Beautiful Beast (Gypsy Heroes)

by Le Carre, Georgia

  ‘Are you going to stand there all day staring at me?’ he teases.

  I flush all over. I am so distracted by his big, golden body, it is embarrassing. ‘I’m sure I wouldn’t be the first one,’ I mutter, taking a step back.

  ‘Give me ten minutes to finish up here.’ He raises one glorious eyebrow. God, how good-looking is this guy? ‘Want to have that swim or maybe walk around the garden before breakfast?’

  ‘OK,’ I say unsteadily, and am turning away when his hand catches my arm.

  I look up into his face. His eyes are crinkled up against the sun and flame blue in his tanned face. ‘You look beautiful this morning. I could stand here all morning staring at you,’ he says softly.

  I can’t help it: the heat creeps up from my throat and up to my cheeks. Suddenly, the desire in my head is out in the open, in the darkening of his eyes, in the tightening of his jaw.

  ‘Now, on your way, before I throw you on the ground and show the rabbits how it’s done.’

  I stumble away quickly. When I am halfway to the house, I turn around and see him standing where I had left him, just staring at me. After that, I don’t turn around anymore.

  Once past the house, I decide not to swim but to explore the gardens. An elderly man in faded clothes and a battered hat is trimming some bushes in the far corner of the property. He lifts his hand to me in a wave, and I return the greeting absent-mindedly. I guide my feet out beyond the garden, which is haphazardly crammed with all kinds of flowering plants.

  There are butterflies and birds aplenty, but it is not the kind of properly manicured garden I would have expected for a house like this. Still, it has a charm all its own. The type of charm that sinking rusty old tram cars in the ocean produces after ten years. That’s when it becomes a gloriously colorful reef and the home of hundreds of diverse schools of fish.

  As I walk through the garden, I sense the true elegance of allowing nature to take its own course. It is like being in a lost, secret garden. In some places the weeds are taking over, but, even then, there is rich beauty to it. Bushes and creepers have been deliberately allowed to become overgrown to help bury the vulgarity of superfluous statues and stone arches. A sort of balancing of scales.

  I like it, but it makes me wonder why someone would buy a stupendously beautiful, but totally nouveau riche chateau like Saumur and allow the grounds to go their own wild way like this.

  A fat, ash-gray cat with yellow eyes comes and meows by my feet. I reach down and tickle her behind her ears. She rubs her head against my legs before wandering away to curl up on an old, sunlit bench.

  As I venture farther, I realize that some of the property is thickly planted with bushes and low-hanging trees, but that a great part of it is pure meadow. Not far away I can see a wide expanse of water glistening in the sun. There is a Moroccan style tent by the edge of the water. Inside there is a bed with lots of jewel-bright red and green cushions.

  For a while I sit at the edge of the water and look out at the glinting surface. It is serene and peaceful, but my mind is in turmoil. I have never wanted anybody the way I want Shane, but I am not a free agent … yet. Lenny is still in the picture, and it would be wrong and ugly of me to betray him, and … yet, I want Shane. The desire is so strong I don’t think I will be able to resist it for much longer.

  But, as I sit motionless and contemplate the silent beauty of the water, a profound transformation takes place in me. There are no mobile phones, no police sirens, no car horns, no emails, no birthdays to forget, no queues, no terrorists, no wars. All the stress, noise, fears and distractions that form part of my everyday life seem to belong to a different world.

  The sun warms my skin and reflects off the water, and still beauty and peace in the air trigger ancient genes that humans must share with all the other creatures we have evolved with. My body relaxes, my pulse slows, my body feels charged, and I feel as if I have come home.

  I hear my name being called and turn around to see Shane walking toward me. Freshly showered, he has changed into a clean T-shirt and blue jeans. His hair is still wet. With the sun behind him, I can’t see the expression on his face.

  I stand and brush my bottom with my hands. ‘The lake is beautiful,’ I say.

  ‘Well, I like it.’

  ‘Why have you allowed the place to go to seed like this?’

  He looks down at me. ‘I bought this place only because I heard of the sightings nearby of fireflies. And then I set about making the environment irresistible to them. They love moisture, tall grasses and low-hanging trees that they can hide in during the day, and an abundance of insects, slugs, and snails.’

  ‘Will we see them tonight?’

  ‘I’ll be very disappointed if we don’t. We’ll come out after dinner. They’re usually around about nine-ish.’

  ‘You really love them, don’t you?’

  He grins. ‘My madness is I have no time for things that have no soul.’

  ‘Actually,’ I admit, ‘I like it wild and overgrown too.’

  ‘Then you’ll definitely like the owner of this place.’

  ‘Is he the one who’s built like a god?’ I ask cheekily. Being cheeky with a man is something I would never have done before I met him. I’m the boring one. Never say boo to a cat.

  ‘That’s the one,’ he says, and something in his eyes lights up.

  I laugh, and in that moment I’m not the girl with the terrible past. I’m just a girl flirting with an irresistibly sexy man.

  Thirteen

  SNOW

  We have breakfast at a rickety wooden table under the shade of a massive old oak tree. There are croissants, pastries, cold country butter, homemade jams, and slices of watermelon. An unsmiling Madam Chevalier pours thick, strong coffee into small cups for us. It is too bitter for me, but Shane has no trouble downing his. I decide to stick with orange juice. When she goes back into the house, I whisper to Shane, ‘Is she in a bad mood?’

  ‘Nope. She’s always like that,’ he says unconcernedly, and bites cleanly into a croissant.

  ‘Really? Why?’

  He shrugs. ‘Fuck knows. Probably disapproves of what I’m doing to the grounds.’

  I stare at him. ‘And you don’t mind?’

  ‘Snow,’ he explains patiently, ‘this woman cooks using a recipe book that is one hundred years old. As far as I’m concerned, she can be as sour as she likes. Don’t judge until you try her Soupe à l’Oignon Gratinée.’

  I shake my head. ‘I don’t care how good a cook she is; I don’t think I could ever live with disapproving staff.’

  He grins roguishly. ‘Here’s something you might not yet have picked up: Madam secretly likes me.’

  ‘Shane Eden, you are incorrigible.’

  ‘I’ll take that as a compliment,’ he says with a low chuckle.

  After breakfast, the elderly man I had seen pruning the bushes ambles toward us with a hearty smile plastered to his ruddy face. Shane introduces us, then tells me that Monsieur Chevalier is taking us to Cannes’ indoor market. He is a much friendlier chap than his wife, and, because he doesn’t speak a word of English and Shane’s French seems to be pretty basic, he compensates with a lot of nodding and grinning. We get into his beat-up truck and he drives us to Forville Market.

  It is a large red-brown building that oddly reminds me of the Red Fort in Delhi. Inside, it is vast and cool. Vibrant with shoppers and a seemingly inexhaustible array of produce, it is a treat for the senses. There are stalls dedicated just to mushrooms! All kinds, shapes, colors, and scents. Other stalls specialize in dried meats, fruit, flowers, vegetables, cheese, wine, olives, pastries, bread, spices, honey. And everything looks so fresh and clearly locally produced. It is the opposite of the sterile environment of the supermarket where everything is sanitized, homogenized, and sold under a plastic covering.

  Shane buys the ingredients for our dinner: a rack of lamb, baguette sticks, onions, vegetables, pineapple. The sellers all seem to know and like him. One asks about the
fireflies and says he wants to bring his son to see them during the week. He tells Shane mournfully that the fireflies have stopped coming to his land. He blames the pesticides.

  When we get outside, Monsieur Chevalier packs everything into the back of his truck. The plan is for him to drop us off at Le Suquet, a quirky, hilly town overlooking a harbor, before setting off to Saumur to deposit the market produce with his wife.

  Le Suquet is the old part of the city so it is full of quaint, narrow streets full of old-fashioned shops. It is charming, and I fall in love with it, but it is here that I notice that women simply can’t stop staring at Shane. Everywhere we go, he gets ogled at. And I mean really ogled at. When we stop at a little café with tables spilling out into the sideway and order pissaladière, a beautifully simple and delicious pizza with onion, olives, and anchovies, the waitress actually totally ignores me, and flirts outrageously with Shane.

  ‘Are you a model?’ she asks him in English.

  He says something to her in French, which makes her glance at me, shrug, and start taking the order.

  ‘Well,’ I say when she walks away, ‘she certainly thinks you’re God’s gift.’

  He crosses his arms. ‘Says the woman who’s got most of the population of Le Suquet staring at her like zombies with working dicks.’

  I snort. ‘Zombies with working dicks? Excuse me? There were girls walking backwards after they passed us just to keep admiring the other side of you.’

  ‘Well, darling, while you were looking at the women walking backwards, I’ve had to endure the painful sight of men blatantly stripping you with their fucking eyes.’

  I lean back. ‘You’re serious?’

  ‘Damn right I am. It’s fucking annoying.’

  My eyes widen. Can it really be that Shane Eden is jealous? The thought is like a bolt of lightning in my heart. ‘Are you jealous?’ I ask incredulously.

  ‘Yes,’ he admits gloomily.

  ‘I love it when you look all brooding and moody. It’s kinda sexy.’

  He perks up. ‘Did I just hear you describe me as sexy?’

  ‘Yeah, I think I might have.’

  ‘Well, that’s what’s called progress.’ His voice is warm and full of laughter.

  ‘By the way, what did you tell the waitress just now that made her look at me?’ I say casually, taking a sip of my perfectly chilled rosé.

  ‘I told her I was gay but that she was welcome to you.’

  I almost choke on my drink. ‘What?’ I burst out.

  He laughs.

  ‘You don’t care if people think you’re gay?’

  ‘Nope. It’s extremely useful in certain circumstances.’

  ‘Couldn’t you have just told her you weren’t interested?’

  ‘Girls like her don’t give up easy; she’d have been slipping her phone number into my hand as we left. And that would have just made you get all jealous and pissed off.’

  ‘I’m not jealous,’ I deny.

  ‘Oh, you’re jealous all right, Elizabeth Snow Dilshaw. You’re the kind of woman who would try to make a man wear a chastity belt.’

  His statement surprises me. He hardly knows me. ‘What makes you say that?’ I ask curiously.

  His eyes are like mirrors, giving nothing away. ‘Experience,’ he says cryptically.

  ‘Well, you’re wrong. I have never been jealous in my life. Not with Lenny, and certainly not with you. In fact, I found it amusing that all those women were looking at you.’

  ‘That’s really great to know, because they don’t make chastity belts in my size.’ He grins. ‘Too large.’

  ‘I wouldn’t have cared if the waitress had slipped you her number,’ I say.

  There is mischief in his face as he reaches out, grasps my wrist, and strokes it with what seems to be a seductive promise. It is intimate, delicious, and wonderful. Pleasure ripples over my skin, sizzles into my muscles, and instantly I feel strong desire swirl inside me like dead leaves picked up by the wind and helplessly drawn into another’s world.

  The expression in Shane’s eyes changes, becomes so lust-drenched that I am undone by the look. I lick my lips. And we find ourselves lost in our own world. We stare at each other hungrily. Desire shimmering between us like some invisible magic. My blood heats up and I feel wetness pooling between my legs. God, it never crossed my mind that I could be so sexually aroused while sitting in a restaurant just looking at a man.

  The waitress comes with the food, and, standing over us, clears her throat loudly.

  I snatch my hand away. She plonks the pizza in the middle of the table, slaps a small plate in front of each of us, and stalks off.

  I giggle at Shane.

  ‘I told you what she’s like,’ he says.

  We both laugh.

  The pizza is beautifully simple and delicious. Once Shane has paid our bill, we walk out and start walking uphill. It is hot, and the hill is steep, but we get to the top. We stand outside the majestic old church, Notre-Dame d’Espérance, and look down at the stunning view over the bay.

  ‘Want to go into the church?’ Shane asks.

  ‘OK.’

  We pass through the old doors, and inside it feels like we have entered a different world. Even the air is cold enough to make me shiver. The stone walls give the impression of damp chill, and the air is hushed and still. Our footsteps echo. Afternoon sunlight falls dustily from high stained-glass windows into the dim interior and lays in milky shapes of color on the floor. It is deserted except for a woman with a black shawl on her head, bowed in prayer in one of the front pews. She does not turn to look at us. I look at the vast, high-ceilinged space in awe.

  ‘Vellichor much?’ Shane whispers next to me.

  I glance up at him. ‘No, I love it. This is far better than any used bookshop.’

  He looks at me strangely. ‘Are you messing with me?’

  ‘No, I’m serious. Ever since this place was built, people have been coming here bringing all their pain, sadness, hopes, gratitude, and joy. The stones have absorbed it. Hundreds of years of human emotion. Can you not feel it?’

  He stands very still for a few moments, then looks down at me. ‘Nope.’

  ‘Shame,’ I whisper, and move forward.

  He follows me. ‘Have you never been to a church before?’

  ‘No. My mother is a non-practicing Christian so she never took us to church. However, I begged and harassed my nanny until she gave in and took me to the temple with her in secret.’

  ‘How old were you then?’

  ‘My first trip was when I was five.’

  ‘Are you a Hindu then?’

  ‘No. As a child I didn’t go to temple to pray. I just loved my nanny so much, I couldn’t bear to be parted from her for any length of time. Plus, I enjoyed the trip because it was colorful and the priest allowed me to ring the bell.’

  We find ourselves at a side altar with burning candles, and Shane turns to me. ‘Do you want to light a candle?’

  ‘What does it signify?’

  ‘It’s a symbol of your prayer that carries on burning even after you are gone.’

  I remember Chitra lighting oil lamps and asking her why she was lighting them, and I still recall her answer. Sweet Chitra. I miss her so. ‘It is a way of asking for something from God. The fire lifts your prayer up to God,’ she said.

  I look up at Shane. ‘Yes, I’d like to leave a prayer here.’

  He drops a note into the donation box slot and takes two candles out. He passes one to me, and we stand side by side and light our candles solemnly. I watch Shane place his in its holder, and I close my eyes and pray. I pray like I’ve never prayed. I pray to any god, Hindu or Christian, who will listen. I ask the stones to absorb my prayer and keep it safe after I am gone and even when the candle burns out. I pray for a bright, silent intercession from the heavens that my actions harm neither Lenny nor Shane.

  I open my eyes and see another candle about to sputter out. It seems to grasp desperately for its last br
eaths of life. I cannot watch it die. I look up at Shane. He is watching me avidly. ‘Can we buy another candle?’

  His eyebrows rise, but he puts another note into the box and takes another candle out and gives it to me. I light the candle using the fire of the prayer that is about to sputter out, and plant it next to it. I watch the new flame take over and then I turn to Shane and smile. ‘Shall we go?’

  We go out into the afternoon air. It is warm and full of the smell of the sea.

  ‘Feel like an ice cream?’ he asks.

  ‘Lead the way, sir.’

  ‘Step this way, madam, for the best ice cream ever,’ he says when we reach a sweet little shop with a green and yellow signboard and cast iron metal tables and chairs outside. There is a bell at the door that chimes prettily when we enter the shop. It is obviously a mom and pop business. The ice cream counter curves around the entire shop in the shape of a U. A man with a walrus mustache is standing behind it. He knows Shane, and talks to him in French.

  ‘You can have as many flavors as you want in a cone,’ Shane tells me.

  There are so many unusual flavors it is difficult to choose, but in the end I decide on four different types of chocolate: Ecuadorean dark chocolate, Mexican chocolate with cinnamon, Rocky Road, and white chocolate with ginger. Shane has salted Turkish pistachio, grape nut and black raspberry. Shane pays for our ice creams, the man gives us napkins, and we carry our treasures out into the sunshine to sit at one of the tables outside. I carefully lick the white chocolate ginger bit first. It is delicious.

  ‘Good?’ he asks.

  ‘Very,’ I say looking up at him through my lashes.

  ‘Are you flirting with me, little rabbit?’ he asks, his lips covered in ice cream.

  I remember how they felt and tasted last night, and feel a rush of something through my body—what, I do not know, but it is exciting. I like that about him. The way he makes me feel so alive. ‘Maybe,’ I say boldly.