I shall leave my story here, that and the pieces of Jehanne that she lovingly offered. The parts of her that did not belong only to France, but to me, her friend and confidante. Perhaps someday fate will decide it is time for this story to be shared. I cannot help but feel a kinship for the unknown person who will first read these writings, a connection that, if it comes to be, destiny herself will surely orchestrate. In this way, though perhaps through decades of time, we are bonded together. And so my message to you, reader of my words, knower of my heart, is this: I questioned once whether the winds of fate are benevolent or merciless. I know now—believe—with every fiber of my being, that they are only good. For it was Jehanne who taught me so until the moment of her final breath. I hope, dear unknown friend, that you believe it, too. With love, Adélaïde Durand
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Jessica
It was fall in Paris. The temperature had dropped, and with the tourists mostly gone, Parisians took back their beloved city.
Stepping from the train tunnel and beginning the walk to my apartment, I tugged my jacket around myself, trying to manage the buttons while stuffing files I’d been reading on the train into my briefcase, and failing with the buttons. “Oh, for God’s sake,” I muttered, as a swirl of dancing leaves crossed the sidewalk in front of me.
The first drop of rain splattered on my nose, and I blinked at the sky, letting out a tiny squeak when another drop fell straight into my eye. I swiped at it, picking up my pace. There hadn’t been rain in the forecast, so I hadn’t brought an umbrella.
The rain picked up, falling steadily now as I ducked my head and fast-walked, not daring to run in the work heels I wore. I used my briefcase to protect me from the rain, holding it above my head. I must have forgotten to zip it closed in my haste to stuff the files inside, though, because suddenly the folder fell out in front of me, causing me to let out a scream as I came up short, squatting and attempting to stop the papers from flying away.
Someone bent down next to me, putting his foot on top of a loose piece of paper. The shadow of an umbrella fell over me, and the rain, mercifully, was blocked. I laughed, shaking my head. “Merci beaucoup—” I looked up, dropping the papers I’d just gathered, my heart leaping in my chest.
Callen.
Breath whooshed from my lungs, and I almost fell backward.
“Whoa,” he said softly, wrapping his hands around my forearms and guiding me to my feet. “I’m here to save you,” he said, his voice slightly throaty. He tried to hold on to the tilt of his lips, but the smile wobbled and slipped as our gazes locked, his eyes full of gravity.
Oh.
I just stared. The shock of seeing his face, of having him right there in front of me so unexpectedly, had stolen my voice and all my wits, too, it seemed.
He glanced at the papers I’d dropped, moving to gather them, but I reached my hand out, stopping him. “It’s okay. They’re just…uh…” Copies of something, nothing important. “I mean, they can be replaced.”
He bent anyway, gathering up the drenched pile, unmoving now, made heavy by the water and stuck to the pavement. “Still probably shouldn’t litter,” he said as he stood.
“No,” I said, my eyes moving over his face as if he might not be real. “I mean, yes.” I shook my head, trying desperately to clear it. It’d been so fuzzy lately. “Yes, littering is bad.”
His smile widened, and it was so beautiful. He was so beautiful, I almost began to cry. Someone brushed past his back and he stepped forward, guiding me closer to the wall of a building, out of the way of people walking on the sidewalk. He still held the umbrella over our heads, creating an intimate space perfect for two. It made me picture that small room we’d shared in the Loire Valley and a wave of emotion washed through me. Hope, both tentative and strong. “What are you doing here?”
He used the hand not holding the umbrella to run through his damp hair, slicking it back, and then ran his hand down his thigh to dry whatever wetness it had come away with. “I was on my way to your apartment. To see you.”
“You were?”
He nodded, staring at me for a moment, so much longing in his eyes that my heart jumped again. He patted the pocket of his jacket as if he’d just remembered something, and then reached inside, pulling out a folded piece of paper. When he held it toward me, I could see that his hand was trembling. He cleared his throat. “This is for you. I, uh, wrote it for you.”
“Music?”
He shook his head. “No, ah, no. A letter. Just a short one.”
I sucked in a breath. A letter. “You—you wrote it?” Oh my God. Oh, Callen.
He nodded, the expression on his face filled with such raw vulnerability that tears burned in my eyes. “Please don’t laugh at it, Jessie.”
I let out a tiny sob, taking the paper. “I would never laugh at you.”
He shook his head, grimacing. “I know. I’m sorry. It’s just…It’s just a start. I’m not very good yet. But Madame Pelletier says I will be.”
“Madame Pelletier?”
“My tutor.”
“Oh, Callen,” I breathed, swallowing down the lump in my throat that threatened to choke me.
He nodded toward the note, putting his hand in his pocket as he watched me.
I unfolded the piece of plain white paper, my own hands shaking as his had a moment before. Inside, in childish-looking blocky letters, the ink bleeding in several spots where it looked as if he’d stopped and then started again in great concentration, read:
Dear Jessie,
I’m sorry and I love you.
Callen
The most gorgeous love letter ever written in the history of life on earth.
The tears broke free, a sobbing moan rising in my throat as the love in my heart burst forth, mixing with my pride in him, the aching loneliness of the past four months, the worry, the doubts, the pain, and the fear.
“Jessie,” he croaked. “You’re not supposed to cry.” He moved forward, brushing the tears from my face.
I shook my head. “I’m just so proud of you. And y-you wrote this for me. And the songs,” I gasped, “the beautiful, gorgeous songs.”
Callen had moved in even closer and was kissing the tears from my cheeks now. “Jessie,” he murmured. “I have so much to explain to you. That day in my hotel room, I—”
“I know about that,” I whispered. “Nick came to see me.”
He nodded. “I know. He told me.” He smoothed back a piece of hair that had stuck to my damp cheek. “But I’d still like to explain myself to you in my own words. I want to undo the hurt I caused you. I want to earn your forgiveness.”
“I do forgive you, Callen. And I want you to forgive me, too. I never meant—”
He put his fingers over my lips, halting my words. “There’s nothing to forgive. You can tell me how it happened, but I know you didn’t mean to hurt me. You’ve only ever brought me gifts.” He paused. “And in a way, that was one, too, Jessie. Funny as it seems. You saved me once, and then again, but I needed to save myself.” He ran his knuckle down my cheek, and I leaned into his touch. “You were right about that. You were right about so many things.”
I smiled. “Oh, Callen, I—” A gust of wind blew straight at me, causing me to step backward as my coat flew open, my dress plastering itself to my body. I turned my head against the gust, and when it changed direction, I opened my mouth to continue the sentence I’d started. When I looked back to Callen, he was staring down, his eyes wide, his mouth slightly parted.
His eyes flew to mine, his forehead creasing. “Jessie?” He reached down, running his palm over my swollen belly, just beginning to round with his growing baby.
“I tried to call you,” I said, nerves assaulting me. “But your number was changed.”
He blinked, still staring, as if in shock. “I changed my number when I moved to France,” he murmured.
France? “Oh. Um, well, I didn’t know how to reach you, and I didn’t have anyone else to call. I tr
ied to look Nick up, but I didn’t have his last name, and Los Angeles is a big city…lots of, ah, website design companies. And then I thought after I received your music that you’d get in touch with me…I was waiting…I’ve played your songs so many times.” I let out a strangled laugh. That was an understatement. I had the entire soundtrack memorized, every note, every chord. “I’ve played them all to the baby, too,” I whispered. “I wanted he or she to know you right from the beginning…and…I felt your heart there. I…” Oh God, say something. Anything.
Something seemed to break inside him as he let out a breath, his shoulders relaxing and a slow smile overtaking his face. “We made a baby that weekend in that tiny attic room, in that tiny bed.” His grin widened even more, and he laughed, a sound full of joy.
“Yes. I…You’re…happy?”
“Jessie.” He laughed again, dropping the umbrella on the street and reaching for me, pulling me into his arms. “I’m happy. It’s a miracle.” He brought his lips to mine, laughing as we kissed, and he spun me around in the dwindling rain. Elation gripped me, a relief so intense that it felt like my knees might buckle. But Callen held me tightly, not allowing me to fall. Rescuing me.
After we’d kissed for a few more minutes, he pulled back. “You told me you weren’t pregnant, that night at your work dinner.”
“I didn’t know. It had only been two weeks since that weekend. And I guess I just figured I wasn’t. Maybe I…maybe I even hoped I wasn’t. I didn’t know how to feel. Things were so—”
“I know. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” Callen kissed me again, holding me close.
After a minute I tilted my head, his words from earlier penetrating. “Wait, you moved to France? When?”
He smiled. “Yep. A few months ago. I bought a house in Giverny. It’s really old, has tons of history, and a beautiful private garden in the back with so many rosebushes you can smell them in the air when you step outside.” His expression sobered. “It has plenty of extra bedrooms. There’s a small one next to the master that would make a perfect nursery. It has this window seat and lots of light…”
I let out a sound that was half laugh, half sob, not sure whether I wanted to laugh with joy or cry with unspent emotion. Maybe both. I cupped his cheek in my hand, running my thumb over his cheekbone. “You’ve been there all these months by yourself?”
He shook his head. “No. I mean, yes. I mean, I have a dog now. Pierre. She’s good company.”
I raised a brow. Pierre? “She?”
He laughed. “Yeah. I didn’t look closely enough before I named her. By that time she was already answering to it. I’ll tell you all about how I found her later.” He leaned in, resting his forehead on mine. “We have so much to talk about, Jessie. I have so much to tell you.”
“I have so much to tell you, too,” I whispered, smiling. “But tell me again.”
“What?”
“What you wrote in your letter.”
“That I’m sorry?”
“No, not that part. The other part.”
His smile was filled with tenderness. “I love you, Jessie. Only you. I’ve loved you for a long, long time, forever I think. I want to make a life with you and our baby. I want to write you love letters with my music. I want to feed you French chocolate.” His smile increased, and I let out a soggy-sounding laugh before we both went serious again, my breath suspended at the look of adoration on his handsome face. “I want to hear the passion in your voice when you talk about your work. I want to take walks, and sit in front of fires, and make love, and raise children, and grow old together. I want to be your prince.”
I was crying again, silent tears that coursed down my face, but I smiled through them, so much happiness in my heart.
“I love you, too,” I said, pulling him to me again, touching my lips to his as the last of the raindrops fell and the whole of Paris seemed to pause, just for a moment, just for us.
EPILOGUE
Callen
The little boy toddled unsteadily through the wildflowers, the faint vibration of sound emanating from his throat and floating to me on the mild spring breeze. He was humming. My heart caught, squeezing with love, and just a little bit of fear, before resuming its calm, steady pace. Music lived inside him, too—I’d passed on that gift. Perhaps I’d passed on my struggles as well, and maybe it was what the music did: fill our brains so completely that there was little room for other things. Then again, I’d learned to read. I would never grasp written words and phrases, sentences and language structure the way Jessie did, but I could read menus now. I could read signs and directions, product information, text messages, and e-mails. The world had opened up to me, but most of all, I felt a renewed sense of my own capabilities, the pride that came with putting my mind to something and accomplishing it, the self-respect that accompanied a new willingness to try, even when I was afraid.
And in any case, I would be proud of my son for whoever he was. The words that would ring in his head when he thought of me would be words of love and admiration, pride, and joy. He would always know that when I looked at him, I saw a miracle.
“It’s a beautiful day, isn’t it?” Jessie asked, coming up next to me and wrapping her arms around my waist, her head resting on my shoulder. I put my arm around her and pulled her closer, kissing the top of her head as we watched our son laugh and change direction, following after a romping Pierre.
“It’s perfect,” I said. We had come to the field next to the cave where Adélaïde’s letters had been found and had a picnic lunch, enjoying the gorgeous Loire Valley as spring burst forth and basking in the sweet memories of the place where we’d fallen in love. The place where our family had begun.
Maybe that wasn’t totally accurate. Perhaps our family had actually begun its story many years ago, in an abandoned boxcar on a summer evening in California. Maybe fate had waited all this time for us to see the path she’d so lovingly laid out for us. She seemed to be patient that way.
“I feel them here,” Jessie murmured, turning to the cave behind us. “I can still hear Adélaïde’s voice in my head sometimes. I imagine the things she might say, the advice she’d give.”
I looked into her dream-filled eyes, my gaze moving over her beautiful face, those large hazel eyes, those sweet, full lips that I’d never tire of kissing. Thank you, I whispered inside myself. Thank you for her. For them. The sun had brought out Jessie’s freckles, and I leaned down and kissed one, unable to resist. She laughed and I smiled. “What does she say?”
Close to where we stood, Austin lost his balance and went down on his well-padded, diapered butt. Pierre was at his side in an instant, licking his face as our eighteen-month-old son pulled himself to his feet, continuing the exploration they’d been on.
“She tells me to listen to my heart, to notice all the gifts I’m given, even the seemingly small ones, and to have patience when you leave your cereal bowl in the sink without rinsing it out.”
I laughed. “She’s a wise soul.”
Her smile became pensive. “She is. Mostly, she reminds me to be grateful for it all.” I pulled her closer, feeling just that.
The year before, to create a more complete picture of the writings that had been translated, Dr. Moreau and Jessie tracked down information on Captain Olivier Durand, who had served in the French army during the Hundred Years’ War. They searched through ancient French archives and finally found records that showed that Captain Durand had married Adélaïde Beauvais, the disowned daughter of a French aristocrat, the same year Joan of Arc was burned at the stake for heresy. Captain Durand had retired from the army, and together they’d raised five children. They’d lived out their days in a village in France, where Olivier and Adélaïde farmed the land, tending their orchards until their deaths. Olivier passed first and Adélaïde followed three weeks later.
There was no information that could be found on where they’d been buried, if the gravestones even still existed, and so we came here to pay homage. It felt right. Here
they had lived. Here they had expressed their love for the first time, and here was where they’d been brought back together.
And it was the same for us.
Jessie had given her notice at the Louvre the week before and was going to venture out on her own as a freelance translator. She’d been the lead on several big projects since she’d worked there, but she’d get more variety of work if she was a free agent. And she’d be able to work according to her own schedule and travel if she wanted. She’d already been contacted by a museum in the French Riviera that had come across buried writings from an old French prison and a family on the coast of Normandy who had found a box of letters that they believed incriminated a distant relative who had been a duchess of murdering her husband the duke.
And so we’d go on adventures together once again, Jessie and me, at least while Austin was young. She’d learn to cook, she said, and continue to fix up our French cottage, which she’d fallen madly in love with. And she’d tend the roses in our garden. Roses, to remind us of the weekend that changed everything, the weekend that fate brought us to an inn with a room that provided very close…proximity. The room where I handed over my heart and had been happily ruined for anyone else forever. The room where we’d unknowingly created our beloved little boy.
And, of course, I would continue to write Jessie love letters with my music.
The soundtrack I’d written, with the title song for Jessie, had become a success beyond any of my wildest dreams. I’d even won several Academy Awards, which had brought my career into a whole new realm. The security the money brought was nice, but the fame didn’t fill me anymore. I cherished my quiet life in Giverny, venturing to Paris only once in a while for the occasional business meeting with my new agent or to wine and dine my wife. Jessie went a little more often, to visit Frankie and have lunch with friends and old colleagues.