The Paris Connection (21 page)

“And you said that Lillian agreed to my return, as well?”

He inclined his head. “Not without a bit of persuasion, but then, she does not know you as well as I do.” He turned on the bench, and it groaned at the movement. “Will you forgive me, Emma? For doubting your integrity? And will you return to Aquitaine? I cannot promise an immediate promotion, but hopefully, in the future, something can be arranged.”

“Not if it means losing Cole,” she stated. “I think he’s going to do wonderful things for our company.”

“Our company? Then you’ll come back?”

She thought about hesitating, trying to punish him a little bit longer. But that wasn’t her style.

“It will be just like I never left.”

She knew by his smile that it was the answer he’d been hoping for.

* * *

E
MMA
COULD
NOT
understand Melanie’s insistence. Now that their au pair would be staying with them through the school year, she didn’t see why they had to visit the Champ de Mars tonight, of all nights. But Melanie kept saying she wanted to see the Eiffel Tower lit up against the evening sky, and she couldn’t wait. She insisted it would be a celebration, now that they could stay together for a few months more. Avery backed her up on this, pleading with Emma to take them.

Emma pointed out that since they would be together for a while longer, they’d have plenty of opportunities to view the Eiffel Tower at night another time. But Melanie and Avery protested mightily at this, insisting it had to be tonight.

She hedged for a bit, repeatedly checking the screen of her cell phone. She had spoken to Solene earlier, thanking her for what she’d done. They’d made plans to get together next week to talk through everything that had happened. But Solene’s wasn’t the number she kept hoping would light her screen.

After her news from Julien, she had expected Cole to call and speak to her himself. Wasn’t he happy about the decision for her to return? Perhaps their last exchange had changed his feelings for her. Maybe she wouldn’t hear from him at all but would have to face him when she returned to the office in a few days’ time. She was embarrassed to admit that rather than going out and viewing the breathtaking magnificence of the Champ de Mars at night that she would prefer to stay in and wait by the phone for him to call.

Ashamed of these feelings, she finally caved and told Melanie to dress Avery warmly for their evening excursion. With one last glance at her cell phone’s screen, she pocketed it and grabbed her own sweater to guard her against the chilly autumn air.

* * *

T
HE
C
HAMP
DE
M
ARS
was not as crowded on a weeknight as it might have been on the weekend, but still, there were several dozen people spread out along the stretch of green fronting the Eiffel Tower. Emma paused to take in the glittering beauty of the iron structure. Lamplights lined the avenue and illuminated the strip of grass that stretched to the tower’s base. The monument glowed with hundreds of light projectors and several thousand strobe lights, casting a golden radiance. Emma’s breath caught in her chest. How had she thought she could leave this place? She loved Paris, the city that had somehow come to be home more than any other. She reached for Avery and drew her daughter against her side.

“You guys were right. This was a good idea.”

She didn’t care who called her a romantic. There was something about that beacon of love that made her feel all would be right with the world.

She reached into her pocket and withdrew her cell phone, checking it one more time. No calls. A bit of her romantic optimism deflated. Perhaps Cole had forgotten all about her already.

“Come on, Mom.”

Avery began tugging on her arm, so she reluctantly slipped the phone back into the pocket of her jeans.

“Slow down there, kiddo,” she begged as Avery’s grip became more insistent. She practically dragged Emma across the lawn in the direction of the Eiffel Tower. Melanie laughed and kept pace beside them. She could hear the joy in that sound and wondered if the younger woman would learn to love Paris as she had when she was an au pair.

“Avery, what’s gotten into you?”

But her daughter just kept moving, and when Emma looked to Melanie for help, the girl could only shrug. The excitement of Emma’s return to Aquitaine must have lifted their spirits even more than it had raised hers. Of course, her own happiness was tempered by no word from Cole.

What would she do if he no longer wanted to see her? How would she mend together a heart that he had claimed, if he now released his hold on her? She couldn’t begin to think in those terms, didn’t even know where to start.

And then, her attention was arrested by a sight that made her sigh. Someone had set up a table in the middle of the Champ de Mars, directly in the center, with the Eiffel Tower shining down. It was lit with candles, and it appeared as though a dinner had been laid. How lovely. Some woman was extraordinarily lucky to experience such thoughtfulness. She looked around, wondering just who the happy couple was, and that’s when she saw him.

Cole. He was dressed in his office attire, wearing black pants and a white button-down shirt with his vest over top. His hair was styled as though he’d just come from work, though a blond lock had fallen across his forehead. He stood, a single rose held in his hand. She looked from the candlelit table to him and found his expression serious.

“Go, Mom.”

Avery went around and pushed her forward from behind. She glanced at Melanie.

“Avery and I are going for a walk. We’ll see you back home later on, okay?”

Emma felt a flutter of nerves take over. “Maybe you guys should stay.”

“M-o-o-o-m,” Avery protested. “Go talk to Cole.”

She grabbed Melanie’s hand, and before Emma could protest further, they were skipping away, back across the green. She turned back to Cole, who offered a tentative smile and then took several steps forward. He met her halfway and held out the rose.

“Would you like to join me for dinner?”

Her stomach was doing so many somersaults that she didn’t see how it would be possible to eat a thing. Still, she wasn’t about to turn him down. She took the rose in her hand.

“Yes, I’d like that.”

He gestured toward the table, and when his hand touched the center of her back to guide her forward, she felt her knees grow weak. He pulled out a chair, and she sank into it, laying the rose beside her. She wished she’d had some sort of warning so she could have dressed a bit more elegantly than her T-shirt, jeans and sweater. From the corner of her eye, she noticed several couples stopping, taking note of the scene Cole had created, before sighing and leaning into each other as they moved on.

“How did you do all this?” she asked, as he took the seat across from her.

“A gentleman doesn’t reveal his secrets,” he said and then pulled the covers off their plates to reveal a simple dish of soup and sections of baguette along with several slices of cheese. In the center of the table rested a small plate with half a dozen
macarons
in varying flavors. She knew they had to be from Ladurée.

“Cole, this is...” Inexplicably, she felt tears fill her eyes. “No one has ever... I’ve never...”

“What’s more romantic than dinner in Paris with a view of the Eiffel Tower?”

She looked at him, her chest expanding with love. “I can’t think of anything more wonderful,” she whispered.

He placed his arm on the table, reaching toward her with his palm up. She placed her arm there, as well, putting her hand into his.

“Emma, I’m sorry for any doubts I had, about things at Aquitaine. I know you better than that, and I should have spoken up for you, should have trusted in you more than I did. I’m asking you to forgive me and making a promise that if anything like this happens in the future, I’ll put more faith in you.”

She swallowed at these words but couldn’t find breath to speak.

“You are the most loyal person that I know, and I...I am completely in love with you. Can you forgive me and agree to work with me at Aquitaine again? Will you consider restarting a relationship with me?”

She was overwhelmed by this declaration and found her chest so full that she still couldn’t force out a reply. He must have mistaken her silence for hesitation because he continued.

“If you still have doubts about dating someone you work with, and especially your boss, I’ll resign my position at the company.”

“No.” The idea of Cole leaving forced the word out. He jerked back slightly, his fingers losing their grip on hers.

“No?” he asked, and she realized how her reply had sounded.

“I meant, no, I don’t want you to resign from Aquitaine, but, yes...I want us to be together.”

She watched as a smile broke over his features, lighting his hazel eyes with happiness. “Then it’s a yes?”

“It’s a yes,” she confirmed, feeling her own grin widening with joy.

He stood, moving his chair around the table and setting it beside hers before taking his seat once more. He reached for her hand again.

“When I came here, I never thought I could learn to love this city, but I have come to adore it, all because it brought me to you.”

She moved her free hand to touch his face, running her fingers along his jaw and down to his chin.

“When I was younger, I just knew I’d find love here. Maybe it’s why I never left, after my marriage to Brice ended. Maybe, deep down, I knew I had to stick around until you found your way here.”

“Then thank you,” he said softly, “for waiting.”

“Thank you for giving me a good reason to.” She leaned in to nudge her nose against his. “And for reminding me I’m a romantic at heart. I had almost forgotten.”

“I won’t ever let you forget again.”

And that, she knew, was a promise.

EPILOGUE

E
MMA
WAS
IN
awe of the church sanctuary, each pew draped in swaths of silk and an abundance of orchids stationed at every end. There were ultrafeminine touches of lace and trailing ivy and more candles than she could begin to count. She turned to Cole, his hand wrapped loosely around her waist as he guided her forward.

“I always pictured Lillian and Julien’s wedding as a simple affair.”

Cole shrugged. “It appears that Lillian’s idea of a wedding is much more ostentatious.”

Emma couldn’t believe it. She’d been privy to many conversations between Lillian and Julien over the past eight months as they planned the event of their nuptials, but she hadn’t paid close enough attention to realize just how extravagant it all would be. After all, Julien had always been a bachelor, and Lillian had been a widow for over twenty-five years. Who knew the two would go all out on the occasion of their marriage?

The usher stopped and directed them to enter a pew. Cole gestured for her to go first, and then he slid in beside her. His arm immediately went around her back, his palm running over her other arm. She leaned into him.

“Oh, by the way,” she said, “I wanted to ask you what you’d think if I threw a goodbye party for Melanie. She’s scheduled to return to the States in another month, so I’d have to pull something together rather quickly, but Solene’s already agreed to help.”

He leaned over and pressed a kiss to her temple. “I think that’s a very thoughtful idea. Just make sure you pick a weekend when Avery isn’t scheduled to spend time with her dad.”

“Oh, good point.”

She turned her attention to the front, where she spotted Julien in his tux. It had been specially fitted for his wide girth, but she had to admit that he was a commanding figure.

“Julien looks happy, doesn’t he? I never imagined Lillian would be the one to wrangle him into matrimony.”

“Really? I always thought they’d make a great couple.”

She rolled her eyes. “You did not.”

“You wound me, Aquitaine. Have you already forgotten what I know?”

“What’s that?”

“I know that the heart wants what the heart wants.”

These words, murmured in her ear, caused her to shiver, and Cole noticed the goose bumps rise on her arm.

“Are you cold?” he questioned. “I can give you my jacket.”

He started to shift away from her to remove it, but she grabbed the end of his tie and pulled him back into position. He ran a hand over her arm, and she shivered happily.

“Oh, look, there’s Ophelia and Dane, up near the front.” She had met Lillian’s daughter and her husband when they flew to Paris from Hawaii after the announcement of Lillian’s engagement. “It’s a good thing Lillian and Julien scheduled this wedding when they did. It doesn’t look like Ophelia will be able to fly much longer. That’s quite the baby bump.”

When Cole didn’t respond, she slid him a glance out of the corner of her eye. “You’re not jealous, are you?”

“Of Ophelia’s baby bump? That was never a good look for me.”

She nudged him in the side. “You know what I mean.”

He moved his arm and cupped her chin, turning her face to look at him directly. “I’m happy for Ophelia, and I wish her well. But I don’t miss her. Not even the tiniest bit. Let her and Dane keep their island paradise. You and I have the City of Light.”

She thrilled at this reminder just as the music began to swell. The guests all moved to stand, and the sound of rustling fabric filled the sanctuary. Emma turned toward the back, along with the rest of them, and waited for Lillian to appear.

She entered the auditorium in a cloud of tulle and satin, a stylish little hat cocked on her head with a thin veil of netting covering her face. Her gaze swept by them all and went to the front of the room. Emma couldn’t help following her line of vision to see how Julien’s face brightened with pleasure at the sight of Lillian. She suppressed a sigh of contentment.

She loved weddings. And though she and Lillian had experienced a few ups and downs on her return to Aquitaine, it was obvious the older woman made Julien happy. So Emma had gradually learned to put aside her occasional annoyance with the way Lillian handled things and decided to like her.

Besides, she wouldn’t be seeing as much of the company owners in the future. Lillian and Julien had informed them that they would be turning over an even greater amount of control to Cole and Emma in the days ahead. The newlyweds planned to travel and spend a considerable amount of time in Hawaii once Lillian’s grandchild was born.

All the talk of babies had made Avery curious, and she had begun asking Emma if there might be a sister for her one day soon. Emma kept putting the question off, but she knew a secret that she’d been holding close. It was the discovery of a velvet ring box from a jewelry shop she had admired some months ago during an outing to the Champs-Élysées with Cole. She had been dropping off several of Cole’s suits at his apartment, placing them in his closet after picking them up from a dry cleaner’s, when it fell from its hiding place and knocked her gently on the head.

She had picked it up, hesitating, and wondering if perhaps it was from Cole’s failed proposal to Ophelia from the year before, when she’d finally opened it up. If she hadn’t recognized the jewelry shop’s name, she wouldn’t have immediately realized it was for her. She had quickly returned it to its hiding place and hadn’t breathed a word of her discovery to Cole or anyone else.

But she was waiting, eager to see what sort of proposal scheme he’d come up with. For someone who had been so opposed to Paris in the beginning, Cole had proven himself a romantic of the highest caliber. He was forever offering up little unexpected surprises, making her fall in love with him all over again each and every day. Like this morning, when she’d gone into her kitchen to find the words “I love you” spelled out in grains of French lavender across the counter. She still wasn’t sure when he’d snuck into the apartment and set that one up. Perhaps Avery had helped him. She was often his accomplice in that sort of thing.

By now, Lillian had reached the altar, and the guests all resumed their seats. The minister began the ceremony, discussing love and its importance, how it knew nothing of age nor time, that it was eternal.

Cole reached for her hand, and she felt a rush of happiness at the warmth of his fingers around hers. As Lillian and Julien began their vows, she turned her head and looked at Cole, letting everything else fade away save for his face. He met her gaze, and she saw exactly what she’d been looking for in his eyes. Then she nestled into him, placed her head on his shoulder and let his arm come around her as she turned her attention toward the front of the sanctuary and her heart toward the future.

* * * * *