Diamonds in the Dust

by Charmaine Pauls

  I’m shaking violently when he picks me up, sheltering me against his chest. He carries me inside and easily closes the door balancing me in one arm. He goes to the bathroom and lowers me onto the rug next to the bath. I wrap my arms around myself, shivering as I watch him open the tap to let the water run warm. The petals and candles are gone. The bath has been cleaned. Housekeeping came in while we were having dinner.

  The bath is only a quarter full when he slips his palms under the jacket and brushes it off my shoulders, carelessly disregarding the expensive garment crumpled on the floor. He picks me up and puts me on my feet in the bath. Taking a jar of bath salts from the edge, he empties the whole jar in the bath and scoops water into the jar that he empties over my shoulder.

  The warmth dispels the cold. My skin contracts with goosebumps. He refills the jar and drains it over my other shoulder. He does the same with my front and back, and then he crouches down to soap a sponge. He starts at my waist, dragging the sponge from my hip to my thigh before squeezing out the sponge and letting the soapy water run down my calf. Meticulously, he washes me, stroke by gentle stroke removing the blood and the cold.

  The bathroom is warm, but I’m still shivering. When the bath is half-full, he turns off the water and guides me to lie down. Twisting my hair in a knot, he trails it over the edge of the bath. The water stings between my legs, but heat envelopes me, melting the last of the bitter frost under my skin and calming my shivers. All the while, he continues to bathe me, washing away the remnants of our coupling in a strangely humble way as if I’m the princess and he the servant.

  When my skin starts to wrinkle, he pulls the plug and takes my hand to help me out of the bath. Draping a fluffy towel around me, he dries my body. When not a patch of wetness is left on my skin, he leads me back to the room and makes me sit on the loveseat while he strips the sheets off the bed, leaving the duvet. Folding it back, he looks at me in silent command.

  I’m spent. My fight is cold. I get up without arguing, dropping the towel at the side of the bed before getting in. Turning on my side, I face the wall. He gets in beside me, flicks off the lamp, and spoons me from behind with an arm he throws over my stomach to anchor me to him.

  Our breathing is quiet. We’re both awake, but neither of us speaks. Light from the streetlamps falls through the window into the room. It plays over the walls, creating a shadowed reflection of the free world outside.

  After a long while, he says into the darkness, “If I had the time, I would’ve made you fall in love with me first.”

  At the words, I stop breathing.

  They’re meant to be a consolation, but they’re stunningly cruel.

  Chapter 12

  Maxime

  * * *

  The day is gray, the Mistral blowing at full force when we land in Marseille. It was a bumpy flight and a rough landing, but my pilot is skilled. A car is waiting when we exit the plane, Alexis leaning against it. I’m not fooled into seeing it as a one-man welcoming committee. My brother isn’t here for me. He looks beyond me at the woman who stiffly descends the steps. His curiosity is palpable and his excitement sickening.

  In an impulsive, possessive act, I find Zoe’s hand and close my fingers around hers. Alexis’s gaze homes in on the gesture. His face folds into a frown as he takes in her fashionable wool coat and patent leather boots.

  He straightens as we approach. Not sparing Zoe another glance, he addresses me in French. “What’s going on, Max?”

  My smile is fake. “You tell me.” My cousin, Jerome, informed me that Alexis negotiated a deal with the Italians.

  He watches me with the attention of a hawk. “Why is our hostage wearing Gucci?”

  My voice betrays my tension. “She’s no longer our hostage.”

  He lifts a brow. “You were supposed to hand her over to me.”

  “The plan has changed.”

  “To what? The whore is now our guest?”

  I narrow my eyes. My tone is quiet but the violence underneath anything but. “Mind your mouth. She’s my mistress.”

  He laughs softly, shaking his head. “You’re something else, Max. Father won’t be pleased.”

  I open the car door for Zoe. “Does it look like I give a damn?”

  “No, you don’t. That’s part of the problem, isn’t it?”

  It’s not the first time he accuses me of putting my selfish needs before the business. He’s a hypocrite. Alexis has never done anything unless it benefits him.

  “Why?” he asks. “Does she have a golden cunt?”

  I’m not going to let that remark slide, but I’m not taking him on in front of Benoit and Gautier who are following with our luggage. Alexis will own up to his filthy tongue later.

  I keep my smile intact. “Jealous?”

  He turns his attention back to Zoe, looking her over as if she’s livestock. “Nah. She’s not much for the eye. Too thick around the hips for my liking.”

  That’s because he hasn’t been in her space, hasn’t seen her hopeless faith and quiet resilience. He’d crush a pretty little flower under his two-thousand-dollar moccasins and never even notice it.

  “Shut up and drive.” I add mockingly, “Isn’t that why you’re here?”

  He grins, not taking the bait, and shifts to behind the wheel.

  Benoit and Gautier load our suitcases into the trunk before making their way to the hangar where we keep a couple of cars. They’ll follow.

  We don’t talk on the way home. I keep holding onto Zoe’s hand, feeling her tense as we turn through the gates of my property forty-five minutes later. The house stands on an acre of land on the outskirts of Cassis. It’s built on the edge of the cliff, overlooking the sea.

  Alexis parks in the front but doesn’t get out. “Welcome home, brother. I’m not going to hang around for the victory drinks.”

  Ignoring his mocking tone, I get out and open Zoe’s door. A guard rushes over from his post by the entrance to take our bags from the trunk. Zoe looks up at the two-story mansion with its double chimneys, shutters, and ivy-covered walls. I try to look at it through her eyes, try to see what she sees. It’s a typical southern French design, the house dating from four centuries back. I went to great pains to restore it, as well as with the design of the formal garden and its maze. It must be unfamiliar and strange, not what she’s used to.

  The front door opens just as Alexis pulls off. My mother exits, wearing her cooking apron over a Chanel dress. As always, she’s impeccably groomed, her white-gray hair styled into a bob and her makeup cleverly invisible. Despite her age, her face is youthful, a lucky trait she’s inherited from her long line of purebred aristocracy.

  “Max.” Her features light up with a smile that freezes when she notices the woman at my side. Her mouth draws down. It’s minute, quickly replaced with a friendly expression, but I noticed. I know her too well.

  She pulls herself to her full petite height, her spine going stiff. “I cooked. I reckoned you’d be hungry. God only knows what you had to eat in that godforsaken country. I didn’t expect you to come home with a guest.” She looks at Zoe. “There won’t be enough food.”

  “Never mind, Maman.” I kiss her cheeks. “We’ll make do.” I switch over to English. “This is Zoe. Zoe, this is my mother, Cecile.”

  My mother doesn’t kiss Zoe’s cheeks, but offers her hand, a gesture that demeans Zoe for a lower class but that someone not familiar with our culture won’t grasp.

  Zoe glances at me. I give a small nod, a warning, at which she shakes my mother’s hand. My mother isn’t up to speed with the grittier details of our business, even if she knows how we conduct it is shady. My father prefers to keep her in the dark, to protect her as he claims, not only from the blood on our hands, but also from his mistresses. If my mother knows, she’s never given on, but her reaction to Zoe tells me she may be less ignorant about my father’s infidelity than what I’ve thought, or, for her sake, hoped.

  “Well,” my mother says in English, her accent wo
rse than mine, “you better come in.”

  She steps aside for us to enter. The guard follows with the suitcases.

  “Where must I put this, sir?” he asks in French.

  “In my bedroom.”

  My mother purses her lips. Her gaze flicks over Zoe’s pleated coat and killer heel boots with distaste.

  As I help Zoe from her coat, my mother, reverting back to French, asks, “How long is she staying?”

  I put the coat on the stand by the door before removing my own. “A while.”

  Her silence communicates her displeasure.

  “You didn’t have to come out all the way here to cook for me,” I say.

  She pinches my cheek. “I’m your mother. That’s my job.”

  “In English, please.”

  She irons out her apron and switches back to English. “Go freshen up. Lunch will be ready when you’re done.”

  I show Zoe to the guest bathroom downstairs and wait outside.

  When she exits, I take her arm, squeezing harder than necessary. “Not a word to my mother or anyone for that matter. Say anything out of line, and Damian pays the price. Understand?”

  She stares at up me, her big, blue eyes shimmering with apprehension and a twist of hostility. “Yes.”

  “Good.” I kiss the top of her head just because I can and lead her to the dining room.

  Her arm brushes against mine as we walk. I’m overly aware of her, my usual business-focused mind distracted. I don’t know many twenty-one-year-old virgins. I never could’ve guessed. The knowledge surges in me with heated satisfaction. Her innocence suits me even better. I’ve never liked to share my toys as a child. That hasn’t changed once I turned into an adult. If anything, the trait became more imbedded in my making. I guess Alexis is right. I am a selfish bastard.

  My mother waits at the table, her apron removed and the rings she takes off for cooking back on her fingers. The five-carat emerald surrounded by diamonds is a family ring, passed on for generations from mother to daughter. We don’t have a sister. Alexis and I are the only children. As the first-born, the ring will be passed on to my wife, and I know exactly what my mother is thinking as she twists the ring on her finger while studying Zoe with a tight expression.

  I seat Zoe on my right and take the head of the table. My mother already sits on the left, a place normally reserved for the lady of the house. A veal roast with Parisian potatoes and green beans are set out. There’s enough to feed ten people.

  “It smells delicious,” I say, taking the carving knife.

  “Your favorite.” My mother gives me a tender look, a look that speaks of family intimacy and customs, one that excludes outsiders such as Zoe. Our clan has always been a clique.

  After I’ve carved the meat, my mother serves while I pour the wine. She fills me in on the watering of the plants she’s managed in my absence, which ones have flowered, and the groceries she’s ordered to be delivered. We talk about my cousins, Sylvie and Noelle, who will be home soon from the university they attend in Paris.

  “I got you some tangerines,” my mother says after we’ve finished the main course, pushing the bowl toward me. “They’re the ones from Corsica you like so much.”

  “You shouldn’t have gone to so much trouble.” I take one, peel it, and place it on Zoe’s plate. “I have a cook, you know.”

  My mother sniffs. “She doesn’t know you like I do. Neither does she cook like me.” She pushes to her feet. “I’ve been in the kitchen on my feet all morning. I need a break.”

  I stand. “Who’s driving you?”

  “One of your father’s men.”

  I kiss her cheeks. “Thank you for lunch.”

  She pats my arm. “Take care of yourself.” To Zoe, she says, “Goodbye, then.”

  Zoe mumbles a barely audible greeting.

  “Have some tea,” I say to Zoe. In other words, stay.

  I see my mother out.

  While pulling her coat and scarf on at the entrance, she asks, “How did you meet this…” she waves a hand, “…whatever her name is?”

  “Zoe. By chance.”

  My mother fits her gloves. “She’s a foreigner, Max.”

  “I’m well aware, Maman.”

  “Is she Catholic?”

  “You know I’m not religious.”

  She sighs and pats my cheek. “I have to be home before the charity meeting this afternoon. Do think about making a donation. Those poor kids can do with the aid.”

  “I’ll write a check.”

  “Good.”

  I signal the guard waiting on a bench next to my father’s Mercedes and walk my mother to the car.

  My mother hesitates when I open the door. “Max, you know how this is going to look.”

  I feel one of those long talks coming. “I’m thirty, not ten.”

  Sighing again, she gets inside and waves as the driver pulls off. I lift a hand in greeting, waiting until they clear the gates before going back inside.

  I find Zoe in the dining room where I left her, a teacup in her hand. She looks up when I enter, her expression uncertain.

  “Come,” I say. “I’ll show you the bedroom.”

  The way she tenses gives me the same jabbing sensation in my chest as when she showed me so openly how repulsive the idea of me fucking her is. My face may put her off, but she had pleasure last night. She may hate the idea, but she liked what I did to her. In time, she’ll get used to looking at me.

  We go upstairs to the master suite. I open the door and usher her inside. The room is spacious with a sitting area and dressing room that connects to the bathroom. The French doors open onto a balcony. The view is magnificent. She goes to the window to look out at the sea. I’m proud. My home is more than an investment. It’s the only place I can let my guard down and relax.

  “What do you think?” I really want to know. Why it’s important to me that she likes my home I don’t know.

  She turns on me, ire shining in her pretty, blue eyes. “What do you want me to say? That it’s lovely? That my prison is beautiful? Shall I swoon over how big and fancy your property is, over how much it’s worth?”

  I give her a warning look. “A simple thank you will do.”

  “Oh, my mistake. I guess this is the part where I thank you for saving me from being locked up and raped.”

  I let it go. She’s tired. She’s been through a lot in the last three days, especially last night. “If you need anything, my housekeeper, Francine, will see to your needs. My home is yours, and I won’t go out of my way to make you miserable.”

  I step closer. “However, don’t make the mistake of thinking I’m a forgiving man. You will act your part, or Damian pays. If you run, your brother is dead. Live by my rules, and we’ll get on fine. It doesn’t have to be unpleasant for you. If you try, I’m sure you’ll like living here.”

  Her look is cutting. What the hell am I doing? I took on a mountain of problems for myself by claiming Zoe. I could’ve just handed a faceless, nameless, meaningless woman over to my brother, just another pawn in a strategy to protect our business. No, I had to make it personal. I had to see her for who she is. I allowed her to fascinate me. I allowed her secrets to tempt me. Whatever the case, no matter how ungrateful she is or how much she hates me, I can’t go back on my decision. After last night, it’s much too late for that now.

  I cup her cheek, giving her affection, because that’s what she needs. “I’ll be back tonight. Feel free to look around the house, but don’t go outside. In case you’re tempted, I have guards stationed on the grounds and at the gate. If you get hungry, Francine will fix you a snack.”

  I kiss the top of her head and walk away before I’m tempted to strip her naked and do more. Leaving her alone so soon isn’t ideal, but facing my father is a bigger priority.

  After giving my guards instructions not to let her off the property, I leave a note for Francine, who is out on her lunch break. My guest isn’t allowed to use the telephones. I unplug all the landlin
es and lock them in my study. Then I take one of the cars in the garage, preferring to drive. I need to think, and I’d rather be alone.

  On the way to Marseille, I consider how to present the decision to my father. He won’t be happy, especially not now that our negotiations with the Italians have started. He’d want no complications, nothing to interfere with the fragile business development.

  My father’s office is near the harbor. I pull up front and throw the keys to the valet to park the car. Raphael Belshaw sits on his throne behind his desk when I enter. His thick, gray hair is brushed back, the waves neatly tamed. As always, he’s dressed in a black suit and white shirt. My uncle, Emile, my father’s younger brother, sits in the visitor’s chair.

  My father looks at me through narrowed eyes, the left one drooping. “You’re late.”

  His displeasure isn’t about the hour. I bet Alexis wasted no time in sharing the news.

  “Bad weather. We had to circle for a while before we could land.” I bend down to hug my uncle and slap his back in the habitual way of greeting. “How are Sylvie and Noelle?”

  He scoffs. “Spending too much money in Paris.”

  “At least they’re getting a good education.”

  My uncle raps his fingers on the desktop, the gold ring with our family crest knocking against the wood. “I don’t know why they bother. They’ll marry and have babies. What good is a career going to do them, then? If you ask me, they’re only throwing money into the water.”

  I take the seat next to him. “Some women like to work, just like men.”

  He stands. “Times have changed, and I’m not sure it’s for the better.” He nods at my father. “I’ll leave you to catch up with Max. Don’t forget Hadrienne is organizing a lunch on Sunday to welcome the girls home from Paris. We expect you all to be there.” He takes his hat from the coat stand. “You included, Max.”

  The minute the door closes behind him, my father says, “You have some fucking explaining to do.”

  I give a wry smile. “Ah, Alexis stopped by.”

  “Alexis said you took Damian’s sister as a mistress. Tell me it’s a joke.”