Noah laughed. ‘A dog after my own heart.’
Afterwards, we bought hotdogs. Sergei had his with no mustard, I had mine with just one line, and Noah very bravely had two.
‘That’s where the kick comes from,’ he said wolfing it all down easily.
In the evenings we went to restaurants outside London and we behaved as if we were just another ordinary couple having a night out. No bodyguards, drivers, or fear of anything. We fed each other little bits of food, we laughed, and we hired rooms in little-known countryside hotels. We spent all night having wild sex then, wrapped up in each other’s arms, we talked the rest of the night away. Well, I did most of the talking. He’s not much of a talker.
And now here we are in Nice.
The lazy October sunshine is deliciously yellow and warm. The architecture and buildings are so Mediterranean and baroque you could be forgiven for thinking you are in Italy. Nice is also the place some of the best Russians families came to so they needed a house of worship that was worthy of their status. Hence, Nice boasts one of the finest Russian orthodox churches outside of Russia. Baba has asked me to pay a visit to it and light a candle for Papa.
‘Can we go to the church? I promised my grandmother that I would light a candle.’
‘Sure,’ Noah agrees easily, ‘but first breakfast.’
Breakfast is socca at a stall in the Cours Saleya market in the colorful old town. It is brought piping hot in the back of a scooter by a man. Turns out it is a traditional peasant snack and is basically a very large chick pea pancake with a lots of pepper. It is served on paper with no cutlery, and is surprisingly delicious served with a glass of local rosé.
Feeling pleasantly tipsy after the one and a half glasses of rosé so early in the morning, I lean into Noah’s hardness as we pass by a myriad of sounds and sights. We walk together, our bodies sometimes touching on the vehicle-free streets. The sun beats down on my head and I can taste the salty air on my lips. In the butcher’s window I see a tiny whole dead piglet tied up with string.
‘Oh my God. Look! Why would anyone keep something so gruesome in the window?’ I exclaim with surprise.
‘That’s prochetta. An Italian style specialty. It’s actually a hollowed-out pig filled with chunks of meat, fat, herbs, and lots of garlic before being roasted on a spit. They slice right through it and serve it in large thin slices as you would luncheon meat.
‘Ugh. Food with faces. Just no.’
‘It’s actually very delicious,’ he tells me.
‘Why did you buy a house here?’ I ask him nosily.
He shrugs. ‘The weather is pleasant and I like that there is a big Russian community here.’
‘Do you speak French?’
‘Nope. I get by with English and Russian. Do you?’
‘I studied it at school, but I’m rusty.’
‘Good, you can do all the speaking from now on,’ he says.
‘Tell me, what were you like as a child?’ I press. Left to his own devices, he says very little. I want to know everything there is to know about him.
He gives my question some thought as if no one had ever asked him such a question before. ‘Serious. Eager to please. Loyal, very loyal. And you?’
There it is again. Turning the conversation back to me. I look at him behind my eyelashes. Never mind, he cannot hide forever. Little by little I will teach him to trust me and reveal himself to me.
‘I was a plump, terrible, little thing. In the summer months I lay on the cool floor totally naked and refused to get dressed, and in the winter I ran around looking for places to hide so I could jump out with a great roar and frighten my mother and Baba.’
He laughs.
I smile. ‘Yup, I did that. They would pretend to scream and I thought that was hilarious, and I would fall about laughing. I mean, I would be clutching my stomach and rolling on the ground.’
‘I would have liked to have seen that,’ he says, smiling. ‘I’ll have to get you to hide in one of my cupboards.’
‘It won’t work. I lost the ability to laugh like that. Now I find it almost impossible to laugh uncontrollably.’
He stares into my eyes. ‘I never laughed like that even when I was a child.’
‘Why?’
‘Probably because my mother was always so sad. She never got over being discarded by my father.’
‘Do you ever miss Russia?’ I ask softly.
‘No.’
‘No?’
He shakes his head. ‘When I was younger I used to dream of my childhood days. I could even remember taking my first steps holding on to my mother’s finger. The memories came so close I could feel them breathing into my mouth, but there is nothing left of them now. The house, the people, the memories. They’re all gone … I don’t think of them anymore.’
Twenty-two
Tasha Evanoff
The church is located in a green area of the city, and you cannot see it until you are actually almost upon it. It has six onion domes and an exterior that is richly decorated in mosaic. Add those features to the fact that it is nearly hidden makes it seem foreign, isolated, almost an oasis in that bustling city.
There is a guard at the door, a man in all black. Even his glasses have black frames. He has a dour totally Russian personality, but strangely, he doesn’t speak Russian. He speaks to us first in French then in English. He is apparently there to enforce the rules. Basically, no taking pictures or videos. No talking loudly. No shorts. No naked shoulders.
I brought a scarf with me and use it to cover my hair before we enter the church. The interior is even more grand and fabulous than the exterior. There are no chairs, but it is very much a working church attended by the large Russian community that live in Nice. In the Orthodox Church the congregation stands.
It is full of stunningly beautiful and intricate icons and paintings. Hundreds of candles burn, adding to the hushed, otherworldly atmosphere. Religious artifacts include a huge hammered silver cross, and delicate icons made of silver and studded with semi-precious stones.
‘I have to light a candle for Papa,’ I whisper into the solemn air.
He looks at me strangely. ‘My grandmother asked me to,’ I explain with a shrug.
He waits for me while I go up to the icon of a saint. Bowing my head in veneration, I say a prayer for Papa. ‘Please make Papa repent. Enter his heart.’ Then I look deep into the icon’s eyes because Baba says that if you do this while meditating, you will enter a lake where you will meet your own soul. Of course, I have never prayed long enough for that to happen, and it does not happen now either.
Pulling a tissue out of my purse, I wipe my lipstick off before I kiss the icon on the hand as a sign of love and faith. We never kiss the faces of icons as Judas betrayed Christ with a kiss on the cheek. I light my candle and plant it before stepping away, then make the sign of the cross over my face before going to join Noah.
‘You love your father,’ he says, almost to himself, as we leave the cool exterior of the church and come out into the sunshine again.
I stop and look up at him. He seems surprised that I would, and I can understand why he would be. He needs to know how I feel.
‘I know Papa has done some really bad things to my mother. When I was small I saw him push my mother to the front door and kick her so viciously she flew out the door and fell sprawled on the front steps. In one instant all those years with her came to that. I wouldn’t do that to a stray dog. He treated her like she was nothing. While she was still standing there bleeding, crying, and screaming that he was wrong, she had not been unfaithful to him, he closed the door on her and forbade me to ever see her again.’
Noah stares at me, shocked.
‘The thing is, my mother hadn’t been disloyal to him. You have to be a very brave fool indeed to be unfaithful to my father.’
Noah’s eyes widen. ‘And that was the last you saw of your mother?’
I shook my head. ‘No. My grandmother made sure I saw her regularly when my
father was away. I still do. Secretly.’
‘Good,’ he mutters softly.
‘When I was young I used to dream of a father who loved me, took me out to eat ice cream, or watch a movie with me, but my father is not like that, and I’ve learned to live with it.’ I smile. ‘It’s better to have a father than to have none at all. He’s the only father I have, maybe I do love him. In his own cold way Papa loves me too.’
He tilts his head and looks at me as if I am a creature he doesn’t understand. ‘Doesn’t it bother you though that he is forcing you to marry a man you don’t love?’
‘He’s not forcing me to marry Oliver. He … suggested it and I agreed.’
‘Really? You had a choice?’
I bite my lower lip. ‘When I agreed to marry Oliver I had no one and it didn’t seem like a bad thing. He was from a good family and he was easy on the eye. I had met him a few times and he was always courteous and solicitous. However, I recently found out something about Oliver. He’s not what he seems to be. I think he may be into perverted things. I know Papa has ambitions, but he wants me to be happy too, and I could never be happy with such a man. When Papa comes back I’m going to tell him that in these circumstances I cannot marry Oliver.’
To my surprise Noah doesn’t make any comment at all. Instead he veils his eyes so I won’t be able to tell what he is thinking. ‘I thought we could try some parasailing before lunch,’ he says, completely changing the subject.
‘Parasailing? I’m game,’ I say immediately.
We make our way to the water sports center on the Promenade des Anglais, and I see the yellow parachutes with their distinctive yellow smiley faces floating in the hot blue sky over the sea. Noah has already booked a slot for us and he hands our vouchers over.
An instructor with a bronze tan and strong French accent gives us a safety briefing and a lesson on parasailing basics. Then I step into a safety harness together with Noah. We wade out into the warm water. Our instructor connects our harness to the giant parasail and a pull rope attached to a speed boat. The boat pulls forward, our sail fills with air, and we rise into the sky.
‘Oh, my God. We’re airborne. We’re flying,’ I scream as we soar up more than a hundred meters into the sky. The wind rushes into my face and it is the most thrilling sensation to be so high up. Giddy with excitement, I whoop like a child when we rise even higher.
‘Whoopeee … check out how far we are from the ground,’ I shriek, pointing to our small shadows on the sea’s surface.
Noah just chuckles at my enthusiasm.
As we glide effortlessly over the Baie des Anges, we enjoy stunning aerial views of the French Riviera’s sandy coastline, the turquoise blue waters of the Mediterranean, the rolling hills of Provence, and Nice’s historic streets. As the boat makes its turn we drift back down for a water landing as the boat slowly comes to a stop.
‘Oh my God, we are going to crash land,’ I scream again. Splash. Oops. Ha, ha.
‘You smell of the sea,’ Noah says with a laugh, as he catches me and holds me close to him.
High from the unforgettable experience, I throw my arms around his neck. ‘That was wonderful, Noah. I loved it. Can we go again?’
‘If you enjoyed this you must come paragliding with me. It’s even better. You are not towed by a boat but driven by the sheer force of the wind, and you race through the sky.’
‘Is that your hobby then?’
We start to wade back to shore. ‘I don’t know if it is a hobby, but I like it.’
‘Do you paraglide in England?’ I enquire.
‘Usually in Nepal, the desert, or where there are mountains.’
We are standing in the water, the waves sucking at our feet. ‘Maybe you’ll take me with you one day,’ I hear myself say.
Twenty-three
Tasha Evanoff
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXHzZBr_zuU
The Last Unicorn
We have lunch by the beach. Salad Nicoise, fresh pasta with pesto, and hollowed out fruit and vegetables stuffed with meat. We are both ravenous after the parasailing, and we polish our plates off in quick time.
‘What’s next on the itinerary?’ I ask, putting my fork and knife down.
‘You choose. Henri Matisse or Marc Chagall museum,’ he says, wiping his mouth.
‘Marc Chagall,’ I say immediately, beaming at him. ‘He’s actually my favorite artist.’
‘How patriotic of you.’
I shake my head earnestly. ‘The fact that he was Russian has got nothing to do with it. He was a genius. I totally agree with Picasso who said, “The man must have an angel in his head.”’
He smiles at my enthusiasm.
‘Don’t you like him?’ I ask curiously.
One of his shoulders lifts and falls. ‘I’ve never really studied fine art appreciation, or had a chance to know much about it. My life took me on a different path. Tattoos are the closest I’ve come to art.’
‘You introduced me to parasailing. I’ll introduce you to Chagall,’ I say excitedly. ‘Looking at his paintings is like gazing into a magical world. He makes you want to believe in unicorns.’
‘Well then, to Chagall’s world we go.’ A masculine grin that I usually associate with tanned, devil-may-care cowboys plays on his lips.
I lean my chin on my hand. ‘Noah?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Thank you for bringing me on this trip. I’ve really enjoyed it. I can’t think of a time I’ve been happier in my life.’
Something flashes in his eyes, then it is gone. It is so quick I can’t tell whether he is embarrassed, amused, or something else completely different.
The museum is on a hill in a very quiet area compared to the hustle and bustle of the city we have come from. We pay our ten euros and enter. The walls of the hexagon shaped spaces are stark white, making the large paintings pop.
While we sit on the wooden benches and gaze at Chagall’s masterpieces, all at once generous, naive, shrewd, secretive, sad, vulnerable and full of love and joy, I tell Noah little interesting tit bits I have gleaned about the painter over the years.
‘Do you know he was so poor he used to eat the head of a mackerel one day and save the tail for another? Then when he met the woman he would marry she would knock on his window to bring him cakes and milk. Later he said of her, “I only had to open the window of my room and blue air, love and flowers entered with her.”’ I pause to look at Noah. ‘Isn’t that the most romantic thing you ever heard?’
‘No,’ he says. ‘The most romantic thing I ever heard of was when a beautiful blonde came into my office for a night of lust wearing a pink cardigan.’
I giggle softly. ‘It was that or the see-through dress with the plunging neckline.’
‘I’m glad the pink cardigan won the day.’
‘Why? Wouldn’t you have preferred me in the see-through?’
‘No. I wouldn’t change a thing from that night.’
When we stand in front of a photograph of Chagall with his mischievous faun-like face and strange, almond-shaped eyes, I turn to Noah and ask, ‘Do you know he prepared his charcoal pencils, holding them in his hand like a little bouquet?’
Noah gazes at me as if he is looking at something he has always wanted, but never thought he could have.
‘Holding them so he would sit in front of a blank canvas and wait for an idea to come. When it came, he raised the charcoal and very quickly started tracing straight lines, ovals, lozenges. Out of those shapes, as if by magic, a clown would appear, then a unicorn, a violinist, a pilgrim, an angel. Once the outline was done he would step back and sit down again, as exhausted as a boxer after a round. Imagine how his mind must have been. The whole picture was clear to him in one flash of inspiration.’
‘That’s an amazing talent to have,’ Noah says slowly.
‘Yes, it must be wonderful to have such a unique ability. He once confessed that all he wanted to do was to stay wild and untamed … to shout, weep, pray.’
Tasha Evanoff
Our next stop is Cap de Nice, where Noah’s house is. It is set high on the hill. He opens the tall door and we enter an elegant art deco villa full of natural light. We go through the living room with its impressive chandelier made of capiz shells. When he opens the sliding doors, the mother-of-pearl discs twinkle in the strong wind that rushes in.
I move closer to the doors and see that the house is built on rocky ground. It has a hundred-and-eighty-degree view of the sea front and boasts several terraces and balconies.
‘Wow, this is amazing,’ I say.
‘I know,’ he says softly. ‘It’s the reason I bought this house.’
I step out onto the terrace and see the steps cut into the jagged white rocks. One set diverts off towards a white stone platform where you can stand and look out at the breathtaking view of the ocean, and the other offshoot leads down to a small private beach.
He takes my hand and leads me out of the shade of the terrace towards the steps. The sun is beating down on them making them glare with heat and light.
I shade my eyes with my hand. ‘I can’t stay long in the sun. I don’t want to get a tan. It will be a dead giveaway that I’ve been out of the country.’
‘Don’t worry. I won’t keep you out here for long,’ he says, stripping off. Naked and staring into my eyes, he unzips my dress and lets it drop to the ground. Underneath I am wearing my green and blue bikini. He pulls me onto the burning tiles of the terrace.
‘Are we going to have sex on the beach?’ I ask with a grin.
‘Not on the beach. Think of all that sand in all the wrong places.’
‘Ouch.’
‘I want to take you at the water’s edge.’
I look around. We are not actually alone. In the distance there are figures. ‘People can see us,’ I protest.
‘I don’t care,’ he says, leading me to the water’s edge. ‘I want you right now.’ He pushes me so that I overbalance and we topple onto the damp sand. It feels lovely and cool against my bare skin. His stomach and legs are hot and smooth on my belly and thighs. The sand gives as I wriggle underneath him. He pins my wrists above my head.
You Don't Know Me: A Bad Boy Mafia Romance Page 9