Rooted (Pagano Family #3)(24)

“Now, ladies,” Jordan announced, “You need shoes.”

Carmen turned to see him standing with two pairs of shoes in his hands—gold strappy sandals with a mile-high heel, and nude platform pumps, also with a deadly high heel, though not as high as the sandals. Probably four inches, though. She would break a leg on those. Or her neck.

Rosa squealed at the gold sandals and snatched them from Jordan’s hand, but Carmen shook her head. “No. Those will kill me. Jordan, I wear work boots and sneakers every day of my life. There’s no way. I need a lower heel. And maybe black. How about boots? I’m good in boots.”

“Boots would be terrible with that dress. And the nude will extend the line of your amazing legs.” He waved the pumps at her. “Come on, just try. You’ll look so fantastic, it’ll be worth a death or two. You’ll see.”

She took them from him, to humor him and to prove her point. No shoe would look good enough to risk certain maiming.

In the end, she bought the shoes.





6



Carmen had backed off dramatically, and Theo wasn’t sure why. When they’d been in her bedroom, she’d been right there with him, feeling and responding to the same intensity of connection that he felt. He had not been alone in that heady moment. He knew it. She’d been there.

But then Rosa and the boys had come back, and somehow something had changed for her between the moment that they’d heard the elevator, and he’d pulled his hand out from under her top, and the moment that she’d sent them away for the night.

He had no idea what. Was it the way Rosa had returned? Was she holding him responsible for Eli and Jordan not taking care of her little sister? He was disappointed himself, but she’d seemed last night to have been more accepting than he had, putting more of the responsibility on Rosa.

He didn’t know. He also didn’t know why he cared so much. Or, rather, he knew why. He simply didn’t know why her, why now. After years of wanting little more than the solitude that came with marriage to a memory, why had a woman like Carmen—resistant, elusive, possibly uninterested—woken need in him again?

But she’d called in the morning, and they had fixed their plans for the day. Nothing had changed, after all. Until lunch, when she made a point to keep her distance, embedding herself in the conversation among the youngsters rather than speaking to him.

While Jordan shopped with Carmen and Rosa, Theo and Eli took care of extending Eli’s visa, so he could stay longer in Paris. Then they went back to the apartment, changed, and went out for a run. Theo knew he was being a terrible companion, unable to keep up his end of any conversation, until Eli simply stopped trying, and they spent the afternoon mostly in companionable silence. He was distracted, working through the new puzzle of Carmen Pagano.

Theo was a writer, a poet, and that made him a student of the mind. The human condition in both micro and macro scale. His job was to reach into people’s heads and draw pictures on their brains. Perhaps the years had made him rusty in the ways of the female mind, but he knew he’d figure Carmen out.

By the time he, Eli, and Jordan were dressing for dinner—Jordan in a midnight blue tuxedo, with his patent leather slippers and a crème-colored silk scarf, Theo and Eli simply in dark suits and ties—Theo thought he might have gotten it. She was afraid of the intensity. The roar of the connection, transcending the physical, that had turbo-charged his interest in her had instead spooked her.

But then, he was the one who’d felt understood, who’d been read in more ways than one. She hadn’t given him enough yet for him to return the favor.

As he stood at the mirror in the bathroom, straightening his tie, he decided that he’d play it cool. Let her decide when she wanted to be read.



oOo



Hunter had given him the keys to his Range Rover, which was a ridiculously large vehicle for Paris, but Theo was sufficiently comfortable driving in the city, even in a yacht like the Rover. They were only a few blocks from Carmen and Rosa’s place, but the restaurant at which he’d made reservations was in the Latin Quarter, too far to walk, especially dressed for dinner. So he and the boys drove to pick them up.

Rosa answered the door upon Theo’s knock and immediately looked past him to smile over his shoulder at Eli. “Hi! Come in. We’re just about ready. Carmen is whining about her shoes.”

Theo tried to imagine the woman he was getting to know whining. Nope. Couldn’t see it.

They followed Rosa in. She looked…festive. Lovely and sparkly in a vibrantly sequined, strapless dress. Theo turned to Eli; she certainly had his son’s attention.

He and Eli had talked a little about Rosa while they were out on their own in the afternoon. He thought she was fun and ‘hot,’ and he was interested in ‘hanging out’ with her. He hadn’t minded that she’d gotten so drunk; he’d seen lots of girls like that in college and ‘that’s just what they do.’ He did mind that he’d caught flack for not stopping her, asserting that it wasn’t his place to make her choices. He’d kept her safe. End of job.

Theo assumed that Eli had the kind of attitude he should adopt as well. The kind of attitude he’d had briefly about Carmen, after that first encounter. Fun. Companionship. And then, when it was time, a parting.

And then Carmen came out of the bedroom, her shoe problem evidently solved, and he just wanted her. All of her. Her dress was snug and black and looked pasted on somehow, caressing her sinewy body. Her legs were miles long. She—or maybe Rosa—had done her hair up, in a sleek bun or roll or something. And she was wearing makeup. Theo realized that he didn’t think she had been wearing it when they’d been together before. Her beauty was simply natural. Now, it was dramatic.