I turn back toward the window because looking at him in my bed is a problem I’m not prepared to solve before coffee. The floorboards creak softly behind me. Then he’s there. His body warms my back. One hand settles at my waist. His mouth touches the side of my neck, not demanding, not teasing, just there with the easy confidence of a man who knows exactly what happened between us and isn’t going to pretend it was less than it was.
My hand closes around the curtain as he kisses the skin beneath my ear. My breath slips.
“Damien,” I say.
He pauses against my neck. “Yes?”
“That wasn’t a complaint.”
His mouth curves against my skin. “I know.”
Of course he does.
He kisses me once more, slower this time, then lifts his head and looks past me toward the rooftops.
“You have coffee here?” he asks.
I lean back against him by a fraction before I can think better of it.
“Even better.”
“What’s better than coffee?” he asks.
“There’s a brasserie downstairs,” I say.
“Good espresso. Better people-watching.”
His hand tightens briefly at my waist. “Thatisbetter.”
“We should go before I make reckless decisions with hotel-room coffee.”
“That would be tragic,” he says.
I turn in his arms and look up at him.
“You’re very opinionated for a man in someone else’s room.”
“I was opinionated before I arrived.”
“Yes,” I say. “I remember.”
His eyes drop to my mouth.
For one wild second, I think neither of us is going downstairs. Then he steps back first, which is either mercy or strategy. I’m not sure I like either.
We dress quickly, with the strange, intimate quiet of two people finding clothes after wanting each other more than they cared about order. I find one earring beneath the desk. He finds my other hairpin near the door and holds it out to me without comment. His fingers brush my palm when I take it, and my body reacts far too quickly.
He sees it.
He says nothing.
That may be the only reason I survive the elevator.
Downstairs, the brasserie is already awake. Small tables spill onto the pavement beneath a striped awning. Cups clink against saucers. A waiter in a white apron moves with sharp morning efficiency. The air smells like espresso, butter, hot bread, and jam warming in the sun.
We take a table outside.
Damien orders in French before I reach for the menu. Espresso for him. Café crème for me. Croissants. Water.
