Page 139 of The Stranger

“Not the children, not Zoe, not Jacques or anyone else. And never Emmy.”

“Understood.”

“Which means no more cake.”

“I don’t want cake. I want the whole banquet.”

“So what happens now?”

His mouth brushes mine again, maddeningly brief. “We go to bed. Alone, sadly.”

“And tomorrow?”

He considers me for a moment. “Sylvie has been bugging me to spend the night with Maria and her family, sleeping under the stars. I’ll arrange it for tomorrow.”

My eyebrows lift a little. “Camping? Your children?”

“Not quite.”

“But convenient.”

“Sometimes fate hands you the keys to paradise.” Luc catches my hand, his thumb moving once across my knuckles.

My pulse skips. “So paradise tomorrow?”

His smile is slow and devastating. “Heaven between your legs.”

I can hardly wait.

34

PRIMROSE

I wake excited. There, I admit it. As soon as I open my eyes, my insides fizz with anticipation and nervousness of what’s to come.

Drum roll, please…

Sylvie is out of bed, as usual, by sparrow fart, dancing and singing and asking a million questions a minute, though she does sit still long enough for me to braid her hair.

“I like it when you brush my hair, Primrose.”

“That’s good to hear, sweetie,” I say, holding a hunk a little ways from the root as I tackle her silverly locks with an old-fashioned brush. “I don’t know how it gets so knotted. You must party in your sleep or something.”

“Emmy says I sleep like a cheese rolling down a hill,” she says with a giggle. “Do you know there is a place en Angleterre, I mean, in England,” she begins to turn her head to look at me before remembering with a small wince that it might not be such a good idea, “that there is a place where people roll cheese down hills?”

“Yes, in Gloucester,” I say as though there’s nothing weird about that.

“Vous êtes dingos!” she replies laughingly.

“We are not all bonkers. Just some of us.”

“Brava, Primrose, you understood! Your French is getting better.”

“Thank you.”

“I told you I am a good teacher.”

So good a teacher that I don’t remember the lesson. Also, oops for slipping up. But at least her dad wasn’t around to hear. That would’ve been awkward.