Rhys, on the other hand, was trying very hard to make sense of it all.He’d brought Jillian to Paris to celebrate her birthday, even as Jillian was planning something for him.
When Jillian finished her last madeleine, Lyndsey set down her cup.“Come on, birthday girl,” she said.“You and I have plans.Your father is officially off duty for the rest of the day.”
Jillian blinked.“But—”
“No arguments,” Lyndsey said firmly, though her eyes were warm.“It’s your night, and I intend to spoil you rotten.Besides”—her gaze shifted to Cat—“these two have a little catching up to do.”
Understanding dawned on Jillian’s face, followed by her irrepressible grin.She slid out of her chair, looped her arm through her mother’s, and kissed Cat’s cheek.“Don’t let him be grumpy,” she whispered conspiratorially.
Cat smiled.“I’ll try my best.”
Rhys stood as they left, brushing a kiss across the top of his daughter’s head.“Happy birthday, love.”
“Best one ever,” Jillian said, already halfway out the door.
When the door closed behind them, silence bloomed, not awkward, but weighted, and warm.The café felt smaller somehow, cocooned in the hum of other people’s conversations and the faint patter of rain against the tall windows.
Rhys sat again, his expression soft, almost dazed.“They planned this together,” he said quietly.
“You must feel how I felt in Kalamazoo.I was gobsmacked.One moment I was working at my desk after class, and the next Jillian Harmon was in my room.”Cat grinned.“You do know she’s going to be a handful when she grows up.”
“Oh, she’s a handful already.”Rhys took Cat’s hand, fingers lacing with hers.“You didn’t come because she forced you to?”
“I’m here because I missed you terribly.”The laugher was gone from her voice and her expression grew somber.“I’m here because I made a mistake.I shouldn’t have left—”
He silenced her words by leaning across the table and kissing her.It wasn’t a brief kiss, either.When he finally lifted his head, she couldn’t speak; she could only look at him with so much love.
“I missed you,” he said, sliding one hand along her jaw to cup her face.“I don’t like this Michigan-England thing we’re doing.”
“I don’t, either.”
“We belong together.”
She nodded, turning her face ever so slightly to kiss the palm of his hand.“We do.”
“So, what do we do?”
“Go back to my hotel room?”
*
Paris woke slowlyunder a pale February sky.The city was washed clean from the night’s rain, and the cobblestones outside the Hôtel du Lac gleamed.From the open window of their room, Jillian could hear distant church bells and the low rumble of morning traffic.She yawned, stretching beneath the hotel duvet, and turned toward her mother, who was sipping coffee in bed and scrolling through the photos she’d taken the day before.
There were dozens of photos too.Jillian at the café with a mug of hot chocolate almost bigger than her hands.Jillian blowing out the single candle Lyndsey had found at a patisserie.Jillian mid-laugh, her hair wild, her joy unguarded.And then there were the others—the ones Jillian had begged her to take discreetly of her father and Cat greeting each other at the café yesterday, and then later, standing close together on the bridge.
Lyndsey stopped at one of those shots, zoomed in slightly, and smiled.“You’re quite the strategist,” she said.
Jillian returned to the bed and scrambled close to her mother.“I really like her and she makes Dad happy.”
“I think they make each other happy,” her mother agreed, handing Jillian the phone.
In the photo, Cat and Rhys were standing close, his arms wrapped around her, while the city around them seemed to shimmer.Jillian’s chest filled with something too big to name, equal parts pride and love.
“I was scared this wouldn’t work, and they’d just end up more upset,” she said.
“It was a risk,” Lyndsey agreed, reaching over to tuck a stray curl behind her daughter’s ear.“But you’re brave, and you have a beautiful heart.Most people your age just ask for phones or concert tickets for their birthday.”
“I just wanted everyone to stop being sad.”
