“I’ve gone out with a few women over the years,” he said to her honestly. He didn’t want to go on lying to her, and she was old enough now to know. It felt much better to be truthful. “But none of them meant anything to me,” he went on, “so I didn’t introduce them to you. But Natalie is different.”
“How?” Heloise looked panicked as she met her father’s eyes. She didn’t want to give up her place to someone else. “We have something special together. Why ruin it?”
“Natalie can’t ruin it,” Hugues said gently. He wanted to cross the room to hug her, but he didn’t. She looked like she wanted space and distance, so he respected it. “Besides, you just lived with François in Paris. Why can’t I have someone in my life?”
She looked even more panicked then. Natalie was even young enough to have a baby, although Heloise hoped she wouldn’t. She didn’t point out that he was fifty-three years old and Natalie was thirteen years younger. Heloise looked devastated but remained polite. She seemed shell-shocked.
Her father spoke quietly to her then. “We had some wonderful years together alone, and I wouldn’t trade them for anything in the world. But you’ve grown up. You just lived with a man for six months, and I didn’t complain about it, although it worried me. I thought you had a right to make your own decisions. Please respect mine. Natalie and I have a very nice relationship and she’s not going to take anything away from you.”
But she already had. Heloise knew that she had lost a part of her father to her. Things weren’t the same. She was no longer the only woman in his life. She wanted to crawl back into the womb.
He spoke to her very clearly then, seeing all that she felt in her eyes. “You’re not going to lose me. You never could. No one is ever going to replace you. There is room for all of us here.” He said it with enormous love for her in his eyes.
“No, there isn’t!” she said with tears in hers. It was the worst shock she’d ever had, since she didn’t remember her mother leaving. “I’m going back to France,” she said, pacing around the room, and although he didn’t feel it, Hugues tried to appear calm.
“No, you’re not. You have an internship to do here. You won’t get your diploma without it. And besides, this is your home.”
“Well, it’s not hers. I don’t want to see her around here.”
“I’m not going to hide her from you, Heloise. I respect you both too much. I should have told you a year ago, and I didn’t. It was a big mistake, and I’m not going to do that again. I hope you’ll get used to the idea, and to Natalie. She wants to be your friend.”
“I have enough friends. I don’t need her. She’s twice my age.” He didn’t say anything and waited for her to calm down, and instead she grabbed her coat, turned to look at him, and said, “Thank you for ruining my life.” With tears running down her face, she ran out of the apartment and slammed the door. He was sure she was going to one of her friends to complain about him, but at least he had finally told her. Now she had to make the adjustment to Natalie being in his life. And he knew it might take her a while. He wasn’t shocked by what she said, just sad for her.
He called Natalie later that morning and repeated the conversation to her, without the comment about ruining her life. He had been true to his word. He had told Heloise at last and got the reaction he had expected. She was grateful it wasn’t worse.
“How is she?” Natalie asked, sounding worried. She hoped it hadn’t been too bad, for either of them.
“She’s very angry at the moment. And probably scared, and hurt. She’ll get over it. She just needs a little time.” He sounded confident and calm now that he had done it.
Heloise slept at a friend’s that night, and on Christmas she was still not speaking to him. Natalie was at her brother’s in Philadelphia, as she was every year for Christmas, so he didn’t ask her to join them, which was just as well. It was a very tense Christmas. Heloise refused to have dinner with him and worked at the front desk instead.
And the day after Christmas, Natalie came over when she got back to town. They were having dinner quietly in the apartment, when Heloise came in, saw her, stomped into her room, and slammed the door, without saying a word. The fear and hurt she felt had turned to rage. She looked like a tornado tearing through the suite, and she was acting like a child.
“Wow!” Natalie said softly. She could see why he hadn’t told her before. She was being anything but gracious about it. Heloise had spoken to several of her favorite people around the hotel, including Jennifer, and they had all said that Natalie was a kind person and good for her father, which made Heloise even more upset. She wanted them to hate her as much as she did, but no one would sign on. She was alone in the fight, and they all thought that it was time he had a serious woman in his life again. Heloise thought they were all traitors and hated them too. But she hated her father most of all, for the ultimate betrayal of replacing her. She had no intention of sharing him with Natalie or anyone else. He was hers.
“She’ll be all right,” Hugues tried to reassure Natalie, but she was upset too. She hadn’t wanted to destroy his family, or the relationship he had with his only child. But there was nothing they could do now except wait out the storm. And it looked like it was going to be a long wait.
The next day Heloise left to go skiing in Vermont with friends. And she said not a word to him when she left. In a way it was easier that she had gone away for a few days. Natalie could stay with him, and they could spend New Year’s Eve together in peace. They had no particular plans other than being together, and Natalie was worried now that she might be ruining his life.
“Do you want me to get out of your life again?” she asked him, feeling guilty for the trouble she’d caused.
“No, I don’t!” he said sternly. “I did this for us, and it’s the right thing to do. Now help me see it through. You can’t just bail out of the boat the first time we hit a wave.” She nodded and didn’t know what to do to calm things down, other than support him and wait it out.
“Do you suppose she’ll ever give me a chance?” Natalie asked him, looking anxious.
“Not for a while. She was always a very stubborn child, and she hasn’t changed. The storm will have to blow itself out. And I’m sure it’ll be pretty unpleasant for a time.” He put an arm around her and kissed her. And as much as he had feared Heloise’s reaction for the last year, he was ready for it now and willing to endure it. It was Natalie who looked scared.
When they went to bed, she tossed and turned for most of the night, and she looked tired the next morning.
“Try to stop worrying about it. We just need to give it time,” he said firmly.
Natalie finally relaxed on New Year’s Eve, and they spent a wonderful evening together, watching old movies and drinking champagne. Hugues had tried to call Heloise to wish her a happy new year, as he always did, but she didn’t answer her phone. He left her a voice mail and sent a text message. Natalie was amazed at how calm he was. Now that he had finally told her, he was fine. And he refused to talk about it that night. The evening was theirs.
Much to everyone’s amazement, Heloise was still angry when she came back. More so than ever. He had betrayed her, in her eyes, and betrayal was something she couldn’t forgive. She started her job at the front desk two days after New Year’s, and she scowled at her father whenever she saw him. He gave her plenty of space and didn’t force the issue. She had the information she needed, that Natalie was part of his life now. She had to get used to it, whether she liked it or not.
She didn’t relent for all of January and barely said two words to him in five weeks and ignored Natalie entirely. Hugues was a little discouraged by then. He wondered how long she could continue the vendetta. Apparently a very long time. Jennifer tried to talk to her too, to no avail. Heloise didn’t want to hear it, from her or anyone else. She said she hated Natalie and that was it. But Jennifer dared to disagree.
“This isn’t the temporary catering manager flirting with your father and sle
eping with the sous chef in the freezer,” she reminded her. The reference actually made Heloise smile. She had forgotten about Hilary. “Natalie is a decent woman. She won’t give you a hard time. And she’s not trying to take him away from you. You should give her a chance.”
“Why? I don’t need a mother. I have one. And I don’t want to share my father with her.” It was honest at least, although she sounded about five years old, which was part of the problem. In some ways she still was. She was acting immature and spoiled. And Jennifer told her so, which made her even more furious. Jennifer told her she wasn’t being reasonable, and that she was better than that. Heloise stormed off in a huff and went back to the desk, where she was doing a very good job. Her father was pleased to hear it and giving her a wide berth. Natalie was staying away from the hotel when Heloise was there.
At the beginning of February, Heloise was still angry and upset, Natalie was a nervous wreck, and Hugues was getting a little tired of it all. Natalie kept offering to leave him, Heloise would have loved it if she did, and he wanted them both to calm down. He reported to Jennifer about it every morning, and she kept telling him to hang in and be patient. He said he was.
“Why don’t you just marry her then?” Jennifer said one morning. “You might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb. If Heloise is this mad, she’ll just get mad all over again if the two of you ever get married. Why not get it over with all at once? And then Natalie can just move in.” He hadn’t shown Heloise her new apartment. He didn’t want to spoil it by doing it when she was so angry. He wanted her to enjoy it and was waiting for her to settle down, and she hadn’t yet. And it was beginning to look like she never would. But he liked Jennifer’s idea and thought about it for a few days. Maybe she had a point. Heloise was already mad and had been for nearly two months. What difference would it make? And he loved the idea of spending the rest of his life with Natalie. They had talked about it a few times, before the furor began when Heloise got home.
He didn’t say anything to anyone, and he bought Heloise a beautiful red Givenchy coat for Valentine’s Day and gave it to her at breakfast. He could tell that she was tempted to give it back to him, but instead she opened it with a surly expression that melted when she saw the coat.
“Papa, I love it!” she said, and looked like her old self for about five minutes. He hugged her, and she put it on, and then she went back to her bedroom and slammed the door again. At least it had been a break in the clouds, which gave him hope. Maybe one day the hurricane would pass. Her relentless fury was getting old.
And that night he took Natalie to dinner at La Grenouille, which was her favorite restaurant, and then they went back to her place to talk, relax, and eventually make love. It had been a stressful two months for both of them. They were both working hard, and Heloise was making life miserable for them. He loved getting away from the hotel now, whenever he could, to be with Natalie and enjoy their time together in peace.
They were lying in bed afterward at her apartment, talking about Heloise again, and Hugues changed the subject. He didn’t want Natalie to get upset again. It was all they talked about now, most of the time, while they tried to guess how long it would take Heloise to relent about them. Maybe never, at the rate she was going. It had been a very long two months.
He was trying to tease Natalie to distract her, and kissed her, and then he looked at her with a worried expression, as though he saw something he didn’t like. “What’s that in your ear?” he asked her, and she looked scared for a minute.
“In my ear? Is there something in my ear?” She brushed her hand past it as though it might be a bug of some kind.
“There’s something in your ear,” he insisted, still frowning. “Let me have a look.” He peered into it, and she giggled. He was tickling her.
“What are you doing?”
“I think it’s stuck. Maybe I should get a pair of pliers or something.”
“Don’t be silly,” she said as she turned around and kissed him, which distracted him for a minute. He wanted to make love to her again, but there was something else he wanted to do first.
“Do you have a pair of pliers?”
“No, I don’t. And you’re not going to put a pair of pliers in my ear!”
“Oh, here it is! I got it! I knew there was something in there!” He handed something to her, and she didn’t know what it was at first, and she looked at it and stared in disbelief. It was a beautiful diamond solitaire. He had followed Jennifer’s suggestion and gone to Cartier that day. It was much larger than any engagement ring Natalie had ever dreamed of, and she looked at Hugues in amazement.
“Are you serious?”
“That looks like a very serious ring to me,” he said, laughing. “It’s a good thing I got it out. We might have had to cut off your ear to get to it.” And then he grew serious too. “Will you marry me, Natalie?” He slipped the ring on her finger as he asked her and then kissed her.
“Yes, I will,” she said when they came up for air. “I would even without the ring. I never expected anything like that.” That made it even more fun for him. He loved spoiling her. And she had earned it. She had waited a long time for him to do the right thing. And now he was doing more.
“When shall we get married?” he asked her, looking happy and relaxed as he lay next to her, and she was flashing the handsome diamond on her finger and grinning from ear to ear.
“I don’t know. Is tomorrow too soon? What if you change your mind?”
“I won’t.” He got quiet again for a minute. “I have to go to Heloise’s graduation in Lausanne in June, and by then I hope you’ll come with us. I’d like to give her a party when we get back and combine it with her twenty-first birthday. I don’t want to steal her thunder. What about July? How does that sound to you?”
“Perfect,” she said, as she turned and kissed him. The whole evening had been perfect. Their lovemaking, the proposal, the gorgeous ring. And a life with him forever. And then she looked worried again. “What are we going to tell Heloise?”
“That we’re getting married,” he said simply. “She hates me right now anyway. How much madder can she get?”
“Maybe a lot,” Natalie said, looking nervous.
“She’ll get over it.” He still believed that. And he had told Natalie when she came back to him that it was for good. And he was true to his word. “When she calms down, I’m going to ask her to be my witness.”
“I’ll ask my brother to give me away,” Natalie said happily. “Actually Heloise might like my nephew. He’s awfully cute. We can introduce them at the wedding.” She loved the sound of it as the words rolled off her tongue … ‘“at the wedding” … It was sheer bliss.
“That might help,” Hugues said, looking equally happy. “I assume we’ll have the reception in the ballroom?” he asked her.
“Of course. We could have a minister do it there.” She wasn’t particularly religious, and he was divorced, so it sounded right to both of them. It all did. The wedding. And the life that would come afterward. He had a life again. And he was going to have a wife who loved him. And one of these days, he might even have a daughter again too.
Chapter 16
HUGUES DECIDED TO speak to Heloise the next morning. After leaving Natalie at her apartment, he walked back to the hotel, saw Heloise at the front desk, and asked her to come into his office. He looked very official as he said it. She was standing at the desk in the navy suit that was the uniform for female desk clerks, and she came in to see him a few minutes later.
“Am I in trouble?” she asked, looking nervous, forgetting for a moment that she was angry at him. She wondered if she had done something wrong while working at the desk, or a guest had complained about her, but he shook his head and asked her to sit down.
“No, I probably am. But you’re already angry at me. I want to make it clear to you again that I love you, that no one ever could or will take your place. You’re my daughter. And there’s room for you and Natalie in my life. Th
ose are two very different roles. We had a crazy life for a long time, and we both loved it, with only the two of us. But you’re not going to stay alone forever, and I shouldn’t have to either. That’s not fair.” She was squirming in her seat as he said it. He looked at her quietly then and went on. “But since you’re so mad at me anyway, I figure I don’t have much to lose. I want you to be the first to know that I asked Natalie to marry me last night, and she accepted. I’d like you to be part of it. I want you to be my witness, instead of a best man. And no matter how mad at me you are, I love you. And I hope you give Natalie a chance and get to know her one day. We’re going to do it in July, after your graduation, which is a very big deal to me too.”
Heloise stared at him then, with a look of silent pain as tears rolled down her cheeks. “How can you do something like that? You always said you’d never get married again.” She couldn’t believe what he had just said and what he was planning to do. It was the worst news she’d ever had. And then she wanted to hurt him too.
“She’ll probably just walk out on you like Mom did,” she said with an angry look. Hugues made an effort not to react to what she said. He spoke to her quietly from across his desk.
“She’s a very different woman than your mother. I hope our marriage works, but if it doesn’t, it’ll probably be because I screw it up, not because she runs off with a rock star or anyone else. She’s a serious woman. Give her a chance. You might even get to like her too.”
Listening to him, Heloise looked sad. She was losing her father to a woman she hardly knew. She was sorry now that she had gone away to school. She was sure that if she had stayed it never would have happened. She looked heartbroken at his exciting news.
He stood up and came around the desk then, with a loving look at her. He could see how upset she was and spoke to her in a quiet tone. He had just had an idea and hoped the timing was right and that it might help. “Please go to the front desk and get the key to five-oh-two.” They walked out of his office together, and he waited for her at the elevator while she got the key from the front desk. She hadn’t asked him why. She was too upset. The assistant manager smiled when she took it. He had been wondering when her father was going to give it to her. It had been sitting empty for two months.
Hotel Vendome Page 18
