A/N: Bprice, CaskettLover726, chippyzippy, Gaben, slbwhitewolf, and Valawenel thanks so much for the alerts, favorites, and reviews! You taking the time to alert/favorite and especially review really mean a lot! Gaben, thank you so much for being my always patient beta!
Paris
Paris was Sophie's city. At least that is what she'd always told everyone on the team. And she'd told them plenty of times! She'd told them about the shopping the Triangle d'Or; and Avenue Montaigne, which had Chanel, Avenue des Champs-Elysées which had Louis Vuitton, and Hermes which was on Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré. If he had to hear about one more major designer or too cute boutique Eliot was going to scream!
The Paris Sophie knew was a lot different than the one Eliot knew. He'd discovered Paris on one of his first jobs as a retrieval specialist. The hitter had checked into a bed and breakfast about a kilometer from the job he'd been doing. He'd gotten pretty banged up, but thought that he'd done a pretty good job of patching himself up. Well, that had been until he'd checked in and had gotten clucked over by Fatimah and her husband Henrí. Henrí had been in the French Foreign Legion for many years and knew exactly what he was looking at: A shoulder which had just been relocated, bruised ribs, and a few contusions for good luck. On top of what was going to be a nifty set of bruises. Well, three weeks later Eliot had checked out; and Henrí and Fatimah Villeneuve had put on a couple of pounds and their bed and breakfast had a new chef whenever he was in town. And the retrieval specialist had gotten himself not only a safe house; but, a nurse and a pair of good friends for life! And in Eliot's profession friends like the Villeneuve's meant a lot.
Yeah, Paris meant a lot of different things to a lot of different people. Sophie saw the shopping, Parker saw shiny things to steal, Nate saw remnants of his marriage to Maggie, and Hardison… Well, Eliot was pretty sure that Hardison saw Paris like he saw every other city. A place with free Wi-Fi.
To Eliot, Paris was not so much La Ville-Lumière: The City of Light; but, more of a place of freedom. Henrí and Fatimah had given him a sanctuary a place where he could just be Eliot; Eliot Spencer. Eliot Spencer, a man who loved to cook; a man who loved to sing; and a man that loved to spend time with friends. He wasn't a retrieval specialist, a hitter, hired muscle… He was a no one in Paris; and that was nice!
As it was with so many places, Lahore, Albuquerque, Singapore, Eliot's memories of Paris were formed around food, or retrievals. His first memories of Paris were Fatimah's Eierflöckchensuppe. A mouthful of a name for a simple egg drop soup which she fed him while he was too sore to do much more than lift his head. The soup wasn't Turkish, like Fatimah; but, Austrian. And in her slight accent Fatimah told Eliot about the guest that had taught her how to make Eierflöckchensuppe. Now whenever he was sick or hurt Eliot made, or had delivered egg drop soup; preferably Eierflöckchensuppe. And in Boston he'd even found a small Eastern European restaurant run by an Austrian guy who made Eierflöckchensuppe almost as good as Fatimah's.
They'd spent hours listening to Sophie prattle on about the shopping and the restaurants. The restaurants she kept talking about were all A-list type of places. Places where being seen was as important as the quality of the food, and reservations were almost impossible to get. The places that Henri and Fatimah had shown him were usually tucked away in back alleys or had superhero's painted on the walls. Gawd, there was one little pub that Eliot loved late at night. L'Ami Jean made the best rice pudding with pistachio brittle, crème anglaise, and dulce de leche. Eliot had tried to recreate it, time and time again; but, he couldn't quite get the pistachio brittle right.
Sophie would drag Nate to the white tablecloth places like Benoit, where they'd eat escargots, cassoulet and tarte Tatin. And they'd do it with their pinky's held high in the air. Eliot, Fatimah, and Henri would meet at Le Cambodge and gorge on simple Cambodian food and talk about jobs and operations they'd done in Asia. They'd eat be cha gio and compare scars, they'd wolf down the porc au caramel and bitch about the weather, then finish off a third bottle of wine discuss upcoming sporting events. The food at Le Cambodge wasn't as good as that place near the Cambodian border with Laos and Vietnam. That place was a small restaurant which surprisingly both Henrí and Eliot had eaten at, although at very different times.
Or the three of them would sit around the two hundred year old farm table in the Villeneuve's kitchen and snack on Shakshuka, made from the eggplants just picked in the garden, while dinner cooked. When it was just the three of them Fatimah would make the dishes she'd grown up eating: Tavuk Tandir, chicken with oregano; mounds of fluffy rice pilaf; and fresh baked bread. Fatimah was from the southern part of Turkey, and she'd grown up in a small apartment which had grape vines climbing up the side of the building. She told them stories of reaching out the window and eating grapes straight from the vines. Over dessert, Kaymakli Ayva Tatlisi, quince with heavy cream, and another bottle of wine she'd retell the story of how she'd met her handsome uniformed Legionnaire. This was his Paris; friends and good food, not seeing and being seen..
Although, there was one restaurant which Eliot would put a tie on for willingly: Chez Georges. Chez Georges was a wonderful little bistro. Going to Chez Georges was a spiritual experience. Eliot had read a biography of Julia Child and in the book it waxed poetic about Chez Georges and how this restaurant was one of the Julia's favorites. The door to the restaurant was almost hidden; and it didn't look like anything had changed since the place had opened almost a hundred years earlier. Henri's second cousin a beautiful young Mademoiselle named Nanine had taken Eliot there. The tables were packed so close together that to sit against the wall; Eliot had needed to actually move the table for Nanine. They had shared wine, rillettes, duck cooked in duck fat, and then for dessert they'd had tarte au poire, a phenomenal pear tart. Eating there had been amazing; the whole meal Eliot had felt the spirit of Julia Child looking down on him.
Yes, the hitter knew Paris. He could even appreciate Paris; but, still there were other places he much preferred to eat in France. Lyon with their specialty of saucisson pistaché, a pork sausage with pistachios. Continuing down Route Seven to Valence, or the gateway to the region of Provence, and their specialty of pan bagnat. Pan bagnat, which was nothing fancy; but, Eliot's favorite was served at a roadside stand just outside town. It was an open faced sandwich, with niçoise salad on it and lightly fried fresh anchovies. Or freshly caught duarade, sometimes called dorade or sea bream doused in ratatouille that was another amazing meal! Yeah, Sophie could have Paris; Eliot would take almost anywhere else in France.
E/N: Yes, the shopping and the restaurants are real! Check out the foodie magazines and maybe a guidebook or two. I'm even pretty sure that I got the addresses right And someday I'll eat my way across France. Someday… And Gaben: Thanks so much for the idea on the Bed and Breakfast. Shakshuka is a classic Turkish dip made from eggplant, potato, hot peppers, garlic and tomato. All the other Turkish dishes are real; I'm just not in the mood to add the recipes. Google them if you want. They are really good!
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