“I think you’re out of your mind,” Cynthia said, shaking her head. But it wasn’t a no, and that I was happy with, for the moment at least. “We are getting an ironclad prenuptial agreement; you know that, right?” I laughed.
“I would expect nothing less,” I said. “So what do you say?”
“Shawn,” she said, taking a deep breath, and I thought she was going to tell me no. “As much as I tried to move on with my life...having you in it again…” she licked her lips. “It feels too right to stop now. I guess I can’t say anything else except yes.”
I didn’t even wait to put the ring on her finger; I kissed her again, hungrily, and pressed her body tightly against mine. With any luck, we’d be back at the apartment, which was now in my name, with Cynthia’s information on a request to add her that I was waiting to file. We’d be alone together, in less than thirty minutes, and I would show her just how happy she’d made me. But, for the moment, all I could do was put the ring on her finger, crack open the champagne, and try and keep my hands off of her until we were finally alone. I had never thought that when I went to Cynthia to get her to clear my Dad’s name, that I’d end up in a whole new life. But, I had to admit I wasn’t disappointed with how things had turned out. It felt good.
The End
Epilogue
“If I had known that you were going to make our honeymoon this much of a mystery, I would never have agreed to you planning it all on your own,” I said, as Shawn finished tying the blindfold around my head. I tried not to feel anxious about the fact that I couldn’t see anything around me.
“The whole point is the surprise,” Shawn told me.
“The fireworks at the wedding reception were enough of a surprise,” I countered.
I felt the private jet shifting as it banked to make its landing, wherever it was we were going to. Shawn had refused to tell me anything, at all, about our honeymoon destination. “The captain asks that you take your seats and buckle your belts,” the flight attendant told us, and Shawn helped me get back into the chair. I felt so helpless with my eyes covered, and part of me wanted to just tell Shawn that he was being ridiculous and that he should let me see where we were landing, at least.
But I also wanted the surprise. I wanted to see just how complicated Shawn’s scheme was. I knew it was going to be something amazing; he’d been planning it almost from the moment I’d become his fiancée, from what I could tell.
“So, we were on that plane what, six or seven hours?” Led by Shawn, I had made it safely into some kind of vehicle and managed to resist the temptation to remove my blindfold. “There aren’t all that many places we could get to in that time.”
“There are enough,” Shawn countered, and I could hear the amusement in his voice.
“Can’t you, at least, give me a hint?” I could feel my heart beating faster from the excitement that threatened to turn to anxiety just from not knowing about my surroundings. I trusted Shawn completely, but there was some animal-brain part of me that just, flat out, didn’t like being blindfolded, especially when I didn’t know where I was in the world in the first place.
“It’s a place we talked about going to when we were teenagers,” Shawn told me. I groaned.
“We talked about going like eight different places,” I countered. “I mean, most of them wouldn’t be an eight hour flight away, so that at least limits it to...four places.”
“I’ll let you take the blindfold off when we’re in a prettier area,” he suggested. “Like when we’re about ten minutes away from where I’m taking you to start off our honeymoon.”
“We technically already started,” I pointed out.
“No, it doesn’t really start until we arrive in the city itself,” Shawn told me.
“You’re annoying, you know that?” Shawn laughed out loud.
“You said that on the plane too,” he reminded me, his voice low in my ear, his breath hot on my neck. “But I seem to recall that you took it back when I finally let you…” I felt my face heating up with an involuntary blush, but why was I blushing? There was nothing embarrassing about having sex with my new husband.
“This had better be the sightseeing equivalent of a mind-blowing orgasm, then,” I told him, tartly. “Or else I’m not taking it back this time. I felt Shawn’s lips brush against the spot where my pulse fluttered in my neck, and then the sharper graze of his teeth. Then, he took my hand and kissed it gently.
“It will be totally worth it in another...fifteen minutes,” he told me. I tried to be patient, just to spite him, because I knew he was enjoying every second of my excitement, every moment that I struggled to not remove the blindfold and spoil his surprise.
I felt a tugging at the blindfold sooner than I thought, and the fabric slid against my skin and light flooded into my eyes all at once. I had to blink to adjust to the morning glare after the long period of being blindfolded, and then I looked around through the windows of the town car.
For a few seconds I was clueless; we were in a city, and it was clearly older than the one we’d left. The buildings had that shabby-chic, artfully worn down look of European cities, something that nothing other than maybe the very, very old neighborhoods in New York City could come close to capturing. I’d guessed that we’d be somewhere in Europe or the United Kingdom; two areas we’d talked about visiting. But I hadn’t been able to mentally narrow it down any further than that.
But then, all at once, I caught sight of the words on signs for different shops; Boulangerie... Pharmacie... Boutique..., and then it hit me. The next instant, the driver turned a corner and I saw the first, perfect image, cliché but so endearing and exciting all at the same time. The top of the Eiffel Tower, like a tall man in a crowd, overlooking the city of Paris.
“We’re in Paris?” I stared at Shawn and he grinned.
“Not only are we in Paris, but we’re headed straight for the Eiffel Tower,” he replied. “We have a reservation for dinner, catered in, at the top.” It felt as if my heart had somehow simultaneously dropped down to my knees and leaped up into my throat.
“That’s...that is amazing,” I said, stunned beyond words.
“Do you remember telling me; I think it was like right after our first kiss,” Shawn said, reaching for my hand and taking it in his. “You said you wanted to drink wine at the top of the Eiffel Tower as soon as you arrived in Paris. Whenever that would end up being.” I felt my eyes stinging with tears, but I was smiling at the same time.
“I cannot believe you actually remembered that,” I said, shaking my head.
“I remember everything about you,” Shawn said. “Everything we talked about, it’s drilled into my head, and my heart.” He kissed me lightly on the forehead, then on the lips, pulling me close.
“This... I never would have expected this,” I admitted, once I could look around again. The sight of historic buildings, some of them dotted with placards proclaiming a famous person who’d lived in them, and people on the sidewalks going about their normal day carrying grocery bags. The Parisians, themselves, set apart from the tourists by their easy-chic style and the occasional paper sleeve wrapped around a baguette, only thrilled me more.
“We’re staying at the Mandarin Oriental, next to the Seine,” Shawn explained. “I almost got the penthouse suite there, but I didn’t think we needed three bedrooms.”
“And we have reservations at the best restaurants that I could get the concierge to recommend,” Shawn continued. “And from here…”
“From here?” I’d taken an entire month off work for our honeymoon, something I would never have considered doing before. But with the money I’d brought in for Shawn’s case, along with his father’s, the senior partners were more than happy to give me the time off.
“We’re going to Versailles, and then down to the south of France,” Shawn said. “And I thought maybe we could spend a few days in St. Tropez.”
“This is shaping up to be the honeymoon of all honeymoons,” I told my husband. Sha
wn grinned.
“Oh trust and believe. I tried my level best to spend a million dollars on it, at least,” he said. I shook my head.
“What?” I had no idea. Shawn had left his father’s business to start his own, and while I was pleased that he was more legitimate, Shawn Senior had insisted on keeping Shawn on the books as an investor; so Shawn was still a billionaire and would probably always be. I hadn’t quite gotten used to the way he threw money around when he felt like it.
“It’s my money,” Shawn said, kissing me again. “I can spend it how I like. And besides, there will always be more.”
The car pulled up to a parking area close to the Eiffel Tower, and Shawn helped me out of the car. The big, metal edifice looked just as amazing right up close as it always did in pictures, as incredible as it had been when Shawn had taken my blindfold off.
“We’re going to take the lift up, because while I know it’s a thing to walk up to the top, I’m not up for it today and I don’t think you are, either,” Shawn said.
“Not even a little. But we should try before we leave the city,” I told him. He went to the ticketing area and I waited while he talked with the employees, while looking all around me. Of all the things that had happened to me since Shawn had come back into my life, I had never expected to be in Paris on the first day of my honeymoon, about to have a private date at the top of the Eiffel Tower.
Shawn came back and took me by the hand. “Ah, Monsier, Madame, Bienvenue,” a man said, approaching us. “We ‘ave the Gustave Eiffel room ready.” They cleared the elevator for the ride to the top of the tower, and the man ushered Shawn and I into the lift, telling us, in inflected English, how beautiful a couple we were and congratulating us on our new marriage.
The room was technically supposed to be used for business meetings, but it was obvious to me that Shawn had gone all out describing what he’d wanted. As we stepped through the door, I took in the panoramic sight of all of Paris surrounding us in the tower, mingled with the same kinds of flowers from our wedding. There was a single table set up for Shawn and I, with a bottle of champagne in a bucket of ice waiting. “I thought I’d step up the wine we’d be drinking a little bit,” Shawn said, letting my hand go to open the bottle for us.
I stood at one of the windows while he poured us glasses of champagne, and felt myself tearing up. I was so overwhelmed at how beautiful Paris was, how happy I had felt, how utterly romantic everything was. “This is more than I ever would have imagined,” I said, unable to even pull myself away from the view.
“And it will only get better from here,” Shawn said, coming up to stand next to me, a glass of champagne in either hand. I took one from him, and for a few moments, we both just stared out over the City of Light together, hand in hand. Beneath us the Champs-de-Mars spread out into a broad, green quadrangle. And over there, the fountains of the Trocadero Gardens arced and vaulted in a dazzling display.
I turned Shawn as he wrapped his arm around my waist. “Everyone,” I said, “Should have a moment like this once in their lives.”
“This is all for you,” Shawn said. “All of it for you because, you see that sky above us? That big beautiful blue Parisian sky is how much I love you.”
He pressed me closer to him and I felt the fullness of his chest. And, as we kissed, Paris at our feet, I let myself finally surrender fully to the beauty of us, together, in this place, at this radiant moment. We were free and alive, and in love.
Let’s Hang Out
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Elliot’s got a billion in the bank,
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But all he wants, all he needs is … her.
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About the Author
Marcella Swann is an Amazon #1 bestselling author of heart-thumping and heart-melting contemporary romance. She's plied her trade in the newspaper business, written and produced a way off Broadway play, and is the proud mama of a singer-songwriter. When she's not trying to save newspapers from imminent doom (by subscribing to them all), she loves to take her readers on dreamy journeys to that place where all the men are hotties and the women are beautiful and strong. She also swings a mean kettle bell at the gym and likes people watching at Grand Central Station on a busy day. For more information visit www.marcellaswann.com. Marcella loves to hear from her readers! You can follow her @MarcellaSwannRomance on Facebook and @Marcella_Swann on Twitter or contact her at [email protected].
Redeemed: A Billionaire Second Chance Romance (Lost Love Book 1) Page 12
