Chapter 8 Gustave #2
“Papi insisted that we learn how to cook because my mother isn’t allowed. She’ll poison us.” Once again, her love for family came through. She was close to them. No doubt about it. “My mother designs jewelry.” She wiggles her fingers, the rings catching the lamplight. “She made these.”
They were not the expensive and ostentatious jewels, the kind that Simone paraded, but finer, intimate pieces.
One was a thin band of hammered silver, uneven in texture, as if shaped by hand rather than machine. Another was warmer—gold flecked with tiny stones, turquoise maybe. They weren’t heirlooms meant for vaults or society galas. They were personal and charming. Like Tara.
“Can you open that bottle?” She gestures toward a bottle of Pommard on the kitchen island.
I suppress a grin. It’s from a domaine in Burgundy, not far from my own place there. It feels almost like a sign. If I didn’t already know her, I might have suspected the coincidence was a little too perfect.
I pour the wine as she flips tortillas, each one puffing and browning in the pan. The scent lifts—sweet, smoky corn woven with the slow burn of chili simmering on the stove—and it strikes me, sharp and visceral. Hunger, yes, but not just for food.
She takes a sip of wine, her hips swaying lightly as she works.
She talks about this and that, easy topics as she sets the small wooden table pushed against the window.
The table is worn but cheerful, dressed with striped cloth placemats that don’t quite match. She sets out a handful of plates—one chipped, another too ornate to belong here—and somehow, in her hands, they look intentional, like the kind of artful mix you’d find in a tucked-away bistro in Le Marais.
“I found these at a vintage shop in Le Marais,” she says proudly. “The apartment came with China, but it was all white. Soulless. These have…personality.”
She ladles chili into colorful ceramic bowls, probably picked up from some nameless Paris shop. No Sèvres porcelain or Louis XVI dinner service here.
Steam rises in fragrant ribbons as she scatters cilantro over the top, the bright green cutting through the deep red. A wedge of lime lands on each rim, a flash of sunlight waiting to be squeezed. The tortillas—warm, pliant, and faintly charred—go into a woven basket lined with a clean dish towel.
There’s no performance to it, no curated elegance. She moves with quiet assurance, serving not a meal for show, but one for comfort—for connection. For love.
When she places everything on the table, the room changes. The little apartment, once sparse and quiet, feels lived in now—anchored, human, warm. It feels like her.
Once we’re seated, I wait for her to take the first bite, uncertain how to approach what she’s served without a fork or knife. She tears a piece of tortilla and uses it to scoop up the chili, movements easy and instinctive. I imitate her, trying not to look as inept as I feel.
The flavor hits instantly. It’s smoky, fiery, and deeply comforting. Cuisine du c?ur*. Food that feeds something deeper than hunger.
I groan aloud. “Mon dieu. This is incredible.”
We eat, and we talk. It’s easy. She tells me more about her family. I tell her about Aubert and a little about myself.
“So, you grew up rich and all that?” She lifts her wine glass. There’s no accusation in her voice, no hint of envy or awe—only an open curiosity, an honest desire to understand who I am beneath the name and the legacy.
“Plus ou moins*…ah…more or less.”
“Are you close to your family?”
“I’m close to my son…or at least, I think I am.” I chew on a piece of succulent beef, and then continue, “He’s remarkable.” And suddenly I wish I could introduce them. Aubert would like her.
“I’m sure he is. He’s yours after all.”
The way she says it with a smile tells me she’s not holding my behavior against me.
If this were Simone, we’d talk about it nonstop for a year, which is why I became careful about what I said to her, shutting myself down to avoid the unpleasantness. But it couldn’t save our marriage and couldn’t protect Aubert from its implosion, either.
“So, what does a count actually do?” she asks cheerfully while she cleans up after dinner, refusing to let me help.
I don’t mind. I watch her, and as I do, I forget the walls I’ve built around myself and let her in.
“Mostly?” I swirl what’s left of the Pommard in my glass.
“Sign papers. Attend meetings. Smile politely while people pretend that aristocratic titles still matter. In reality, it’s managing the family holdings—vineyards, properties, investments, and foundations.
And making sure the press has nothing scandalous to feast on.
” I pause, seeing my life for what it is, and it seems so interminably bleak.
“The truth is, Tara, a count doesn’t do much of anything.
He spends his life proving he deserves what he was born with. ”
She turns, dish towel in hand, studying me with those honey-brown eyes. “That seems like a difficult way to live your life.”
I cock an eyebrow, a wry smile tugging at my mouth. “Most people would think, considering all our wealth and prestige, quite the opposite.”
She shakes her head, drying her hands on the towel. “If you can’t be you…then what’s the point of all that wealth and prestige?”
Her words are close to the ones I tell Simone when she tries to control our son’s life, but I never associated them with myself. It never crossed my mind. My life, as was my father’s and his father’s, is about upholding the de Valois family name.
“I have more than most.”
“You are fortunate on that account.” She hangs the towel over the oven handle to dry and sits across from me. “Would you like some coffee?”
I lean forward, take her hand in mine.
We both freeze, caught in the spark of it.
Her eyes lift to mine, wide and unguarded. I feel that dangerous pull, that certainty that one night with her was not enough.
“Tara….”
“Yes,” she whispers.
The air between us thickens. The room seems to shrink until it’s only her and me. Desire crashes through me like an avalanche.
I curl my fingers over hers. “The attraction is still here.” My confession is a surrender.
“I know,” she agrees gently.
God help me, I want to kiss her, to lift her onto my lap, to lose myself in her warmth.
But I can already see the headlines, the photographs, the ruin. My father’s voice in my ear, Simone’s triumph if she caught even a whiff of this. Aubert…if I dragged him into another scandal.
I squeeze her hand once, then let it go. “It’s too risky.”
Her gaze holds mine, searching. She nods slowly, though I see the hurt flicker across her face.
I don’t like that at all.
I reach out and brush a strand of hair back from her cheek.
Her breath hitches, her lips part.
For a heartbeat, we lean toward each other, magnetized, inevitable.
My hand lingers at her jaw, then falls away.
We sit like that for a while, looking at one another.
When I finally rise to leave, she walks me to the door.
“Tara,” I whisper roughly. I should leave it there. But the truth claws its way out. “That night,” I tell her, “was the best of my life. The best sex I’ve ever had. The best…comfort. And I wish”—I pause to quell the knot in my gut—“I wish I could have more of you. But I can’t.”
Her eyes lift to mine, shining with sadness and something visceral that mirrors the hunger I’ve denied myself.
We drift toward each other, drawn like gravity.
Our lips brush—so softly that I barely taste the wine on her breath—before we step back at the same time, as if some unspoken force has yanked us apart.
Two people bound by something they can’t name and can’t afford.
And as I walk out of her apartment into the cold Paris night, I know one thing with terrible certainty: I will never forget her or stop wanting her.
* Imbecile (French)
* Listen (French)
* Cooking from the heart (French)
* Plus or minus/more or less (French)