Unself-consciously, he dropped the towel from around his hips and shook out a pair of boxers. He was standing with his back to her, and he delighted in the little sound she made as his ass came into view. When he was pretty sure she’d looked her fill, he stepped into his underwear, then picked out a pair of pants. After pulling on a shirt, he sidestepped to check himself over in the mirror on the wall, running a hand through his still-damp hair to mess it up a little.
“Would you like to hear what I had in mind for our outing today?” he asked.
She hesitated. “You really don’t have to spend all this time with me. I wasn’t expecting . . .”
Of course she wasn’t. He didn’t like the note of insecurity in her disclaimer, though. He half twisted around. “Do you not want me to?”
And that wasn’t an immediate no forming on her lips.
Huh. He faced the mirror again. “You can have the day to yourself if you want.” Annoying, because he’d thought his plan was pretty good, and he wasn’t particularly fond of the idea of spending the day alone. Not when there was someone interesting to spend it with.
“I want to get some more drawing done,” she said after another brief pause. “But it doesn’t have to be today. What were you going to suggest?”
He’d been starting to think she’d literally never ask.
“Well.” He fixed the collar of his shirt, then turned around. “Since you’re a tortured artist and everything.” With a little spring in his step, he threw himself onto the bed, landing on his stomach with his head by her side, his elbows braced beneath himself. The mattress bounced around as he settled, and he laughed at her yelp of surprise as she was jostled. Sneaking in under her arm, he pushed the hem of her—his—shirt up and planted a smacking kiss to her side. “What do you say we head up to Montmartre?”
Tugging the shirt back down, she gave him a playful shove. He let her go and twisted around, clambering to sit beside her on the bed, close enough to catch the echoing sweetness of her scent.
“Montmartre, huh?” She reached up, threading her fingers through his hair.
“Sure. See some of Picasso’s old haunts, steep ourselves in what’s left of the whole turn-of-the-century art scene. Drink some absinthe. You know, like artists do.”
She smiled, a real, nice, genuine smile. “That’s actually a really great idea.”
“Of course it is. I came up with it.” He nipped his way down her neck, sliding an arm around her waist.
Laughing, she leaned into him, and suddenly it wasn’t just silliness anymore. They fit together so nicely like this, and his throat got tight.
“Plus,” he said. “It’s beautiful. All set up on the hill like that. You can walk to the very top, and there’s Sacred Heart Basilica. All these gorgeous stained-glass windows. And the view from up there? You can see all of Paris, spread out at your feet.”
“Sounds amazing.”
“It is.”
He wanted to show it to her. Wanted to show her a lot of things, and as he held her closer, it was a little too easy to imagine they were any ordinary couple, heading off to explore the city together.
Dangerous, entertaining thoughts like that. They were only fucking, after all—and they hadn’t even gotten around to doing that yet.
Retreating slightly, he cocked one eyebrow in a leer. “Unless you’d prefer to stay in today.”
“Nah. Tempting as you are”—she unwrapped her hand from around his neck, sliding it lower, fingertips lingering for a second at the chain where it crossed his collarbone—“daylight’s burning. And there’s plenty of time for that later.” Her voice wavered, and her thumb stroked lower, drifting closer to his father’s ring. “Right?”
Instinct had him grabbing her hand, but his rational mind stopped him from pushing her away from the ring. Instead, he lifted her knuckles to his lips, kissing each one in turn. “Plenty,” he agreed.
Five more days, he reminded himself.
The golden band against his breastbone felt like a weight.
Five days was more than enough.
Kate didn’t think she would ever get enough of Paris.
Rylan was barely hiding the bemusement on his face as she all but skipped along at his side, her hand wrapped around his elbow. She loved Montmartre. How much time had she spent studying all the people who had lived and died and loved and painted here? Pablo Picasso and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. Renoir and Degas and Van Gogh.
So much must have changed since their time, but the whole place had this feeling to it, like you could picture someone whipping out an easel and a set of paints at any moment. She and Rylan had had brunch in the kind of dingy café she’d always imagined artists sipping coffee in—not one of the fancy ones near the museums down by the Seine. Ducked into little shops and even taken cheesy selfies in front of the Moulin Rouge, and she was bursting. She just wanted to set up shop and draw hungover people in black clothes, smoking cigarettes and talking, forever.
And always, in the background of every one of those scenes would be Rylan. Rylan with his self-satisfied smirk and his fake frown. He liked to stand aside and watch her have her fun, scowling at it all, but she saw through him. He was having fun in spite of himself.
It was sort of strangely adorable. Like a cat who didn’t want to admit he loved being petted.
“Okay,” she said, putting down a hat she did not need to spend any of her dwindling resources on. She tugged at his arm as they set off down the sidewalk again, nudging him until he took his hand from his pocket so she could intertwine their fingers. “You’ve indulged me all day.”
“Really? I hadn’t noticed.”
She was ignoring that. “So now what do you want to do?”
Suggestiveness colored his tone. “I can think of a couple of things.”
She could think of a couple, too. Montmartre had kept the lion’s share of her attention today, but it had taken effort not to slip into daydreams about how patiently he’d touched her the night before. Images of those big hands on her breasts and framing her hips. The warm lapping of his tongue . . .
Blinking, she squeezed his hand harder. “Things you want to do in Montmartre,” she clarified.
“You’re not narrowing it down much.”
“Be serious.”
“Well, that’s no fun.” He eyed her legs, but not in quite so suggestive of a manner. “Your feet too tired yet?”
They were, a little, but considering how much walking she’d been doing, that was basically to be expected. “Not too bad. Why?”
He gestured up the hill, and she squinted against the brightness of the sky. “It’s a heck of a climb, but it’s worth the effort.”
She considered. “That’s Sacred Heart up there, right?” A big, old, famous church. That didn’t sound like something that would be particularly enthralling for him.
“Yup.”
“Why do you want to go there?”
“Isn’t it on your list of things to see?”
“Yeah, but I asked what you want to do.”
“I told you.” He wasn’t looking at her. “I want to show you around town.”
“Which you’ve done. A lot of. There must be something you’d like to do for you.”
His mouth settled into the lines of a frown, and he didn’t answer for a solid minute. Finally, just when she’d been about to start needling him, he offered, “It’s got the best view in the entire city. If we’re this close already . . .” He shrugged. “I’d like to see it. And I’d like to see you see it.”
“Oh.”
And it wasn’t lost on her, that half his entertainment really did seem to amount to watching her taking in the city he’d clearly come to know so well. She couldn’t pretend she entirely understood it, but she wasn’t going to question it anymore.