Nine Lives

by Danielle Steel

  “I worked for my husband’s father before we got married, and I haven’t worked full-time since our son was born. I’m trying to figure all that out now, about what to do next.” She didn’t look depressed about it. She looked like a newborn in some ways, trying to learn everything at once. It was sweet and it touched him. She seemed very pure and unspoiled, unlike the women he knew and was used to now. He admired her all the more for coming to Europe alone, which must have been daunting for her. She didn’t seem like she was looking for a husband, in her austere, plain black dress. Its simplicity somehow highlighted her beauty. There was nothing to distract from her perfect figure, and flawlessly lovely face. He thought she was a hundred times more striking than all the painted dollies in the room, half of whom were expensive hookers, which he knew Maggie didn’t realize, though he did. He was used to seeing them and could spot them with ease.

  “I have a boat here. Would you like to come sailing with me tomorrow?” he asked her simply, and she nodded.

  “I’d love it.” He had been her high school sweetheart, and it was fun seeing him again. “I heard that you were a famous Formula One racer, but somehow I don’t think I really connected the dots. I was living our quiet life in Lake Forest and that seemed very unreal.” She understood it better now, seeing him in this setting and how people reacted to him. He was a very big deal. “Do you still race?”

  “I do. Just not as often. I do the big races for my sponsors. And in case you’re wondering if I’m an arms dealer, or a drug dealer, I’m not. I did well with racing and other dangerous pursuits, and invested intelligently. The more dangerous the sport, the higher the pay. And it does pay off very nicely. Most of the time, I follow my investments now. I have a contract to race when I want to. I pick and choose the races around the world. I don’t have a home life anymore, but no one is complaining about the risks I take either. It’s a trade-off. Freedom is addictive after a while, just like danger is. I’m hooked on the adrenaline rush.” He said it with the same mischief in his eyes that she remembered from thirty years before. And he was honest about himself. He had been as a boy too. He’d never lied to her, and was clear about his priorities, even then.

  “You always were hooked on that,” she reminded him. “That was what my mother objected to, since my father was a fly junkie and it killed him.”

  “What happened to your brother?” he asked her. “He was such a cute kid. And a pain in the ass occasionally.”

  “He was. He died in Iraq, at twenty-three. He was a Navy pilot. It killed my mother. It took a while, but she never recovered. I married Brad right after that. I know being married to an accountant doesn’t sound glamorous, but he was such a good man, and I wanted a safe life. I knew I’d have it with him. We were happy. And the irony is that he never took a single risk. We went to New York for a two-day trip, to an accounting convention, and the plane crashed. So I guess you never know how it’s going to turn out, even if you’re with the safest guy on the planet.” And some men, like Paul, got away with taking all the risks. So far anyway.

  “That’s not fair.” He was surprised she was still standing after losing her father, her brother, and now her husband, but Maggie had always been like that. Brave and determined. He knew she’d be okay now, but it must have hurt like hell.

  He walked her back to her hotel then, and told her he’d pick her up at ten the next morning to go sailing. She smiled when she looked up at him and thanked him. She was thinking of him at eighteen, and what a sweet kid he was. How he had befriended her when no one else did. “That’ll be fun.” It was so odd to have run into him here and she was happy she had.

  “And no scary stuff, I promise. Just a nice, tame day sail.” He had never tried to frighten her, he saved all the high risks for himself.

  “I’m looking forward to it.” She went to her room thinking about him. Once she talked to him, he didn’t seem to have changed much, no matter how sophisticated he looked. He was still so appealing and so profoundly nice, but her mother had been right too. He liked everything dangerous, and had sacrificed two marriages to do it. Romantically, he was a good man to stay away from. But she had no intention of getting involved with him, and he probably wouldn’t want to either. They were just old friends connecting for a minute. There was nothing dangerous about that. It was just a funny quirk of fate that they’d run into each other. An odd coincidence, with no risk involved. He was just a reminder of a sweet memory from the past.

  Chapter 6

  Paul picked her up the next morning in a pale blue vintage Lamborghini that was almost a work of art. He drove her down to the port at full speed, chatting with her, and stopped next to an enormous sailboat. Suddenly, she realized that it was the one she had admired the day before. The Lady Luck was Paul’s boat.

  “I saw this boat yesterday.” Maggie grinned at him in surprise. “She’s beautiful.”

  “I love her,” he admitted. “I’ve had a few boats, but I only love this one. She was built in Italy. I keep her here. She’s registered in the Cayman Islands for tax reasons, I like keeping her here. I spend as much time on her as I can. In some ways, she’s home to me.” He had apartments all over the place, but his boat was home. He had certainly grown up to be footloose and fancy-free, and lived extravagantly. It suited him. He didn’t seem to be hurting, or grieving over his marriages. She wondered what kind of women he had married, probably flashy ones. They had both grown up so much in thirty years, and taken such diametrically different paths. But his seemed to be working well for him. Hers had too, until the crash. She was doing okay now. She was slowly getting back on her feet and trying to get used to being alone.

  * * *

  —

  Their day of sailing on the Lady Luck was absolutely perfect. They motored out of the port, and when they were clear of it, the crew turned off the engine and sailed his spectacular boat, which glided peacefully through the water. He was an expert sailor, and took the wheel for a while. He had a crew of eighteen on board. They sailed fairly far off the coast, and then came back to eat lunch in a protected cove near Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat. As they sat in the outdoor dining area, waited on by two stewardesses, eating lunch prepared by a fabulous chef, he talked about his years of racing all over the world, climbing Everest, his thirst to conquer impossible odds, including his marriages. Her life had been peaceful and uncomplicated compared to his, and certainly not exciting. In many ways, Maggie found he hadn’t really changed since their time together at seventeen and eighteen, despite the luxurious trappings. He was bigger and older and had more expensive toys, but the drive he’d had then was still the same, and she suspected probably always would be. And he was just as kind and gentle as he had been as a boy. She wondered if her father had been that way, endearing but thrill seeking. At nine, she couldn’t have assessed it. She thought her father was a hero, but maybe he had been as driven to take risks as Paul was. She was grateful that she’d had the sense to marry Brad and have a quiet life for almost twenty years. Paul’s unquenchable thirst for danger would have terrified her. But Paul was still alive, and Brad wasn’t, so nothing was predictable, as Paul had pointed out. And oddly, she still felt the same attraction to Paul she had at seventeen, and she could feel that he was attracted to her too, but they had nowhere to go with it. They would be off to their own lives again in a few days, miles from each other, living different lives. It was obvious to her that he was thoroughly enjoying his life just the way it was. He seemed to have no regrets that he was divorced.

  They were lavishly but discreetly waited on all day. The crew never intruded on them. There was a constant stream of food or drink if they wanted it. They swam off the boat after lunch, and laughed like old times, like two kids. She remembered what a good sense of humor he had, and how much fun he was to be with. She had forgotten that about him. He could make anything seem special, even when they were both poor, and teenagers.

  “I was always
impressed that you wouldn’t sleep with me,” he said after they swam, as they lay in the sun close together on sunbeds.

  “I knew you were leaving, and I was afraid that if I got pregnant, I’d never see you again.”

  “That was smart of you. You were a woman of principle even then.”

  “Just not a risk-taker, like you.” She laughed, and he grinned. When they got too hot in the sun, they went swimming again, and chased each other in the water like children. At sunset, they finally sailed back toward Monaco, and he looked at her seriously.

  “What are you going to do now? Are you really going to get a job?”

  “I have absolutely no idea,” she said. “I don’t know why anyone would hire me. I’m a great car pool driver, I make good pancakes and a decent meatloaf. Other than working in a diner, or driving an Uber, I’m not qualified for much of anything. I like to think I was a good wife, but who knows.” Brad had been so easy to please. She wondered now if she had done enough for him. Maybe she should have done more.

  “Did he leave you any money?” Paul asked her softly, worried about her. She nodded, but didn’t say anything specific. “Do you have to get a job?”

  “I can’t sit on my ass for the rest of my life doing nothing. I’ll drive myself crazy. I was thinking I might work in an art gallery or something.” She still loved art in all its forms, although Brad had never been interested in it. He liked numbers.

  “Why don’t you come skiing with me this winter?” Paul suggested out of the blue.

  “I haven’t skied in years. I learned in college, but Brad didn’t like it. He played golf with his clients, and baseball when he was a kid and football in high school.”

  “I go helicopter skiing in Canada every year. But I was thinking more like Courchevel, which is fancier and would be more fun for you. You could hit the bunny slopes, and I could ski the three valleys, which is fairly challenging. I don’t have anyone to go with me. I’m between women at the moment,” he said, looking boyish and mischievous, and honest with her. They were still friends, after thirty years apart.

  “I’m not sure if that’s a compliment or an insult,” she said as she laughed at him, “to be invited as filler.” They were still oddly comfortable with each other because they had been so close as kids. They still felt like teenagers when they were together. She had always been able to say anything to him and in a way, neither of them had changed. They were just older, and richer. His lifestyle was impressive, and his boat was fabulous, but he was still Paul, in spite of the luxuries that surrounded him, and she hadn’t changed either. He wasn’t a show-off in an obnoxious way. He just lived well. Very well.

  “We could go skiing after Christmas,” he persisted. “I assume you’ll be with your son during the holidays.”

  “Yes, I will.” She wouldn’t give that up for anything. He was the main event for her, the only event now, and she wouldn’t let anything interfere with that.

  “You could bring him if you want.”

  She smiled at him.

  “He has to go back to school then.” She thought about it, and it might be fun to go skiing with Paul, as friends. Sooner or later, he’d be involved with another woman and she wouldn’t have the chance. And she liked the idea of coming back to Europe. He would be fun to do things with. He always had fun.

  “I’ll be on the boat in the Caribbean during the holidays. I always send it over in the winter. It’s great to have it there. And I have friends who show up. Would you meet me in Courchevel after the holidays, Maggie?” he asked her with the look of a cocker spaniel pleading for a treat, and she laughed at him.

  “Maybe. You might meet the love of your life before that. If you do, my feelings won’t be hurt if you cancel the invitation.” She had no expectations, which made everything easier between them.

  “I won’t cancel it. And I met the love of my life thirty years ago,” he said, suddenly serious. “I just didn’t know it then. I was too young to recognize it until you were long gone, and I had no idea how to find you.”

  “What does that mean?” She was startled by what he said.

  “Just because we didn’t see each other doesn’t mean I stopped thinking about you or loving you. I always have. Feelings like that don’t just vanish into thin air.”

  “You could have found me if you wanted to. I didn’t go far,” she said. She couldn’t imagine that he had loved her for thirty years.

  “Would you have married me if I’d found you?” he asked her longingly. She looked at him squarely when she answered him.

  “No. You were everything I was afraid of, and my mother warned me about. She was right. People who wantonly risk their lives the way you do, and are addicted to it, are dangerous for those who love them. I don’t want to end up like my mother, dying young, with dementia, because the losses were too much for her.”

  “You’re stronger than that,” he said solemnly.

  “I hope so. But I still wouldn’t take the chance. It’s too dangerous. Brad never scared me or broke my heart. He died in the end, but he wasn’t risking his neck or my heart when he did. You’re dangerous, Paul. You always were, and now you have all the tools and skills to do it better. You’re still racing, you go helicopter skiing. You probably still skydive and mountain climb and do all the other crazy things you did. You couldn’t even afford it then, and managed it anyway. I can’t do that to myself, or my son. He needs stability in his life, now more than ever.” And so did she. She didn’t want to give that up.

  “He has you for that,” Paul said thoughtfully.

  “Yes, he does. And I’m not sure you’d be a good influence on him. He has some of that thirst for risk that my father had, and you do. I try to keep a lid on it, but I know it’s there, just waiting to spring out.” She looked concerned as she said it. She worried about Aden, a lot. She could sense her father’s genes in him.

  “I like him already,” Paul teased her.

  “If you ever invite him to do something dangerous with you, I’ll kill you.” She sounded like a lioness protecting her cub when she said it. He could see that she meant it, and he intended to respect it.

  “If he has that in his DNA, you won’t be able to stop him, though,” he said wisely. She knew it too.

  “I know that. I’m just hoping to slow it down a little. He plays ice hockey in college.”

  “People like us have nine lives,” Paul said to her. “Like me. I’m still here.” And Brad wasn’t, but he didn’t say it. He didn’t have to.

  “One day you use up those tickets. I don’t want to be around for that.” She was serious and he knew it.

  “All right, if I promise not to jump off a mountain or kill myself on our ski trip, will you go with me?” He was determined to convince her, but she looked at him and shook her head. They had lost each other for thirty years and a day after he’d found her, he wanted her to go skiing with him. It seemed too soon to her, and he wanted to start where they’d left off, at eighteen.

  “I might go skiing with you sometime, but if you don’t behave, I’ll leave.”

  “Behave in what sense?” he teased her. “Risk-wise or in other ways? You’re all grown up now, Maggie Kelly.”

  “You missed the boat on that,” she said gently. “I still feel married to my husband.” He nodded. He could tell. She was still wearing her wedding band, which was a clear message. He planned to respect that too. He had never forced her hand before, and didn’t intend to now. And despite growing up in poverty, he was a gentleman.

  “Separate rooms,” he promised her, and she believed him. He had always been nice about that when they were dating in high school too. He had never insisted, or tried to push her to do something she didn’t want to do. “What are you doing for dinner tomorrow night?” he asked her, changing the subject.

  “I’m flying to London tomorrow, for the last week of my trip.�
�� She smiled at him and he smiled back. They were good together, they always had been, even as kids. She considered him a friend now, not a romance, no matter how attractive he still was.

  “I’m supposed to fly to London tomorrow too. I was going to delay it for you. Do you want to fly with me?” he asked, and she grinned.

  “Sure. Are you flying the plane?”

  “No, I have a pilot, two of them. You’re safe. Will you have dinner with me in London tomorrow night then?” She hesitated and then nodded. The old attraction still wasn’t dead. But she knew better now. She wasn’t going to let him get under her skin, no matter how nice he was to her, or how much fun he was to be with. He was still the same Paul, addicted to risk. Maybe worse, since he had the means to indulge it in every way he wanted to, which made him even more dangerous now.

  They pulled into port at eight o’clock that night, after a full day on the boat. It had been heavenly. He had a very pleasant life. He invited her to have dinner on the boat. They had a delicious meal, prepared by his excellent chef. A light pasta with pesto and fresh tomatoes, a salad, and lemon sorbet for dessert.

  “What are you going to do in London?” he asked her. He liked talking to her, just like old times.

  “All the tourist stuff.” She smiled at him, unembarrassed. She wanted to see it all, just as she had in Rome and Paris. “I want to see the Victoria and Albert Museum, and the Tate, the Tower of London, the crown jewels, Westminster Abbey, the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace. All the silly, corny stuff, like Madame Tussauds.”

  “I’d do it with you, but I have meetings all day. Where are you staying?”

  “Claridge’s. It’s been a nice trip. I saw everything in Rome and Paris. A friend said I should go to Venice, but I’m saving it for next time.”

  “I hope that’ll be soon.”

  “Do you ever come to the States?” she asked him.

  “Not often. Only when I have business there,” he said. “Would you come if I race in the States?” he asked, and she shook her head.