J.C. and the Bijoux Jolis: The Rousseaus #3 (The Blueberry Lane Series Book 14) (9 page)

“
What
are we?” he asked her, taking a step closer.

She gulped, opting for honesty. “I don’t know.”

His face—his beautiful, chiseled face, which had looked so stormy a moment before—softened. “I don’t either.”

“Can we let that be okay for now?”

***

He grinned at her, nodding slowly. “Yes.”

Why her answer had made him feel so happy, he wasn’t sure. Maybe because for the first time in his own life, J.C. was also in unchartered waters. He didn’t have a tidy little box for Lib’s keeping. He didn’t know what to call her. He only knew that the longer he knew her, the more his feelings for her swelled in proportion to his attraction, which was quickly becoming all-consuming.

Never in his life had he seen anything as fucking beautiful as Libitz standing under his Anthony Primo, eyes closed, surrounded by art he’d handpicked, breathing in the
je ne sais quoi
of his gallery the way other people sipped fine wine or appreciated music. He understood what she was doing, he had done it himself more times than he could count, and it was insanely erotic to catch her in the act of inhaling his most sacred space. It did wild things to his heart that he’d never seen coming.

As her heels clacked over the marble just behind him, he tensed in excitement and anticipation. The best was yet to come.
Les Bijoux Jolis
hung on the wall of his office across from his desk, and he intended to watch her carefully as she first laid eyes on it, to see if he was alone in his fascination or if she felt the sort of kinship to it.

They stepped into his office, but when Libitz reached for one of the chairs in front of his desk, he gestured behind her to the couch.

“It’s more comfortable there.”

She looked over her shoulder at the couch, and from where Jean-Christian strategically stood, he could see the exact moment her eyes slid up to the portrait, and he watched intently as she turned her entire body, slowly, slowly, to face the painting.

Gasping softly, she stepped closer, her eyes glued to the model’s face on the far-left side of the portrait, her hand reaching up as if to touch the canvas before suddenly stopping herself and lowering her arm to her side.

“Who—What…What is this?”

“It’s called
Les Bijoux Jolis
,” murmured Jean-Christian, moving to stand beside her, his eyes flicking quickly to the bejeweled model, then back to Libitz.

“My God…” she hissed, taking another step closer.

“It’s uncanny, isn’t it?”

She darted a quick glance at him, her eyes wide and troubled. “At first glance, I thought maybe you’d had it commissioned. I couldn’t understand…”

“Why I’d have a portrait of you in my office?”

She nodded slowly. “Yes.”

“It was painted in 1939.”

“By whom?”

“Pierre Montferrat.”

“I’ve never heard of him.”

“He was a French painter in Marseille…and my great-uncle.”

Her neck jerked to the left, and those huge, wide brown eyes were suddenly trained on his. “Your uncle?”

“Mm-hm. My sister Jax found the portrait in her attic.”

“In 1939,” murmured Libitz. “O’Keefe and Dalí were popular. Modernism ruled. No one was doing this.”

“
Someone
was.”

“I mean to say it wasn’t popular,” she said, still staring up at the portrait. “Etty painted the Titian copy…when?”

“Um…1823, I think,” said J.C., “though Manet painted
Olympia
in 1863.”

“Still,” said Libitz, “this was painted seventy-six years later.”

“People have been copying
Venus
forever,” commented J.C., realizing that his arm was brushing hers, though she didn’t seem to notice.

“This is no copy,” she protested. “It’s…I don’t know. It’s haunting. Her, um…Her expression is—what is it?”

She looked up at J.C., searching his face for guidance. His gaze slipped momentarily to her lips before sliding back up to her eyes.

“Young. Hopeful. Lovely.”

“Yes,” she murmured.

He stared deeply into her eyes, transfixed by the nearness of her, the clean fragrance of her perfume heady, the naked intensity of her eyes alluring. “Too young for emeralds. Too hopeful for a country on the brink of war. Too lovely for…”

“For what?” she asked, leaning closer to him, her breath choppy and shallow between them.

“…me,” he whispered, dropping his mouth to hers.

The last time Jean-Christian had kissed Lib, it had been via coercion and with an intense hostility sizzling like static between them. This time was completely different. This time her lips were pliant and willing, and her body molded effortlessly into his. She looped her arms around his neck to pull him closer, and when he slid his hands down her back to her ass, she let him pick her up, locking her ankles around his waist with a low moan of approval. Holding her firmly against him, her sex flush against his through two layers of denim, he had no doubt she could feel the throb of his erection, swelling to full, almost-painful, rock-hard size between them.

Backing up to his desk, he leaned against it with Libitz still entwined around his body, adjusting her so that his cock pressed up into the hollow between her legs, and she moaned. He felt the slight pinch of her fingernails against the skin on the back of his neck as she arched her back to rub her breasts against his chest.

Sliding his lips from her mouth to her neck, he groaned, “You’re so fucking hot,” as she twisted her neck to give him her ear, which he bit hard enough for her to whimper before demanding his lips again. He sealed his mouth over hers, plunging his tongue into her mouth, and she met it with hers, tangling with abandon, her breath choppy and shallow. She tasted like coffee and sugar, like good coffee and real sugar, bitter and sweet, and he reveled in the taste that so accurately represented the woman in his arms. Sharp, but unexpectedly tender.

He wanted her.

Dear God, how he wanted her.

But his phone, on the desk beside them, was buzzing and banging loud enough that it couldn’t be ignored. Libitz drew away from him, her eyes glazed, her lips slick and red.

“Answer it.”

With a sneer of frustration for whomever was calling, he picked up the phone, still holding her tightly against him with one hand, their noses an inch apart, their panted breath mingling.

“What?”

“
C’est Étienne
.”

“
Oui
.”

“Are you busy today?”

Lib’s heart beat wildly against his chest, but her forehead rested on his shoulder. She didn’t fight to leave his arms—her ankles were still locked around his waist and her hands still linked behind his neck. It was challenging, trying to hold her with one hand, but he tensed his grip around her—if she wasn’t going anywhere, he sure as hell wasn’t going to let her go.

“
Peut-être
.
”
Maybe
. It all depended on the woman in his arms.

“Jax found a cradle in the attic, and she wants us to have it for Noelle. Can you pick it up for me? Kate’s still trying to get everything organized for tomorrow, and I think she’ll cut off my balls if I leave.”

“For Noelle.” One of the only names on earth that could have cut through his fog of lust.

“Yeah. Can you help me out?”

“Of course.”

“Oh! And Kate said that Libitz had a meeting downtown this morning. Maybe you could call her and give her a ride back to Haverford? Kate feels bad that she had to take a taxi this morning. As long as you’re coming here anyway? You don’t mind, do you? I’ll give you her number and you can text her. 212-555-3232. You two have to learn how to get along.”

“Mmm,” he hummed as Lib’s lips scorched the skin of his throat with a kiss. “I feel confident we will.”

“Yeah, but don’t take it too far, okay? Kate’s serious about you two not hooking up. She’d be a mess over it. Keep your dick in your pants…or in Felicity, okay?”

He heard Lib’s short gasp of breath in his other ear and winced. Fuck. She was so close to him, she’d heard his brother loud and clear and froze in his arms. When she released the breath in a hiss, her hands unlocked from behind his head, and she untangled her legs, slipping down the front of his body and taking a step away from him as he released his arm from around her tiny waist. He stared at her—at her hurt, increasingly angry eyes.

“I have to go,” murmured Jean-Christian, clenching his jaw with frustration.

“See you later. And be nice.”

The line went dead, and J.C. shoved the phone back into his pocket.

“Who’s Felicity?” she asked.

“Just a distraction. Like Neil.”

“I’m not
fucking
Neil,” she said softly, then dropped his eyes, flinching like she’d given too much away.

Juxtaposed against the rush of awesome he felt at this admission was the reality that she stood before him looking angry, hurt, and yes, God, still gorgeously fucking aroused.

He reached for her. “Lib…”

“That was good advice.” She pulled her arm out of his reach, lifted her eyes, and nailed him with a hard look. “Keep your dick in Felicity, J.C. You can send me an invoice for the Kandinsky. Let’s go get the cradle, and then you can leave me alone.”

“Not possible,” he said, surprised by how fervently he meant it. He wasn’t going to be able to leave her alone, and the sooner they both accepted it, the better.

“Then I’ll go back to New York this afternoon.”

“Libitz, come on…”

“No,” she said softly, shaking her head, her face colored with deep regret. “I shouldn’t have let that happen.”

“You say that like it’s an option to ignore what’s between us. You can’t, Lib. I certainly can’t. It’s magnetic. It’s chemistry. I haven’t been able to get you out of my head for weeks.”

She inhaled sharply, whispering, “We’re not good for each other.”

She was wrong. She
was
good for him. She was the only woman he’d ever met who’d made him even consider love and commitment and forever. That
had
to be good.

“Please…”

“Back off or I leave today, J.C. I mean it.”

Her voice was low and sharp, and there was no doubt in his mind that she was serious. Thinking of Kate’s disappointment and fury, he put his palms up in surrender, unable to keep the frustration from his narrowed eyes as he whispered, “You win.”

She gave
Les Bijoux Jolis
one last longing look, then turned and walked out of his office.

Libitz stared out the window as Jean-Christian drove them out of Philadelphia, her stomach in knots, a lump in her throat, and adrenaline making her jumpy even though the car was silent and her seat was comfortable.

Not possible…
You say that like it’s an option to ignore what’s between us…It’s magnetic…It’s chemistry…I haven’t been able to get you out of my head for weeks…

His confession, which mirrored the feelings in her own heart, had started a process she’d desperately hoped to avoid: Libitz was falling, head over heels, for Jean-Christian Rousseau, and it scared the ever-loving shit out of her.

She’d been on the brink at Kate’s wedding, of course, quietly swept away by his dark good looks, sexual energy, and focused attention. Frankly, she’d only avoided sleeping with him out of sheer willpower and her loyalty to Kate.

But this?

This was much worse.

Before, she’d lusted after his body. Now she was feeling an indelible unwanted attraction to his head and maybe even to his heart.

And fuck, but she’d worked hard against this happening—shooting him down at the wedding and dating Neil as soon as she got home as a way to distract herself from memories of Jean-Christian but also to focus herself more intently on a mature, meaningful relationship.

She winced because all of it was for naught: she couldn’t ignore what was between them. She was trapped with him in a maelstrom of desire, attraction, and fast-growing feelings, and Noelle’s impending arrival only served to solidify the feelings she so desperately wished to avoid.

She felt it in the way she’d pulled him to her when they kissed, how much she wanted his hard body pressed against hers. She felt it in her kinship to his beautiful gallery and in the way he’d described
Les Bijoux Jolis
, a portrait so hauntingly beautiful, so thrillingly erotic, so unaccountably personal, she couldn’t stop picturing it.

Goddamn it.

She was falling. And she was falling hard.

So what now?
she asked herself.

Fuck him to get him out of my system?

That was a terrible idea, chiefly because the possibility of getting Jean-Christian out of her system was long gone. Fucking him would only serve to heighten her longing—she’d know the bliss of his body sliding into hers, the hard rod of his cock moving against the tender, throbbing flesh of her sex. She’d know the look on his face when he came inside of her, know the sounds he made when he climaxed and the way his skin smelled after sex. She would never be able to forget the way it felt to be held in his arms as she reached her own peak, his heart thundering beneath her ear as she rode out the surges and spasms of promised pleasure.

No. There would be no getting rid of him once she’d had him. There would only be a lifetime of wanting more. A lifetime of wanting something she couldn’t have. A lifetime of temptation and yearning, seeing him at every major life event of the child they would share.

So what now?
her heart demanded again.

You’re falling for him…but you can’t fuck him.

You want him…but you can’t have him.

You can’t ignore him…but you can’t forget him.

Taking a deep breath that sounded jerky in her ears, she closed her eyes, searching desperately for a solution, and as if God heard her plea, a sudden vision of Neil appeared in her mind.

Neil.
She sighed, some tiny measure of peace taking the edge off her panic.
Call Neil.

She opened her eyes and turned to Jean-Christian. “Do you mind if I make a call?”

“Be my guest.”

She took her phone from her purse and dialed Neil’s number, praying he’d pick up quickly.

“Y’ello?” he greeted her, 100 percent a born-and-bred New Yorker.

“Neil,” she sighed. “Hi.”

“Lib!” he cried, and she knew he was smiling. She could hear it in his voice, and it made her smile too. “How’s Philly?”

“Good,” she said. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Jean-Christian’s fingers tighten on the steering wheel, his knuckles an angry white. She shifted her body away from him, looking out the window. “I miss you.”

“You do?” He chuckled happily. “I miss you too.”

“Pick me up at Penn Station on Monday night?”

“Of course I will.”

“And”—she cleared her throat and lowered her voice a touch—“plan to stay over at my place?”

Neil was quiet for a moment before speaking, but when he did, his voice was huskier than it had been before. “Are you sure, honey?”

He’d never called her “honey” before, and she wished she liked it more than she did. She clenched her jaw and gulped. “Mm-hm. I want you to.”

“I’d love that, Lib.”

“Okay then.”

“I didn’t”—he paused before starting again—“I didn’t expect this. It makes me really happy.”

She winced. “You’re such a good man.”

“I just know what I want,” he said. “I knew it the first moment I laid eyes on you, Lib.”

Her heart stuttered at his admission, and the panicky feeling she’d been trying to assuage a few moments before came rushing back, much worse than before.

“I’ll text you my train info,” she squeaked.

“I’ll look out for it. I can’t wait.”

“Bye, Neil.”

“Bye, Lib.”

Pursing her lips, she pressed “End” on her phone and dropped it back into her bag. She didn’t dare look at Jean-Christian, but she could feel the tension, the fury, the frustration being thrown from his body like heat.

“How’d
that
feel?” he snarled.

“Fine,” she answered, wishing her voice had more conviction.

“Bullshit. You feel like shit now, and we both know it, Elsa.” She ground her jaw, refusing to look at him. “You’re going to fuck someone you don’t want to try to forget someone you do.” He let that thought sit for a minute before adding, “It doesn’t work. I’ve tried it. It just makes everything worse and hurts someone who doesn’t deserve to be hurt.”

“You don’t know—”

“Don’t kid yourself, sweetheart. I’ve had a lifetime of meaningless sex…which is exactly what you just offered to Neil.” His words, like jagged glass, cut her. “Poor trusting bastard.”

“Fuck you!” raged Libitz, hating him for wanting her and making her want him when he had nothing else to offer but smirky grins and no-strings-attached screwing. “Just because you like cheap and shallow doesn’t mean you get to criticize me for wanting something real!”

“Get off your high-fucking-horse. You’re not being
real
. Whatever you’ve got going on with Nice Neil is the antithesis of real. You started dating him about five minutes after we kissed at Ten’s wedding. You’re just using him.”

“And you’re just a whore with a big cock!”

“And wouldn’t you love to know exactly how big,” he growled.

Yes. Wait. No!

“You’re a pig,” she spat.

The sound of brakes screeching would have made her lurch forward even if he hadn’t suddenly come to a stop on a dime by the side of the road. He snapped the gearshift into “Park” and turned to her.

“Listen up, Libitz,” he said, his eyes boring into hers as his chest rose and fell rapidly, his eyes focused fiercely on hers. “Any way you slice it, you’re using him to get away from me. You know it, and I know it.”

“So
what
?” she demanded, blinking her burning, confused eyes at him. “Why is that wrong?”

“Because it just is!” He reached for her head, cupping the back of her skull with his hand as he yanked her closer. “Because this…
us
…is
right
.”

She didn’t fight him when he kissed her, his tongue invading her mouth to mate with hers the moment their lips connected. Whatever was wrong between them, their physical connection was so undeniably strong, she couldn’t force herself to push him away. She didn’t want to. She didn’t know how. And she was so tired of fighting her attraction to him, shutting down her thoughts of him, and pushing away her growing feelings for him. Falling for him wasn’t something she’d planned; it was just something that had happened…and she’d never felt so helpless about anything else in her entire fucking life.

“It scares me too,” he murmured, his lips hot on her neck, his teeth biting her earlobe and making her gasp, then whimper. “I can’t stop thinking about you, Lib. I’ve tried, but I can’t…”

She reached for his face, cradling his cheeks and demanding his lips once again. His free hand groped at her shirt, slipping inside the thin silk, under the lace of her bra to cover her breast with his hand as he had when they’d kissed in the moonlight at Kate’s wedding. She didn’t push him away. She arched her back, filling his hand with the small mound of flesh and moaning when he rolled her erect nipple between his fingers.

Hot tears, uncharacteristic and unwelcome, burned her eyes as he ravaged her mouth, as he explored hidden depths, plundering hot, wet crevasses that felt branded by the intimacy of his touch, almost like she didn’t belong to herself anymore. Almost like she belonged to him.

“Lib…Lib…Lib…” he whispered. “We were made for this…”

She inhaled his breath, nipping at his bottom lip as he smoothed his hand back up from under her bra, leaving the taut points of her breasts longing for more of his touch.

Opening her eyes, she found his black and wide, fixed on hers, as hot as she’d expect, but surprisingly vulnerable.

“I’m not fucking you by the roadside,” he said between panted breaths. “The first time we fuck, it’s going to mean something.”

She gulped, the muscles at the crux of her thighs contracting with lust, the ice around her heart thawing as he said “mean something,” words she doubted he’d ever said to another woman.

“This is messy, Jean-Christian,” she murmured, using her fingers to clear away the moisture that had gathered at the edges of her eyes. “Really fucking messy.”

“It doesn’t have to be.” He rubbed at her cheek with his thumb, the touch tender, almost reverent.

“We can’t be reckless.” She reached for his hand and pulled it away. “There’s too much at stake here.”

“I know,” he whispered, leaning back in his seat, his eyes still holding hers, pleading with hers. “Don’t sleep with Neil.”

She winced, shifting away from him as she straightened her bra and blouse. Taking a deep breath, she backhanded her slick lips before looking at him. Honestly, she had no idea what to say. She exhaled slowly as she gazed at him.

“Let’s just…see what happens.” How she managed to muster a small smile wasn’t totally clear to her. Maybe it was just because she was staring into his eyes, and in their depths—deep, deep in the forest-green wilds of them—she saw something that felt a little bit like hope. “Deal?”

***

“Deal.”

But he felt unsettled. The idea of her fucking Neil on Monday night was going to eat him up inside.

And yet…the way she was looking at him right now? Like maybe, through the almost-insurmountable terrain of his father’s legacy of betrayal and his mother’s pain, he could someway, somehow, find his way to her? It made his heart swell with hope and wonder in a way he’d never experienced before. And though he didn’t feel it coming, suddenly he was smiling back at her like she hung the moon and all the stars, and to save his life, he couldn’t stop the rush of endorphins that made him feel like anything—
anything
—was possible if this woman wouldn’t give up on him.

He’d realized, in the days following Étienne’s wedding, that the emotion he’d felt watching Libitz with her prep-school friends at the reception had been jealousy. Before that moment, he’d never felt that sort of true, primal jealousy over a woman—never known it, never wanted a woman to
belong
to him the way he wanted Libitz. Without that feeling of possession, jealousy had never kicked in. But he’d felt it then, and he felt it now as he considered her phone conversation with Nice Neil. And it fucking killed him to think of her choosing Neil because he, Jean-Christian, was unable to best his rival for her heart.

Confident that he was at least as wealthy and well educated as Neil, he had an edge physically, because he already knew that Lib’s attraction to him was stronger than her attraction to her so-called boyfriend. Where he lost—where he would
always
lose—was that she was looking for a “meaningful forever,” which no doubt Neil could offer, while the concepts of both “meaningful” and “forever” still scared the shit out of Jean-Christian. They scared him so much, he almost doubted he could change into a person who would consider either “meaningful” or “forever.” Was it even possible for a thirtysomething man who’d lived most of his life in the shadow of his father’s blatant and abusive infidelity to figure out how to offer a woman something real?

He sighed with frustration, turning away from her and shifting the car into “Drive.” “We have a cradle to pick up.”

She nodded. “Sounds good.”

“No matter who I am or what I’ve done,” he said, almost more to himself than to her, “I’ll always be there for Noelle. She’s…I mean, I’ll never let her down. Never. I want you to know that.”