Julien’s face fell.
Son of a bitch.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. I just…I don’t know.”
“Are you keeping the baby?”
“Yes. God, yes. That’s not even a question. I just have to figure out how to do this whole domestic thing. Babies and cohabitation and…marriage.” She almost choked on the word but forced it out. She was an adult, damn it, and she needed to start acting like one. “I’m not very good at it, in case you couldn’t tell.”
It had been difficult to let herself get wrapped up in Julien. She knew what happened when you let your whole self, your identity, and your happiness rest on another person, only to have him ripped away from you. She couldn’t let that happen. But Julien had done something to her. Made her hope in those first few weeks and months. Made her risk it all.
And now she’d hurt him.
She was really screwing this up. Last night, she’d finally told her brother about the baby. Tyler had been wonderful—supportive, comforting, and offering to come to her rescue if she needed him to. Just like big brothers were supposed to do. Though, growing up, she’d often felt like the older sibling, watching out for him, taking care of meals and laundry while their mom worked her ass off.
“So you don’t want to get married?” Julien sounded so lost, and it broke her heart.
“No, I didn’t say that. What happened to focusing on one thing at a time? Let’s talk about the baby first.”
“Okay,” he agreed. “Have you been to the doctor?”
She nodded. “She says I’m doing well and the baby looks good. I’m due in March.” It seemed like such a long way off, but she knew it would all go by in the blink of an eye. How could she be ready by the time the baby came? She was just trying to get her bearings and figure out her own path, and now she’d have this little baby to care for. The thought was overwhelming.
“Bon.” He reached over and closed the box on the engagement ring with a loud snap.
She jumped at the sound. All she wanted was to make Julien feel better. She could feel the frustration rolling off him in waves.
“You’re going to make a wonderful father,” she said.
He smiled, but she knew her words had wounded him. How could they not? She had to do better. “It took me a full month to wrap my head around the baby thing. Could you maybe give me a day or two to figure out what I want?”
“What about what I want?”
He was right, of course. His opinion, his needs—they mattered. “Tell me.” She had to hear him out. She owed him that much.
“I want you and this baby. I want it all, Mandy. The three of us together as a family.”
She rubbed her belly, which was just starting to show the growth of the fetus inside her. This baby deserved to grow up with both of its parents, something neither Julien nor Mandy had gotten to do. She knew why being a family meant so much to him. Knew he was terrified she might leave him like his mother had when he was small.
She thought back to how he’d told her about his childhood while they were lying naked in her bed one day. Remembering it broke her heart. At least her father had been forced to leave them, first by his false imprisonment, then with his death. It didn’t make missing him any easier or mean she wasn’t just as torn up inside at his absence through her childhood. But it was a little better than knowing your own mother had woken up one day and left without looking back.
Her heart ached for the little boy Julien had been. But what if he wasn’t sure? What if he was so desperate for the family, for the life he’d been denied as a child, that he only thought he loved her? Mandy stared into his green eyes, which were swimming in emotion. Begging her not to go.
She nodded, knowing this was the right answer. She would get over her fears of marriage, of losing herself in another person. Her baby deserved that much from his or her mother.
“Yes, Julien. Oui. I will marry you.”
Chapter Four
Mandy strolled through the Latin Quarter—le Quartier Latin, she corrected herself automatically. Rubbing her open palm against the fabric covering her stomach made her heart flutter. She didn’t know if she was ready for this. Marriage, babies, happily ever after. But she’d agreed, and it was much too late to go back now. Besides, it would rip out Julien’s heart if she changed her mind just two days after saying she’d be his wife.
If someone had asked her six years ago, or even six months ago, she would have said she wasn’t the marrying type. She’d watched her mom work herself almost to death for her family. Mandy had wanted more for herself, but it seemed life had other plans for her. She twirled the gold engagement ring round and round on her finger, wondering how she’d gotten herself into this mess.
Her gaze roved over the cream-colored buildings with their wrought-iron balconies and gates as she neared campus. Honestly, she didn’t think she’d ever tire of living in Paris. Taking in a deep breath, she turned the corner and entered the main gate to Sorbonne University. A few international students milled about in the cour d’honneur, the bright summer sun shining down on them.
Where was Julien? He’d said his class would be over by five, and they were supposed to go out for dinner after that.
Two of her students waved from across the stone courtyard, and she returned the gesture, still searching for her fiancé. The word felt foreign, even in her mind; she had yet to say it aloud.
Finally she spotted Julien at the base of the statue in the middle of the quad a few yards away. For a moment, her brain refused to make sense of the scene before her. Julien had his arms wrapped around another woman. No, not a woman. A girl. Mandy’s throat constricted as she recognized the dark curls and petite body. Annabelle Lavoie. One of her students. How could Julien do this to her?
“What the hell?” she yelled. Her loud American voice drew stares, but she didn’t care. Annabelle drew back from the lip-lock. Mandy’s gut clenched, and nausea rolled through her. This time it had nothing to do with morning sickness. She stomped toward them, the urge to forcibly yank Annabelle away from Julien like a living thing in her. Mandy yearned to wipe that smug smile off the young coed’s face. She was barely eighteen. What did Julien see in her?
“Ma belle,” Julien whispered, shoving his new friend aside.
No, he didn’t have the right to call her his beauty. Not now. Maybe not ever again. If he thought she would just let this go, he was sorely mistaken. Much as it would kill her, she’d move back to New York and raise this baby without him if she had to. He was the one who had been so happy when she told him she was pregnant. Could she have mistaken his reaction to her pregnancy for joy when it had been something more akin to fear?
He moved toward her, his hands outstretched.
“Don’t touch me!”
He froze. “Calme-toi, ma belle—c’est rien.”
“If it’s nothing, why the hell did you just have your tongue down her fucking throat? And don’t you dare tell me to calm down.” God, they couldn’t be having this argument here. Not in front of her students, her coworkers. Getting together with Julien in the first place had been unprofessional, and quite the scandal through campus. If she stood here arguing with him, it would be career suicide. She had to get out of here. She’d barely agreed to marry him, and already she felt like her heart was shredding. No way could she give anyone else that much power over her happiness.
The little trollop moved closer, placing an arm on Julien’s shoulder as if she had a right. “Julien, oublie-t-elle. Viens.”
He shrugged off the hand, but Mandy had seen enough. Annabelle pressed her thick red lips together and smiled. It was an evil little grin.
“Mais bien sûr, Julien, va avec ta mère. Félicitations,” Annabelle sneered.
Julien turned his angry gaze toward Annabelle. “Va te niquer.”
It took Mandy’s brain a full ten seconds to translate what Annabelle had said, and when she did, her anger boiled over. Screw making a scene. Mandy was too pissed to car
e now. Go with your mother? Mandy advanced three steps before Julien moved in front of her. Of course he would protect Annabelle. Tears threatened to break through the anger, and Mandy stopped moving.
He took a deep breath and spoke again, in English this time. “I’m sorry. Please, let us go back and speak at home.”
She’d loved the way he’d called her one-bedroom apartment their home just this morning, but now it was like a kick to the face. She clutched her belly. God, she’d known better than to say yes, and to a college kid of all people. The boy was barely in her goddamned generation. She’d known it was only a matter of time until he ran right into the arms of someone his age. She hadn’t thought it would be so soon, but that didn’t matter. How could she have been so stupid?
“We have no home. Not if this is the way you act days after proposing to me,” she said, her voice hollow. It was better than screaming, perhaps, but not by much. She glanced around and turned from him. Attacking a student in the middle of campus wouldn’t do her any good. Head held high, she walked back through the stone courtyard. Courtyard of honor, her ass.
She forced her feet to keep moving, stopped her knees from buckling by sheer will. She walked through the iron gates she’d come to love. And then she began to run. She didn’t stop until she reached the Metro station. She refused to look behind her to see if Julien would follow.
And she couldn’t decide which would be worse—if he followed her…or if he didn’t.
PUTAIN! JULIEN CHASED after his belle, determined to make this right. Damn Annabelle. She had to have known Mandy was there. Known that throwing herself into his arms and molding her lips to his would infuriate his betrothed. Annabelle had hated Mandy from the start, the salope. And on his behalf too. As soon as Mandy had kicked him out, Annabelle had announced she hated the new professor, and barely showed up for class anymore.
He sprang from the school’s main gates, his gaze darting right and left as he looked for his American beauty. She must hate him, surely. He spotted her down the street and ran after her. She disappeared into the entrance for the Metro at Maubert. As he chased her, he prayed to Dieu that he could catch her before she got on the train. He raced down the cement stairs into the Metro station.
He tried to form the correct apology in his mind, but he had no words. He should have known Annabelle would cause a problem after she walked into Mandy’s office at the beginning of the semester and witnessed them kissing. She’d called Mandy a bitch behind her back. Asked Julien if he was sleeping with Mandy just to get better at English. He’d tried to avoid Annabelle, but she was in too many of his classes. Friends with too many people he knew.
Mandy slipped into the crowd, and he lost sight of her. The train roared into the station as he was jostled this way and that by Parisians pushing to get on or off the train. He could get on the train and try to find her, but it would be too easy to lose her. He wished she’d continued on past the station and to her apartment, but non. She was going somewhere else. Would she go to the cathedral? He could picture her there, in her favorite spot below the famous Rose Window, gazing up at the stained glass for serenity. Or perhaps she was at the Shakespeare bookstore beside the cathedral. She could go anywhere in the city from the Metro. Including the airport.
Merde.
She had to come home at some point, didn’t she? Julien watched as the train rushed from the station, taking the love of his life with it. He left the Metro at the same place he’d entered and walked the two streets over to the blue door of Mandy’s building, feeling like shit. Why hadn’t she just given him a moment to explain? She’d been so quick to judge the situation. So sure he was doing something stupid. Not that she’d been wrong. The look on her face when Annabelle called her his mother would haunt him forever. She’d looked devastated.
He hadn’t realized the eight-year age gap between them bothered her. She hid it so well. Or maybe he’d just ignored the signs. It didn’t matter. She would come home. And then he would make her listen to what he had to say.
He used the keys she’d given him two months ago to get into the building and then into the apartment on the third floor. It was familiar to him, but lacked the comfort it usually offered.
Mandy’s place had become a haven in the city, giving him the closest thing he’d had to a home since leaving Carcassonne. But now it felt empty, completely devoid of her warmth. What had he done?
* * * *
Julien’s eyes threatened to close as he sat on Mandy’s bed. Their bed. Or it had been until he’d let himself get suckered into the kiss that could ruin it all. He shook himself awake and looked at the clock again. It was well after midnight, and Mandy still wasn’t home. How could he have been so stupid?
The sound of the squeaking apartment door made a vise clench around his heart.
“It was bad, Ty,” Mandy said from the entryway.
Merde. She was on the phone with her brother. Julien got up from the bed and walked into the short hallway. Mandy was in the kitchen, but she had her back to him. Should he interrupt her conversation?
“He had his arms around her, and I’m pretty sure his tongue was in her mouth.” Mandy’s voice broke. “I should have known. He’s so young…”
It was like a stab through the sternum. He waited as Mandy listened to what Tyler had to say. Julien hadn’t met the man before, but Mandy talked about him enough with the pure love of a younger sister that Julien was sure they would get along. Or he had been sure until now.
“No, Ty. Don’t come out here…” She paused, listening again. “Promise me. I need to handle this one on my own.”
Julien released the breath that had been choked in his throat. Mandy gasped and turned around, her caramel eyes too large in her heart-shaped face. She clutched the phone.
“Oh, God. He’s here,” she whispered into the phone. Still not speaking to him, apparently. “No, he doesn’t speak English well enough.”
That was a lie. Why would she lie to her brother for him? It didn’t make any sense.
She groaned, then held out the phone. What? She wanted him to talk to Tyler? Oh, this was so not a good idea. He needed to work things out with his fiancée, not her family.
But she was glaring, the dark skin of her face creased with lines of irritation. She was beyond enraged. So he took the phone from her.
“Alors, je ne sais pas ce que vous…” Julien stopped speaking, realizing that in his stress everything from his lips would be français.
Tyler jumped right in and talked over him anyway. “Kid. Shut up. I don’t understand French. You know enough English to understand me, though, don’t you?”
“Yes, of course,” Julien said. He wasn’t a kid, even if Mandy seemed to think so. But now was not the opportune time to point that out.
“Good. If you are lucky enough to have my sister forgive you, and you ever do something stupid to hurt her again, I will find you and hurt you. A lot,” Tyler said, his voice rough and ringing with sincerity.
“I would never allow this to happen again.” He wasn’t going to waste his time explaining to Tyler. It wasn’t him Julien had to convince; it was Mandy. His dark-skinned beauty. The love of his life. L’amour de sa vie.
“That’s good,” Tyler said.
Evidently that was the end of the conversation, because Tyler didn’t say anything else. Julien handed the phone back to Mandy.
“Yes, I’m fine,” Mandy said. “I love you. I will. Thanks. Bye.” She ended the call and set the phone on the counter beside her. She licked her bottom lip, a trait that spoke of her nervousness. One that Julien had come to adore. Only now, knowing he was the reason she was nervous wore heavily on his soul.
Her eyes were bloodshot, the skin around them puffy. He’d put that look there. And it made him feel like merde.
“She threw herself at me. I’m pretty sure she saw you coming across le cour and shoved her mouth against mine. I swear to you, I was not kissing her. I was just about to disentangle myself from her and ask her what
she was doing when you cried…eh, screamed. I swear it.”
Dieu, he hoped he could fix this. Because no way would he allow his child to grow up without a father. He knew what it was like to only have one parent around, and so did Mandy. But he feared he might have destroyed the possibility of a happy two-parent household for all of them. What would he do if she left him?
Chapter Five
God, she wanted to believe him. Mandy yearned to tell him he was forgiven, that it was all a big misunderstanding, and she knew it would never happen again. But how could she? A niggling voice in the back of her head told her this was what she’d been afraid of all along. The word mother still rang in her mind. Eight years wasn’t that big an age difference, was it? Maybe. Tonight it seemed insurmountable. Just another tick mark on the long list of reasons she and Julien shouldn’t be together. His age, her inability to commit, his desire to move to New York, her need to stay in Paris.
Add all that to the fact that he hadn’t pushed Annabelle away or come to Mandy’s defense, and she wasn’t sure she could forgive one more strike against them. Wasn’t sure she should even try. A bout of familiar nausea made her head swim, reminding her of the number one reason she’d agreed to marry Julien. She didn’t want to screw up this whole mother thing. Making the wrong decisions now would affect so much more than just the rest of her life.
“I don’t know if I can believe you,” she said. “Are you sure you wouldn’t just rather be with someone like her? Your age. French. It’d be easier for both of us.” He wouldn’t get made fun of. She wouldn’t have students and faculty alike criticizing her for her poor choices.
She’d planned on breaking up with him once. Maybe she should have followed through, for both their sakes.
He smiled in a way that was clearly forced. “You think that’s what matters to me? Making things easy?”
“No. Yes. Damn it, Julien, I don’t know.”
He shook his head. “Non. You. I just want you. S’il te plaît, chérie, je te promet. C’était rien,” he pleaded with her. Why did he keep calling it nothing?
Marietta Hotels 2: An Engagement in Paris Page 2
