The King (The Original Sinners: White Years, #2)(131)
He hired a car in Paris and drove into the countryside. The country had changed in twenty years, but not the beauty. The beauty remained. The rolling hills, the ancient churches, the crumbling castles on the roadsides, the farms, the cottages, old Europe, old magic… He would bring Céleste here someday.
By late afternoon he arrived as his destination. He parked the car at the end of a long dirt road and walked barefoot on the French soil all the way to the door.
He knocked and waited. A few moments later he heard footsteps.
The door opened.
Nora looked at him across the threshold of his son Nico’s house.
She didn’t look shocked to see him. She didn’t look surprised. In fact, she looked as if she’d been expecting him. Maybe she had.
“Before you say anything else,” Nora said without any trace of remorse on her lovely face. “Just answer one question for me. How much trouble am I in right now?”
Kingsley smiled.
“All of it.”
*
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
WRITING IS A SOLITARY PROFESSION, BUT EDITING takes a village. Thank you, Karen Stivali, Alyssa Palmer, Miranda Baker, Robin Becht, Melanie Fletcher, Cyndy Aleo and Andrew Shaffer who help me beat The King into shape. Thank you, Gitte Doherty for your help with S?ren’s Danish. Thank you to Susan Swinwood, editor extraordinaire, who has claimed S?ren as her book boyfriend (sorry, ladies, I can’t fight my own editor for him). And thank you to Sara Megibow, my dream agent who is a dream agent because she’s helped me make all my dreams come true. Thank you, Andrew Shaffer, my fiancé, for being my best friend and toughest critic. Special kisses and pets to Buckley Cat and sad little Honeytoast Kitteh for keeping me entertained during long writing hours. Thank you to the good people at the Jesuit Spiritual Retreat Center in Milford, Ohio, for giving me an internet-free sanctuary in which to write The King. Apologies if I gave any Jesuits a heart attack when I honestly answered the question, “So what do you do for a living?”