Chapter 19
Chapter
Nineteen
DOMINIC
Iwoke up in Paris after an unplanned nap, my body boneless and my mind quiet for the first time in weeks, the kind of peace that only came from forgetting the world in Rachel’s arms.
Not in the poetic way people said it, like it was a revelation or a reinvention. I woke up in Paris because I opened my eyes and there were unfamiliar walls, unfamiliar light, unfamiliar quiet—and Rachel.
We couldn’t have been asleep long. The morning hadn’t even fully arrived yet, the light still thin and pale, like it hadn’t decided what kind of day it wanted to be.
She was curled into me, breathing slow, her hair a soft, damp mess across the pillow like she’d fallen asleep mid-thought and never bothered to move.
I didn’t move. I just lay there, letting the reality of her settle into my bones, letting myself believe this wasn’t something I’d imagined during the flight or the train. She was warm and real and here, and for the first time in weeks, my mind felt quiet.
This—this small, borrowed morning with her—was what I’d been missing all along.
Not just the calls. Not just the texts. Being here with her. The way her face softened in sleep. The way her hand twitched slightly when I shifted, like her body had memorized mine even if she was learning to live without me.
She stirred a few minutes later, blinking up at me with a confused, sleepy smile.
“Oh,” she said. “You’re still here.”
“I was hoping that wasn’t a morning hallucination,” I replied.
She laughed softly and rolled onto her back, staring at the ceiling like she was doing mental math. “We’re late.”
“Define late.”
She sat up abruptly. “No. Like actually late. I have a meeting at the Daily in forty minutes and—” She checked her phone and groaned. “Thirty-three minutes.”
I shifted against the headboard. “Okay, I’m moving.”
She paused mid-scramble and looked at me. “You don’t have to go… you can stay here and—”
“I want to go,” I said. “I want to see it. Your life. Your work. Everything—” I paused. “Unless I’d be in the way.”
She hesitated. Not about me — about the question.
“Take my boyfriend to work day?” she said lightly.
I latched onto one word. “You can take me anywhere you want, especially if you call me your boyfriend.”
She rolled her eyes, but she was smiling. “The work isn’t always pretty. It’s messy, chaotic, and I don’t always know where I’m going until I get there. So—you may not have fun.”
There it was. The real question, hiding inside the logistics.
I studied her for a beat — hair wild, eyes still soft with sleep, already pulling herself into ten directions at once.
“I don’t need fun,” I said quietly. “And you don’t have to entertain me. I want to see you. However that looks.”
That earned me a smile that was half grateful and half worried.
“Okay,” she said softly. “But I warned you.”
I smiled back. “You didn’t warn me about anything. You challenged me.”
You’re always challenging me. It’s why I can’t get enough.
But I kept that part to myself. Rachel wasn’t ready for that yet.
We were both dressed in a hurry—me in the same jeans I arrived in and a borrowed sweater of hers—one she stole from me—that smelled faintly like her apartment, her in black pants and a jacket that made her look both professional and perpetually five minutes from running.
She made us a pair of coffees in disposable coffee cups. “I try not to use these as often here, but we’re running late, so I don’t want to stop on the way.”
“I can always step out to get you one once we get there,” I offered, enjoying the way she moved so fluidly, barely slowing down to segue from one action to the next. I just stayed out of her way unless she told me to grab something.
On our way out, we ran into a blonde coming out of her apartment on the first floor. A quick flip through the mental files pulled her name out. Alix. Student at the Sorbonne. Rachel liked her.
She took one look at me, then at Rachel, then back at me.
“Oh,” she said, her voice a soft purr with a deeply French accent. Also, thankfully, she spoke in English. My French was passable, but I had been practicing. “So this is Dominic.”
Rachel froze. I offered my most polite, well-trained lawyer smile.
“Guilty.”
Alix grinned like she’d just won a bet. “Good. I was worried you were imaginary. I’m Alix. Welcome to the building.”
“Be nice,” Rachel muttered.
“I am being nice,” Alix replied cheerfully. “I just like knowing what my friends’ mysteries look like.”
She leaned in and kissed Rachel on the cheek, then nodded at me. “Take care of her. She forgets to eat.”
“I’ve noticed.”
Rachel shot me a look. “Traitor.”
We stepped out into the morning air, Paris already awake in that effortless way cities only manage when they’ve been doing it for centuries. Rachel walked fast, phone in one hand, coffee in the other, already half in work mode.
“You can hang at the café across from the Daily if you get bored,” she said. “It’s decent. Wi-Fi works. I might disappear on you for a few hours.”
“I’m not offended,” I said. “I came to see you in your habitat. This counts.”
Her office was exactly what I expected, beautiful chaos. Light everywhere. People hurrying around with purpose. Conversations overlapping in French, English, and whatever shorthand people invented when they worked together long enough.
The first to spot us was an attractive woman with auburn hair up in a neat twist and wearing an equally sharp pantsuit accented by a colorful scarf.
She didn’t even seem to hesitate as she strode over to greet us. She looked me up and down once, then turned to Rachel with a knowing smile.
“C’est toi, Dominic?” she said.
Rachel visibly tensed. “Oui.”
The woman gave a soft throaty laugh then gave me another once over. From the glint in her eye, she approved. “No wonder Rachel plays it coy about you,” she said, this time in English.
I blinked.
Eyes narrowing, Rachel glared at her and it wasn’t quite as playful as the woman’s flirt. “Margaux—”
Margaux waved her off. “Détends-toi. J’approuve. On n’a juste pas beaucoup de mystères par ici.” Then to me, “I’m Margaux. Welcome to the circus.”
I was going to have to ask Rachel for a translation later, but she was already gone—pulled into a rapid-fire conversation in French where I caught maybe one word in twelve. Maybe. I recognized deadlines and another about lights. Then the rest was pretty much French to me.
I stood there for a second, coffee in hand, feeling strangely like a guest in someone else’s dream. At the same time, this was exactly where I wanted to be.
Margaux pointed me toward Rachel’s desk with a look that was half permission, half amusement, and I settled against it, trying not to look like I was trespassing in sacred territory.
A few people glanced over. Some openly curious. One woman whispered something in French to another and both of them looked me up and down like I’d wandered into the wrong movie.
Margaux said something else under her breath—also in French—but I caught Rachel’s name and the word intéressant. That earned her a raised brow from me and a smirk in return.
Apparently, I was being reviewed.
And somehow, I didn’t mind at all.
I let myself just… exist there. Not hiding. Not hovering. Just being Rachel’s, in a room full of people who clearly knew her better than they knew me—and maybe found that interesting.
So immersed in her conversations and tasks, Rachel disappeared and reappeared several times. She didn’t check on me or apologize for leaving me standing there, and I was oddly grateful for that. This wasn’t a performance for my benefit. This was simply her life, unfolding at full speed.
I spent the next hour watching her move in and out of meetings, laughing with people, frowning at screens, gesturing wildly as she explained something I couldn’t hear.
She was brilliant.
She was alive.
And she was running.
When she finally reappeared—hair slightly more chaotic than before, sweater half-slid off one shoulder—she looked genuinely surprised to see me still there.
“You didn’t leave.”
“I said I wouldn’t.”
She smiled, but there was a crack in it. “I’m sorry. I just—today’s one of those days.”
“I know,” I said gently. “I can see it.” I glanced at the clock on the wall. “I’m going to get lunch and bring it back here. You eat when you can.”
For a second she just stared at me, like I’d offered her something in a foreign language. Then she nodded, slow and grateful.
“I’d like that.”
Feeling useful for the first time all day, I straightened. “Any preferences?”
She thought about it, then shrugged. “Surprise me?”
“Dangerous answer.” I reached for her hand, then paused. “Public displays of affection acceptable in this institution?”
She caught my hand before I could pull back and brushed a quick kiss to my mouth, soft but unmistakably deliberate.
“Absolutely.”
A few people definitely saw. Margaux definitely did.
I didn’t care.
Savoring the contact, I headed out into the street with a stupid smile on my face and the very clear, very satisfying knowledge that for at least a few hours, I belonged to this version of her life.
When I came back with food, the atmosphere around Rachel’s desk had changed.
Not in any way you could subpoena. No raised voices, no obvious conflict. Just a subtle shift in posture, volume, and movement—the kind of thing you learned to clock in a courtroom before someone objected.
René was there.
He stood beside Rachel’s chair, coat still on, one hand resting on the back of it like it was a deposition prop he’d claimed. He was speaking in low, precise French, each sentence clipped and controlled.
Rachel had gone still in that way people do when they’re listening under pressure.
I slowed automatically.
René turned his head and looked at me.
Not hostile. Not friendly.
Evaluating.
The same look I gave opposing counsel when they walked in with a smile that didn’t reach their eyes.
Ah.
Master Grumpy, Esquire.