*****
She saw it even before she reached her floor. Hard not to, since her building didn’t have an elevator. She paused on the stairs and sighed, drumming her fingers on the railing as she pondered the thing. Shaking her head, she finished her climb and walked slowly up to her door.
On the floor in front of it was a bouquet of roses set in a pink ceramic vase. She unlocked her door, picked the thing up, and walked in. Crooked in her other arm was the elaborate bouquet she’d received in the office, far lighter now since she’d given some of the flowers away.
She turned the vase around, but nope. No note, as usual. She picked up her phone and tried calling Arnaud again, but again got his answering service. “Typical,” she sneered.
She picked up an empty coffee can, filled it with water, snipped off the stems of her office bouquet, and stuck them in. That done, she changed into her jogging outfit and set out for her evening jog.
As she stepped out of her building, Madame Dimanche approached her with a smile. The woman was both her landlady, as well as the one who took care of the garden in the central courtyard.
“Amanda? You... eh... eh,” the woman waved her hands as she desperately tried to remember her English. She gave up. “Les fleurs?”
“The flowers? Oui, madame.”
“But no... eh... eh... card!” She snapped her fingers, delighted to have remembered the word.
“No, madame. Is it a French custom?” Privately, Amanda groaned to herself. Now my neighbors have something about me to gossip about.
Mme. Dimanche gave her a knowing grin. “It means... eh... eh... you know each other. Why say... eh... why say more. Yes?”
Amanda realized that on top of French language lessons, she also had a long way to go in understanding local nuances and customs. She sighed. “But we don’t know each other, Mme. Dimanche.”
“You will,” the woman beamed. “You will.” She gave her tenant a wave as she set off with a flower pot in hand.
Amanda stood there watching the woman walk off. It had taken her about four weeks to get a smile out of her landlady, and now, all that woman ever did was grin at her. Some guy nearly ran her over, they had sex twice, and now, he kept sending her flowers. But what he couldn’t seem to do was answer her calls for some reason. She stepped out onto the sidewalk, thinking vague thoughts about how difficult it was to crack the French.
Making her way to the Jardin des Tuileries, she hoped to catch the last hours of daylight before the prostitutes and drug dealers reclaimed it for the night. Psyching herself up for a long and enjoyable jog ahead, she vowed not to stop by any bakeries when she was through. And this time, she positively meant it.
She therefore didn’t notice the person who started following her.
Chapter 6
“What do you mean you didn’t send me any flowers!?” Amanda huffed as she got into Arnaud’s car.
“I’m sorry,” he sounded genuinely puzzled. “I didn’t want your office mates to gossip about you.”
She shook her head. “But I’ve been getting flowers all week! At my office, at my building. I’ve no more room.”
“So what do you do with them?”
“Been giving them to Mme. Dimanche, my landlady. She has a green thumb, that one.”
He smiled, but didn’t look happy as he drove them off. “What do the notes say?”
“Nothing. None of the flowers came with notes.”
“Then you must have a secret admirer.”
“Sure you’re not the one sending them?”
“It’s not a secret that I admire you.”
“Huh!”
“Have you been seeing someone while I’ve been away?”
Amanda wanted to believe she heard jealousy in his voice, but she couldn’t tell. “No. Have you?”
“Would you mind if I did?”
That made her pause. Sex with him was wonderful and something she badly needed after a year-long hiatus. And he was hot – exactly her type and more. But it wasn’t serious. She wasn’t in the mood for a relationship. Besides, men like him weren’t the type to settle down. With his money and looks, she had no doubt that her time with him was limited. His type grew bored very quickly, as she knew from personal experience.
“I don’t think so,” she lied. “Besides, you probably have mistresses all over the world.”
He chuckled but didn’t answer.
Yup, she thought, struggling to keep her face a careful blank. I don’t have much longer with this one. “And on that note, I expect the same answer from you.”
Amanda was careful to keep her face turned away, surprised that she was getting emotional. As such, she didn’t notice the sharp look he gave her.
Dinner was Italian casual, this time, though a look at the menu’s prices told her that it wasn’t going to be ordinary pizza and spaghetti. They were in Montemartre, a hill in the 18th arrondissement that overlooked Paris. To cap it all off, they had a balcony table with a view to die for.
“This is fantastic!” she crooned.
“You like it?”
“I love it! How long has this been here?”
“Almost three years. I was one of the first customers, so I knew they’d be a success.”
“How could you tell something like that? I thought restaurants have a high attrition rate.”
“Yes, but Gio, he’s the owner, convinced me.” At her puzzled look, he continued. “I came here with an American client who wanted iced tea with his meal, even though it wasn’t on the menu.” He winced and shook his head. “Gio stormed out of the kitchen and told the American off, ‘we only serve genuine Italian food here! And if you don’t like it, you can leave!’” Arnaud laughed.
Amanda shook her head. “I don’t get it.”
“Iced tea dulls the taste buds.”
“Aah! Ok, then. Thanks for the warning. So what did your client do?”
“He offered to buy the restaurant. Gio refused, of course. With that kind of dedication and refusal to compromise, I knew this place would be a success. I made sure of it, too.”
She raised her brows at him.
“I invested.”
“You mean you own this place?”
“Only partly. I let Gio run it.”
“Wow. Why am I surprised? In that case, Mr. Restauranteur, you order.”
He laughed and did just that. Amanda wasn’t disappointed, as she knew she wouldn’t be. But that wouldn’t last. They were just tucking into desert when a gorgeous woman with long, curly blond hair ran up to their table.
“Arnaud? Arnaud! I knew it was you!” she squeaked in a Bostonian American accent. “Daah-ling! It’s been a while!” she cooed as she kissed him on the cheek. “Oh, hellooo! I’m Tanya!” she squealed at his companion as if just noticing her.
I knew it, Amanda fumed. Taking a deep breath, she put on her best fake smile for the woman as she introduced herself.
That done, the woman proceeded to ignore her. “Arnaud!” she gushed. “It’s been soooo looong! How’ve you been? I missed yeeuw!”
Amanda tuned out and turned to her desert. For some strange reason, it no longer tasted as good as when she had first tucked into it. The woman’s high-pitched voice was very piercing, made even worse by her volume. The other diners did their best to ignore her, but it was hard. The woman seemed to think Arnaud was deaf.
Sadly, she hadn’t forgotten Amanda. “Oh don’t worry about us, we’re just friends... now.”
It took her a few seconds to realize the woman was talking to her. She looked up from her desert to see Arnaud looking distinctly uncomfortable, something which made her strangely happy. It took her even longer to notice the silence. Looking up further, she met the woman’s gaze.
“I’m sorry?” Amanda spluttered.
“I said, you shouldn’t be jealous of us. Arnaud and I, we go way back. Don’t we?”
“Eh...” Arnaud seemed to be turning slightly red.
“But it wasn’t meant to be.” The blond d
itz smiled and shook her head. “Now, we’re just friends. Isn’t that right, Arnaud? So how have yeeuw been, daah-ling?”
Ignored yet again, Amanda had to fight back a grin. The man was positively turning red – exactly the way he did when they were having sex. When they finally broke up, she vowed to herself, she would never do to him what the blond was doing now.
The woman finally left them after several more agonizing minutes before leaving the restaurant with some Middle Eastern-looking guy. Arnaud finally let out a dramatic sigh.
“One question,” Amanda said. He raised a brow at her. “How the heck could you stand her voice?
He shook his head. “We were never an item. It was just... just...”
“A one night stand,” she finished for him. “But how could you stand her voice?”
“Now you know why it was just a one night stand!”
They laughed. They were still doing that when they stepped out on the street, but it didn’t last long.
Arnaud froze. “What the...”
“Oh my god!”
*****
“How could no one have seen anything!?” Arnaud barked at the police officer in French.
The man shrugged, but Amanda wasn’t paying attention. Someone had smashed in all the windows of his Porsche Boxster, but he or she didn’t stop there. The tires had been slashed, the rearview mirrors were gone, the paint had been scratched all over, and dents showed where someone had taken a bat to it.
Montemartre is a heavily populated part of Paris, but the area they’d parked in was a largely residential section. A crowd had gathered, but no one came forward to say they’d seen the vandal. Some, in fact, were smiling; meaning it could have been one of them.
“Amanda, I have to go with the police to make a report. I’ll have my driver take you...”
“It’s all right. I’ll just get an Uber.”
“No! I want you home safely.”
“Listen, hot stuff, I can take care of myself. You take care of that, first. Sheesh, they really did a good job on your car.”
“That’s a good job?”
“It’s an expression. I’ll be ok,” she said as she kissed his cheek. “Unless you want me to come with you to the station?”
He shook his head then stopped and turned to the police officer he’d been yelling at moments before. The officer just shook his head. Turning back to her, he said, “No. I don’t want you to do that. But I want to take you home. My driver can be here in...”
“It’s late. Let your driver sleep. You take care of this and I’ll see you... next week?”
“Suis vraiment désolée...”
Ignoring the officers and the crowd, she gave him a hug. On impulse, she also kissed him on the lips. “No, don’t be sorry. There’s nothing to be sorry about. It’s not your fault. Sure you don’t want me to come to the station to hold your hand?”
“I’d like you to hold something else,” he grinned. “But no. There’s no need. I’ll wait here till your Uber arrives.”
He didn’t have to wait long. As Amanda’s car drove off, she looked back at him, then at the ruin that was left of his car. “Who could do something like that?”
“Madame?” the woman behind the wheel asked.
“Nothing. Sorry. Just thinking aloud.”
The woman nodded and kept driving.
“It’s just... my boyfriend. Someone smashed his car while we were having dinner.”
“It’s all those illegals!”
“Huh?”
“Yes. They come in from North Africa and the Middle East, cause trouble...” she shook her head. “Only Marine le Pen can fix it. She’s like your Farage, yes? Your Nigel Farage? ”
Amanda wanted to kick herself for opening her mouth. Just her luck to get stuck in a car with an ultranationalist driver. Le Pen, the French Donald Trump, running for the French elections on a campaign to curb immigration and break away from the European Union.
She decided to keep her mouth shut and waited for the ultranationalist tirade that usually spewed out of these types. None came. To make it stay that way, Amanda kept quiet for the rest of the trip.
She had just stepped on the curb outside her building when realization hit. The car was pulling out of the curb when Amanda ran after and began whacking the trunk. The car screeched to a halt.
The rear right window rolled down and the driver leaned back, looking at her with a puzzled look. “Madame? Did you forget something?”
“He’s not my boyfriend. I know I said that, but he’s not.”
The driver let out a huff and shook her head. “Is there anything else, madame!?”
“No. I just wanted to clarify that point.”
Still shaking her head, the driver rolled up her rear window and drove off.
Amanda likewise stood there watching the car recede into the night. Shaking her head, she couldn’t help adding, “French people. I mean, really.”
She saw it even before she reached her floor. She paused on the stairs and crossed her arms as she frowned at the bouquet of flowers resting on the floor beside her door. Bending down to pick it up, she wasn’t surprised to find no card.
“Well, well, well... it seems I really do have a secret admirer, what?”
Nor was she surprised to receive flowers the next day at work.
*****
“If you get any more of these, you can start your own garden,” Savitri observed as she admired the new bouquet.
“Mme. Dimanche has already started,” Amanda replied. “Help me with this zipper, will you? Have you seen the garden in my courtyard? The sudden profusion of flowers all come from yours truly.”
“Where did he say he’s taking you tonight?”
“To meet some friends of his.”
“Ooh, some friends of his. Must be serious, then, eh? And how do you feel about that?”
Amanda shrugged.
“You’re lying and you know it. And you know that I know it. Even better, you know that I know that you know it. You are so busted, missy!”
She bit her lip. “Is it that obvious?”
“It is to me. So what’s the problem, then?”
“Weren’t you the one who said that his sort don’t...”
“Mandy! How much longer are you gonna live like a nun, what!? No scratch that. I know you don’t. But isn’t that why you came here? To start anew? How...”
Amanda’s phone rang. “It’s him. He’s already here.”
“Go, then. And stop overthinking everything. Shoo!”
“Don’t forget to lock up!”
“After I steal everything, of course. Now go!”
Amanda had just stepped out on the sidewalk when she heard a low rumble. Heads started turning, so she craned her neck to see what the fuss was about when a silver Panoz Esperante GTLM Convertible stopped on the street before her. The two-seater had its top down, giving her a perfect view of the man driving it.
“Impressed?” Arnaud asked with a grin.
She nodded. “More than I was with the other one.”
He looked offended. “What’s wrong with my Porsche!?”
“Nothing,” she said as she got in. “Well, aside from the fact that it’s a wreck. It’s just that I like the look of this one better.” Then she gave him a peck on the cheek. “Why?”
He made a mock crying face. “I miss my baby! Waah!”
“You can afford to get another one, I’m sure. With all the bells and whistles, too. So listen, are you really sure this is a good idea?”
“The convertible?”
“No! This... you know, meeting your friends thing.”
“Why not? I know Savitri. Besides, they’re not really friends. Well, not most of them. Just people I’ve known for some time... and get along with.” He grinned.
“What? You have no friends?”
“Very few, but most are out of the city, right now. Lots of acquaintances, though.”
“Great. I feel better already.”
And
she did. It was a cool evening in late September and she was in a sports car with a hot hunk who was great in bed. With the top down, people stared at them as they passed. It made her uncomfortable, at first, but she learned to relax and enjoy the jealous glances other women made at her.
But how long before you end up watching him drive past you with another woman sitting where you are right now? Amanda thought about that for a moment before telling her evil twin sister where to stuff it. Soon enough, no doubt, she told her twin. But for now, I’m gonna enjoy this while it lasts.
They drove into the courtyard of what looked like an impressive building. She couldn’t tell if it was a private residence or a hotel of some sort, but when she asked Arnaud, all he said was that it belonged to a “friend” of his. He jumped out of the car and smilingly took her arm as he led her into what looked like a ground-floor office and library.
“Arnaud!” boomed a very tall and skinny man with a long, white beard. He gave Arnaud a tight hug, shaking him from side to side as he laughed. “Oh, it’s been so long! Where have you been, my boy!? What mischief have you been up to, what!?”
“Busy, as usual,” came Arnaud’s muffled reply as the man continued to shake him.
The man laughed again and pushed him aside as he took a step toward Amanda. “And I take it this is she?” he said in a Scottish accent. “Oh my dear!” he cupped her face in his hands. “You are a beauty to behold, indeed! I am Duncan, and absolutely, positively delighted to meet you at last!”
Amanda grinned, warmed by the man’s genuine enthusiasm. “Has Arnaud been talking about me?”
Duncan let her go and stepped back as he clasped his hands dramatically before him. “Oh! Oh my dear, has he! But from the expression on you, I take it he’s said nothing about me. Oh, so typical. I’m Arnaud’s godfather. Mind you, I’m a dyed-in-the-wool Protestant, but the senior du Lac was such a good friend of mine, I didn’t mind dabbling in heretic Catholic practices, ha ha!
“But don’t let’s stand here! Come! Come on in! Dinner’s about to start shortly. Ermm... or so I believe. This way, my dear. This way!” He offered his arm and promptly walked away forcing Arnaud to follow.
Though charmed, Amanda’s nervousness returned. What if I use the wrong fork or knife? What if...
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