Not talking to him was driving me crazy. This was ridiculous. I knew it was for the best so why was it so hard?
When we finally got off the coach and stepped into the hotel reception, Sammie came racing up to us.
‘I’m so glad I caught you!’ she said, waving multiple envelopes. ‘I meant to give you your photos to look over at dinner. Sorry!’
‘Oh yeah,’ I said. ‘It’s okay. We were too busy eating and… taking in the views, we probably wouldn’t have had time to look at them properly anyway. We can just do it tomorrow.’
‘Ahhhh…’ Sammie winced. ‘No can do, I’m afraid. You’re already late for submitting all of your photos, so you have to submit your favourites before midnight tonight. Those are the rules, otherwise you’ll lose points and I probably shouldn’t say this, but you two are one of the frontrunners at the moment.’
‘Really?’ I perked up.
‘Yeah! You’ve been visiting lots of extra locations and your photos are really unique. The ones of you sketching each other at Place du Tertre were genius!’
‘That was Gabriel’s idea,’ I smiled, wanting to make sure he got the credit.
‘It was a great one,’ Sammie said.
‘Merci,’ he replied.
‘So, like I was saying, it’d be a shame to ruin your winning streak. You’ve still got time to submit them.’ Sammie glanced at her watch. ‘The restaurant’s closed, but maybe if you went to one of your rooms you could go through them there…’ A devilish smile touched her lips.
I knew she was trying to do her job to bring us together but I wasn’t falling for it. I’d already nearly kissed Gabriel once tonight and there was no way I was going to risk being alone with him in my bedroom. That was just asking for trouble.
‘Perhaps we could go to the bar,’ Gabriel suggested and my shoulders loosened.
‘That sounds much better.’ There were bound to be other couples there so it’d be safer.
‘Oh, okay, cool,’ Sammie said, clearly disappointed that she hadn’t persuaded us to go to our room and start banging or some nonsense.
Never gonna happen, love.
Once we took the envelopes, we went to the bar. Gabriel ordered us two glasses of wine.
I probably shouldn’t drink any more tonight. I’d already had a glass of welcome champagne on the boat, followed by half a bottle of wine which was much more than I normally had. But I supposed an extra glass wouldn’t hurt.
Just as I took a sip, my phone buzzed.
When I took it out and saw Juliette’s name pop on the screen I groaned.
Shit.
I’d meant to text her earlier but I’d forgotten.
I was always reliable so she’d know that was unlike me. Then again, I’d promised to call yesterday and hadn’t either.
It was half eleven now.
Ihadto call. I downed my wine in one.
Just as I was about to dial her number, a message popped up.
Juliette
Hope you are having fun! I cannot wait to hear all of the juicy details about your sexy Frenchman. Enjoy!
I swallowed hard.
Fuck.
