Page 101 of The Paris Roommates: Dean
“No, she’s right.” Jacqueline took a few more steps to the back door before turning around. “I was a fool to believe something like this could happen so fast.”
“That’s not true.” He could feel panic rising up his spine as he opened his arms. “Jacqueline, from the moment I met you, I knew you were special. My dream girl.”
“You made me laugh and promised to help me with my dream all while lying to me and keeping secrets from me.” She puffed out a breath and then turned her head away. “Perhaps we were both fools.”
She swung around and walked briskly to the door, slamming it behind her. The chandelier gave an angry melody. Dean rubbed his neck as pain robbed him of breath. He bent at the waist. God, hindsight was a bitch. “Dammit!”
A strong hand touched his back. “You might let her cool down first before you try and get her back.”
Madison.
He rose slowly, his throat working. “You think that’s possible?”
She patted him on the back awkwardly before saying, “I won’t sugarcoat it. It won’t be easy. Only you can know if she’s worth it.”
His roommates ventured closer, their faces openly worried.
“She is,” he said in a rough voice.
There was a bleep, and Kyle dug out his phone. He cursed fluently. “I just got a text about the auction. Yvonne has barred us from bidding on the grounds of a conflict of interest with a Beaumont.”
Everyone gasped their shock, and a few additional curses were muttered.
“That bitch!” Madison asked harshly. “Dammit, we needed that cave!”
Dean wanted to hang his head, but that’s what cowards did. Instead, he first met Nanine’s eyes before looking at everyone else. “It’s my fault. I’m sorry. I promise you. I’ll find a way to get us what we need. Even if I have to buy my own vineyard, okay?”
“Oh, Dean,” he heard Thea call as he walked out of the restaurant.
He needed to clear his head.
He’d lost his dream girlandtheir one hope to refill Nanine’s cave.
This wasn’t how Dean Harris was going to go down.
CHAPTERTWENTY-FOUR
What did a person do when they were told no? Dean had always reached deep for greater inspiration while using his charm to convince whoever it was who needed convincing. What were his options here, though? Yvonne was so not going to fall for his charm.
Fighting his emotions as he strode away from the restaurant, Dean asked himself where he could find the greatest inspiration in Paris.
He ran through the possibilities, discarding the Eiffel Tower and the Seine when nothing inside him flipped cartwheels. Then it hit him. The Louvre had collected the greatest works of inspiration of all time under one roof. Tingles spread across his skin. He called an Uber, trying to block out images of Jacqueline’s devastated face and self-destructive thoughts about his roommates and Nanine hating him for tanking their shot at the cave.
The answer to his dilemma had to be in the Louvre. Even better, he could be emotional and testy, like most tourists, which would cover up his current heartbreak.
Arriving at the museum, he bought a ticket after waiting in line and headed to find a catalogue. Where to go? Well, he was in a fight for what he wanted, wasn’t he?
He sought out paintings with war scenes in them. Sawyer would be proud of him for this idea, but he studiedLiberty Leading the Peopleby Delacroix and found no answers. More war paintings met with the same results. Nothing spoke to him. No tingles ensued. The only answers he found in the art depressed him. No one really won in a war. Hadn’t he already lost everything? No, he wasn’t going to think like that.
When he sighted the arrow pointing the way to Napoleon’s apartments, something he’d never visited, he felt a slight tingle again. Interesting. Dean wasn’t a big history buff—okay, he wasn’t any kind of buff—but he knew the French general had managed many victories before being put on that island. Elbow? No, that wasn’t the name. Shit. Didn’t matter. He was looking for another way to get what he wanted. When he arrived in the grand apartments, the burgundy curtains and upholstery reminded him of Pierre’s burgundy throw for his cage. More tingles. Weird. So he pushed on.
The gold and glitz conveyed an over-the-top grandeur, but something was missing. A story. Like Jacqueline used to tell him about the oldest French vineyards. Hearing a loud voice in English in the next room, he headed that way and drew up short. A British guy was holding a red flag to signal he was the tour guide. Dean hadn’t signed up for any tour, so he normally would have left, but again, the guide’s words stopped him.
“Napoleon won many of his victories in battle by what is called a flanking maneuver,” the Brit told the crowd of tourists clustering around him.
Dean’s neck tingled. Flanking.Tell me more, tour guide.
“That is accomplished when you attack on the sides—not directly,” the man continued in his British accent. “The effect is to surround your opponent before they know you are there, thus securing your winning position.”
