Amanda's Guide to Love (28 page)

Amanda took a deep breath. “I owe
you a drink at the Ritz for this news.”

“The official announcement will be
made tomorrow morning, but I thought you’d sleep better if I told you now.”

Amanda grinned. “I’ll sleep like a
baby. You made my day.”

“Wait, I’m not finished yet.
Patricia Bernier was named acting CEO. She should be confirmed in a week or
so.”

“Patricia is good,” Amanda said.

“I think her main asset is that
she’s solid, and she’s been with the company for twenty years.”

“She deserves the job.”

“There’s more.” Karine paused. “It
concerns you.”

Oh God. Could it be . . .?

Amanda didn’t dare form the
question.

“Patricia wants you back. She’ll
call you tomorrow, and if I understood her correctly, she sent you an e-mail
earlier to—”

“Can you please repeat what you
just said?” Amanda sat down. “Slowly.”

“Patricia. Wants. You. Back.”

“How do you know that?”

“She asked me if I had your private
e-mail. I said I’d have to search, but I’d find it a lot faster if I knew what
she was planning to do with it.”

Amanda smiled. “Now I see how you
got your unofficial title.”

“Information is king, my dear, and
I do what it takes to have it.”

Amanda found herself struggling to
wrap her mind around the news. “I had no idea she appreciated me.”

“I’m sure
she
has no idea
you
appreciate her.” Karine chuckled. “You guys have a lot in common. Anyway,
Patricia is smart and knows what’s good for the company.”

When Amanda hung up, her hands were
shaking. She fired up the laptop that sat on her little desk and opened her
inbox.

There it was.
Patricia’s short but oh-so-significant note.

To
: Amanda Roussel

From
: Patricia Bernier

Subject
: Job Offer

Dear
Amanda,

You
may have heard by now about the latest events at ENS. My assistant will call
you tomorrow morning to see if you could drop by my office later during the
day. But I wanted to give you a heads-up so you can start thinking. I’d like to
create a new, tailor-made position that would allow ENS to benefit fully from
your unique set of skills and talents. They were sorely missed this summer.

We’ll
discuss the details, but please know that I won’t give up until you accept my
offer.

Kind
regards,

Patricia

Right
.

Amanda pinched herself and reread
Patricia’s e-mail three more times. She wasn’t dreaming. ENS wanted her back,
and boy, she wanted to be back. She’d negotiate and play hard to get, as anyone
in demand
would, but in her heart she knew Patricia’s offer was as good
as signed.

Then she noticed another e-mail
that had landed in her inbox a few hours earlier. It was from Kes, and the
subject line read, “A Woman’s Guide to Love, Part III.”

Amanda opened it.

Personal
Note
: It’s four in
the afternoon. I’m sitting in front of the family caravan, staring at the
smaller caravan next door and waiting for my parents and siblings to
reassemble. I’m in the shade, but the heat is liquefying my brain. Maybe that’s
why I just had a revelation: you, Amanda Roussel, are a human version of
Garfield.

Not
convinced? Open my next e-mail and use the gift card to download an e-book
titled
Garfield Classics, Volume Fifteen
(it’s my favorite Garfield
volume). Read it tonight, if you can, and tell me what you think.

Introduction
to Part III
: Behavioral
psychology has a method that can be highly effective in some situations. The
subject must simulate feeling a certain way until she begins to actually feel
that way. The idea is that if she behaves as if she were experiencing an
emotion or a state of mind, there’s a chance it’ll become real. For instance,
if she’s sad, she should force herself to smile, and continue smiling for as
long as she can until she begins to feel happier. Or not. In any case, she
should stop when her facial muscles lock into a painful spasm.

It’s
unclear where the cutoff line should be when the subject is pretending to be in
love. We suggest she does it for three days and then assesses the situation.

Instructions
: Over the next three days, act as
if you were in love with a man (for instance, a certain Gitan with highly symmetrical
shoulders).

Here
are some ideas:

1. Forget you disapprove of his origins and
occupation.

2. Tell friends and colleagues how irresistible he is,
how he makes you melt, and so on.

3. Isolate yourself five to ten times each day and
think about him.

4. At least once a day, imagine the kids you’d make
together (hint: they’d be amazing).

Bonus
Points
: Go to a
tattoo parlor and get his name tattooed somewhere. If this seems too
melodramatic or if you’re afraid of needles, get a temporary tattoo. It’ll still
earn you a point or even two, depending on its size and location on your body.

~ ~ ~

This
is the third and last part of “A Woman’s Guide to Love.” We hope you find it
useful, and more than ever, we count on your goodwill and cooperation.

Amanda closed Kes’s e-mail and
downloaded the Garfield book to her laptop. The rational voice in her head
whispered she should forget about Kes’s assignment and focus on preparing for
her talk with Patricia. But she told that voice to shut up. She’d think about
the job tomorrow morning.

Right now, she wanted to think
about Kes.

Amanda changed into a silk nightie
and made a mental note to tell Kes how unfair it was to give Vivienne a
hand-painted scarf and to give her an e-book. As for the experiment he wanted
her to conduct . . . why the hell not? It would be fun. She’d do
the ridiculous things he asked her to do, and they’d laugh about it.

It would be easy to act as if she
were in love with him. She wouldn’t even have to pretend.

Amanda froze at that thought.

Wait, wasn’t she supposed to do
something right now? Something super urgent, like . . . er . . .
brush her teeth? Yes, this was the perfect time to brush her teeth. She rushed
into the bathroom. After she put her electrical toothbrush down and turned off
the lights, she returned to the living room.

What now?

A glance at her watch told her she
still had over an hour until Kes’s arrival. She picked up the laptop, climbed
into her favorite armchair, and opened the Garfield book.

The very first cartoon showed
Garfield alone, thinking to himself, “I wish Jon was here. I’ve had to annoy
myself all day.”

Amanda grinned.

There was no denying she and
Garfield shared some traits.

And no denying that in two short
months Kes had gotten to know her surprisingly well.

Maybe even better than
she knew herself.

* * *

Kes strode toward his building, a
bounce in his step and an indefensible lightness in his heart.

The daylong stay with his family had
been a bumpy ride, but he’d kept his end of the bargain and told his folks he loved
them. They didn’t freak out—even if they did inquire about his health.

He told them he was fine. Better
than ever.

The hiccup occurred when part of
the family reassembled for dinner, which was served inside the caravan because
of the rain. The party consisted of his parents, sister, eldest nephew, and
himself. Nouna had declared she’d made enough of an effort and stayed in bed.
His brother and brother-in-law were working late, harvesting grapes for a local
wine producer.

A young woman who looked vaguely
familiar stopped by to borrow some table salt. She lingered to chat with
Rosanna and Mama, sounding like she knew them well.

Kes smiled politely.

“I’m Clara,” she said, pausing to
let him process the information. “Don’t you recognize me?”

He furrowed his brow. This woman
couldn’t be Clara. No way. Clara was Alberto and Maria’s girl—a scruffy, gangly
kid with mussed hair who played elastics with her friends all day long. The
woman before him must have been eighteen. She had expertly made-up green eyes,
a silky black mane that cascaded down her back in tame waves, and soft curves.

Had he been an objective onlooker,
he would have found her gorgeous.

But he wasn’t. Clara’s beauty made
him think of Amanda—a gadji Snow Queen to this Gypsy Venus. It reminded him of
how that Snow Queen—
his
Snow Queen—made him feel. Of how just looking at
her made his heart pound with giddy joy, and his cock harden. And when she
shared one of her dry, misanthropic observations, he found them funnier than
Garfield’s best punchlines.

Amanda enthralled him in a way that
no other woman ever had.

Or ever would.

He smiled. “You’ve changed, Clara.”

“I hope it’s a compliment.” She
searched his eyes. “Do you like what you see?”

“You’ve become a beautiful young
woman.”

“I’m glad to hear you say that . . .
because you’re the most handsome man in the whole world.” Clara blushed furiously
and ran away.

“What was that about?” he asked
when she was out of earshot.

“No idea.” Tata suddenly became
fascinated by something on his plate.

“Oh come on, Django, you’ve got to
help me here.” Mama put her fork down and gave Kes a grave look. “As you said
yourself, son, Clara has blossomed into a real beauty.”

“Good for her.” Kes nodded.

“Good for you, too”—Mama arched an
eyebrow—“because she likes you.”

Kes looked down at his plate and
discovered a morsel just as fascinating as the one his father was inspecting.

“We’ve talked with Alberto and
Maria,” Levna plowed on. “Luckily for you, they are prepared to overlook your
connections and even let Clara live among the gadje, following you wherever
your . . . business takes you.”

“Once the two of you are married,
of course,” Django said, finally looking up.

Oh God.

If he told them bluntly there was
no way he was marrying Clara, the family dinner would turn into yet another
shouting match that would end with him getting banished or vowing never to
return.

Either of which sucked.

“I already have a girlfriend,” he
said.

“Who? That washed-out gadji you
brought here for Lysandro’s christening?” Levna looked like she would’ve spat
on the floor had she been less genteel.

“Mama, her name is Amanda,” Kes
said.

“As if I cared.” Levna shrugged.
“What matters is that Clara is better in every way. She’s younger, prettier,
sweeter. An eighteen-year-old Gypsy rose ready to be picked.”

Levna peered at him.

He stared back, poker-faced.

“In case you didn’t catch my drift,”
she said, “Clara is a virgin, as our tradition requires. Never had as much as a
petit ami
. Everyone in the clan can testify to that. Maria told me the
girl has been obsessed with you for years.”

Django stroked his beard. “She’d
make you a perfect wife, son.”

If only Marco had been around to
crack a joke and defuse the tension! Even if his cousin weren’t a fan of
Amanda, he wouldn’t let Kes down. He never did.

But Marco had taken off at dawn,
and no one had seen him since. He didn’t pick up his phone or call back.

That left Kes with only one
possible ally.

He turned to his sister. “Rosanna?
Feel like saying something? You’re always complaining that Gitane girls are
married off too young and miss out on opportunities. Clara is only eighteen.”

“I do believe our girls deserve
more education and choices.” Rosanna avoided his eyes—a bad sign. “But the
thing is,
you
are Clara’s choice. She told me her dream is to go away
with you.”

Kes pressed his mouth into a hard
line and weighed every word before speaking. “I’m sorry to break the family
consensus, but marrying Clara isn’t
my
dream. And she isn’t my choice.”

Levna took her head in her hands.

“Little pral.” Rosanna touched his
arm. “You’re blinded by your attraction for that woman, but if you could reason
with clarity, you’d see that we’re right. We want the best for you.”

He smirked. “And Clara is the best
for me?”

“Besides all the qualities Mama
just mentioned, Clara is a Gitane.” Rosanna squeezed his arm as if trying to
convey something beyond her words.