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

twinkle in his eyes he’s had the last few weeks. Even when he’s not in a good mood he has … spark. He hasn’t had that in a while. And never mind the laughing. My God. The man hasn’t found anything funny in years. Years. Long before she died.” She let go and stepped back.

The silence that followed felt like the heavy, deafening aftermath of a resounding explosion.

I realized I was stunned still, my pulse pounding. I closed my mouth, my jaw snapped shut.

“Yeah,” she said. “I can’t believe I dropped that bomb on you. I blame the champagne.”

We both turned by unspoken agreement and went to the bathroom stalls to do our business.

Nerves climbed from their dance party in my belly up to my throat as I washed my hands at the sink. The bathroom and retiring area were a lot more crowded now. We needed to get back out there and have fun, dammit. “I don’t know what to do with the information you gave me. I’m too champagne-headed for this,” I said. And I wasn’t sure I believed her. But I wanted to, and that was pretty terrifying.

“I don’t know what to do with what you told me either,” she said with a wistful grin. “So I’m going to pretend you didn’t.”

We agreed to one more drink and a few more dances, and then we’d call it a night. I was hoping to be too tired to even think let alone wake up breathless as I still did most nights. Outside the quiet chatter of the retiring room, the deep throb of the club resumed. The music had changed from 90’s classics to sexier, deeper beats. My thoughts were whirling. Back at the bar we ordered two more glasses of champagne. The place seemed even more electrified than it had been before we went to the restroom. The bartender looked up and past us into the distance for a moment, and then turned to grab an open bottle from a silver ice bucket.

I turned to look behind me to see what had caught his attention and only saw the dark, smoky club—laughing faces, and dancing bodies on the dance floor. Then something made me look up. Maybe it was because there was an energy drawing attention upward.

My throat closed.

He was there, on an upper level, his white shirt turned up to his elbows that leaned on the railing, looking down over the crowded club.

Xavier Pascale. Scowling like he’d kill anyone who came near him. The energy of the entire room seemed swept into his orbit even though he stood alone, telegraphing don’t-fuck-with-me vibes.

In slow motion his gaze found us then found me, and my mouth went dry.

Andrea must have seen me staring, or she felt the shift along with everyone else. “Holy shit,” she said. “I think I need a cold shower.”

“Huh?” I forced my eyes from him and turned to her.

“Never mind. I guess you’re going up there.”

“What?” My heart pounded in my chest and ears. “No. I’m staying with you.”

“No. You need to go talk. I don’t mind. Trust me.”

“I do. I mind. We came to dance. We came to have fun. Let’s do that.” I tilted the champagne and gulped it down, the tiny bubbles almost threatening to explode out my nose, I drank so fast. My eyes watered.

“I’ll go back to the boat and check on Dauphine and make myself scarce.” She put her mouth close to my ear, so I could hear her properly. “You go up and talk to him.”

“I can’t,” I said, turning my head slightly in case he could read my lips. My nerves made my legs feel like jelly, and I gripped the bar top tightly. “No. Come on. Let’s pay for our drinks and get back out there.”

“He already bought them for us.”

I let out a long breath. “Of course he did.”

“Go talk to him.”

“Ahh, les filles élégantes!” We turned to find our two young admirers looking a little sweatier and just as enthusiastic as before. “Voulez-vous danser encore un fois?”

“Yeah, I don’t think so.” Evan appeared on the other side of us. His gaze burrowed into Andrea’s. “Having fun?” he growled.

Whatever was on Evan’s face had the two boys disappearing into the crowd as quickly as they’d shown up.

“Hey,” yelled Andrea over the noise. “What was that?”

Evan said nothing, though I could tell he was biting his tongue, and Andrea looked ready to spit fire. Whoo boy. If anyone had chemistry around here it was these two. It was pretty funny that she couldn’t see it.

My eyes left them and found him again. He hadn’t moved. He watched us still. He watched me. Like a leopard from a tree.

“I’ll make sure Andrea gets back safely.” Evan’s voice was loud in my ear, presumably so I could hear him over the noise. “He wants you upstairs.”

I flinched. “He does?”

And then, in the time it took for me to process Evan’s words, he and Andrea were gone.

Xavier Pascale took a drink from a heavy looking tumbler, then he set it down somewhere next to him I couldn’t see.

My legs shook, and my heart pounded in my throat. I knew if I went up there, it was going to forever change me.

A spark of anticipation and nerves, hot and searing, scorched through me from my neck to my navel. And then I was halfway across the room, pressing through the people, my pulse racing at Mach speed and my breathing not much better. Apparently, I’d started toward him before my mind could give me permission.

There was a bouncer at the bottom of the stairs. A rope. But somehow I was past them. The bouncer hadn’t stopped me. The stairs were glass as I found my footing. The railing was cool wood and steel under my palm.

By the time I’d reached the top, I’d run a marathon. Adrenaline pumped. My lungs bellowed.

He waited for me, retreating from the railing and inclining his head slightly toward a small couch and table