As we stepped outside, I bided my time and asked, “Models aside, what did you think of Bethany’s collection?” I found myself hoping he’d loved it as much as I did.
He looked at me carefully before reticently admitting, “I barely remember the other models or the music. I was thinking of how beautiful you looked. How you stood out amongst the crowd. You are truly unique.”
I beamed at his praise. “I don’t think I’m unique, and I sure hope I didn’t stand out. It was everyone’s night to shine.”
“Bethany must think so, too. She singled you out.”
Confused, I stopped walking. “What?”
“The color of your gown. Her speech.” I stepped in beside him as he resumed walking.
I pictured my gown amongst the others.
“The color was… the color of a sunny winter sky. Icy and refreshing. Distinctive.”
“Distinctive?”
“Surely you realized you were the only one wearing that color.”
“No, I didn’t.” I thought about it and decided to make light of it. “Regardless, I now have a lovely, custom-made dress.” Looking down at the gift I wore, I continued, “Two, actually. I love this.” He complimented both gowns and Bethany and me, letting the subject change.
“What are the plans for dinner?”
“I believe Ted is spending a small fortune and having dinner prepared and delivered to their apartment.”
My phone chirped. After reading the text, I asked, “Which do you like better, Mexican or Thai?”
“I’ve never had Mexican food. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a Mexican restaurant in Paris. Earlier, Charlotte wanted Lebanese, but Thai is fine.”
“I’m guessing we are going with the impulses of a pregnant woman whose been having Braxton Hicks contractions all day.”
Shaking his head, he asked, “Is she sure they are only Braxton Hicks? When is her due date? Spicy food and contractions are a poor combination, unless she wants to have the baby early.” His concern for my friend endeared me to him. It also made me wonder if this was bringing back memories for him.
Squeezing his hand, I said, “Don’t worry. She’s about four weeks out. I’m sure everything is fine. I’ll tell them something not spicy.”
***
The second we walked through the door, I knew something was wrong. Hillary was pacing the long hall from the entry to the back of the apartment. “What’s happening?”
Her answer was interrupted by Liam shouting, “For fuck’s sake!”
I shot Sébastien a worried glance before rushing down the hallway.
Des Bannerman stood next to the couch where Charlotte lay, holding her ankles in the air, while Liam stood beside him, brooding. Ted and Tiziana stood off to one side, barely suppressing laughter. Marian wasn’t even trying to pretend the situation wasn’t ridiculous. She was bent over, laughing so hard not a single sound escaped her.
Charlotte had tucked a light throw blanket around her waist, trying to be modest, and reassured Liam, “He’s right. I read it in one of the baby books.”
“So, I’m not allowed to touch you. Meanwhile…” Here he paused to give Des a disparaging look. “…an actor who played a doctor once gets to help you.”
“I received an Oscar for it,” Des interrupted.
Liam shot him a look that told him to shut up. Des wisely lowered his eyes and assumed a submissive posture.
“Charlotte, what is going on?” I asked.
“I was just having some more Braxton Hicks. Liam was massaging my feet—they ache so bad—when Des just reminded us that that can actually induce labor. So, Des is elevating my feet, Liam is pissed, and the rest of us are hungry.”
I nodded. “Got it. What are we having for dinner?” I looked at my watch; it was almost eleven o’clock.
“Ted ordered food,” Tiziana answered as she got back to setting the table.
At that moment, Sébastien wondered, “How is it that Des Bannerman is here, Kathleen?”
Des rescued me by stretching out his hand to Sébastien. “Long story, mate. Ted and I are friends. A friend of his is a friend of mine.” Then he cast me a surprisingly pensive glance and added, “As long as Kathleen’s happy.” I watched Sébastien process this much-abbreviated explanation while they shook hands.
Des, whose attention span was that of a gnat, swung his gaze to Liam and Charlotte. “So, really? Michael is the godfather? I’d make an excellent one.”
I watched Sébastien. He was amused by Des’s antics, once he absorbed the odd reality of having an international movie star lounging around the living room, behaving like a normal person. I would fill him in on the details later.
The doorbell rang. “Shall I get it?” I called to our hosts, who were whizzing around the kitchen.
Ted poked his head through the doorway. “Doorbell? No. I’ve got it.”
Moments later, a parade of doormen, taxi drivers, and a couple of employees wearing black suits, white shirts, and black bow ties, Le Cinq monogrammed on the left breast of their coat, made their way down the parquet hallway and into the kitchen. I still couldn’t get over the fact that none of us flinched. How much had this cost? Five years ago, we were just girls with big dreams. Now we were women living our dreams in the proximity of a billionaire, an international celebrity, and two very successful businessmen. And, a baby was on the way. I couldn’t forget the baby. Literally, I couldn’t.
“What is the American saying? Go big or go home?” Liam asked as he stood beside us, watching them disappear into the kitchen.
Hearing a wheezing sound, the three of us turned to Charlotte and saw her panting, her face squinched in pain. Des once again elevated her ankles but had a wild look about his eyes. “I swear to god, I didn’t touch her feet.”
Liam shot to her side. “Shall I get a doctor?”
She pushed out a few breaths that sounded like, “Who, who, hee, hee, hee,” while nodding. “I’m sorry, but I think so.”
Liam quickly scrambled to his feet, whirling around as he tried to figure out what to do. “Fecking hell,” he muttered none too softly.
Sébastien stepped in. “Don’t worry. I know someone. She’s excellent.” He quickly tapped the numbers on the screen of his phone, and when she answered his questions, he gave her the address. When he hung up, he announced, “A doctor’s on the way.”
“Dinner’s ready!” Tiziana calmly announced, walking out of the kitchen.
To Sébastien I whispered, “Bummer! I was pretty excited about the food.”
“Don’t worry, chérie. We’ll still get to eat. This could be a long night.”
While I thought about the fact that I possibly sounded like a terrible friend, I was happy to find out I wasn’t the only one who wanted food. “Maybe a bread roll. Until the doctors come and tell us what’s up,” I proposed.
All of us, save Liam and Charlotte, made our way into the kitchen, to give them privacy.
Sébastien whispered to me, “Is it always this crazy?”
I nodded. Always.
German Bloggers
I was wound up from the long day and night and couldn’t sleep. I shuffled from my bed back to the living room, where I tried reading and then doodling designs for my apartment. Neither helped. So, I opened up my laptop and started wandering through the internet. One thought led to another, and soon I found myself knee deep in Aksel Pedersen’s life. I had learned enough to make me very curious about the man.
He’d earned a graduate degree in mechanical engineering at one of the oldest and most renowned universities—TU Brauenschweig, or University of Brunswick, Institute of Technology, in Brauenschweig, Germany. Afterwards he had gone to work for a German car manufacturer, where he had designed tools, which as far as my limited understanding allowed for, could be applied to automobile and aeronautical manufacturing. He’d worked there for quite some time and risen through the ranks.
Eventually, he’d been lured away by a British firm as their Chief Technology Officer. Hi
s reasons for departing last year were not noted.
The information on his personal life was limited. He’d been married and divorced to a German woman, named Helga. They had two sons, who would now be in their twenties.
Nothing I found pointed clearly to Sébastien.
The only thing I found that was truly compelling to me was a blog, written in German, with a photo of him standing at an easel, working on a large, abstract painting. I emailed the link to the blog to my work email address. Tomorrow I would find someone who spoke German.
8:30 AM, Friday, October 2
One Last Dose
“OKAY, SO WHAT do you think?” Charlotte’s voice chirruped across the phone lines excitedly.
I looked at my phone with incredulity then checked my watch. “Charlotte, less than ten hours ago we thought we were on our way to a hospital, and now you’re asking me which designers are showing today?”
“I didn’t come to Paris to sit on my ass. The doctor said I needed to keep my feet up and rest ‘for most of the day.’” She feigned a horrific French accent, impersonating Sébastien’s very attractive doctor, Marie-Odette Norbert.
“What’s wrong with you? You’re pregnant. Your baby should come first.”
“My baby does come first and will come first for the rest of his or her life. Please, just give me one last dose of glamour—before I’m covered in burp cloths and spit up.”
“Eew! That’s quite a loving image of motherhood you’re painting there.”
A faint sniff on the other end followed by a long silence told me she was crying. “Charlotte, relax. You’re going to be a great mom, and Liam is going to be a great dad. You have it all. The job, the house, picket fence, family.”
“I know. I should be happy. I am. Hormones, probably. I just want to get all dressed up and forget that I’m as big around as I am tall.”
“Well, not yet,” I drily inserted, hoping she’d laugh.
The sounds of snuffling laughter reached my ears. I felt my smile burst wide open. “I love you, Charlotte.”
She begged, “Then please help me get out of here!”
I sighed. “Let me talk to Liam.”
“No.”
“That’s the only way.” I spoke firmly.
There was muttering in the background, the phone clanked, and I heard her make a heaving sound. Eventually, Liam was on the phone. Through much cajoling and pleading, I finagled Charlotte a late morning and early evening outing. “Thank you, Liam. She really needs this. You’re a good man.”
“If she goes into labor, that’s on you. And you’re gonna owe me.”
“Well, she’s going into labor at some point. Might as well be in the middle of Dior’s showing. Think of the headlines.”
“She’s been in the headlines enough.”
“True,” I said.
He passed the phone to Charlotte without a goodbye. Was he angry?
I glanced at today’s list of showings. “Who do you want to see?” I read her the day’s schedule.
Friday, 2 October:
Loewe / Chalayan / Christian Dior / Isabel Marant / Andrew Gn / Undercover / Lutz Huelle / Yohi Yammamoto / Elie Saab / Masha Ma / Sophia Kokosalaki
She had me read it a couple of times. “I would really like to see Dior and Elie Saab. Did His Highness give me permission to do that?”
“Don’t be rude. Liam loves you. Dior is at noon, and Elie Saab is at 7:00 pm. Perfect. Plenty of time to rest in between.”
“Yay for me!”
I grinned into the phone, wanting to reassure her, and told her we would do this again next year. “When you aren’t pregnant, we’ll go to all the shows!”
“Really? And drink prosecco?” The squeal behind her question told me I had said the right thing.
“Really. Babies, prosecco, burp clothes, and all.”
As I was about to hang up, I heard her call my name. “Sorry, didn’t hear you. What?”
“Did you ever ask Sébastien about last night, when he went all Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde?”
“Shit! I completely forgot.”
Tiziana’s Boudoir
I meandered through the crowd outside a huge tent in Espace Ephémère des Tuileries. A few acquaintances stopped me to talk about the Bethany Halvorsen show and Forbes Magazine interview. When I felt warm fingers brush the back of my arm, tingles spread from my fingertips to my toes. Sébastien.
Once again, he seemed to know the people in the group I’d been talking to and slid easily into the conversation. When the audience began to surge inside the tent, he leaned down and softly spoke in my ear. “Must we go in? Chérie, you are too lovely to be hidden in the dark.” He hooked his arm around my waist and pulled me against him. His warmth, the smell of him, did crazy things to me.
“Think we can find seats for just the two of us where we’ll go unseen?” I asked.
“I doubt you will go unseen, but if it allows us to be alone, I will make my best attempt.”
“Sounds wonderful.”
“Mademoiselle, since I’ve met you, I must constantly remind myself that this is the week to see and be seen.” His eyes held the glint of flirtation. “Tell me, why do you wish to be alone?”
Deciding against the obvious response, I batted my lashes at him and rested my hand on his lapel. “Marian. Hillary. Or Tiziana, for that matter. It’s like they have some crazy kind of radar.” While maybe not the words he’d hoped for, I let my desire for him simmer in my eyes. In his gaze, I found the same.
He led me off to the side, out of the surging mass of humanity, offering a solution. “Let’s wait a moment. We’ll go in just before they turn down the lights. Maybe we’ll get lucky, and it will be too late.” I happily agreed.
From my hiding spot, I could see my friends in the distance looking this way and that, probably searching for me, since a single, lonely chair separated Marian from Salma Hayek. The lights dimmed while the music, heavy on techno funk, directed the viewers’ attention to the large red wall at the opposite end of the tent. When an usher waved us in, we looked at each other and did the right thing. But we did find seats at the back, near the exit.
Clearly, Sophia Kokosalaki had been influenced by ancient Egyptian clothing. Her collection was predominantly gold and black fabric and embellishments, funked up with cobalt, fire-orange, sky-blue, and white. The dresses had python-skin bodices paired with sheer, flowing silk skirts and sculpted high heels. Some pieces had fabric with hieroglyphic motifs. A few were accessorized with ornate breastplates in gold. Plenty of tassels and feather trim adorned butter-soft suede separates. It was the sheer drama of the pieces that kept my attention.
I was jolted from the dramatic scene when Sébastien boldly ran his hand from the nape of my neck to my lower back. I shot a glance at him. His eyes were no longer smoldering; they were scorching, which left me breathing heavily. Just like that. My pulse was racing.
He nipped the tender flesh of my neck before softly saying, “You are… exceptional. I was not expecting someone like you to enter my life. A woman whose presence could simply, without any effort, leave me aching. All day, I long for more kisses, adventure, change.”
I searched for my own words to tell him I felt the same. When I saw Sophia Kokosalaki walk with the last model down the runway, I seized the moment. It was time to gamble. I grabbed Sébastien’s hand. “Let’s go.”
We darted outside and straight into Ted. “Hello there! Are the rest with you?”
“Uh, no. We didn’t see them.” I tried to sound normal while casting a very disappointed glance at the man I wanted to be alone with.
“Well, they’ll be along soon. Have you weighed in on where we should have dinner?”
Though I wanted to make an excuse, I didn’t. I pulled up my big girl panties and reminded myself I was glad my friends were in Paris for a few more days. I looked at Sébastien, and he seemed to understand my look of resolve. “What are our choices?” I asked.
“I cannot remember. Marian was in charg
e of tonight.”
“Then I’m guessing Hillary won’t be happy,” I muttered loudly, drawing smiles from both men.
***
We found ourselves in the boudoir environment of the world’s most famous burlesque establishment, Moulin Rouge. Seated at one long table, we were directly in front of the stage. I gave Sébastien an apologetic look. He leaned over so he could speak quietly. “I’ve always imagined that Tiziana’s bedroom looked something like this.”
“Me, too! Well, minus the table.”
Marian wore an enormous smile, clearly pleased to find herself here. Her neck swiveled as she took in the tented ceiling, red walls, dramatic lighting, and small lamps that bathed the white table linens in a golden glow. “Do you think those are original posters?” she asked, pointing to a large column not too far away, covered in posters of women performing the can-can.
“I’m so embarrassed!” Hillary said to no one in particular.
“Mademoiselle, we are having an adventure. No need to be embarrassed,” Sébastien comforted her. “Besides, it is my culture, not yours. Perhaps I should be embarrassed.”
Realizing she might have put her foot in it, Hillary quickly reassured him, “No, no! It’s just that there are so many wonderful places to go, and she picks a burlesque club.”
Marian overheard her. “Well, you aren’t always so pious! You had a great time dancing in the tranny bar in London last summer. Besides, everyone else likes it here!”
“It was the wine,” was all she would admit. On cue, the waiter arrived, bearing wine.
I leaned as close as possible to Sébastien and said, “I could use a bottle and a straw.”
“Chérie, just relax. This is very entertaining. I haven’t been here in quite some time.”
“That’s what the wine and straw are for, to relax.”
“You are truly funny. I like it.”
“Hmm.”
Cognac & Couture (The Passport Series Book 2) Page 11