“Traveling light does have advantages,” Edie said. “Although there are the extra questions from scary border officials about why you don’t have luggage, accompanied by a bomb dog’s nose in your butt.”
“Unpleasant,” Cosima said, closing her eyes. “I was afraid when you got goosed that you would confess we’re going to France to find a treasure.”
“Of course not. We don’t need henchmen following us through Europe, ready to tie us up and steal our spoils. Although I’m not sure what kind of spoils I should be anticipating. How much do gold bars weigh?”
Cosima listened to Edie talk with her eyes closed while thetrain moved out of the station. She fell asleep in the dark cabin as the car settled into its smooth hum, racing overland on its way to the channel.
She couldn’t tell what made her wake up—if it was a door opening or the sound of clinking glasses—but she knew she didn’twantto. After hours of travel grime and sore legs and threatening headaches, she was surrounded by a soft smell that reminded her of the lemon zest she’d piled onto the saucer. Every muscle in her body had gone lax, her limbs tucked into or surrounded by eye-rollingly beautiful softness. The tension in her eyes and neck had been chased away by the delicious half dreams of her nap.
“Cosima.”
She burrowed herself deeper into the lovely, soft nap place.
“Princess.” Edie’s voice was close, but maybe she was dreaming that. If shewasdreaming about Edie, she wondered if she could initiate a meditation that would allow her toreallydream about Edie. To hold her the way she wanted to and practice kissing Dream Edie until it got as good as she hoped it could be.
“The drinks service is coming through. It’s possible you might want to, um. Find your way to your seat.”
Edie’s voice vibrated against Cosima’s cheek. It was nice. “Am in my seat.”
“Part of you is in your seat. And part of you is in my seat. On me.”
Cosima opened her eyes. She went to adjust herself and then fully appreciated why Edie had interrupted her nap.
Her leg was wrapped around Edie’s thigh, for starters. And, as she sheepishly slid her leg away, she discovered her forearm snuggled between Edie’s breasts, her hand along Edie’s jaw, and her other arm—once those two disobedient limbs had beenextricated—wrapped around Edie’s shoulders, her fingers cupping the nape of Edie’s neck.
She rubbed her face and felt the impression of the collar of Edie’s shirt pressed into her skin. She had been sleeping on her like a koala in its handler’s arms, possibly with even less shame.
Embarrassing. Yes. Incredibly so. But agony to separate herself.
“You could have shoved me back into my own space,” she finally said. “I am mortified.”
Edie’s smile made a dimple appear beneath her eye, like a shooting star. “There was no moving you. At one point I tried a bit of polite shoehorning, but you growled.”
“Oh, no.”
“Did you know”—Edie raised her eyebrows—“that you talk in your sleep?”
The horror hit Cosima like a splash of cold water. “What?”
“I couldn’t make everything out. I had to stop listening once you were comparing my breath to the sweet perfume of June lilacs.” Edie bit her lip.
“You’re making that up.”
“I am.” Edie had a new cluster of forehead freckles from today’s walks in the sun. There were six wedge-shaped flashes of gold in her left eye that Cosima hadn’t noticed before. She studied them, full of slow, sleepy longing. “No talking. Just a little snoring.” Edie’s voice was low and husky. “The porter’s holding our dinner. It’s on a tray, like an airplane meal. I can push the call button, and she’ll bring it.”
“I’m not hungry.” The Eurostar was a blanket of soft white noise, the lights low. There was nothing out the windows, only the occasional glimpse of a concrete wall to indicate they were passing beneath the English Channel. No one had been seated opposite them. They were nowhere, alone and unobserved.“We’re in international waters,” she said. Her pulse skyrocketed in response to her own audacity, but Edie only looked confused.
“Yeah?”
More humiliation. Cosima ignored it. She had to, or else live the rest of her days without knowing how Edie’s lips would feel against hers. “I’m suggesting that the laws are different out here. The rules.”
“Do you want to pirate the other passengers? I don’t think that’s a great idea after Pierre le Pooch made such a close inspection of me.”
Cosima wanted to laugh. Here she was, with no hands-on, practical experience of this kind of thing, and Edie couldn’t tell how many rules she was willing to break on this train, in this hour before they’d be on the streets of Paris, where everything would be hemmed in by reality again. Cosima had tried innuendo and failed miserably.
But then the skin on Edie’s cheeks flooded pink, and the green of her eyes was edged out by her pupils widening. A much more than adequate reward for the risk Cosima had taken.
“Edie.” She hadn’t known her voice could sound this knowing, except that every part of her was so sensitized to the knowledge of this woman, how couldn’t it?
