Midnight in Montmartre: A French Kiss Sweet Romance (7 page)

L
uc caught
Mia as she lost her balance walking down the steps of the Montaigne building's front entrance.

"Whoa, are you okay?"

His arm automatically wrapped around her waist, steadying her balance. Her head leaned on his left shoulder momentarily, and he could smell the coconut scent of her shampoo.

"My legs suddenly turned into rubber," she said, letting out an embarrassed laugh. "It's like I forgot how to walk."

"It was pretty intense in there," Luc said.

"Maybe I was more nervous than I thought."

"Here we thought you were completely confident," Didier said with a grin.

"You thought I was confident?" She laughed. "I was a ball of nerves on the inside."

"You commanded the room," Luc said, "and got the others into a meaningful discussion. It was impressive."

"Don't worry," Didier added. "Luc and I have made a career out of faking it until we made it."

"I'm probably having postmeeting shell shock," Mia said.

"You definitely hid your nerves well," Luc said. "And won us the campaign. Your speech was amazing."

"Thanks." Mia beamed at him with that beautiful smile of hers that warmed him from the inside. "I think Beth would've approved the ad regardless. She seems to be a woman of good taste and sense."

"She certainly is." Didier gave Luc a knowing look, but Luc ignored it.

"Should we get a drink to celebrate?" Luc cut in before Didier could say anything more about Beth.

"I'd love to," Didier said, "but my wife's been mad at me for working overtime lately. We have a daughter at home who's going through the terrible twos."

"What's her name?" Mia asked.

"Lorraine. She sleeps early, so I better get going if I want to see her. You guys have fun. There's a nice cocktail bar down the street."

"I know the one," Luc said.

"Great. I'll take the limo first. Just call the driver when you're ready and he'll come back for you later on."

"
Bonne soirée
," Mia said. “
À demain
.”

"Learning a thing or two from those French classes?" Luc teased Mia as Didier got into the car.

"I'll teach you a thing or two," Mia teased back.

When the limo turned the corner, they were alone on the sidewalk. The sun was starting to set, casting a warm glow over them. Luc had the desire to take Mia into his arms and kiss her. Of course he restrained himself. He wasn't sure how Mia would feel about the impromptu gesture.

She was still wobbling a little as they walked to the bar. He didn't know how women could walk in high heels. It must be a challenge. He put his arm around her shoulders to help her balance. At least that wasn't weird. Her skin was soft, but she was starting to get goose bumps as the temperature dropped in the evening.

He took off his suit jacket and draped it around her shoulders.

"Thanks." She smiled up at him. The sun shone behind her like a glowing golden aura.

They went into Pêche 22, a cocktail bar with more than a hundred different kinds of cocktails on the menu.

A waiter showed them to their seats at a round table with a gold stencil of a lace pattern on the surface. The bar was dim, more romantic than Luc remembered. There were couples holding hands all over the place.

It wasn't a bad thing. The waiter came by with a lit candle and placed it in the center of the table.

"Certainly sets the mood," Luc remarked to Mia. Then he wished he hadn't. It was an awkward thing to say. He suddenly felt like his old, gawky teenage self, at a loss for words with a girl he liked.

Mia didn't seem to notice any awkwardness between them. She looked through the expansive list of cocktails and exhaled in amazement. "The options are endless. You've got the Bloody Mary, the Bloody Maurice, the Bloody Henry—everybody in this family is bloody."

Luc chuckled. "I don't know about you, but I think I'm actually going to have some wine."

"That sounds good, as long as the only choice is between red and white."

"Red," Luc and Mia said at the same time, then laughed together.

"I'll tell the waiter," Luc said.

At Luc's request, their waiter, a serious young man with gaunt cheeks and dark eyebrows meeting at a thin point in the middle, came back and poured them the most expensive bottle of red on the menu. Mia deserved it, although since she still didn't speak French all that well, she didn't know how much the bottle cost.

Mia took a sip first.

"What do you think?" Luc asked.

Mia shrugged. "It's good. I mean, it tastes like wine. Why? Are you a wine connoisseur?"

"I wouldn't say that."

"You'd seem the type to know a lot about wine, and you'd be disappointed to know that I don't know anything about it."

"Well, wine is ultimately grape juice," Luc said, amused. "Have you ever been to a wine tasting?"

"No, have you?"

"Yes. It's pretty funny. Everybody's smelling and swirling, and spitting—”

"Spitting?"

"Oh yeah. Into a little bucket. It's so that they don't get too drunk."

She shook her head. "But that's the whole point of drinking wine."

Luc laughed. He found Mia to be utterly unpretentious and refreshing. He raised his glass.

"You said it. Let's toast to a successful campaign."

"Congratulations," Mia said, "for landing the contract. Were you nervous, too?"

"I was. Those board members are a hard bunch to please."

"Yes, it was intimidating. Everyone's so fancy. I thought I was visiting the queen."

"Yeah, well, most of them grew up wealthy," Luc said. "Beth does come from an aristocratic family. The Montaignes even have a family crest."

"A family crest?" Mia said incredulously. "And here I am, a girl from Seattle who doesn't even know who my parents are."

"Maybe you can create your own family crest," Luc joked.

"Hmm, what would I put on it?" Mia got into the game. "Maybe my spirit animal, the penguin."

"The penguin?"

"They're cute. Oh, and a laptop, since I'm always on it for work. I like symbols of peace, like doves or olives, but maybe that's too cliché."

"I would use something tough and manly," Luc said. "Like a weight set, or a monster truck. Because that's what I am, a manly man."

Mia laughed out loud. "Right. I can tell."

"Anyway, I don't think you should've let those guys make you feel inferior."

"No way," Mia said. "I didn't. Eleanor Roosevelt once said, 'No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.’"

"You're right. You probably made
them
feel inferior."

She giggled as she sipped her wine. "I doubt that."

He picked up his own glass again. "For all their wealth and upper-class sophistication, they're no match for a girl from Seattle. At least not a girl from Seattle like you. So tell me about your family. I'm curious."

"Nothing out of the ordinary. My adoptive parents couldn't have children, so they decided to adopt. I was the only child. Childhood is only interesting to others when there are horror tales to tell, but I have none. My parents loved me. They'd take me to Disneyland every year. I never doubted for a moment they loved me and would've loved me no less had I been their child by birth. This is why I feel so guilty that I'm on this search."

"Have you ever talked to them about your birth parents?"

"Yes. They were very open with me. Unfortunately, it was a closed adoption, and they told me all they knew, which isn't much. We started these kinds of discussions when I was about twelve, when I became more and more curious about my background."

"How did you do in school?" Luc asked. "You seem like you'd be a good student."

"I was a good student. Is it that obvious? I was one of those rare kids who actually enjoyed school. My parents believe in education. I always enjoyed English class and writing on my own, so naturally I went on to journalism. I also liked history and became something of a history buff."

"I could've guessed from the Eleanor Roosevelt quote."

Mia laughed. "I can give you quotes galore. The thing about being educated, and, well, colored, is that you draw criticism sometimes. Not from white students so much, but from black students."

"Really?" Luc leaned in.

"Yes. I remember a couple of black students being pretty rude and resentful; they would accuse me of acting white. The funny thing is that they probably didn't know much about the history of black people in America. For example, after the Civil War, slaves were passionate about getting an education. Many of them could not read, and many slaves had to learn how to read secretly. If they were caught, there were severe penalties. Most of them, if not all, wanted the education so they could read the Bible. Many had become religious even as slaves, and they saw the travails as another type of Exodus. Historian Eugene Genovese stated this in his books and—”

She slapped a hand over her mouth. "I'm talking too much. I'm sorry."

"No, it's all right. I always enjoyed history myself. Keep going."

"I've been talking about myself a lot. Tell me about you. What was your childhood like?"

"Oh, chaotic. Very chaotic. There's seven of us in total."

"You have six siblings?"

Luc nodded. "Four brothers and two sisters. I'm the second oldest. Alain is the oldest, but he's an anthropologist, and he's always off in Africa or some exotic location or other. Then there's Mathieu, who you sort of know."

"The rock star. Of course."

"He's the wild and loud one in the family, along with his twin sister Marianne. They're both firecrackers. Marianne also has the creative gene. She's a filmmaker."

"Really?" Mia exclaimed. "French films?"

"Yes. She just got funding to make her first feature, so she's really busy. Actually, most of my family are quite busy. Philippe, the third youngest, is a chef. Xavier is twenty-five. He's a boxer, or trying to be. The youngest is my sister Audrey. The baby of the family."

"You mean, she's actually a baby?"

Luc laughed. "No. She's twenty-two and still a student. She's studying art history."

"It sounds like your family is quite eclectic."

"We all have different interests. That's because my parents are quite different. My dad's the no-nonsense business type, and Mom's a free-spirited painter. Opposites attract. My childhood was loud. Really loud. It was like a circus, almost.”

"You didn't live in Paris, did you? The apartments here are not big enough for big families."

"You'd be surprised. There are massive apartments, but you have to be a millionaire. We don't have an apartment. We're lucky enough to have grown up in a house in Montmartre. It's not too far from where you live now. It's cozy, and my parents are still there, along with my sister Audrey. We visit every Sunday, though, if we're all in town."

"Growing up in a large family sounds wonderful," Mia said wistfully.

"There's never a dull moment," Luc agreed, "but at some point, when I was about sixteen, I contemplated becoming a monk in a monastery where everyone had to take a vow of silence."

"Really?"

"Well, not seriously, but I did think about buying a small cabin in the middle of the woods somewhere."

Mia laughed. "How did you get into advertising?"

“Believe it or not, I almost went into astronomy."

"That's totally different."

He nodded. "It is. To get some peace and quiet as a teen, I would go for walks, sometimes at night. You can't always see the stars in Paris, but sometimes you can, when it's really late, really dark, and the sky is clear. I was fascinated by the sky. I'd read books and try to study on my own. We live in an incredibly beautiful galaxy, but at the same time, it's scary how we're just tiny specks in the universe. I still read books on astronomy, and I try to go to the observatory whenever I have the time."

"Why didn't you study astronomy?"

"I realized that I was also creative and had good business sense. Astronomy is not the most well-paying position. I figured if I got into business and advertising, I could be an amateur astronomer, but I couldn’t go into astronomy and be an amateur businessman, so I made a decision."

"I think you would've been successful either way," Mia said confidently.

"Thank you." He beamed. The wine was starting to make him feel light-headed, in a good way. He loved Mia's company. He could've talked to her for hours.

And he did.

When they polished off the bottle, it was starting to get late. He wanted to ask Mia if she wanted to eat dinner with him as well, but she made a comment that she had perhaps overdone it with the wine and wanted to go home to rest after an exhausting day. Reluctantly, he asked for the bill.

Mia reached for her wallet.

"You're crazy if you think I'm going to let you pay," Luc said.

"Why not?"

"In France, the man always pays."

"Even if we're coworkers?"

"Yes. You'd be doing us a disservice if you take that away from us."

Mia slowly put her wallet back in her purse. "I wouldn't want to do that, then. Thank you."

Luc used his credit card. He took out his cell phone and called for the car. When they walked out onto the sidewalk, Mia still wasn't doing too well in her heels. They had both had a glass too many, but perhaps Mia was more sensitive to alcohol.

Mia looked up at the sky.

"The stars," she said. "I see them."

Luc looked up. It was impossible to see stars in the downtown core, when the city was all lit up. He didn’t know what she was talking about. There were no stars in sight.

"Do you see them?" she asked.

"Well..."

"There." She pointed upward, squinting.

Then she was stumbling, falling back into Luc's arms. He held her, and she turned to look up at him with a sheepish, embarrassed expression. He looked into her beautiful eyes.

For a second they were both frozen in their embrace. He pressed his lips on hers. Her hands wrapped around his neck. He took in her sweet and mysterious fragrance. He lost himself in the kiss, and for a moment, he thought he actually did see stars.