“We’re all going? The whole troupe?”
“The troupe’s going to Spain, where they should be safe enough. No one will come looking for a bunch of backup singers. Who the Nazis and anyone else with an ax to grind will be looking for is you. You’re the one who has to get far enough away where they can’t reach you.”
“You’re coming with me, right?”
“I’ll see you onto the plane for the States. Then I’m coming back to France.”
She sat straight up in his lap. “What? No!”
His mouth quirked. “You’re a civilian. You go. I’m a soldier. I stay. That’s the way it works.”
“You expect me to just run away?”
“I expect you to do as you’re told.”
“You can’t force me to go.”
“You’ve done your job. It’s over. You keep on with it, you’ll get caught and die. I’m not going to let that happen. I want you out of harm’s way. Now, while you can still get out.”
“I’m not leaving you.”
She realized what she’d said, what she’d revealed, that she’d just ripped the lid off their professional association and made it personal even as his eyes darkened on her face.
“We’ve had a good run. The trick is to know when it’s over.”
“Do you think you’re the only one who wants to win this war? I do, too. I need to stay. I can help.”
“I’m done letting you risk your neck.”
“It’s my neck. If I want to risk it, what do you care?”
He didn’t reply for a moment. His eyes looked black in the uncertain light as they met hers.
“I care,” he said. His voice was low, gravelly.
Her heart started to thump. “Do you?”
His mouth twisted. He replied with a single curt nod. Then he slid a hand around the back of her neck, pulled her close and kissed her.
Chapter Thirty-Six
The kiss was soft and slow, hot and demanding, earthshaking, heartbreaking. Somewhere in the middle of it, Genevieve figured out that she was in love, and had been, probably, for a long time. She also figured out, from the fact that Max had let his guard down enough to be kissing her at all, that he’d made up his mind that they would be saying goodbye soon, whether she liked it or not.
She didn’t like it. But much as she hated to face it, she knew he was right. Touvier had almost killed her tonight. The Nazis had searched the theater. Two bullets dodged. But sooner or later, her luck would run out.
Her mother—panic twisted through her at the thought of abandoning her. I can’t. Anything could have happened, or be happening, to her. If Max had found Lillian, done something about Lillian, she was as sure as it was possible to be that she’d know, so she didn’t think he had. Anyway, there’d been no time. But there was Emmy. Had the raid that had caught up Touvier’s cell and killed Pierre also ensnared Emmy? The possibility made her stomach knot with fear, and the worst thing about it was there was no way to know. If that—the worst—hadn’t happened, Emmy was still out there doing her utmost to save Lillian, and maybe by now she’d succeeded. The fact that she’d heard nothing might as easily mean something good as something bad. Emmy knew that tomorrow night was her last night in Paris. She would be in touch. If Genevieve hadn’t heard from her by the time she took her final bow tomorrow night, then she could panic.
But for now there was this amazing development that was her and Max.
“I care, too,” she said, quite loudly, just so there was no mistake, when at last she came up for air.
His eyes were heavy lidded with passion as he looked down at her. “You sound very certain.”
“I am.”
Their faces were inches apart. Her arms hugged his neck. The blanket and his jacket had fallen away, and his arms were around her. One hand, big and warm, caressed her bare shoulder. The other had stopped moving a moment before, centimeters into the act of pulling down the zipper that did her bodysuit up the back, as if he’d had second thoughts about the wisdom of what he was doing. It was now splayed flat against her rib cage. She could feel the size and shape of it through the skintight satin.
Just the feel of those big hands touching her was enough to make her shiver.
He said flatly, “You’re leaving.”
“I don’t want to go.”
“If something happened to you, if I let you stay and you were killed, I’d put a bullet through my own brain. You being caught would end up getting us both killed.”
Disregarding the horror of it, that was far and away the most romantic thing she’d ever heard. He must have been able to see the softening in her eyes because he said, “Like the idea of that, do you?”
She batted her eyes at him. “It’s just like Romeo and Juliet.”
He looked revolted. “I take it back. If you get killed, I’ll get smashing drunk and go on with my life.”
“That’s not better.”
He relented. “It’s not true.”
“I would want you to, though.”
“We’re going to circumvent the whole problem by getting you out of here before it happens. No more arguments.”
“No more arguments,” she agreed.
At the slight smile he gave her, her heart throbbed like a sore tooth. The numb was definitely gone, and emotions, she was rediscovering, were a mixed bag. She loved him so much it hurt, and the thought of losing him hurt even more.
She’d just found him. Or, at least, just found that she loved him. She wasn’t ready to leave him.
“Max.” She tightened her hold on him.
“Hmm?”
“What if they catch you? What if you get—”
“They won’t,” he said. “I won’t.” Then he kissed her again and she kissed him back and somewhere in the process they lost the thread of the discussion.
By the time he called a halt by putting firm hands on either side of her waist and lifting her off his lap, her mouth was swollen from his kisses and the top of her bodysuit was down around her waist.
“Max,” she protested as he set her down on the sofa and stood up, breathing hard, running a hand through his black hair. His shirt was partly unbuttoned, and his bow tie hung loose on either side of his collar. She was flushed and trembling, melting inside like butter in the sun, and she would have stood up, too, and molded herself against him, except she didn’t think she could stand up. His eyes dropped from her face to her breasts, small pale globes now plumped and dazzlingly sensitized by his hands and mouth. She could almost feel the heat coming off him as he looked at her, and her lips parted and her breathing quickened in response.
“Come back,” she said, and patted the sofa beside her invitingly.
His eyes blazed at her. Then his fists clenched at his sides, his jaw hardened and he glanced away.
“I want you to take a moment and think.” His voice was hoarse, and he was talking to the window or the wall or whatever was over there instead of her. A little shy now that he’d whisked himself away, she struggled to pull her top back into place. “We’ve been thrown together under the most adverse conditions imaginable, surrounded by danger, our lives on the line every day. You may think you care about me, but when this is over, when the world is sane again, you may feel differently. The smart thing to do would be wait, make a date to get together after the war, see how we feel then.”
“I don’t want to wait until after the war. One or the other of us might not make it until after the war.”
He was looking at her again, watching with a grim expression as she made necessary adjustments to her top so that she was at least minimally decent, but he didn’t say anything. His silence told her what she already knew: her words were true.
He said, “I don’t feel right about...carrying on with this, and then sending you away and not seeing you again for months or years or maybe forever. Yo
u should wait for someone you can...be with long-term. Build a life with.”
Her clothes were more or less back in place, and her legs were more or less recovered. She stood up, took the two steps necessary to reach him, slid her hands up his shirt front to rest on his shoulders and swayed toward him.
“I want to be with you.”
He caught her by the waist before she could plaster herself against him. In the dark glass of the nearest window, a blurry reflection of them both caught her eye: her in nothing but her shiny black bodysuit, still only partly zipped up, with suspenders striping pale thighs above shapely legs in net stockings and pumps, her black hair cascading in waves around narrow shoulders; him far taller and broader of shoulder, his black hair disordered, his jaw dark with stubble, his white shirt and black trousers the perfect foil for his lean, powerful build. Her heart skipped a beat: louche, decadent, slightly scandalous, the people in the reflection looked like they belonged together, a matched set.
His tone was skeptical. “For less than a week.”
“It’s better than nothing.”
“It might not be.”
“I care—” a pale and puny word, but she was being cautious with her feelings and his, and wasn’t ready yet to go beyond what he had admitted to “—about you. Is this you saying you got it wrong before and you don’t care about me?”
He hesitated, and his face tightened. His reply, when it came, was almost reluctant. “I’m not saying that.”
“Well, then.”
“Well, then, what?”
“I’m not a virgin, if that’s what’s worrying you.”
His eyes flickered. “I didn’t expect you to be. And for the record, I’m not, either.”
She had to smile a little at that. “I didn’t expect you to be.”
“Genevieve—”
She said, “I’m going to think of however long we have left together as a gift. If we don’t make the most of it, I know that I, at least, am going to regret it for the rest of my life.”
His hands tightened on her waist. For a moment he seemed to study her face.
She smiled at him.
“To no regrets, then.” His voice was very quiet. Then he bent his head and kissed her.
After that, what happened, happened.
Her previous experience consisted of the single fumbling act of love that had given her the blessing that was Vivi. Which, except for the type, if not the depth, of the emotion involved, bore absolutely no resemblance to what she shared now with Max. Their coming together was torrid and primitive and hungry and electric, and, in a word, a revelation.
When exhaustion finally sent her off to sleep in the small hours of the morning, they were in his bed, she was naked in his arms, and he had just reached down and retrieved a blanket that had fallen to the floor and pulled it over them both. When she woke up, the first pale fingers of dawn were starting to creep in through the windows. After a surprised moment in which she blinked through the lightening gloom at the open curtains, the plain white walls and the unfamiliar bed because they made no sense, she realized that the tensile warmth beneath her head was, in fact, a man’s muscled chest. Max’s muscled chest.
He was naked, she was naked, and they were wrapped around each other and all tangled up in a single blanket.
Remembering what they’d done, she went rosy all over. Then, to her consternation, she glanced up to find that he was awake and looking at her.
What did one say to a man after a night like that?
“Good morning,” she tried, not flustered at all. She raised herself up on an elbow and, in the process, without really meaning to, took in every detail of his wide shoulders, muscular arms, tapered chest. A wedge of black hair thinned as it trailed down past his navel to disappear beneath the modesty-saving blanket. Flat on his back, he tucked an arm beneath his head, the better to watch her as she clamped a careful hand against the top of the blanket to hold it in place and started to rather self-consciously disentangle her legs from his prior to getting up.
“Good morning.” His tone was grave. His mouth was unsmiling. His eyes—she met them, almost unwillingly, and, beneath the lurking twinkle he couldn’t quite hide, what she saw in them for her made her lips part and her heart start to thump. “Sleep well?”
“Yes, I—yes. You?”
“Like a rock.”
It was an inane conversation she knew. But she was wrestling with the problem of how on earth she was going to get out of bed, because she couldn’t just stand up naked, and if she took the blanket, then he’d be naked and—she was quite sure, from his responses, from his expression, that he was aware of her predicament and enjoying it.
Of course he was. That was Max. She narrowed her eyes at him.
He smiled at her. Then he said, “Genevieve, who’s Vivi?”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
The question hit her like a blow to her heart. Her eyes flew to his face. Her expression must have reflected her shock because he said, “You called for her in your sleep.”
The room tilted sideways. Oh, no, she thought. Oh no, oh no, oh no.
“Genevieve?” Max frowned at her. Her eyes fastened on him, her anchor, as all around her the world started to spin. “What is it?”
She couldn’t talk. She physically could not make her lips move. It was all she could do to breathe.
As if his speaking her name had conjured them, the images crowded into her head. She could see Vivi, hear her voice, feel the warmth of her little body in her arms. She felt the blood leach from her face.
“Are you ill?”
At the alarm in Max’s voice, she managed to shake her head. Her heart felt like it was caught in a vise that was slowly tightening. The pain was excruciating. She was propped up on her elbow, staring at Max without really seeing him. Her vision was focused inward, on snippets of Vivi’s life playing out on the screen of her mind’s eye, and she was helpless to do anything about it. She was dizzy, aching with loss, terrified that the movie in her head wouldn’t stop until it reached its shattering end.
Max sat up even as she sank bonelessly back against the pillows. Her hand, strictly of its own volition, still clutched the blanket, holding it in place on her chest. She closed her eyes. It was a mistake. The images came faster. The dizziness got worse instead of better. Grimly she concentrated on battling it back.
Max said, “Is this about what happened last night? Touvier? Lafont?”
Of course. Pierre’s death must have brought on the dream. She should have foreseen...
A long shudder racked her.
“Genevieve, talk to me.” He was leaning over her. She knew he was there. She could sense him, feel that tingle akin to an electric charge that, lately, had alerted her to his proximity. She took a deep breath and opened her eyes to find him frowning down at her. Broad shoulders, solid as a rock, blocked out her view of the room still spinning around him. Sturdy and unmoving, the hard-muscled arm propped beside her head served as a bulwark against the encroaching shock waves. She focused on his face, concentrating fiercely on each familiar feature, on the here and now as opposed to the past. His hair was disheveled, his jaw was dark with stubble, and the lines around his eyes and mouth were deep with worry. He looked slightly dangerous, totally disreputable and wholly dependable.
She made a tremendous effort. “I can’t—” She broke off, shook her head.
“Can’t what? Talk to me?” He stroked her cheek. “Whatever it is, you know you can. You can tell me anything.”
Not this, she wanted to say, because even thinking about it hurt too much. To resurrect the memories, to have the images rise up in her head, was to relive them all over again. To put what had happened into words...
She sucked in air, the sound more sob than breath.
“You’re scaring me,” he said. His hand felt warm and strong against her cheek.
His thumb feathered the corner of her mouth.
She looked up into his lean, dark face and drew strength. Her chest ached, her throat was tight and the vertigo afflicting her was making her feel sick. But the past was over, was behind her, was composed of ghosts and memories and dreams, and he was real and alive and there. His eyes held hers, encouraged her, willed her, compelled her. She’d given him her loyalty. She’d trusted him with her life.
“Who’s Vivi, angel?” His voice was almost unbearably tender.
She loved him.
Genevieve reached down deep and dragged the words up from what felt like the depths of her soul.
“She was my daughter,” she said, and closed her eyes.
He said something that sounded profane, but she didn’t hear it, not really, because she was battling the fresh upsurge of pain, fighting the sting of tears, resisting them with everything she had.
“God Almighty.” He gathered her up, holding her tightly against him as he rolled onto his back. Draped skin to skin across the width of his chest, she wrapped an arm around his neck and buried her face in the warm curve of his shoulder and reminded herself, fiercely, to breathe. “Tell me what happened, Genevieve.”
Her eyes were hot with tears. Her throat burned with them. But last night she had cried an ocean’s worth to no avail. The dream had come back. The pain once again twisted through her like a knife. The wound still festered. The images lived inside her.
She wanted Max to know. She needed Max to know. This was such a vital part of her, her center, her core. Without knowing the part of her that belonged to her daughter still, he could never really know her. And without knowing her, how could he love her?
Breathe.
“She...” She paused, gritted it out. “Vivi died.”
Her tongue and lips formed the once familiar sounds as if they’d last done so just moments before. The syllables, emerging in her voice for the first time in seven years, were as poignant and as powerful as a nearly forgotten prayer. As her precious little girl’s name hung in the air, waves of emotion crashed into her, threatening to tear her from her moorings and tumble her beneath the surface of grief’s stormy sea. But she held on to Max, held on to the present and, this time, managed to stay above the waves.
The Black Swan of Paris Page 34
