Page 61 of The Stipulation
“That sounds ominous.”
“These street names.” He gestures vaguely behind us. “Rue du Chat-qui-Pêche. Street of the Fishing Cat. Who names things like that?”
I grin. “It’s charming.”
“It’s unhinged.”
“It’s poetic,” I counter. “Imagine living on a street named after a fishing cat. That’s infinitely better than living on, say, Industrial Estate Road.”
He huffs a reluctant laugh. “You’re such a romantic.”
“You like that about me.”
His eyes flick to mine. “I do.”
The way he says it, quiet, certain with no trace of his usual teasing smile, makes something inside of me stir, almost like a warning. Careful, Jo. You’re going where you’ve never gone before.A breeze lifts a few strands of my hair, and he reaches out and catches the loose strands. His fingers brush my cheek as he tucks my hair behind my ear. It’s such a small thing, but somehow, here with him, it feels enormous. Like we’re a couple!
“So,” I say, because if I don’t fill the spaces I might drown in it. “What was your street called growing up?”
“Rhodes Drive.”
“That’s aggressively normal.”
“Thank you.”
“Did you grow up in New York?” I ask.
“Mm, in Brooklyn,” he says with a nod. “My mom and I shared a tiny brownstone with her two sisters. It was chaos with too many cousins and loud Sunday dinners. My grandmother always came for Sunday dinner, and she believed silence meant someone was plotting something. And what she said went.”
I laugh. “She sounds terrifying.”
“She was five feet two and ruled the roost with a wooden spoon.”
“I respect her already.”
He smiles at that, and it softens him in a way I don’t think many people get to see. The sharp edges ease. The perpetual calculation behind his eyes gives way to softness.
“What about you?” he asks. “London girl. What was your empire like?”
“Not an empire by any stretch of the imagination.” I tuck my hands into the sleeves of my cardigan. “I grew up in a semi-detached house in Richmond. We had a small garden where my mum tried to encourage me to grow herbs we would never use. Naturally, I resisted and spent most of my time inside.”
“Reading.”
“Obviously.”
“Obviously,” he echoes.
“I used to line my books up by height,” I admit. “Not genre. Not author. Not even series. Height.”
He stares at me. “I guess you would be an interior designer’s dream client.”
“It is aesthetically pleasing.”
“It’s kinda psychotic.”
“Maybe a little,” I admit with a laugh.
A group of teenagers passes us, talking loudly in French, one of them licking an ice cream that’s melting faster than he can manage. I watch the dripping ice cream with mild concern.
