“Let me down!” I cry, pummeling his back with my fists.
“No, Pearl. Stop behaving like a wayward teenager. You’re coming with me. I’m fed up with this nonsense.”
“I’m not marrying you, Alexandre Chevalier! Not until you sort—”
“Stop telling me what to do,” he barks, his gait strong as he strides towards his car. “You’re marrying me and that’s the end of it.”
I suddenly think of something. “You can’t marry me, you don’t have my divorce papers. So there!”
“Oh no? I’ve had Suresh get them couriered over to the hotel we’re saying at in Vegas. All will be quite legal, I can assure you.”
We arrive at his car. With one hand he opens the trunk, chucks my case in and, keeping a tight grip on me with the other arm so I can’t escape, lowers me into the back seat and lays me inside as if I were a child not allowed in the front seat with her daddy. Then he locks the door. I try to open it from inside but it won’t let me out. Child safety locks, no doubt. I pound on the windows.
He comes around to his side, opens his door and jumps in. “Not so fast, Pearl Robinson, soon to be Pearl Chevalier. You are not running out on me. You did that once in France and I won’t let it happen again.” He starts the engine, puts it into first and revs forward, Formula One Style.
“So I’m your prisoner?”
“Yes. And then you’ll be my wife.”
“Also in jail. Do not pass GO - DO NOT COLLECT $200.”
“There’ll be more than $200 to collect, of that you can be quite sure.”
“But still in jail.”
“Yes.” He smiles and adds, “A very pretty, gilded jail where you can have anything you want.”
“Except my freedom.”
“Believe me, you’ll be there of your own free will.”
“Like now? Trapped in the back of this Mercedes being abducted into marriage?”
A gentle smirk edges his curvy, dark red lips. “I know what’s best for you, Pearl. Trust me. You need to marry me.”
The arrogance! I would laugh but it’s not funny. I’m crying now, tears trailing down my cheeks. “You’re taking me to my death.”
He laughs out loud and changes smoothly into fourth.
“I’m not kidding, Alexandre. Laura called. She says Sophie tried to kill her.”
“Nonsense.”
“She did! She says it was no accident and that Sophie owns chunks of Vegas and will have me murdered.”
He doesn’t say anything. Just keeps his eyes on the road.
“What is wrong with you? You sister is insane and you’re too blind to see it!”
“I agree, my sister is a little eccentric, shall we say, but she’s not going to try and have you killed.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I know her. I know how her mind works.”
“Like she stabbed your father in the groin? She is dangerous.”
He turns his head abruptly to me. His lips close tightly, bitterly – his eyes flash with rage. “He deserved what he had coming to him. Don’t you dare defend that vicious monster.”
“It doesn’t let Sophie off the hook. She’s out to get me.”
“She’s jealous, Pearl, that’s all. She’ll get used to you.”
“She will not get ‘used to me’ because I’m bailing, Alexandre. I value my life too highly, however much I love you. I’m not going to marry you with your whack-job sister in the picture.”
“I made some calls tonight. I’m selling her my share of HookedUp. Once and for all. Satisfied? Most men wouldn’t let their girlfriends pussy-whip them the way you have with me about this, but because American women have a history of dominating their men, I’ll forgive you. But just this once. It won’t happen again, Pearl. This is the last time you tell me what to do. Do you understand.” No question mark but a statement.
I am speechless. Pussy-whipped? I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. Instead I blurt out, “I got pussy-whipped tonight. Literally.”
He looks around at me with a wry smile and then back at the road. “Oh yes?”
“Yes, A bit of lesbian S and M.” There, said it. “Surely you don’t want to marry a quasi lesbian who got beaten by your sister’s lover? Oh, and by the way, thanks for letting me in on the fact that Sophie is gay. Another secret you’ve been hiding from me.”
“I didn’t think it was my place to reveal Sophie’s sexual preferences. It’s something we never discuss – she’s very private. It was up to her to tell you. What do you mean, ‘my sister’s lover?’ ”
“What?? So it’s true then, she’s gay?”
“Yes, she’s gay. She kept it quiet from me for years but I always had my suspicions. What do you mean, ‘my sister’s lover?’ Are you talking about Alessandra Demarr?”
“Yes, I found a photo which I stole for evidence as I’m fed up with you telling me I’m imagining things. They are lovers. At least that’s what the photo is spelling out loud and clear.”
He changes the music. Leaving on a Jet Plane. How apt. “Interesting,” he mumbles.
“What?? Why do you not seem shocked by this?”
“Sophie must have got together with her when we went backstage that time at the theatre - when we saw her in that play.”
“What? Alexandre, why didn’t you tell me this?”
“I did. I told you we saw a play of hers in London. Sophie wanted to congratulate her so we went to the green room backstage afterwards, but I got bored waiting so I left. Sophie stayed, though. She never told me the two of them had anything going on, or that they’d even met. I had no idea. And you had a little fun with Alessandra, too? Oh well…keep it in the family.” He laughs.
“Stop it!” I yell leaning forward, still riding in the back seat. “I am disgusted! I feel used and dumb and a total freaking idiot. Why did I not see this? She seduced me, Alexandre, and I let her. My ass is so sore I can hardly sit. She whipped me, she made me come, she…she…” I find myself wailing through angry, shameful tears.
He turns the music down. “Ssh, now chérie, it’s so not important in the great scheme of things.” But he still has a slight smile on his face as if the whole thing tickles him somehow.
“Why the hell do you want me anyway?” I sniffle. “I had a threesome with two guys that went all wrong. I’m a quasi lesbian. I can’t do a work deal without being totally screwed over. I can’t look a penis in the eye, excuse the pun…I’m a basket-case. I am a disaster. This is all wrong, Alexandre, this is all screwed-up. I am screwed up. Really, I’m not the person you thought I was. I’m not Miss sweetie-pie Star-Spangled American cutie, golden girl. Look at me, I’m all over the place.”
He changes gear again. “I know.”
“No, you don’t know! You thought I was perfect.”
He threads his arm to the back seat and holds onto my hand. “Perfect for me, chérie. You think I want Miss Goodie-Two-Shoes? That I could relate to someone like that with my fucked-up past? I know who you are, Pearl, maybe even better than you know yourself. You’re a contradiction, a paradox, a mix of all things messy and delightful. We’ve only known each other four and a half months but you are my media naranja – my soul mate - I knew that the second I laid eyes on you.”
“The other half of the orange?” I snivel, grabbing some Kleenex from my purse and blowing my runny nose. “That Spanish expression you wrote me in your love letter?”
“That’s right. We fit perfectly together. We’re two separate orange halves that make up one whole.”
I exhale with frustration but climb forward and maneuver myself into the passenger seat so we can have a more normal conversation. All Alexandre’s love and forgiveness still doesn’t solve the Sophie problem. This is exasperating. I feel as if I have been left to bubble and boil in Sophie’s and Alessandra’s witch’s cauldron. With Lucifer purring away, observing the whole crazy scene.
“Well, this is all a big shock for me, I can tell you,” I say buckling up, remembering Be
tte Davis’s line in All About Eve, ‘Fasten your seatbelt, we’re in for a bumpy night.’ “I mean finding out about Sophie being gay, being Alessandra’s girlfriend and, oh yes, P.S. Sophie is married.”
“So? You think she’s the first gay person to be married? It helps her social status, not to mention fiscal benefits. In France, being single’s expensive. It’s way more cost-effective to have a spouse.”
I glare at him. “Is that why you want to marry me, to save on tax?”
“I file in America, chérie. My primary residence is New York, in case you haven’t noticed. And no, I would never marry for financial reasons, you know that. Sophie’s different – she’s obsessed with money, as you are well aware.”
“I feel grossed out. I might as well have had sex with Sophie herself. I kissed Alessandra. I let her whip me!”
He looks at me for a second, still vaguely amused. “And are you over it now? Cured of your bondage curiosity? Because don’t ask me to get the handcuffs out and spank you.”
I shuffle in my seat trying to find a comfortable position that doesn’t chafe my tender butt. “Yes, I’m over it. It hurts. No more, thank you very much, my derrière is really sore.”
His lips curve very slightly. “Good. Now can we get on with our relationship or do you have some more sniffing about to do?”
“Are you pissed at me?”
“What I had envisioned in my obviously very boring male imagination was a little kissing between two beautiful women, some light sexual entertainment, not my fiancée being beaten with a whip by my sister’s lover.”
“Yeah, well, I regret it now, that’s for sure.”
I suddenly remember all the dirty details that Alessandra shared with me about her ‘ex’ liking hairy underarms. The ‘ex’ obviously being Sophie, the ‘tigress in bed.’
“It was an experiment,” I say, excusing myself. “I wanted to beat out those nasty memories of that fateful night – wipe out my past.”
Alexandre takes in a deep breath as if to say, Good luck.
“What, you think that’s crazy?”
“Revenge is a dish best served cold,” he replies ominously.
“What are you trying to say, Alexandre - what are you telling me?”
“Nothing, just quoting a rather fitting line from Shakespeare – or maybe not Shakespeare at all; perhaps it’s some old Sicilian proverb.”
Sicily. Alessandra. Yes, come to think of it I’ve heard that expression in The Godfather – Michael Corleone talking about how his father gave him that very same advice – Revenge is a dish that tastes best when served cold. I remember what Alexandre said to me on the phone earlier about the footballers - that he’d ‘track those fuck-heads down’ - and then I wonder, is that what he did with his father - serve him up a cold dish of revenge years later? His father’s ‘disappearance’ – a cold payback dish that Alexandre took out of the freezer, thawed and served up when his dad was least expecting it? I’m dying to ask but every time I mention his father he gets riled. Now is not the moment to press him.
The car breaks smoothly to a halt. I can see the private jets clustered together a way off – Van Nuys Airport isn’t a maize like LAX. “We’ve arrived,” Alexandre lets me know in a serious voice.
“I’m not going to Vegas.”
“Yes you are.”
“I’m not getting out of this car.”
He laughs. “Do you want me to carry you in a fireman’s lift again?”
“I’ll scream and attract attention so you’ll let me go.”
“Not a chance. I’m keeping a firm grip on you until you’ve got that ring on your finger. I’ll gag you if I have to. You want a bit of rough play, a bit of bondage? – you’ve got it, baby.”
“What good will a dead wife be to you?” I shout. “Sophie will have me ‘topped off’ as Laura put it. Yes, that was the expression she used.”
“Laura and Sophie get on fine – this is all ridiculous, I can’t believe Laura called you and said that.”
I fumble in my handbag for my cell. “Right, if you don’t believe me, I’ll play you the message!” I squeal.
He pretends he hasn’t heard. “Where shall we go for our honeymoon? Anywhere in the world – you name it, baby, we can go. Kauai or Bora Bora. We can leave straight after the ink is dry on our marriage certificate if you don’t fancy hanging about Vegas.”
I want to scream. Why is he ignoring me? I grapple about for my phone in my oversize bag. Where is it? “Alexandre, why are you not listening? Your nutcase sister is going to kill me and all you’re doing is laughing and in total and utter denial! She tried to kill Laura! Where is my goddam phone?”
“Calm down, Pearl.”
I try to unlock my car door again but he grabs my wrists. I stamp my legs on the floor. “I will NOT calm down!” Then I fish about in my bag again and finally locate my cell. Suddenly, a brilliant idea flashes into my brain like a torchlight. I take a deep breath and say. “Okay, fine, Alexandre. I’m coming along. I’ll be quiet and behave but please keep an eye on me until we have got the hell out of Vegas. I’m scared.”
“Good girl. And don’t worry, I won’t let you out of my sight. Ready now?”
“I think my cell fell out of the side pocket of my handbag,” I lie.
“What a bummer, there’s nothing worse than losing your phone. I’ll buy you another. That one was outdated anyway.”
“Never mind,” I grumble.
He gets out of his side and quickly dashes around to open my door. I generally love that about Alexandre; he has such gentlemanly manners; always treats me with such respect, opening doors for me – except for now, throwing me over his shoulder like I’m a little girl – ignoring my plea. He’s so dominating it worries me. Do I want to marry this man? As things stand at the moment, no, I don’t. I can just see myself lying dead in a ditch somewhere in the suburbs of Vegas or in a dumpster with a bullet through my brain, or covered in liquid cement like some Jane Doe in a CSI Las Vegas episode. Alexandre admitted Sophie was ‘eccentric’ but he still won’t stop her mad games And now he’s putting my life in danger! I glare at him furiously.
He helps me out of the car and puts both his hands about my waist. “Christ, you’re beautiful,” he murmurs with hooded sex-eyes, raking me up and down as if he wants to eat me alive.
“Thank you,” I mumble, bowing my head to stop his burning gaze - loathing him and loving him simultaneously.
“C’est normal,” he says in French and then takes my face in his large hands tilting my chin up and planting a firm kiss on my mouth. My heart is racing. His devastating good looks, his flashing green eyes, his soft, dark red lips…but more than all that, the adrenaline rush of what I’m about to do…
I break the kiss. “I really need to go to the bathroom.”
“You can go when you’re on the plane.”
“Don’t we need to go through some sort of security though?”
“Lately they’ve got a little picky – sometimes they frisk you with the metal detector thing before you board.”
“That’s what I was afraid of,” I say, thinking I have metal balls inside me jiggling away. But then I remember that I took them out.
He smiles wryly. “Why, have you got a pistol on you?”
“No, just…well, I’ve got my period. I would really like to use the bathroom now before we board.”
“You’re just saying that. You’ll try to do a runner.”
“That’s one of those British expressions you picked up from Laura, isn’t it?”
“I have a feeling you’ll try and slip away, Pearl.”
“Don’t be silly,” I assure him, holding his hand and leading him to the building where some double doors are. “I just want to freshen up a bit and those airplane toilets are so squished – even on private jets - you can hardly turn around. Anyway, we have to drop the rental car keys off, don’t we?”
“All I have to do is make a call and someone will come and pick up the keys.”
“But I need to use the bathroom to clean up.”
“Alright, but don’t dawdle. This is already taking far too long.”
We find the ladies room.
“Why don’t you drop off the car keys while I go to the toilet?” I ask, knowing he’ll say no.
“Some chance. I’ll wait here.”
Alexandre hovers outside the door watching me suspiciously as I go in. I rush inside to have a sniff about. No windows.
I come out again grimacing. “It stinks in there - half the toilets are blocked up. I need to find another.”
“Come on, this is ridiculous, just go on the plane.”
“I have blood all over me,” I hiss at him.
I march ahead, desperate to bring my plan to fruition but it looks as if I’ll be getting on that jet, like it or not. I find a new bathroom and do a quick check over. Bingo, there’s a tiny window high up. I go over and see if I can open it. Just. It’ll be a real squeeze but I’ll try. I search in my bag and get out what I need. All my cash and my passport. I stuff it in my jeans’ pockets. I casually come out of the ladies room. Alexandre is standing there, legs astride in his Alpha male stance, watching my every movement. I smile nonchalantly.
I edge up close to him, fingering the expensive material of his sharp, charcoal-grey suit jacket. “You look so handsome. How come you’re wearing a suit today?”
He strokes the knuckles of my hand. “I didn’t get a chance to change. I double-backed on that meeting in Montreal, remember? Chasing about after you, Ms. Pearl Robinson. But not for much longer though,” he glances at his watch, “before I make you mine. You won’t be Robinson any more. Pearl…” he says, rolling his tongue around the R of Pearl… “Chevalier. Sounds good, doesn’t it?”
“Can’t wait,” I answer sweetly. “Hold my handbag, will you? There aren’t any hooks on the back of the doors in there. Disgusting, I hate putting my handbag on the floor with all those germs everywhere.” I give him my bag and hug him closely, slipping my hand surreptitiously into his jacket pocket until I find what I need. I distract him meanwhile with a kiss, gliding my teasing tongue glide along his lower lip and then I nip him there with my teeth. I lock my eyes with his. “I love you, Alexandre Chevalier, whatever happens, remember that. You’d better call the pilot and tell them we’re on our way. I’ll be a while in there, though. I need to change my panties.” I hold a ‘fresh pair’ up at him (which is, in reality, a bunch of Kleenex scrunched in my hand with his car keys inside) …but it does the trick.
Shadows of Pearl (The Pearl Trilogy, Part 2) Page 16