“You’re going to have to make your choice, Alex,” she said, gravely. “Either alcohol or me.”
For weeks she’d put up with his snoring and his foul breath. She’d tried to ignore Marie’s reproachful looks and her sons’ worried expressions as they watched their dad stumble around the house.
“Dominique,” he said, clumsily trying to kiss her. “I feel so alone. … Nobody loves me, except you. …”
He tried to take her to the bed, but she put up a struggle. She’d just caught him drinking in the adjoining bathroom. He thought she was still on her way back from school with the twins. He knew she was angry, but he figured he could calm her. He grabbed her and lifted her off the ground. He took a couple of unsteady steps, and they crashed onto the bed. Furious, Dominique tried to free herself, but he hung onto her like a drowning man.
“Don’t go, honey, please … Don’t go …”
He’d slipped a hand under her T-shirt. He didn’t realize he was being rough and thought that his wife’s resistance was a game.
“You and I haven’t had sex for such a long time,” he said.
He struggled with Dominique’s zipper, eventually ripping her Bermuda shorts. Dominique was trying to push him off in silence. She’d known since she was a little girl that the walls of the house were thin. She didn’t want her mother to hear their struggle, but she also didn’t want to give into Alex, as she had no desire whatsoever to make love to him.
“You smell good. …” he muttered, not letting go of her. “Your skin is so soft. …”
Excited by the fight Dominique was putting up, he managed to undress her.
“Stop immediately,” she said between her teeth. “Stop it, Alex. I don’t want to!”
He let go of a drunken laugh and put his entire weight on her, while forcing her legs open. When he entered her, she stopped moving, resigned, her eyes filled with tears.
Louis-Marie gave his sister-in-law a smile. She was now hooked on his novel, asking him to read the last pages he’d written every morning during breakfast. He wrote at night, in his bedroom, trying to forget that he was lonesome. Pauline called him regularly, asking how he was and telling him what she was doing with her days, but never setting a date for her return. Esther was off to summer camp, and Pauline wanted to take the opportunity, she said, to spruce up the apartment and paint the living room walls. She said she was overseeing the renovations, asking Louis-Marie’s opinion about insignificant details. She was always the one calling. He never did. He listened to her happy voice, laughed with her, said nice things to her, but couldn’t help being assailed by doubt, and he faked being cheerful while waiting for her to reassure him, which she never did.
“Why is your main character putting up with that bitch?” Laurène asked at the end of the latest chapter. “How come he’s not leaving her?”
The young woman’s naïveté amused Louis-Marie. Of course, he’d carefully changed the characters and invented most of the scenes, but the manuscript also told his very own story in a significant, deep manner.
They’d kept up their habit of sharing breakfast on the shadowy terrace. Fernande, concerned about the future mom’s health, prepared extraordinary trays, with fruits, yogurts, eggs, jams of all colors, and scones straight out of the oven. When Jules walked by, he’d stopped and have some coffee with them, but he never sat down. Louis-Marie would then ask what he could do for him that day, and his brother always found tasks for him to take on. As Louis-Marie always seemed to do things well, Jules didn’t hesitate to give him responsibilities, big or small. And more than anything, his brother’s presence alongside Laurène enabled him to spend less time with his wife, time being something he always needed.
Laurène shaded her eyes with her hand to look at the car coming up the castle’s driveway.
“That’s your sister, right?” Louis-Marie asked.
Laurène got up, delighted, and went down the steps to greet Dominique. They fell into each other’s arms.
“Are you staying for lunch?” Laurène asked right away.
Dominique nodded and went up to the terrace to kiss Louis-Marie.
She was smiling, but he thought she looked sad. Dominique was too proud to complain about things. She’d come to Fonteyne to find a bit of solace, not to confide in anybody. She sat next to them with the curious impression of having returned home. She glanced at the office’s windows, sad to think that Aurélien was no longer in there. In her mind, the image of her father-in-law was still intimately linked to Fonteyne.
Mistaking what her sister was thinking about, Laurène said, “Jules is in Bordeaux right now, but he’ll be back by lunchtime. … So, how are you doing?”
“I’m good, honey. Very good. I’m the one who should ask you that question.”
She looked at Laurène lovingly, happy for her sister.
“I see Dr. Auber every two weeks. Jules insists on it.”
Dominique was going to ask her a question when Fernande appeared on the terrace. She shrieked at the sight of Dominique and couldn’t help hugging her, and then she went back inside to get her some tea. She still missed Dominique and the relationship they’d developed in the house over the years. Laurène couldn’t manage the place, but Fernande pretended otherwise to reassure Jules.
“What about Alex?” Laurène asked hesitantly. “Still in the same frame of mind?”
She didn’t want to seem like she was avoiding the topic, though it was a painful one for everybody. But Alex was Dominique’s husband, and Laurène couldn’t act as if he didn’t exist.
“He’s set in his ways,” Dominique said, in a terse manner.
She didn’t feel like talking about him, that much was obvious to the others. More than just worrying her, Alexandre was now making her truly unhappy. He’d asked forgiveness, the day before, for what he’d just done to her, but she hadn’t listened to him, getting dressed silently and leaving him sitting at the foot of the bed, head in hands, looking pathetic. They’d gotten along wonderfully for years, having the same tastes, laughing at the same things. She’d defended him against Aurélien and Jules, had tried to make him stronger. She’d been fulfilled as a mother by the twins’ birth, and all in all everything in their life was good. And here was Alex ruining everything by attacking his family, ignoring his kids, and acting like a mean drunk with his wife. Until now, Dominique had managed to overcome her anger and sadness, but she was reaching her limit. She’d come to Fonteyne without thinking, certain that she’d be welcomed there, that she’d be in a friendly place for a moment of respite.
“Would you like some rib steak for lunch, Mrs. Dominique?” Fernande asked. “I have some nice wine shoots with that, as well as beautiful mushrooms.”
Fernande waited for her approval, and Dominique flashed a huge smile. The old lady never forgot people’s favorite foods, a leg of lamb in Louis-Marie’s case, grilled shad for Robert—the only one who knew how to properly pluck out the fishbone. Dominique accepted and Fernande, delighted, poured her some tea.
“It’s so nice here,” Dominique whispered, sitting back in her chair.
The sound of a car engine made them all turn to the driveway. Louis-Marie could sense the catastrophe coming even before seeing Alexandre.
“Hello everybody!” he said, slamming his car door.
Distressed at not finding Dominique in Mazion, he’d borrowed Antoine’s automobile. He was close to sober, having only downed a glass of cognac to give himself some courage. He regretted what he’d done the day before and, above all, feared he’d gone too far this time. Dominique was a kind woman, but also a very determined one. He had to have her forgiveness at all costs, even if it meant running into Jules. He came up the steps, gestured at Louis-Marie, and kissed Laurène on the cheek.
Trying to look detached, he threw worried glances around him. The last person on earth he wanted to see right now was “the bastard.” Fernande was the one who suddenly appeared on the terrace, startling him.
“Alexandre,” she
said. “Well I’ll be …”
She came over to him, grabbed him by the shoulders, and shook him.
“You don’t look so good,” she said.
She didn’t know what else to say to him. She was nervous to see him here at Fonteyne but still had a lot of affection for him. A painful moment of silence followed. Everybody on the terrace hoped that Jules wouldn’t return anytime soon.
“I wouldn’t mind a little something to drink,” Alexandre said. “It’s time for an aperitif, isn’t it?”
He was provoking them, sensing their embarrassment, but not wanting to back down.
Louis-Marie got to his feet and said, very calmly, “You can’t stay here.”
“Says who?” Alexandre said.
“It’s just how it has to be. …”
Alexandre tried to make eye contact with his wife, but her head was lowered. He wanted her to at least respect the fact that he was putting up a front.
“Listen, Alex, another fight wouldn’t be good for any of us. You …”
“No!” Alex shouted. “You listen to me. Dominique is welcomed here with open arms, and I don’t have the right to set foot at Fonteyne? You kept me out of the wedding, but I’m not going to let that sort of thing happen again!”
Louis-Marie frowned and stared at his brother.
“Didn’t the bastard tell you that he prevented me from coming into my house? That he hit me like a thug?”
“He did tell me,” Louis-Marie said. “And also that you vomited all over him. … You weren’t very presentable, if I understand correctly. …”
Embarrassed, Alex went over to lean against the terrace’s stone parapet.
“So what?” he said. “I drank to the bride and groom all by myself. …”
Fernande slipped back inside the house, while Dominique and Laurène were looking aside. Alexandre suddenly felt abandoned, excluded from a world he still loved, deep down inside. He gave Louis-Marie a hangdog look.
“We’re all scared of him,” he said in a low voice. “You realize that? You too, you’re terrified at the thought of how he might react if he found me here. … One day, he’s also going to kick you out, you and Robert. Your turn will come. …”
“Alex, that’s enough!”
Dominique was now standing next to him. She took his hand.
“Let’s go,” she said, with strained kindness.
He let himself be guided down the steps. She put him in the car and shut the door herself.
“I’ll be right over,” she told him.
She watched the car turn around and make its way down the driveway, and she sighed with relief. He’d come to Fonteyne to get her. Even though he hadn’t put up a fight when she asked him to leave, as she’d expected, she knew he was proud of his audacity. When Alex’s car was out of sight, she turned to Fonteyne’s façade and contemplated it for a moment. That’s where she wished she could live, nowhere else.
“So you’re not going to stay?” Laurène asked.
Dominique shook her head no and climbed into her own car.
Jules followed the secretary to a leather-padded double door. The extravagant luxury of the office amused him. The entire place reeked of over-the-top opulence.
“I am so delighted to finally meet you!” exclaimed Valérie Samson as she stood up.
Her voice was warm and modulated, her diction perfect. She walked around her desk to shake Jules’s hand.
“Please,” she said, “have a seat.”
She didn’t try to conceal her curiosity, examining Jules from head to toe. Then she turned around and went back to her plush chair. Jules had time to admire the lawyer’s elegant silhouette, her long legs, her superb hair.
“It was very nice of you to accept my invitation,” she said, smiling. “This meeting is, of course, completely informal, but the justice system is so overloaded that members of opposite camps can never meet. …”
She planted her sparkling eyes on Jules’s and saw how dark they were.
“You’re not how I pictured you,” she said.
He burst out laughing, took out his pack of smokes, and asked her if it was okay for him to light one. She pushed an ashtray toward him and opened a folder on which was written, in red: Château-Fonteyne Company.
“My approach is quite unorthodox,” she said, “and I’m not sure what Mr. Varin will think of it … but I felt like meeting you so I could form my own opinion. I can see in this file that your brother Louis-Marie is a writer. The other is a surgeon, head of surgery at the Lariboisière Hospital. …”
She glanced at Jules. He kept quiet, looking back at her.
“They’re both on your side and have nothing to say against your father’s will.”
She shut the folder with a brisk gesture.
“Three against one, that’s worrying. I’d like to understand. … Of course, your two brothers live in Paris and have no reason to doubt your competence. But even if your management and bookkeeping are faultless, the fact that your brother Alexandre was kicked out of the company is morally unacceptable. That’s what I’m going to focus on during the trial. … See, I’m telling you everything!”
Jules exhaled a line of smoke. His silence obviously annoyed Valérie Samson.
“This case is more complicated than it seems,” she continued. “Questions of moral right, of moral prejudice, you know, those can be interpreted in many ways. It’s up to the judge’s discretion.”
She stood up and took a few steps, knowing that his eyes were on her. She left few men indifferent, and most speechless, so she was surprised by Jules’s pointed question.
“Are you planning to put a drunk on the witness stand?”
“You’re talking about Alexandre?”
“I’m not talking about anything,” Jules said with a charming smile. “I’m not even talking to you, since we’re not supposed to be meeting, Mrs. Samson.”
Loosening up a bit, she burst out laughing, suddenly appearing much younger.
“This is going to be a fun case!” she said, her voice cheerful.
Jules wasn’t laughing. He put out his cigarette and said, “I don’t think any of this is fun. This is not a chess game. Alex’s antics could bring Fonteyne to the brink of disaster. I have employees, responsibilities.”
“And also debts, I believe?”
“It’s no secret. Debts are necessary in this business. But the balance is fragile.”
She kept quiet for a moment, looking at a document in the folder.
“Dr. Auber is the one who treated your father?” she finally asked.
“Yes. He’d been his doctor for twenty years or so.”
“I’m going to contact him to ask in what mental and physical condition Aurélien Laverzac was when he wrote his last will, the one that established Fonteyne’s succession. …”
Jules straightened in his chair, and Samson thought she’d touched on a sensitive topic.
But he only said, “This is Alex’s latest bright idea? God knows, Aurélien wasn’t senile.”
The way he’d uttered the name Aurélien made the lawyer look up at him. She found him very attractive and couldn’t help smiling at him again.
“Your brother Alexandre also asked me to verify that everything about your adoption was done legally, but …”
Jules slammed the top of Samson’s desk.
“Alex’s biggest fault until now was stupidity. But now he’s getting downright mean, too? Dig as deep as you like and good luck.”
He was now standing, looking furious.
“If you get angry every time your opponent takes a swing at you,” Samson said with a voice devoid of hostility, “you’re not going to make it to the end of the bout.”
He struggled to remain calm.
“I know that this is some sort of game for you,” he said. “A sport. It’s your profession, and I suppose there’s good money in it. But I really don’t have any time to waste. From now on, I’m going to ask that you talk to Mr. Varin about this matter.”
>
He gave her a short nod and headed for the door. She didn’t try to stop him. She’d wanted to meet him because she liked to see who her opponents were. She put people in very distinct categories, sizing them up in a few minutes with her almost infallible instinct and vast experience. But Jules was impossible to figure out. He was unlike anyone else, least of all his brother. His undeniable charisma was going to serve him well during the trial.
She went to the window and easily spotted him down on the street as he headed back to his Mercedes. She took the binoculars off the bookshelf to better examine him as he unlocked the car and sat behind the wheel.
“Jesus, that’s a handsome man,” she said with a smile she never gave anyone.
Robert removed his gloves, mask, and surgical gown. He’d decided to let his assistant finish the sutures at the end of an especially successful operation. He took a shower in the surgeons’ locker room and then went back to his office. Glancing at his agenda, he sighed at the workload awaiting him. Beside his phone he saw the many messages scribbled by his secretary. He went through them and was relieved when he found that Pauline had called to confirm their rendezvous. They’d seen each other every day for the past week. Tired of going to hotels, she’d said she wanted them to meet at his place instead, and he’d made sure to erase all traces of Frédérique’s brief stay there. The young woman was living in one of the rooms in the hospital reserved for visiting doctors, but she made it her mission to find an apartment she liked as soon as possible. Robert had asked his loyal secretary, Janine, to help her out, saying that Frédérique was some distant family member from out of town. Then, he’d undertaken steps to find her a good administrative position in the hospital. Once that was taken care of, he was able to concentrate on the one great love affair of his life: Pauline.
As Robert had since abandoned any hopes he may have once harbored, he remained cautious and didn’t dare ask questions about the future. He knew that Pauline was in no hurry to go back to Fonteyne to be with Louis-Marie, so he decided to wait and see. The month of July was well under way, and yet she remained evasive, didn’t say anything about when she’d finally leave Paris for Fonteyne. She slept at his place for a few hours, then demanded that he take her back home at dawn. Their relationship, free and yet at times strained, had a certain surreal aspect. They made love with incredible passion, as though they longed to damn themselves for eternity, as if they were never going to see each other again. They drank champagne, gazing at each other, easily breaking into giggling fits like children. And yet what they were sharing was but a fleeting affair, and Robert knew that.
A Bordeaux Dynasty: A Novel Page 46