by Lila Dubois
“James.”
He froze. It couldn’t be.
Christiana was standing on the sidewalk, hands clasped together in front of her. She wore jeans and a lightweight coat, backpack straps on her shoulders. With her hair up in a ponytail and sneakers on her feet, she looked like the classic American tourist.
She’d never been more beautiful.
She swallowed and looked away. “You’re in a hurry. You probably have a thing. I’m sorry, I don’t mean to make you late.”
“You’re here. In Paris.”
Color touched her cheeks. “I…yes. I am.”
James shoved his phone into his pocket, then reached for her. He stopped himself at the last minute. “Why are you here?”
The question came out harsher than he’d meant, and she backed up half a step. “I’ll go.”
“Wait, please. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that.”
“I need to go before I start crying and feel even stupider.” The statement was wry, but he could hear the catch in her voice.
James remembered how she’d reacted when he’d showed up at her worksite. Despite all that had been between them then, she’d run to him, embraced him.
James gave in to his heart’s desire, took three steps, and caught her up in his arms. He pulled her against his chest. For a moment she was stiff, then she relaxed into him.
It didn’t matter why she was here. She was here. They stood together, wrapped in one another’s arms, as the world went on around them.
Christiana sighed with relief when James ordered in flawless French. In the twenty hours she’d been in the city, she’d come to regret not having stayed awake on the flight to listen to the “French for Beginners” audiobook she’d downloaded. Not that a single audiobook would make her fluent, but maybe she wouldn’t have been quite as lost and inept. She’d been getting by mostly by using English and some Spanish.
When the server left, James reached across the very Parisian iron table at the outdoor cafe they’d walked to. He took her hands. “You’re here,” he said again.
Christiana had spent two days crying, two days enraged, and one day realizing that she’d given up, let her cowardice, fear of rejection, and feeling of inadequacy—he was still, after all, a billionaire prince—stop her from doing what she’d promised herself she would do.
She hadn’t fought for them.
A day after that realization, she’d been on a flight. Last time she’d been a coward and abandoned her plan to go after him and find him. This time she’d had the courage to whip out her credit card and book a flight.
“I’m here,” she agreed.
All her life she’d fought for what she wanted, and she wanted James. Admittedly, her pursuits were not normally so dramatic. Flying halfway around the world? She was more of a quiet persistent fighter, but for James she’d step outside her comfort zones. All of them.
“I’m here,” she repeated. “To find you. I was going to go to London, but then saw a news article about a summit you were speaking at in Paris.”
“Yesterday.”
She nodded. “So I bought a ticket for Paris.”
He smiled, and it was that real smile she loved so much. It made her heart flutter and her cheeks heat. “I was just thinking about showing you Paris.”
That took her by surprise. “You were?”
“Yes, you see, I was rushing out because I’d decided to go back to San Francisco to find you.”
“You…were?”
“I was. I needed to tell you I love you.”
Christiana smiled so wide her cheeks hurt. “You do?”
James picked up her hands and kissed each finger in turn. “I do.” His expression turned cold and sad. “But I’m not a good man, Christiana.”
This conversation was not going the way she’d imagined, and she didn’t know yet if that was a good thing or a bad thing. “Yes, you are.”
“No, I’m not. I’m shallow. Nothing, and no one, holds my attention for long. You said you Googled me. How far back did you go?”
“Not that far, I’m guessing, based on that very leading question.”
“I have a history of starting things then abandoning them. I get excited, enthusiastic, then my interest fades and I jump to the next thing. First I did it with drugs. Weed to ecstasy to cocaine.”
Maybe that was why they’d called him a bad boy.
“I got clean, then started doing the same thing, but with businesses. I burned through nearly a hundred million dollars of capital.”
“A hundred…” She couldn’t think about that too hard or she’d faint.
“My uncle forced me to stop, helped me find a job within the company that was project-based to keep me motivated and interested. But I’ve done the same thing in relationships.”
She frowned. “If that’s true, then why did you offer me a collar?”
“Because I wanted you. I still want you.” He looked away. “I tried to be clear that it wouldn’t last.”
“You made it clear,” she assured him wryly.
Normally he smiled when she said something like that, but this time he didn’t.
“I’m sorry I turned you down,” she said quietly.
“You had every right.”
“I meant what I said. I think it would be easy, way too easy, for me to become nothing more than your sub. I could imagine spending all my time working, building up time off so when you were in town I could spend every second with you. Then you’d leave and I’d go back to doing nothing but working, waiting for you to come back.”
“That’s not what I intended.”
“We were supposed to date other people in the meantime?”
His gaze flashed with a cold fire. “I don’t want anyone but me touching you.”
“So I really would have been your mistress.”
He swallowed, shame etching lines in his face. “I never wanted to make you feel that way. I was trying not to hurt you, and in the end I hurt you anyway.”
The server brought them tiny cups of espresso and buttery croissants. Christiana took a bite and then a tiny sip. She was hungry and the food and coffee were divine.
“You know,” she said when she was done chewing. “I tried to ask you out on a date.”
“You did? I think I would have remembered that.”
“I kind of chickened out. When we were on the plane, I asked if you wanted to get food when we landed.”
He frowned, but then his brow cleared. “And then when we got to the house on Russian Hill, I said we should order in.”
She shrugged, embarrassed. “It was stupid, but it made me feel even more upset.”
“You were upset before then?”
“I was.”
“Why?”
“I liked what we did on the island.”
“And you regretted it later?”
“No, that’s the problem. I wanted more. I want more of all the super dirty stuff.”
James’s gaze ran from her face down to her breasts, which he couldn’t see since she was wearing a thin sweater and a jacket. Her nipples hardened inside her bra.
“I would like to do more of the super dirty stuff to you,” he said quietly.
“Don’t you see? I was kind of freaked out by how much I liked it, and then you offered me a collar, and you bought a house just so we could have a private dungeon… and at the same time you didn’t want to go out to dinner with me.”
“My sweet, it wasn’t that. If I’d known…”
“Would you have said yes? If I asked you out on a date?”
“Yes. Even knowing I shouldn’t, for your sake. Even knowing how much I’ve hurt partners in the past when I ended relationships too abruptly.”
She considered everything he’d said. It was clear he was distressed, that he really believed he would end up hurting her.
She was about to voice her questions when he spoke, voice soft and hollow. “I love you, but I’m not someone capable of long, lasting love.”
> She wanted to stroke his head, to hold him close. “Why do you think that?”
“Because I’ve never been able to be in a relationship for more than a few months.”
She watched to see if he was joking. He wasn’t. “So you have…normal relationships? You know, the kind that end until you find your lobster.”
He looked up, some of the anguish erased from his features by confusion. “My…lobster.”
“New plan: we go watch a bunch of Friends reruns on Netflix.”
“I don’t really watch much TV.”
“I’ll introduce you to all the best stuff.”
James looked at her, blinked, and then started to laugh.
“What?” she asked.
“I had prepared this whole speech for when I got to San Francisco.”
“Oh yeah? Let’s hear it.”
“It was about how I’d love you as hard as I can, for as long as I can. A friend told me that it should be your choice if that’s enough. Yet we’re here discussing lobsters and TV.”
If he was right, and he eventually got bored of her, and moved on, she would deal with it. Avoiding love because maybe in the future her heart would get broken was cowardice. “I’m no expert, but I think loving someone as hard as you can, as long as you can, is all any of us can ask for.”
“I hadn’t thought of it like that,” he said softly.
“But,” she added. “I expect you to fight. For us.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean when things get hard, or boring, you don’t just shrug and walk away. You…” Christiana waved a hand in the air. “Read a relationship advice book. Go away for the weekend. Try a new hobby together. You work on it. I’m not an expert, but I know that love, like anything, takes work. Despite you being a prince and a reformed bad boy, I know you work. I’ve seen you work.”
James stared at her, his lips parted slightly. She wanted to keep going, to push, but she knew him well enough to see that he needed a moment to process what she’d said.
They finished their coffee and croissants in silence, but it was a companionable silence. Things weren’t settled, but they understood one another now. This wasn’t how she’d imagined the meeting going. She’d planned to profess her love, fall to her knees, and ask him to collar her.
She’d been willing to take what she could get at first, and work on the rest, fight to turn a Master-sub relationship into something more.
That plan still had merits. The part where she got on her knees and he put a collar on her. Despite the serious nature of their conversation, just being near him made her hot and needy. She felt both overdressed with all these layers on, and underdressed because nothing she was wearing had been placed there by him.
She licked a flake of pastry off her lip and looked at James. “Do you still have it? The necklace?”
Now his gaze focused, sharpened. “I do.”
“If we go someplace private, would you—” Her courage failed her for a moment, but she reminded herself that she was brave and strong and that even if this relationship failed, she’d be okay. “Would you put it on me, please, Master?”
He set his cup down with a click, rose, and held out his hand.
Christiana placed her fingers in his, scooping up the strap of her backpack with her other hand. James dropped some coins onto the table.
“We have to make one stop first,” he said.
“Where?” she asked.
“A jeweler.”
“Why?”
James raised her left hand to his mouth, kissing her knuckles. “For a ring to go with your collar. Something simple for now, until I can have a proper engagement ring custom-made.”
“En…gagement ring.” She blinked up at him. “You don’t have to marry me.”
“You’re right in that I am not afraid of work. If work is what it will take to make sure this lasts, then I will do it to the best of my ability. I can’t make promises, but, I want to show you, prove to you, that I’m willing to try. To work on the, uh…”
“Relationship,” she finished for him.
“I was trying to think of a more dramatic term. Relationship seems so pedestrian.”
Christiana couldn’t stop herself from smiling. “James Nolen. I love you. And I will absolutely not marry you. At least not right now.”
He stopped walking, and she bumped into him. “You’re…refusing me?”
“Yup.”
He narrowed his eyes, but the corner of his mouth twitched. Oh how she’d missed this. This teasing and intimacy. “I must admit I’m confused,” he said. “We love one another. You’ve accepted that this may not have a future, but also proposed several solutions if the love affair—”
“Just say relationship.”
“—begins to suffer. Why won’t you marry me?”
“First of all, there are issues. One, you’re a billionaire prince.”
“Is that a point in my favor or a demerit?”
“Both.”
He pursed his lips. “Your cousin will be jealous.”
“Oh, nice one. You’re right. But seriously, James, your mother is royalty and—”
“My mother was not my parent. I told you that. I’ll take you to meet Sorena. She’s at a retirement facility in Amsterdam. Next issue.”
“My job is in San Francisco. You live…well, you don’t seem to live anywhere.”
“If I offer to help you get a job with my company…”
“I would be insulted.”
“Right. If I asked you to quit your job and travel the world with me…”
Christiana smiled up at him. “I’d knee you in the balls.”
“An eminently logical response. Perhaps you might consider starting your own firm? That might give you some flexibility.”
It was something she had considered. “Maybe, but for now instead of an engagement ring, I need you to move to San Francisco. That’s what I want from you.”
“Then your wish is my command.”
Christiana had a sudden very vivid image of James saying that while naked, on his knees, and wearing some cuffs. A hot wave of arousal washed over her, and she had to force herself to focus on what he was saying.
“I’ll still have to travel,” he warned.
“Travel. Yep. We’ll deal with it.”
James raised one brow. “What are you thinking about?”
“I am not telling you.”
“Tell me.”
“Definitely not. Well, maybe later. Maybe that can be what we try if you get bored.”
He broke into a grin.
“What?” she asked.
“You make me happy. You make me think maybe we’re not doomed.”
“Love me as hard as you can, for as long as you can. That’s what I want.”
“And that’s what I’ll do.”
She stood on tiptoe, wrapped her arms around his neck, and kissed him. They stayed that way, lost in one another, until someone bumped her backpack, knocking her to the side. James glared at the man, keeping one arm around her.
Christiana put a hand on his chest, drawing his attention to her. The kissing had left her hot, needy.
“Now can we go to a jeweler?” he asked.
“Still no.”
“Hmm, I think I’m insulted.”
“Please don’t be. I need to make sure I can be with you, without losing myself.”
His frown deepened. “I wouldn’t want that. I wouldn’t let that happen.”
“It’s not your job to make sure of that. It’s mine.”
“Then this is a ‘no’ for now. Not forever.”
“No for now,” she repeated. He didn’t look mollified. To soften the blow, she stood on tiptoe to kiss him, then arranged her features into shocked horror. “Wait a minute. You’re a prince. If and when you do propose—”
“I just did. Twice. You said no.”
“—I expect you to get down on one knee.”
He raised on brow. “And would you like a h
orse-drawn carriage?”
“Obviously. Also it should be magical and made out of a pumpkin.”
James hailed a taxi. They slid in, and Christiana couldn’t stop the ridiculous grin that spread across her face. He loved her. He wanted to marry her, but more importantly he was going to move to San Francisco to be with her.
And most excitingly, he was going to do dirty, dirty things to her.
“Any other requests for the proposal, princess?”
“Princess? I could get used to that.”
“Perhaps a tiara then.”
Christiana put her hands on James’s cheeks, framing his beloved face. “You know I’m joking, right? All I want is you. All I need is you. Move in with me. Be my friend. My lover. My Master.”
He laid his hands over hers, sealing them together. “I will love you as hard as I can, for as long as I can.”
She would never get tired of hearing that.
“You’re more than I ever imagined I could have,” she said quietly.
“And you’re more than I ever knew I wanted,” he replied.
The driver started cursing in French at another vehicle, breaking the spell. They smiled at one another, then Christiana leaned in close. “We’re going someplace with a bed, right?”
“Yes. I’m afraid I can’t wait any longer to have my hands on you.”
“I’m really hoping you plan to put more than just your hands on me.”
“Of course, my sweet.” He took both her hands in his, and kissed her knuckles.
There were still things they would have to talk about and figure out. There were more reasons why they shouldn’t be together than why they should, but for now they would trust one another. Love one another as hard as they could, for as long as they could.
The story continues in Paris Pleasure, part one of the Paris Trilogy.
* * *
He hated Paris.
People who waxed poet about the city—the lights, the culture, the architecture—were fucking idiots.
And yet here he was, walking through Paris, at night, in the rain, like some tragic poet or brooding hero.
There were a lot of things Solomon Carter was, but poetic and heroic weren’t among them.
It was nearly eight o’clock, and the second arrondissement was quiet. The daytime population of the primarily-business district was long gone, and the nighttime population of weirdos wasn’t out yet. As long as he avoided the Palais Garnier opera house and the few other theaters in the district, he would be able to avoid people, at least until he got to his destination.
