Praying for a miracle that never happens.
Instead, I blink in astonishment as this bizarre night takes another unreal turn. More accurately, gains another new cast member.
“Kavia?” I croak. “What…on…”
My throat cannot manage more than that. I doubt the woman has ventured farther than the outskirts of Loire her whole life, but the kitchen maid who has always been more like my second mother is here, at least a three day’s ride from our family’s Angers château. She looks the same yet is eerily different. She still wears her favorite kerchief, which holds her curly hair back from her strong features, but the rest of her clothes are different. Is she wearing…trousers?
That is not the observation that jars me the most. The urgency across her features brings my roughest jolt. Her gaze is so intense and unblinking.
“Bastien.” She rushes over, tears coursing down her cheeks as if I have died along with Magique. No. As if I have died and come back to life. “Saints be praised! We found you in time!”
“In time? For what?”
“Carl! In here! I found him!”
I stare in confusion as her husband appears in the doorway. Carl is not the same as I remember him either. The last time I was home, so many months ago, there was only time for a brief visit with Father and Mother, so perhaps my memory is playing games with me. But Carl seems bigger now, and not just in a physical sense. The man, usually the staid calm to Kavia’s keen storm, paces into the room like a thunderhead in his own right.
“Mon dieu.” His triumphant growl is matched by his wide grin. “We did it. And just in time.”
I shake my head, abandoning confusion for bewilderment. “Did what? In time for fucking what?”
“Yes,” Kavia exclaims. “I told you we would!”
She drops down and yanks my head to her bosom.
I wrench away, which slams me closer to Magique. That aids with maintaining my sanity, but only a little.
“What the hell is happening?” I demand.
Nothing changes about Kavia’s mien. Everything changes about Carl’s.
“Mon coeur,” he mutters to his wife. “The boy…perhaps he has a good point. If he has to follow his heart out of this, but his heart is here, with her…”
“No,” I retort, pulling my lost angel tighter as if to shield her from his bizarrely bleak words. The syllables that feel so small compared to the size of my love. And loss. “My heart is not here. Not any longer.”
I struggle to imagine where she has gone, conjuring images from so many Sundays in church during my youth. But Maximillian was always more dutiful than I, listening carefully while I squirmed in the pew and fantasized about vanquishing Pierre Lacrosse at stick duels in the yard. The possibility of brimstone depths versus shiny clouds always felt far away and pointless.
Not anymore.
“We still have to try,” Kavia insists. Her grip on my shoulder is equally commanding. “We have to!”
“Agreed,” Carl utters. “We have come too far. Risked too much.”
I force my gaze away from my beloved’s still face. “Damn it, what are you two talking about?” I mean every syllable. Oui, they are far from the château, but this is not the center of Paris. I am more concerned with his second sentence. “Risked too much how?”
“We can explain,” Kavia says. “But not now. Not here.”
As if her fervent tone needs more support, the chaos from the street gets louder.
“Mierde,” Carl spews. “My boy…I am sorry. You must leave her here and come with us. Now!”
CHAPTER TWO
RAEGAN
Present day…
“Okay, woman. There’s no time like now.”
Before Allie’s done with the command, she’s acting on its implication—and earning herself my instant wrath.
“No!” I lunge off her big leather couch, flailing at a tattered sleeve of the Moulin Rouge! The Musical sweatshirt in her grip. But all I come back with are cotton pills in my palm and a cramp in my thigh. “Seriously?” I bark. “This is how you repay me for watching your place for a week while you and Le Prince Hottie screw your way across the Italian countryside?”
Allie balls up my beloved garment. “Not an accurate statement, missy, and you know it.”
“Désolé, little Raegan,” consoles the handsome guy who’s appeared behind her. “But we both know mon miracle speaks the truth.” As if he needs to kiss up to Allie any further, Maximilian De Leon scoots in and gives the side of her neck a string of sensual nuzzles. “The only prince in this apartment is the one in the Purple Rain film on the magic streaming device.”
An affectionate giggle spills from Allie as her man seems to hit a sensitive spot. “I was referring more to the screwing-our-way-across-Italy part, Hot Stuff—and don’t deny that I haven’t been clear about it. Work trip, remember? Trend reports and fresh footage for the new season? Several hours of content we owe our generous network and their sponsors?” But she gasp-laughs again as he deliberately bites her earlobe. “Maximillian George Jean Valence De Leon! You promised you’d remember!”
The man steps back a little. “Hmm. But I also remembered the exact spot on your neck where you like me to—”
She stops him short with a sharp point toward their bedroom door. “Go. Finish your packing. That’s a decree. Quinn will be here any second, and she said we couldn’t dawdle. Traffic is a mess, so we have to get moving as soon as she gets here.”
I sit up straighter, forgetting my beloved sweatshirt long enough to declare surrender on my hold. It’s fine. Allie doesn’t realize that a relaxed morning walk will get me to the theater district in no time, ensuring I’ll have a fresh version of Satine and Christian across my chest before she and Maximillian go to sleep in Rome. But that’s not my main thought right now.
“Hemline sent Quinn to drive you? On a Saturday?”
Allie waggles her brows. “Oh, yeah. In the Escalade.”
“Ooh la. Someone is definitely a fashion channel’s golden girl these days.”
Her brows descend toward her rolling eyes. “Blink and you’ll miss the moment, babe. Not about to give up my MetroCard yet.” She adds a fast shrug. “I mean, the perks are nice but really just icing on the cake. You know that better than anyone, right?”
“Of course.” I stamp my sincerity into both syllables. This isn’t a new exchange for us: Allie, freaking out about letting her new fame and fortune going to her head, and then me, ensuring her it’s not. But if it did, I’d tell her right away—ergo, her fresh push on the conversation’s repeat button.
“Besides, it’s not going to be forever. Very little in the fashion industry is, yeah?”
I swallow on a new weight in my throat. “You’re talking to the girl who learned that one the hard way, remember?”
Allie’s features widen. Her eyes are dilated in pure mortification. “Oh my God, Rae. Oh my God.”
She plummets next to me on the couch, hauling me in for a fervent hug. It’s weird. I’m usually the hugger, not the huggee. The moment affords me a second to study the framed photos across the apartment. Most of the images display Maximillian and her with hefty hitters in the fashion world’s elite. Surprisingly, my ex-jerk isn’t in a single one of them.