS AFTER OUR first baby-making session, I lie calmly on my side and watch Kate sleep, the desperation of a few hours ago just about swept away by euphoria. I used to hate to think about the future. I’d boxed myself into such a tight corner I didn’t have much of one. Now I’m sitting prettier than the asshole who graduates first in his class at Harvard Law School.
Kate and I just won the biggest murder trial in the last ten years. We could live or work anywhere in the world, be partners at any law firm in the country, make a couple million a year between us without breaking a sweat. Or maybe, if we’re not quite ready to jump back into the harness, we just hang in Paris for a while. Stretch our trip from a week to a couple of months. Rent an apartment in the Marais. Soak up the culture. Learn about wine.
A happy woman is such a lovely sight, and Kate looks so content, even in her sleep. If she’s determined to start a family, why not do it? I’m not getting any younger. Maybe she can go to work, and I’ll be the stay-at-home dad, teach the little ginks the fundamentals before it’s too late, have them dribbling with both hands by the time they’re in preschool.