“I read about it in Vogue,” she said, leading us to a table wedged into a tight corner. “Apparently a ton of models and photographers hang out here.”
I almost pointed out that our coming to a café that was crawling with internationally acknowledged beauties might have demonstrated a tiny bit of overconfidence, but I bit my tongue. Then I thought about the young model who’d been murdered — what was her name again? Had she come here? I tried to shake off the morbid thought.
Hannah ordered us three coffees, and then we people-watched — Hannah looking right at home, Pilar trying desperately not to look like she was trying desperately to look cool, and me, squinting against the din and the crowds. When the waitress brought our drinks, we all stared — there were three tiny coffee cups, each on its own saucer with three sugar cubes and an itty-bitty spoon. They could have been straight out of Alice in Wonderland.
“Um … what exactly did you order?” Pilar asked, taking one and peering down into it. The coffee was dark brown and smelled like a whole Starbucks shoved into one large sip.
“Café noir,” Hannah said, trying to look snooty but faltering for a moment. “Because it’s dark outside.”
Then, because she’d rather stab herself in the eye with a stick than admit she was less than perfectly in control 100 percent of the time, she dropped her sugar cubes in, stirred it up, and drank the whole thing in one gulp.
Her eyes popped open for the briefest moment — but then she narrowed them in triumph and looked at me and Peely.
We obediently followed her example. It was like getting a shot of coffee straight into your artery. My head had already been reeling from the noise and the bustling crowd — adding a jolt of caffeine made everything twice as bad.
“Are you okay?” Pilar asked, tugging on my hand.
My heart beat like a snare drum, and my breath felt like it was snagging on something in my chest. And the people seemed to be one big wall, closing in around me —
“Colette, if you sit there looking like you’re about to vomit all over yourself, you’re really going to hurt our chances of meeting cute boys,” Hannah said.
Her voice was like rusty razor blades in my ears.
“I’m fine,” I said. “Um … I’ll be back in a minute.”
Clutching my purse to my chest, I took a deep breath and plunged through the crowd as if I were diving into a poisonous swamp. I muttered, “Pardon, pardon, pardon,” as I went, but I didn’t dare slow down to let anyone actually move out of my way. I must have bumped into a dozen French fashionistas. The music and conversation swelled into a single force that pushed in on my ears, and the smoke and dirty looks stung my eyes.
To my left was a door under a glowing green sign that read SORTIE. That meant “exit,” right? I turned sharply, smashing into a pair of models, who swore at me in French as I passed.
The door slammed shut behind me, leaving me in instant stillness. Off in the distance, a plaintive car horn cut through the clear, chilly air.
I paced back and forth, trying to clear my head and catch my breath.
I was in an alley — not really very different from the regular streets we’d walked earlier in the day, only it was too narrow for cars to pass and its edges were dotted with trash bins and empty wooden crates. About fifty feet to my right was the road where the taxi had dropped us off; to my left, the alley curved away out of sight.
I cast a wary look at the door through which I’d exited. The mere sight of it made the hair on my arms stand up.
I can’t go back in there.
But what was I going to do, wait outside all night?
I leaned against one of the stone walls. The night air seeped through my pale-gray cashmere sweater, and my royal-blue faux-fur shrug was definitely more for looks than for warmth.
There was no getting around it — I had to go inside.
I started one last round of pacing, complete with lots of deep breaths, as though I could store fresh air in preparation for the suffocating smallness awaiting me in the café. But just before turning for the door, I heard a sound.
It’s amazing how fast your brain can tell you that something is very wrong.
My brain, for instance, immediately told me: GHOST!
I hurried away from the sound, farther down the alley. I figured that as I rounded the curve I’d find myself on another brightly lit street, surrounded by people out to have a good time.
Only I didn’t. I found myself staring at more of the same — a dark, narrow alley.
Now the sound was so close I could easily tell that it was footsteps.
I broke into a run. I’m a decent runner, so I probably would have been fine — if I hadn’t tripped. In my defense, I was running blindly down centuries-old uneven cobblestones wearing a pair of Hannah-approved shoes with three-inch heels.
Just as I started to vault to my feet, someone grabbed my shoulder.
“LET ME GO or I’ll scream!” I said.
“Non, please do not scream.”
At the velvety sound of the voice, I looked up and saw a boy — I mean, a man …
Or maybe more like a god or something.
It took my eyes a second to adjust to looking at him. He was strikingly, mythically gorgeous, like a lion that had been turned into a human. He had sparkling golden eyes and waves of honey-colored hair. He looked vaguely familiar, but that was probably because he looked like every gorgeous movie star I’d ever seen, all rolled into one even-handsomer form. I was so distracted by his beauty that I couldn’t stop staring.
“Bonsoir, mademoiselle,” he said. “I am Armand Janvier.”
He extended his hand, and I let him pull me off the ground.
“I’m Colette. Colette Iselin.”
His eyes, which already looked like the sun setting on a pool of liquid gold, got even sparklier.
Oh, help.
“Are you hurt,” he asked. “Won’t you come back to the café?”
How did he know I’d been in La Dominique? Had he followed me?
No. There was simply no way someone like him would follow someone like me anywhere. Much less out of a café full of models on a freezing-cold night.
“No, thank you,” I said. “I’m just meeting my friends. They’ll be wondering where I am —”
“But your friends are still inside,” he said.
I stood dumbly for a moment.
His laughter was rich and colorful. “Colette, I mean you no harm. Come with me.”
“But why?” I asked.
He leaned closer. My breath got shallower and my legs started to feel numb.
“Because,” he said softly. “You and I have something in common.”
I wanted to ask what it was, but I couldn’t find the words. I felt my mouth open and close like a fish.
“Come,” he said, resting his hand lightly on my shoulder. “It’s too cold out here. There will be time for explanations later.”
So I followed him to the front door, past the doorman, who nodded respectfully to us, and back into La Dominique, which was as full of crushing, sweaty bodies as it had ever been.
“This way.” Armand aimed me toward the left side of the room, where a dark-red velvet rope separated a large table from the rest of the café. He moved the rope aside so I could go in.
It all happened before I had a chance to figure out what was going on. And then I realized that we were in the VIP section. Hannah and Pilar were already seated at the table, looking like they’d won front-row seats at Paris Fashion Week.
Armand pulled a chair out for me and effortlessly pushed it in as I sat down. Then he went back to the head of the table.
Hannah slinked into the seat next to him. “That’s Colette,” she said. “She’s one of my friends.”
Then she started talking about herself, throwing in carefully calculated references to her family’s cabin in Aspen and their condo in the Caribbean. Armand seemed to lap it all up.
I turned to Peely. “How did this happen?”
�
�He just, like, saw us from across the room and invited us to come sit here! Isn’t that amazing?” She looked like she might swoon. A waitress appeared with a tray full of café noirs. Pilar grabbed one and downed it.
“He asked you to sit with him?”
“All three of us! He noticed you’d gone outside so he went out to get you. Talk about chivalry.” She leaned in closer, practically vibrating from the caffeine coursing through her body. “Hannah called dibs, though, so be careful.”
The warning was completely unnecessary. In the first place, no way would someone who looked like that ever be interested in me. In the second place, it would never even have occurred to me to make a play for Armand before Hannah had made it clear that she was done with him.
And from the looks of things, she was just getting started.
For the next two hours, their heads were never more than inches apart as they whispered and laughed. Hannah was aglow — I’d never seen her look so beautiful. And Armand looked like a handsome prince out of a fairy tale. They were a perfect match.
Pilar and I talked to Armand’s friends, a mix of girls and guys almost as gorgeous as he was. They were really nice to us, too, although that might have been an act of obedience to Armand’s wishes rather than the goodness of their hearts. They asked us about America and answered our questions about France.
I kept looking for opportunities to talk to Armand. It began to seem like I would never get one, as long as Hannah was around. Not that I would be foolish enough to try to get him to like me. What I wanted to figure out was why — why he’d selected us, when there were clearly older, more sophisticated, and more exciting people he could have welcomed into his roped-off paradise. What had he meant, saying that he and I had something in common?
Finally, Hannah excusez-moi’d herself to la toilette. And I made my move.
“How’s it going?” I asked, planting myself in the chair next to Armand.
“Très bien.” His eyes were lit from within, a sign that he was thoroughly under Hannah’s spell. When she wanted to be, she was enchanting, bewitching. It was where her power came from — her ability to reel people in and then, if it suited her, turn on them and treat them like they were nothing to her.
“Is tonight a special occasion?” I asked. “Or do you always reserve the VIP section?”
He shrugged, grinning. “I like the privacy.”
“Isn’t it … expensive?” I asked, catching myself too late to stop the question.
“Hey, it’s just money.” He smiled at me in a way that meant, Right? And I realized that he assumed we were all wealthy. Probably because of the glaring extravagance of Hannah’s fur minicape. Or the way Pilar talked about her grand piano and her antique square piano and all the other pianos she was thinking about buying.
“Well, thanks for inviting us to sit with you,” I said.
“Of course,” he said, flashing his white teeth. “I had to, when I saw you.”
“How did you notice us, out of everybody else here?”
“Not you,” he said, swirling his finger around to indicate Pilar and Hannah’s empty chair. Then he pointed at me. “You.”
I sat for a moment, completely shocked.
And then he reached up and touched my arm in a motion that made my whole body feel tingly and warm. I thought for a second he was trying to hold my hand — and a warning sign flashed in my brain, in all caps, saying, DO NOT DO THIS. HANNAH WILL MURDER YOU. But I was too busy melting to stop him.
“I noticed this.”
Then I realized that he hadn’t been reaching for my arm — he was holding my medallion.
“My medallion?” I said. “What is it? What does it mean?”
He touched my arm again. And this time, it was a deliberate, lingering touch. It took my breath away.
“It means you’re special,” he said quietly. “Like I am.”
“Special,” I repeated. “Really?”
“Yes. And perhaps soon we will have a chance to talk more about it.”
Suddenly, a tiny mug appeared inches from my face.
“Hey, Colette. Have a coffee.” Pilar’s words held a hint of approaching danger — Hannah. So I yanked my arm away from Armand and scrambled back to my own seat.
Hannah slipped down next to Armand. “Did you miss me?”
“Bien sûr.” He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it. “Of course.”
I was dying to ask Armand more about the medallion, but with Hannah latched on to him, it would be impossible. They resumed their conversation, Hannah glancing around the room, collecting bits of other people’s envy like seashells.
ROCHELLE DUBOIS LEANED against the pile of pillows on her bed, pouting. Monique, her childhood friend, sat at the foot of the bed, tears streaming down her face.
The tears offended Rochelle, who did not wish to be made to feel guilty for something that she thought of as “following her heart” (which sounded better than “stealing her best friend’s boyfriend”). Was it her fault that Giancarlo had grown bored with Monique? Was it Giancarlo’s fault that Monique had gained fifteen pounds, while Rochelle had stayed thin and beautiful?
And now she and Giancarlo were — well, if not exactly “in love,” at least interested in each other.
Rochelle had decided to take the high road and be honest with Monique about it, and look what that had gotten her! Une catastrophe totale. Just a bunch of sobbing and carrying on about betrayal and friendship and blah blah blah.
“Je te supplie,” Monique blubbered. “Je te supplie, Rochelle!”
Rochelle turned away and rolled her eyes. Begging? That was really taking things too far.
She picked up the phone and texted Giancarlo to let him know that things were going worse than predicted. MONIQUE = PATHETIQUE.
He replied: C’EST DOMMAGE.
Then she set the phone down and opened her bedroom door, calling for the old butler. He appeared a minute later, peering in at Monique with a worried look on his face.
Rochelle ordered him to take Mademoiselle Poirier home; she wasn’t feeling well.
The old servant gave Rochelle a dirty look as he practically pried Monique out of the chair and herded her into the hallway, his ancient arm wrapped around her shoulder.
As soon as she saw the family’s BMW pull away from the curb with Monique safely loaded into the backseat, Rochelle smiled and stretched her arms. At last she could relax and enjoy her day. The best part was, she and Giancarlo didn’t have to sneak around anymore.
Although, without all the sneaking around, he already seemed less fun. He used too much hair gel. And his cologne smelled like shoes.
Well, maybe it would be a short fling. But Rochelle was determined to enjoy herself nonetheless.
She went out to the kitchen to get a snack, taking the loaf of bread out of the pantry and grabbing a long serrated knife from the drawer by the sink. She set them on the butcher-block countertop and turned to get the cheese from the tray in the corner. As she did so, she caught sight of a black smudge on her arm. Had some of Monique’s dripping mascara gotten on her? Disgusting.
When Rochelle turned back to the counter, what she saw made her jump and drop the cheese, which fell to the ground with a sickening splat.
A woman stood in the kitchen with her, wearing an elaborate ball gown that looked like it came from the eighteenth century.
“Mon dieu!” Rochelle exclaimed.
The woman stared down her thin, imperious nose at Rochelle.
Rochelle put on her best snarl, the one she used on bouncers who wouldn’t let her into clubs, or waitresses who took too long with her food.
“Qu’est-ce que vous voulez?” she asked, a challenge in her voice.
But the woman didn’t answer the question, didn’t tell Rochelle what she wanted. Instead, she pointed to the counter.
Rochelle looked to see what the woman was pointing at —
And just as she turned her head, the large knife sailed through the air, straight towa
rd the softest part of her neck.
JULES WALKED BACKWARD in front of us. “Probably the most celebrated work of art on display here at the Louvre is Leonardo da Vinci’s La Joconde, or as it is commonly known, the Mona Lisa.”
Hannah rolled her eyes and yawned. “Kill me.”
“It’s famous,” Pilar said. “Don’t you want to see it?”
“I’ve been to Paris seven times without being dragged into this tourist hole,” Hannah said. “I’m supposed to celebrate now?”
“If you like art, I guess,” I said.
“I like art as much as anybody. I’m the one who talked my dad into buying that painting in our foyer, the one of the purple horse. And that was like twelve thousand dollars.”
As Hannah spoke, she slowed, and we slowed with her. She would have been completely happy to go back outside and sit on a bench for the four hours we were scheduled to spend inside the museum. But I glanced ahead at Jules, who was involved in a conversation with Audrey.
“Um … I think I’m going to catch up with the group,” I said.
“Why?” Pilar asked.
“Curious, I guess,” I said. “I don’t get to a lot of art museums.”
Hannah closed her eyes as if my very words were giving her a migraine. “Whatever.”
I pulled away from them and dodged the groups of tourists to rejoin the others.
We crowded into a smaller gallery where the Mona Lisa hung on the wall. I had to admit, the painting wasn’t as impressive as I’d thought it would be. It was small — smaller, in fact, than most of the posters I’d seen of it. I fought my way to the front of the room, where a low barrier kept the crowds several feet away from it. With the pulsing group of bodies moving behind me like pounding ocean waves, I wasn’t eager to linger and absorb the painting’s more subtle merits. I found myself pushed up against the barricade with some guy’s giant camera stabbing me in the arm, and the air in my throat seemed to thicken.
“Here, Colette, this way,” Jules said, taking me by the shoulder and leading me to a patch of open space.
“Thanks,” I said, breathing deeply and trying not to show how relieved I was.
Marie Antoinette, Serial Killer Page 6