Last Chance for Paris

by Farmer, Merry

  The rest of the house was burning just as quickly as they raced through the halls for the front door. The amount of smoke had tripled, stinging Louis’s eyes and making him cough as he ran. Solange coughed as well, which made his blood run cold with fear for her, but also told him she was still alive, as he could barely make out her form through the smoke.

  He only felt a tiny bit of relief as they made it to the front door and bolted out into the clear night. Some of the watchers gasped as they emerged, coughing and sputtering, but Louis ignored them. They were so stunned that they stepped aside and allowed the two of them to push on, up the street and away from the house. In the distance, fire bells sounded as the fire brigade finally arrived at the blaze.

  Louis and Solange didn’t stop until they reached their carriage. Even then, Louis shouted, “Go, go, go!” at the driver as they leapt inside. The driver obeyed at once, tapping the reins on the horses’ backs and shouting for the crowd to move out of the way.

  Louis and Solange sagged against the seat, coughing and catching their breaths as much as they could. Neither said a word as the carriage jostled and jerked its way through the growing crowd and back to the main road.

  Only when they had been galloping for several minutes, indicating they’d cleared the city and were on their way back to the palace, did Louis reach for Solange’s hand.

  “I didn’t need the brooch,” he wheezed. “Not really.”

  “Yes, you did,” she told him, following her words with a wracking cough. “If you hadn’t rescued it, you would have regretted it for the rest of your life.”

  He wondered if she were right. It was entirely possible. He nodded and squeezed her hand, but didn’t say more as the carriage sped on.

  By the time they reached the palace and stumbled out of the carriage, exhausted, bleary, smelling of smoke and sweat, and dragged themselves up the stairs and into the strangely quiet hall, the ball was over and all of the guests were gone. There was no sign of Lafarge’s body or police activity, or anything at all. Louis found the whole thing odd.

  “Something must have happened after we left,” he said.

  Solange wasn’t listening to him. She marched straight into the closest parlor, the ledger she’d taken from Lafarge’s house clutched to her chest. Louis followed her.

  “You shouldn’t have risked your life to get those things,” he told her, barely able to hold his thoughts together. “Lafarge is dead. His press and his home are destroyed. What is the point of saving incriminating evidence against him when there will be no trial. It’s over.”

  Solange shook her head as she sat on one of the sofas and opened the ledger. Loose papers spilled over the edges and soot stained the sofa. “It’s not the evidence against him I wanted to save,” she said. “It’s this.”

  She selected half a dozen papers from the ones she’d gathered in a hurry at Lafarge’s house, then closed the ledger, stood, walked to the fireplace, and threw the ledger on the flickering flames. Once that was done, she took the six pages she’d saved to Louis, handing them over.

  Louis took one look, and his stomach dropped into his feet. “My God,” he muttered. “What was Asher thinking?” If anyone saw the things the handful of letters in Louis’s hands said, Asher would be in a lot more danger than having his family’s business printed in gossip rags. Louis glanced up at Solange. “We need to burn these as well,” he said, starting for the fire.

  “No.” Solange stopped him with a hand on his arm, then plucked the papers from his hands. “We have to keep them.”

  Louis frowned. “But the things they contain. They could ruin the entire McGovern family.”

  Solange shook her head. “There has to be more to it than that. Something isn’t right about these letters, and something isn’t right about what Asher did.”

  “I’ll say it isn’t right,” Louis growled. “I didn’t know the man was a traitor.”

  “That’s just it.” Solange carefully folded the papers, a frown creasing her sooty brow. “I don’t believe he’s guilty of any of this.”

  Louis opened his mouth to argue the point, but decided against it. He let out a breath and stepped closer to Solange, resting his hands on her arms.

  “I admire your loyalty,” he said, a smile tugging at his mouth. “I think you are beautiful and noble to stand up for your friends this way. I think you have been unbelievably brave through all of this. And I know I would never have succeeded in my mission against Lafarge without you.”

  He stepped even closer to her, taking the papers out of her hands and tossing them aside. With them out of the way, he closed his hands around her beautiful, soot-streaked cheeks and leaned into her for a kiss that came from the bottom of his heart. Solange tensed in surprise for a moment before every last ounce of resistance drained away from her. She slid her arms around him, digging her fingertips into his back in a gesture of need and acceptance that had Louis’s blood racing through his veins.

  “I love you,” he said, breaking their kiss long enough to take in the loveliness of her expression and the heat in her eyes. “I love you for who you are and who you will always be to me. I don’t care how unusual it might be, I want to marry you. I cannot go through another instant of this strange life of mine without you by my side, as my partner and my heart.”

  “Louis,” she said on a rush of breath. “Are you certain?” Her question was small, but the wealth of emotion and meaning in her eyes as she gazed up at him spoke more than he could ever put into words. She cared for him—enough to let him go if she had to. But he wasn’t about to let them continue on for another second apart.

  “I am more certain of my love for you than I am of the sun rising in the morning. I’m more certain than I would be if I’d grown up knowing we would be together. The moment I saw you, my heart belonged to you. And we’ve lived more of an adventure in the last few days together than most couples ever encounter in their lifetimes.”

  He stole another kiss from her lips. The taste of her and the heat of her ardor far outweighed the smoke and dirt that their adventure had left them with, just as the core of who she was and how he felt about her would always outweigh the trials and stupidity life and society would throw at them. None of that mattered. She was all he needed.

  “Marry me,” he said, swaying back enough to smile at her and to see delight take over her expression. “Marry me and continue this mad adventure of life with me. I have no interest in an ordinary life and every interest in being yours.”

  “I don’t think I’m capable of an ordinary life,” Solange said, a smile growing on her face, lighting her eyes with joy and excitement. “But if you’re willing to put up with me, then I’m yours.”

  “You’re the one who will have to put up with me,” he laughed, his heart feeling as light as air. He kissed her again quickly, then paused to ask, “So is that a yes?”

  She nodded, her smile bursting into laughter. “God help me, but it is. Yes, Louis Bramwell, I will marry you.”

  A fire could have broken out in the parlor where they stood and Louis wouldn’t have noticed. An army could have attacked them with bayonets drawn or Lafarge’s ghost could have swooped down on them with rattling chains, and neither would have made the slightest dent. He swept Solange into his arms and brought his mouth crashing down over hers with enough joy to set the angels singing. They may have been a mess in a thousand different ways, but together, they were perfection. He had found his home at last.

  Epilogue

  “The carriages are ready to leave,” Lady Hattie McGovern called to her cousin, Asher, as she swept back into the grand front hall of the Château de Saint-Sottises from the front drive. She wore her traveling outfit for the first time in almost a month, complete with a plumed hat positioned jauntily on her elaborate hairstyle. Just because she and her clan would spend the next few days on trains as they journeyed across the Alps and down the Italian Peninsula didn’t mean she couldn’t look her best. “Miss Sewett is beside herself getting every
one to settle down and behave with decorum, but I know you will—Good heavens, Asher, what happened?”

  She stopped abruptly several yards away from where Asher stood by the foot of the palace’s grand staircase, poring over a multi-page letter. His face had gone pale as he scanned the letter with narrowed eyes. The moment Hattie spoke, he flinched hard, jerking the letter behind his back.

  “Nothing,” he barked. “It’s nothing.”

  Hattie settled her weight on one hip, frowning at him. “It doesn’t appear to be nothing to me,” she said, crossing her arms.

  “Really, Hattie. I swear, it’s nothing.” He pulled the letter out from behind his back, folding it with hands that—if Hattie wasn’t mistaken—shook slightly, then stuffing it in the envelope Hattie presumed it came in. “Everyone is ready, you say?”

  “Mostly.” Hattie frowned deeper at the way he nervously tucked the letter inside his jacket pocket, as if it’d never existed in the first place. “Evangeline is being difficult on purpose just to vex Miss Sewett and Roselyn is still saying her goodbyes to Solange.” She paused and tilted her head to the side as Asher approached her. “I still don’t think Solange is telling us the full story of why she and Lord Sinclair eloped the other day.”

  “They’re in love,” Asher insisted, offering his arm to Hattie as he reached her, then escorting her on.

  “Yes, but what a whirlwind courtship,” Hattie said, not sure if she wanted to laugh or marvel at all the questions the match raised in her.

  Asher shrugged. “People do all manner of odd things when they’re in love.”

  “Well, I won’t,” Hattie insisted. “I am not that foolish.”

  Asher sent her a sideways grin. “Don’t tell me that you wouldn’t go to wild lengths to be with whatever Italian count you’re about to meet in Venice.”

  Hattie laughed. “Never. I have far too much sense for that.”

  “Then you aren’t a true McGovern.”

  Hattie’s teasing grin dropped. What sort of rumors had Asher heard about her? Whatever they were, they were lies. She was her father’s daughter, God rest his soul, and no one could prove any differently. Even if her mother had been a bit wild. If there was one thing that Hattie knew, it was that she wouldn’t repeat her mother’s mistakes where the opposite sex was concerned.

  “Truly, though,” she said, forcing her tone to be light again, as they stepped out into the breezy morning and the line of waiting carriages, “what could be in that letter you were reading to put such an expression on your face?”

  “I swear to you, Hattie, it’s nothing,” Asher said in a dark voice.

  Hattie arched one eyebrow at him. “It doesn’t have anything to do with this mythical McGovern secret I keep hearing about, does it?”

  “No,” he answered firmly, then said no more.

  “For heaven’s sake, Lady Evangeline,” Miss Sewett said, obviously exasperated, as she chased Evangeline from one carriage to another. “A lady of your station should not behave in such a childish manner. Choose a carriage and take a seat at once.”

  Asher glanced to Hattie and rolled his eyes. “It looks as though I’ll have my hands full in Italy, what with my sister’s high spirits.”

  Hattie hummed. “I rather think Evangeline has the right way of things.”

  “You wouldn’t say that if you knew what Miss Sewett has done for this family,” Asher said, then let her arm go. He strode across the gravel drive to catch up with Evangeline. With one whisper in her ear, she stopped pacing and fussing and climbed into a carriage with him.

  Hattie shook her head. There was more going on with her older cousin than he was willing to let on, and she was determined to find out what it was. If not in Venice, then as they passed through Tuscany. Certainly, before they reached Rome and departed for Egypt. She would figure him out if it was the last thing she ever did.

  But one thing she would not do in Italy—or so she told herself as she headed for the carriage containing her brother, Trent—was fall in love.

  * * *

  I hope you have enjoyed Solange and Louis’s story, and the entire Paris trilogy of Tales from the Grand Tour! The McGovern clan is off to take the Italian Peninsula by storm next. Will Hattie stay true to her vow of not falling in love in Italy? (Of course not!) And what shocking secret is Asher hiding from the family? Look for more clues soon, starting with Tuscan Sunrise.

  If you enjoyed this book and would like to hear more from me, please sign up for my newsletter! When you sign up, you’ll get a free, full-length novella, A Passionate Deception. Victorian identity theft has never been so exciting in this story of hope, tricks, and starting over. Part of my West Meets East series, A Passionate Deception can be read as a stand-alone. Pick up your free copy today by signing up to receive my newsletter (which I only send out when I have a new release)!

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  About the Author

  I hope you have enjoyed Last Chance for Paris. If you’d like to be the first to learn about when new books in the series come out and more, please sign up for my newsletter here: http://eepurl.com/cbaVMH And remember, Read it, Review it, Share it! For a complete list of works by Merry Farmer with links, please visit http://wp.me/P5ttjb-14F.

  Merry Farmer is an award-winning novelist who lives in suburban Philadelphia with her cats, Torpedo, her grumpy old man, and Justine, her hyperactive new baby. She has been writing since she was ten years old and realized one day that she didn't have to wait for the teacher to assign a creative writing project to write something. It was the best day of her life. She then went on to earn not one but two degrees in History so that she would always have something to write about. Her books have reached the Top 100 at Amazon, iBooks, and Barnes & Noble, and have been named finalists in the prestigious RONE and Rom Com Reader’s Crown awards.

  Acknowledgments

  I owe a huge debt of gratitude to my awesome beta-readers, Caroline Lee and Jolene Stewart, for their suggestions and advice. And double thanks to Julie Tague, for being a truly excellent editor and assistant!

  Click here for a complete list of other works by Merry Farmer.