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They hadn’t talked about it for a reason, right? Now it was up to him to get them to the next moment.
He offered his elbow. “Milady.”
She took the offered arm but didn’t respond.
They walked silently into the museum.
He’d just made the entire night weird, hadn’t he?
But it was always there for him. In the back of his mind. How things had ended, the decision he’d made that night because hethoughtit would hurt less in the long run.
The “what if” that never disappeared.
Was he crazy to assume she had similar thoughts?
Would she be here if she didn’t want to be?
They reached their table and André introduced her to Tyrone and his wife, Tara, and Charles and his wife, Heidi.
He pulled her chair out for her and when she went to sit down is when he caught the first glimpse of her exposed back.
The rose vine started high on her right shoulder and curved across her back in an “S” shape where it disappeared into the dress. But he knew it wrapped around her right hip and then her right thigh. A thin line ran from the nape of her neck to the center of her back where it connected to the vine.
On first glance it looked like a smaller vine without roses.
But it was words inked vertically that said “L’amour c’est être stupide ensemble.”
She’d gotten it in Paris.
It meant “love is being stupid together.” A quote from the French poet Paul Valéry.
He tucked in her chair while his eyes remained on the tattoo. His hands flexed at his sides before he took his own seat.
He wanted to touch it.
To run his fingers down her spine and press his lips to each rose.
How could he be so close to everything he had ever wanted and still be so far away?
She leaned closer to him and he reciprocated as she spoke in hushed tones.
“Do you think they have a shrimp platter around here?” she asked.
He chuckled and reached for his water. “Do you have room in your dress for it?” he asked behind his glass.
The look she gave him had him arching his eyebrows.
She glanced around at their table companions, but no one was paying attention to them.
“Sir, you have no idea what’s under this dress.”
He choked on his water.
Knowing Nikki and how she always did things the way she wanted, regardless of what was expected or proper, he should have been worried.
But instead, he was amused, curious, and just a little bit aroused.
Which was to say, how he felt around Nikki all the time anyway.
