Chapter 31 Paul Prague #2
"No, you don't understand." She props herself up on an elbow, looks down at me with fierce intensity.
"I love you. Not because you saved me. Not because you're my escape.
I love YOU. The way you hum when you paint.
How you can't make coffee without making a mess.
The fact that you alphabetize everything except your paint brushes, which you organize by some system I still can't figure out. "
"Color temperature." I start explaining. "I organize them by—"
She kisses me quiet. "I love that you're explaining your bizarre brush system while we're naked in bed. I love that you watch me sleep and think I don't know. I love that you've been painting me from memory for months, but you still look at me like you're seeing me for the first time."
"Vivianne—"
"I'm not finished." Her voice cracks slightly. "I love that you see me. Not the Faulks heiress. Not the asset. Not the victim. Me. Just me."
I pull her down, roll us so she's beneath me, cage her face between my hands. "You're everything. You know that, right? Everything."
We make love again, slower this time, memorizing each other with touch and taste and whispered promises. The sun climbs higher, warming our small, perfect world, and for a few hours, we forget about testimonies and trials and the weight of history we're helping to correct.
The doorbell breaks the spell.
We both freeze. No one knows this address except—
"It's me." Merlin's voice calls through the door. "And I brought lunch."
We dress quickly, laughing at ourselves for the moment of panic. When I open the door, Merlin stands there with bags from the Czech bakery down the street and a smile I rarely saw before the Swan was recovered.
"I'm interrupting." He takes in our mussed hair and the general air of afternoon debauchery.
"You're welcome." Vivianne counters, kissing his cheek and taking the bags. "Always."
We eat at our tiny table—bread and cheese, and those little Czech pastries Vivianne has become addicted to.
Merlin provides an update on the latest recovery efforts.
A cave in Austria yielded three tons of gold bars.
The Swiss finally opened a set of accounts that had been dormant since 1945.
Seventeen families have been reunited with artwork they thought was lost forever.
"There's a ceremony next month." Merlin sets down his coffee. "In Warsaw. They want to honor everyone involved in the recovery efforts."
"We won't be there." The refusal is immediate.
"I know. But they wanted you to know you're invited. Both of you."
"Maybe someday." Vivianne's voice is soft. "When it's safer."
Merlin studies us over the rim of his coffee, eyes amused, then lands on her bare left hand. "Speaking of ceremonies... when are you proposing?" He tips his head toward Vivianne. "I'd like to raise a glass to Paul and Vivianne Mercier while I'm still young enough to stand for the toast."
Vivianne laughs, color rising to her cheeks. "Subtle as ever."
"It's a rare gift,”I say.
The room narrows to the curve of her mouth, the way her thumb makes slow circles on the table between us. Not do I want to marry her—that's been true from the first impossible moment—but can I ask her to carry the word again. Wife. Ceremony. Promise. After everything.
Her eyes meet mine, steady, searching. She nods, almost imperceptibly, like she's giving me permission to ask and herself permission to want.
I reach for the string handle on the pastry box and work it loose, hands suddenly clumsy. "I should have a ring." My voice comes out rougher than I intend. "But I have this ridiculous bit of bakery twine and the only thing that matters."
I push back my chair and go to one knee on the chipped tile. The world goes very quiet.
"Vivianne Faulks." The name feels like a chapter closing. "Will you marry me? Will you be my partner in all of it—the quiet, the storms, the ordinary days—and become Vivianne Mercier?"
Her breath catches. For a heartbeat, all I see is the long shadow of her first wedding, the bruise of it. Then she exhales, eyes wet and bright, and holds out her hand. "Yes." Like a secret she's finally allowed to tell. "Yes!"
I tie the makeshift ring around her finger. It looks absurd and perfect. Merlin swears softly and wipes at his eyes, then pretends he didn't.
"Small ceremony." I stand and pull her into my arms. "Just us. Merlin as witness. Nothing like—"
"Nothing like before." She leans on my shoulder. She pulls back, smiling in that way that feels like sunlight. "Something real. Something ours."
Merlin clears his throat, back to brisk. "I know a magistrate here in Prague. Very discreet. Could be done tomorrow if you wanted."
"Tomorrow's too soon." Vivianne's voice is soft, then softer, to me, "But maybe in a year?"
"As you wish, ma chérie." The words settle in my bones like relief.
Later, when Merlin leaves with a hug that cracks my ribs, we stand in the doorway and look at the piece of string on her finger, and then at each other.
"Happy?" I ask.
"Yes." Her smile is real, and for the first time, I believe it.
The news plays on the café's small TV. Images of her father being led away in handcuffs. Prescott screaming about his rights. The Swiss treasury announcing the largest repatriation of stolen assets in history.
Vivianne doesn't even look at the screen.