But she was certainly not prepared for such a crash landing. She’d thought of everything—except that her relationship with Robert would come to a swift and sudden end.
* * *
COMPLETELY UNSUSPECTING, SHE HAD been returning from the vet with William Morris that afternoon when she saw the red-haired woman in the slim, dark-green skirt and white blouse who was walking up and down outside her store in elegant leather pumps. From a distance she had thought it was the Italian woman—Gabriella Spinelli. But as she came closer she saw that it was a stranger. A strikingly beautiful woman.
She carefully put down the bag that contained the softly whimpering William Morris. “Bonjour madame, are you looking for me? I’m afraid the store is closed today.” The slim woman with the red curls smiled.
“I’ve already noticed that,” she said in rather clumsy French, which didn’t quite fit in with her perfect appearance. “I don’t want to buy anything, anyway. I just want to talk to the owner of this postcard store.”
“Oh!” said Rosalie in some surprise. “Well then, you’re in luck. That’s me. Rosalie Laurent. What do you want to talk about?”
“I don’t really want to discuss it on the street,” said the stranger with a strange smile, her gaze resting on a passerby who was looking at her in fascination. “Can I come in for a moment?”
She had an unmistakably American accent, and Rosalie wondered if it was a matter of business. Was this woman with her chin-length curls perhaps a publisher looking for a new illustrator?
“Yes … of course … come in.” In spite of the smile she looked kind of intimidating, thought Rosalie. More like you imagined a tax investigator to be. She unlocked the store and invited the American in.
“Please sit down.” Rosalie opened the bag and put William Morris carefully into his basket. “What did you want to talk about?”
The American glanced at William Morris in some confusion, and looked briefly around the store before looking back at Rosalie. Was she just imagining it, or could she glimpse a trace of hostility in her green eyes?
“No thanks, I’d rather stand.” She deliberately looked Rosalie over from head to toe. “It’s about Robert Sherman,” she said.
“About Robert?” repeated Rosalie, not understanding at all. “What about Robert?” A bad feeling took hold of her. “I spoke to him on the telephone yesterday. Has something happened?”
“Yeah, I’d like to know that, too,” replied the redhead with a cold smile. “Because I spoke to Robert on the phone over the weekend—and I have to say it was a very strange call. Dear old Robert seemed to me to be quite confused.”
“Dear old Robert”? Was this woman an acquaintance of Robert’s? Rosalie looked at her in bewilderment. “Well, yes…,” she said. “A lot of things happened, you know—”
“I don’t want to be impolite, but may I ask what your relationship to Robert is?” the woman interrupted sharply.
“Pardon?” Rosalie could feel herself getting hot. “What do you mean? Robert Sherman is my boyfriend. And who are you, please?”
“Listen, that’s what I wanted to have a little chat with you about. Because there’s a little problem here.” She fixed her eyes on Rosalie. “Robert Sherman is my boyfriend—or rather my fiancé.” She gave a thin-lipped smile. “I’m Rachel, by the way.”
“Rachel?” The name meant nothing to her. Was this woman crazy? Or was there a conspiracy of red-haired women who were all after Robert Sherman? Rosalie shook her head energetically. “There must be some misunderstanding—Robert doesn’t have a girlfriend called Rachel.”
“Oh … doesn’t he?” Rachel raised her eyebrows and her voice took on a very unpleasant tone. “I’m afraid the misunderstanding is all yours, mademoiselle.”
“No…” Rosalie contradicted her, but then suddenly turned pale. She had of course heard the name Rachel once—when she’d been standing outside the terrace door at Max Marchais’s villa and Robert’s cell phone kept on ringing.
“Oh, that was just … Rachel. Someone I know.” In her mind’s eye she saw him again, sheepishly putting his cell phone back in his pocket.
“But … Robert said you were just an acquaintance … you sent him the manuscript … now I remember,” she said in confusion.
“An acquaintance?!” Rachel laughed curtly. “Well, he certainly hasn’t told you the whole truth.” She held her right hand under Rosalie’s nose. “Do you know what this is?” she asked triumphantly. A diamond was glittering on her finger. “Robert is my fiancé, we’ve been living together for three years in a little apartment in SoHo. But when we marry this fall and Robert takes over at Sherman and Sons, we’ll probably look for something bigger.”
She pulled her hand back and looked at her perfectly manicured fingernails. “Fortunately he’s come back to his senses—a guest professorship at the Sorbonne, really! I told him straight away that it was a crazy idea, but after his mother’s death he was understandably a bit out of it.” She sighed.
“And then all the excitement about that manuscript.” Rosalie felt as if the old stone floor was rocking beneath her feet. This woman knew too much to be just an acquaintance. Was it possible that Robert had lied to her so badly? She could see him again as he leaned back in bed after that unbelievable night, smiling at her as if she were the only woman in the world. “That can’t be true,” she said in a dull voice, leaning on the counter for support.
“And yet it is,” replied Rachel cheerfully. “I’ve come to Paris to fetch Robert. Didn’t he tell you that? On Thursday we’re flying back to New York.”
“He said he loved me.” Rosalie felt as if the pain was tearing the floor out from beneath her feet.
Rachel looked at her pityingly. “I should really be mad at you, but I can see that you had no clue at all. Don’t take it too much to heart, you’re not to blame.” She shook her head, and a keener observer than Rosalie, who was totally floored by this experience, might well have noticed how false her smile was as she now said, “It’s always the same with Robert. He’s like a little boy—he just can’t resist a pretty face. That’s why I’ll be very glad when he gives up working at the university. All those young students.” She clicked her tongue and looked with the utmost satisfaction at the young woman behind the counter, who was staring at the floor, blinded by tears.
“So, no hard feelings,” she said, shaking her red curls and turning to go. “I think we understand one another. I’m sure I don’t need to ask you to keep your hands off my future husband?”
Without waiting for an answer she turned and left the store.
Thirty-one
They had certainly been the three most exciting days of his life, thought Robert Sherman, as he walked on air through the Latin Quarter. An hour before he had been with Professeur Lepage to sign the contract for his guest professorship. The day before he had sat for hours with Max on a bench in the rosarium of the parc de Bagatelle and come to the astonished realization that it looked as if he now had a father again. And the day before—he shut his eyes for a moment and experienced once again that incredible sense of happiness that filled him whenever he thought of his night with Rosalie—the day before, he had found the woman of his dreams.
The ludicrous ultimatum that Rachel had presented to him in New York had almost run out. He remembered their edgy conversation when he called her back after the break-in and told her excitedly about the manuscript that Rosalie had found totally by chance in a box on top of Marchais’s wardrobe. “Gosh, it sounds like a novel by Lucinda Riley,” Rachel had said with a sigh, and then laughed—although the laugh had not sounded particularly friendly. “Perhaps you two should open a detective agency. Listening to you, I get the impression that you’re hanging around with that postcard seller day and night.”
“What nonsense. Rosalie’s just helping me, that’s all,” he had said—and at that point in time it had still been the truth. “She’s very nice. You’d like her.”
“I’m not so sure about that.” Ra
chel had ended the conversation rather snappily, but when she called him again on Friday evening she had been very friendly and understanding. She had kept on asking questions, and so he’d finally told her about his planned visit to Max Marchais and also briefly mentioned that he’d spoken to the dean at the university.
“And?” she had asked.
“We need to talk about that calmly when we have more time.” He hadn’t wanted to get into an argument with her, not at that moment, not before the other important matter was cleared up. So he’d given her evasive answers and ended the call by saying that he’d be in touch with her again on the weekend. “I’ll call you when I get back from Le Vésinet,” he had said, and only now did he remember that he still owed Rachel that call. Because it was precisely that weekend when all those events had coincided; his whole life felt like a whirlwind had hit it and he’d tumbled from one excitement to the next. But as he sat at breakfast with Max in the morning and gazed out over the garden he had suddenly become very calm. The decision was made: he would stay in Paris, perhaps forever.
He intended, as soon as he got back to the hotel, to call Rachel and get things straight. Nothing was going to hold him back on his new path through life.
“Oh, Mr. Sherman, you will see, you will like it ’ere with us,” the dapper Professeur Lepage had said as he escorted him to the door and delightedly shook his hand. “You already look like an ’appy man.”
With a smile, Robert speeded up as he turned from the boulevard Saint-Germain onto the rue du Dragon.
He was a happy man.
He was burning to tell Rosalie everything and could hardly wait to take her in his arms.
Strangely, nobody came to the door. The store was shut as it was every Monday. Robert peered through the store window in the hope of seeing Rosalie inside, but she wasn’t there. He rang the doorbell of the apartment several times, also in vain. He looked at his watch. It was six thirty and he’d called her that morning to say that he would drop in on her in the early evening.
Was she still in the veterinary clinic? Had her little dog’s condition perhaps worsened?
Robert stood indecisively for a while looking at the pattern on the turquoise gift wrap that was hanging in the window like a cloud in the sky. Then he called Rosalie on her cell phone. But no one answered that either. He left a short message to say that he was now going back to the hotel and then directed his steps toward the rue Jacob.
The receptionist in the Hôtel des Marronniers gave him an amused smile. “You have a visitor, Monsieur Sherman. Your friend said she’d like to wait for you in your room. I hope it was all right for me to allow her to go up.” She smiled conspiratorially as she handed him the second key over the dark wooden counter.
Robert nodded, a bit surprised, but then his heart began to beat a little faster in joyful anticipation. Rosalie had obviously already picked up his message and rushed to the hotel. Impatiently, he pressed the button in the elevator which, after a short, worrying buzzing noise, clattered into motion.
That’s all I need—to get stuck in here now, thought Robert cheerfully. But the elevator got to the fourth floor without any incident.
He ran his fingers quickly through his hair and tugged open the door in happy anticipation. He saw the silhouette of a woman standing in the sunlight beside the window.
“You’re here already!” he said tenderly. “My God, how I’ve missed you!”
“Hello, Robert!”
The woman at the window turned slowly round, and Robert felt his train jumping the track. An apparition! It had to be an apparition!
“You’ve missed me? I’m glad about that: when we last talked on the phone I didn’t get the impression that my absence meant so much to you.” Her green eyes glittered as she took a step toward him to embrace him.
“Rachel!” he blurted. “What are you doing here? This is … well, this is a surprise.”
Thoughts rushed zigzag through his head like hares fleeing a hunter.
She gave him a kiss—in his thunderstruck state he just let it happen—and he thought he saw a malicious smile pass fleetingly across her face. “So, I hope it’s a pleasant surprise, Robert,” she purred, stroking his hair. “You really need a haircut, my dear.”
“Yes … no … I mean…,” he stuttered. “I thought we were going to talk on the phone, to discuss … everything.”
“Exactly,” she said. “But then you didn’t call and so I thought it would make more sense for me to come over to … talk.” Her smile was now unmistakably ironic. “Although this room is really frightfully small—how did you manage to put up with it the whole time?”
“Oh, you know … time has just flown,” he stammered. “Sure, the room isn’t particularly big, but the courtyard is pretty. And anyway, I haven’t spent a lot of time in the room.”
“Really?” She raised her eyebrows. “Oh, yes, of course”—she smacked her forehead with the palm of her hand—“you were so dreadfully busy.” She glided over to the bed, leaned against the headboard, and crossed her long legs seductively.
The telephone beside the bed began to ring, but Robert didn’t move from the spot.
“Well, darling, aren’t you going to answer it? Don’t let me disturb you. Just act as if I wasn’t here.” She smiled at him like a snake with a rabbit.
He stared at her as if spellbound. Rachel had gotten on a plane and just flown over. That was quite something! A sunbeam fell into the room and her red curls glowed like fire. She smiled at him without saying anything, and Robert had the definite feeling that her intentions were far from positive. He wondered what she’d slipped to the receptionist to persuade her to allow her to come up to his room. The ringing stopped.
“Rachel, what is this? What are you doing here?” he asked.
“I’ve come to take my somewhat confused professor of literature home,” she said with an indulgent smile. “It seems to me, Robert, that you are a bit muddled.”
“What?” Robert was speechless. “Take me home?”
“Well, your four weeks are up on Thursday, my love, and I thought we could spend a few days together in Paris before flying home. You could show me around a bit, and I really want to go shopping in the rue de Rivoli. They say they have really great purses there.”
Robert shook his head hesitantly. He might as well tell her here and now. “I’m afraid that’s not going to happen, Rachel.”
“What’s not going to happen?” she replied like a pistol shot.
“Anything, Rachel. I’m going to stay in Paris. I was going to call you today. We need to talk.”
“About the guest professorship?” She looked at him slyly.
“Rachel, it’s not just the job. Since yesterday I’ve known that I have a father who lives in Paris.”
“Aaaah!” she exclaimed. “Now there’s a father in Paris as well. How extremely practical!”
“There’s no need to be sarcastic, Rachel. I’ve only known since yesterday myself.” He took a deep breath. “And since yesterday I’ve known that I’ve met the only woman for me here in Paris.”
“Really?! That was quick!” Strangely enough, she didn’t seem at all surprised.
“If it’s the right woman, it’s always quick,” he said slowly. “I’m sorry, Rachel.”
Rachel sat up and stared at him with unconcealed rage. “If you mean the girl from the postcard store, you can just forget it.” She laughed scornfully. “Because you’re definitely on her shit list.” She said it with indescribable elegance.
“What do you mean, Rachel?” Robert felt his heart sinking.
“Exactly what I say.” Her voice rose in a shrill crescendo. “What do you think, Robert? Did you really believe I’d allow my future to be screwed up by a little postcard seller? What do you think you’re doing with that child? She doesn’t even have a proper hairdo with that stupid braid of hers. Please, Robert, you cannot be serious. Did you drink too much red wine?”
Robert turned white with rage. “What have you d
one, Rachel? You didn’t … oh, God, you did.…” He took a threatening step toward her, ending up directly beside the French bed.
“Of course I went to see her.” Rachel fell back calmly and laughed softly. “Well, what can I say—the girl wasn’t exactly pleased to discover you’d lied to her. Then I explained to her that we’re not just acquaintances.…”
“You know exactly the terms I came to Paris under, Rachel! It was you who gave me the damn ultimatum. It was you who was going to leave me.”
Rachel waved dismissively. “All water under the bridge. I was very worked up at the time. Sometimes you change your mind. Anyway,” she continued unimpressed, “I told her what was what and then waved my engagement ring under her nose. The mademoiselle with the braid turned rather pale—I almost felt a little sorry for her…”
“You bitch!” He would have liked to wring her neck. “You know very well that that’s not an engagement ring.” Robert still clearly remembered the visit to Tiffany’s when Rachel absolutely insisted on the white-gold ring with the little diamond for her birthday.
“Whatever.” Rachel looked at the ring on her finger with some satisfaction. “She was quite impressed, I have to say. Especially when I said we’re getting married in the fall.”
“You said what?”
Thirty-two
Half an hour later Robert was back outside the little store in the rue du Dragon ringing up a storm on the doorbell. He drummed on the door in desperation. He could see that there was a light on in the first floor, but Rosalie wouldn’t come to the door. She had shut herself up in her oyster shell, and he couldn’t even blame her for it after Lady Macbeth had so successfully spread her poison. He’d ushered a stunned Rachel almost physically out of his room.
Paris Is Always a Good Idea Page 23