All for You

by Laura Florand

  He liked being her strength when she needed it. He liked it a lot.

  “I love this hot chocolate,” he said, because even as tired as she was, she’d made him some anyway, with a quick smile and sparkle of her eyes, whisking the chocolate into hot milk as he washed their plates.

  He’d spent the hours between his quitting time and hers in the gym, working out, so he could use all the hot chocolate he could get.

  His muscles were still a little pumped, in fact, which he was enjoying quite a bit because Célie’s eyes kept lingering on his biceps whenever she glanced his way. He smiled at her.

  She rolled on her back on the rug, gazing at the brick wall. God, the backbreaking, tedious hours she’d spent scraping plaster off that thing. And now she beamed every time she looked at it.

  Kind of like he did, every time he looked at the gleaming hardwood floors or the elegant efficiency of the bathroom or the beautiful kitchen he’d built her, after consulting with her every step of the way—how she moved, what she reached for, what kind of things needed to go on the high shelves only he could reach for her, and what things in the cabinets she had to bend for. It meant that most of the things were slightly misplaced for him when he cooked, but that was okay. It was still way the hell better than anywhere he’d ever lived before.

  On the wood mantle he had built for the fireplace sat photos Célie had framed. Them dressed up at Jaime’s wedding—about damn time Dom got his guts up for that—and another of them a mess of sand and fun after helping build a sandcastle that same wedding weekend over in the U.S. Joss in Legion camouflage, with the men from his unit after they’d just finished cleaning out camps of drug dealers in Guyane. Herself, splattered with chocolate and beaming, holding up a trophy she’d won in a chocolate-making competition. Joss loved that one. It made him want to lean over and taste her for chocolate every time he looked at it.

  She kept the postcards he had sent her in a drawer by her side of the bed, hidden, thank God, so that every friend who came over didn’t have to see how bad he’d been at putting his heart down on paper. But sometimes, if they started snapping at each other over some minor thing, she would stomp off to the bedroom mad. He’d take a few minutes to calm down and want to make up, then follow to find her sitting on the bed looking through the postcards. And she’d smile at him, the irritation forgiven and forgotten in favor of what really mattered.

  “I love this place,” she said softly.

  “I love you,” he said.

  She found his bare ankle and curved her hand around it, her thumb caressing his ankle bone as if even that part of his body had a texture she couldn’t resist.

  Hell, that felt good.

  He set his chocolate on the hearth and pulled her up to nestle back against his body, her head tucked against the join of his thigh and hip.

  “A lot. I mean … really a lot.”

  He just didn’t have the eloquence to tell her how much. “Really a lot,” hell. Maybe he should have gone off for five years of poetry classes instead. He suspected Corey Chocolate wouldn’t pay him nearly as well for an expertise in poetry, though.

  She smiled at him. “I love you, too.”

  Maybe … now would be a good time?

  His stomach tightened. He tried to breathe through it. Hell, if Dom Richard could finally get up the nerve to propose to Jaime, Joss could risk a second rejection.

  He could.

  Damn it, he could.

  Mostly because he just wanted it so damn bad.

  Célie reached up from her position against his thigh to stroke his cheeks, and the coolness of her fingers made him realize how hot his skin was. Oh, fuck, was he blushing?

  “How am I doing on the cuddles?” he asked.

  She nestled her face into his thigh. “I’m so happy.”

  Sometimes he didn’t know what to do with how much tenderness swamped him in moments like this. He almost couldn’t breathe from it, as if it was his kryptonite or something. A force that could overwhelm a man no matter how strong he tried to be. He had to stroke her cheek and just sink into it.

  “I wanted to ask you something.” Heat burning in his cheeks, he rubbed one hand against the slate of the hearth. “I suppose now is a good time.”

  “Okay,” she said quietly. She’d gotten so good at that—listening to him. She’d managed to breathe that anger out of her somehow and release it, in the way his mother had never been able to release her anger with his father, not even when she let it spill onto her son, too. Célie’s quiet when he tried to talk to her now made him feel as if they were teenagers again—when they could talk about anything. When she had been his refuge, the person who made his thoughts feel whole and true and worthy of being shared.

  Like teenagers, but … bigger. Stronger. Even a little wiser.

  Oh, hell, he just had to go for it. He cleared his throat and dug awkwardly into the pocket of the hip she wasn’t lying on. Yes, he had been putting this item in his pocket every morning for the past six months, just in case his chances looked good that day. Just in case he could get his nerve up.

  He got it free and took one deep breath, trying for the techniques he’d learned to deal with adrenaline in the Legion—fill your lungs. Hold it two seconds. Let it out long and slow. And go. “Do you ever think there might come a time again when people would think you were running around in sequins because it would make you so happy … to wear this?”

  He held out the diamond ring she had once turned down.

  And his stomach tightened to the point of implosion. The platinum burned against his fingers as if he’d pulled it straight out of a fire.

  She drew in a breath, pressing her fist to her mouth.

  Was that—oh, God, that was the exact same expression she’d had on her face just before she said no the other time.

  His fist clenched around the ring. “Or, if you’d rather …” He had to clear his throat much harder this time. He fished in his pocket again. “There’s this one.”

  God, this goddamn ring. Cheap, slim band, oversize fake diamond, bent setting. He had to breathe slowly to keep his hand open and the cheap thing resting on his palm, instead of hidden inside a fist.

  But Célie … she lit up like, like … sequins. She sat up, grabbing his hand so she could look at it better. “Did you go back and buy me one just like the one you almost bought me before?” Her voice came out so hushed and wondering.

  Damn, his throat felt rough. Five years in the Legion had ruined his voice. He tried to clear it anyway. “This is the one I bought before. Five and a half years ago, the night before I left.” See how pathetic it was? See why I couldn’t offer it to you?

  Her hands tightened spasmodically on his. She jerked up her head so fast she almost hit him in the chin. “You bought it? You actually had it in your pocket when you told me good-bye that night? And you lost your nerve?”

  “I wanted to be better,” he said low, a little helplessly.

  “Oh, Joss.” She threw her arms around him, holding on as tight as she could. Hell, that felt good. That was so much better than crying and telling him to go away. Oh, thank God. No matter how badly this proposal attempt turned out, at least it was already better than the last time. “I will strangle you one of these days, I swear.”

  He rubbed her back gently. “I’ve got a strong neck. I can risk it. For you.”

  “I love you so much,” she whispered. “I always have.”

  Okay, so he was making progress. He was definitely getting better results this attempt than last one. But …

  Oh, fuck, would she just say it? Yes or no? The fucking suspense was killing him. What if she was letting him down gently? Or what if she was going to say yes?

  He set both rings into the same hand and held them out to her on his palm. “You can have either one you want.”

  His pinky finger curled surreptitiously over the cheap one, trying to hide it.

  Célie peeled his pinky finger back, looking at it. Oh, hell.

  S
he looked back and forth between the two rings for a long time, the one that he was so proud of, that showed all that he had been able to accomplish, and the one of which he was ashamed, that showed where he came from. When she looked up at him, her eyes were shimmering. Fuck, not the tears. That had ended so badly for him last time.

  And then she said, “Can I have both?”

  He blinked, not quite able to absorb what she had just said. He felt kind of … dizzy. As if all his world had just turned into this mass of swirling sequins under a disco ball.

  “Because I love both those parts of you. Who you were and who you drove yourself to become. I love that you loved me then, and I love that you love me now,” Célie said.

  He snatched her into him, hugging her hard as he buried his face in her hair. “You can have either one you want.” His voice hurt, coming through his throat. “As long as you say yes this time.”

  “Yes,” she whispered.

  Yes. His arms tightened on her so hard that she made a muffled sound of protest, and he eased his hold, but his empty hand kept petting her too deeply, over her back, her arm, up to frame her face. Yes, she was still there. It was the real Célie. She wasn’t disappearing before his over-urgent fantasies. “Really? Hell, Célie, really?”

  She opened the fist he’d made over the rings when he grabbed her and eased the tip of her ring finger into the cheap ring on his palm.

  Damn that cheap one. But he took her hand and eased it on properly, then followed it with the other, much finer one.

  Which looked ridiculous. “Célie.” He covered the cheap one with his finger. There now. That expensive one on her finger—that looked beautiful.

  “Maybe one on each hand.” She pulled them off, and Joss quickly pre-empted her choice and slid the expensive one on her left ring finger, leaving the right ring finger for the cheap one.

  She held out both hands. “Okay, that looks kind of … excessive.”

  Joss frowned at the cheap ring. But … it still did look kind of pretty on her hand. Way, way better than leaving that hand bare. He rubbed it, an almost wistful affection brushing him, as if he was honoring a fallen, difficult comrade.

  “I’m going to have a jeweler frame it in gold,” she decided. “So that it makes a pendant, the ring in its little frame. And wear it here.” She placed her hand over her breast, right near her heart.

  Because she valued everything about him. His accomplishments and his failures. Who he was and who he had been.

  “You really have always loved me,” he said low. “And I’ve always wanted to be good enough for that love.”

  “And you always have been good enough, Joss. Always.”

  He petted the wisps of hair on her forehead and stroked down her cheeks. “You make my life light up, you know.”

  She linked her hands behind his head. “You, too.”

  He shook his head, a little bemused. “Hard to imagine myself as lighting things up.”

  “It’s all those sparkles off you,” she teased gently. “Now that I’m wearing your ring.”

  A slow smile seemed to grow deep down in his belly and blush all the way through his body. He thought this might be what happiness felt like. Just this utter, blissful security of accepting and believing in love. “Think I should get us costumes made out of sequins?”

  She shook her head, nestling into him. “It would be redundant.”

  Joss snuggled her in more closely. A deep, profound wonder filled him, a warmth and surety he never could have believed possible, once upon a time.

  “You know, you were right all along,” he said softly. “Together is a really good way to be.”

  ***

  FIN

  Thank you!

  Thank you so much for reading! I hope you enjoyed Célie and Joss’s story. And don’t miss Vi’s story, coming up next! Sign up here to be emailed the moment it’s released.

  Working on Célie’s story inspired me to write a short story about Dom and Jaime (it involves sandcastles and courage) that I want to offer free to readers who love those two. Sign up here to be emailed a copy as soon as it’s released.

  (If you’re new to my books and would love to read Dom and Jaime’s full story, it is in The Chocolate Touch.)

  All for You is the first in the Paris Hearts series. If you enjoyed the Paris and chocolate of the setting, you can find more of it in the Amour et Chocolat series. Or head south to a world of sun and flowers with the Vie en Roses series. (Keep reading for glimpses.)

  Thank you so much for sharing this world with me! For some behind-the-scenes glimpses of the research with top chefs and chocolatiers, check out my website and Facebook. I hope to meet up with you there!

  And this book is lendable, so if you enjoyed it, feel free to loan it to a friend. Anything that encourages discussions around books makes the world a richer place. Kind of like love and chocolate!

  Thank you and all the best,

  Laura Florand

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  Other Books by Laura Florand

  Paris Hearts Series

  All for You

  Amour et Chocolat Series

  All’s Fair in Love and Chocolate, a novella in Kiss the Bride

  The Chocolate Thief

  The Chocolate Kiss

  The Chocolate Rose (also a prequel to La Vie en Roses series)

  The Chocolate Touch

  The Chocolate Heart

  The Chocolate Temptation

  Sun-Kissed (also a sequel to Snow-Kissed)

  Shadowed Heart (a sequel to The Chocolate Heart)

  La Vie en Roses Series

  Turning Up the Heat (a novella prequel)

  The Chocolate Rose (also part of the Amour et Chocolat series)

  A Rose in Winter, a novella in No Place Like Home

  Once Upon a Rose

  Snow Queen Duology

  Snow-Kissed (a novella)

  Sun-Kissed (also part of the Amour et Chocolat series)

  Memoir

  Blame It on Paris

  Once Upon a Rose

  Book 1 in La Vie en Roses series: Excerpt

  Burlap slid against Matt’s shoulder, rough and clinging to the dampness of his skin as he dumped the sack onto the truck bed. The rose scent puffed up thickly, like a silk sheet thrown over his face. He took a step back from the truck, flexing, trying to clear his pounding head and sick stomach.

  The sounds of the workers and of his cousins and grandfather rode against his skin, easing him. Raoul was back. That meant they were all here but Lucien, and Pépé was still stubborn and strong enough to insist on overseeing part of the harvest himself before he went to sit under a tree. Meaning Matt still had a few more years before he had to be the family patriarch all by himself, thank God. He’d copied every technique in his grandfather’s book, then layered on his own when those failed him, but that whole job of taking charge of his cousins and getting them to listen to him was still not working out for him.

  But his grandfather was still here for now. His cousins were here, held by Pépé and this valley at their heart, and not scattered to the four winds as they might be one day soon, when Matt became the heart and that heart just couldn’t hold them.

  All that loss was for later. Today was a good day. It could be. Matt had a hangover, and he had made an utter fool of himself the night before, but this could still be a good day. The rose harvest. The valley spreading around him.

  J’y suis. J’y reste.

  I am here and here I’ll stay.

  He stretched, easing his body into the good of this day, and even though it wasn’t that hot yet, went ahead and reached for the hem of his shirt, so he could feel the scent of roses all over his skin.

  “Show-off,” Allegra’s voice said, teasingly, and he grinned into the shirt as it passed his head, flexing his muscles a little more, because it would be pretty damn fun if Allegra was ogling him enough to piss Raoul off.

  He turned so he could see the expression on Ra
oul’s face as he bundled the T-shirt, half-tempted to toss it to Allegra and see what Raoul did—

  And looked straight into the leaf-green eyes of Bouclettes.

  Oh, shit. He jerked the T-shirt back over his head, tangling himself in the bundle of it as the holes proved impossible to find, and then he stuck his arm through the neck hole and his head didn’t fit and he wrenched it around and tried to get himself straight and dressed somehow and—oh, fuck.

  He stared at her, all the blood cells in his body rushing to his cheeks.

  Damn you, stop, stop, stop, he tried to tell the blood cells, but as usual they ignored him. Thank God for dark Mediterranean skin. It had to help hide some of the color, right? Right? As he remembered carrying her around the party the night before, heat beat in his cheeks until he felt sunburned from the inside out.

  Bouclettes was staring at him, mouth open as if he had punched her. Or as if he needed to kiss her again and—behave! She was probably thinking what a total jerk he was, first slobbering all over her drunk and now so full of himself he was stripping for her. And getting stuck in his own damn T-shirt.

  Somewhere beyond her, between the rows of pink, Raoul had a fist stuffed into his mouth and was trying so hard not to laugh out loud that his body was bending into it, going into convulsions. Tristan was grinning, all right with his world. And Damien had his eyebrows up, making him look all controlled and princely, like someone who would never make a fool of himself in front of a woman.

  Damn T-shirt. Matt yanked it off his head and threw it. But, of course, the air friction stopped it, so that instead of sailing gloriously across the field, it fell across the rose bush not too far from Bouclettes, a humiliated flag of surrender.

  Could his introduction to this woman conceivably get any worse?

  He glared at her, about ready to hit one of his damn cousins.

  She stared back, her eyes enormous.

  “Well, what?” he growled. “What do you want now? Why are you still here?” I was drunk. I’m sorry. Just shoot me now, all right?