She’s asking the wrong person. I’m the girl who just fell head over heels for some guy I fucked on a plane barely minutes after meeting him. Lucien’s words come to mind. “L’amour ne s’explique pas, mon amie.”
She spins to look at me. “Has Paris turned you into a beret-wearing, baguette-eating hopeless romantic?” At least she’s laughing.
“Something like that, I guess.” I exhale heavily. “Stop trying to be a good girl, Mac. It doesn’t suit you. It’s inauthentic and it’s no good for your blood pressure. Come on, let that bad girl free. I miss her. It’s like I moved to Paris and you turned into a stiff.”
Her tone goes dry. “You seem to be forgetting that I majorly fucked up my life. I lost focus. Started partying my ass off and totally missed the boat on my application to Joffrey.”
“That was a fluke,” I promise her. “You’re the best dancer I know.” Mackenzie has convinced herself that her dance career is over if she can’t get into Joffrey. At least she’s not the one being told that she’ll need a screw in her knee if she wants to prevent it from being dislocated every time she makes a sudden movement. She wouldn’t be able to handle standing in my shoes.
“This is all crazy,” she whimpers. “Crazy. He’s a rock star, Julia. Beautiful women throw themselves at him everyday. Do you honestly think that he and I could have something real?”
I roll my eyes and sigh. “Don’t be pissed just because he gets mad groupie love. Even Prince Charming had to work his way through a throng of groupies before he could find his Cinderella. Don’t turn down your invitation to the ball, Mac-Mac.”
She stops fidgeting for just long enough to stare into the camera. “Sweet analogy, Jules, but c’mon…”
“Mackenzie, go with him. He’s the hottest musician on the planet. He could have any girl he wants. And he wants you. Stop overthinking this. It’s just one concert stop. Go with him. Go make some memories.”
I toss my itty-bitty yellow and white bikini into my open suitcase. Carpe diem. Go make some memories…Now, that’s some advice I plan to take.
Chapter 26
Julia
The grin on my face is a mile wide as I turn off the faucet and reach for the towel hanging on the hook behind the bathroom door. I sing loud and off-key as I wrap myself up and step out of the stall. I lean over the sink and rub my palm across the cloudy mirror, chasing the fog away.
I pull my hair into a messy bun high on my head and pack my toiletries into my pouch all while humming the White Hot Coals tune low under my breath.
“Lucien? Are you back?” I call out. I could swear I heard a small bang in the other room. I must have been mistaken, though.
Lucien’s friend, Grégiore, is lending us his car for the trip to Théoule-sur-mer. Lucien left shortly before I jumped in the shower to go pick up the car and get a few things that we’ll need for the trip.
I’m fucking beaming. I’m so excited.
I carry on singing as I glance around the room one last time to make sure I’m not forgetting anything. I’m all packed for our trip to Lucien’s hometown.
I throw the bathroom door open and am in no way prepared for the sight that greets me.
There’s a stunning woman sitting on the edge of the bed. She’s wearing nothing but Lucien’s white button-down shirt and a menacing frown.
“Wh-who are you?” I ask. I cling tight to the bath towel, holding my toiletries case defensively against my chest.
Her eyes narrow as she stands to her feet and pads over to me, her long blond hair swaying with her movements. She towers over me, glaring at me from under her thick eyelashes.
She holds up her phone, waving it in my face. In the screensaver photo, she and Lucien are standing face-to-face, foreheads touching. She’s in a white dress and there’s a glistening diamond on the ring finger of the hand cupping his cheek. “I’m Anaïs. Lucien’s wife,” she snarls in a thick French accent. “Now, who the fuck are you?”
Chapter 27
Julia
Nothing can really prepare you for the moment when you first discover that you are nothing but a cheap imitation of your lover’s wife.
Her hair is blond like mine but longer and thicker. Her eyes are blue like mine but deeper and more striking. Her limbs are long and elegant in a way that I immediately envy.
“So, where is my husband and why are you in my house?” Anaïs growls accusatorily as she stands in front of me, her weight shifted to one elegant leg and her hand fisted on her slender hip.
I try to stand tall, look her in the eye. After all, I haven’t done anything wrong here. “Lucien never mentioned you,” I say defensively.
She hocks bitterly. “Le bâtard. Le salaud,” she mumbles under her breath.
He is a bastard. Well, at least that’s something Anaïs and I can both agree on. Hey, who knows – we might have a thing or two in common.
Aside from the blond hair.
And the blue eyes.
And the fact that we were both duped by the same handsome, lying Frenchman.
“Do you fuck my husband?” she asks so angrily that I’m afraid to answer the question. Anaïs penetrates me for a moment with her angry stare before hocking venomously, spinning on her heel and heading towards the kitchenette. “Du vin! Du vin! I need some wine!”
I watch, still stunned as she rummages frenetically around in the cupboards before retrieving a wine goblet and a bottle of red wine. She busies herself opening the bottle, moving around the kitchen with a degree of choreographed familiarity, as if it’s something that she’s done so many times before.
I should go. I should get dressed, grab my suitcase and go. That’s what my mind is saying, but my body remains immobilized, still in shock, still trying to process what is going on in front of me.
She glances up after a while as if she had forgotten that I was still here. “Mais pourquoi tu restes là?” she says frowning deeply. “Va-t’en! Go away, stew-pid American girl,” she hurls with a dismissive flick of the wrist. She spews curse words at me and, it may be because of the speed at which the words fly out of her mouth or because of the fact that I’m still in utter shock, but my mind refuses to even attempt to understand and translate what she’s saying.
I pull a steely breath, fighting back the tears burning the back of my eyes. I pull a dress from the top of my suitcase. It’s the flirty, green summer dress I was wearing the day I came back to Paris. The day I met Lucien and fucked him in the lavatory. The day I decided that, even though I was attracted to him, I didn’t want anything beyond a few illicit moments in an airplane washroom.
How the fuck did I wind up here? In Lucien’s apartment. Wrapped in a towel. Face-to-face with his wife.
Fuck – I’m a silly girl.
Anaïs rattles on in French and I catch bits and pieces of her hysterical tirade.
“…How could Lucien do this to me?...”, “…I’ve been nothing but a good wife…”, “…I don’t deserve this…”
I should say something. I should do something. I should fight back. Lucien misled me as much as he did her. I’m a victim, too. I was completely blindsided by what took place here today.
But as I watch Anaïs in the throes of her frenetic meltdown, I think back to the phone calls that he’d take leaning over the verandah, whispering into the phone in hushed tones. And the apricot face scrub that was sitting on the edge of the bathtub and the pink loofah that was hanging on the showerhead the first day I got here but magically disappeared the next time I returned.
The clues were there all along, but I didn’t want to see them because I just wanted to play the part of the broken-hearted American girl falling madly for a romantic Parisian man who could make all my misery go away with one perfectly maneuvered French kiss and a string of sweet nothings whispered in my ear in a language that I barely understand.
Now, his crazy wife is standing directly in front of me, her full glass of wine tipping precariously with each of her animated hand gestures. “Stew-pid girl! Go! Go!
Avant que j’appele la police!”
My eyes are heavy, tears streaming down my face as I wheel my suitcase through the front door and hear it crash loudly behind me as my lover’s wife slams it shut.
Chapter 28
Lucien
The sudden burst of light pouring in through my bedroom window jolts me awake.
“Lève toi, merde. Get up,” Grégiore howls as he yanks the drapes wider and opens the window. “It is beginning to smell like rotting meat in here. Get the fuck up and wash yourself.”
I lie back against my pillow and throw an arm over my eyes. “Grégiore, what the fuck are you doing in my bedroom?”
And that’s when the events of the past few days come flooding back to me again, stabbing through my chest with the intensity of a hot dagger.
I had left a spare key with Grégiore – just in case – when I was planning to take Julia to Théoule-sur-mer for the weekend.
But then, something went wrong.
And now, Julia’s gone.
She just left.
While I was out planning our romantic getaway to my hometown, Julia, for whatever reason, was plotting her escape from me.
But I can’t focus on that now, because Grégiore is standing in front of me, yanking the sheets off of my bed. “Up, up, up. Time is mon-nay.” He’s telling me that he got a fax this morning revealing France’s starting lineup for the Olympic Games soccer tournament. He’s telling me that I’m listed as the first-string forward. He’s yelling at me to go shower and get dressed. Because we have to go. Now. Now. Now.
I tumble out of bed and within half an hour, I’m wearing a clean suit and following Grégiore down the stairs to his car on the sidewalk.
We’re off to a press conference. Because it looks like I’ll be representing my country in the Olympic Games after all.
Chapter 29
Julia
Willow is sitting at the foot of my hospital bed with a small box full of nail polish in her lap. “Australian gold?” she asks jiggling one bottle in her left hand. “Or ginger lust?” She jiggles another bottle in her right hand.
To me they both look the same. And they both remind me of Lucien’s copper-gold eyes.
Actually, everything reminds me of Lucien.
From the Eiffel Tower scrubs my nurse wore yesterday morning to the onion soup that was served for lunch today.
Willow is looking at me expectantly, waiting for a response. I shrug a shoulder as I stare blankly at the television mounted high on the hospital room wall. “Whichever.”
She sighs, sounding dejected as she pulls my left foot into her lap and uncorks a polish bottle. Australian gold, I think.
I know it’s been hard for her seeing me like this. The poor, depressed, hopeless girl lying in this bed is not the Julia Lockhart that she knows. I’m a stranger to her. She knows the strong, sassy side of me. Quick-witted and impulsive and always the centre of attention. This Julia – the one that wants to curl up into a ball and hide – is unfamiliar to her and my family and the rest of my friends.
This is the Julia that only Lucien Beauvier really knows.
Lying, deceitful, married Lucien Beauvier.
The sportscaster on the television rattles off some random statistics about the Olympics. It starts in less than three weeks in Rio de Janeiro. My mind inevitably goes to Lucien and I feel a pinch in my heart when I think about how not being able to participate must be tearing him apart. Yes – he hurt me, but I love him and I can’t stand imagining him in pain.
“The doctor said the surgery was a success, right?” Willow’s voice breaks through the chatter in my mind.
I shrug again. Yes, Dr. Mitchell mentioned that the implantation of the metal rod went according to plan with no hitches. But now, I have a goddamned piece of steel in my knee. I can never dance again. So, in my mind, I can’t bring myself to describe the surgery as a success.
The room falls silent again for a long time. Then, Willow speaks again in that soft, cautious way of hers. “Jules – Why didn’t you tell us – Mackenzie and me – about your injury?...Even when you visited us back in June, we had no idea that anything was wrong with you…We would have been there for you…we would have done anything to make things easier for you.”
And that’s exactly what I was trying to avoid. I didn’t want to see the look of pity on my friends’ faces and I definitely didn’t want them putting their lives on hold to take care of me. Mackenzie’s dancing in front of thousands of people in a new city every night and Willow scored the internship of her dreams at a hot, new technology start-up. I didn’t want their pity for me and my broken dreams to get in the way of their dreams, their bright futures.
I lift my shoulder high to my ear again before letting it drop in defeat.
Willow frowns at me. “If you shrug at me one more time…” she threatens in her best attempt at a stern voice. That gets me to laugh because shy, timid Willow couldn’t even intimidate a fly if she tried.
I blow out a heavy puff of air. “Look – I’m not used to not being the strong one. I didn’t know how to be vulnerable and weak, so I pretended that everything was okay.”
Willow’s eyes fill with tears. “You don’t have to be a superhero all the time, Jules. You get to be vulnerable, too. When you need to be. And in those moments when you can’t be strong, we get to be strong for you. That’s what best friends are for.”
She’s right. I’d want to be there for her or Mackenzie if they were going through a rough patch. I suddenly feel selfish and immature for having tried to handle this all on my own.
“Come here, Willie,” I say choking on my own voice as I pull her into a hug, burying my tears in the curve of her neck.
Chapter 30
Lucien
I’m still dressed in my dirty football uniform, my cleats kicked off carelessly in the middle of the room, my bag tossed on the floor. I’m sprawled off on the couch and sleep is finally creeping over me.
It has been an exhausting past few days.
Team practice has intensified since the starting line-up for the Olympic Games was announced. Plus now, there are all sorts of press events and other social gatherings to attend. Grégoire has been running around like a madman, trying to capitalize on all the endorsement opportunities and interview requests that have popped up. The media is calling me “L’ange du football” and they have dubbed my recovery a miracle. Even poor Cynthia has been hounded by the press for an interview but she has kept quiet, of course, because of the ethical implications of discussing my recovery.
And in all the melee that has been going on, I keep thinking about Julia. Where the hell did she go? And why? And will she come back?
I’ve gone to her apartment several times, but no one is ever home. Those ballerinas keep a rehearsal schedule almost as hectic as us footballers.
I’m at the point now where I just feel like giving up because I don’t think that I will get her back. I’m afraid that she has left Paris and if she is already in New York, I have no way of finding her.
My Julia…
Just as I’m letting go, drifting off to sleep, I hear a key rattling in the lock.
I bolt up right, headed for the door.
But when the door swings open, it’s not Julia standing there.
“Anaïs…” I feel bile rolling in my stomach.
She pushes past me. “Is she here? Did she come back?” Anger radiates off of her skin.
And realization dawns on me. “C’était toi! It was you!”
“Where is that American bitch who was here the last time? Did she come back?” She steps into my space, her pointy, red fingernail jabbing into my chest.
“What did you do to her, Anaïs?” I demand pushing her hand off of me.
“How could you bring your whores into our house, Lucien? This is our house! I am your wife! You said you loved me!”
“Anaïs, stop your foolishness. Please. I love Julia and you need to leave.”
“Non! Non, chérie. Je t
’aime. Je t’adore,” she purrs as she tries to bring her hand to my cheek.
“C’est fini entre nous. It is over between us, Anaïs. When you called on the phone, I told you not to come back. I never want to see you again.”
She’s crying and protesting as I throw her over my shoulder and deposit her outside of the door. She’s banging on the walls, causing a scene, but I don’t care.
Foreign Love (An International Sports Romance) (Love in Shades) Page 8
