Page 125 of The Little Board Game Café

She looked at him, puzzled, but he just raised his eyebrows and nodded at the paper in her hand. She glanced down and couldn’t quite believe the first word that caught her eye.

‘Eurostar?’

‘Eurostar.’ Ludek smiled and nodded.

She looked at the sheet again. ‘To Paris? Today?’

‘If you’d like to? A short walk from King’s Cross to St Pancras and off we go. We’re not going to play Dinner in Paris; we’re going to have dinner in Paris. I’ve booked a lovely restaurant near the Seine.’

‘As in dinner in actual Paris? In France?’

‘As far as I know, there isn’t another Paris. And then tomorrow…’

‘Tomorrow?’

‘Tomorrow, we’re going to explore all of Montmartre’s finest little cafés. How does that sound?’

‘But what about my café?’

‘Kate…’

‘Kate knows about this?’

‘I had to let her in on my plan.’

Kate had known they were going to Paris? No wonder she’d told Emily that she had to look chic.

‘Kate, Annie and Mr B are going to cover the café until we get back,’ said Ludek, ‘so you don’t need to worry on that score.’

Emily was amazed; they were all going to so much effort. For her. But there was one snag.

‘I don’t have my passport.’

‘No, but I do.’ He reached down into the bag for a third time and pulled out one of his Ziploc bags, containing two passports. ‘And I’ve got a change of clothes for you too.’

She had a sudden image of him breaking into her flat and rummaging through her underwear drawer. The thought of him seeing her greying collection of knickers. Her period pants. That stupid red feathery thong she’d once bought on a whim. Or worse still, the Spandex all-in-one that Kate had talked her into buying, saying that it would give her a better shape.

‘Don’t worry, I haven’t been through your things,’ he said, reading her mind. ‘Kate packed it. She brought it all over yesterday. Good job she had the spare key to your flat.’

Emily was speechless. Had he really gone to all this trouble?

‘Are you okay, Em? I don’t want to force this on you. If you don’t want to come to Paris with me, we can have a walk round Hyde Park or the Natural History Museum, then get the train home this evening.’

‘Of course I want to come. I just can’t believe it.’ She looked out of the window at the countryside flashing by. ‘But where will we stay?’

‘I booked a hotel. Two rooms as I didn’t want to presume. But that doesn’t mean we have to use both. Although you’d have to be gentle with me as I haven’t quite healed yet.’

Paris. With Ludek. Dinner by the Seine. A hotel, and an invitation – that had sounded like an invitation – to share his room and be gentle with him. And she was finally going to visit those little cafés in Montmartre. So much to take in and the train hadn’t even reached Pontefract.

*

‘I’ve been very wary of getting involved with someone new,’ said Ludek as they approached Doncaster. ‘I know it’s early days, Em, that we’ve got to get to know each other, but my relationships always go wrong when it gets to the moving-in stage. I’ve never met a woman yet who was willing to put up with a house full of board games.’

‘But you’ve never dated a woman who owned a board game café before.’

‘True. And I’ve got a proposition for you.’

‘Aren’t you supposed to wait till we’re actually in Paris for that?’ Emily said before she could stop herself. Kate would kill her. You weren’t supposed to drop hints about marriage. Especially not at the very start of a relationship.