“How’s Cass?” Leroy was determined not to let Will dodge his questions. This time, Will would put out, or Leroy … Well, he’d make him spill the beans.
“I’ll tell you when we get where we’re going. Have you eaten yet? Good. I’d like to show you the place we’re having the meeting before the action starts. Le Hotel Meurice is a real grande dame, built in the nineteenth century. It’s luxurious. Be prepared for your mind to be blown. We’ll walk; it’s only a block.”
They were strolling down a posh Parisian street as the evening dimmed to night. “The Tuileries Gardens are across the street. Catherine de Medici put the garden in during the 1500s. They’ve held up pretty well, don’t you think? The Arc de triomphe du Carrousel is over there.” Will jerked his head in its direction.
Leroy noted that Will had a tolerable French accent, but not as good as his. Turning to follow Will’s gesture, he noticed two black clad men following them.
“A couple of guys are following us,” he whispered.
“Six actually. I rented the apartments above, below, and all around us. Hannah’s European staff is on duty. She’ll be here in a few hours.”
“Is this conference dangerous?”
“To my pride, mostly. But I’m exposed. The guys at this meeting aren’t friends. If someone wants to kill me, now’s the time.”
“Should you be walking on the street like this?”
“No. But I like Paris. I’ve got to do stupid things once in a while. Most of the time, I feel like a fucking French poodle, locked up in a cage.”
They had reached an elaborate building, not too tall with kind of a loaf shape on top. The roof “loaf” looked like it was glass. A colonnade of arcs ran along the street for a whole block.
Leroy sucked in a deep breath as they walked through the very large revolving door, thankful for every English country house, palace and museum he’d visited. This hotel would be intolerable if he had hadn’t gone to all those places.
“It’s a world-class hotel, Leroy. Royalty stays here, and heads of state. Everyone from the composer Tchaikovsky to Queen Elizabeth has camped out at Le Meurice.
“We’re holding the meeting here so we can demonstrate we’re world-class. We have our annual meetings all over the globe, but it’s hard to top this.”
They walked down a wide gallery that ran the length of the hotel. The check-in desks were to his left, as elegant as the rest of the vast space. The arched windows to the outside were to his right. The hotel was gorgeous. High, high ceilings, big stripes of marble running up the walls. Everything that could be gold-trimmed was. The designs on some of the rugs were pretty weird, like drunken amoebas. Some light fixtures were like that too.
“Salvador Dali used to hang out here for a month every summer. A lot of the hotel’s design relates to his work. Do you know Dali?”
“Yeah. Melting clocks.” Leroy felt like he was being quizzed, but not so that it bothered him.
“I expect my people have drilled you up the wazoo.” They made their way across the marble-floored expanse. The window arches that ran down the hall looked out on the Tuileries garden. You couldn’t see much now, but it must be beautiful in the daytime.
“This is Le Dali, one of the hotel’s restaurants,” Will walked to a wide opening. Beyond it was a big open space adjoining the promenade. The restaurant was furnished with sculptured metal chairs and tables with dazzling white tablecloths.
“This is their informal restaurant. I’d take you here, but I can’t.” Will looked a little wistful, gazing at the open room. They walked on. “I can’t take you here, either.” Will stuck his head into a room as fancy as any Leroy had seen. More marble and paintings of pastel-clothed people in a garden, swinging and playing like adults never would. The white linen tablecloths fell to the floor. The tables were set farther apart than a regular restaurant; the place would never be crowded.
“This is their formal restaurant. All the art work is original to the building, which was built in the late 1800s, I think.” Will patted Leroy’s shoulder. “We’re going this way.”
A tuxedo-clad man, too grand and formal to be a waiter, led them through a passage and into an elegant room at the end. A single dining table was set for them. “I trust this will do, Mr. Duane.”
“Certainly,” Will tried to speak French, but his accent was lousy.
A waiter in black livery seated them. Will spread his napkin on his lap and Leroy followed suit.
“I can’t tell you how much I’d like to go to MacDonald’s,” Will confided. “I can’t. Some jerk with the only Numo Ranger in the world that doesn’t work would corral me. Or someone who thinks I should have solved the problems of the world instead of living like I do will start screaming. Or worse …”
Leroy listened to Will. He hadn’t thought of any of this. “You’ve been attacked?”
“Oh, yeah. Hassled, shoved around. They almost got me a couple of times.” He pointed at his ribs. “Hannah makes me wear Kevlar when I’m in public. She’s right. I’ve gotten a couple of bullet holes from not following her advice.”
Will’s eyes made a fast circuit around the room, obviously a habit, before boring into Leroy’s. “They tried to kidnap Kathryn and Cass. My security men were following them, thank God. But they weren’t good enough. The bad guys already had Cass into the van. She was a little kid. They lured her with a box of kittens. The other one was manhandling Kathryn. She was drunk, as usual. A perfect patsy.
“That’s when I hired Hannah and gave her free rein. She runs her missions her way. Easier for me, I don’t know anything I shouldn’t.” He indicated the sumptuous room. “We get to eat in a private dining room instead of with everyone else. Hannah will have a fit when she finds out. But she’s not here yet.”
The food was delicious, perhaps the best he’d had on his trip. Will tried to order in French, but Leroy spoke the language better than his boss. He ordered for them. They ate their way forward, course after course.
Finally, a full belly slowed Will down enough so that Leroy could get him to talk about what he wanted. “How’s Cass?” Every time he’d spoken to Will, he’d asked about Cass, but Leroy never got the full picture. Just, “She’s doing fine. No problems.” Now, he wanted to know everything.
Will sat back, heaved a huge sigh and wiped his mouth with his napkin. “We’ve hit a snafu. Her bulimia kicked in.” Leroy didn’t know what that was.
“It’s an eating disorder. The person with the disorder feels ugly and fat, so she—it’s almost always a she—throws up after she gets a decent meal. Or maybe, any kind of a meal. The minute she started looking like a semi-normal woman, Cass made herself throw up. The hospital won’t let her go until she’s got her eating under control. She thinks she looks like a pig.
“Cass is 5’ 9”. She could weigh 160 pounds and not be overweight. Do you know how much she weighed when she got to the hospital?” Leroy shook his head.
“Eighty-seven pounds. She was barely alive. They got her up to 120 and all hell broke loose. They want to keep her until she stops throwing up and weighs 130. So—we’ve got a couple of months to wait. She was doing so well until all this came up, I don’t think she’ll be in the mental hospital for more than a month or two.”
“You’re still going to put her there?”
“Oh, yes. Leroy, you are a newcomer to our lives. You don’t know what Cass is capable of. I’m not going to let a few months of good behavior fool me into thinking she’s healed.”
Leroy kept his mouth shut. He knew he could heal her, but he’d have to ride rough-shod over her father to get to her. Carl had said that Cass was burning for him too. In a while, she’d bust loose from the hospital and come after him. That wasn’t a good idea. In the hospital, she was safe. Hannah’s soldiers would watch out for her. He needed to trust the Great One and all of Its soldiers to make this work out right.
“What do you want to do for a couple of months, Leroy? I think you should plan on coming home for Christmas,
but you’ve got some time to kill. My meeting will be over on October 20th. You’ve got two months to fill. Do you want more language school?”
Leroy raised his hand in defense. “Please, no.”
Will smiled. “What do you want to do?”
Leroy leaned forward and whispered. “What’s a debutante ball? I got invited to one.”
“Which one?”
“The Queen Charlotte’s Ball in London. It’s next weekend, October 25th.”
“Boy, you scored a big one.” Will shook his head ruefully, smiling enigmatically. “I can remember escorting the debs. Those were the days. Who are you escorting?”
“Lord Martingale’s daughter, Lady Clarissa. I met him golfing. She’s Lord Ballentyne’s niece, too. He asked me to escort her, and I said I would.” Leroy felt embarrassed to be going to such an event. He had no idea why Lady Arabella had wanted him to help her cousin “come out.” He was also embarrassed for another reason.
“Will, what’s a debutante ball?” Leroy leaned forward, whispering furtively.
Will rocked back in his chair and chuckled. “A debutante ball is part of an elaborate, upper class, puberty ritual. It’s when a young woman makes her début in society—when her parents chuck her out into their rarified world, signaling that she’s ripe for marriage.
“It’s as archaic as horses and buggies, yet ‘coming out’ endures. Everyone knows if a family can afford to ‘bring out’ their daughter in style—the whole spectacle costs a bundle—she’s got the chops to make her worth marrying. Financial chops, anyway.”
A look Leroy hadn’t seen on Will before crept onto his face. A smirk. A bad boy grin.
“I’ve been to so many debutante balls. I was the most desirable escort in the world for years. Even now I get asked once in a while.” The grin blossomed. “Some of the mothers wanted me to escort them. I did, and their daughters too. You’d be surprised at how attractive being the richest man on the planet makes you.”
Will’s grin effervesced. “God, those were the days. I did ‘em all. Lined ‘em up and fucked my way down the line.” He leaned toward Leroy as though imparting a secret. “When they see you, there’s going to be a stampede. You are prime beefcake, Leroy. Top of the line dick. It’s time for you to cash in on what you’ve got.” Leroy’s nostrils flared and he pulled away from his host, eyes growing wider with Will’s every word.
“Son, if you want to sample a few of those rich little tarts, go ahead. It won’t bother me at all. You and Cass can get together when the time comes, and you’ll have some delicious memories.”
Leroy pushed his chair away from the table and jumped up.
“It’s not OK with me,” he said to his prospective father-in-law. Leroy could feel his cheeks redden and his heart pound. He’d heard about how Will was with women, but never like this. If what Will said was true, and Leroy knew it was, he was disgusting.
Will registered his loathing. “Sit down, Leroy. I don’t know why I say things like that. People, the men at Numenon, and everywhere, thought I was the coolest thing in the world when I was running around. But I don’t think it’s cool now and I don’t do it any more either.
“I did fuck all those pop-tarts all those years. I’m not proud of myself.” He looked down, putting his hands in his lap to hide their shaking. “I haven’t been like that for years. I met a friend of Elizabeth Bright Eagle’s, a healer, and she didn’t allow ‘acting out.’ Long story. She dumped me.
“But that’s how I ended up at the Meeting and met your grandfather. And fell in love with Elizabeth.” He made a little huffing noise. “I’m lucky with money, but not with love.” Will’s face seemed carved from granite. Lines spelling sadness dropped from his nose to the corners of his mouth.
Leroy looked up as Hannah Hehrman stormed into the room. She wore a black sequined jacket that dropped below her hips, a short black skirt and high heels. She still walked like a commando. Leroy saw the bulge of her pistol at her waist.
“What are you doing here, Will? Are you out of your mind?” She leaned over the table and skewered Will with her eyes. Her voice was low. Hearing it was like being hit with bullets from a silenced weapon. “Do you know who’s here? Diego Donatore.”
“Enzo’s brother? Donatore Industrial isn’t supposed to be at the conference.”
“It is now. One of the South Americans ‘got sick’ and your friends drafted Donatore to come. He’ll fight every word you have to say tomorrow, if he doesn’t kill you on the way back to the apartment.
“My men are outside, as are Donatore’s. But Donatore’s soldiers are not men. You know what they are: scaled monsters with acid venom and claws who can look human when they want. You saw them at the Meeting. You know all about them.
“It’s dark; they can take their reptilian forms. Conveniently, there’s a park across the street where they can hide.” Hannah grabbed Will’s elbow and dragged him out of his seat. “How could you be so foolish?”
Hannah kept spitting her bullets as she dragged Will toward the hotel entrance. “Now all we need to do is get back to our hotel with monsters chasing us. Monsters that can’t be killed.”
22
A Walk by the Park
Leroy watched Hannah carefully as she crossed the lobby in front of him. She stalked with her knees bent, covering ground like a tracking cat. She scanned the gigantic hall, head moving from side to side in barely perceptible arcs. Her hands moved repeatedly to the bulge on her waist as though they were out of her control. She wanted to pull her weapon out. Not here. Not in the vast promenade that was the entrance to the Hotel Le Meurice.
The main entrance, a very large rotating door, was exactly in the middle of the foyer. If they left from there, they’d have to walk an additional half block on Rue de Rivoli, the street fronting Le Meurice, exposed to whatever lurked in the park across the boulevard.
The three of them made for the far end of the esplanade. Another entrance was there, but something had changed while Will and Leroy had been eating dinner. A shiny black concert grand piano sat in front of the door. Someone very good was playing it.
The hotel had put chairs out, arranged in rows like a small concert. Every chair was taken. Le Meurice was known for the comforts it provided guests. Cushy chairs and seating areas were arranged from one end of the hall to the other. They were packed with people, especially the groupings closest to the recital. Waiters served drinks and appetizers.
Leroy saw a red dot flash on the wall behind the check-in area. Someone outside was using an automatic scope, sighting on Will’s white hair. His head was a bright target.
“Will, we must run,” Hannah said, turning around to grab his hand.
“Did you see it?”
“Yes.”
“We can’t go out the door at the end,” Leroy said. “If they start shooting, the bullets will come right through the glass. Those people will be killed.”
Hannah sucked in a breath and looked around. “Where can we go?”
“They must have an exit on the side of the building. For employees.” Leroy said, walking toward the end of the check-in desk.
Hannah beat him, dragging Will by the wrist. She barked at the attendant, “We must leave the hotel very fast. Is very important.” Leroy smiled. With her Israeli accent, Hannah murdered French worse than Will did.
Will tried next. “Is there an exit to the street back there?” He pointed at the doorway at the end of the long registration desk. “What’s over there? Can we get out there?”
The clerk’s French was impeccable. Leroy could see that Will understood it, but could not reproduce it. “Guests are not allowed through that door. Only staff.” Will was about to offer a small fortune if the guy let them out. The clerk anticipated that. “Even if you were to give me all the money in the world, I could not let you through that door. See,” he pointed to a camera above the doorframe, aimed in their direction. “Things have been stolen …”
Leroy leaned against the registration desk.
He spoke to the clerk in his very good French, grinning with a close approximation of Will’s bad-boy grin. He drawled, “They need to get out of here because her husband just walked into Le Dali. He was with his mistress, of course. But husbands never take this sort of thing well.” Leroy nodded his head to Hannah and Will. Hannah continued to clutch Will’s arm. “Her husband carries a firearm, from his time in the Legion. I would get them out of here so that none of those good people are hurt.”
The clerk’s eyes widened. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I just did. They don’t speak French well enough to explain. Or maybe they don’t want to.”
The whites of the fellow’s eyes flashed. “Come with me.” He raised the wooden counter top and they slipped through. He took them to the door with the camera over it and opened the elaborate lock. “Go there. Follow the hallway. There’s a freight receiving area. The metal door opens to the outside.”
The passageway ended in a bay that must have been used to receive guests’ luggage and packages, as well as small hotel necessities. It was too small to be a general freight access. They lifted the metal roll-up door and found themselves on Rue de Castiglione, the street that ran at ninety degrees to Rue de Rivoli.
“Stay back,” Hannah barked at Will.
He had no intention of lagging. “No. We’re in danger because of me.” He pushed forward, jogging even with her.
Hannah looked up and down the street. “Where are my soldiers? They should be here.”
“We’ll come upon them bye and bye,” Leroy said. “The problem is—which way should we go?” The door had dumped them out halfway down the block from the Rue di Rivoli where the Le Meurice’s front entrance was located. To get back to their apartment, they’d have to go back that half block toward the front of the Le Meurice, and then turn right for another block, exposed to the shooters in the garden.
In Love by Christmas: A Paranormal Romance Page 17
