“Would I be here if I did?”
She shook her head, closed her eyes.
“And you? Do you think it’s too late?”
“I hope it’s not. I don’t trust what I think anymore because my judgment hasn’t been good for me up to this point.”
“Hey,” I gently tugged her hand to get her to look at me. “We had a deal. No recriminations, self or otherwise. We move forward and we only look back to learn from our mistakes.”
“Okay.” She nodded, the ghost of a smile hovering on her lips. “And when we get home…?”
I inhaled a breath and held it. “When you’re better, and we know for sure you are healthy, then we’ll cross the other bridge when we come to it.”
She looked at me with that same enigmatic smile that might have put the Mona Lisa to shame. “I’m really, really looking forward to crossing that bridge.”
I grinned, a laugh slipping past my lips. “Me too.”
With that, we stood, discarded our garbage and walked back to the hotel, enjoying each other every step of the way.
Chapter Thirty-One
Mia
The night before we were to fly home, I found the courage to take a bubble bath in the enormous bathtub in our penthouse bathroom. It had a full window in front of it from which I could watch Paris below me. So I dumped a ton of bubble bath into the tub and let the bubbles rise up. I didn’t lock the door. I’d built up a wall of bubbles all around me so that if Adam came in, he wouldn’t have to look at my ugly scars and tattoo marks. He’d just see a naked woman sitting in his tub. And, if I got lucky, he’d volunteer to join me.
They had a special mechanism in the tub that kept the water warm so I could soak in there as long as I wanted. And after spending over half an hour with my eyes closed, my head resting against a waterproof cushion, I heard steps in the doorway.
“Have you shriveled up like an old lady yet?”
“You should try it before you knock it.”
“Hmm. So many things I could do with that.”
“When was the last time you took a bath?”
“I have no idea. I can’t even think of a time I’ve taken a bath since I was a little kid.”
I turned around and looked at him. “Are you shitting me? Seriously?”
“I’m seriously not shitting you.”
“Then strip and get in here.”
“Hmm. How do I know you aren’t just using this bath as an excuse to get me naked?”
I laughed. I was extremely transparent these days, apparently. It had been way too long since I had seen him naked, goddamn it. And I didn’t want to leave the City of Love without a glimpse of my favorite six pack and muscular thighs—to say nothing of his butt. “Well, that’s not beyond the realm of plausibility. But until you’ve enjoyed the true luxury of soaking in bubbles, you can never understand.”
“I’m just having a lot of fun standing here watching you enjoy it.”
“Hmm. That sounds kinda pervy. I like that.”
“I do have a pervy streak.”
“I already knew that. Well, get over here and make yourself useful, then. I need my back scrubbed.”
He took a step forward and I glanced down, noting that the bubbles had mostly flattened after I’d been in the tub so long and, thus, were no longer covering my breasts.
“Wait! Turn around, please.”
He froze. I could see his surprised profile in the mirror as I reached out, grabbed a small hand towel and draped it over the upper half of my body. He turned around, his features blank.
“Okay, I’m good,” I said, leaning forward. With a little hesitation, he approached again.
“There’s some soap over there, and a washcloth…”
“As you wish, my lady.”
I laughed, amused by the Princess Bride reference. I adjusted the towel against me and said in my best imitation of an English accent. “Farm boy, wet the cloth and wash my back. Every bit of it—please.”
He did as I asked with a quiet, “As you wish.”
He used the towel at first, then his hands were on my back, sliding over my soapy skin. I let out a long breath, tantalized by the feel of his hands on me, even if just to clean me. After massaging my shoulder blades, along my spine and down to the small of my back below the waterline, he rinsed the washcloth and rubbed it over me again.
“Farm boy, don’t forget my neck.”
“As you wish,” he repeated, but instead of washing it, he kissed it. I tilted my head, giving him access to more as tingling energy sluiced through me. My body was alive and coursing with lust from his touch in under five short minutes. When would it be time to cross that goddamn bridge again? Oh yeah, we hadn’t come to it yet.