Kissed in Paris by Juliette Sobanet

Author:Juliette Sobanet [Sobanet, Juliette]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2012-02-02T15:00:00+00:00

***

The feeling of Julien’s arms squeezing tighter around my waist startled me awake. Camille must’ve been taking another one of her extra sharp turns.

I blinked my eyes, adjusting to the darkness that had now settled upon us. I hadn’t even realized I’d fallen asleep. The neon clock in the Smart car flashed nine p.m. Shouldn’t we have been in Lyon by now?

I lifted my head off Julien’s shoulder and shifted to the right so that I could see his face. The minute I caught a glimpse of his profile—his clenched jaw, his lips sealed tightly together, his eyes wearily focused on the winding road ahead—a sinking feeling seized my gut.

Something wasn’t right.

“What’s going on?” I asked, not even attempting to hide the panic in my voice. “We should be in Lyon by now.”

Julien kept his eyes focused on the darkness outside. “There has been a change of plans.”

“What do you mean?”

“While you were sleeping we received a phone call. Our mother is not well. We are on our way home, to the vineyard.”

I squeezed my fists in my lap and just as I was about to open my mouth to tell them that I needed to be on a train to Paris tomorrow with my passport, and that we had to go to Lyon, I stopped. They’d just lost their father, and if their mother was sick now too, they didn’t have a choice. They had to be with her.

“Where’s the vineyard?” I asked.

“It is forty minutes north of Lyon. We were almost to Lyon when we got the call, so we just rerouted up north.”

“How long do you think we’ll stay?”

“I am not sure.”

That nauseated feeling—which I was unfortunately becoming accustomed to—took hold in my stomach once again.

Julien’s anxious gaze met mine. “I am sorry. I have no choice.”

I nodded. “I understand.”

I didn’t know what else to say at that point, and even though I felt like I would explode if I didn’t get out of that car immediately and figure out what the hell I was going to do, I realized I was stuck. And since Julien and his sister needed to find Claude as badly as I did, so were they.

Five minutes of tense silence later, Camille swerved off the main road onto a long, gravel driveway, her foot even heavier now against the pedal. Julien’s body stiffened against mine, letting me know this must’ve been the path leading to his house.

The darkness that blanketed the sky couldn’t mask the massive brick home that stood at the end of the driveway with a candle in each window, lighting the way. This was his family’s home? It was gorgeous.

What if Julien wasn’t telling me the truth? What if Camille had convinced him to drop me off at some random home in the country so they could retrieve the painting without the annoying American along for the ride?

I didn’t think Camille could make this little car move any faster down the bumpy driveway, but she could. And she did.

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