He picked up the soap and then used it on my back as he said, “My brother’s old friends we’re meeting. After we shower, let’s tour the beach and the resort.”
“Okay.” Brother? I meant to ask, but then his lips met the crook of my neck, and I moaned.
The steam in the shower grew and so did my libido. He fondled my boobs, and I arched to give him whatever he wanted. He sucked them into that mouth of his, and I sighed.
A moment later, he turned off the water, and my hunger for him grew as I backed into the still damp wall. He lifted my leg, and I wrapped it around him as he slipped a condom on that he must have dropped on the floor earlier and entered me.
My tension grew deeper and deeper until I hit a crescendo. Nothing else mattered but this moment. I heard him cry out for me, but I was too far gone.
Wow.
No one had ever done this to me. He kissed my cheeks as I gathered my senses, and then put the water back on.
The instant the cold water hit, it doused me back into my body. I helped scrub his back as he’d done mine. Fair play and all.
Lastly, I washed his wanker with a little extra play because he’d been so good to me.
Soon we were done, and he stepped out and handed me a towel.
I grabbed my bag to get a sundress when I saw my phone had a dozen messages. I picked it up while Quentin dressed to meet his friends and quickly typed out, Sabrina, I’m in Monte Carlo.
Then I quickly sent a picture I’d taken from when we checked in, and she typed back, Gorgeous.
Oh, she had no idea. I sucked on my bottom lip and decided I couldn’t contain the happiness inside me. Not half as gorgeous as the French guy I met.
I put on a white sundress I’d bought for my honeymoon. My phone beeped when I zipped up.
Quentin stepped onto the balcony, and for a moment I didn’t follow. Sabrina was a research director in Allegheny, so she spent tons of time on facts and figures, like me.
Thank goodness. We all hated Marlon.
I laughed at the message. My shoulders were like a weight lifted off me in that moment. Seriously? I wish she’d said that to me last week. You’re just saying that because we’re best friends.
That and it’s the truth.
I typed back quickly, So it’s okay to follow my heart with my sexy French man?
It’s about fucking time. You need a real man. No more jerks like your last.
Thank you
I waited and read Sabrina’s last message, Have fun, and we’ll see you at the airport next week.
I never wanted this week to end. Right now, I was on top of the world, and it wasn’t just because my body was warm and still sparking from the shower.
I turned off my phone and brushed out my hair. Satisfied that I was decent, I went out onto the balcony where Quentin put out a cigarette, the first one I’d seen him puff. “What were you doing?”
“Texting my best friend, Sabrina.”
“What did you tell her?” he asked and followed me inside, closing the door behind him.
I ignored the knot in my chest. We were only a week-long relationship. I had made too many mistakes for more than that. “That I was in Monte Carlo with this sexy wanker I met in Paris.”
His face blushed, but he handed me my sandals and checked his hair. A minute later we were out the door.
My cotton dress seemed dressed up in some corners of the hotel where people were in bikinis and too simple in other corners where a group all wore fancy dresses like they were off to a prom or a wedding.
I held onto Quentin’s arm, and he guided me into a ballroom with sparkling crystal chandeliers and a panoramic view of the Mediterranean as the sun set.
The blue waters were full of light, too, but he walked me to a table near one of the windows and held my chair as another man stood.
“Simon,” Quentin address the man. “This is Kara.”
The men shook hands, and he then shook my hand and then said, “Quentin, this is my wife Bridget.”
He shook the other woman’s hand, and I did the same. We took our seats a minute later, and then Quentin asked, “Where are your children?”
I instantly relaxed. Quentin had said she was American, but she seemed like my oldest sister in her demeaner as Bridget said, “With their grandparents. It’s just adults tonight.”
Quentin dropped his napkin in his chair as he stood and waved at a nicely dressed couple. “Here comes Nigel and Calliope.”
A second later two more people joined us, and we shook hands with a super fit woman and her husband.
“Quentin,” Calliope said, “so glad you’re free of Cecilia. Nice to meet you…”
I swallowed. That wasn’t nice to speak of the dead. I must have misheard. “Kara.”
She smiled. “Where are you from?”
“Pittsburgh,” I said. “I’m in Europe, on vacation.”
The waiter brought some black appetizer I’d never seen. Bridget cleared her throat. “And how did you two meet?”
“By the Eiffel Tower actually,” I said and saw how the men were eating. I slipped my spoon into the jelly-like substance and bit.
Instantly, the taste of fish hit, and movies rushed in my mind. This was caviar. I tried not to cough like in Pretty Woman and swallowed despite the shock.
A minute later, I put my spoon down and realized they were all eating with small forks.
“That sounds romantic.” Bridget sighed. “Why were you there, Quentin?”
He sipped a wine, and I realized the waiter must have poured us all glasses. I picked mine up as he said, “I intended to say goodbye to Paris and wanted a nice view.”
Simon folded his hands on the table. “Quentin, you don’t have to quit.”
He nodded and said, “I absolutely do. I should have been better.”
Calliope added, “We all make mistakes.”
“I killed her,” Quentin said, and I flinched.
“What?” I croaked.
Simon cut in. “No you didn’t. I read the files you sent.”
Files. Doctor. I pieced together that information and realized a case must have gone wrong. And Quentin wasn’t perfect; none of us were.
Quentin shook his head. “Doesn’t matter if I was cleared. It was all me.”
My mind still hadn’t settled. Should I run out the doors now?
My voice came out like a mouse. “Who died?”
The table was quiet until Simon spoke up, addressing Quentin again. “Sometimes you can stop cancer. And that’s not your specialty.”
Cancer. So, this wasn’t some operating mistake. But Quentin took his patients seriously. My mind connected the dots as Quentin said, “I didn’t diagnose properly. The timing was the death sentence.”
Got it. I reached under the table and patted his leg. Mistakes happen to all of us. There had to be a way to separate the personal feelings from the job for mental health.
If he quit over this, he’d hate himself forever.
Simon leaned back for the waiter to clear his plate. “Then I kill people all the time. Even Bridget here would have blood on her hands.”
“I’m a nurse,” she said to me fast.
“I admire what you all do,” I added. “I’m… I was a financial analyst for a wine bottling company. Very boring.”
She smiled at me as Quentin reached under the table and squeezed my palm. “I was so into myself that I missed something obvious.”