What If It's Love?: A Contemporary Romance Set in Paris (Bistro La Bohème Book 1)

by Nichols, Alix

  He walked into the kitchen and poured himself a glass of water. “Well, then I guess I’ll see you all in Saint-Fontain in mid-July. Say hi to everyone.”

  His mother promised to do that and made Rob promise to eat well and stay away from cigarettes. It was how they ended each of their conversations for the past six years, and Rob had grown to appreciate the reassuring invariability of that ritual.

  He hung up and went to the shower. As warm drops hit his shoulders and back, his thoughts turned to yesterday’s exchange with Lena Malakhova. They’d gotten off on the wrong foot. So he’d need to start over… if he were to accept the job.

  I can do this.

  He would fix their bad start and get Lena to relax around him. And then he’d get close enough to her to eavesdrop on her conversations without raising suspicion. And if he could manage to hold this gig throughout the summer, his little tuition problem would be solved without any need for a fairy godmother.

  With a sigh Rob admitted to himself his decision was made. He needed the money, and he was running out of time and options. The gig stank, all right. But after Googling Boris Shevtsov in every language he knew, he hadn’t found anything to suggest the guy was involved in criminal activity. So it would be as he’d said—just a bit of corporate espionage.

  Nothing more.

  Rob turned off the shower, dried himself and got dressed. Then he went to his desk, picked up Boris’s card and dialed his number.

  Boris answered immediately.

  “I’ll give it a go,” Rob said. “But if she’s not interested after a week, I won’t pursue her. You’ll have to find someone else. Are we agreed?”

  “Agreed. I’ll talk to you in a week.”

  * * *

  When Lena was eleven, her parents divorced. They didn’t fight over her custody in court but resolved the matter amicably after Dad paid off Mom. Lena still remembered every word of that dreadful conversation shortly after the scandal had erupted and turned their lives upside down. She could still feel the lump in her throat as her mother held her by the shoulders and shouted over her wailing. “You can’t come along. If you do, both of us will starve.” Lena had seen starving children on television. They had huge bloated bellies and vacant eyes. She didn’t want to starve.

  Then Mom left and Lena stayed with Dad. She cried for a week. For the next year, she waited for Mom to return for her. After that, she waited for Dad to mellow and let Mom visit. After several years, she gave up.

  Lena shook her head to dissipate the memories and forced herself to concentrate on the e-mail she’d been writing for the past half hour. It had two sentences. She added a third one, and reread her note.

  Hi Mom,

  I’m in Paris now, settled and very happy with my neighborhood and apartment.

  I’ll be working on my thesis over the next month and then will travel to Geneva for the defense. After that—we’ll see.

  Hugs,

  L

  Lena pressed send and sighed with relief. It was no small feat to have written such a well-rounded and informative missive to her mother. Those three short lines summarized hours and hours of phone calls with Dad.

  Just think of all the time she saved . . .

  Rob arrived at La Bohème an hour before his shift was to start. He scanned the bistro for Lena. To his great relief she was there, sitting at one of the sidewalk tables with her laptop and a glass of iced tea. He made himself a coffee and settled at the table next to hers.

  The moment she stopped typing to take a sip from her glass, Rob made his move. “Hi there. I see you like our little bistro.”

  She looked at him, recognition flickering in her eyes. “Hi. So you’re here as a patron today?”

  “Not really. Just getting sufficiently caffeinated to make it through the evening. Saturday nights are the waiter’s nightmare.”

  “I thought they were the best in terms of tips,” she said.

  “You thought correctly. Which is why we servers accept to work them without coercion. Have you ever waitressed?” he asked.

  “No, I haven’t. My knowledge is purely theoretical.” She took another sip of her iced tea and asked, “Are you a born Parisian? I cannot quite determine from your accent.”

  Rob smiled. This conversation was going well. In fact, much better than he had hoped, given the other day’s calamity. “I’ve lived here for the past six years, but I come from a small village in the southeast of France. The region is called Jura.”

  “I know Jura. It borders Switzerland. I even went hiking there on the Swiss side a few times,” she said quickly.

  “So, I take it you come from Switzerland?” he asked.

  She hesitated for a second and then said, “I’ve lived there for the past seven years.”

  “I like Switzerland, but I don’t think I could live there. It would be like living inside an idyllic postcard.”

  She leaned in, eyes bright with understanding. “Exactly. Like someone locked you up inside an idyllic postcard and threw away the key.”

  It was Rob’s turn to offer an insight into Swiss life. “It’s a very reliable country, just like its watches. The first bus always arrives at your stop at 7:13, as announced on the schedule. The postman delivers the mail at 7:14, and the ducks land on the pond at 7:15 sharp, every day.”

  “It depends.” She arched her eyebrows. “Where I lived, they hit the pond at 7:03. Every day.”

  He shrugged. “Must be lark ducks. Hey, here’s another one: the Swiss won’t cross the street at a red light even if there isn’t a single car in sight. They’ll just stand there and wait.”

  “If you try it in Paris, people will think you’re stoned. Have you ever noticed the big red button you’re supposed to press in such situations?”

  “When you’re stoned?”

  The corners of her mouth twitched upward. “No, when the traffic light is red, but there are no cars.”

  “Ah, that one! Yes, I’ve seen it. We have them in France, too.”

  “Well, in Switzerland people actually use them! They press, and wait, and press again several times, and wait some more. There are still no cars, but they won’t cross.”

  Her eyes were now sparkling with mirth. “I used to think the button made the light change to green faster. But then I timed it and realized its sole purpose was to give the law-abiding citizens some form of release. Like a punching bag for fingers.”

  Rob laughed. “Reminds me of another Swiss quirk. If you inadvertently drop a candy wrapper or a bus ticket, at least three people will notice and tell you in French, German, and Italian to please pick it up.”

  He held up his index finger and said with a thick Swiss accent, “Keeping our country clean is everybody’s business!”

  She put her hand over her mouth. “Oh my God—this actually happened to me once!”

  The game is on, he thought as he listened to her peals of happy laughter.

  I’m glad that you’re in love with someone else,

  I’m glad that I’m enamored with another,

  And I’m content that never will the Earth

  Relax its pull, condemning us to hover.

  With you, I can be funny—or a mess,

  Let down my hair and abandon caution.

  No fierce blushing every time our hands

  Brush lightly in an unexpected motion.

  I thank you from the heart for being kind,

  For loving me so sweetly, so benignly,

  For cherishing me, for my peaceful nights,

  For the non-kissing in a moonlit alley,

  For the non-dates, no passion to confess,

  For happily behaving like a brother,

  For being charmed—alas!—by someone else,

  While I’m—alas!—enamored with another.

  Marina Tsvetaeva

  THREE

  Two weeks after her arrival in Paris, Lena had become a regular at La Bohème. She went there every morning for a breakfast of coffee, croissants, and orange juice. Aft
er that she either headed to the library or stayed at the bistro typing away on her laptop and refueling on the barista’s delicious-smelling brews. On most days, she cleared the premises by noon, when the shop assistants, builders, and white collars working in the neighborhood arrived for lunch. She often returned in the late afternoon for dinner.

  Before giving the monopoly over her nourishment to La Bohème, Lena had made sure to check out the available alternatives. But her forays into the neighboring eateries turned out to be disappointing.

  At the first place across the street, she was served green beans overcooked to a sickly shade of gray. She ordered a medium steak at a more expensive restaurant a few blocks further down the street. The steak was served raw, and then reluctantly taken back to the kitchen to be returned a good half hour later, thoroughly burned.

  The last place she tried had decent food and the wait wasn’t too long. But as she ate, she became witness to a heart-wrenching scene. An ostensibly pregnant woman had walked in and pleaded with the maître d’.

  “I’m sorry, monsieur. May I use your bathroom?”

  “Are you a customer?”

  “No, but—”

  “The bathroom is reserved for our patrons.”

  The maître d’ swirled and walked away, leaving the woman stranded by the entrance. She shifted from one foot to another, her face contorting in discomfort as she scanned the room for a more sympathetic waiter. Lena rushed to the counter and got a token—the open sesame to the toilet door.

  “I’m transferring my bathroom entitlement to her,” she told the glaring maître d’ and handed the token to the woman.

  Lena resolved there and then that the establishment didn’t deserve her business.

  La Bohème, on the other hand, was free of such nonsense. Its food was delicious and its service quick. Its proprietor and staff were friendly for Parisian standards. Better still, they provided a constant stream of entertainment.

  There was the Adonis, of course. Lena still didn’t know his name—he never introduced himself, and he never asked her name, either. So, she continued to identify him as Adonis, even though the moniker was beginning to sound ridiculous. He had gotten into the habit of stopping by her table to exchange a few words about this and that, which made her feel like a valued patron. At least this was her official explanation of why she enjoyed those little conversations so much.

  After a few days, they’d established they were both finishing grad school and writing their theses. Adonis told Lena he was almost done and shared a few time management tricks.

  Yesterday afternoon when he threw her a friendly “how’s that thesis coming along”, she replied with pride she’d written more than half.

  “Well done!” he cheered, and Lena felt her cheeks warm with pleasure.

  If I were a cat, the entire café would hear me purr, she thought.

  He placed a cup smelling of coffee and chocolate on her table. “This cappuccino is on me. You deserve it.”

  She shook her head, “No, please, you shouldn’t do this. I’m happy enough with your verbal encouragements.”

  “Oh, but it’s nothing. If it makes you uncomfortable, I’ll rephrase it. This cappuccino is on the house—more precisely, on Pierre, the owner of the bistro.”

  He winked and added, “Pierre has no clue he just extended his generosity to you, but I can guarantee when he finds out, he won’t mind. He values education highly.”

  “Well . . . I suppose it would be rude of me to refuse a drink offered by the proprietor.”

  “He would be scandalized.”

  She raised the cup. “Here’s to Pierre—the champion of education, a generous boss, and an all-round good man.”

  “Amen,” he said.

  Then, there was the blue-haired waitress. Most of the other regulars called her Jeanne, and she knew their names as well. She’d greet the old lady who came for her daily espresso with a “Mme Blanchard, how is that knee today?” and actually stop to listen to the answer. She’d inquire of the gray-suited office rat, “Did your business trip go well?” She seemed to know about the patrons’ families, their work (or the lack thereof), and health. She certainly knew their culinary preferences, which made her order taking remarkably efficient.

  Lena couldn’t wait for the day Jeanne would greet her with a “Hi, Lena! The usual?”

  She had also spotted a goofy fellow who had his dinner at La Bohème every day. His wild curls and huge thick eyeglasses—the kind ugly ducklings wore in movies before their transformation—hid most of his face. On top of this, the guy was extremely thin. His T-shirt hung from his wide but bony shoulders in a two-dimensional way, like a shirt on a clothes hanger, with no noticeable relief anywhere along its length. His arms were so skinny that were he a woman, Lena would have bet he had anorexia.

  Did men suffer from anorexia?

  Mr. Clothes Hanger appeared to be Rob’s buddy. He also seemed to be carrying a torch for Jeanne—if his lingering looks and repeated clumsy attempts to strike a conversation with her were any indication. Unfortunately for him, Jeanne didn’t take the slightest interest in his person, except how he liked his coffee and his steaks.

  The third waiter Lena liked to watch was a black-haired Spanish guy, Pepe. He had the body of a matador—elegant and compact. It was a shame, really, that his shapely frame was too small for today’s male beauty standards. He had a goatee, beautiful obsidian eyes, and a charming accent. He flirted desperately with every fair-haired girl who passed through the café, even though the girls didn’t flirt back with him.

  Once Lena heard him ask three German girls having beers next to her table, “What are your names, lovelies?”

  “Brunhilde,” one of them said with a sweet smile.

  “Irmtraud,” the second said with an even sweeter smile.

  “Hildegard,” the third said, her smile so big Lena worried the corners of her mouth would tear.

  Pepe looked from one girl to the next, lips moving as he tried to memorize their unlikely names. This sent the girls into a prolonged fit of the giggles that finally drove him away.

  Pepe didn’t attempt to flirt with Lena, who was exceedingly grateful this particular gentleman preferred blondes.

  * * *

  “Having trouble with the writing?”

  Lena looked up. Pepe the Matador stood by her table, shaking his head in sympathy. “What if your nails don’t grow back?”

  “Oh,” she said, jerking her hand from her mouth. “How observant of you—Pepe, right?”

  “Yes, and you are?” Pepe replaced Lena’s empty cup with a steaming frothy blend.

  “Lena. I live in this building, as it happens.”

  “I figured as much. Are you a friend of Rob’s? I see him chatting with you whenever he has a spare moment.” Pepe smiled innocently and gave her a suggestive wink.

  As Lena marveled at how he could accomplish such a paradoxical combo, her brain registered that Rob was Adonis.

  “No, I am not a friend of Rob’s. In fact, I have no clue why he stops to chat with me.”

  “Don’t you?” Pepe gave her an are-you-dumb look. “Let’s see. If I were you, I’d assume he liked me. But what do I know?” He shrugged and headed to the kitchen.

  Lena’s thoughts scattered like beads from a torn necklace. Could Rob really like her? He did chat with her a lot, almost every time he had a spare moment. But what did he find in her? With his looks and charisma he could have any girl—any gorgeous girl. Could he have found out she was an heiress? But then, he wasn’t the kind of guy to pursue a girl for her money . . .

  She blew out her cheeks. This was ridiculous. For one, she had no idea what kind of guy he was. She tried her best to concentrate on her work. But as if on cue, Rob walked into La Bohème. He wore a basic white T-shirt and faded jeans. Hidden in her corner, Lena ogled him in a most shameless way. Her gaze feasted on his narrow hips and flat stomach, then traveled up his well-muscled arms to his broad shoulders, caressed his firm jawline, and dran
k in his intelligent hazel eyes.

  Rob sauntered to the counter, his every movement infused with easy masculine grace. When she finally lost sight of him as he disappeared behind the door marked STAFF ONLY, she could feel her heart racing and her cheeks burning. How stupid! She should know better than to drool over the first handsome stranger she met in this town.

  He’s just a pretty boy, offered the familiar sensible voice in her head.

  Boy, he is pretty, retorted a voice she’d never heard before.

  In the face of such blatant sauciness, her sensible self kicked below the belt. A pretty boy who will break your heart, given the chance.

  Bingo. Lena blinked as her pulse slowed down and color drained from her cheeks. A broken heart was a messy business. Was the pretty boy really worth it?

  Nope. Especially not now. She was finally over Gerhard, really over him. Her soul was filled with a sense of freedom she was beginning to seriously appreciate. She’d nearly forgotten how it felt to jump at every phone call, and to spend hours debating if she should make a move, or if her boyfriend was still into her. Gerhard had never been given to excesses, but a few months ago Lena started to suspect he cared more for his Labrador than for her. In March she began to wish he’d just dump her and put her out of her misery. But Gerhard was in no hurry to end their relationship. And she didn’t have the guts to do it herself. Which was when the idea of a research trip to Paris turned into a plan to move there.

  Lena closed her laptop and waved for the check. She wanted to leave before Rob emerged from the staff room and shattered her resolve. This newfound freedom of hers, this unattached bliss—it was too precious to throw to the wind. She should protect it at any cost.

  Especially when all she had to do was stay away from a handsome Frenchman named Rob.

  * * *

  Vanves was one of the Parisian suburbs where Tsvetaeva found refuge during her long French exile. It was residential and dull. Lena wandered through its streets, trying to imagine how they looked in the 1920s when Tsvetaeva lived here. Those years weren’t a happy time for the poet. She was separated from her friends and her husband, struggling to provide for her children, and unable to publish her work. She was stuck in French suburbia, too bourgeois to return to Bolshevik Russia and too poor to move her family inside Paris. A fish out of water.