I snuck a glance over at him and saw his lips twitch reluctantly.
“I just can’t stop making the sausage,” I repeated, this time in English.
I beamed as he chuckled, shaking his head at my antics.
“You may be acting like a fool,” he agreed, taking a side step to bump me with his hip. “But at least you are an adorable fool.”
I laughed too, so relieved that the tension had dissipated that I felt almost giddy.
“I love French expressions.” I sighed happily and leaned into him.
“They have to be the most nonsensical idioms in any language,” Sinclair noted but his voice was warm and I knew he was happy to have someone to speak to about France.
“Well, les doigts dans le nez happens to be my favorite and it makes absolutely no sense. That’s the beauty of them. I mean ‘the fingers in the nose’ does not translate well to ‘with my eyes closed’.”
“Who do you think knows more?” Sinclair’s eyes gleamed with challenge as he looked down at me.
“Me, hands down. You said yourself you haven’t considered yourself French in a long time. At this point, I probably speak your language better than you do,” I taunted.
He leaned down, so close to my face that I could smell his minty breath, and grinned boyishly.
“You’re on.”
We spent the entire morning in Brooklyn. After five hours in the water with three gorgeous striped bass in our cooler, we made our way to a small pizza shop that was already packed at eleven in the morning. The pie was cheesy, greasy and loaded with fat speckled pepperoni and we devoured it between sips of Sprite, which we both agreed wasn’t nearly as refreshing as the French Schweppes.
He caught me up on the developments with the Mexican resort; Richard Denman was flying into town with the preliminary blue prints and he was in the process of procuring a decrepit building near the Hudson, which he hoped to turn into high-end condos. I loved the passion in his eyes as he spoke about his work and I knew that, despite his parent’s wishes, he would never go into politics when he could be building things.
I told him about my years in Paris, how I had met Brenna and why my relationship with the Canadian boy had ended. Nothing serious passed our lips and by the time the check came, my lips were rubbery from holding onto a smile for so long.
As we slipped back into the Porsche, I thought about how easy it was to forget about everything else when I was with Sinclair. Our chemistry still sizzled in the air between us but today had truly felt like a date between friends, our looks full of a different kind of intimate heat.
The closer we got to Manhattan, the stiffer I became as reality began to encroach on my thoughts. In an hour, he would be home with Elena and I would be back to pining for the unattainable Frenchmen.
“Stop over thinking,” Sinclair ordered, placing his hand on my thigh. “We just had an amazing morning. Let’s not ruin it by thinking.”
I sighed. “Am I that easy to read?”
“You forget how well I know your body.”
His fingers splayed across my jean-clad thigh and I could feel the heat of his touch through the thick material.
“I should forget,” I said.
“No, don’t ever.”
I shifted out from under his hand and looked out the window. How could he so easily balance the morals of this situation? Was it because he really didn’t care about me in any way other than as a friend, with only a lingering desire for my body? I knew he wasn’t a bad person, that he wasn’t hoping to use me for sex or manipulate me into falling further in love with him, but no matter his intentions, both outcomes were entirely possible.
“Why don’t we swing by and pick up Cosima?” he suggested, his voice bright for my benefit. “When we first moved to New York we went to a show on Broadway every Saturday.”
“That’s a good idea,” I agreed, mostly because I knew he suggested it to put me at ease. If Cosima joined us it wouldn’t be so taboo, that he usually hung out with my sister suggested that our behavior was fine.
Sinclair waited in the car while I zipped up to our apartment to fetch her. I was pulling the keys out of my purse to open the door when I saw that it was already cracked open. The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end as I slowly pushed the door open.
I cautiously moved through to the back of the apartment and finally caught a glimpse of someone sitting at the island in the kitchen, someone I had never seen before. My gasp must have alerted him, because the large, bare chested man swiveled on the stool to face me.
His broad face was tight with pain and my eyes quickly crossed the quilted breadth of his chest to latch onto the sight of his hand over a bloody towel pressed to his left side. Through my shock, I noted the thick, wavy brown hair falling into black eyes and over deeply tanned skin. He was so gorgeous, he made my e
yes water.