That Spring in Paris

by Ciji Ware

  to say we both miss you madly.

  Merry Christmas and come back in the spring.

  Love, A

  By this time, her father was peering over her shoulder at the painting.

  “Why, that’s first rate work,” he praised, adding, “and don’t you think it’s a good sign that Avery is able to paint again?”

  “This portrait proves to me that Avery wants to paint again,” Juliet replied. She sought her father’s glance. “She was horribly traumatized by what happened when her friend died—”

  “Yes, yes... we’ve heard all that before,” Mildred interrupted. “No need to bring up such depressing things on Christmas, for pity’s sake!”

  Juliet’s father had continued to inspect the portrait, and then seized the card and looked at his daughter with a sly grin. “So, I can see by the flight jacket that this is the former Air Force pilot you met that Jamie said he’d be staying with in France. Handsome young man, if Avery’s work is true-to-life. What sort of aircraft did he fly?”

  “Rescue helicopters in the Middle East,” she said, noting how her mother was now paying close attention to their conversation, “and then—after he got shot down—he piloted unmanned drones.”

  “Is he a friend of Avery’s?” Mildred asked, her eyes narrowing.

  “Actually, I met him first,” she disclosed reluctantly, “at the American Hospital where Avery was taken, along with her friend who died—and who happened to be the grandson of my friend Finn’s landlady.

  “Ah... so I gather this pilot is the source of your opinions about the dangers of using drones in warfare... and private encryption used by civilians?” Mildred said sharply. She looked at her husband. “Not surprising, is it? Most military men are against others demanding their civil rights of free expression.”

  Juliet shook her head in frustration. “Major Finn Deschanel actually thinks encryption is necessary in today’s world, but he quit the military rather than to continue flying drones, Mother, so I doubt you know what his opinions are.”

  “I can certainly guess!” she shot back. “We all know that the U.S. government uses encryption. But it’s no secret they wouldn’t want anyone to gain a back door into their version of this secret coding.”

  “The difference there is—they’re trying to protect this country, not train America’s youth to be electronic killing machines just for fun and profit!” Juliet felt her ire starting to rise as it always did in these discussions.

  Mildred, too, was starting to get upset.

  “You’re sounding like a broken record! Brad reviews all the research data and there’s very little that says video war games make kids any more aggressive than playing football does.”

  “That sounds suspiciously like the arguments the tobacco industry used—‘there’s no absolute proof that cigarettes, alone, cause cancer.’ ”

  “Look, gals,” the senior Brad intervened, pretending to play the lighthearted mediator, “This is one of those discussions that turns out to be kinda like Pandora’s Box. Once it’s opened, all sorts of devilish beasts can fly out. It’s Christmas! Can’t we call a moratorium on this discussion—at least just for today?”

  Her mother smiled as if she’d won the skirmish.

  “You’re right, for once.” She flashed him a manufactured smile. Then she turned to Juliet, pointing at the portrait in her lap. “I suggest you put that away. I don’t want you to use Avery’s gift to rile up Brad by saying Jamie went to Paris to see to her welfare. He considers Avery Evans disloyal in the extreme.”

  “I’m sure Brad already has figured out that if Jamie went to Paris in the dead of winter, he’d surely see Avery in the wake of the Paris attacks.”

  Silently she speculated on what her mother would think if she knew her precious elder son had sexually accosted Avery in this very hotel. Juliet struggled to keep from bursting out with this defense of her friend, so, instead, she took pains to neatly wrap Avery’s portrait of Finn in its silvery paper and slip it into her Christmas carry-bag.

  Just as she’d stowed the present behind one of the upholstered chairs near the fireplace, brother Brad, along with Jed Jarvis, walked into the room without knocking. “Hey, Dad... Mom,” he said as he and Jed advanced into the room. “Merry Christmas,” he added perfunctorily He looked at his sister and then looked away, as if dismissing her very presence.

  Brad senior glanced briefly at Juliet and said to his son, “Just one thing today, all right? No family spats.”

  “Oh, no!” Jed joked, punching Brad in the arm. “Did I miss another Thayer family argument? Juliet is so entertaining when she gets red in the face.”

  “Merry Christmas to you, too, Jed,” she snapped.

  “That’s a joke, Juliet,” he replied, pursing his lips. “You’re so touchy these days.” He leaned toward her ear and whispered, “PMS a problem this week?”

  Juliet reared back in her chair and stared at the long, lanky figure in a black T-shirt matching the one Brad always wore.

  “Cut it out, Jed,” she warned in a low voice, “or you can leave right now.”

  How in the world had she ever considered this guy a boyfriend or, worse yet, slept with him? It was a question about which she owed it to herself to spend some time seriously considering since at that moment, she could hardly stand the sight of him.

  Meanwhile, an uncomfortable silence filled the room. Juliet recognized that it was her own damn fault Jed had come to the annual Thayer family brunch. Since no one in the room knew she’d officially broken up with Brad’s oldest buddy, he’d obviously been extended his usual invitation to join them Christmas morning.

  Glancing at Jed, now, she recalled how hugely relieved she’d been when he hadn’t shown the slightest concern or dismay over her recent actions to end their relationship. Even so, given Jed’s behavior just now, she could see that he was, indeed, upset by her rejection, mostly due to pure pride and not any great sense of loss, she imagined. She seriously doubted that he’d even admitted to anyone—including Brad—that she’d dumped him. But why hadn’t she let her parents know?

  She knew the answer before it had formed in her mind. She was chicken. She had used the excuse of it’s being the holidays and the current family turmoil with the family business to avoid telling them. The main reason, she knew—if she were brutally honest with herself—was that she’d been afraid to face even more of her mother’s wrath.

  When will I simply not care if my mother approves of me or not, she wondered bleakly.

  She glanced again at Jed. A look of feigned, injured innocence had spread across his face. Then, he merely shrugged, as if Juliet’s existence was of no consequence. He and Brad moved to the sideboard where, instead of orange juice, Jed poured himself a generous cup of the family’s traditional champagne-laced punch.

  He leaned toward Brad and said just loud enough for Juliet to hear, “I have to hand it to you, buddy... I’m amazed how you can deal with Debbie Downer twenty-four-seven.”

  Juliet reached behind her chair, grabbed the edge of the wrapped portrait of Finn, and rose to her feet. I have to get out of here, or I am going to start to scream! She forced a smile and addressed the assembled group. “Continue opening presents, everyone. I’m just going to take my loot to my room. Be back in a bit,” she added, and before anyone could stop her, she made her escape.

  CHAPTER 19

  “Avery, the portrait of Finn is fantastic!” Juliet declared into the wavy Skype image of her friend that appeared on her laptop. “I’m so happy you’re painting so wonderfully again.”

  “It’s the first new one I started since... well, you know,” she said with a wan smile. “I wanted to thank both you and Finn for all you’ve done to help me.”

  “So Finn’s shrink was a good thing?”

  “Helping both of us, I think. That doc really knows her stuff. She worked for the VA before she joined the American Hospital, here. Among several things we do in our sessions, she’s basically showing me how to retrain my b
rain and consciously choose to think something else when bad stuff comes up. It doesn’t always work, mind you, as Finn has probably told you, but I’m definitely getting better.”

  “Does he know you sent me the portrait of him?” Juliet asked casually.

  On her laptop’s screen Avery’s smile grew wide and she chuckled. “Of course! I thought I’d better get his permission before I gave it to you. His only worry is that you wouldn’t know what to do with it.”

  Juliet held her laptop’s pinpoint camera in the direction of the portrait so Avery could see it was in her room.

  “Well, I love it! I’m going to hang it today on my wall, right over there,” she gestured. “Tell Finn I’m thrilled to have it, will you please?”

  “Here, tell him yourself. It started snowing like mad last night so we all decided to stay over at Claudine’s after midnight mass at Notre Dame. Now Jamie and I and my art professor are at Finn’s barge for supper. Here, let me hand my cell phone to him.”

  Juliet had been so concentrated on Avery’s face on the screen that she hadn’t noticed the background, which she now saw was the wood and glass windows identifying the pilothouse interior on L’Étoile de Paris.

  Finn’s handsome face and distinctive deep voice suddenly filled her screen, a replica of the portrait she still held in her hand.

  “Hi... Merry Christmas again,” he said. “Or I should say Joyeux Noël.”

  “And the same to you.”

  He cast her an apologetic look. “Hold on just a sec, will you? I’m cooking something on one of my burners. Let me turn it down while we talk.” He turned away to fiddle with the controls and soon turned back to her.

  “What are you making?” she asked.

  “I’m hoping I’ve mastered Coquilles St. Jacques.”

  “Oooh, fresh scallops dripping in that wonderful cheesy white wine sauce?”

  “Lots of white wine called for so, I figured how bad could it be?” Then he added, “The good Doctor A says booze cooked in food is okay... all the intoxicants are gone.”

  Juliet laughed. “The taste without the one-two punch. Clever you!” Then she asked, “You even have the shells to serve them in?”

  Juliet told him about one of the Bay View’s chef specialties, that of making sea scallops presented in large shells and cooked in a Napa Valley sauvignon blanc.

  “Borrowed the shells from Aunt Claudine. The lady worked for Vogue for thirty years, don’t forget. She possesses every specialty serving item known to the culinary world.”

  “It sounds like you’re all having fun,” she said, unable to keep the wistful tone from her voice. “Wish I could say the same.”

  Finn frowned and paused. “Hey, what’s wrong? More family squabbles?”

  “That, plus Jed was just being a son-of-a-gun this morning. I’m glad Jamie is missing all the nastiness, but man, do I wish I were over there with you all.”

  “I wish you were right beside me, helping dish out the chow.”

  She laughed. “Chow? You need a much more elegant turn of phrase for the French cuisine you’re creating.”

  “Speaking of which, hold on again.” He walked toward his right where the sink and burners were embedded in the desktop. “I’m turning this baby off. There!” She could clearly see the Eiffel Tower out his window. “Okay, what gives with that ex-boyfriend of yours?”

  “Oh, I don’t want to put a damper on your day, there,” she hastened to say, trying to wind up their conversation on a positive note. “I’ll tell you sometime when your scallops aren’t bubbling. Enjoy your feast, but you’d better let me speak to my baby brother before I sign off.”

  “Okay,” he replied and she could hear the reluctance in his voice, “but I mean it, Juliet. I really wish you were here with us.”

  “Thank you for that... and the sentiment is mutual, believe me. At least I have Avery’s wonderful portrait of you for company in my rooms.”

  “It felt a little weird when she showed it to me, saying it was her Christmas present to you. I thought maybe you won’t want it, or won’t have a place to hang it.”

  “I love it, Finn,” she assured him. “See that wall behind my desk over there?” She pointed behind and to her right. “It’s going right there as soon as I can get a hammer and nail.”

  Finn’s relieved expression filled the screen. “Turns out Avery sneaked a photo of me and worked from that for a week. Now, I want her to do one of you. I’ve commissioned her, in fact.” Before Juliet could react to this startling news, he said, “I gave her that great picture I took of you sketching the de Medici Fountain at the Luxembourg Gardens that day. Uh oh. Here’s Jamie. Bye, now.”

  Sensing her call was interrupting the party, Juliet briefly told Jamie how she’d just literally fled the family scene.

  “Brad hasn’t softened his position one iota since you’ve been gone. He’s demanding our total loyalty in the coming fight with the VCs. Wants everyone to sign some sort of document, but I haven’t seen what it says, yet.”

  “Holy crap. The guy is paranoid.”

  “Maybe not. The rumblings are getting louder about a potential takeover. I can tell Brad knows that there are folks who wouldn’t necessarily fight a change of control.”

  “What does the lawyer say about our position?”

  “He’s still looking into it at the rate of six-hundred-and-seventy-five-bucks-an-hour.”

  “Wow. Well, let me know what you find out, as I’d really like to never come home.” Then Jamie amended, “For a while, at least.”

  “I hear ya. Sounds like you’re having fun, right?”

  Jamie’s voice lowered and he turned his back to the others who were sipping drinks and eating some sort of hors d’oeuvre. “Like you, I love Paris, but I’ve got some close competition here, I think.”

  “With Avery? Really?”

  “Really,” he repeated in an even lower voice.

  “Who?” Please not Finn, she thought suddenly.

  She saw her brother cup his hand over the phone’s speaker. ”A Frenchman. Alain somebody. He’s standing right behind me. He’s Avery’s art teacher where she studies. He eez ver-ry char-mant, you know what I’m saying?”

  Juliet glimpsed the elbow and shoulder of an additional male figure in the background. She could see the furrows between Jamie’s eyebrows. She smiled back at him with as much cheer as she could muster.

  “Look, bro... you’re pretty damn charming yourself, so don’t give up. Alain’s been great to Avery since the attacks, that’s all. Meanwhile, say hello to the Eiffel Tower, will you?”

  Jamie turned his head to look out the windows facing the river. “Ah... so you know this view pretty well, do you?” His grin looked comically distorted on her screen.

  “Only as a very well-behaved guest.” Then she added, “I miss that view. A lot.”

  In the way that Jamie could always read her like a book, he said, “Does Jed know how you feel about the view?”

  “He knows I finally told him to get lost.”

  “Well, now... that is a nice Christmas present,” chortled her brother.

  Juliet laughed too. “Merry Christmas, Jamie. Give my love to everyone there.”

  * * *

  It had begun to rain hard by the time Juliet reached the lawyer’s office on Battery Street on a cold January afternoon, two days after New Year’s. Edward Adelman, of Adelman and Marx, was a specialist, she’d learned, about stock options in start-up companies that had gone public on the New York Stock Exchange. Adelman was also skilled in coordinating hostile takeovers—or fighting them. Whatever his clients hired him to do.

  The advocate, celebrated among his peers for his lean-and-mean approach to the law, reached for her dripping raincoat and hung it on the back of his office door. If he weren’t in his custom suit and tie, Juliet speculated he was most likely one of San Francisco’s “Spandex Warriors.” These were the sinewy professional men in their mid-thirties and forties seen hunched over six-thousand-dollar road bikes
as they crossed the Golden Gate Bridge most weekends and toiled up Mount Tamalpais in Marin County on the other side of the Bay. Juliet judged the man was fit, buffed, and only mildly arrogant.

  Deeply conscious of the clock ticking at $675 an hour, she swiftly broached the reason for wanting this face-to-face meeting following a brief conversation by phone.

  “So, Mr. Adelman—”

  “Edward... please,” he said with a practiced smile as he indicated a chair opposite his office desk and closed the door.

  “Edward,” she corrected herself, ignoring a sixth sense that he might be coming on to her. “So, from our initial phone call, it sounds as if you’re saying that my younger brother and our parents and my own best chance for receiving the most advantageous payout to exercise our company stock options would occur if there is a change-of-control within the company?”

  Adelman nodded, adding “And in the case of you and James, this would be especially true if you two elect—or are asked—to terminate your employment at GatherGames as the new owners take control.”

  “Got it,” Juliet said.

  “Under those circumstances you would—or I would, actually—bargain for an immediate payout of your stock and for an acceleration of your options granted to you to purchase more stock at the price when the company was founded. All this would be in exchange for a fast exit—which would then, of course, leave your brother Bradshaw without some important family allies and bolster your position with the take-over contingent even more strongly.”

  “Whoa...” Juliet said on a long breath. “That’s pretty radical. Is it the only way to get my parents, Jamie, and me out of this thing in one piece?”

  The hotshot lawyer nodded once more, a self-satisfied smile quirking the corners of his mouth. Then his expression grew serious. “This is a guts ball game,” he warned. “In the legal world, we call it ‘negotiated accelerated vesting’ caused by an ‘ownership change of control,’ coupled to the termination of you and your brother as employees—with all events orchestrated to happen at the same time. It’s a pretty neat hat trick, but we’ve managed it in a number of hostile takeover situations like yours.”