J.C. and the Bijoux Jolis: The Rousseaus #3 (The Blueberry Lane Series Book 14) (14 page)

He sighed with annoyance, but his eyes were soft as he gazed up at her, placing his hands on her hips to draw her a little closer. “Let me drive you home tomorrow.”

“Yes,” she said, reaching to cup his cheek.

“Let me buy you dinner.”

“Yes,” she said.

“Come to the Met with me on Tuesday.”

“Yes,” she said again, bending to kiss his forehead and sweep an errant lock of hair back into the fold.

“I’m crazy about you, Libitz,” he murmured, then flinched as though the words were a mistake, his eyes wide and worried.

She inhaled sharply, biting her bottom lip as she stared at him. Caressing his cheek before dropping her hand, she smiled and said sweetly, “Then get in the closet for me.”

He smiled at her as though relieved and stood up. She reached down for his shirt and handed it to him, gesturing to the closet with one hand and straightening the bed once he was securely inside.

“Lib? I couldn’t find aspirin. Just Motrin. Can I come in?”

Libitz grabbed a cardigan sweater from on top of the dresser and opened the door to find Kate in the hallway.

“Thanks, KK.”

Kate handed her the vial of tablets and glass of water, then reached out to touch her friend’s very flushed cheeks. “You
are
warm, Lib. No more sun for you today, okay?”

“You got it.”

With a last longing glance at the closet, Libitz closed the bedroom door behind them and walked back to the party with her friend.

Jean-Christian pulled into the driveway at Toujours at one o’clock on Monday afternoon, bounding up the front steps in the rain to ring the doorbell of his brother’s house.

After exiting the fucking closet yesterday afternoon, he’d rubbed one out in the guest bathroom before returning to the BBQ, and he avoided Libitz for the rest of the night, uncertain he’d be able to keep from reaching for her if they found themselves together. It made for a frustrating and fairly miserable BBQ, half-listening to conversations as he zoned out, his eyes on a constant search for her, happy yet simultaneously jealous when he found her talking to someone else. The only voice he was interested in hearing was hers, and it sucked that she was so close and yet so off limits.

Finally, he’d decided to go home, but not before cornering Jessica English and asking her to take care of things at the gallery for a few days. She was on prematernity leave from her position as head docent at the Barnes Foundation but seemed excited to have a temporary job behind his desk at the gallery. After giving her a spare key and the security code, he’d left the party early, his balls still blue and his mood the same color.

But today was a new day—a new day in which he got to spend time with Lib, who wouldn’t be sleeping with Nice Neil tonight after all. He had a furtive hope that she might, in fact, be sleeping with him, as there would be no Kate English, er,
Rousseau
, interrupting them when they were about to—

“J.C.! Hello,” said Kate, opening the door and leaning forward to kiss his cheeks. “It’s very nice of you to take Lib to the train station. You’ve been her chauffeur all weekend.”

“It’s the least I can do for Noelle’s godmother,” he said.

“I appreciate that,” said Kate. “It means so much to Étienne and me that you two are trying to get along.” She cocked her head to the side. “How about some coffee?”

“No, uh, um…” His voice trailed off in a quiet sputter of distraction.

Over Kate’s shoulder, Libitz was coming down the stairs. Wearing a simple denim shirtdress and knee-high brown boots with her short, black hair slicked back with gel, Libitz was effortlessly stylish and endlessly chic. Her brown eyes sparkled from where she stopped with one hand on the newel post, and the way she grinned at him made him feel like he was the only man in the world.

“Ready to go?” he asked.

She nodded and he forced himself to look away from her and back at Kate, who was staring at him with a pinched expression. Apparently he and Lib weren’t very good at hiding their growing feelings for each other, because Kate seemed to have gotten up to speed over the course of about twenty seconds.

“
I
can drive her,” said Kate, her tone curt.

Libitz stepped from the stairs and moved quickly to put an arm around her friend, turning Kate to face her. Her voice was gentle but firm. “No, Kate. Jean-Christian will drive me.”

“Lib,” said Kate, shaking her head back and forth slowly, her face pained. “You promised me.”

“I haven’t broken my promise,” said Libitz, her voice soft and even.

“But I can
see
it,” said Kate, a desperate edge to her voice. “I can tell that you two—”

“…are attracted to each other?” she asked, flicking a quick glance at J.C. “We are. So what?”

Kate took a labored breath and placed both hands lovingly over her belly. “We
need
you both in Noelle’s life. You understand that?”

Libitz looked up at J.C., her expression severe before turning back to Kate. “We do.”

Looking back and forth between them uncertainly, Kate finally shrugged. “There’s nothing I can do to stop you.” She turned back to Libitz. “But I will not bounce back quickly if you two fuck this up. Got it?”

J.C. locked eyes with Libitz, nodding at her slowly, solemnly, silently promising her that she wasn’t like the others, that whatever happened between them, it wasn’t frivolous or cheap. He had no gift for predicting the future, but whatever was between him and Libitz, it
meant
something to him, and he wouldn’t treat it lightly.

“We understand, Kate,” he said gently.

Kate backed out of Libitz’s arms, standing aside so she could look at them side by side. Her eyes were sad and terribly uncertain as she shrugged and mumbled, “You look good together.”

Libitz took a step forward, “Kate…”

“Have a safe trip back to New York,” said Kate, turning to rush up the stairs, the sound of soft crying accompanying her footsteps.

J.C. watched her go as Libitz called after her friend, “Kate, come back!”

“Give her some time.”

She looked up at him. “I just made a pregnant lady cry. I’m the devil.”

He shrugged. “If it’s any consolation,
we
made her cry. It wasn’t just you.”

“I swear to God,” said Libitz, poking him in the chest, “if this is just a game for you…if I’m just another conquest, a—a—”

J.C. reached for her, cupping her cheeks with his unworthy hands.

“It’s not just a game to me,” he promised.

“What is it then?” she whispered.

“I don’t know,” he answered honestly. “But it’s not a game.”

“Are you saying…,” she said, averting her eyes from his for a moment before nailing him with a fresh and steady gaze, “that I
mean
something to you?”

He searched her eyes, waiting for a feeling of panic to rise up inside of him as he absorbed her words, but to his surprise, and delight, it didn’t come. He didn’t feel panic. He just felt…happy.

“Yes. You…this…us…yes. It means something to me.”
Something big. Something amazing. Something that feels more life-changing every day.

Her lips trembled as they tilted up into a surprised grin. “Is this the first time you’ve ever said that?”

“Fuck yes.” He released a held breath in a whoosh. “First time I ever
felt
it.”

She nodded slowly with approval. “It’s a good start.”

He leaned down and pressed his lips to hers, lovingly, softly, taking his time before pulling away. “Then let’s keep going.”

***

An hour into their two-hour drive, Libitz had learned quite a bit about Jean-Christian.

All his Sirius presets were jazz, with one rogue inclusion of bluegrass. He often spoke French under his breath—as he did when they missed a thruway exit or when the car ahead of them didn’t use its signal to turn left—and she suspected, from his tone, that most of what he said was unfit for polite company. He nursed a large cup of Starbucks coffee during the ride that smelled suspiciously sweet. He told her it was a pumpkin spiced latte when she asked, and his cheeks colored for a moment, like the admission embarrassed him. He shared with her that he had studied finance at Princeton, and for a while, he and his brother had managed an investment company together, but he hadn’t enjoyed the business very much and was grateful when they were bought out and Jean-Christian could start his own gallery.

Two topics of conversation made him far more animated than any of the others—when he spoke of art or his family, his voice changed, softening with love or speeding up with excitement. And it occurred to her that it was very strange that someone so passionate about family and art would have such a difficult time with commitment. Though it didn’t escape her notice that his fond memories of family never included mentions of his parents, only his siblings. It didn’t take a human behavioral specialist to figure out that his parents had likely been unhappy, and their failed marriage the genesis of his mistrust toward relationships in general.

It had touched her deeply at Toujours when he said,
You…this…us…yes. It means something to me.
But the sweetness of the moment was bitter when she reflected on Kate’s face, her friend’s expression of disappointment and the sound of her tears as she ran upstairs. Like many expecting mothers, Kate was hormonal and emotional, eager to have the very best of everything for her firstborn, but she wasn’t being irrational. Her fears were sound: Jean-Christian was a wild bet at best. Still, Libitz couldn’t seem to help making the wager.

It was an awkward situation to be sure…wanting Jean-Christian as she did, feeling the differences in him since their first meeting, yet owing her loyalty to Kate. Could she have them both? Was it possible?

“You’ve gotten quiet,” he said.

She glanced over at him, at his impossibly handsome profile. “Just thinking.”

“About…?”

“Kate. Us.”

“Us,” he said softly. “Yesterday you said we weren’t together.”

“We’re not…technically.”

“Technically,” he said, his jaw tightening, “you’re still with Nice Neil.”

“I’m breaking up with him on Wednesday.”

Jean-Christian was silent for a moment before asking, “Because of me?”

“Because I can’t let him think I’m his girlfriend when I’m spending time with you. It’s not right. So yes. Because of you.”

“So essentially,” he said, “once you break up with Neil, we’ll both be single because we want to spend time with each other. Isn’t that the same as being together?”

“Maybe,” she demurred. “We’ll see on Wednesday.” She turned to look at him, raising her eyebrows in challenge. “Isn’t this the part where you go running for the hills?”

“Usually,” he said. “But I left my running shoes at home today.”

“What makes this time different?”

“You do. You make everything different, Elsa.”

“Elsa.” She gave him a sidelong glance. “Haven’t I proven I’m not an ice princess?”

He laughed softly. “Yep. In spades. But the name suits you, so I’m keeping it. Any objections?”

“No,” she said, grinning at him as butterflies pooled in her tummy.

Picking up her phone, which was charging in the console between them, she checked out her new messages, gasping with delight when she found one from
Galerie des Fleurs
in Marseille.

“The gallery wrote me back!” she said, clicking on the message.

“In English or French? I can pull over if you want me to translate.”

“Hold on…um, English!”

“What do they say?”

Using her finger to scroll down the message, she read snippets aloud: “
Pleased to tell you we still have the five Montferrats from our website in stock…the models are not the same woman, but twins…if you look closely, you will see the sign of Gemini painted into Msr. Montferrat’s signature whenever he worked with them…a personal folly. I once saw a Montferrat with a crescent moon and star in the signature…the model must have been Turkish
.”

Libitz looked up at Jean-Christian. “Did you notice anything about his signature in
Les Bijoux Jolis
?”

He shook his head. “No. But I’m dying to take another look now.”

“Me too!”

She turned back to the message: “
Should you wish to buy one or all of the portraits, please contact me at…
and then it’s just his info.”

“Huh,” Jean-Christian muttered. “I’d suggest we pull over and take a look at it now, but it’s raining.”

She glanced up at a green sign overhead. “We’ll be in Manhattan in half an hour.”

“You know?” he said, turning to her. “It occurs to me that I have no idea where I’m going.”

“Upper West Side,” she said. “West Seventieth and Central Park West.”

“Tony neighborhood.”

“I like it.” She tucked her phone back in her bag. “Where are
you
staying?”

“West Seventieth and Central Park West?” he asked, glancing at her with a hopeful expression.

She shook her head. “Not until Neil’s out of the picture.”

His brows furrowed with annoyance. “Are you serious?”

“I am,” she said.

“Then I guess I’ll stay at the Mandarin,” he said, referring to a hotel ten blocks south of her apartment building. He sighed, a slight growl accompanying his release of breath. “But fair warning: we’re fucking hard on Wednesday night, Libitz.”

Her breath hitched. “How hard?”

“So hard, it’ll be morning when we’re done. So hard, you’ll be sore, but I’ll be back between your legs the next night because you’ll want me there. So hard, you’ll swear there was never anyone else before me.”

She whimpered softly, managing to murmur, “And then…?”

“That’s it. That’s the long-term plan,” he said. “You and me. Fucking. Indefinitely.”

And because she couldn’t think straight, let alone come up with a better plan than the one he proposed, she crossed her legs to quell her trembles and didn’t argue.

***

After a stop for gas, some traffic, and a little trouble finding street parking, they finally arrived at Libitz’s apartment around four o’clock, and J.C. insisted on pulling her suitcase and carrying
Les Bijoux Jolis
inside.