Chapter 12
Gustave
Our family name is inscribed on plaques in the Louvre, whispered on donor lists, and echoed in marble corridors.
Tonight, I attend yet another patron event—part gala, part board meeting, part performance of aristocratic duty.
I make my greetings, nod where expected, letting my name do most of the work.
It has been this way for centuries.
Henri de Valois, a seventeenth-century ancestor, served as a close advisor to Louis XIV.
When the Sun King decided the Louvre should no longer be a medieval fortress but a palace worthy of France, Henri was one of those who oversaw commissions with the royal architects.
In the records, his name appears beside Le Vau and Le Brun—not as brightly, but he was there smoothing conflicts and securing contracts.
Years later, during the Revolution, another de Valois—étienne—risked his life to protect the art in the Louvre from the mobs.
He smuggled canvases through side doors, hiding them in cellars until they could be restored to the nation.
One of those, a luminous portrait of a de Valois matriarch painted by Nicolas de Largillière, still hangs in a quiet gallery in the famed building.
Tourists pass it by, but for my family, it is proof that ‘our blood is in these walls’ as my grandfather would say.
When Napoleon decreed that the Louvre would become a museum for the people, a de Valois signature was on the first list of donors. Ever since, generation after generation, my family has written its name in stone and in paint here.
But when I step into the Salle des états, my gaze is no longer my own. It looks for her.
Tara is the antithesis of everything I have been raised to expect—of dynastic marriages, calculated alliances, and the suffocating choreography of the French elite.
The monarchy may have fallen, but the old order lingers.
Our names still carry weight, our influence seeps into boardrooms and museums, into salons and society pages.
And yet I want her. She, who is utterly outside that world, untouched by it, which is maybe why I can’t look away.
She stands with her colleagues near an easel, her hair pinned haphazardly, a smudge of something pale—chalk, plaster?
—at the edge of her wrist. She hasn’t bothered to dress up as the others who work at the Louvre have.
She’s merely in the middle of her workday, wanting to show her face and get back to the de Valois pastel.
She looks utterly out of place in this room of lacquered men and women, and yet somehow she belongs more than any of us because she’s of the art. She is life amongst the marble.
Our eyes lock across the gallery.
For a moment, the crowd melts.
She quickly looks away, paying attention to something Cece says, but the tension lingers like the echo of a bell.
She’s in a colorful skirt that goes all the way down to her ankles and a black shirt that stretches across her breasts.
I want her.
I force myself to continue my circuit—greetings, handshakes, banalities.
But every few steps, I glance at her. And every time, I catch her profile, her lashes lowered, her lips pressed into the careful, neutral line of someone trying not to be caught staring.
Later, when the speeches are finished and the crowd begins to drift toward the champagne, I find her alone at the edge of the gallery, looking to escape.
“Tara.”
She freezes at the sound of her name. Then she turns, polite smile in place, as if we are acquaintances and nothing more. “Gustave.”
The way she says my name. Putain! I’m done for.
“I…meant to bring it up when I met you, but our conversation….” I let my words trail away.
She jerks her chin up. “What of our conversation?”
I take a deep breath, and look around to make sure no one is close enough to hear. “I owe you an apology.”
She arches an eyebrow. “You do.”
“Yes. It was…uncouth to propose, as I did, a liaison.”
I want her.
I want her.
I want Tara Gayarre.
She swallows and shakes her head. “That…was…”—her voice drops—“both of us.”
Hope soars inside me.
No other woman has gotten to me as she has. It’s not how she looks because she is stunningly beautiful—non, it’s more. It’s how she easily quotes Sola or talks about art or…says my name.
“I also must apologize for Simone.” The words taste bitter. “She was out of line at the Fondation. Rude, deliberately so. You did not deserve that.”
She looks down at her boots as she tucks her hands in the pockets of her skirt.
By God, she’s in a paint-stained shirt at a foundation gathering, and she doesn’t give two fucks.
I envy her freedom. I wish I could stand with her and breathe the air she does, one not weighed down by centuries of expectations and responsibilities.
“She was…memorable.” There’s a glint in her eyes when she adds, “And she was subtle.”
“She uses subtlety like a weapon.” It’s reprehensible for me to discuss my ex-wife in a poor light with the woman I want to bed.
But it doesn’t feel sleazy. It feels liberating to talk to her, tell her what’s in my heart.
“I should have—” I stop myself before I say protected you. That sounds patronizing.
“You should have what?” she demands.
I exhale, my control fraying in the presence of her steady gaze. “I should have stopped her.”
For a moment, silence stretches between us, heavy with all the things I cannot say. That I wanted to tear Simone’s hand from my arm, that I wanted to tell the entire glittering room that Tara mattered more than any title or jewel. That I wanted to walk away with her, only her.
But I say none of it.
Instead, I incline my head—the Count, the diplomat, the man who must always choose restraint, and centuries of de Valois men speak through me when I say, “Good evening, Mademoiselle Gayarre.”
I walk away, my heart heavy, and talk to acquaintances about things I don’t care about.
Giselle is perky and smiling, and I nod, ask polite questions about the Carriera. All the while I look around for her, and a pang runs through me. She’s gone.
Where?
Suddenly, it feels unbearable to be without her. Un-fucking-bearable.
The corridors are quiet, the echo of voices fading into the marble as I make my way back toward the restoration wing—an excuse, I tell myself, to see the Carriera, though I know that’s a lie.
When I push the door open, the lab is semi-dark.
Low lamps glow over the long benches, tools neatly aligned, brushes in jars.
She is tucking her phone into her bag, her hair falling loose around her shoulders.
She looks up, startled when she sees me. “Gustave.”
The door softly clicks closed behind me. “I had to see you.”
For a heartbeat, we only stare at each other. She turns her back to me, her palms on the workbench.
I move behind her, closing the distance between us with deliberate slowness.
She doesn’t turn around, but I can feel her breath hitch, her body tense.
She knows what’s coming.
My fingers graze her hips, and she shivers, her ass pressing back into me.
I groan.
I lean in, my lips brushing the shell of her ear.
“Turn around,” I whisper, my voice low and rough.
She does, and Christ, her eyes are already dark with want.
Her lips part, rising to meet mine.
“Gustave—” she begins, but my mouth silences hers.
The first kiss is soft, almost chaste.
I deepen it languidly, my tongue sliding against hers, claiming her mouth like it’s mine. She tastes like mint and sin.
I can’t get enough.
My hands roam her body, gripping her waist, then her ass, pulling her flush against me. She gasps into my mouth, her hips grinding against my erection.
Her hand slides against my chest as if to push me away, but she doesn’t. Instead, she clutches the lapel of my jacket, pulling me closer, her body arching into mine.
She breaks away, breathless. “We can’t. This is a mistake.”
Her eyes are wild, conflicted. She wants me. She doesn’t want to want me.
I cup her face, my thumb brushing her cheek. “I know. I want to regret this, Tara. I should regret it. But I can’t.”
Her breath hitches as I kiss her again, deeper this time.
My hands trace the curve of her back, hers digging into my shoulders, both of us caught in something neither of us has the strength to stop.
The lab smells of solvents and varnish, but all I can breathe is her.
All I can think of is her.
When she finally tears her mouth from mine, her voice trembles. “This won’t end well.”
“No,” I agree, resting my forehead against hers. “But it will be worth it.”
This time, she pulls me to her, attacks my mouth. My cock twitches in anticipation, already hard as marble.
The sounds we make, the hushed moans, amplify above the quiet of the lab, the faint hum of the climate control system keeping the air cool and sterile.
My lips trail down her neck, nipping and sucking at her pulse point.
She moans, her fingers tangling in my hair.
“Gustave,” she breathes, and it’s enough to send a jolt of heat straight to my erection.
I push her back until her ass hits the edge of the table, then lift her onto it with one swift motion. Her legs fall open instinctively, and I step between them, my hands sliding up her thighs, pushing her skirt up to her hips.
I push the gusset of her wet panties aside and cup her.
She shudders, her hips lifting off the table, begging for more.
I oblige, circling her clit with my thumb while two fingers slide into her tight cunt.
She’s so wet, so ready for me.
Her head falls back, a whimper escaping her lips as I pump my fingers in and out, curling them to hit that sweet spot inside her.
“Please,” she whines, her hands clutching the edge of the table.
I drop to my knees, pulling her panties down. They get tangled up in her boots, but I get them off, and slide them into my suit pocket.
I spread her thighs wider.
Her pussy glistens in the dim light. I can’t wait any longer.
I bury my face between her thighs, licking a long, slow stripe from her entrance to her clit.
She cries out, her hips jerking, but I hold her down, my tongue flicking over her clit in quick, teasing strokes.
“Shh, chérie,” I murmur against her heated flesh.
She’s trembling, her thighs squeezing my head as I eat her out like a man starved.
I add another finger, plunging deep inside her while my tongue works her clit.
She’s close—I can feel her walls tightening around my fingers, her breath coming in ragged gasps.
“Come for me,” I command, and she does, her body arching off the table as she whispers my name over and over again.
I don’t stop until she’s spent, her legs shaking, her pussy still quivering around my fingers.
I stand, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand.
She looks up at me with heavy-lidded eyes.
“You’re beautiful.” My voice is thick with lust.
She smiles, her fingers already fumbling with the buttons of my pants—
We hear doors open and close.
We freeze.
I kiss her mouth gently, releasing her hands from my clothes. “Next time, chérie.”
I now know there will be a next time…and a next time. Screw scandal, I want this woman. She’s a fire in my blood.
She nods. She understands, too.
More doors open and close. Someone is coming. This is risky.
“Tonight. I’ll come to your place tonight.” I kiss her pouty mouth once more. “Say I can.”
A door slams. She gasps. “Yes, you can,” she whispers urgently.
I trace a gentle thumb over her lower lip before I walk out of the lab.
As soon as I do, I bump into Giselle.
“Ah, Giselle. I wanted to check on the Carriera.” I take advantage of her interest in me and tuck her hand on my forearm, and walk her away from where Tara is recovering from the orgasm I gave her with my tongue. Giselle gladly lets me.
“So, this American is working out?” I ask, polite, conversational.
I steer her toward the Salle des états, away from the conservation lab, away from the woman who has undone me with a single whispered yes.
Giselle hums in approval. “Yes, she’s quite talented. Dedicated. I suppose we should be grateful you arranged the loan.”
I smile faintly.
My blood is still humming from Tara’s touch, my lips still tingling with the taste of her. My mind is half here, half back in that quiet, controlled room where she let me kiss her, which I did like a starving man.
We enter the Salle des états, where the patrons are gathered under the floodlights, glasses clinking, the chatter of money and influence filling the air.
Phone cameras go click, click, click near the Mona Lisa, guests preen and circle one another. The room feels empty because she’s not in it.
I leave shortly thereafter, in a hurry to get to her.
My heart soars in a way I have not felt since I was a boy.
This is no performance.
For the first time in years, I am not thinking of scandal, or of Simone, or of the headlines that might follow me.
For the first time in years, I am thinking only of a woman. A woman who is mine.