This chapter contains French. You won't miss anything if you don't know any French.


"It's beautiful," Edith said.

Ned's fingers tightened on Nancy's and she wondered if he was remembering.

Edith turned to Nancy. "You designed this?"

Nancy nodded. "From memory."

The cold line crept over her skin like ice water. She knew the question, could have mouthed it along with Edith. "And what made you remember a place like this?"

"Oh, Ned and I..."

"We spent some time in a place like this," Ned said.

We kissed and I took him back to my hotel room and told him I wasn't ready for a commitment while I was still shaking from his touch.

Iris ran her fingertips over a leaf. "Drew taste is excellent, isn't it," a faint smile on her face as she turned to her stepdaughter. "Oh, Carson's waving..."

The grill had been delivered the previous day, and Ned made their lunch on it, much to Edith's delight. James and Carson were watching the game, drinking beers, and utterly unconcerned.

Iris went back to look at the zen garden, after Ned and Edith went to check on the food. Nancy followed her back, the silence between them comfortable.

"She looks at you..." Iris shook her head.

"You weren't here," Nancy said. "Edith remembers Ned with a heart broken by my hand."

"Is that okay with you?"

Nancy shrugged. "I don't have much choice," she said, sitting down on the bench. "It's either that or mother to her grandchild."

Iris looked over at her. "I can see it," she said. "If I thought someone felt that way about me, it would be a bit difficult to... maintain a healthy relationship."

"Yeah, well, Ned's going to start looking for a child," Nancy said. "That should firm the relationship right up."

"Aren't you two...?"

Nancy shook her head. "Maybe we should go to doctors. But maybe he and I just weren't meant to have kids."

"That would be a damn shame," Iris said. "He'd make beautiful babies."

Nancy shrugged. "He's going to Asia in a few weeks, maybe he'll just find us a beautiful baby."

Iris glanced over Nancy's shoulder and sighed dramatically. "Let's go save the guys from themselves."

The meal passed without incident. Nancy kept her hand resting lightly on Ned's right thigh, as though drawing strength from him. She kept waiting for Edith to make an excuse to go upstairs, to make some comment about the nursery, but she did not.

Nothing had happened, again.

Carson made plans to meet Nancy the next time she had a lunch hour free. Iris gave Nancy a long hug before she left. James and Ned had tickets to the same game, so they would be attending the next weekend.

Her briefcase was on the table. She had casefiles to be looking over before the morning. Instead she lay with her head cradled against Ned's thighs, staring at but not actually watching the game. A rare leftover hamburger sat cooling on the kitchen bar. During a commercial break she left the warmth of his lap and mechanically dressed the hamburger, cut it in half with a sharp knife, brought him an unopened beer.

She handed over half of the burger without even asking if he wanted it. "Thanks," he said.

George called Nancy's cell and she left the house, the sounds of chanting frustrated fans that echoed around their living room, walked out to the garden.

"Wilder hired me. I'll be coming down to teach a few courses, in the summer, and if things work out they'll option me for the next school year."

"That's great!" Nancy said, her body curled in on itself on the bench, as she looked down at the bobbing goldfish. "So when will you be back around here?"

"Next month."

"We should do something," Nancy said. Her eyes traced the calm surface of the water. "We should go sailing."

"Where?"

"Oh... I don't know. Maybe Maryland."

George laughed. "Has Ned kept up with Andy all this time?"

"Yep. I'm sure he wouldn't mind, what with that mansion he and Annabel have."

"Hey, and if we're lucky maybe Bess can inflict her children on someone else for a weekend and go with us."

"You gonna bring a date, too?"

"Probably not," George said. "But who knows, maybe I can dig up someone in a month."

The sun was setting as she walked back to the house, bare feet on cool grass. Ned was rummaging around in the refrigerator. "Hungry?" he asked.

"No," she admitted, her hand resting on the writhing warmth of her belly. "When are you going to China?"

"It's up to you whether I go," he reminded her, stacking sandwich supplies on the countertop.

She closed her eyes, resting in a chair at the kitchen table. "Go," she said. "I'll stay with Bess. Bring back pictures of cute babies."

He didn't make any noise for a moment, and she opened her eyes, to find his gaze steady on her face. "Nan," he said.

"I mean it," she said, drawing the barely realized tears back before they even touched her eyes.

He held her gaze for another minute, then opened the loaf of bread. "All right," he said. "You don't want to come with me?"

She gazed out the window, into the gathering dark, at her empty garden. "Of course I do," she replied. "But you said you'd be busy the entire time."

He sighed. "I will," he admitted. "If I go. But at least you'd be back in the hotel room to keep me warm."

"Assuming I didn't get into any trouble," she said, her lips curving up in a smile.

He grabbed a dishcloth off the counter and tossed it at her. "You'd better not," he said.

She picked it up off the floor, where it had fallen short. "George says she's coming to stick around for a while, next month," she said. "Let's go to Maryland and stay with Andy."

"I'll call him and see," Ned said. "Is this a family vacation?"

Nancy ticked them off on her fingers. "You, me, George... think Bess and Nate, maybe?"

"Long weekend," he said. "Andy might be more okay with that."

He was deep in sandwich-making as she crossed the room, dishtowel still hanging from her fingertips. If he was serious... ahh yes, he was digging around in the cabinets for the sandwich press. He plugged it in, as she tossed the towel into the laundry room, and she slipped her arms around his waist.

"Thanks," she said.

He rested a hand over hers. "So you don't want me to bring you back a Chinese infant?"

"Pictures," she said, softly. "Bring me back pictures of girls. I want a little girl."

"Okay," he said.

--

Domestic adoptions.

He had researched it one day, on his laptop, with Nancy on the opposite end of the couch reaading a book, her cold toes curled under his thigh. The two of them had been married, legally, for under a year, even though when he tacked on the time they had started living together, it had been over a year. The marriage that only they and their witnesses acknowledged would have given them sufficient time to prove stability of the relationship, but they had spent the majority of that five-year span, nearly all of it, apart, irreconciled.

The money wasn't the issue. The issue was that they had not been together long enough. When he added up in his head how long they had been dating, the idea seemed ludicrous, but a year and a half ago she had been a stranger to him. That was sobering.

Even if they could have managed to sweet-talk some agency into handing over a child, he remembered the cases of fathers coming back years later to claim the children they hadn't even known existed. Father's rights were sticky.

He had glanced over at his wife then, serene, her hair twisted up on her head, not a trace of makeup on her face, and had wished again that he could have the right to call some living breathing child theirs. His anger at her secretly planning to take the pill seemed almost ludicrous. Pill or not, every month it was the same.

He wondered, again, if maybe it was him.

If she wasn't pregnant by their second Christmas together, then he would at least know why. He'd subject himself to the tests, the prodding, the indelicate questions. But in the meantime...

International children, especially Chinese, those abandoned by their parents, had little to prevent their adoption by American parents. So many of them were little girls. Nancy wanted the glossies, something she could hold in her hand, read a dossier, pick and choose who might come to their sunlit nursery. Ned, on his next trip, could see them in the flesh.

That was, if the trip itself weren't going to be so packed.

He sent off for an information packet, of children meeting Nancy's vague criteria, and had it delivered in her name. One night he had come in late, tie loose, having dragged himself away from the more insistent female population of the secretarial pool who said just one more drink wouldn't hurt. The presentations were almost ready for the conference, slides and figures and statistics and full-color handouts and he just wanted to draw a breath that wasn't laced with some cloying perfume.

Not a spare inch of their bedspread was visible. She had arranged the papers, the gleaming photographs, in a mosaic monument to the lost, her robe half-hanging on one shoulder, her eyes bright. He dropped his briefcase, took off his coat.

"They're beautiful," she said, with a sweep of her hand. "There are so many of them. We could have a little girl taking her first steps in this house, calling me her mother."

He curled an arm around her, and at his touch she started slightly. "You want to go to sleep," she said, and started gathering the papers into her hands.

"Nan, it's okay," he said. He stepped out of his clothes after she had stepped out of his embrace, putting the papers down on their dresser, flannel robe stretched against her skin. He pulled back the covers and slipped beneath, reaching around her waist to swing her in with him, feeling incredibly weary.

"We'll make a pretty baby," he murmured, arms around her.

She reached up and traced a fingertip over his lips. "Have," she said softly.

"Sure," he replied. "Any one you want."

--

She was still half-asleep as she crept into the relative cool of the shower, her husband still inside. She had dragged herself downstairs for the coffee, and despite an impassioned effort she still couldn't feel any effect.

She hurried through it, gave him a quick kiss which he definitely wanted to turn into an encore performance, dressed in pastels and summerweights and was just packing her briefcase when he came downstairs.

"Lunch?"

"Hotel?" he returned, shaved and glistening, a grin on his face.

"Can't get enough, can you," she said, suddenly stilled, her awareness of the passing time growing faint.

"I can," he said, leaning down to kiss her softly. "You are."

"One o'clock."

--

When he first mentioned it, she wasn't very enthralled by the idea. She didn't like the fact that he had to go on business trips, she didn't want him to make the trip any longer.

"Hey," he'd said one morning, watching her pull her stockings up her legs while he adjusted his tie. "Paris in a month. Wanna go?"

"Business trip?"

He half-smiled. "Of course."

"How long?"

He shrugged. "I think right around a week. But the end of it will be on a weekend, they're telling me, so maybe we could see a bit of the nightlife. More than we already have."

Nancy grinned. "So how much Paris nightlife have you seen, pray tell?"

He leaned over and planted a kiss on her scalp. "If you go with me you'll be the best part."

--

They didn't travel that much, not together. She was always momentarily startled when he started speaking something fluently that he hadn't when they had been together before, and she was sure he felt the same way. They had talked about it extensively but it was always different to hear it, to see the evidence. And wonder what he had been doing during those five years when he thought she was lost to him. The things she was afraid to ask, the questions she didn't want to repeat.

He told her about women at the office, but in a rather gossipy way. Who was doing what with whom. No one in particular, no one especially, except people she had met before, people who came to the weekly poker nights with their wives. She liked most of them. And she didn't sense that he was being careful with her, that he needed to hide anything or his relationship with anyone from her.

She knew she didn't have to be careful with him. Absolutely nothing to hide, except the occasional twinge when she thought of certain things. Because it wasn't serious, wasn't enough to bother him, she would be fine...

She decided she would go. They hadn't gone somewhere together in a while, and she hated being home while he was away. Not the entire time, though; she'd take off for the long weekend and leave the business dealings to him. Maybe get a nice French chateau near Johnny Depp's house and lounge around all weekend.

--

Ned was still in a meeting when Nancy arrived, so she took her time on the way from the airport. She found a gorgeous black silk dress and a new perfume, and when she called him during his break he asked if she'd meet him for dinner.

"A lot of the people here haven't met you," he said. "So I'm gonna tell them I'm meeting someone later and not mention who you are. I think we should both just speak French. It'll be great."

Nancy giggled. "You have an odd idea of a good time, Nickerson. Cheating with your wife."

"il n'y a personne avec qui je preferais tricher." There's no one I'd rather cheat with.

"Merci," she whispered.

--

He had no idea what he had bargained for.

He recognized her by her wedding rings. She hadn't taken those off, and the charade would work just as well if his date were also married. Her clinging ankle-length gown was black silk. Her hair was done in curls, cascading down her bare back, and her lips were a shade below bloodred, her eyelids smoke grey. She was chatting with the older, balding bartender in fluid, liquid speech, and he could tell by the speed and the bartender's relaxed response that her accent was nearly flawless. Between her slender fingers, ending in red-polished nails, was an unlit cigarette.

He knew that she had seen him somehow. Without appearing to do so (but of course not, not with years of experience trailing suspects under her belt) she knew he was behind her as she slipped the cigarette between her lips and raised an eyebrow.

"T'as besoin d'un feu?" Need a light?

"S'il te plaît," she murmured, looking at him from beneath lowered eyelids. "Merci."

After he lit her cigarette she turned back to the bartender, but Ned noticed both the look she gave him and the look the bartender was giving him. Appraising. She'd been in the bar a while and he was being protective. But he was called away by another customer, and Ned slid onto the next barstool. Nancy took two drags off her cigarette and then fitted it carefully into the ashtray near her left elbow.

"Je pense que nous devrions danser." I think we should dance.

She raised an eyebrow, holding her head erect. She wasn't staring into her drink, ignoring all the guys in the room, and they definitely weren't ignoring her. She looked like she knew exactly what she was doing, but it was all casual, without deliberation or calculation. She allowed a small, faintly amused smile to cross her tinted lips.

"Nous ne dansons pas maintenant?" Are we not dancing now?

If he had run into her while she was on a case, in that time apart, like this, he would not have been able to resist her. Not the way he had while they were in Hong Kong. No hint of hesitation or uncertainty marked her manner now, no hint of vulnerability. She was completely, fully, undeniably feminine, aloof and charming and full of grace, and he wanted her. He was the only man in the room who knew whose bed she would be in later.

He wanted her in his bed immediately.

She accepted his hand and Ned could feel the psychic sigh from every other man in the room, the disappointed return to their drinks, the bartender's gaze on her back. She could handle herself, he knew that.

This Nancy could, at least. This Nancy could handle anything and more.

"Pouvez-vous tango, chérie?" Can you tango, darling?

"Pour vous, ce soir, je pense que je pourrais faire beaucoup de choses." For you, tonight, I think I could do many things.

He swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry, as he drew her close to him on the dance floor. In her eyes he saw a spark of pure amusement. She was thoroughly enjoying this, enjoying his being off-balance when confronted by this tigress in black silk.

"Tu le manques?" Do you miss it?

"Quoi me manque?" Miss what?

"Pas tellement le travail mais la chasse, glissant dans la peau des autres. Tu le fais tellement bien. Je ne t'ai presque pas identifié." Not so much the job but the hunt, slipping into someone else's skin. You do it so well. I almost didn't recognize you.

"Mais tu m'as identifié," she said, her eyes sparkling. "C'est qui je suis, après que quelques verres et la connaissance que je ne peux pas être touché. J'appartiens à l'homme le plus beau de la chambre, et à lui à moi. Je n'ai aucune crainte."

But you did recognize me. This is who I am, after a few drinks and the knowledge that I am untouchable. I belong to the most handsome man in the room, and he to me. I have no fear.

They danced, aware of eyes all around the room on them, the mona-lisa smile still on her lips. Even the band was watching, and when they played one fast number after another the two of them braved it out until Nancy finally cried out for water, brushing her hair back from her flushed face, laughing.

"Si tot?" So soon?

"Ne t'inquiét pas, je ne suis pas encore fatigué." Don't worry, I'm not tired yet.

They were still swaying together, from habit more than the audible urgings of the band. Nancy reached up and unbuttoned the top button of his shirt, then smoothed the collar away from his neck. His head spinning, Ned leaned over and rested his forehead against her cheek, his breath shivering straight down her spine.

"Je te veux près de moi." I want you close to me.

"Je serai toujours ici quand vous revenez. Mais j'ai besoin de quelque chose de humide avant que vous puissiez m'avoir dans des vos bras encore." I will still be here when you get back. But I need something wet before you can have me in your arms again. He could hear the smile in her voice, and her fingers were cooler than his skin as she loosed another button. He traced his tongue over the edge of her earlobe and felt her pulse jump, and he was smiling as he pulled back.

"T'es sûr que tu n'es pas humide déjà?" Are you sure you're not wet already?

He released her suddenly and spun on his heel to walk back to the bar, then risked a glance over his shoulder. She stood alone on the floor, in the golden and red chaos of the tableaux, a faint blush creeping over her glowing cheeks. Her blue eyes were glinting dangerously from between thick lashes as her gaze followed him. In response he let his eyes wander down the fitted curves of her dress, tracing the rise and fall of her quickened breath by the shifting of the gleaming fabric.

"Tu découvriras," she called to him, her lips parted in invitation. You will find out.

Ned grinned broadly as he returned to the bar and ordered a water for her, in English this time. "Hey," he heard, and looked over his shoulder to see the table full of his conference buddies.

He nodded to the bartender, who still looked slightly wary, and walked over to the table, clapped the guy closest to him on the back. "Hi."

Peter nodded toward the dance floor. Nancy was laughing at something another guy was saying while his date, looking slightly pissed, looked on with her arms crossed and a pout on her lips. "You walked in and picked up the prettiest girl in this place."

Ned shrugged, deliberately casual, a smile twitching on his lips. "What can I say, I just got it."

Ryan, who had given a talk about IT progress earlier in the day, sat next to Peter with his tie loosened and a few empty shot glasses at his elbow. He peered at Ned through his wire rims. "I don't think so," Ryan said. "You might got it, but you've had it with her for a while. I didn't know you'd been in Paris enough times to have something going on the side."

"You think that's the only way I could have picked her up, she's already my girlfriend?"

"And married, too." Derek, sitting across the table, also had more than a few empty shot glasses in front of him. He'd divested himself of tie and glasses, and the solemn expression he had worn for the majority of the day. "If one guy isn't enough for her, maybe two isn't either. She interested in a little extra company, Nickerson?"

Ned felt his chest tighten as he looked down at the smiling man, the muted lighting shining off his shaved brown scalp. His eyes narrowed and he reminded himself that if their situations were reversed, he might have said the same thing. Especially with most of a fifth in his belly.

"I'll be sure to let you know if I can't keep her satisfied," Ned said, mock-serious. Then he leaned in and lowered his voice. "But definitely don't hold your breath."

The sound of their hooted laughter followed him back to the bar as he picked up the water glass and walked back toward Nancy. Her new friend darted a glance over his shoulder and caught sight of Ned, who had dropped the mask of cordiality and was positively glowering. His date, her thin face hard with rage, was tapping her foot on the floor, and Ned heard it sound in time with his speeding pulse.

As they retreated, Nancy accepted the glass and took a long sip, then smiled at him. "J'ai la tête que tourne, j'aura besoin d'une autre boisson bientôt. Donc ces-ci sont tes amis?" My head is starting to ache, I'll need another drink soon. So those are your friends?

Ned bent his head to hers and traced his fingers up to the nape of her neck as his tongue slipped between her lips, into the iced cool of her mouth. Her eyes widened in shock, and then her eyelashes fluttered down as his fingers pressed into the base of her skull, his tongue insistent as it tangled with hers. Her free hand groped for him and she curved her arm around his back, pulling him closer to her.

"L'un a juste demandé s'il pourrait nous joindre plus tard ce soir," Ned gasped into her skin as he pulled back. One of them just asked if he could join us later tonight.

"J'ai besoin d'une autre boisson maintenant," she replied, her eyes darting back and forth between his. I need another drink now.

She downed the rest of her water on the way back to the bar, and as Ned ordered her a vodka caramel she smacked the empty glass down and walked carefully back to the table, smiling down at the group of wide-eyed guys. Each one of them felt the weight and consideration of her gaze, but she settled at last on Derek.

"Vous ne pourriez pas me manipuler, petit garçon."

With one last wide grin, predator to insignificant bystanders, she turned on her stacked heel. Ned escorted her back to the floor, one of her hands wrapped securely around her drink, the other in his.

Derek looked around. "What did she say? Peter, what did she say?"

Peter took a long swig of his drink before he replied, a smirk on his face. "She said you couldn't handle her."

Derek looked around and noticed that a few of the guys were staring down into their drinks, trying not to smile, though it twitched the corners of their mouths. "That's not all she said..."

"Little boy," Derek heard translated just as Ned mentally translated Nancy's whispered repetition into his ear, and his laughter mingled with that of the rest of the table as he dipped her. His eyes glowed in adoration as he pulled her up and close to him again.

"Une danse de plus," she murmured. "Puis viens, couche avec moi."

He didn't want to wait for one more dance. He wanted to lift her into his arms and carry her out now, in full view of that entire table, as she laughed up into his eyes. He wanted to hear their groans of envy as they heard her cry out for him, with him.

He settled on curving a palm around her hip and resting his thumb against the tattoo he could find even though the fabric, through the memory of touching her in the dark a thousand times. The mask slipped enough to allow her a startled gasp, a shocked gaze, and the suggestion of movement into his touch.

"Une de plus," he repeated, his voice rough, pride swelling in his chest as her eyes fluttered shut again. He traced his tongue over the seam of her slightly parted lips and tasted caramel.

"Je peux sentir leurs yeux sur moi, je peux sentir vos yeux sur moi. C'a fait longtemps." I can feel their eyes on me, I can feel your eyes on me. It has been a while.

"Tu sentiras plus que mes yeux." You will feel more than my eyes.

She released a trembling breath and he claimed her mouth again, tasting the sugar on her tongue as the music tried to urge their barely moving bodies into motion. His fingertips traced over her upper thigh, sliding over the silk, and she moaned. They pulled apart and she rested her forehead against the side of his neck, her eyes narrowed in concentration as his fingers stroked against her. He felt the tempo of her breath change with the shift of his fingers, and an inadvertent smile curved his lips. She leaned away from him so she could finish her drink, and as she started to move her hips in time to the music she planted a kiss under his chin.

"Une plus," she reaffirmed, and pushed him away from her, her eyes sparkling. She was in control again.

"Tu me tueras, mademoiselle," he growled, returning her good humor. You will kill me, woman.

"Pas encore. J'ai une autre idée." Not yet. I have something else in mind. Her smirk dissolved into shocked laughter as he grabbed her around the waist and twirled her, just as the next song began.

He could feel their eyes too, the way she had. As he twirled her around the floor and watched her toss her hair back, eyes closed, lips slightly parted, he was in awe of her again, in awe of the fact that he could possess this. He was so accustomed to the eyes of women that he had tuned it out over the years, but he was hypersensitive to it again, the way she had been at the gaze of his "friends" back at the table. Separately, they turned heads; together, Nancy and Ned commanded the attention of the entire room.

She was right. It had been a while since he'd felt it. Right now he wasn't her husband, they were not some demure married couple who had tired of waking up next to each other every morning, and never would be. Right now he was the man who had claimed her a lifetime ago on a moonlit beach as his and his alone, and she was the exotic creature who only existed in the darkness of their bedroom, sure of but never bored by his touch. He may have never seen her this way in the light, but he had given her the self-assurance and the confidence, the knowledge that made her the smoldering vixen who could have him at the crook of her finger.

And she had given him back that same confidence the day she had married him again.

He dipped her again and melted a little at her delighted smile, when he drew her back against him. "T'es tout à fait beau ce soir," she said. "Tout le monde te regard." You look quite handsome tonight. Everyone's looking at you.

Ned smiled softly, shaking his head. "Non, chérie, tu sens leurs yeux sur toi, parce que ni eux ni moi n'avons jamais vu une créature plus exquise." No, darling, you feel their eyes on you, because neither they nor I have ever seen a more exquisite creature.

She blushed again, but met his eyes steadily for a moment before she stood on her tiptoes and drew his face to hers. The music rose and he lifted her against him in his arms, her feet leaving the floor as he twirled them around. He returned her kiss, but she pulled back from him slightly and touched their noses together, still resting with her weight supported by his arms.

"Je t'aime," she whispered.

"Je t'aime aussi, ma belle, ma vie." I love you too, my beautiful one, my only one.

The bartender's gaze followed them to the door, and Ned acknowledged it, but he didn't acknowledge the envious gaze from the table nearby. A cold gust of air made Nancy gasp and huddle into his side, and Ned wrapped an arm around her as he raised his hand for a taxi.

After making sure the cab was headed in the right direction, Ned pulled Nancy onto his lap. The can driver didn't say anything; Nancy was giggling despite her cries of "Arrêt, attends, attends," telling him to wait until they were safe in their hotel room. Ned had a passing, disconcerting thought that maybe he believed her a more expensive escort, but it evaporated as Nancy wrenched off his jacket and pressed kisses down the side of his neck.

"Que t'as voulu attendre," he said playfully. I thought you wanted to wait.

"T'as bien chaud ét j'ai si froid," she murmured into his skin. You are so warm and I am so cold.

"Donc, c'est tout que tu veux?"

"Tu sais pas," she retorted. You know not. "Bientôt tu mettras cette chaleur dedans."

He closed his eyes and rested his face against hers. She released a sigh.

"Je suis tout nue sous ma robe," she breathed.

He bent his face to hers and kissed her, finding her unresisting as her eyelids fluttered down.

The taxi driver's lecherous chuckle broke through the haze in Ned's brain, and he pulled back from his wife with an audible pop and focused on the man's unshaven face. "Nous sommes arrivés," he announced. "Mais je vous donnerai encore quinze minutes gratuitement si vous voulez finir ce que vous faisiez."

We're here. But I'll give you another fifteen minutes free if you want to finish what you were doing.

Nancy blinked a few times, but Ned could read the smaller signs. She smiled at the taxi driver in a vague, friendly way, then reached up to the side of her dress, watching him follow her every movement with hungry, expectant eyes.

She held it closed. "Même pas si tu m'a payé," she replied sweetly, then crawled over Ned, grabbing his jacket on the way and draping it over her bare shoulders.

Ned emerged a moment later, chuckling to himself. "Not even if you paid me," he repeated, then shook his head. "He might have paid pretty well to see you naked, too."

"If you have to ask the price, you can't afford it," Nancy replied, waiting until the taxi had pulled a safe distance away before she kissed him again. "Alors, veux-tu coucher avec moi ce soir?"

In answer he lifted her into his arms, and she snuggled into his jacket as he carried her into the hotel.