Paris Was The Place I Met My Billionaire Lover (My Sweet Billionaire Love Story Series) (5 page)

“What hold does time have on us, really?”

“Well, that’s a sweet thought,” Caitlyn said, “but it’s only a week-long vacation.  Anyway, there’s hardly anyone out.  Are we allowed to be on the river this late?  Should the captain have taken us back by now?”

Julien chuckled.  “Observant, intelligent, I’m very pleased.  Caitlyn, you needn’t worry about these things.  You are wise to be aware, and as always I admire your strength and cunning and the sheer power of your personality.  But, dear Caitlyn, the
Seine
is calm and the streets are quiet because it is late, quite late; or perhaps it is better to say that it is quite early.  It will be dawn soon.  And the captain?  He’s at my disposal, taking us in no hurry exactly where I want us to be.”

Almost afraid to ask but unable to resist, Caitlyn muttered, “And where is that?”

“Paradise.”

Julien leaned in, his lips drawn toward hers with the invisible pull of the hours they’d spent, the beautiful words that had passed between them, the shared feelings and thoughts and memories swirling together as their lips finally met.  His nose graced the tip of her own, their lips pressing together beneath them.  Their faces shared a gentle rotation, soft moans underscoring the moist greetings of their tongues, finding one another in the unseen warmth and darkness of their satisfied anticipation.

Caitlyn’s arms trembled, goosebumps rising along the nape of her neck.  Her eyes dipped shut, she could sense his face in front of hers, his low growl reverberating in the sliver of space that wiggled between them.  His tongue was certain but not invasive, finding the hidden spaces as her jaw lowered delicately to take him in.

Waves of pleasure rippled through her again, under the surface to push up and make her body jut in little twitches of tiny joy. 

Julien’s hands came to rest upon Caitlyn’s forearms, fingers big and thick, squeezing ever so gently, Caitlyn a quivering mass.  He’d brought her into the embrace of the city, into the arms of Paris, and now she was in
his
arms; where he wanted her and where she wanted to be.  It felt right, the warm strength of his powerful body in front of her, his arms at her sides, protecting and nurturing and loving.

She’d found what she was looking for, and much more. 

And it had found her.

He
had found her.

Above them, the black of night had receded to the purple of dawn, birds singing their morning songs, waves of the river lapping lazily against the sides of the boat.

It was a new morning in Paris.

As soon as they got back to Caitlyn’s condo, they fell into each other’s arms.  Caitlyn peeled away Julien’s jacket and shirt, pushing it away to reveal his steely chest and lean torso, hairless and rippling with muscles.

Caitlyn could feel his heart began quickening, and her own with it, when he started nibbling the nape of her neck.  Caitlyn threw her head back and sighed, she felt his body anticipating that promised place she knew he longed for. 

Caitlyn knew what men wanted, and what women wanted; she was under no childish delusions.

Caitlyn reached down, stroking Julien through his slacks, cooing.  She kissed her Frenchman too, biting slightly with a subtle growl.

Julien unzipped Caitlyn’s dress and let if fall lazily to the floor around her pretty, naked ankles.  He reached around, kissing the nape of Caitlyn’s neck as he unfastened the clasp of her bra and lightly cast it aside.  Caitlyn’s nipples stood high upon her proud breasts, ready to enter Julien’s warm mouth, to be tickled and tortured and teased by Julien’s expert tongue.

Caitlyn raked her fingers through Julien’s hair, ever stronger as he attended to her with greater vigor.  Caitlyn lay back on the bed.  Julien kissed his way up her long legs, muscles pulling and twitching under his masterful lips.  His hot breath collected along the smooth, warm walls of her thighs.

Julien shifted, guiding himself easily in.  Caitlyn wrapped around him as Julien pressed into her; an introduction of two bodies that were destined to enjoin. 
             

Julien made love to Caitlyn in slow, purposeful strokes with a vaguely circular motion to his churning hips.  Julien felt huge, Caitlyn trembling as her body squeezed and clamped; savoring every biting point of contact, nerves beginning to jangle inside her.

Julien increased his pace, an even but still quickening rhythm intended to drive Caitlyn’s body and soul over the edge, juices rising from low and percolating to a hot, boiling froth.

Caitlyn’s legs were splayed on each side of Julien’s pummeling pelvis as he drove himself even faster, stifled grunts and muffled moans rising up from her quivering throat.  Caitlyn’s face was flushed red and hot, eyes shut, mouth open.

Julien knew precisely where to place himself, how deep and for precisely how long.  When he changed his even, measured rhythm back to a slow and heaving grind, her nerves popped and vibrated like piano strings.  Her lips were pressed tight, her head pushed backward into the pillows. 

Caitlyn felt it all welling up inside her; squealed squeaks squirmed out of her throat, louder with the rising pace and force of Julien’s hips.  Caitlyn’s insides were bursting, legs kicking and flinching, knees bent up very near to her ears.

Julien released himself into her, twitching and writhing in her clenched canal.  Caitlyn’s body slowly stopped trembling, her head rolled to the side. 

They fell asleep, but awoke in the small hours to re-enact their sacrosanct seduction.

* * *

The
Church Notre Dame de Paris
began life in 1163 during the reign of Luis VII.  It fell in and out of disrepair and disuse until as recently as 1991, when a a decades-long restoration program gave rise to a shell of scaffolds around the outside of the famous buildings, which remained during Caitlyn and Julien’s tour.

Inside the
Sainte Chappelle
and the Cathedral of Notre-Dame, stained glass windows rose to give color to the stream of sunlight shining down on the rows of empty pews.  Visitors muttered to one another, the din of their amazement hovering around the vacuous sanctuary.

In the courtyard, Caitlyn and Julien took in the gentle midday breezes, dewy with mist form the
Seine
.  “It’s really incredible,” Caitlyn said.  “I mean, the cathedral, the river, the whole city is like some huge museum.”

Julien brushed her cheek with his fingertips.  “And you are its newest treasure.”  They kissed again, his breath hot against her chin.

Caitlyn tried to smile.  “I wonder how I’ll like living in a museum.”

Julien chuckled, but only a bit.  “It’s is only a metaphor, no?”

“No.  Well, yes, I mean,
oui,
but... well, I dunno, I was talking to a professor, and my parents, of course... they all thought it would be a good career move for me, maybe museum curator.  Y’know, keep the masterpieces of the past alive, keep all this wonder preserved for future generations.”

“
Une impossibilité!
” Julien spat out, as if offended by the mere notion.  “For a creature of such life and beauty and vitality to spend her life in some dusty old museum, haunting the halls like a ghost, taking care of old paintings of dead people, painted by dead people for the benefit of dead people and those who are not yet dead.  No,
mille fois, non!
”

Getting the gist of what he said if not the exact letter of it, Caitlyn said, “Well, what do you suggest?”

“
Mon Dieu
, anything at all would be better than that!  Take some time away from school, get a real education.  University will always be available to you.”

“That may be true,” Caitlyn said, “though I don’t know that I’ll always be able to count on the funding.  And Paris isn’t going anywhere, right?”

“Paris?  No.  Paris will remain.  But time; Caitlyn, time slips away so quickly.  Of all the things in this world; love and food and wealth and pleasure and pain, time is the only truly finite resource.  Time is the one thing we cannot afford to waste.”

“S’funny,” Caitlyn said, eyes cast up at the wondrous cathedral only a few yards away; greater than anything she could ever accomplish in her lifetime, or in ten of them.  Built over centuries, a monument to what mankind can achieve; and to what Caitlyn herself knew she never would.  “I feel like I’ve been doing nothing
but
killing time.”

“Then now is the time to change that pattern,” Julien said, his voice quick and smooth, with an urgency that made it sound almost like a plea.  “Now is the time in your life when you must embrace change, Caitlyn, take in all that the world has to offer you. 
Laissez l'aventure commencer;
let the adventure begin!”

Caitlyn turned her attention back to Julien.  She knew the subtext of their conversation, and knowing it was something she enjoyed.  Even pitting her wits against this formidable and impressive man, so sophisticated and experienced, Caitlyn was holding her own.

Caitlyn lobbed, “What’s the offer?” with a little smile.

Julien said, “Stay here in Paris, with me.  Forget going back to school.  I can teach you what I know about the business world, skills that will keep you living well for the rest of your life; real world experiences that are education enough for a lifetime.”

Caitlyn allowed herself to drift even closer to Julien, their faces only a tantalizing few inches apart.  With a slinky pout in her voice, she asked, “Is that all you’re going to teach me?”

“What I can teach you cannot be described,” Julien said with a sexy growl.  “It must be experienced.”

They kissed again, the spark between them only growing hotter with each passing moment, every kiss increasing the pitch of their intimacy, their cheeks trembling with every little caress.

“I do not believe you are taking me seriously,” Julien said, his eyes fixed upon hers.

“It’s not that, I know you’re not a frivolous man.  And I’d like to stay here in the land of dreams and romance and passion with you -- ”

“Then say you will.  Simply ask, and everything the world has to offer will be yours -- ”

Caitlyn smiled, but the discomfort was changing the shape of her lips, bending them downward at the corners as her shoulders arched upward toward the bottoms of her ears.

A digital coo leaked up out of her purse. 
Daddy’s cell phone!
Caitlyn realized. 
Crap!  It’s been in my purse the whole trip, I never called him to check in or anything.

“You’re expecting a call?” Julien asked.

“If you’ll excuse me,” she said, pulling the phone out and raising it to her lips.  “Hello?”

“Caitlyn, it’s your father.”  His voice was quick and level.  Something was wrong.

“Hi, Dad!  Hold on a minute.”  She cupped her hand over the phone and called, “It’s my dad, Jenny, I’ll be right there!” loud enough for him to hear, then raised the phone back to her ear.  “What’s up?  How’s everything back home?”

“Not so great, sweetheart.  We got a very troubling call from your friend Jennifer’s parents.”  A cold stone of dread sank in Caitlyn’s stomach, the few seconds between her and the truth she’d have to face burning painfully away.  Harrison added, “Turns out your friend is having a wonderful time... in Cancun.”

Caitlyn thought fast.  “Oh, yeah, well, I didn’t want to trouble you.  But she and I weren’t getting along, and she decided to change her plans.  I know she paid for it herself, the way she was going on about it.  I didn’t know what to do.  I didn’t want to leave Paris, but I didn’t want to worry you either.”

After a nasty little silence, Harrison exhaled tiredly and said, “Caitlyn, she told her mother everything, and her mother told us; about your plan, the hundred dollars you paid Jennifer to go along with it, everything.”

Crap!

“Why’d you lie to me, Caitlyn?”

“I didn’t mean to -- ”

“Caitlyn, stop it!” he barked, his little metallic voice still strong and imposing, even coming out of a tiny speaker from a half-a-world away.  “You knew you were lying then, you just  now spun a web of lies at the drop of a hat.  Is this the girl I raised?  Didn’t I teach you anything about the value of the truth, about right and wrong?”

Caitlyn turned away, as much as to direct her attention more effectively and completely toward her father as to misdirect Julien’s attention away from her and especially that particular conversation.  “I’m sorry, Dad, I know I messed this up.  I just... I couldn’t find anyone to go with me, and I didn’t want to miss Paris to go to stupid Cancun.”

“That’s not the point, Caitlyn, and you know it.”  Another ugly, disappointed silence crawled past before Harrison added, “What are you doing there now?  Who are you with?”

“Why do you ask that?  What do you mean,
who am I with
?”

“Don’t give me any more of your sass, young lady.  It doesn’t matter anyway.  Every minute you spend there alone, you’re in danger.  I’ve already bought a ticket for you on Air France, tonight’s red-eye.  You get to the airport now, have a meal, do some shopping, get some rest.  But don’t miss that plane.  I’ll pick you up at LAX.”

Oh no, Dad, don’t!
Caitlyn wanted to plead. 
Please don’t ruin this for me!  It’s no big deal.  Why does everything have to be about truth and right and all that stuff?  I’m young and in Paris, with an incredible man I think I might really be in love with.  Please don’t ask me to walk away from all that just because I hurt your feelings, because I stretched the truth this one time!

Instead, Caitlyn turned and caught a glimpse of Julien in the corner of her eye, quietly observing without wanting to intrude.  Caitlyn turned back to the phone and her expectant, angry parent on the other end of the phone.

Caitlyn said, “No.”

A moment passed, swelling with disbelief until it finally popped with Harrison’s astonished, “What?!”

“I’m an adult now, you can’t keep treating me like a child.”

“Okay, that’s fine, Caitlyn, then take a vacation like an adult and pay for it yourself, plus your school, your dorm, your expenses.  As long as I’m paying for those things -- ”

A hot pride rose within Caitlyn, filling her soul and her imagination.  Julien’s words echoed in her memory, humming in the back of her ears.  She said, “You’re right, Dad.  I’m sorry, you’re right.”

“Well all right then, get to the airport and -- ”

Caitlyn felt the little half-smile push her right cheek back.  “No, I don’t mean it that way.  I mean that you’re right, you shouldn’t be paying my way anymore.  It’s time for me to strike out on my own.”

“Sweetheart, you don’t know what you’re saying -- ”

“No, Dad, you’re the one who doesn’t know what I’m saying.  I love you  and I’m grateful for everything you’ve done.  But it’s time for me to really start living, to get a real education.”

“A real edu -- ?”  Harrison’s voice cracked, confusion clogging his retort.  This conversation clearly hadn’t gone the way he’d anticipated, and something about that pleased Caitlyn.  It meant she was the one guiding the conversation, and guiding her future; for once.

“I’ll let you know what my plans are as I make them,” Caitlyn said, her own voice taking on the brassy intonation of confidence and control.  “Until then you may want to get a refund on that red-eye.”  Without waiting for an answer, she clicked the phone shut and slid it back into her purse.

She stepped toward Julien with a new sensation, like a new person; stepping into a new future, a new life, leaving the old life behind.

Julien wrapped his arms around her, clearly pleased as she pressed her body against his and her lips against his, tongues re-engaged in a friendly dance, a happy reunion.  After their moist disengagement, Julien said, “And I thought that was
bad
news.”