Page 14 of Sawyer
“My two cents, as you Americans say.” Jean Luc gave an enigmatic shrug.“If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.”
“Descartes.” Sawyer sighed. Now that philosopher was going to ramble around in his head too. “And so true.”
“But that’s so depressing!” Thea cried.
“Perhaps,” Jean Luc continued, “but Sawyer knows what I mean. Search yourself but do your best to balance the doubt with the truth. You know what the truth is.”
“Bro,you are on a roll today.” Sawyer stood up, taking a bite of his baguette, knowing he’d gotten under Jean Luc’s half-Italian, half-French skin with that nickname.
“The bro comment tells me everything about your state of mind, Sawyer. Come,chérie,let us leave him to his artistic agonies. The greats do seem to like them.”
“But—” She firmed her lips as she shot Jean Luc a look. “Sawyer, I’m going to talk like Brooke now, and I don’t care if it’s not what you want to hear. Don’t make me put you in a Philosophy Time-out. Both of you, actually. No more Descartes or any of those other dead guys.”
He almost choked on his bread. “A what?”
Jean Luc rasped, “Dead guys!”
“You heard me.” She pointed her baguette at him before thrusting it out at her fiancé like a sword. “You too, Jean Luc. I know you think I’m sweet, Sawyer, but I’m not going to let you get stuck in negativity. Like Dean says, it’s counterproductive to following your dreams.”
Positivity was a missing piece in his double helix, no doubt about that. “It’s no wonder you and Dean are First and Second Course on Nanine’s Personality Type by FrenchCourse quiz. You two are eternal optimists. Maybe I was born on a day with no sun—an eclipse.”
God, where was his trusty pastel when he needed it? The invisible cords of doubt were all around him now.
“Oh, Sawyer.” She came over and rested a comforting hand on his chest as tourists from a crossing boat threw up a cheer. “I believe in you and your art. I know you can do this! Look at how much Operation Thea changed my life! I’m telling you. Operation Sawyer is a guaranteed success with your roommates on your side.”
“Yourbroas well,” Jean Luc supplied.
A major consolation if Sawyer ever heard one. “Thank you.”
She kissed his cheek. “Wait until you see what else we have in store for you.”
Ominous. “Did you guys have a secret meeting without me today? Do I hear a bell tolling?”
“Where?” Thea looked around, making Jean Luc’s mouth quirk.
“He is teasing,ma Thea. As for secret meetings, they would not be secret if we told you, Dr. Jackson. Thea, let us continue our walk. Now that you have set us both straight.”
Fussing with Jean Luc’s collar was her way of assuring her fiancé, Sawyer imagined. He sent her a smile as she waved and walked off with Jean Luc. Facing the Seine, his doubts resurfaced, murky thoughts ready to drown him.
He needed a distraction. Slicing his pastel through the air like a madman the rest of the afternoon would have him picked up by the police. But where to go? He couldn’t go to his favorite art store only a few blocks away since it was closed on Sundays, but there was another art form that lit up his soul.
Books.
He headed up the uneven stairs from the quay to the street and walked down the pavement until he reached thegreen boxes of the famed bouquinistes. Sure, there was art to be bought, but mostly prints for tourists. The real magic was the old books. Nothing first edition-like. There were plenty of bookstores in Paris that specialized in those babies. But he’d found treasures here, including a history of Paris with old maps in it from the 1800s, before the Eiffel Tower had changed the city’s landscape.
He started toward the stacks of books on the end.
Then he saw Venus come to life and felt the world tilt on its axle yet again.
CHAPTER
FOUR
His goddess come to life wore a lime green coat.
Nothing else—not books, or art, or even the lone strands of a violin from a nearby street performer—could grab his attention away from her as she stopped at the next bouquiniste. He wanted to say it was the contrast of her lime green attire with the deep emerald paint of the stand, but he knew that wasn’t it. No, not at all.
She might have stepped out of a Titian painting for all her rich colors. She had a wild mass of red hair and green eyes that sparkled in a flawless oval-shaped face. Her brows were thick and arched, and her mouth was lush and sexy and painted a deep rose. Long gold earrings hung from her ears—those chandelier kind, brushing the strap of an oversized purple purse that he now saw matched her purple leather gloves. Her legs were encased in navy leggings embroidered with white roses, leading down to navy lace-up boots that were old-school Victorian in style.
