Chapter 8
8
Dawn hadn’t quite broken when Noah returned the next morning.
On his bike, again. With another leather jacket for Laura.
‘It’s the one I used to wear many years ago when I had my very first bike,’ he told her, as he held it out for her to put on. ‘But it’s warm and you’ll need it. We have a long ride ahead of us, ma puce . All the way to le plateau de Valensole .’
How could she feel this awake? Laura wondered, as she slipped her arms into the sleeves and pulled the jacket around her. This alive ?
She doubted she’d had more than an hour or two of sleep.
Noah gently eased the helmet onto her head. She tilted her chin and closed her eyes, not just to make it easier for him to fasten the chin strap, or even to focus on the touch of his fingers. She knew that Noah was thinking about kissing her and this would be her invitation. His acceptance was palpable even before his lips settled gently against hers for a heartbeat and then again, longer this time.
Who knew that it was possible to develop a silent means of such intimate communication with someone when you’d been in their company for less than a single day?
Magic, that’s what it was, and this was definitely not the time to try and analyse it, when being on the back of this bike again was a part of that magic, with her arms around Noah and the feel of his body against hers. When she could so easily imagine that she could still smell the scent of him. When she could feel the warmth of his skin seeping into her own body through the lining of the old jacket he used to wear when he was probably still a teenager.
They might be both fully clothed and hurtling through time and space but part of Laura was still in the rumpled sheets of her hotel bed, because those hours would always be the core of this fantasy that she was living. And for this part of the new day, at least, she could pretend that it was never going to end.
That she was going to live happily ever after inside a fairy tale in which all her dreams would come true. This was a game that Laura was giving herself permission to play because another part of her was all too aware that the clock was ticking and it would have to end very soon.
In the meantime, however, she could be in love with her prince. Flying on a magic carpet that was taking her to make a dream come true. In a couple of hours, with the sun far enough over the distant mountains to make this summer’s day perfect, she would be walking in the purple sea of the lavender fields.
They stopped in a small village for a strong cup of coffee and a croissant. Except that it wasn’t the plain croissant that she thought Noah was ordering for her that arrived at their pavement table. It was a pain au chocolat. Something so rich and so decadent it hadn’t even occurred to Laura to ask for it.
But it was as perfect as everything else today.
Noah had known it would be. A quirk of his eyebrow and the glow of amusement in those golden-brown eyes told her to simply forget any rules she had about her diet and enjoy the treat.
She had to close her eyes as she felt the warm, flaky layers of pastry in her mouth melt away to reveal the velvety chocolate hidden between them. She had to lick away a smear of chocolate on her lips and, as she did so, she opened her eyes to find Noah watching her. He held a small cup of espresso in his hand, poised in mid-air as he gave her one of those slow, lazy smiles.
He knew exactly how much she was enjoying this mouthful of food, in the same way he’d known exactly how to touch her last night. And exactly how much time and confidence she’d needed to allow herself to experience what she’d believed only existed in the movies or the pages of a steamy romance novel.
Oh, help … the look in Noah’s eyes now made her think he could guess what she was thinking about. She had to break that eye contact and try, desperately, not to let the heat of a blush staining her neck reach her face.
But she could feel herself smiling and her gaze met Noah’s again.
‘ Ce pain au chocolat? ’
‘ Oui? ’
‘ C’est une tuerie .’
Noah’s smile widened. ‘ Ouais . Profite, mon coeur . Enjoy…’
* * *
Noah sipped his coffee. He hadn’t expected Laura to be okay with him lighting a cigarette, but she gave her permission with a tiny shrug that made him instantly remember she had French heritage.
Maybe it shouldn’t have surprised him this much.
Laura looked different today.
No, that wasn’t true. She’d looked different at the airport yesterday because her clothes and her attitude had been a revelation.
But… she was different today.
She looked…
Noah hid his smile by pulling smoke into his mouth and releasing some of it in a perfect ring, watching it expand as it rose.
She looked like a woman who’d recently been made love to and loved it.
He’d known he needed to take it slowly with Laura. Right from when he’d met her he’d sensed a wariness that wasn’t dissimilar to a wild creature that could flee and run at any moment. That was what had intrigued him all along, was it not?
To be as stunningly beautiful as she was and to be so… restrained, was that the word?
Controlled. Almost afraid to surrender to her senses, even for a moment.
But she’d surrendered last night. Strangely, it had felt as if this was her first time. Not for sex, of course, but for that level of satisfaction – the pleasure that was so intense it was almost pain.
Even more strangely, given that Noah had long ago lost count of how many women he’d taken to his bed, it had felt the same for him.
Because it had been so different.
The real Laura he could see beside him today was so different.
So compelling, but it was a warning that Noah could dismiss as easily as he stubbed out his cigarette. They only had a few more hours to be together. This was simply one of life’s temporary pleasures.
Like a pain au chocolat.
Only much, much more delicious.
* * *
A rainbow-striped hot air balloon hung in the distance, between the purple smudge of the endless rows of lavender and the misty mountains far away. Closer, right amongst the lavender, were the ruins of an ancient stone building, with just enough of the walls remaining to show the peaks that had once held a roof and the spaces where windows and a door had made this a dwelling.
‘ Parfait ,’ Noah declared, using his camera himself this morning as he snapped photo after photo. ‘Go into the field, Laura. I need a picture of you.’
‘Are we allowed to do that?’
‘There will be hundreds of people here doing that very soon. We’re lucky we’re early. See?’ Noah pointed at the sign near where he’d parked the bike.
‘“ Propriété privée” ,’ Laura read aloud. ‘“ Ne pas couper la lavande”. ’ She shook her head. ‘People wouldn’t really do that, would they? Pick the lavender?’
‘ Pfft …’
The sound suggested that there were things tourists could do that would horrify her. It made Laura laugh. Noah lifted his camera but she turned away before she heard the click of the shutter. She wanted to remember this moment forever, but a camera could never truly capture what she was feeling and she didn’t want to remember anything less.
The earth between the rows of lavender looked recently tilled – a fine, dry mix of stones and dirt. Some of the lavender flowers almost reached the waistband of Laura’s jeans. She stopped for a moment to inhale the scent, tilting her head back and holding out her arms, filling her nose and mouth and throat with the gorgeous herbal, floral, smoky aroma. She could taste it as much as smell it. She reached to lift the drooping head of the nearest flower to admire the tiny, individual blooms that made up the spear, and then let it drop to merge with so many others that it became a purple cloud over the straight green hedges beneath.
The only sound she could hear was the soft buzzing of what had to be a million bees getting on with their work. She knew Noah would be taking a photograph of this but that was okay. If her face was hidden, the memory that the image would evoke would be the one imprinted on her heart right now.
And in her soul.
She didn’t want to be anywhere else in the world.
Or with anyone else.
She’d never been this happy in her entire life. So happy, she could feel the prick of tears behind her eyes for the third time since she’d returned to France. Why was she so emotional when she probably couldn’t even remember the last time she’d cried as a child?
She blinked hard to crush the prickling sensation as she heard the crunch of Noah’s boots on the stony earth. By the time he was beside her she was smiling. It didn’t matter that it was a misty smile because she knew that he would understand.
This was a dream coming true for her.
It was huge.
If she hadn’t already told him how much she’d wanted this, he would surely have known by the glitter of tears in her eyes because he knew that she would never normally lose control enough for tears to even form.
He knew her.
Better than she knew herself?
This alchemy had started to simmer when they’d first started messaging each other, but what was happening between them now – this ability to communicate with no more than eye contact – was not simply due to the words or images they’d shared. She hadn’t realised how close they’d come to each other through the invisible dance of navigating what lay between the lines, the stories behind the images, or… the emotion behind the music.
Becoming close enough to build trust, on Laura’s part at least, had only been possible by playing with time and taking as long as she’d needed to absorb every response. Persuading herself that it was still safe. Letting herself peep through a gap in her defences.
Letting herself live a little?
Because it had been with this man. This extraordinary man who was the opposite of everything Laura had always imagined she wanted but was actually exactly what she’d needed. He’d stepped into the most private space she had by sharing the grief of losing his sister – at the same age that her own life had changed forever when her father had vanished. That had taken their connection to a completely new – albeit sombre and slightly disturbing – level.
But Noah had balanced it perfectly.
With an evening out fit for a princess.
By making love to her as if she was the only woman in the world he could ever want to be with.
By making her dream of walking through a lavender field a reality.
‘ Merci .’ Laura’s whispered word faltered just a little. ‘ Merci infiniment , Noah.’ She searched for something more to convey how much this meant. ‘ C’est inoubliable .’
This was unforgettable.
Not just the lavender fields.
Everything.
The corners of Noah’s eyes crinkled but the smile didn’t reach his mouth, which made it, somehow, even more genuine.
He touched her cheek and, as Laura’s lips parted to take in another wonderful breath of the scented air around them, he let his fingers drift slowly down to lift her chin.
He kissed her then. Slowly. Deliciously. And Laura knew that she would never again catch even a whiff of lavender that wouldn’t bring her back to this place and this moment in time.
Laura had never got this close before, and maybe it was only because this was such a fantasy, but she also knew, beyond any shadow of doubt, that this was what it felt like to fall in love.