“No, they closed four hours ago.”
When the back door opens, we’re greeted with a warm gust of air that smells divine. “If I could bathe in that air, I’d die a happy woman.”
“Monsieur Gerard!” A rosy-cheeked baker greets us with wide-open arms. “And mademoiselle, are these for you?” Reaching behind him, he pulls out a box of still-warm palmiers.
Cosette groans and reaches with two hands pinching at the air. “If my grabby hands are any indication, I think you have your answer.Thank youuuuu.”
I discreetly tuck a wad of bills into his hand. “Thankyou.”
“Monsieur,” he says in a low voice. “This is too much. I can’t?—”
“I am confident I’ll be calling you again,” I mutter as Cosette tears into a palmier, flakes of pastry littering the ground. She moans in a way that sounds so sexual I need to get her the fuck out of here.
We amble down the street, bathed in moonlight, the twinkling lights of the Louvre our backdrop. It’s stunning and majestic and a little cold, I realize, when she shivers and rubs her free hand on her arm.
“These are even more delicious than I imagined,” she moans.
I shrug out of my jacket and drape it over her shoulders. “Glad you like them and the baby’s happy now. Should’ve gotten you a sweater, too.”
“I was hot at the time,” she says, pulling the jacket around her more tightly. As she looks out over the Louvre, she whispers her thanks. “Thank you, Lyam.”
I don’t ask her for what.
“Oh, look,” she says with that earnest wistfulness I almost forget about. It’s one of the things I like best about Cosette, how excited she gets over the simplest things.
I look to where she points but don’t see anything. “What are we looking at?”
“The moon over the water. Look, it casts a shadow that looksexactlylike a dragon.”
We pause by the Seine and I squint my eyes, trying to see what she does. “Are you just giving me shit?”
I love the sound of her giggle. “No. Not this time, anyway.”
I give her a playful smack on her ass.
“You can’t do that, Lyam,” she says in a heated whisper.
“Do what?”
“Smack my butt.”
The hell I can’t. “Why not?”
“I’mpregnant.”
I burst out laughing. God, it feels good to laugh. I haven’t laughed like this in so long, I can’t seem to stop.
“You think because you’re pregnant we can’t do anything kinky?”
“Lyam!” Her cheeks flush pink this time as she covers her mouth and looks around us.
I shake my head. Thayer has given me full details about what exactly I can and cannot do with a pregnant woman, and smacking her ass doesn’t even come close.
“I’ve done my research,” I say with a smile.
“Oh, really?” She pops the rest of the pastry in her mouth. “Maybe I need…a demonstration.”
I pick her up and carry her the rest of the way back.
