“Papa said you didn’t want to go back to the Louvre,” Aubert adds carefully.
I straighten. “Aubert?—”
“I know, I know,” he cuts me off. “What happened was awful. I told Papa it wasn’t you, but he sometimes acts without thinking.”
“I’m not going to discuss your father with you,” I say gently but firmly. “You understand, right?”
He rolls his eyes in that teenage way that makes me laugh despite myself. “I don’t get you grown-ups.You’re two people in love. Why can’t you make it work?”
That stops me cold. My heart does a little painful twist. Gustave told him he loves me? He toldhis sonhe lovesme?
Dios mio!
I clear my throat, not wanting to dwell on that. “You hungry?”
“Oui!” Aubert says eagerly. “Papa told me the food was amazing when he was here yesterday. He wouldn’t shut up about the salsa.”
Obviously, Gustave was openly talking to Aubert about us, about me.
I motion for him to follow me into the kitchen. “Did your father send you here to butter me up?”
“Absolutely,” he admits without shame.
I narrow my eyes. “He shouldn’t involve you in this.”
“Too late,” he replies cheerfully. “I’m alreadyveryinvolved and invested.”
We step into the kitchen and find Papi standing over a massive pot, humming to Vicente Fernández.
“Tara,sirvele algo?*,si?” he calls over his shoulder.
“I’m on it, Papi.”
I plate two tamales, drizzle them with green sauce, and set themin front of Aubert.
Aubert takes a bite and immediately closes his eyes. “Mon dieu.”
“None of that French blasphemy in my kitchen,” Papi says with mock sternness.
“It’sdelicioso?*, Juan, sir.”
“Good to hear,mijo?*.”
Aubert eats like a man starved.
“I’m sorry I didn’t reply to your messages,” I admit softly. “It…hurt too much.”
He looks up, eyes solemn. “It hurt him, too…once he realized…ah…qu’il avait la tête dans le cul…do you say that in English?”
“Is he saying his father has his head up his ass?” Papi remarks as he passes by us to get to the pantry.
“Juan, sir, you speak French?” Aubert exclaims.
“Un poquito?*,” Papi says before he disappears into the pantry.
Aubert smirks. “I like your father.”
“Everyone does,” I say softly. I love seeing Aubert here. Love that he likes my father.
