Broken French: A widowed, billionaire, single dad romance, Natasha Boyd [e reader books .TXT] 📗

call from someone who’d found her on the floor of the bathroom and called the ambulance. I showed up at the same time they did. I saw her.” I hissed in a breath at the pain of the vision. “It was too late. It will haunt me for all of my days that I didn’t go with her that night. That I could have done more to save her. And I hurt for Dauphine that her mother’s sickness was stronger than her love for her daughter. That love couldn’t win. But the thing that haunts me the most is that my marriage had died in front of my eyes, and I did not see it until it was too late. I did not see it! How does one, how do I, ever trust this emotion again when all it does is blind you and wait until you are at its mercy, and then kick away the earth beneath you? I know better now, I think to myself. I will not fall for it again. Jamais. Jamais … ensuite il y a eu toi. But then you. But then … there was you.”

All I heard was my own breath.

She was gone. Our calls had dropped every now and again over the intervening days since our nighttime calls had begun. It was an annoyance of long distance over apps. And that was okay now. I waited and heard nothing.

I needed to do this next part alone, anyway.

It was like being in a confessional of darkness. Of forgiveness. Without judgment or repercussion. “I want … I want to love you, Josephine. Maybe I do. But I don’t trust that it’s real. I’m sorry. Mon dieu. I’m so fucking sorry.”

I squeezed my eyes closed against the burning behind them, my free hand coming to rest over them for a moment—a useless instinct.

The phone was pointless now too, and I slipped it from my ear to turn it off. But then I saw the call was still connected. My breath froze in my chest, and I slowly brought it back to my ear. It was milliseconds before I realized the call was now truly gone. But not before I heard the quiet sob before she ended it.

What had I done?

Chapter Fifty

JOSIE

Charleston, SC, USA

Buried under my pillow, my sheet damp from my stupid tears, I heard the muffled sound of my bedroom door opening, then closing. I felt Meredith sitting on the bed beside me. She took the phone I still held in my hand and laid it on the bedside table.

“This can’t go on,” she said gently and removed the pillow, wincing when she saw the state of me. “You can’t just put your life on hold so you can speak to Xavier Pascale every night. Especially not when it’s killing you like this.” She reached over and grabbed the box of tissues, ripping a handful out and pressing them into my palm. “It might be the middle of the night for him, but for you it’s prime socializing time. You are young and hot and deserve a real relationship. Not to lie here crying in the dark every night over a man thousands of miles away who couldn’t see what he had when he had you.”

“I don’t cry every night.” How did I explain our normal phone calls? “I—you’re right. Of course.”

“So?”

“So what?”

“So what are you going to do about it?” she asked.

Tonight notwithstanding, mostly it had been comforting to lie here in silence connected to Xavier. Even though it was seriously fucked up. “Nothing. I’m not going to do anything. He needed me. I wanted to be there for him.” And now we probably wouldn’t speak again.

“Nothing? I need you. You’re supposed to be my friend, yet between your new job and your nightly phone calls, I never see you.”

I bit my lip. “I’m sorry.”

“What does he talk about, anyway? I mean you just lie there listening. That’s some weird shit.”

“We don’t talk. Usually. I just let him fall asleep. He-he doesn’t sleep well, and—”

“You have to be kidding me. You’re blowing me off so you can listen to a guy sleep?” She threw her arms up. “Fuck that shit. Get up.” She stood.

“Meredith. No.”

“Yes. I’m getting an ice pack for your eyes and we are going out. What the hell, Josie? This isn’t you. You are not one to let some guy gut you of your self-esteem.”

“I don’t need tough love right, now, Mer. I hear you, okay? I know. I know. Xavier and I won’t be talking anymore. I told him we’re done. So just let me grieve tonight. I’ll go out soon with you, I promise.”

She towered over me, hands on hips. “Promise?”

“Yes.”

She sank onto my bed again. “I’m sorry. I just hate to see you like this. And I really hope if you ever, ever, caught me in the same position, you’d kick my ass.”

I squeezed her arm. “Pay back will be a bitch, I promise,” I said sincerely.

“Fine. That was warranted. But seriously, it’s killing me to see you like this. Your mom is worried, too. She called me. She also noticed how different you’ve been since you got back.”

“I am different. Sure, I have a renewed sense of purpose about what I was doing with my life. But mostly, I fell in stupid, big, all-consuming love. Like I even dream of the smell of him kind of love. Of the way he spoke while we … you know.” Meredith scrunched her nose up, but I continued. “And like, I-want-to-be-a-mom-to-a-little-girl-who-isn’t-mine-but-feels-like-mine-because-she’s-a-part-of-him kind of love. It was as though I left Charleston like an overgrown teenager, and I came back as a woman. That’s the closest explanation I can give you. And not to mention the sex … other worldly. I mean I’ve always enjoyed sex, but it’s never been like it was with Xavier. Never. So freaking intense. And I’ll probably never find that again … for the rest of my whole life.”

“Well, fuck. I’d be crying too