by Donna Alam
Hénri murmurs something into the microphone, kind of like the one at a McDonald’s drive-through. The gates swing slowly open, gravel crackling under the wheels as we follow the line of lush trees, lit by lanterns from below. Up ahead, the house—no, mansion—stands grand and imposing in the Belle Époque style. Something else I’ve learned since I moved to Monaco. A pale stucco front and mullioned windows, the building is all style and balanced aesthetic with Juliet balconies made of lacy ironwork. The car slows to a stop at the porticoed entryway. I’m not so green or uncultured to know I should wait for Hénri to open the rear passenger door. But when the door to the house doesn’t open, I find myself glancing back at him.
‘You must follow the path to the back of the house.’ His smile is encouraging, his manner almost avuncular despite being around my age. My heels sink into gaps between the gravel, now doubt being destroyed, but a little farther ahead, the tiny stones give way to paving edged by lanterns. Though it’s still light, dusk not appearing until late during the European summertime, leaves from the trees have darkened the sky above. As I round the house and the precisely trimmed greenery, breath catches in my throat, the space opening up to the most breathtaking view. I live pretty high above parts of Monaco myself, and the views are pretty spectacular, but there’s a starkness about them. A modern austerity. But not here. Lush greenery frames an azure infinity pool drawing the eye to the view beyond. And what a view. It stretches out for miles, high above the whole of Monaco and out to the Mediterranean beyond. Mountains stretch left and right framing gardens that are a riot of colours. It’s all so beautiful; it takes me a moment to remember why I’m here, but my feet begin to move again eventually.
Down a set of wide sandstone steps, the path splits in two; one way leads to the pool, the other to a pergola clasped in vines and divinely scented honeysuckle I can smell from here. I take the second option, drawn by the heavenly scent of the tiny blooms and the view. Oh, the view. Which includes a casually dressed Remy, which is a feast for the eyes. Dark loafers, navy shorts, and a light blue shirt, open at the neck, rolled at the sleeves, tan skin showing in all the places in between. Riviera chic.
His smile spreads rich and sweet like honey as I approach.
‘You made it.’ As I reach him, his hands find my shoulders, kisses pressed to each cheek. I try not to stiffen, and I think I manage mostly, until he pulls back, sweetness replaced with melancholy. ‘When on the French Riviera . . .’ The pause he left was long enough for me to understand his meaning.
‘Greetings come with kisses.’
‘But not always French ones.’
I find myself struggling to hide my smile and duck my head. In truth, it wasn’t his greeting that was startling; it was more his touch. The shock of his fingertips, the nearness of him. It somehow caught me off guard. Made me want.
‘Please, sit.’ He gestures to a refectory-style table; iron legs with a marble top, the table settings as fancy as any hotel. Ever the gentleman, he pulls out my chair before taking the seat opposite me. ‘Would you like a drink? Maybe a cocktail?’
A waiter materialises as though out of air, and drinks are ordered; a G&T for him and a mojito for me, a pot d'accueil, or a welcome drink. We don’t speak until the waiter withdraws.
‘You look beautiful, Rose. I could’ve watched you all night, standing at the top of the stairs.’
‘I think I almost stayed there,’ I say, brushing off the compliment, ‘the view is just like a peek at the heavens. It’s cooler up here, too.’
‘Too cool? Would you like the fire lit?’ He points to the outdoor hearth that gets very little use, judging by its condition. It’s filled with white stones, the mantel-shelf standing at least my height.
‘No, honestly. I’m fine. It’s kind of nice.’ Nice. Urgh. Shoot me now. Will our conversation be so stilted the whole evening? Given the choice between arguing and playing nice, I’d definitely choose the former. The latter I can do with anyone. ‘What’s the story with the house?’ I tilt my head back at the beautiful building behind us.
‘What do you mean?’ He brings his glass to his lips, his brows suspiciously high.
‘Why are we here? Is the place yours? Does it have a big cellar, and have I been kidnapped?’
He shakes his head, kind of like you do with small children when they do something adorable. ‘The house is mine, for a little while, at least. We are here for privacy and no. That doesn’t mean we’re hiding. As for a cellar, yes. But one with an extensive wine collection. Have you been kidnapped? I wish.’
‘Well, I’m kind of confused.’ And kind of wrong, I decide, as my lady parts decide to take an interest in the conversation.
‘And I am kind of besotted.’ I blush like a debutante with her first dance card at his words. My guess is it won’t be the last blush of the night. ‘But I draw the line at kidnapping.’
In front of us, the sky turns the colour of cotton candy and the sparse clouds like violets, as cocktails turn to our appetiser, and appetiser to entrée, or as they say in France, entrée to plat principal. I suppose it’s kind of a simple meal, though every morsel is served with the greatest of care and is utterly delicious from the peppery salad that I could totally make friends with—wafer-thin slices of radishes and tiny sweet tomatoes in a heavenly vinaigrette—to the main event of steak frites. Steak with fries by any other name, though if you were served portion sizes like this back home, I’m sure there would be complaints. But the fillet is melt-in-the-mouth tender, and the fries such a perfection of crisp and golden that it’s just as well there are less than a dozen on my plate. I think I could eat these until they came out of my ears. But the time we reach the cheese course, I’m coming to realise the reason for the tiny serves.
‘I chose a decent bottle of Beaujolais to pair with the cheese, or should we open the champagne?’ The sky has long since turned to night, a chandelier hanging above us, fiery lanterns dotted around the garden.
‘Are we celebrating?’ Did I mean to purr? I don’t think so, though the cicadas decide to join the chorus. At least, that’s not how this night is supposed to go. It must be the cheese. I do love me some cheese.
‘I think that’s up to you.’
‘I thought I was on the clock.’ His laughter, deep and rich, resounds across the space, so much so that I find myself playing my response back in my head. Nope, sounded correct; on the clock, not on the . . . you know what I mean. ‘What’s so funny?’
A deep breath. A sigh. His gaze falling over me, trailing fire in its wake. ‘Any night spent with you is cause for celebration.’
‘Maybe you’re just trying to get me drunk.’
‘Tempting, but no.’ His eyes, dark and glossy, dance with mischief.
‘I shouldn’t imagine you’ve ever had to get a woman tipsy to persuade her into bed.’
‘I don’t want a woman in my bed. I want you. Not just in my bed but my life.’
I glance around me, wondering how I can change the subject, wondering if I really want to when he takes pity on me, changing the subject as the waiter appears with champagne on a silver tray accompanied by two tall flutes. It’s like he read my mind. With a murmured thanks, Remy takes the bottle, the man drifting into the night like a ghost.
‘Have you visited the casino yet?’
‘Not yet,’ I answer, sure he means the Casino de Monte-Carlo, an icon of Monaco. He presses a napkin to the cork before beginning to twist the bottle. The cork releases with a decadent hiss.
‘You’ve done that before.’
‘Once or twice.’ The ends of his hair turn the colour of newly minted pennies as reaches across the table, splashing the effervescent bubbles into a glass. ‘I have a few other tricks I can show you sometime.’
‘Uh-huh.’
He cuts a wedge of pale coloured cheese, coupling it with a torn morsel of bread. ‘I once opened a bottle with my ski after a particularly exhilarating run, and another time with a sabre.’
When it becomes clear t
he cheese is for me, I open my mouth to accept it, a need sticky and sweet working its way down to my belly at his expression. I pause to chew as he takes his seat again.
‘Explain, please.’ I cover my mouth with my hand as I swallow, my gaze sliding from his. ‘Let’s go with the sabre first, because everyone carries one of those.’
‘A little like purple sex-toys?’ If this isn’t a perfect example of how different we are, I don’t know what is. Posh boys carry skis and sabres while girls from the other side of the tracks carry defence dildos. Only, the more I say it, the less it seems to matter to me. ‘It was a wedding,’ he continues with an almost disparaging shake of his head. ‘In the wilds of Scotland somewhere, and there were these old cavalry swords hanging above the mantel.’
‘And you couldn’t resist,’ I deadpan.
‘More like I’d had too much to drink. Do you have a moral objection to casinos? It’s just, you frowned when I asked.’
‘Not really. I mean, it is a beautiful building and I guess I will go at some point. If for no other reason than the inside is super swanky, so I’m told. ‘Gambling doesn’t hold any interest for me.’
‘Really?’ He picks up his glass, leaning back in his chair before proceeding to study me over the rim.
‘Do you like to gamble?’
‘Not in the ways you’re thinking,’ he answers cryptically. ‘I think perhaps your objection to gambling comes from experience.’
‘Not in the way you’re thinking,’ I parrot back. I pause as I debate the merits of telling this silly story.
‘You look so torn, but that just makes me want to know all the more.’
‘You’re going to be disappointed.’ I help myself to another wedge of cheese, eyeing the figs and choosing a grape instead. Less messy. ‘When I was travelling, on my way to Australia from Europe, I had a layover in Hong Kong. The hostel I was staying in—you know, like dorms? Don’t look at me like that—I bet you’ve never stayed anywhere less than five-star in your life. Anyway, I met a Danish girl in the hostel, and we decided to go to Macau where the casinos are.’
‘There’s a cheap bus, which is a bonus when you’re broke. We wandered from place to place, munching on the complimentary snacks.’ He looks less than impressed by that. ‘Hey, it was no worse than some of the food we saw at one of the food markets. Shim Sham Poo or something.’
‘Sham Shui Po,’ he corrects with an indulgent smile.
‘You’ve been?’ He inclines his head. ‘Well, the free food on offer was better than stinky tofu and those century eggs. Or even sea cucumber.’ I shiver at the recollection.
‘So you ate snacks. And then you gambled?’
‘Cheap bus, free food, free bottles of water. All very important when you’re living on a shoestring.’
‘And you and your Danish friend were bought drinks by the casino’s patrons, no doubt.’
‘One or two,’ I agree, though most men’s focus lay elsewhere. ‘Then after a few hours of wandering around, we decided to place a couple of lowkey bets, hitting the roulette table. Like you said, when in Rome.’
‘Let me know when you’re ready for those French kisses.’
‘Ha. Right. Is that like, overtime?’ I squint, he laughs, before I carry on with my story. ‘Anyway, we had a couple of hundred dollars between us—p’
‘Hong Kong or US?’
I pull a face as though to say is that even a serious question? ‘Which part of poor did you not get?’ Or maybe it’s more the case that he doesn’t understand what poor is.
‘So, you had thirty dollars,’ he murmurs indulgently.
‘Thirty we were willing to waste,’ I reply, feeling the definition is important. I had money at that point; more money than I’d ever had in my life thanks to the windfall from mom’s mysterious relation, but I also had a plan. Travel. Get worldly. Move back and take the hotel management world by storm. While even the best-laid plans go belly up, I still had a blast.
‘Did you try the blackjack tables or the slots next?’
‘We stuck to roulette,’ I answer loftily. ‘Flipping a coin every six or seven hits, placing a red or a black with no expectations and no seriousness. Within thirty minutes, our thirty bucks became two thousand dollars. Honk-Kong dollars, but it was a lot of money to a traveller on a budget.’
‘It must’ve taken you a long time to save for a trip around the world.’
‘Actually, a distant relation died and left me a little money. It was a godsend, really. Plus I worked as I travelled. Fruit picking, waitressing, that kind of stuff.’ Remy nods as though understanding, but how could he? I carry on. ‘To us, the money was a fancy dinner and night in a hotel instead of a backpacker’s place. Maybe not Monaco fancy,’ I say, reaching for my glass. ‘Stop laughing! I’m not talking about the kinds of places you stay in. Hell, the places you own.’ It suddenly hits all over again how different we are. How we’ll always be so.
‘What is it?’ His expression falters, his laughter dying away. There’s no sense in making us both feel sad.
‘I was just thinking that, back then, a fancy dinner was a place that had linens and plates.’
‘I don’t know, there’s a certain charm in eating food from a stick,’ he replies, referring to the Hong Kong street markets. I guess we do have some experiences that are similar. ‘And drinking beer at rickety tables with plastic tablecloths.’
‘Slumming it, were you?’
‘Gaining a little life experience, the same as you. So, you had your night in a hotel,’ he asserts, getting us back on track.
‘Not at that point.’ I take a sip of my champagne, placing my glass down. ‘We had to go back to the hostel in the city to grab our things. We ate dinner in Macau and headed for the bus back to the mainland. But while we were waiting, we got to thinking.’ I tap my index finger against my chin for effect. ‘If we made two thousand with two hundred dollars, what could we make with two thousand?’
‘You were bitten by the bug.’
‘Well, we were definitely bitten.’
‘And what was the outcome?’
‘We shared a can of cola on the way home. Gambling is for suckers,’ I say over the sounds of his guffaws.
Remy’s mirth settles, his eyes dark and glossy in the ambient light. ‘Some things are worth taking a risk on, you know.’
‘I suppose this is when you tell me I need to take a risk on you?’ My cynical response was in the place of a hundred things I could’ve said. Things I’d rather have said. But I’d just be creating problems for another day. Yet his answer still blows me away.
‘No. Take a risk on love.’
34
Remy
‘Don’t.’ Her expression falters from teasing and testy to disquiet. I hate that she’s unhappy, that I made her unhappy, but I can’t envisage a time when I’d give up. Give up on us. ‘Don’t do that. Don’t blur the lines.’
‘Rose, we don’t have lines. You have a demarcation zone and barbed words like wire.’
‘And why is that?’ she answers fiercely.
‘Because I’m an idiot. And arrogant. And I thought I could take care of this before it ever got near enough to hurt you. You remember our first time here in Monaco? Remember how I said I’d never had another woman in my bed? It’s true.’
‘Because you never lived there,’ she almost whispers, her eyes looking anywhere but at me.
‘It doesn’t matter. The penthouse, the house with Amélie, the hotel—none of those beds have seen another body next to mine. Since March, I have been faithful to you. As ridiculous as it might sound, I never wanted anyone else, though I had chances.’ More recently, Amélie. At one time, I might have taken her up on yesterday’s offer, if for no other reason than to teach her how little she meant to me. But not anymore. ‘I was faithful to the idea of you. The woman who looked after me. The angel.’
‘I’m no angel.’
‘To me, you are. So, when you arrived in Monaco, it was like a sign. I’d already moved out
of the house, though in truth, Amélie was rarely there. The place is like a palace, and though we lived under the same roof, we never lived together. But the day I saw you in the hallway, I moved to the penthouse, like I was like wiping the slate clean.’
‘Except you didn’t, not really. You just swept your problems under the carpet.’
‘For a little while. I thought she’d come back, and I’d tell her. That I’d buy her off, I suppose. I fully intended to tell you, but at the point where I could say the ties between us were truly broken. The problem dealt with.’
‘Instead, it came and bit you in the ass.’
‘And I deserved it. I’m only sorry that I hurt you.’ Reaching across the table, I cover her hand with mine, something unfurling inside as she allows me. ‘We punish ourselves sometimes, I think, with the kind of love we think we don’t deserve. But I want to deserve your love. I want to be worthy of you. Don’t say anything, please. Just listen because I’ve had a very, very beautiful idea. Don’t look so worried. I’m not going to drop to my knee with a ring. Unless you want to,’ I add quickly.
‘If you drop to your knee, I’m out of here.’
I find myself laughing as I top up our glasses. ‘Mon hérisson épineux.’
‘That sounded like something that requires a trip to the pharmacy to cure.’
‘I called you my thorny hedgehog.’
‘Oh, yeah. That’s super endearing.’ But she’s smiling. ‘You want me to take a risk on love, and then you liken me to a spikey rodent? My mother was right. Trying to understand men is like trying to explain what colour the number nine smells like.’
‘Men are not so complicated.’
‘Yeah, I’ve heard that, too,’ she replies cynically. ‘You have two settings. Hungry and horny. If you haven’t got a hard-on, I’m supposed to feed you a sandwich, right?’
