Christmas in Paris (6 page)

CELINE WAS THE
easiest bride. Her father insisted on paying for the wedding, so Celine was happy to let her stepmother, Mathilde, plan the elaborate reception at the George V.

Sometimes Alec passed boutiques filled with chiffon wedding dresses and lace stockings and wished she wanted his opinion on the flowers or strawberry meringue. But then he pictured the glorious nights in Celine's bed and thought he was being ridiculous.

Everyone knew spending too much time planning the wedding was the fastest way to get a divorce. He should be grateful all he had to do was slip on the gray morning suit and yellow boutonniere and show up at Cathédrale Notre-Dame at three o'clock.

*   *   *

ALEC ATE THE
last bite of wheat cracker and thought if only Patrick hadn't appeared. It seemed perfectly innocent when Celine's boss asked her to show his Australian nephew around Paris. Alec pictured a boy with sandy hair and freckles clutching a cricket bat.

He remembered when he arrived in the Place Vendôme at six o'clock. Celine asked him to meet them at a café and then they would take a dinner cruise on the Seine.

*   *   *

ALEC BUTTONED HIS
coat and thought it really was too cold to sit on a barge at night. There was never decent heating and you could barely see out of the windows because of the fog. And why would a boy have any interest in seeing Paris after dark? Alec was sure he'd rather visit Cirque d'Hiver or to see the Christmas lights at Disneyland Paris.

He turned the corner and saw Celine sitting across from a man with wavy blond hair and blue eyes. He wore a blue cashmere sweater and gray slacks.

Alec approached the café and wondered why Celine had her hands in her pockets. Was she hiding her diamond ring or just keeping warm? And where was Patrick? Did she send her boss's nephew away so she could flirt with the guy who looked like he had stepped out of a Ralph Lauren catalog?

“God, it's freezing.” Alec rubbed his hands together. “I hope Patrick didn't stop at a newsagent to buy a packet of sweets. He won't appreciate the braised duck and sliced beets if he's stuffed with caramels.”

Celine looked up and smoothed her hair. She wore a teal sweater and cream slacks and Alec thought she had never looked more beautiful. Diamond teardrop earrings glittered in her ears and she resembled an angel on top of a Christmas tree.

“This is my fiancé, Alec,” she said to the man sitting across the table. She turned to Alec and her mouth puckered. “This is Edgar's nephew Patrick.”

*   *   *

“HOW ON EARTH
can that blond Adonis be Edgar's nephew?” Alec spluttered. “I pictured some knobby-kneed kid with bangs, not one of
People
's fifty most beautiful people.”

“Edgar is almost sixty, why shouldn't he have a grown nephew?” Celine retorted. They had returned from the dinner cruise and were standing in Celine's living room.

Alec thought he'd never had a more miserable evening. The Cabernet had been off, and when the waiter placed the chocolate soufflé in front of him, it collapsed. Patrick insisted on standing on the deck to see the Christmas lights, and Alec was so cold, he almost asked the woman next to them if he could borrow her mink coat.

“How can he be so tan in the middle of winter?” he continued. “I felt like a wax figure at Madame Tussauds.”

“He's from Melbourne, it's the middle of summer in Australia.”

“Well, someone needs to tell him to wear a hat.” He scowled. “If he stands on a cricket mound without protection, he's going to get a terrible sunburn.”

Celine took the ribbon out of her hair. “It sounds like you are jealous.”

“Jealous?” Alec started. He gazed at her high breasts and small waist and felt like the Wicked Witch dissolving into a puddle. “Why on earth would I be jealous?”

“You tell me,” she said, unzipping her slacks and letting them fall to the floor. “You were the one who was sulking like a child who didn't receive any Christmas presents.”

“I was not sulking,” Alec muttered. “It was freezing, and I was trying to stop my teeth from chattering.”

She took his hand and led him into the bedroom. Alec watched her unsnap her bra and forgot about the bad wine and limp dessert. He slipped his hand under her panties and thought he had discovered a hidden treasure. He pressed his fingers in deeper and watching her face open, like a flower in springtime.

She drew him onto the ivory bedspread and pulled him inside her. She urged him to go faster, and he felt the slow build and sudden terror of not being able to stop. He pulled her hands over her head and their legs twisted on the silk sheets. Then he collapsed on her breasts and heard her cry out.

God, it was incredible! Like they were the only two lovers in Paris. He waited until she stopped shaking, and then he closed his eyes and for a moment he knew perfect happiness.

“You're not a child at all,” Celine murmured. “You're very much a man.”

Alec suddenly felt invincible. He tucked her against his chest and whispered, “How could I ever be jealous when I get to hold you in my arms?”

*   *   *

ALEC SCREWED THE
lid on the jar of preserves and thought that if he had known that was the last time they would have sex, he would have made it last longer. How was he to know that three days later she would board a plane to Melbourne?

And now he was alone in a honeymoon suite at the Hôtel de Crillon. He remembered Isabel stepping onto the boulevard and was glad she wasn't hurt. It was bad enough his fiancée had deserted him; it would be terrible if he were responsible for Isabel getting run over by a taxi.

That was the thing about life. You thought everything was moving in the right direction. And then something appeared out of the blue and changed your course forever.

He thought of the night he and Celine checked into the Crillon. He couldn't get over the welcoming basket of exotic nuts and fresh fruits from Mexico. He moved around the suite, examining the Armani shaving cream in the bathroom and the heated floor in the bidet closet.

*   *   *

ALEC POPPED A
handful of macadamia nuts in his mouth and glanced at his watch. They were meeting Celine's parents for dinner at Le Meurice and she had gone to the salon to get her hair done. But now it was almost six o'clock and they'd never get through pre-Christmas traffic if they didn't hurry.

He grabbed the key and took the elevator to the lobby. He crossed the Persian rug and approached the concierge.

“Could you direct me to the salon?” he asked. “My fiancée had an appointment hours ago, and hasn't returned.”

“Are you in suite five-twenty?” The man looked up from his computer.

“Yes, how did you know?”

“The mademoiselle told me to expect a tall man wearing a red sweater.” He handed Alec an envelope. “She left you a letter.”

“My mother bought me this sweater,” Alec snapped, stuffing the envelope in his pocket. “It's Shetland wool, hand-knit in Scotland.”

Alec took the letter up to the suite and ripped it open. He scanned it quickly and groaned. How could a woman with a degree from the Sorbonne write a Dear John letter like a bad romance author? And how could she decide eleven days before their wedding to fly to another continent?

“Who moves to Australia? It's a bunch of scrub and marsupials.” He tossed the paper in the garbage. “There's no decent culture and the weather is the same three hundred sixty-five days a year.”

He glanced out the window at the rain falling on the Champs-Élysées and felt a sharp pain in his chest. He knew why she had decided to spend twenty-four hours in a pressurized airline cabin when they could be sharing the marble bathtub in their suite: because she had met the only person he had ever seen who was more beautiful than Celine herself, and she couldn't resist him.

*   *   *

HE OPENED THE
bottle of scotch and sank onto the sofa. He really shouldn't cry, Celine would think it was unmanly. Then he remembered Celine was on her way to an Australian beach and a sob escaped his throat.

He filled his glass and gazed at the silver platter of mangoes and kiwis. He picked up a slice of melon and wondered if he would ever be hungry again.

*   *   *

NOW ALEC MOVED
to the Regency desk and studied a sketch of Gus throwing a boomerang. It had been three days since Celine left. If that had been love, he never wanted to experience it again.

For the first time since he and Celine met, he was surprised that he felt completely normal. He was like a ship passenger who has survived a transatlantic voyage and finally reached solid ground.

He thought of all the things about Celine he missed: the way she peeled an orange and read the Sunday comics out loud. How she would overhear a conversation at a café and invent a story about the couple talking.

And God, he loved the way she stepped out of the shower and lathered her body with lotion. As if she didn't know that every move she made was like the most glorious ballet.

There was a knock at the door and he stood up to answer it.

“Here you are.” Mathieu entered the suite. His brown hair was slicked back and he wore a wool overcoat. “I thought you might be walking into the Seine with rocks in your coat pocket.” He glanced at Alec's smooth cheeks and freshly washed hair. “You look pretty good for someone who was left at the altar. I guess sleeping under thousand-thread-count sheets and eating room service cracked lobster does wonders for a broken heart.”

“I wasn't left at the altar, we never made it to the church,” Alec said irritably. “And I can't afford room service, I've been eating crackers and jam.”

“I was afraid of that.” He examined the empty preserve jars. “Helene suggested you join us for dinner. She's making Nicoise salad with hard-boiled eggs, and strawberry melba for dessert.”

“As much as I enjoy the company of my best friend and his Cordon Bleu–trained wife, I'm not ready for an evening of discussing the joys of marital sex and the pregnant woman's libido.” Alec sank onto a velvet love seat.

“Helene thought you would say that.” He grinned. “She authorized me to take you to Le Reservoir in Montmartre. We're going to get drunk on pomegranate martinis.”

“I'd as soon stand under strobe lights in a nightclub as lock myself into a prison cell in the Bastille.”

“You can't stay here eating salted nuts, you have to get on with your life,” he replied. “It's Celine's loss. Helene says if she met you before we fell in love, she would have been smitten. You're good-looking and charming and you're the only man she knows who can hang a shower curtain.”

“You and Helene are childhood sweethearts, she would have had to meet me in kindergarten.” Alec's face broke into a smile. “You are a good friend, Mathieu. I don't know what I'd do without you.”

Mathieu took off his overcoat and folded it over a brocade armchair.

“I'm not just here as your friend, I also came as your attorney.”

“I see.” Alec felt something hard press against his chest.

“In two weeks it will be the first anniversary of your father's death,” he began. “You will be quite a wealthy man.”

“Who goes parasailing at the age of sixty-five?” Alec's eyes glistened. “He should have celebrated his birthday like a normal Frenchman by eating beef bourguignon made with too much butter and drinking too many glasses of port.”

“His doctor said his heart could have given out anywhere,” Mathieu replied.

“Have you ever gazed down at the Mediterranean from six hundred feet?” Alec asked. “My mother tried to dissuade him. She told him the Greek myth about Icarus and he insisted it was perfectly safe. He said a ninety-year-old man went up the day before.”

“Your father led a wonderful life. Two handsome children, a successful business, a beautiful house in Paris's most exclusive arrondissement.”

“You forgot the two wives.” Alec bristled. “The first one who deserted him and the second one whose stepdaughter never let her forget she wasn't the love of his life.” His eyes narrowed. “Stepmothers are vilified, but stepdaughters can be worse. Was it my mother's fault that Bettina's mother left my father for a farmer who lived in a thatched cottage like Mellors in
Lady Chatterley's Lover
?”

“Family histories can be as convoluted as abstract paintings at the Centre Pompidou.” Mathieu shrugged. “But it doesn't change the law.”

“Ah, yes, French inheritance laws.” Alec walked to the bar and poured a glass of scotch. “It's no wonder the French are the most unfaithful race. What wife wants to devote thirty years of her life to a man, only to be kicked out into the street the moment he's dead?”

“The laws were created to protect the children,” Mathieu explained. “And to dissuade mistresses of wealthy patrons from demanding a wedding ring.”

“My mother was the most caring wife and mother,” he sighed. “Bettina is behaving as if she was a stray dog that didn't work out.”

“The law says you and Bettina inherit two-thirds of Alain's estate and your mother receives a third. She is allowed to live in the family home for a year after his death and then she must relinquish it to his children…” Mathieu paused. “Unless she gives up her portion of the estate in exchange for living there for the rest of her life. But then she couldn't afford to live in the house.”

“You know that's all she wants. Forty Rue de Passy has been her home for thirty years.” Alec fiddled with his glass. “She has her vegetable garden and rooms filled with Alain's favorite things. If she leaves, estate taxes will eat up her principal and she'll end up in a walk-up in Pigalle.”

“Your father stipulated in his will that whichever child marries first could live in the house.” Mathieu poured a glass of soda water. “He wanted the gardens filled with children playing on swings and catching butterflies.”