Blame It on Paris. Jennifer Greene

I was translating it correctly.”

      “Afraid so.”

      “Really. Oh, well.” She gulped, looked again and let out another short, uneasy laugh. “Okay, I have to admit my school French is turning out to be useless, but on the second line down, they couldn’t really mean pigeons stuffed with figs, could they?”

      “Afraid so.”

      “Pigeons? They’d kill pigeons? I mean…pigeons coo. And they walk right up to you in a park. They make a mess, I know, but they’re so sweet and friendly. I can’t even imagine anyone killing pigeons to eat.”

      He sighed. “We’re not going to end up eating here, are we?”

      She had another restaurant on her list. It was one more place Will tried to talk her out of, but not for long. The more time they spent together, the more he got the big picture. Kelly had the memory of an elephant, the stubbornness of a hound and the absolute capriciousness of a woman.

      “I have to prove to you that I’m not a fussy eater now,” she insisted. “Normally I really can eat anything. I love to experiment and try new stuff. Honest!”

      Uh-huh. This round, they got as far as the outside of the restaurant, where a menu was posted in the window. She looked at it for a long time, while she stood there shivering in spite of his jacket around her shoulders.

      “It’s a very famous restaurant,” she began.

      “Uh-huh.”

      “The food is undoubtedly fabulous. It’s listed in every single guidebook.”

      “Uh-huh.”

      She sighed. “It’s the black,” she admitted in a small voice. “It just seems…unappetizing…for all the food choices to be black.”

      “Is it the black truffle pizza that got to you or the black hors d’oeuvre plate?”

      “Both.”

      He grinned, tucked her inside his shoulder and said, “My turn to pick. You’re out of votes.”

      She’d forgotten about the personal questions, he thought. But God knows that didn’t mean she’d run out of conversation.

      “I don’t quite get the difference between a bistro and a brasserie.”

      “Well, a bistro’s just a little restaurant. Usually it’s owned by a family, and a bistro tends to serve regular meals, you know, lunch, dinner. But brasserie is the French word for brewery. You can usually get some kind of food in a brasserie, but it’s a guarantee they’ll serve beer and wine. And both kinds of places are informal.”

      He ushered her into his choice—Le Petit Saint-Benoit, in the Saint Germain. It was distinctly a French place, not so touristy, more a place that the locals guarded for themselves. It was a night spot, with a good share of tables set up outside, even though it was ball-bustingly chilly by then. Still, the decor inside was from the thirties, and the food was basic French, which meant damn good if not outright fabulous. They had all the basics. Shellfish. Good wines. Filet mignon so tender it could melt in your mouth.

      “All day, everywhere I went, the women were wearing scarves,” Kelly, who’d already proved she could talk and look at everything in sight at the same time, noted. “And what really irritates me is that they all know how to tie the scarves to look really chic. I mean, the real chic, not the cliché chic. I stick out like a sore thumb, don’t I?”

      “Sore thumb, no. Uniquely attractive woman, yes.”

      “You don’t have to butter me up. We’re already sleeping together. And I meant, I stick out because I look like an American. Not like a Frenchwoman.”

      He started to loosen his tie, then remembered he didn’t have one on. It was the question that was constricting his airflow. “I don’t know. Would that be a good thing or a bad thing?”

      She chuckled and pointed a shrimp at him. “Are you afraid to answer the question, Maguire?”

      “Of course I’m afraid. When women ask certain questions, a guy tends to feel like he’s stepped in cow manure. No matter what he answers, he’s gonna be in trouble.”

      “But you’re not going to step in cow manure if you tell me what the big deal is about your living in Paris. I realize I’m prying, but come on, what possible difference could it make if you tell me? I’m not telling a soul. You can get it off your chest. No one’ll ever know.”

      “There’s nothing to get off my chest.”

      “Fine,” she said. “Be a martyr.”

      The waiter returned to pour more wine. He took one look at Will’s face and brought another liter. “Did I know before sleeping with you that you could be a complete pain in the butt?”

      He thought it was a pretty good insult, but she only chuckled. “Hey, I’d have ’fessed up to being a pain in the butt if you’d just asked. But it’s okay. You can keep your secrets. I was just thinking of all the reasons why you might not want to go home. A warrant out for your arrest. Like for a murder rap. Or drugs—”

      “Oh, for Pete’s sake. It’s nothing like that.” He reached for the bread at the same time she did. Naturally the bread was fresh out of the oven, still warm, still wonderful. But every other woman he knew fretted whether stuff like bread went straight to their thighs. Kelly inhaled it faster than he did.

      “My dad and I don’t get along. Think of two quarterbacks from opposing teams,” he said finally.

      “Opposing quarterbacks play together every Saturday,” she noted. “And you already told me that you and your dad have a really conflicted relationship. But it’s still a stretch from not being close to feeling you have to live a whole continent away.”

      Hell. It went on. Past the bread and salad. Past a liter and a half of wine. Past the filet mignon, and then, when she saw the pastry tray, past watching her salivate as she made her choice.

      Correct that. Choices.

      “I’ve got three sisters. No brothers. So I’m the only male. My dad started Maguire’s, built it into a monster-size corporation. But now he wants to retire, and he wants to do it by my taking it on.”

      “But pretty obviously you didn’t want to, so you told him no.”

      “I’ve been telling him no since I was old enough to talk. He’s heard it. He doesn’t give a damn. Aaron Maguire wants me to do what he wants me to do.” Will pushed away the plates, went for the demitasse. “And back when I was a boy, I really cared. I did everything but stand on my head to win his approval, his respect.”

      “But it was impossible?” she asked gently.

      “Oh no. I got it just fine. As long as I do exactly what he wants, everything’s always been hunky-dory. And that’s the point. He doesn’t just want me to run the company. He wants me to do it his way. Eighty-hour workweeks. Him involved in all the decisions. And then there are my sisters.”

      “Your sisters work at the company, too?”

      “No. That’s exactly the point. They don’t. They want to live in the style he’s let them become accustomed to. Lots of money, no responsibility. Bail them out whenever they lift a finger or run up a credit card bill or want a trip to Goa.”

      He wished she would look at him with a little more sympathy. Instead she kept asking more questions. “So you told your dad how you felt about that, too.”

      “I’ve talked to him about all this fifty ways from Sunday. I also always met him more than halfway—like going to Notre Dame because he wanted me to. That was a smooth stretch, but the minute I graduated, the pressure started up again about my coming into the company with him. He wouldn’t give up. He won’t give up. And I just plain got tired of fighting all the time.”

      She