Page 98 of Beyond the Lavender Fields
“To a fine meal that I’ve cooked? I should warn you, I am worthless in the kitchen.”
“No, I come home and you tell me about all of the people you’ve helped in our hours apart.” His fingers ran over the hem of the little jacket she wore, which fell just below her waist.Oh, spit it out, Gilles. “We discuss the news of the day, more often than not arguing about the direction of our government—”
“Which argument I win more often than not.”
How he loved this stubborn woman, who would not even allow him to ask for her hand without asserting herself. “Naturally. But instead of retiring angry, we acknowledge the points on which we do agree, and then I kiss you, because I cannot imagine how I was blessed with so wonderful a ... wife.”
Gilles searched her impassive face for any clue to her thoughts. Perhaps in time he would get better at reading her expressions.
“What do you say to that arrangement?” he asked after a moment.
She cocked her head. “I think you will need to kiss me first. I still don’t know if you can do the job properly.”
A thrill raced down his arms as he cupped her face in his hands. Her soft lips beckoned. “In all fairness, you’ve never given me the chance.”
Her brow arched. “I thought you would jump at the suggestion, rather than standing there complaining about—”
Gilles pressed his lips to hers. Gently at first. But then her arms stole around him, pulling him against her. She kissed him back with the fierceness he’d dreamed of for weeks, and for a moment the sea andle Rossignolfaded. Once again they were in the endless lavender fields, the ocean wind replaced by the fire of a golden sunset.
He let her take the lead, and as her lips moved fervently over his, the kisses melted into each other. He couldn’t tell where one started and the next began, his head buzzing with the rush of this moment he’d believed would never come. The warmth of their breath mingled in the cool sea air. She didn’t relent, and he didn’t want her to.
So this was what she had meant when she said her kisses weren’t sweet.
A whistle and a chuckle wrenched his mouth away from hers, and he spied his father retreating from the quarterdeck. Caroline’s grip on Gilles’s jacket did not let him get far.
“I’m sorry. This is hardly a good place.” His face warmed, and he pulled at his neckcloth. That was a fine way to set tongues wagging. They wouldn’t have a moment’s peace the rest of the voyage with all the teasing.
Caroline looked away, back toward Marseille and the rising sun. “We’ll never see it again, will we?” She spoke with a steady voice, while Gilles could barely think through the pounding in his chest. How did she do it?
“Not as it was. All of France will be a very different place.” He took her by the shoulders. “But we’ll change it for good. Together.”
A small smile touched her lips. She wrapped her fingers around his and squeezed. “Yes, together.”
He rested his forehead against hers. “Does that mean the kiss will suffice?”
“I found it lacking in one thing, which I’m sure is only a sad consequence of your little games.”
Gilles pulled back. “Lacking?” His dizzy mind had yet to settle from the taste of her lips.
“Yes.” Her fingers crept along his neck and buried themselves in his hair. “I found it entirely too short.”
Short? “The crew,” he gasped as she leaned in.
“What of them?” Her words brushed across his lips.
Well, if she wasn’t worried ...
She swept him back into a kiss, her slender hands refusing to let him escape. And as their lips moved in time to the beating waves, he was happy to comply as long as she wished. No matter what the tides of revolution threw across their path, they would weather it so long as he had this woman to hold.
September 1793
Saint-Malo, Brittany, France
Young men marched down the street heading south toward Paris. Citizens of Saint-Malo lined the path around them, waving and singing the stirring anthem so popular in Marseille. Some cried. Others cheered. But Gilles and Caroline watched in silence until the battalion moved out of sight.
“You should be grateful,” she said as they turned toward the door of their little apartment. Gilles couldn’t help his grin as he followed her back inside the cramped home. Her presence spread light to every dark corner.
“Why should I be grateful?” He closed the door and leaned against it to watch her make her way to the kitchen. Cloudy light illuminated her features as she took a bowl of resting dough from its place near the hearth.
