by Alix Nichols
“She has the male vote in her pocket,” Elorie says.
Diane turns to her. “She doesn’t have any pockets.”
“Fine. Tucked into her bodice.” Elorie pokes her tongue out. “Smartass.”
And so it continues. Song after cheesy song gets points following a logic I fail to grasp. One thing is clear—it has nothing to do with their artistic quality.
At some point, I realize I’m staring at the screen without seeing anything. Nor am listening to Marie-Anne Blenn’s and the girls’ acerbic comments. My mind is completely overtaken by something a lot closer to home—Diane. More specifically her back against my chest, my left hand on her tummy, and my right hand, which has somehow made its way to her thigh.
I’m sporting wood. And I’m perfectly aware there’s no way this development could’ve escaped Diane’s notice. Right now, I’d give half of what I’m worth for everyone around us to be temporarily relocated to a parallel universe so I can do what I’m dying to do. Cup her breasts. Fondle them. Pinch her nipples gently between my index and thumb. Slip my hand into her panties and stroke her until she pants. And then stroke her more until she writhes and moans. All the way to her orgasm.
God, this isn’t helping.
I must stop thinking these thoughts at once. What I should do is glance at my phone, look concerned, and say I have to go.
Diane shifts in my lap as she leans forward, peering at the screen.
Jesus. Christ.
My lids drop, and I forget what I intended to do. My breathing becomes shallow. All I can think of is my hand in her panties.
Would she be wet for me?
“My money’s on yes,” Jeanne says.
I open my eyes. What the fuck?
Jeanne passes a napkin with a two-column table drawn on it to Manon. Manon scribbles something in the first column and hands the napkin to Elorie.
“What’s that?” I ask Diane.
She looks over her shoulder. “We’re betting on the Greek contestant.”
She points to the screen where a guy in a shiny white suit is wailing yet another heartrending ballad while playing a grand piano.
“And?”
“In roughly fifty percent of performances that feature a piano—especially when the contestant is playing it himself—the instrument is set on fire at the end of the song.” She smiles. “So the bet is if the Greeks will burn their piano.”
“I see.”
I feel a little stupid for having panicked a few seconds ago.
“What’s your bet—yes or no?” Diane asks, holding the napkin.
“No,” I say.
She puts my name in the second column and hers in the first.
A minute later, the piano burns.
I hand Jeanne a fifty euro bill and a two euro coin. “I have to go now.”
She starts to rummage through the pocket of her apron.
“Keep the change,” I say. “Please.”
“OK. Thanks!”
Diane stands up.
“Please stay,” I say to her. “I don’t want to be a spoilsport.”
She shakes her head. “You aren’t.”
We stare into each other’s eyes, and I’m sure she’s asking herself the same question I am—are we going to have sex tonight?
We say good-bye to Diane’s friends and get into my car.
“You know,” she says, “I still don’t understand why you hired me knowing I had a chip on my shoulder.”
I hesitate. “I have a confession to make.”
“Go on.”
“Part of the reason I picked you was guilt. I’m not proud of what I did to Charles, and I guess I wanted to buy myself a good conscience by supporting him through you.”
“I don’t get it. Isn’t driving competitors out of business what you do all the time, what all successful businessmen do as you keep telling me. Why the sudden guilt?”
“I may have gone further with Charles than I usually do.”
“Explain.”
“I had my R and D team clone his bestsellers.” I pause, hesitating again.
The corners of her mouth drop. “And then?”
“My sales team pushed them at half of his price.” I glance at her. “He didn’t have a chance.”
For the next fifteen minutes, Diane fidgets with the three-carat rock on her ring finger as if itching to take it off. She won’t talk to me.
It doesn’t look like we’ll be having sex tonight, after all.
And that’s a good thing, right?
Part IV
Town House
SEVENTEEN
I’m staring at the prints of my rooftop photos spread out on the floor of my TV room. Only half of them—that is, twelve out of twenty-four—will be on display at La Bohème starting next Monday.
The question is which twelve. And I’ll be damned if I have a clue.
Earlier this afternoon, Chloe stopped by to help me choose. She left an hour later, utterly frustrated with my inability to make up my mind.
“They aren’t your babies,” she said with her hand on the doorknob. “They’re just photos.”
I made a face. “I know.”
“And they’re all great, anyway.”
Does she realize how totally counterproductive her last comment was?
I go over the prints again, remembering the exact location, circumstances, and weather conditions of each shoot. Some of them are colorful and happy, like the ones I took in Buttes Chaumont. Others are black and white and melancholy, just like Paris feels sometimes when it’s drowning in smog and drizzle. I can handle that sort of weather all right for twenty-four hours. After forty-eight hours, my mind begins to crave a respite. After seventy-two hours, my body starts to zombify. After a week of fog, the only solution to avoid a total collapse is an immediate southbound evacuation of my person.
This photo was taken atop Notre Dame—the only spot in Paris with a view of the seven bridges across the Seine—in the middle of an epic downpour. And this one I shot by night in late December, from the top of the Arc de Triomphe. I wasn’t allowed to take my tripod up there, so I had to get creative. But, man, it was worth it! I took my best night shot of the Champs-Elysées with its horse chestnut trees wrapped in sparkling garlands, snowflakes dancing in the air, and an unobstructed view of the boulevard all the way to Le Louvre.
Chloe has a point—in some ways, my photos are my babies.
Ask a mother of two to pick the child she likes better, and you’ll know what I’m going through. Besides, now that I’ve resigned from the supermarket, as per my contract with Darcy, I have a lot more time for photography. This is great, but it has a flip side. I spend even longer on editorial decisions than before.
My doorbell rings.
I startle and glance at the clock on the wall. It’s seven in the evening—too early for Darcy. Elorie is still at work. Chloe must be on her way to Montrouge to see the house she and Hugo will be refurbishing next. And, anyway, none of these people ever show up on my doorstep without calling first.
Turns out one of them does after all—Darcy.
“You don’t have to let me in if you don’t feel like it,” he says from behind the door. “I realize I should’ve called or buzzed from downstairs.” He doesn’t sound quite like himself.
“It’s OK,” I say, deciding that my tee and leggings are presentable enough, and open the door.
He steps in, holding a gorgeous bouquet in one hand and a bottle of vodka in the other.
I put my hands on my hips.
“I bought these from the florist two blocks down the street,” he says, handing me the flowers.
“What’s the occasion?”
He shrugs. “Can a man give his fiancée flowers without needing an occasion?”
He’s definitely acting weird.
I cock my head. “Is the man in question drunk?”
“Just a little.”
Darcy smiles his crooked smile, provoking a mild quake in my knees.
I hate it when he does that.
“Have a seat.” I motion him to the couch in the TV room. “Oh, and if you step on any of the prints on the floor, I’ll strangle you with your own overpriced tie.”
“Understood.” He makes his way to the couch, slaloming between the prints.
I set the flowers in the vase that Chloe left behind when she moved out and fetch a bottle of Orangina and two glasses from the kitchen.
He points at the vodka. “We should drink this first. The Poles swore it’s the best vodka in the world.”
“Which Poles?”
“From Mleko, the biggest milk product company in eastern Europe. They’re market leaders for yogurt and ice cream in over a dozen countries. My deputy and I, and most of my legal team, have been working on this since February. As of today, Parfums d’Arcy is Mleko’s main flavor supplier. We signed a deal this afternoon.”
I arch an eyebrow “While eating yogurts and washing them down with Polish vodka?”
“Exactly,” he says. “And with French champagne. And without the yogurts.”
I shake my head in disapproval. “So, you down a few shots and decide that now is a good time to go check on Diane.”
He spreads his arms. “The alternative was spending the rest of the evening carousing with my new partners. I told them it was my fiancée’s birthday today.”
“And left the poor Poles to carouse in a foreign city all by themselves?” I tut-tut.
“My deputy’s with them, bless his heart.” He opens the vodka and pours a little in each glass. “It’s called Zubrowka, and it’s flavored with bison grass.”
I sigh.
“Come on, chérie,” he says. “Don’t be a spoilsport. I want you to tell me if Zubrowka is the best vodka you’ve ever had.”
“I’ve only tasted one other vodka before. A Swedish one, I think.”
“Must’ve been Absolut. It’s owned by Pernod Ricard now.” He hands me a glass. “You’ll tell me how it compares to Absolut.”
I take a sip, keep the liquid in my mouth for a moment, and swallow.
“Can you feel the woodruff and almond notes on the nose?” Darcy leans in. “And the vanilla near the end?”
“Err… I’m not sure.”
He drinks the content of his glass. “Definitely vanilla at the end.”
I empty mine. “It does have a sweet aftertaste… I guess.”
“Have you eaten yet?”
“Uh-huh. You?”
He nods. “The Poles came with pickles and sausage to go with the vodka.”
He refills our glasses. “Try to drink this like a Pole, to the bottom.”
I nod and we both empty our glasses in one gulp.
“Are these the photos that’ll be displayed at La Bohème?” Darcy asks, pointing to the floor.
“I have to discard half of them.” I give him a mournful look. “It’s killing me.”
He squats in the middle of my prints and spends a few moments studying them.
“You really can’t choose?”
“Nope.”
He picks up the photo I took from the terrace of l’Institut du Monde Arabe and sets it on his left. “Yes.”
Next, he takes a pic from the series I shot in the 11th. “No.”
He continues, taking one pic after the other and sorting them into his yes and no piles. I watch him until he grabs my Latin Quarter roofscape and places it with the rejects.
Crouching next to him, I lift the photo and transfer it to the “yes” pile.
He smiles. “Ah, so you do have some favorites?”
“I don’t. It’s just… I almost broke my neck taking this one. If you leave it out, it’s as if my almost sacrifice was for nothing.”
“I don’t like the sound of this.” Darcy frowns. “Where exactly did you go to take these pictures?”
“All kinds of places.” I hesitate before admitting. “Rooftops, mostly.”
His frown deepens. “Do you actually walk on roofs?”
“I don’t when it can be helped. But, you see, my camera… it’s a solid Nikon, perfect for portraits, but it doesn’t have a full-frame sensor, so it’s not ideal for landscape photography.”
“Why don’t you buy another one?”
I raise my eyes skyward and sigh. Rich people. “Anyway, the way around it is to take multiple shots and combine them in Photoshop. It just requires that I move around the roof a bit.”
He stares at me for a moment and nods. “OK, your Latin Quarter’s in.”
“Merci, monsieur.” I put my hand to my heart. “You’re very kind.”
Thirty seconds later, he’s done.
I look at the two piles and then at him. “May I know what criteria you used in your super-efficient selection process?”
“None.” He screws up his face in a way that’s so sexy I nearly drool. “When pros and cons are in a tie, the only way forward is to shuffle them together, push them aside, and let your gut guide your hand.”
“Is that what you just did?”
He nods. “But I can see why you were having such a hard time. They’re all amazing.”
“They better be.” I smirk. ‘Considering that the photo lab’s bill has put me in the red.”
“Oh. I’m sorry to hear that.”
I shrug. “The irony of it is that I could make better prints if I had the right equipment. And they’d be cheaper to produce.”
“Really?”
“Oh, yeah.”
“Wouldn’t it be smarter to invest in the equipment instead of paying a lab to print your photos?”
“Sure,” I say. “It would be much smarter.”
“Then why—” He stops himself. “The cost. Listen, why don’t I advance some of your fee so you can buy yourself a nice printer and a camera that’s good for landscapes?”
I shake my head. “Your money goes to Dad. He’ll need all of it to start over.”
“In that case, I’d like to lend you some—”
“Thanks,” I cut him off, “but no, thanks. I’ve managed fine so far with what I have, and I intend to go on until I save enough to afford what I want. There’s no emergency.”
He sucks his teeth, probably trying to come up with a counterargument.
“Hey, here’s something you could do for me,” I say to change the topic. “If you have any more tips on fast decision-making, I’ll take them. I’m hopeless in that area.”
His expression brightens. “It’s certainly something you can improve with practice.”
I set the photo piles on the coffee table and motion him to the couch.
“The first thing you can do,” he says, “is narrow your field. In other words, discard all the options that aren’t the best.”
“OK. And then?”
“Remind yourself there’s no perfect option, and that what you need is a decision that is fast and roughly right. That usually unblocks your gut instinct.”
“Makes sense.” I eye him up and down. “Have you always been so… decisive?”
He smirks. “No.”
I wait for him to continue.
Instead he pours us two more vodka shots and raises his glass. “Na zdrowie.”
“Huh?”
“It means ‘to your health’ in Polish.”
“To the bottom?” I ask.
He nods and empties his glass.
I do the same.
“Papa overdosed when I was twenty-three,” he says. “I was so not prepared to fill his shoes. They seemed huge at the time…”
“Wasn’t there someone else to run things for a while? A deputy or some experienced CEO?”
“We’re a family business, and Papa had made sure it would be me who’d take charge if something happened to him.”
“Did you want to take charge?”
He lets out a long breath. “In theory, yes. In practice, I wasn’t ready. It’s one thing to tell yourself that your future is in your hands. But realizing that the future of my younger brothers was in my hands, too—th
at came as a bit of a shock.”
“How old were they?”
“Raph was nineteen and Noah only fifteen.” He loosens his tie. “Do you mind if I remove this overpriced item?”
“Please.”
He hangs it over the armrest and shrugs off his suit jacket. “My brothers had their trust funds, of course, and Maman was well taken care of, but most of the d’Arcy fortune was invested in the company.”
“I see.”
“Then I realized something else and it was even harder to stomach.”
I give him a quizzical look.
“The livelihoods of hundreds of people employed by Parfums d’Arcy depended on me… When that realization hit me, it felt as if someone had loaded me up with a supersize backpack filled with rocks.”
“How did you deal with it?”
“I created a persona.” His lips curl. “I started acting as if I was the man Papa wanted me to be. Decisive. Unwavering. Someone who knows what he’s doing.”
“A real homme d’affaires.”
He nods. “A man no one would dare call a greenhorn. A man his subordinates looked up to. I couldn’t afford to show any sign of weakness or nonchalance.” He smiles. “Not that I ever had any nonchalance to start with—that’s Raphael’s specialty.”
“When my dad’s business was going well,” I say, “he hired someone to help him. It broke his heart when he had to let that person go a few years back. I can’t imagine how it feels to know that hundreds of jobs hinge on your knowing what you’re doing. That kind of responsibility would probably paralyze me into total inaction.”
He leans toward me. “Let me tell you a secret. That’s exactly how I felt, too, in the beginning. But I had no choice, so I began to… fake it. And I’ve been at it ever since.”
“No way.”
He nods and smiles. “I make my best guess and act on it with enough aplomb to convince everyone I know what I’m doing.”
My head begins to turn as his charisma—yes, dammit, charisma—envelopes me in a soft, yummy-smelling cocoon and lifts me up. The sentinels I’ve stationed throughout my brain sway on their feet and fall one after the other, clutching their mortal wounds.
It’s a bloodbath.
With my first line of defense decimated, I can’t help inhaling the heady scent coming off Darcy. I have no clue what part of it is him and what part is cologne, but the mixture does nasty things to me on some primal, subatomic level. He’s a fragrance man, I remind myself. He must’ve had his labs concoct a highly potent love potion for his personal use.
