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Chapter 191


I close the door
Like so many times, so many times before
Filmed like a scene on the cutting room floor
When I let you walk away tonight
Without a word

I try to sleep
But the clock is stuck on thoughts of you and me
A thousand more regrets unraveling
If you were here right now
I swear I’d tell you this

Baby, I don’t wanna waste another day
Keeping it inside, it’s killing me
‘Cause all I ever wanted comes right down to you
I wish that I could find the words to say
Baby, I would tell you every time you leave
I’m inconsolable

- “Inconsolable” by the Backstreet Boys


He made for a pathetic sight, he was sure. Lying supine atop the hotel bed, his good knee drawn up, his legless stump laid flat, Nick held up his cell phone and dialed her number again.

“Hey, it’s Claire…”

As the phone connected to her voicemail, he sighed and shut it off, sick of being tortured by the sound of her cheerful voice. He tossed the phone aside; it was a lost cause. Either her phone didn’t have service in France, or she just wasn’t answering. Equally likely options, and both equally frustrating. He had no way of knowing where she was, where she might have gone, or how to reach her while she was still in Paris, and he only had a matter of hours to try before he was set to leave for the next city, Munich. Once he crossed the border into Germany, he was shit out of luck. She wasn’t going to follow him there.

He still couldn’t believe she had shown up here, at his hotel in Paris. Paris. When he had gone to the door, prepared to tell off whoever stood outside it for bothering him at six-fucking-a.m., squinted through the peephole and seen her, his heart had jumped into his throat, and then he’d thought he must have been dreaming. Or hallucinating. But when he’d opened the door, there she was, in the flesh, his Claire, looking like hell and beautiful even so. Beautiful because it was her, and she was there, in front of him, in France.

For one perfect moment, the realization that he wasn’t dreaming had been wonderful enough to make him forget about the other woman in his bed.

He had sworn off groupies after his last tour in Europe, but somehow, in going back, he’d fallen back into the old habit. There was something incredibly sexy and sensual about European girls, the way they said his name in their accented voices. They could drink with him without getting drunk and stupid, and expose themselves to him without seeming trashy and easy. They didn’t want to talk as much as American girls did; they could play it cool and casual and just be with him. The European fans were as crazy as any American, if not more so, but the ones he brought back to his hotel room at night were not like that at all.

The brunette in his bed had been with him two nights. He’d met her after the show in Brussels, and she’d come along with him to Paris. He thought she’d said she was from Norway, but couldn’t remember for sure. He got those Scandinavian countries confused, but her accent made it obvious she was from one of them. He’d gotten good at accents.

He supposed he should feel bad about how he had thrown her out of his room, with only enough time to put her clothes back on, and without any concern for how she was going to get back home or even back to Brussels. But he found it impossible to concern himself over anyone but Claire… finding Claire before either one of them left the city.

Unless she answered her phone or turned up again soon, he had a feeling it was going to be impossible. Damn her. As much as he loved her, sometimes he hated her for being the way she was. How could she drop everything to fly to Paris and surprise him, only to turn around and run away from him once she got there, without even giving him a chance to talk? How could she be so cool and casual one minute, only to fall into a fiery temper and burn him the next? Why did she have to be so goddamn melodramatic? She was an outright bitch sometimes, making it seem like he was the one to blame when she was the hypocrite.

He could trash her all he wanted, but it didn’t change the fact that he was still desperate to find her. Find her and tell her once and for all how he felt – and make her say the same. That she did love him, that she wanted to be with him. She wouldn’t have flown all the way to France if she didn’t, and they both knew it. Bitch or not, he loved her too, and with every moment he wasted, this one chance of getting her back slipped another inch from his grasp.

The problem was, he could reach all he wanted, but if Claire didn’t want to be found, he was never going to find her.

***

The two women meandered down the Parisian sidewalk, their reflections walking along in unison in the store windows. They made for a mismatched pair, one tall and dramatic-looking, with her black hair styled in a sleek, modern cut and her slender figure dressed in European high fashion; the other comparatively short and dumpy-looking in her rumpled jeans and hoodie, her red hair limp and flattened.

Yet Jenn Brooks, who had made a name for herself in France with her photography and lived a glamorous life vastly different from the one Claire led back home, was as good a friend as she had been in the days when she and Claire had done their shopping at Hyde Park Village, looking identically dumpy in their stovepipe jeans and University of Tampa sweatshirts. During their UT days, she had shaved her head bald so that Claire wouldn’t be alone once chemo had taken her hair. Today, she had given up her Sunday morning’s lie-in and taken the commuter train into Paris, so that Claire wouldn’t be alone again.

They’d met in the small café where Claire had hidden out, eventually calling Jenn with the number she – thankfully – had stored in her cell phone, and waiting for her to arrive. It had taken her almost two hours, but finally, there she had come, striding over in her clicking, high-heeled boots to embrace Claire and say, in a mix of exasperation and admiration, “Damn, you’ve got balls, girl.”

Claire had laughed weakly. “Maybe… but what good are balls without a brain? I don’t know what I was thinking…”

“Maybe you weren’t thinking, but hey, love’ll do that to you,” Jenn replied matter-of-factly. “I think it’s très romantique.”

“Très stupide, is more like it,” Claire scoffed, though she managed a wry smile.

Jenn returned it. “Well, if nothing else, it’s an excuse to visit me. I just can’t believe you… All these years I’ve been begging you to come to Paris, and you never have. Then Nick Carter comes for two days, and you jet over here on a whim. Shows me where I rank, huh?”

Claire’s crooked smile turned apologetic. “I know I suck. Like you said, love’ll do that to you. But it doesn’t matter now… I’m here, so let’s hang out. I need something to make this trip worthwhile…”

And Jenn had delivered. She’d gotten Claire out of the café and taken her to the Louvre, arriving shortly after the art museum opened for the day. It was already crowded with tourists, but Claire didn’t mind. She enjoyed losing herself in the shuffle and the amazing works of art, ancient sculptures and famous paintings she had only seen in pictures. For a few hours, they took her mind off of Nick; she could have stayed there all day.

But they didn’t. Jenn knew the Louvre well and made an efficient personal tour guide, making sure Claire saw all of the best rooms and most famous pieces before they left. After stopping for some lunch, they went for what Jenn referred to as “shop therapy,” a form of rehabilitation Dianna would have definitely approved of.

Now they walked along the Champs-…lysées, the “Fifth Avenue” of Paris. Jenn had warned her that it was touristy, and Claire could tell what she meant. Many of the stores were the same stores they had at home – The Disney Store, Nike, Gap, and Virgin – but it was fun to step into the luxury boutiques and department stores and oggle at the designer names and prices. Jenn liked to try on clothes, even the most ridiculously expensive items, and Claire spent long stretches of time waiting outside the dressing rooms for her to come out, modeling evening gowns or €500 jeans. “Try something on,” she urged Claire, who grimaced as she glanced around the store.

“I don’t think I’d fit into any of these sizes right now,” she replied, slapping her hips. Child-bearing hips, she called them now, and doubted if she’d ever get back the figure she’d had before she’d borne the girls.

“Aww, come on, you don’t look bad for a woman with four-month-old twins,” Jenn said kindly. “You will too fit into these clothes; find something to try on. Something that’ll make you feel sexy.”

“Ha,” Claire snorted. “Knowing my luck, my boobs will start to leak while I’m trying it on. That’s not sexy. There’s pretty much no chance of me feeling sexy right now. But thanks anyway.”

Jenn heaved a sigh and shook her head. “Alright, fine. But if you ask me, you’ve looked a million times worse than you do right now. At least you look healthy, right?”

“Yeah…” said Claire, stopping to look at her reflection in one of the mirrors. She wasn’t crazy about what she saw, but she supposed Jenn was right. She looked tired, but at least she had some color in her cheeks. And hair. So what if she was fatter now? “At least there’s that.”

They chit-chatted as they continued to shop, talking about Claire’s babies and Jenn’s photography, and carefully avoiding the topic of Nick, which they’d been sidestepping ever since Claire had spilled the whole story over the phone. It was in the Louis Vuitton store that his name finally came up again.

“So, what are you going to do about Nick?” Jenn asked bluntly, turning suddenly from a display of handbags to face Claire. “I mean, you flew all this way to see him, found him with another girl, and had all your hopes crushed, but what now? Is that it? Do you just let him go on with his life and fly back to Florida with your tail between your legs?”

“What else am I supposed to do? Go back and smack him in the face for being such a player? Hope that I give him a black eye or knock out some teeth or something so he’ll have to cancel a show or two?” Claire chuckled humorlessly.

“No, you swallow your pride, and you go back and tell him that you still want to be with him, if he can show you that you’re the one he wants to be with too. You do, don’t you?”

“Want to be with him?” Claire pretended to consider it, though there was really no need. Deep down, she already knew the answer. “Yeah, I do,” she sighed. She almost wished she didn’t; it would have been simpler that way.

“Then here’s what we need to do. Find a store with clothes that are actually affordable, and get you something new to wear. Something sexy; something that will knock him off his feet. Er… foot?” Jenn cleared her throat. “Well, anyway… we’ll get you looking like the hot mama you are, and then you go back to that hotel and confront him again and just be honest with him. Don’t be mad; be honest. Got it?”

Claire laughed. “It’s a nice thought, but he probably won’t even still be there. He’s probably already left for the next city on the tour. I don’t even remember where that is… somewhere in Germany, maybe?”

“You say ‘probably,’ but you don’t know. He might still be there. You have to think positive – and why am I telling you this? Usually you’re the positive one and I’m the cynic. What’s up with you?”

“I divorced my husband a year after I married him – guess that makes a person cynical,” replied Claire, rather… well, cynically. “But you’re right… I should at least give it a try, right? At least try to talk to him…”

“There you go. Come on, let’s find a normal store.” Jenn grabbed her wrist in a death grip, pulled her away from the handbags, and off they marched.

***

“Alright… I’m comin’.”

Heaving a sigh, Nick slammed the phone down on its cradle and turned to survey the hotel room. His shit was strewn everywhere, and he’d made no attempt to pick it up yet. Never mind the fact that they were supposed to have left four hours ago. Someone in his camp had probably had to pay extra for their still being there, and Nick was sure no one was very happy with him. He didn’t really care. But now, his manager was insistent – they were leaving. Now. Well, in ten minutes.

Nick looked around again. Ten minutes wasn’t long to get his stuff packed up again. Yet he figured he might as well try. There was no point in moping around this hotel room any longer. He was sick of Paris.

He got off the bed and limped around the room, stooping here and there to pick up articles of clothing. He threw everything into his suitcase in a messy pile, not bothering to fold or organize, not caring that it would all be wrinkled when they arrived in Germany tomorrow. Smashing the pile down to flatten it, he zipped up the suitcase around it and smiled with a satisfaction that wasn’t really satisfying at all.

Checking that he had his wallet and his room key, he lifted the suitcase from the bed, pulled up its long handle, and wheeled it to the door. Several other members of his crew were waiting in the hall for him when he emerged. He offered a grimace, which they returned. No one looked very happy. Nick couldn’t blame them. They had an eight hour drive to Munich ahead of them, and at this rate, they wouldn’t arrive until late at night.

He wasn’t looking forward to the drive any more than anyone else. Eight lonely hours to sit on his tour bus and think, think about Claire and how he was leaving her behind without hardly seeing her, without getting to talk to her, without saying goodbye. Mostly, without telling her how much he still loved her.

***

Even as Claire walked back into the lobby of the hotel from which she’d fled early that morning, she knew she was too late. There was no way Nick would still be here, not when he had a show in a completely different country the next night. It was already near dusk; surely, he would have left by now.

Still, as Jenn insisted, it was worth a shot. Her friend was waiting for her in the café down the street, and Claire knew she had to at least go up and make sure. The new outfit Jenn had bought her gave her a sense of confidence she didn’t really feel, but she faked it well as she strode across the lobby in a new pair of dainty, black flats. “Think of them as souvenirs,” Jenn had said of the shoes and the new top, a low-cut blouse of satiny royal blue that accented the ample cleavage Claire had, courtesy of her nursing twins. “You can buy the cheap, touristy shit yourself.”

Outside room 314, she adjusted her top, smoothing its sleek fabric over her torso, and knocked. She tried not to get her hopes up as she waited, knowing he wasn’t going to answer, yet wishing that, by some miracle of fate, he would.

He didn’t. A few minutes passed, and as she turned to leave, the door to room 312 opened up, and a maid came out, pushing her cart of cleaning supplies. Glancing at Claire, she asked something in French, something Claire did not understand. Claire just shook her head, forcing a brief smile at the maid, and hurried past her, wanting to get out of the hotel as quickly as she could.

Now that she knew she was too late, the disappointment was overwhelming. Why had she wasted so much time flitting around Paris with Jenn when she should have gone straight back to that hotel and confronted Nick like a mature adult? She was more upset with herself than anything else. How stupid she had been. All the money she’d thrown away to take this trip, and for nothing. For absolutely nothing. She had blown a thousand dollars and her chance to make things right with Nick, and now that she realized it, all she wanted to do was go back home, to her girls, and forget the whole thing.

She trudged back to the café where Jenn waited, hardly wanting to face her. But what else was she going to do? Jenn was the only soul she knew in Paris, and she couldn’t ditch her too.

When she walked in, Claire found she didn’t have to explain anything. Her face must have given it all away, because Jenn just gave her a sympathetic smile and pulled her into a bony hug. “If it’s meant to be, it’ll happen. Just not this time,” she whispered in her ear, then pulled away. “You know what we should do?”

“What?” Claire asked dully. She didn’t feel like doing much.

“Hit the clubs and drink till you can’t even remember your name, let alone his.” Jenn’s elfin face gleamed with mischief.

Claire grinned. “Yeah, alright… but can we make one stop on the way?”

“Sure. Where to?”

Claire glanced out the window of the café. She couldn’t see the monument from there, but she knew that was where she wanted to go.

“The Eiffel Tower.”

***

It was like a scene out of a movie. The view of the sun setting on Paris, across the sparkling, orange waters of the Seine River, was breathtaking. Claire’s breath literally did catch in her throat as she stood beside Jenn in the observatory at the top of the Tower. It was gorgeous, magical even, and a part of her couldn’t believe she was here.

And yet, there was something missing.

It wasn’t quite like a movie after all. In a movie, the door to the observatory would suddenly fly open, and Nick would come running in, just in the nick of time – no pun intended – to sweep her off her feet and make things right for the happily-ever-after ending. The crowds would part to make room for the reunion, and everyone would clap, caught up in the moment.

But it wasn’t a movie, and there was no Nick, only herds of tourists who bumped and jostled and got in the way of each other’s pictures. She felt removed from them, like she didn’t quite belong there. And she didn’t. What was she doing at the top of the Eiffel Tower? Her family, her daughters, were back in Tampa. Nick was on his way to Germany.

She continued to look to the west, thinking of her home far across the Atlantic. Then she moved, with the current of the crowd, to the eastern side, where the sky was already fading to dusk. Somewhere out there was Nick, getting further and further away from her while she stood still.

***

Far beyond her eyes’ reach, just beyond the city limits, on a big, black bus trundling into the approaching darkness, a pair of blue eyes were fixed on the tower where she stood.

As the Paris skyline began to fade onto the horizon, Nick watched the Eiffel Tower seem to shrink away and thought of Claire. She was there, somewhere in the city he was leaving behind. Was she still thinking about him… or would she go back home and try to forget?

He slumped lower in his seat with a sigh, as the road curved and the Tower disappeared from his view. He would never know that, for a moment, though they were miles apart and getting further so with each turn of the bus tires, they had been connected in thought.

***