Everyone in the world wanted something at one point in their life. Whether it was the want to be happy or for others to be happy, the want to become someone great or simply be a part of something great, or the want to have everything the world could give or give everything to that one special someone, life was not lived without some degree of wanting or yearning - however large or small. The difference was drawn when the heart wanted more than what it truly deserved. Some believed that they deserved everything without question or quarrel, that all the riches and the wonders of the world should be brought to them on a silver platter without requiring that they give something in return. There were those souls that were gluttonous, ever starved for that which was not theirs or that which they had yet to earn. She'd watched her mother give nothing but her love and loyalty to the one man that the young dark-haired woman was absolutely certain did not deserve her. He could have been a cobbler on the streets of Paris, a man with little to nothing to his name and the woman would have still given him all that she had to give. Even Adelaide, her own flesh and blood, couldn't quite compare to the love that the older woman openly gave to the man that only saw her, only married her for the beauty she wielded. There was no question that Adelaide had been given that same grace and beauty her mother carried near flawlessly. Yet despite that fair skin and dark hair, it was her mother's that the young woman had always admired, that was of course until she grew older and saw the forest from the trees. Just as the nobleman had been so adamant on seeing that the fierce young woman would choose a husband from the men that he selected for her, Adelaide's mother had succumbed to the same fate all those years ago. Just as that wretched nobleman had tried to do with his only daughter, her mother's father had done the very same. He'd sent suitors after the woman, and he had been just ad adamant. This is where the similarities between Adelaide and her mother ended... Where the young woman had been fierce and unrelenting in that pursuit of her freedom, her mother had not been as strong-willed, and in the end she had done the very thing that Adelaide considered nothing short of death to all those dreams that she refused to let go of; she had settled. What was worse was that she had settled for the likes of him . She would never be able to forget those words of her mother's that the older woman had tried to comfort her with, holding onto them so that they would always serve as a burning reminder of what she would never allow for herself to surrender to."You can learn to love, Adelaide. Sometimes, life doesn't give you the chance to find it, to fall into it with someone. Not everyone is so lucky and settling truly is not as bad as it might seem. You might not love him now, but time changes many things".

Despite the wound that had so been inflicted upon the dark-haired woman, in light of the heartbreak and that crushing sensation of betrayal that had overwhelming her when she'd heard Julien with her father that day on her way down that long and winding staircase telling the nobleman that Adelaide was nearly there to saying yes to that proposal they'd both planned on, she wouldn't have had it any other way in the end. Though the pain had been devastation and the wrath that had burned so brightly in those sage eyes when she'd descended upon them with all the fury of the strong woman that she had always been, Adelaide can only glance back to that moment in her life and find that hidden blessing among the rubble that had been her trust she'd so foolishly, naively given to that man as deceitful as her father. Had it not been for that day, she would have likely been convinced to believe that what had existed between the young woman and the man with those pale blue eyes and well-groomed blonde locks was real instead of what it had really been; nothing but some skillfully crafted illusion of all the things she'd wanted to see those men had been able to create. She'd almost been made to think that what they'd had was love, that very first real thing in her life that didn't have a price, and had she not be walking down that staircase in search for Julien, had she never caught wind of those hushed and low baritones echoing through the manor, she might very well have said yes to that inevitable proposal of marriage. She would have been trapped for the rest of her days, those wings forever clipped as those empty promises would prove to become nothing more than just anther cage to keep her in, only there would have been no doors to pry open and fly away from. As much as she wanted to believe she would have felt something to warn her against what was to come, would have somehow seen through those wicked charms that had sunk those claws into her at first in a wild flurry of emotions, exhilaration, and infatuation, that was not how things had been intended to fall into place. Things happened in life, unfolded the way that they did for one reason or anther. Or so this was what the French woman wanted to believe. She wanted to think think that the pain and the heartache, the wounds that had cut into her heart and soul only to leave scars both faded and still fresh all needed to happen as they did so that they could bring her to where she was now, an ocean away from everything that made her feel like she could never be how she wanted to be; free, and ultimately happy. She would live the life that she wanted, more determined than ever to show her mother that those words she'd told her could not have been more wrong, more small-minded... more hopeless. Adelaide would live the life that her mother had given up too easily on, and if she fell in love along the way, then it would only prove that no one should ever have to settle for less than what it was that they wanted most, no matter the obstacles that lay ahead.

Adelaide would never have wanted for Taylor to endure the pain that had flickered only fleetingly in those hunter green eyes, surely only a small fragment of the true magnitude of that wound that had scarred him much like how Julien had done to the dark-haired woman. Had it not been for the past that lurked in the darkest shadows of his mind, she was sure that they would never have found one another, would not be standing there together beneath that starry sky with those city lights sprawled out below their hillside sanctuary. If things would have been different, if she too would have lived in Salt Springs and been that "girl next door", she couldn't help the certainty that found her in this thought that things would have been so much different - not just for him, but for her as well. She would have been there to see him grow and struggle as she surely did, and just maybe she could have saved him from what his future held. It was a silly notion really, thinking that they would have ever existed in the other's past life somehow, but even though it was nothing more than a wistful thought of something parallel world that wasn't really, but it was where her mine carries her for that brief moment when gazed into those depths of his. That woman hadn't deserved him in any sense of the word. If she had, she would not have done such a treacherous thing that had broken Taylor more than his words could tell her. How Adelaide would have given anything in that moment to have been in that petty woman's place, been the one that had found him then. She would have treated him how he deserved, and though she couldn't quite explain it, she knew that he would have returned those gestures. He was a genuine soul, and how anyone could have taken something so rare and wounded it so deeply was enough to bring forth that anger all to familiar to that which she had once only held for her father. Now, she found that it burned for Taylor's own father and for the woman who had hurt him. She wanted to help him to see that there was so much that he could have if he only dared to reach out and take it, that he deserved so much more than he allowed for himself to have and that he all he needed to do to get to wherever it was that he wantes in life was believe in himself more than he did now. She wanted to take that pain and soothe it, make it seem like nothing more than a bad dream only to wake up and find his life so full of promise... with her pressed into him beneath those sheets of the bed they might just share as the first light of a new day rose over Sacrosanct for them to seize together.

Kiss after kiss, she couldn't help but feel that flame in her heart by grow a little each time as it drew her into deepening the next pressing of those dusty rose-colored lips into his. Her heart raced wildly in her chest, each breath daring to quicken a little more before finally she tells herself that she needed to pull away lest those feelings that only seemed to warm her even more as she found herself wanting make her crave more than just those passionate kisses, those wordless exchanges of what both hearts had silently harbored until now push her to an edge she wasn't quite ready to free fall from. It almost brought on a physical ache as she pulls away from him, but she knew that she had to. For Taylor and for herself. She searches his face for silent reassurance that what she'd felt so certain he returned was very much true only to find it and offer an affectionate and tender smile to him before she moves to rest her head on his chest, still not quite ready to move away from the warmth of his body against her more petite and slender frame. She silently listens to that strong heartbeat, her own answering it as it thundered within her as she leans into him, a soft sigh of pure contentment and pleasure as he runs those strong fingers through her hair as she buries her face into his black leather jacket, breathing in the smell of his cologne until she knows she would never be able to forget it. As she speaks quietly to him then, he kisses through top of her head and she only lightly nuzzles into him further. His words are nothing more than a soft whisper and she smiles into his jacket as she feels his arms wrapped around her. She hadn't been held like that before... not even with Julien. There was something about his strong arms surrounding her as he sighed that almost makes her fall apart in his embrace. If her heart stopped beating right then and there, she would leave this world knowing that she'd found the man she hadn't even been looking for. She never knew before what it felt like to feel safe like this. Yes, she knew that in her home with Townsend, Rose, and Reginald she was very much safe... but this was something deeper than that, something that made her want to need protecting when she'd only ever told herself that she would never let someone make her feel like that. Lingering there for a moment, she finally tilts her gaze back up to meet those warm and gentle hunter green depths and she can see a light in them as lilted words reach out to him softly, answered by his own and she can't help the knowing gleam that finds those sage eyes then."I'm certain that you will", she soft tenderly up at him, dark lashes fluttering closed as his lips press gently against her forehead then.

When those glittering sage eyes open once more, they flicker up to the night sky and follow his own gaze, finding herself wondering what it was that he was thinking... As if it couldn't have been more perfect timing, a falling star streaks across the blue-black sky and she can't help feeling like tonight couldn't be more perfect. She was hardly ready for it to end, not even caring to think about what time it was. She could stay there in his arms until the sun rose in the east, but she couldn't do that to him. After all, she was already stealing away hours that he could be spending asleep in his bed as his body and mind prepared for another day's hard work. His tenor tones make her aware then as he asks if she had a certain curfew, using that all too formal calling she'd heard for so many years, his gaze glancing down to his watch as he tells her that it was already the first hours of tomorrow. She glances up to him then, sage eyes glittering mischievously then."I'm hardly a child, Taylor. Though I suppose I shouldn't be so selfish as to keep you away from your bed... though it's almost a pity that I can't join you", she purrs to him then, releasing her hold of him only to allow those slender hands to trace along the rim of his jeans slowly, suggestively as that tender moment of passion shifts into something entirely different as she gives him an impish smile as those fingers toy only briefly with that botton hiding those more intimate parts of him. She lingers there for only a moment, brushing her body against his as she rises onto the balls of her feet so that she can press her lips fleetingly against his own before she moves ever so slightly away from him with reluctance, stepping around him as a hand trails slowly along his hips, dark lashes fluttering teasingly in false innocence as glittering sage eyes remain locked with his hunter greens that trail after her as she walks away from him altogether and back the way they'd come. She gives him a daring look as she glances over her shoulder to him, entirely expectant that he would follow her before gliding gracefully behind a tree only to peek out from behind it on the other side, dark locks swirling around her before falling down her shoulders as that sultry smile teases her lips, curious on how he might react to the sudden rise of that coy and playful side to the French woman."Just five more minutes?", she ushers teasingly in those accented words to the man as she dances just a little farther from him and out of reach, lilted laughter tumbling into the night air as she does, should he catch on to just what it was she was up to. Just because they were adults didn't really mean that they were too old for a little game of tag by twilight, no?