But love was not a garden. It was a war zone right now, and she had no notion of whether to retreat or rejoin the battle. She only knew that it would be wise to have her own hotel room. She phoned the Sofitel and booked a second room for the next few nights, biting out the words so she wouldn’t break down and sob. This was not how she’d planned to spend five days in Paris with him.
Apart.
* * *
He buried himself in work for the next few hours. He couldn’t do anything else. Thinking about her hurt too much.
He put on blinders, and narrowed his focus solely to running his company. Tending to matters. Dealing with suppliers. Even reviewing the plans he’d put together to “change the conversation” when it came to Denkler. The plans were good, solid, strong.
Casey had sent over the marketing strategy. Henry and Eden were fully on board too. But honestly, it wouldn’t take much to get the word out. A few well-placed signs outside Henry’s Upper East Side store, a few online ads, and some social media mentions. Then word would spread of exactly how Eden and Joy Delivered contributed to the community.
Conroy was winning with a message that appeared positive. Denkler and company would overtake him, with a far, far better one.
The approach would work; he was as sure of that as he was of anything when it came to business. He knew how to navigate the choppy waters of the business world. Show him a problem, he’d show you the solution. That was his specialty. Applying logic. Studying the map and seeing a new route through. Finding the path that others hadn’t spotted yet.
With Michelle, he was sure of nothing. He felt so damn much for her. It was like a geyser inside of him, overflowing, and he didn’t know what to do with all these thoughts rushing at him. Confessing about Aubrey was like sloughing off the past, shedding all that had held him back.
So why couldn’t he take the next step with her?
Michelle vexed him. His feelings for her had thoroughly and completely thrown him off. He had to solve the problem. He had to figure this out. He slammed his laptop shut and paced the room. To the window. To the bathroom door. To the couch again.
The whole damn room smelled of her. He grabbed her red dress from last night; it had been tossed onto a chair by the window. It probably landed there when he tugged it off her. Bringing it to his nose, he inhaled her. She was in him. She filled him. She flooded his nostrils, and permeated every pore of his body.
He dropped the dress on top of her suitcase, missing her, even when she’d only been gone a few hours.
He grabbed his phone, just in case she’d texted him or called. But his screen was quiet, and it pissed him off. He stared at the phone as if it were the phone’s fault, then he gunned it at the ground.
It clunked dully on the carpet.
“Fuck,” he muttered. He couldn’t even throw a phone properly. He couldn’t even break a piece of technology. He swiveled around, hunting for a glass, a vase, something. But then he stopped, shoving his hand through his hair. Throwing shit wasn’t the solution. He knew better.
He slid the room key into his back pocket, grabbed his phone and wallet, and then left, hoping the distance would mute the longing.
He reached the lobby, and then walked out the revolving doors onto the Paris sidewalk, the sounds of the French language falling on his ears. He invited it in, hoped it would quell the confusion in his head as he walked and walked and walked. He didn’t have a plan. He didn’t have a destination.
There was only the sidewalk. And the gray sky. And the noises and sights of the city. The clink of espresso cups at cafes, the lush raspberries on a tart in a bakery window, the silvery necklaces on display in a jewelry shop. The beauty for beauty’s sake.
Her.
Everywhere.
In front of him.
Behind him.
In his head.
And here, right here, in the perfume bottles in front of him.
Because maybe, somewhere, deep down he’d had a destination. He hadn’t known it consciously, but somehow he knew. He’d found himself in the passage with the mosaic floor and the latticework ceiling and all the shops that were now open, including this one where he’d been with her. Where he’d begun his unraveling.
La Belle Vie was the name. A beautiful life. He stopped at the window, pressing his fingertips against it, like a kid staring longingly inside a candy shop. There they were—mirrored shelves upon shelves of perfume bottles like he’d seen the other night. He squinted, and swore that in a far corner of the shop he could see a sapphire-blue bottle.
The one she’d wanted. He ran for the door, and stopped short when a hunched over man in a faded blue sweater was locking the door, then swinging around a sign that said FERMÉ.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Consumed
Enough tears were shed. Enough emotions were spent. Enough time was devoted to all this space. Space sucked. Feeling sucked. Loving sucked. She left the gardens and walked into the gift shop, desperate for a book to help her get out of her head. Something to numb all these feelings in her chest.
She wandered past calendars and mugs with water lilies on them, and found a tall set of white shelves with books about art history, and coffee table books of Monet’s paintings, and a huge tome about the Impressionist masters. She spotted a small sturdy paperback on the gardens themselves. Opening it, she flipped through the pages, bursting with details about all these flowers. How to grow tulips like Monet, climbing roses like Monet, even lilies like Monet. Information, facts, details. Nothing more. It was precisely what she needed. To blot out everything else.