“Well, no, but I see what you’re saying.”
“I’m just being honest.”
“And I love how honest you are, but you don’t see yourself clearly, and I don’t know why. Maybe something someone said to you that’s burrowed under your skin and landed in here?” He lifted their hands to the side of her head. “You are beautiful, Skye Smith. Not like Clare or any of those women who make perfecting their looks an art, who go to every beautician under the sun to get their hair, brows, lashes, tan, wrinkles, lip filler and nails all perfect. You are natural, and that is, believe me, utterly stunning.”
Heat flooded her face, turning her red to the tips of her hair. “Okay, if you say so,” she rolled her eyes as though dismissing his words, when actually she was allowing them to flood her body, making her nerve endings pulse.
“I do.” He pressed his finger to her chin, tilting her face to his. “And before you leave me, you’re going to say it too.”
“Oh, am I?” Her heart slammed into her ribs. “Are you now a psychic as well as a sex god?”
He smirked. “Just determined. I think with enough compliments, and being encouraged to walk around naked, you might start to see yourself as you actually are.”
Her lips parted at the picture he painted. “I see.” She cleared her throat, her pulse frantic.
“Shall we test your theory?”
“You’re the one with the theory,” she pointed out.
“I meant your theory, about beginner’s luck.”
And before she could answer, he was kissing her, rolling her onto the floor, the beginning of an arousal pressed against her legs so she moaned, delirious with delight, and curious as to just how much better it could get.
The truth was,each time they were together was better and better, so three weeks later, Skye could no longer look at Matthieu without feeling as though she were bursting into flames. At first, after returning from his grandparents’ home, he’d stuck to his usual schedule, leaving early in the morning to work, coming home in the evening, and making love to Skye all night long. After a few days, he started to come home in the afternoon, to see her over lunch, then returning to the office. A week after that, he spent most of his day at home, heading to the office only for meetings he couldn’t do via zoom. “Hey, you’re not going to be around forever,” he’d shrugged, dropping a scoop of warm, melted chocolate to her stomach and smothering it with his index finger before grinningly licking it off.
She’d laughed, because it tickled, but even then, the casual reference to the temporary nature of their situation set off a flurry of something like pain in her chest, something she put down to a newly-minted addiction to sex. Specifically, sex with Matthieu.
She didn’t particularly want to contemplate life without him, even when she knew it was coming. Like many things in life, the end was inevitable, but focusing on that didn’t do anything positive, so she refused to look around the corner. It would be waiting for her, one way or another.
They hadn’t gone out. No fancy dinners or private members clubs, no visits from his aunt (thank the heavens), no summoning calls from his grandparents. It had been just the two of them and the four (trillion) walls of his very fancy apartment, with its sparkling views of the Eiffel Tower, a sumptuous bed and a spa that was the size of Skye’s old bathroom.
So when one evening, he pushed up onto his elbows and considered her thoughtfully for several seconds, Skye could have no idea what he was about to say.
“I think we should have dinner somewhere.”
She blinked. “Like the table instead of the bed?”
He laughed ruefully. “No,” he pulled himself closer. “Like a restaurant. Out there.” He nodded towards the windows of his bedroom, which framed a picture-perfect view of Paris.
Skye followed his gaze thoughtfully, her stomach immediately tightening into dozens of knots. Here, in the apartment, she felt comfortable and safe. She felt as though she could be completely herself without any risk of reprisal or embarrassment. Out there was a world so ready to judge her, a world armed with smart phones and social media accounts, all too keen to critique the woman they thought would become the new Madam de Garmeaux.
“Oh, I don’t know,” she hesitated a moment. “Why go out when we have food and entertainment here?”
“Entertainment? Do you mean me, mademoiselle?”
She winked. “Exactly.”
“We won’t stay out all night,” he bartered, so Skye sobered a little, because it was clear that he was serious.
“Do you really want to?”
He skimmed her face with his intelligent eyes. “It would be good to be seen together again.”
Something like an arrow landed in the region of her heart and she dropped her gaze to the quilt, shielding her eyes from his perceptive gaze. “Good for the fiction of our engagement?”
“Yes.”
“Of course.” She bit down on her lip, wondering why the hell she suddenly wanted to cry? It didn’t take much thinking, though, to realise.