SCARLETT PARKER
These last few days in Paris with Harry have felt like a dream that I don't ever want to wake up from. Our hotel room is so beautiful that I've hardly wanted to leave it since we arrived, and I haven't been thinking about any of the things that I've recently been stressing out about. My appetite has been through the roof, I'm sleeping through the night, and I just can't remember the last time I was this happy. I'd love to say Paris has something to do with it, and maybe it does, but I think a lot more of it is all thanks to the man answering the door for our room service breakfast. Or, brunch, I guess.
I feel like the luckiest girl in the world as he rolls the cart into our room with just his joggers on, and his hair is still a disaster from how he slept...and from how I was pulling it. Last night, he took me to dinner at the nicest restaurant either of us had ever been to, and gifted me the most beautiful Bulgari gold snake bracelet that I've had my eye on for months now. I only mentioned it once to him and he remembered that because of course he did. Despite how much I missed Seth, it was one of the best birthdays I've ever had.
"Do you want syrup?" Harry sarcastically asks while holding a small saucer, waiting for my answer.
"You're hilarious," my voice is still tired and hoarse as I sit up and watch him pour the syrup over my pancakes until they're soaked through the way that I like them.
He brings our plates over to the bed on a silver tray before he goes back to make our coffees, and I only hop out of bed to swing open the doors that lead to the terrace so we can get some fresh air. I take my spot back on the duvet, wearing Harry's white T-shirt, and cut into a piece of sausage to swipe through the syrup around my pancakes while he hands me my coffee.
"So?" He sits beside me against the headboard. "How was your birthday?"
"Amazing," I speak with my mouth full and look at the bracelet coiled around my left wrist. "I love my bracelet, I loved dressing up for the posh restaurant, and last night was so good."
"I'm glad," he smiles to himself, and that's when I notice the two hickeys I left on the side of his throat...the few on his chest...and his lower abs. At least his tattoos make them less noticeable, and at least I'm the only one who's going to be seeing him with his shirt off. Well, me and the person who brought us our breakfast.
"So what are we doing today?"
He finishes chewing first, then takes a sip from his coffee. "I have a surprise for you tonight."
I smile with my hand covering my full mouth. "For my birthday?"
"No, just because," he casually shrugs one shoulder. "It's not until tonight, though, so the day is still ours."
I'm thrilled, but I still shake my head at him and take a sip from the coffee he made just the way I like it. "You're spoiling me."
"And I know there's no way you're complaining," he counters.
I roll my lips together to shut up before I go on eating my breakfast with a happy little smile. Of course I love being spoiled, especially by him, but I will say that I feel a little guilty for how much money he's spending on me. I already looked up how much this hotel costs for a night, so I don't know what the hell he was thinking when he booked it for five consecutive nights.
"Well, I was thinking we could go to that vintage store we went to last time we were here?" I suggest. "The one where I got you that Pink Floyd tee, remember?"
"Yeah, that sounds great," he sighs as he takes his last bite and sets his plate back on the rolling cart, joining me back in bed.
I finish a little more than half of my plate before I give in to lay down with him instead of getting ready for the day like I know I should. It's just a little too tempting to stay with the way he has his eyes closed again, resting on his chest with his back completely exposed down to the dimples at the bottom of his spine.
"Are you having a nice time here?" I share his pillow and play with his hair.
"I'm having such a nice time," he replies just as softly, smiling when I kiss the tip of his nose. "Almost don't want to go back."
"I thought you said you don't want to live in Paris?"
"I wanna live wherever you are," he corrects me. "And I wanna live in this bed forever."
I laugh and wiggle my body against the mattress just to feel how cozy it is. It's making me think about how we might need to amp up our bed at home because I'm not sure I'll be able to sleep on another mattress than this one ever again.
"I don't wanna go home," I admit, and that earns his attention enough for him to force his eyes open again.
"Why not?"
I shrug and tilt my head down to focus on his shoulder. "I don't have a job and I don't know what I'm going to do all day every day."
"Well, what are you interested in?"
"I have no idea," I answer confidently after having thought about that already. "I'm not good at anything but taking my clothes off."
"Scarlett," he frowns and lifts his head from the pillow altogether. "That's not true at all."
"No?" I scoff a laugh. "What am I good at then? What can you see me doing that I don't need a degree for?"
"You could have a job like mine in a heartbeat," he responds seamlessly without any hesitation. "I could absolutely see you having your own business or managing one because of how confident and smart you are. People like you and you know what people like."
I don't know why, but I'm so surprised that that's what he thought of. It suddenly dawns on me that he actually thinks about me as a person and knows how I am and what I'm like. He doesn't just see me as a sexual object, and that's obviously something I knew already, but it's weird to know that he has his own thoughts about me outside of physical attraction.
"But don't you need a degree to have your own business like that?"
He gives me a look. "We both know Niall charmed his way into passing his classes by the end of university, and there's nothing I can't teach you about having your own business that I haven't learned from mine. I hardly remember what I learned in school."
"Okay, well where am I supposed to get the money to start my own business and what is the business supposed to be?"
"You can get a loan like Seth, Niall and I did, and you have savings right?"
"Well, yeah, but I'm just supposed to put my life's savings on the line for a business that might fail?"
He starts to smirk. "First lesson in business-don't think about failure unless it happens."
I tsk and rub my eyes before blinking at the vaulted ceiling. "I honestly just really can't see myself being successful in something like that."
"You need to have more faith in yourself, angel," he stamps a kiss on my forehead before getting out of bed to roll the breakfast cart back out into the hallway for someone to come and collect.
"Maybe you should just start paying me for sex," I casually suggest. "I'd love that job."
"Ha!" He comes back around the corner to reveal himself, making me laugh when I see the unimpressed look on his face. "Come shower with me."
"How much will you pay me for it?"
He shakes his head and starts coming right toward me, which has me screeching as he kneels on the bed to grab my ankles and start pulling to the foot of the mattress. When I start laughing uncontrollably as I try to get away from him, that's when he lets out his own boyish laugh and helps me land gently on the carpeted floor.
