Chapter Fourteen

Eight dancers in red and blue dresses and feathered hats lined the stage, kicking their legs, swinging their ruffled skirts, and showing off the lacy lingerie underneath. They danced in a circle formation, kicking so high it looked like their legs might fly out from under them. Then they all kicked up their right legs and held them aloft almost vertical with their right arms. Holding this pose, they stomped their standing legs and spun like tops. Around and around they went, longer than seemed humanly possible, until their legs dropped and the dancers fell into the splits on the stage.

Charlotte kicked and tried to follow along with the others. Antoine did quite well, though the men didn't do as much leg throwing as the women. He was the kind of man who could let his ego go and have fun. He didn't care that he didn't know what he was doing. He smiled and laughed the whole time. And when he pulled her in after a particularly fast and rowdy combination of steps and held her waist and hand, a sense of loss struck her. They might never dance together again. This might be the last time he puts his arms around her. Her whole body crawled with anticipatory grief. Everything was so fleeting. Every sensation. Every moment.

It overwhelmed her. Then she caught his gaze, swirling with desire. Everything that existed between them—even the fact that he hadn't changed his mind about marrying someone else—fell away. Like this, she loved him. And she wanted them to be simply a man and a woman one time before reality swooped back in to prevent it.

She put her hands on his chest to stop him from flinging her away in a spin. She clutched his lapel, and then she lifted on her toes and kissed him. Right there in the middle of the dance floor, all those people around. If he was surprised, he quickly recovered. He put his arms around her and kissed her back. His mustache was soft and his mouth welcoming. When he parted his lips, she swiped her tongue along his teeth, kissing harder. Everyone around them disappeared into a noisy blur, and her head swam in delight until some expedient patron whistled and a few others joined in with applause and whooping shouts of ooh la la.

When she pulled away, most of the onlookers had already lost interest in their show of affection and carried on dancing. Antoine was looking at her as if he was in a daze. His dark eyes. His smiling face. His solid shoulders and chest. He was so perfect. And she had to leave him. She had to tell him she was leaving. She had to do it now.

"I'm leaving Paris."

"What?"

"I'm going home to Vernon."

"For how long?"

"I don't know. But probably for a while. For good, maybe."

Antoine's brow furrowed and he took her hand, leading her off the crowded dance floor and back toward the tables. Theirs was occupied, but he found another. He dropped into a chair like he couldn't stand for another second. Then he and looked up at her, still holding her hand. "I don't understand. When? Why?"

"I'm out of money, simple as that. Rent is due on Monday, and I don't have it." She dropped his hand and sat across from him. "It's been harder to sell stories than I thought it would be, and maybe I wasn't very realistic about how much I could earn that way. And so my time is up."

"Charlotte, don't be silly. How much do you need?"

"More than I've been able to earn or feel comfortable asking my parents for. They'd rather I came home anyway."

He stared at her, open-mouthed and wide-eyed.

"It's not that big of a deal. I wanted a Paris experience, and I got it. I've had a lovely time, thanks to you. And now my time is up. Back to real life. At least for now."

"This is what you want?"

"Not exactly. But I can't always get what I want." She imbued the words with as much double meaning as she could muster. She couldn't have him. "It doesn't work that way."

"Don't be silly. I will give you the money to pay your rent."

"Now you're being silly."

"I'm not at all. Establishing a writing career takes time, I'm sure. And I want you to succeed. I want to buy you the time you need. I'll give you the money. We can go to my house and get it right now."

"What? You've got fifteen francs just sitting around back at your place?"

"Yes."

After she'd lost sleep over the money for days, it seemed unfathomable that he could produce it with a quick stop at home. "Antoine, you know I can't let you do that."

"Why not?"

"Because. What will people think?"

"Who cares? No one has to know. I'll give you the cash."

"Antoine." The dancing on the stage finished with a roar of cheers from the dance floor. Then the band began a slower number and the throng of people fell into step.

"Charlotte. Please," Antoine said after a moment. "Let me do this for you. I am your friend, am I not? I have money. You need money. It's as simple as that."

"But it's not as simple as that, and you know it."

"If it's not simple, then you're the one who is complicating it." There was an edge desperation in his words. He leaned back in his seat.

"I don't know when I'll be able to pay you back."

"I don't care if you never pay me back."

"Maybe not. But what will I do next month?"

"By then you will have sold another story." He said it so confidently, as if it could only be true.

"Maybe. Or maybe my departure is inevitable."

Antoine put his hat on the table and his head in his hands. The music swirled around them, and Charlotte didn't know what to say. This was more painful for him than she anticipated. When he looked up, his ruffled hair fell over his forehead and he smiled weakly at her. He reached across the table and took her hand. He held it in both of his and played with her fingers a little, lovingly examining the little callus where she held her pencil too tight and the faint ink stains that she'd scrubbed at earlier. His white gloves were soft against her skin. Antoine was a different sort of man than she'd ever met, and his feelings for her ran deep, deeper than Pierre's lusty admiration. Leaving Pierre had been easy. This was something else entirely. She never felt so admired and loved.

Antoine loved her. It radiated off him. It wasn't a game for him, or a fling. The crumpled, tired look on his face was heartbreak. Charlotte's eyes burned with a surge of tears, which she blinked away. And when that didn't hold them off, she wiped her eyes with her free hand. He raised the hand he had to his mouth and kissed the back of it. He held it there, breathing her in. Then he turned her hand over and kissed her wrist quickly before enclosing her hand in his and setting it back down on the table between them. The delicate gesture entranced her, wiped her thoughts and worries from her mind.

"Is this what you want, Charlotte? Vernon?"

"No. It most certainly isn't."

?

"Let's go see if we can find Guillaume and Diane." Antoine stood up and gently tugged Charlotte's hand so she'd stand too. The loud, boisterous music pounded against his brain. The crowd around them had become oppressive. And he had to convince Charlotte to stay in the city. He had to show her how much she meant to him. He laced his fingers in hers and maneuvered them through the partying crowd. When they made it inside, he searched for their friends at every table.

"I don't see them," Charlotte said. "I don't see anyone we arrived with."

"I don't either."

They checked the bar area and went to the other side of the dining room for a different angle, checking every face they passed.

"Could they have gone back outside? Or left?"

"Maybe. I should check with the ma?tre d'."

Without releasing Charlotte's hand, he explained the situation to the man at the front door.

"Ah, yes. Monsieur Allard left a message for you. He and Mademoiselle Talbot left not long ago, and Monsieur Allard is seeing the lady home."

Charlotte shrugged. And then she didn't argue or even ask where they were going when Antoine led her out the door and onto the street. He didn't quite know the answer himself. He just couldn't stand to be in the cabaret for one more minute, surrounded by all those people when everything inside him screamed for Charlotte alone. He hailed a cab, helped Charlotte into it, and gave the driver his home address before sliding in next to her. As the carriage jolted forward, he removed his gloves and tucked them in the interior pocket of his jacket. Then he took Charlotte's soft, small hand again.

The shadows from the streetlights moved across her face, and he held her gaze for a long moment. Then her eyes flicked down to his mouth. She put her free hand on his thigh and used it as leverage to reach him. She paused for a second, a breath away, and then kissed him.

Antoine moved his hands to her waist and pulled her closer, nearly into his lap, and held her there. Charlotte wrapped her arms around his neck and tipped her head to kiss him deeper. The fabric of her dress rustled as she pressed against him, and the only other sounds were the rhythm of the horses' hooves on the street and Charlotte's soft little moans. She tasted like champagne and the scent of smoke from the club clung to her and mingled with her floral perfume. It drained him of every thought and sensation besides desire.

He had snuck women into his parents' house on an occasion or two. Not that he could get in any sort of real trouble; he was a grown man after all. But everything at his parents' house was simpler when he kept his affairs as private as possible. And so when the cab dropped them in front, he led her around to the side entrance and ushered her upstairs to his rooms. With the door closed behind him, he lit two lamps while Charlotte stood timidly against the wall, seemingly taking in every detail of his lodgings.

"I spend most of my time in here reading and corresponding. My bed and dressing room are through there."

The housekeeper had been through and neatened his piles of books and papers. The surface of his desk had been cleared. He didn't have company often, though the thought of bringing Charlotte back had crossed his mind a million times. Having her here now, in his space, felt more intimate than the other times they'd spent together, perhaps even more so than their carriage rides.

"It's quite grand," she said quietly. "Can anyone hear us talking?"

"No. We are alone. But first…"

He left her and went to his closet, where he kept cash in a carved wooden box. Among his rows of suits and shelves of shoes, he counted fifteen francs, then twenty, off the stack. Then he counted what was left. Thirty-four francs wasn't a small amount of money, but it wasn't that much either. So little to him and so much to Charlotte. He'd give it all to her. He closed the box and returned to Charlotte in the sitting room.

"I brought you here to give this to you. And so I want to do it right away, before anything else happens." He put the money in her hand and closed her fingers around it. "Because no matter what happens next, whether you stay or go or what we do or say, I want you to have this money. Think of it as a donation in support of the arts."

She looked at the money like she wasn't sure she should take it. Antoine was prepared to argue. But then she put it in the pocket of her dress. He could have collapsed with relief.

"Would you like a drink? I have whiskey, and can probably drum up some wine in the kitchen if you prefer that."

"Whiskey is fine. Thank you."

"Please sit."

She did, on the leather settee, while he poured the drinks. He served her, and then sat down next to her, as close as he could get without smashing her. Settling in, he propped his arm on the back of the settee.

Charlotte sipped the whiskey, shuddered, and then set her glass on the edge of the table. That shudder delighted Antoine. He took a drink, savoring the burn as he swallowed.

After a few quiet minutes, Charlotte spoke. "This is a pretty nice place you have here, Antoine."

"Merci. It's been in the family for generations."

"I would assume nothing less," she said with a wry edge. She turned in the seat to face him. Pulling her to him would be so easy, he was so close to her mouth. Their nearness, the amicable silence, seemed to be building. But it was something tenuous, something he should approach with caution. He should wait for her to make the next move, even if his need for her strained in his chest and his pants.

Another quiet minute ticked by. The lamp flickered and shot shadows across them. Antoine took another swallow of his whiskey, and when the glass left his mouth, she took it and set it next to hers on the table. Then she placed her hand on his leg and looked up at him with a cloudy, desirous haze in her eyes.

"Charlotte, are you sure?" He managed to get the words out even as her hand slid up his thigh, closing in on his aching crotch.

She rubbed and whispered, "Yes. I have wanted this for quite some time, perhaps more than I've ever wanted anything else."

She stood, and he mourned the absence of her warm hand as he watched her remove the pins holding her hat to her head. She set them on the table, and then stepped out of her shoes and kicked them away. She unhooked the buttons that held her dress in place. Then she pulled her arms loose and let the whole thing fall to the floor. Catching the strings of her bodice in her nimble fingers, she untied and loosened the laces. She undressed as if she were alone, slowly and without show. It was so simple and so sexy, her self-possession so compelling, that all he could do was watch it all unfold. She bent down to pick the dress up, and then draped it on the back of the wingback chair with her bag. Then she stood before him, straddling his knees with her legs, wearing nothing but a thin chemise, lacy underwear, and the garters holding her stockings. She unclipped them, placing her toes on the settee next to him and sliding the stocking down.

He'd never seen anything like it. He'd never met anyone like her. Her getting naked in his room was like jumping off a cliff, something that he could never undo. His life changed when she entered it. She'd thrown everything off.

With both stockings discarded on the oriental rug, Charlotte pulled the satin chemise over her head, stepped forward as it fell from her hands, and straddled him in nothing but her drawers. The scent of her enveloped him as his mouth met her soft bare shoulder, his hands met her breasts. He would never be the same.

?

"Oh, Charlotte, I'm done for," Antoine whispered into her skin. His warm hands explored, soothing and torturing her at the same time.Charlotte moaned and tilted her hips, rubbing against the fabric of his suit. She laced her hands through his hair, finding his mouth with hers. Her whole body throbbed and her mind focused on him, his lips, his neck, all his layers of clothing between them. She was done for too.

Their lips fused and his tongue dipped into her mouth. Her hands moved down the back of his neck to his shoulders and then to his tie. Tipping her head, desperate to deepen their kiss, she unknotted his tie and slid it free from his collar. The silky fabric slid from her fingers, and she began opening the buttons of his shirt. He moved his hands to her hips while she worked. When she couldn't feel any more buttons, she pushed his shirt down over his shoulders and pulled it free from his pants. He wrapped an arm around her to hold her in place, then bent forward to slip out of his jacket. With her help, he pulled his arm free.

"Let's go to the bed, Charlotte."

She nodded eagerly and stood. As he stood, he removed the rest of his jacket and shirt. Then he pulled her against his bare chest and lifted her. She wrapped her legs around his waist as he carried her toward the bedroom. He bumped into a table on the way, and she cringed at his sharp intake of breath.

"Are you all right?"

"Of course, I am, darling."

They passed through a little hall into his bedroom, which was dark and shadowy. The moon shone through the windows that lined one wall, and that's all Charlotte noticed before he set her gently down on the bed. In a quick swoop, he had her drawers down her legs and off. And then he knelt before her and parted her knees. Charlotte quivered when his tongue met her flesh and pressed against the place where all her nerves came together. She wiggled underneath him and he put his hands under her to hold her in position and licked in firm swipes, then tenderly bit and sucked until her brain glitched and blacked out in pleasure. She cried out his name and writhed against him until her whole body was reduced to a puddle.

Before she could recover, he pecked her inner thigh, stood, and stripped away his pants with remarkable speed. In a second, he was naked and gleaming in the shadowy light of his bedroom. Then he was over her kissing her mouth and pressing between her thighs. After wanting this man for so long, and even knowing he'd never truly be hers, Charlotte gasped as he slowly, gently pushed inside her. It was finally happening. She was as close as she could be to this man.

"Oh, Charlotte," he whispered, pausing for a moment to kiss her jaw before he started moving his hips in a slow, devastating rhythm. Focusing only on that, she forgot about all the other complications of their situation. There were no parental expectations. No society. No gossip. No traditions. It was just Charlotte and Antoine, and the physical act of love.

She wrapped her legs around his waist and ran her hands down his strong, muscled back. His skin was so smooth, silkier even than his fine clothes. As their bodies moved together, her mind softened and the world disappeared. His mouth found hers again, found her tongue, and he kissed her so deeply that something stirred within her. When he came up for air, he groaned and pumped harder and faster, grinding against her until she exploded again into a million tingling stars. Antoine's body tensed then and shuddered as he pulled out fast, spilling onto her stomach. He made the most delightful, guttural sound and then collapsed over her.

Panting and messy and slicked in sweat, he kissed her ear and laughed. "Charlotte, that was marvelous. You're marvelous."

"It was fun, wasn't it?" Over his shoulder, the window cast a pale wedge of light across the ceiling. The chandelier hanging over them hung from the center of an ornate tin medallion. What could it be like to wake up under such elegance every morning? She'd never imagined herself in a room like this. Or with a man like Antoine. She'd scoffed at such fantasies. And here she was, in his huge, satiny bed. Perfectly comfortable. Perfectly in love.

After cleaning up and taking a break, Charlotte and Antoine repeated the performance twice more before falling asleep. But Charlotte didn't sleep for long.

She awoke in the blue morning darkness. Antoine was lying on his side, facing away from her, breathing slow and steady with sleep. She listened to him and tried to fall back to sleep in the pocket of his warm bed. But she couldn't. When the little clock on his bedside table advanced to six in the morning, she gave up and slid as stealthily out of bed as she could. Her legs were still weak from their passionate activities. The air in the room was cool against her bare skin. She moved through the rooms, collecting each piece of her clothing, and redressed herself. The curtains of the sitting room were open, and so the oncoming sunrise cast the room in a pale, creamy light. She'd never slept in such fancy rooms before, and she took in every detail of his space, his habits. When she found his cigarettes on a side table, she took one and held her breath as she slowly opened the glass door that led to the balcony.

Outside was quiet and still. The balcony looked over a garden below. From that vantage point, all the other windows appeared to be dark except for one on the bottom of the other side. The kitchen, perhaps. She'd had too much to drink last night. And she'd practically thrown herself at Antoine. But as the smoke billowed around her, her mind felt clear and open and satisfied. Who knew what would happen next? What Antoine would say after the night they'd had. None of it worried her now. They were in love. Madly. She just had to trust that Antoine would know it meant he couldn't marry anyone but her. When the cigarette was finished, she put it in the cast iron ashtray and went back inside.

Antoine hadn't moved, so Charlotte slowly opened the door that led out into the hallway. Creeping back the way they'd come the night before, she walked quickly and as quietly as possible. The floor was covered in a floral rug with big red roses and greenery. It had been dark when they'd come in, but she found the service stairs easily and made her way down. His house was quite magnificent, as magnificent as the others she'd visited in his company. Until then, his wealth was abstract, at least somewhat. Seeing it firsthand secured the understanding that he was a different sort of person than her.

As she was stepping down onto the landing and the exit, a man in a livery came around the corner and started when he saw her.

"Pardon me, mademoiselle. Bon matin." He recovered himself quickly and smiled.

"Apologies, monsieur. I was just leaving."

"Can I send for a carriage?"

This was a tempting offer, but she was afraid of drawing undue attention to the fact of her existence in the de Larminet mansion. And the shame of being caught was beginning to burn. "No, thank you."

"It's no trouble, and I'm sure Monsieur de Larminet would insist."

"That's okay." Monsieur de Larminet. No doubt this man knew exactly what she was doing here.

The man nodded and stepped forward, opening the door for her. "Au revoir, mademoiselle."

Outside, daylight greeted her harshly. Charlotte was tired and sore and a little hungover. But the air was cool and a light breeze blew off the river. Instead of looking for a cab, she walked back toward Rue de Fortuny, regretting only that she hadn't thought to leave Antoine a note.