“Oui!” He begins walking again and we follow. “In Proust’s novel, In Search of Lost Time, the narrator dips a madeleine into a cup of tea and suddenly a flood of forgotten childhood memories washes over him. Now, when an aroma evokes a memory, it is attributed to the Proust phenomenon.”
Monsieur Lambert leads us through his fields and factory, explaining each step of the process of distillation—from bud to bottle. He tells us the harvest is from August until October and that each blossom is handpicked by a female harvester, because women are more precise and take greater care with the blooms. We end our tour where we began, in front of the factory.
“I wish I could invite you to stay for dinner, but I regret I have a previous engagement,” Monsieur Lambert says, looking at his watch.
“You’ve already been terribly generous. This has been an unexpected, lovely afternoon. Now, when I smell the scent of jasmine in bloom, I won’t only think of my home. I will think of this day and your kindness.” Standing on my tiptoes, I press a kiss to his whiskered cheek. “Merci, monsieur.”
“Je vous en prie, ma chérie. It has been my pleasure.”
Xavier opens my door and I climb in.
Monsieur Lambert and Xavier shake hands. Xavier says something in French, the words muffled through the glass. The old man nods his head and disappears into the stone house. He returns moments later and presses something into Xavier’s hand. Xavier slips it inside his jacket pocket. He climbs into the car, pushes the engine button, and we are off, racing down the tree-lined driveway, leaving a cloud of dust in our wake.
Do you remember Monsieur Lambert said every man has his weakness? Well, my weakness is the kind that kills the cat. I am the curious sort. Right now, I have a mighty powerful curiosity to know what Monsieur Lambert gave Xavier, but my Southern manners are keeping me from asking him.
I hope it isn’t drugs. It sounds ridiculous, but I read an article about the French drug scene before my trip. Unlike some places in the United States, cannabis is illegal in France. The article stated hippies started growing marijuana illegally in communes in the Pyrenees in the ’70s, but since then there has been a growing demand for marijuana, which has increased the profitability and cultivation. Even though there are “grow shops”—places where people can go to purchase supplies and seeds to grow cannabis in their homes—professionally cultivated cannabis is a major business in the South of France.
Is it possible Monsieur Lambert is growing more than jasmine and roses in his fields? Is Xavier a cannabis distributor, one of France’s drug kingpins?
Chapter Six
I look at the expensive whip-stitching on the leather passenger seat and wonder what Xavier does professionally that allows him to drive a top-of-the-line luxury vehicle—and stay in the Christian Dior suite. He laughed when I asked him if he was in the perfume business. In fact, he has been evasive every time I have asked him a question about himself.
Maybe he is a cannabis kingpin.
“Monsieur Lambert is your associate?”
“Client.”
“Client?”
Maybe Xavier sells cannabis seeds to growers on the down-low. Please don’t let this tall, dark, handsome stranger be a drug lord. Please.
Oh, Sweet Jesus! He gave me a Dior purse. I look down at my buttery-soft satchel and wonder if it is ill-gotten gains.
You are being ridiculous, Mandy, my common sense side argues. You know what Daddy used to say: Mandy, darlin’, letting your imagination run wild is like trying to wrestle an alligator. Only a fool would wrestle a gator, because it will grab you, spin you around, drag you down the bottom of the swamp, and feast on your good parts.
Daddy thought a body’s common sense was their best part. Logic over fancy. Reason over passion. The only thing Daddy loathed more than a “featherbrained flibbertigibbet” was a busybody. So, even though I am burning with curiosity, I will not quench it by asking intrusive questions.
“Oui, client.” Xavier turns off the dirt track onto the paved road. “Did you get some good photographs?”
“What?” I am still staring at my Dior and wondering how many ziplock baggies of marijuana had to be sold to earn the money to buy such a pricey purse. “Oh, yes. Thank you.”
Xavier pulls into a service station.
“I need to fill up. Be right back.”
While he is pumping gas, I grab my iPhone out of my purse, turn off airplane mode, and do a quick google search using the words: Xavier, French, drug, dealer. The search returns over three hundred thousand hits, including an article about a $56 million cocaine bust at a Coca-Cola plant in Marseilles by a detective named Xavier Dubois. I scroll down, but don’t see anything of note.
Xavier climbs back into the car and starts the engine. I slip my phone back into my purse.
“Would you like to stop for something to drink?” he asks, turning onto the highway. “I know a little place with a spectacular view of the sea.”
“Yes. Thank you.”
He drives to an outdoor café perched on the edge of cliff, with striped awnings and a terrace overlooking the sea. We choose a table for two in the sun. The table is covered with a starched white tablecloth and the chairs are painted a bright, happy Mediterranean blue.
“Do you know what you would like to drink?” Xavier asks as he pulls out my chair.
I thank him and take a seat. “A citronnade, please.”
“Mademoiselle voudrait un verre de citronnade, s’il vous plaît,” Xavier says to the waiter. “Et je vais prendre un café . . .”
I lean my elbow on the table and rest my chin on my hand, watching Xavier from behind the obscurity of my big sunglasses. Sigh. Listening to a handsome Frenchman with serious designer stubble speak in his native tongue makes me want to do a foot pop. You know in old movies, when the romantic pair kiss and the actress bends one leg at the knee, lifting her foot behind her? That movie trope started in the 1930s, as a silent protest to one of the stipulations specified in the Hays Code (a set of rules governing filmmaking), which specified that actresses filming love scenes must keep one foot on the ground at all times.
The waiter gives us a little bow before disappearing inside the café.
“Citronnade?” he asks with a wry smile.
I sit back and cross my hands in my lap, embarrassed to have been caught gawking at Xavier as if he were Cary Grant and I a lovesick, starry-eyed Shirley Temple. The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer. One of Cary’s best.
“I have always wanted to visit the South of France and I have always wanted to order a citronnade. The heroine of Rebecca drinks a glass of citronnade the first time she is alone with the hero, Maximillian de Winter.”
“Is that what I am to you? A romantic hero?”
My cheeks suddenly flame with intense heat, like the strike of a match. He notices my discomfort and laughs, though not unkindly. He is breathtaking when he laughs. His eyes shine, dimples appear on either side of his mouth, and the severe, dark expression that usually clouds his face disappears. I don’t even mind that he is laughing at me.
“I am no hero, ma bichette.”
My phone chimes and I use the text as an excuse to busy myself, distract myself from Xavier’s disconcerting stare and statement.
“Excuse me.”
“Olivia calls.”
I want to say How do you know it is Olivia texting me? Maybe I have a secret lover who is sending me sexts. But I am not that brazen. I look at the screen and suppress a disappointed groan. It’s from Olivia. Of course.
Text from Olivia Tate:
Ugh! The entire cast of Stomp is practicing in my head. I am not leaving my bed until the pounding-pounding-pounding stops. Tell the Grande Dame we are on a break . . . for now. Go do something wicked—preferably with Monsieur X. See you in the morning for tennis, k?
I smile and slip my phone back into my purse. Olivia doesn’t drink that often, but when she does, she suffers the worst hangover followed by the surliest mood. That she has chosen isolation over
socialization is a good thing, a very good thing.
“Good news?”
“Olivia has given me the evening off.”
“Good news, indeed. How will you spend your free time?”
I shrug because the answer that comes to mind sounds tragically boring. I thought I would have a bowl of onion soup and then grab a book and curl up in bed. Snooze.
The waiter arrives with our drinks. Xavier waits until I have taken a sip of my zesty lemonade before repeating his question.
“So, what will you do this evening?”
“Nothing exciting. How do you plan to spend the evening?”
He smiles. “I regret I have a work function at the marina. A boring black-tie affair hosted by a stuffed shirt with more money than sense. One of those people of ‘substance’ you spoke of earlier.”
“How would you prefer to spend the evening?”
Though he doesn’t alter his countenance, the intensity of his gaze increases, like smoldering embers that suddenly burst into flames, combusting and consuming everything in their path. Beads of perspiration break out all over my body. It is a look intended to convey words unspoken.
Is Xavier flirting with me? I believe he is!
I wish I had more experience flirting. I feel like such a child. A naïve, blushing schoolgirl bungling her first kiss.
I lift the long, slender spoon inside my glass and stir my citronnade, watching as the bits of pulp and zest whirl around, and force myself to take deep, steady breaths. When I find the courage to look at Xavier again, I discover a small, seductive smile curling his lips, and have the terrifying, thrilling realization that he was, indeed, flirting with me. He is a self-actualized man, adept at wielding his sex appeal like a weapon and fully aware of his potent effect on everyone around him.
“What I would prefer to do and what I would do depend entirely on who I was with, ma bichette.” He winks and I stir my citronnade again. “Assuming I was alone, I would go for a swim in the sea or watch le football on L’Équipe. Then, I would probably answer business emails and fall asleep reading a book.”
The image of Xavier lying in bed, his muscular arms behind his head, his broad, tanned chest bare, and a sheet covering his . . . little Elvis . . . pops into my head and my pulse quickens. A lot. If I were living in the Old South, I would flick open my fan and wave it rapidly near my face. I might even mutter I do declare, I have the vapors!
Xavier winks again, and I know, I know, he used his strange, x-ray vision to read my dirty thoughts.
“Drink your citronnade before the ice melts. I can’t imagine pressed lemons and sugar would taste good warm.”
I obey, swallowing half of my citronnade in one un-Southern-ladylike gulp. To my chagrin, Xavier’s lips are still curled in a teasing smile as he casually sips his café au lait.
The sun is hanging low in the sky, a blazing orange beach ball about to fall into the sea. I lift my camera off the table and snap several shots of the terrace awash in the amber glow of sunset, the rows of empty tables and prettily painted chairs, the Mediterranean stretching like a blue carpet from Cannes to Antibes and beyond.
“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”
“Breathtaking.”
“Would you consider giving me a copy of one of the photographs you took—whichever you think most captures this moment?”
“Of course!”
“Merci.”
“No,” I say, smiling. “Thank you for a lovely day. I won’t ever forget it.”
“De rien, Manderley.” He reaches into his pocket, pulls out a small cut-crystal bottle, and stands it on the table. “For you,” he says, nodding his head at the bottle. “A little gift to help you remember this day, something you can carry with you wherever you go to remind you of... home.”
“What is it?”
I lift the bottle and hold it up to the light, looking at the thick, yellowish liquid inside.
“Jasmine Absolute, an essential oil made from the flowers grown on Monsieur Lambert’s farm. It is the same oil used to make Chanel perfumes.”
“You bought this for me?”
“Oui.”
Silly, foolish, schoolgirl tears fill my eyes and I blink to clear my vision. “Thank you, Xavier. I will cherish it, always.”
I unscrew the silver top and inhale. The sweet, familiar floral aroma fills my senses. I am back in the fields with Xavier, walking among the jasmine bushes, the Mediterranean sun burning my exposed skin. I close my eyes and savor the scent, relive the new memory. When I open them, I find Xavier staring at me with a furrowed brow.
“A little bottle of oil means that much to you?”
“Yes.” I sniffle, frustrated with my weepiness. My emotions have been just below the surface since the death of my father. “It is the most thoughtful gift I have ever received.”
I remember the tall, beautiful brunette who met Xavier in the hotel lobby a few nights ago. I am sure she is accustomed to receiving lavish and sentimental gifts from handsome men. Black satin gowns and pearls. Sable stoles and luxurious perfumes in pretty little bottles.
“Men don’t give lavish gifts to women like me,” I say, letting my shoulders roll forward.
“Then you have been dating the wrong men, ma bichette.”
A spark of excitement ignites inside me. Is that what we are doing, I wonder, dating? Is Xavier courting me? I hear Olivia’s laughter in my head. Nobody under seventy uses the word courting. It’s hooking up. Cuffing. Tinder-ing. Conscious coupling.
“You’ve been terribly kind to me. I don’t know how I will ever thank you.”
He brushes my gratitude away as if it were a pesky fly circling his café au lait. “I have never known a woman to show so much emotion over such a small gesture.”
“Then you have been dating the wrong women, Xavier.”
His smile fades and the light behind his eyes extinguishes, like the sputtering wick in a lantern when the kerosene has suddenly run out. Although he is still looking at me, I have the distinct impression he does not see me, that he is looking through me at a distant, ghostly place existing only in his imagination.
I look down at my hands in my lap, still clutching the beautiful perfume bottle. Even though I meant them in jest, I wish I could take back my words. But, like my daddy always said, Once the buckshot is outta the shotgun, you can’t suck it back in.
I force myself to lift my shoulders and my gaze and am surprised to discover light flickering in Xavier’s eyes once more and a polite smile upon his lips.
“Tell me, Manderley Maxwell,” he says, casually leaning back in his chair and draping his arm over the back of the chair beside him. “How do you like your citronnade?”
“It’s delicious.”
“And what about the French Riviera? Is it everything you dreamt it would be?”
“More!” I take a deep breath of the salt-stained sea air and exhale slowly, smiling. “I understand why Zelda and F. Scott Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Picasso, W. Somerset Maugham spent part of each year here. Such beauty is stimulating. Did you know F. Scott’s Tender Is the Night was inspired by the years he spent living in a villa in Cap d’Antibes? After it was published, Americans associated the Riviera with glamour and excess.”
“Do you find it excessive?”
“A little.”
“So you have not allowed the Riviera to seduce you with her world-class hotels, exclusive casinos, and luxury boutiques?”
“I am not seduced by glitz or glamour.”
He smiles as I imagine the wolf smiled before he devoured Little Red Riding Hood’s poor old granny, a wickedly charming, wickedly dangerous smile that does funny things to my lady region.
“You aren’t?”
I swallow hard and shake my head.
“Well, what are you seduced by?”
Are we still talking about the French Riviera? I am not so sure, but I decide to answer as if we are.
“The food.”
“You enjoy French cuisine?”
&n
bsp; “Yes,” I say, smiling. “Grilled sardines sprinkled with sea salt, crusty bread that melts in your mouth like butter, and those potatoes soaked in wine and covered in bacon fat and cheese.”
“Tartiflette.”
“Tartiflette? Is that what it is called?”
“Oui. My grandmother used to serve it for Christmas.”
“The taste of heaven,” I say, licking my lips.
Too late I realize Xavier is watching my mouth, his gaze following the path my tongue makes as it circles around my lips. Heat flushes my cheeks. “Mussels and fries!”
Xavier smiles. “Moules et frites?”
“That is my favorite thing to eat in Cannes.”
“Mine, too.”
“Really?”
“Oui.”
We smile at each other and my shyness disappears, chased away by the discovery that we have something in common.
“Is that all that you like about the Riviera? The food?”
“Of course not.” I laugh. “I am not a glutton. Though I might become one if I continued to take all of my meals at the Majestic.” He laughs and the warm sound washes over me like the waters of the Mediterranean. “The South of France reminds me of home.”
“How?”
“The slow and easy pace, the cobalt skies that fade into the sea, waking to the sound of gulls crying and palm fronds rattling, the taste of salt on my tongue, and the sultry breezes blowing over my skin.”
“Brava, ma bichette. You have described the Côte d’Azur as only a writer could.”
“Thank you,” I say, flushing. “What about you? Do you vacation in Cannes often?”
“My grandmother lived in Aigues-Mortes. I spent every summer of my childhood splashing through her marshes, chasing wild herons, fishing off the shore.”
“Funny.”
“What?”
“We had similar childhoods. My family’s home was surrounded by swamps and marshes and I also spent summers at my grandmother’s house near the sea, fishing and swimming.”
“You fish?”
“I couldn’t be the daughter of Malcolm Maxwell and not know how to bait a hook and cast a line. My daddy threatened us with no dessert for a month if we didn’t catch something big enough to fry each time we went fishing with him.” I sigh. “Of course, he never made good on his threat. Daddy was a marshmallow when it came to his girls, sweet and pliable.”
Dreaming of Manderley Page 7
