Page 61 of The Paris Roommates: Dean
“If I pull this off, I’ll be her hero,” he said with the flash of a smile. “Otherwise, if we lose, it’s like it never happened.”
“That’s your plan?”Brooke leaned over and tapped her head on the table twice before lifting it. “Be the hero, and crow from the mountaintop. Be the loser and go to your grave with your secret. Dean, this is so not a good idea.”
“I agree with Brooke,” Thea said after a throat-clearing cough. “And maybe because I’ve been listening to Jean Luc, I have to ask the question. Even if we end up winning the cave at the auction, who’s to say the French legal system won’t take it away from us eventually, when Jacqueline’s case is finally heard?”
“Madame Beaumont is probably hoping the majority of the bottles will be drunk by then,” Sawyer said dryly as Brooke elbowed him. “Hey! I’m being serious. I had a friend who wasn’t credited for sold inventory in a court case one time, and while I know the system is different here, you can’t count on the law for anything.”
“I take exception to that despite my earlier quote,” Jean Luc said with a disgruntled look.
“The way Nanine lost her cave is the perfect case in point.” Sawyer thrummed his hand on the table. “She was scammed out of it, and French law didn’t protect her or give her recourse.”
Her heart tore a little more as her Courses littered the room with bad memories and her mistakes. When her heart bled enough, as it was now, she could see her young granddaughter Chloe, laughing in her kitchen as she ran around in delight, eating a treat Nanine had given her. “I would prefer we not speak of the past.”
Everyone shifted awkwardly in their chairs, and she had the unusual urge to swear. They were well meaning, but hearing her private business discussed so openly was completely distasteful to her.
“We did not mean to dredge up painful topics, Nanine,” Brooke said, her cat-shaped green eyes turning sad and empathetic.
“I know you did not.” She patted Dean’s arm to assure him. “This is a difficult topic, is all.”
“Why don’t you just tell Jacqueline what you’re planning?” Thea asked in her usual innocent way.
Dean shook his head emphatically. “No way. I’m just gaining her trust. If I tell her now that I’m part of a bid to buy her family’s cave after what she told me, she’ll bolt. I know she will. She won’t be able to see me the same way—as the guy who likes her and wants her to be happy—because I’ll be actively trying to steal her dream. I’ll look like a dick. This way we have a little longer together to build trust in our relationship while letting the fates decide at the auction.”
A couple of weeks, in fact.
Nanine had never been one to trust or believe in fate. But she understood Dean’s logic. She would say one never knows what might happen so it was important to live for today.
“I concur,” Pierre said in French. “Beaumont women. Very mistrustful.”
Thea slapped her forehead. “Great. How did we get so lucky?”
Brooke pushed up her sleeves. “But won’t telling her all of this later, after we win, make you look more untrustworthy, Dean? I think we need a better solution. For Dean and Nanine’s.”
“Word,” Sawyer added. “Shakespeare said it best.No legacy is so rich as honesty.”
“Tell that to a car dealer,” Madison shot back. “I say we’re making things toocompliqué,since that’s the word of the night. Dean, I love you—”
“Really?” he bandied back.
She looked to the ceiling as if imploring patience from the heavens. “Look, you just met this girl, but you’ve known Nanine and us for ten years. There shouldn’t be a question about going for the cave.”
Brooke tapped her fingers together. “And I don’t think anything good can come from dishonesty.”
“Again, I disagree.” Madison leaned forward, her brows knit. “So let’s get back to the original point here. The question Dean came home with. Do we really need the cave?”
“Yes!” Kyle said with heat. “If we want that Michelin star right away, we do. We have eyes on us. Press. Momentum. Heck, Pierre. This cave is the answer, besides the menu Madison is creating and the rest of the restaurant stuff.”
“What he said,” Madison said with a nod.
Nanine could not disagree with their assessment.
“I say we deal with Jacqueline and any other problem related to her family issues after we win the cave.” Determination lined Kyle’s face. “Dean also suggested selling her half, and I’m open to discussing that at a later date.”
“So am I,” Madison said, “but again, I think we need to let things play out.”
“Madison’s right,” Kyle finished, his intensity palpable. “We’re borrowing trouble right now. Also, who really thinks Jacqueline isn’t going to bolt if she hears about this right now? If she’s as mistrustful as we think, she will.”
“I don’t!” Thea said with her usual earnestness. “I would be glad someone told me.”
