by Jade Allen
Within minutes of getting settled into her seat, Rachel, completely spent, tumbled into a deep slumber. Soon, her head began to jerk frantically from side to side as the feeling of being chased by a mob of shadowy figures wielding guns played across her mind’s eye in a stubborn loop. Just as she thought she heard the sharp crack of a gunshot, she was ripped out of her nightmare by the sound of Dylan’s blaring phone. Barely awake, she listened to the quiet murmur of his slightly lilting voice as he confirmed details with whomever he was speaking to.
“Where are we going?” she asked, listlessly.
“You’ll find out soon enough, Love,” he said, looking around to see if anyone was listening. He began to shove a few things into his carry-on bag and then paused, turning his head to meet her glance, placing a hand tenderly on her thigh. “Cheer up, Rachel—the world is your oyster now. Things are about to get a hell of a lot more fun.” He smiled with a wink. “For the two of us.”
PART TWO
It had been a month since Rachel had arrived in Rouen. As she walked by Dylan’s side past the Jardin des Plantes, she looked around—not as furtively as she had when they first arrived, but with curious eyes taking in details that even repeat walks through this part of the city hadn’t yet revealed. She shuddered slightly as she remembered the tortuous trek they had taken to arrive here.
The plane that she and Dylan boarded had taken them to Amsterdam. She had been irritated to discover that after the long flight, they were immediately moving on to a train. In spite of having first class seats, Rachel hadn’t been able to sleep, plagued by nightmare images of her apartment, the fire that had gutted it, shadowy figures and disguised voices. Dylan’s presence through the flight had kept her from descending into full-on panic, but still she hadn’t slept for the entire ten hour trip—she had barely slept the night before they had left, her nightmares of being chased through the terminal interrupted only by sessions of lovemaking with Dylan.
They traveled from Amsterdam to Belgium, Belgium to Geneva, and then finally, from a small town in the French Alps into Rouen. They had been in transit for almost a full week, stopping only long enough to sleep in a hotel. Along the way, Dylan had chivvied her into eating the regional cuisine and enjoying the delicious wines, liquors and ciders these different places were known for. By the time she finally walked into the apartment in Rouen where they were going to stay—at least for the time being—Rachel could barely remember a life spent in one place.
“Leave the worrying to me, Love,” Dylan had suggested after Rachel had rebuffed his offer to take her clothes shopping a few days into their stay in Rouen. “God knows I’d realize it if we were being tailed well before you did.” Part of Rachel had resented the comment; she scowled up at him from her sprawl on the couch, frowning.
“Excuse me if suddenly being the target of some extremely wealthy people who are out to kill me and steal my fortune makes me a little paranoid,” she retorted.
“Ah, you’re starting to think of it as really yours, are you?” Dylan had smiled a little at that. “Good. Means you’ll fight to keep it.”
Glancing at her bodyguard and lover, Rachel had yet to figure out what his real intentions were. He was more than willing to take her to bed. In fact, after the brief hesitation he had shown the first time they were together—trying to push her away with the thought that she was too drunk to know what she was doing—he was eager to satisfy her any time she gave him even the slightest indication that she wanted it. But whether or not he actually cared about her as a person was something that Rachel couldn’t quite decide on.
In some moments while soothing her frayed nerves, holding her body against his and whispering that it would be alright and that her life was not—contrary to what she had believed—a complete and utter ruin, Rachel could almost believe that something other than the hefty paycheck he was earning motivated him. At other moments, she wasn’t certain she could discern even a shred of interest from him; sometimes while assuming his role as her bodyguard, she wasn’t sure if he even liked her, much less loved her.
She was constantly looking over her shoulder, her mind suggesting that each passerby was someone intent on attacking her, abducting her—or worse. After two weeks of relentless anxiety, being plagued by nightmares and panic attacks, Rachel had awakened one morning with the incredible, bizarre feeling that she just couldn’t take it anymore. She had sat up in bed and stared at the shapes of her legs under the blanket and thought, Good god, if I keep going this way I’m not even going to be able to enjoy being wealthy. I’m going to give myself a damned heart attack and save them the trouble of killing me. Her mind had hardened out of the sense of wonder. To hell with them. I’m not going to give them the satisfaction.
She still had bad moments, but that morning, Rachel woke Dylan and told him she was going to get a look at the city they had settled in for the time being—whether or not he was coming with her. While the few clothes she had brought with her across the Atlantic and through multiple checkpoints in border control had been a comfort, they suddenly seemed like the equivalent of a security blanket: a little childish to cling to, particularly for a woman in her twenties. When she and Dylan had first stepped into the Rouen city center, Rachel squealed with delight as the signs advertised that it was sale season.
Rachel had moved from shop to shop, plucking any item that caught her fancy off of the rack and handing it off to Dylan to hold onto until she had enough for a changing room. She had not yet come to the point of being confident enough to walk into the major boutiques—few of whom had locations in Rouen, with Paris so close—but in the span of an afternoon, she had managed to furnish herself with a complete wardrobe, from foundation garments to shoes and bags, moving through stores with the passion of a woman who had seen many things she loved but could never before afford.
Dylan had complained good-naturedly, rolling his eyes with a slight smile tugging at the corners of his lips as they both navigated the variety of stores. Rachel discovered that his French was far more fluent than hers; she let him ask the questions of the various shop clerks.
Before their departure from the US, Dylan had retrieved a collection of credentials, cash, and paperwork from a bank lockbox—some of which he had shown her, most of which he had not. Rachel discovered that she was already half a million dollars richer by the time they landed in Amsterdam, with a notation on the transfer that said Running money. In Rouen, she had a different last name, a couple of credit cards and a passport with her new identity. Their apartment was leased under a completely different identity—a dummy name one of her benefactor’s many alter-egos, according to Dylan—but one that had been under the radar for over a decade, making it safe.
“No need to try and keep it all in mind,” Dylan told her when she asked how they would ever keep up with the various identities and backstories involved in their evasion. “I don’t even keep the half of it stored up here unless it’s relevant at the moment.”
The day after her shopping spree, Rachel had put Dylan through another afternoon of boredom when she booked a long appointment at one of the city’s top-rated salons. She hadn’t altered her hair completely, but she got a drastic haircut; Dylan had suggested with surprising helpfulness that highlights would transform her dark hair still more, just enough to make her a little more difficult to identify
By the end of her splurge, Rachel’s first burst of agitation had eased; she was now an entirely new woman. She occasionally had moments of fear where she wasn’t quite sure how much she could trust to Dylan’s diligence to keep her safe, but she had explored her new city with gusto, taking in the museums and wandering respectfully through cathedrals. She was bowled over by the constant, breathtaking beauty of Rouen; the contrast between genteel, slowly decaying remnants of the old splendor of France and super-modern structures and stores. The Rouen Castle, the Jardin des Plantes de Rouen and the Pont Gustave-Flaubert all danced across her hungry eyes.
Rachel tugged at Dylan’s arm, pointing
towards a street vendor who was quickly pouring batter onto a large, round griddle. She had never understood the allure of crêpes until the first time Dylan had persuaded her to buy one for herself as they waited for the train in Samoëns. That first crêpe, stuffed with deeply colored preserves from a berry called myrtille, had satisfied a craving that Rachel never suspected she had. Ever since, whenever she saw a crêpe stand, it was nearly impossible for her to not stop and try another filling wrapped up in the delicate, thin, soft pancake.
Dylan rolled his eyes with a slight grin, and the two walked towards the street cart, hand in hand. Again, Rachel wondered if his public boyfriend behavior was just to serve for good cover, or if it was instead guided by any kind of affection for her. They stood off to the side as a line of people gathered, heeding the siren call of the sweet, eggy batter sizzling on the griddle. Rachel’s gaze traveled over the menu, her brain laboriously translating crêpe au fromage, crêpe au fraises; flicking through the different fillings offered: bananas and Nutella, thinly-sliced apples and cinnamon, ham and cheese and roasted chicken. She pointed out what she wanted to Dylan and he nodded crisply, maneuvering them into the line.
“Bonjour, Monsieur,” he said, baring his most charming smile. “Une crêpe avec sucre et citron, et une autre avec de confiture de framboise, s’il vous plait.” The man nodded, smiling at the two of them. He asked a question; Rachel interpreted it as “Have you been together long?” Dylan shrugged, glancing at Rachel with warmth in his eyes, and replied that it had been a little over a month.
Within moments, their crêpes—lemon, sugar and butter for her, and raspberry jam for Dylan—were in their hands, and Dylan was waving a thankful goodbye to the street vendor. As they walked away, Rachel took the first bite of her snack and moaned softly as the warm, slightly caramelized, lemony sugar coated her tongue. She closed her eyes, putting her trust into Dylan to keep her from running into anyone or anything, savoring the taste. It was hard to believe that something so simple could be so incredibly delicious.
“Careful with those noises,” Dylan said, giving her hand a squeeze. Rachel realized that she had moaned again with her second bite, which somehow seemed to taste even better than the first.
Dylan’s voice dropped lower, and she felt his breath against her ear, along her neck. “I doubt you’d want to attract attention by driving me to pull you into an alley to make you scream.”
Rachel opened her eyes and gave Dylan a playful shove, shaking her head. “For a guy who’s supposed to be the brains of this outfit, you have a hard time multi-tasking,” she told him airily.
“Oh, I’m great at multitasking,” Dylan countered. “I could pin you up against a wall, get you off, and keep a lookout for jack-booted assailants all at the same time.”
Rachel chuckled, taking another bite of her crêpe. Every once in a while, she was startled by her sudden spring into resilience—by the fact that she had been so deeply afraid for what had seemed like an eternity, only to change into confidence and nonchalance seemingly overnight. What startled her more was that the transformation didn’t seem to be a surprise to Dylan at all.
They made their way back to the apartment, talking sporadically about what they would do to amuse themselves the next day. While Dylan mostly let Rachel organize and plan their activities, he had a rule that by nightfall, they were back in the apartment.
“Too easy to get caught unaware on the street at night,” he told her. “I’m decent in a fight, but if they got the drop on us—if we were both tipsy, out alone, and they sent five or six folks after us between street lights—it would be close. Too close for me to want to risk. So after dark, we stay in.”
It wasn’t as though she’d been much of a nightlife maven before coming into her fortune anyway; the throbbing bass and sweaty masses inside nightclubs never really appealed to her. But she found that the little reminders of her fugitive status made her want things that she had never really considered before: the ability to go out at night, the freedom to meet with whoever she wanted, to wander around alone if she felt like it. Just as he promised, no matter where she went, Dylan was there with her. If she wanted to go to the market, he strode alongside her, usually holding her hand or with his arm around her waist.
There were times when the only way that Rachel could have a few moments alone—or as alone as she could be—was to go into a restroom. Every now and then, Dylan’s constant surveillance felt stifling; not always, but often enough that whether she needed to use the facilities or not, she told him she did. He gave her space in the apartment they shared, but somehow, just knowing that he was only the length of the hallway away from her made Rachel feel like he was still watching, still listening, that nothing she did was unattended. For a woman who had lived in what she jokingly referred to as “spinster splendor” up until the day he had arrived in her life, it was a difficult transition to make, even though Rachel appreciated the necessity.
Dylan’s phone—which was the fourth phone she had seen him use in their time together so far—rang almost as soon as they were through the door. Rachel kicked off her shoes, turning away from him and sauntering over to the sofa in the living room; she knew better than to even give much thought to what the other side of his conversation might be.
“Yes. Absolutely. Still stable. No signs. Understood.”
Rachel sprawled across the sofa, staring up at the rough, plastered ceiling, contemplating the change her life had undergone. It was nice to live in Rouen. It was nice to be able to shop when she felt like it, to order her days the way she pleased. What wasn’t nice was wondering how much longer they would be together; how much longer Dylan would have to look around constantly, poised to defend her from any attack. She wanted to take some kind of action. No matter how many activities she packed into the day, or how many times they made love to the point where Rachel was exhausted down to her bones, she went to sleep feeling restless.
“Unless someone notices your presence in the city, we’re staying here another month,” Dylan said as he set his phone down, sinking into the cozy, wingback chair next to the couch.
“Why do we have to leave in a month? And what if someone notices?”
Dylan shrugged. “I’d assume another fire, though they might not have the guts to be that direct again—not in another country. And we have to leave because we have to keep them guessing.”
Rachel frowned, closing her eyes with a sigh. “If they haven’t noticed me being here a month from now, how dangerous could it be to stay here?”
“Love,” Dylan said; she could picture his facial expression in her mind: slightly exasperated, with a flash of sympathy in his eyes. “If we can, we need to move around while they don’t know where you are. If they find you, it’s easier to track you. If you leave before they find you, the trail’s already gone cold.”
Rachel pressed her lips together, irritation warring with a flicker of instinctive fear. She didn’t want to leave Rouen; not only had she come to love the city, but the prospect of another multi-day trip without knowing where the endpoint would be, shifting from plane to train to bus, was more than she thought any reasonable human being could stand.
“We have way more stuff than we did when we got here,” she said, her voice taking on a slightly whining tone that she normally despised hearing. “God.” Rachel opened her eyes, turning her head to look at Dylan. “If he’s so high and mighty and powerful, why hasn’t he figured out how to get me safe yet?”
Dylan shrugged. “It’s a complicated mess. He doesn’t like keeping you on tenterhooks any more than he likes no longer being in control of his company.”
“Are they at least after him, too?” Rachel knew she shouldn’t wish her own troubles onto someone else—particularly someone who had given her so much—but she almost resented the man who put her in the position of having received a foolishly-given fortune. “If he wanted to give me money, why didn’t he just give it to me out of his own damn account?”
Dylan laughed. “I do
n’t try to plumb the minds of the people paying me,” he said with a shrug. “And yes, they are after him too—so at least you have company in your misery.” He stood quickly, and Rachel felt her heart beat a little bit faster as Dylan stepped towards her, kneeling on the edge of the sofa, leaning in to hover over her face. “Company other than your suspicious bodyguard.” Rachel softly moaned as one of his hands trailed along her body, cupping her breast and then shifting to her waist.
He moved again, turning around to straddle her hips. Rachel reached up to wrap her arms around Dylan’s shoulders as his lips came down upon hers, sealing off any protest she might have made. Rachel opened her mouth as Dylan’s tongue swept along her lips, teasing her. She moaned again as he rocked his hips against her, able to feel the hardening ridge at the crotch of his pants pressing against her. Dylan’s hands moved all over her body, caressing and teasing her everywhere seemingly all at once as he deepened the kiss, his tongue probing her mouth. His fingers moved quickly, unbuttoning her cardigan, peeling the fabric back to expose the camisole underneath. Rachel found herself rising from the couch and then falling back against its cushions again as Dylan quickly stripped off her clothing layer by layer, barely breaking away from her lips to pull the fabric over her head.
Rachel’s hands fumbled as she moved to unbutton his shirt, her dexterity suffering in the face of her rising arousal, the distraction of Dylan’s lips shifting from her lips to her neck, his teeth grazing her sensitive skin. He cupped her breasts, squeezing them carefully, finding her nipples by touch as they hardened against the thin, lacy fabric of her bra and teasing them until they were firm, tingling to his touch. Rachel writhed, feeling her pussy becoming wetter and wetter, her inner muscles tightening convulsively as her arousal intensified. Dylan pulled back; Rachel knew she wasn’t imagining the admiring look in his eyes as he looked down at her, breathing heavier already, his cock already fully hard, straining at the fabric of his jeans.
