Page 16 of Once Upon A Time

Dammit.

Dancing With Your Uncle

Dieter Schwarz

Sometimes, you have to suck it up

and dance with your ex,

no matter how much your heart breaks.

On the third floor of the Louvre Museum, far back in an alcove hung with antique paintings, Dieter and Wulf waited.

Around the corner, Rae Stone spoke to her mother on the phone, listening to her explain that she would be staying in Paris that night and in college afterward, despite her mother’s pleas to go home to the Southwest and the cult that had brainwashed her family. That was a sad situation.

On the opposite wall, an Enlightenment-era painting showed an effete earl posing with his skinny dog, upper-class people doing upper-class things. Dieter didn’t care for the pretentiousness of it. He’d seen enough bullshit pretentiousness in his life.

Mumbles from the huge crowd below rumbled through the floor and ductwork.

It was very uncontrolled down there. Security-wise, he didn’t like it.

The bullet’s crease stung when he moved his arm.

From around the corner, Rae’s voice rose in defiance.

She definitely wasn’t leaving France that night.

Dieter cursed under his breath.

“Something wrong?” Wulf whispered to him in Alemannic.

“She’s not leaving you this week, damn it. I am losing a week’s pay on this.”

Dieter and Wulf had started gambling on everything when they had been in the Swiss Army together, and the habit had spilled over to the rest of the men in Wulf’s personal protection detail.

Wulf asked him, “Do you want to make it all back?”

“How would I do that?” Dieter grumbled. He had outstanding bets on most key areas of Wulf’s life.

“Double or nothing.” Wulf pulled a small, black box from his trouser pocket and snapped it open. Museum spotlights caught the fire in the ring’s dark blue center stone and sent sparks coursing through the white diamonds surrounding it. He tilted it, and the center stone turned red in the slanting light.

It was obviously a goddamn engagement ring.

“Sheisse!”Dieter hissed. How the hell had he missed that this was happening?

Wulf snapped the box closed. “I retrieved it fromSchloss Marienburg.The setting was my grandmother’s.”

“Tonight? Now?” Dieter was going to lose a hell of a lot more than a week’s paycheck on this one.

Wulf said, “I have been trying to figure out a way to get her alone someplace proper. I nearly dragged her to the top of the Eiffel Tower this afternoon. I didn’t think of a mobile call. Bloody brilliant.”

“Sheisse.I put down a thousand euros two years ago that Harry would beat you to the altar.”

“You should demand good odds.”

“Are you sure? Women can be nothing but heartbreak.”

Wulf smiled. “You have ten minutes.”