Cognac & Couture (The Passport Series Book 2) (23 page)

THE NEXT DAY,
all the members
of Sean’s fan club stood in front of St. Nicholas’s Anglican Church to be
photographed. The photographer, a friend of Charlotte’s, posed us in various
combinations with the baby. The bright blue sky was chilly but refreshing as we
milled about, waiting for someone to tell us what to do or where to go.

The afternoon quiet was disrupted
by a loud ruckus. A cacophony of voices emerged from the woodland that
surrounded the church’s ancient cemetery. Sébastien quickly gripped my elbow,
ready to steer me to safety. As the commotion quickly closed in, I heard voices
call out, “Des! Look here! Over here, mate! Oy, is that your baby?” I saw
Liam’s brows draw together and anger spread across his face.

For those of us who’d been in this
predicament before, we knew we had to move fast. The rest stood still, confused.
I quickly herded those nearby inside the church. Once they got moving, I asked
Sébastien to bring up the rear, as I made my way to where Marian, Hillary, and
Tiziana circled around Charlotte and the baby. I took my position and held her
arm to make sure she was steady on her feet, while calmly encouraging her to
keep a firm grip on Sean.

“
Charlotte!”
Liam called so
fiercely, we jumped.

“Christ, he’s intimidating,”
Marian said approvingly.

Instantly at Charlotte’s side, he directed
her, “Take Sean somewhere and hide, in case they make it inside. We’ll handle
it. Just try to relax.”

The noise and chaos was crushing.
Activity came from all directions. Even the church seemed to crackle with manic
energy, once all of us were inside. Looking at the stressed-out family members,
I could only assume they would finally understand what it had been like, two
years ago, when Charlotte had been hounded relentlessly by the press. I looked
for Sébastien, who was conferring with Liam.

Des suddenly popped his head out
of a curtained panel of one of the wooden confessionals, scaring everyone.

“
Fuck!”
Charlotte squawked
from fright. Most of us lurched in her direction then relaxed just a bit.

“Sorry! I’m so sorry. I tried
sneaking in the back door. Bloody paparazzi! Never a moment’s peace.” Des’s
eyes were full of regret. He glanced down at the squalling baby and observed,
“I’m not sure what he’s doing, but your son looks like something straight out
of
Aliens
.”

I looked at Sean, whose little
face was red and contorted. An angry squall burst from his tiny mouth.
Charlotte looked around her. “I’ve got to feed him. Even if he isn’t hungry, it
will quiet him.”

Seeking a solution in the wide-open
church, Sébastien hustled mother and son into the confessional Des had just
exited. “You’ll be safe,” he promised calmly.

Meanwhile, Liam and the rest of
the troops were in position, ready to do battle. “Make sure the paparazzi don’t
see her,” he commanded.

I tried but failed to contain my
snicker and ended up laughing. He gave me an angry glance. I tried to sober up
and apologize, but just then, the vicar appeared from out of nowhere and seemed
completely confused.

“What on earth?” he uttered.

Liam apologized and gave a brief
explanation. Then he spoke loud enough that everyone could hear. “We don’t want
anyone to recognize her. God forbid they think Sean is Des Bannerman’s baby.
What a mess that would be!”

You could almost hear,
Oh
!
ricochet through people’s minds, as the room’s energy surged higher. None of
the Molloys, the Youngs, or any of the friends wanted Sean’s parentage
questioned or any related circus. We had all read enough tabloids in our lives
to understand quickly what would follow if Des was associated with Charlotte’s
baby.

“Mon Dieu! How can you tolerate
this?” Sébastien asked Des as he pulled off his overcoat, used the back of his
hand to wipe his sweaty brow, and then tugged his shirtsleeves into place.

Marian appreciatively observed
him. “Your fella looks positively medieval. Ready to do battle while rakishly
handsome.”

I looked at him and found some
primal part of myself appreciating his elegant battle stance and willingness to
defend my friends.

Liam, who peered through the
window in the door, had finally found his sense of humor. “I feel like I should
shout, ‘You can take our lives, but you can never take our baptism!’”

“What? I thought you were Irish.
You’re Scottish?” asked the photographer, Samantha, who was crouching nearby.

Des noticed her for the first
time. His eyes grew huge at the sight of the camera hanging around her neck.
“Who the bloody hell are you?” he demanded.

Liam took charge. “Des, this is
Charlotte’s friend, Samantha, baptism photographer. Samantha, Des Bannerman,
celebrity idiot!” Liam’s expression turned from bewildered to determined, as he
asked his friend, “What are you going to do to sort this out?”

Des glanced down at his cell phone
before answering Liam. “Glad you’ve asked. I’ve called for help. Security is on
the way.”

“Next time, could you think of
that first?” Liam gave him a look of derision, his expression making it
perfectly clear what he thought of Des’s celebrity baggage, at the moment.

Des sputtered a bit, clearly
taking offense at having his intelligence called into question, but
realizing
he’d blundered again, he was immediately contrite. “You’re right.” He glanced
around the church.
“I’m going to talk to Ted. He’s
nice.”

Liam shot him an angry look, but, before anything further
could develop, the vicar cleared his throat and fidgeted in his clergy robes.
“Might I suggest we use the smaller baptismal font in the annex? There’s an
indoor walkway and small stained glass windows. No one will be able to see us.”

***

A half hour later, all twenty-six of
us were crammed into a small space meant for more intimate gatherings. Once
everyone had finished jostling for a view of the stone baptismal font, the
vicar led us through the ceremony. The hullabaloo outside gradually dissipated
into silence. The clergyman called for the godparents to step forward. Upon
seeing Tiziana, his eyebrows shot heavenwards. Though covered completely from head
to toe, her assets were still evident. The look on his face when he took in
little Sean’s godfather Michael, bruised and hung-over, made me laugh. I
clamped a hand over my mouth, trying to stifle the noise. For that, I got a
chastising glance from him. We proceeded through the ceremony at lightning
speed. I think we had made quite the impression upon him.

After the ceremony, we executed our exit strategy smoothly.
Des was escorted from the church into a waiting limo by a swarm of NoNecks,
while Ted and Tiziana allowed the paparazzi to bombard them, and Charlotte’s
family peacefully exited, unnoticed. The rest of us watched with relief as we
made our way to the street where the cars were parked.

“Jaysus, that was a fecking nightmare! Liam would have Des’s
balls if harm came to Charlotte or the baby. Is it always like that when he’s
around?” I heard Rory ask Marian.

“Yes and yes. Poor Des, though. ‘Oh, what a tangled web we
weave when we endeavor to succeed,’” Marian replied mirthfully.

Impressed, Rory asked, “Did you just make that up?”

“I did. I am a master at tangling up well-crafted
literature.”

SÉBASTIEN
HAD FLOWN
directly from London to New York yesterday for work.
Though I would miss him, I was excited to be having dinner with Anaïs and
Yvette. We were going to try a restaurant Chantal suggested, Pirouette.

Just before I dashed out the door for my final meeting of
the day, my computer pinged. Foolishly, I took a glance.

To:
[email protected]

From:
AkselPedersen@FlytningVærktøj.com

Subj: Dates
for a tour

Mademoiselle
Ehlers,

It is my
sincere hope that you have had a chance to review the offer we have made you.

My colleagues and
I would like to invite you to come to Flytning Værktøj. We wish to share with
you our vision and introduce you to the team you would be working with.

I assume that
this needs to be handled discreetly. We are happy to work around your schedule,
in order to accommodate your needs.

We look
forward to talking with you soon.

Regards,

Aksel Pedersen

My eyes were glued to the monitor. My brain fritzed. I quickly
moved the email from my inbox to a folder labeled,
Random Documents
, as
if that would change anything.

As each day of the past six weeks had passed since meeting
Aksel Pedersen in the bar of Hotel Cambon, I had said nothing and done nothing.
It had begun to feel almost like it had never
happened.
My feelings of guilt at not telling
Sébastien
had abated with time. Until now.

I hadn’t seen Anaïs and Yvette since
Bethany Halvorsen’s show. Once I’d done the math, I couldn’t believe how
quickly the autumn had whizzed quickly by. It had been almost six weeks since
I’d seen them.

We met at the Métro station
Rambuteau-Centre Georges Pompidou, so we could walk down Rue du Renard amongst
the tourists, past the Pompidou Center, and then onto Pirouette.
We
passed many bustling restaurants and bars along the way where tourists and
locals sat outside, taking advantage of the break in the rain.

Inside the restaurant, we were led up a black, metal, spiral
staircase to the second floor, where we could see most of the bustling
restaurant. The space had great energy; it was buzzing but not noisy.

At first, the girls were quite
gentle, asking bland questions about Sébastien and me, but when it became clear
that the relationship was developing at a faster pace than they had expected,
the questions became bolder. “Tell me, chérie, the romantic interludes, are
they
parfait
?”
Yvette inquired, while glancing at Anaïs for
confirmation. I did a double take. This was the kind of question Marian would
ask, not Yvette.

I stared at them blankly, letting the question dangle in the
air. Just as they appeared to be giving up hope, I conceded, “I’m not going to
say much, I’m just going to say… in the words of Marian Connolly, he’s absofuckinglutely
amazing.”

Yvette immediately brought up a conversation we had had when
we first met; they’d asked me if I was a lesbian! It seemed that my hobbies,
independence, and lack of love life had convinced them I was in the closet. Anaïs
observed me blushing and said, “No, not a lesbian.”

Once the food began to arrive, our conversation slowed. I
barely tasted my food as I sat
wondering how to
introduce
my
topics of conversation. There was no other way;
with
a deep breath, I leapt in. Since
they already knew
that I was hoping to get Monsieur Detriche’s job,
I told them about the
unexpected job offer from Aksel, and the complication between Aksel and
Sébastien. They looked at me warily.

When I finished, Yvette jumped in right away. “You should
have told him immediately.”

Anaïs nodded vigorously, agreeing
with Yvette. “What were you thinking?”

I looked at them wide-eyed. “I’m
not taking the job. Besides, I’d only know him for ten days at the time.”

Yvette’s arched brow said it all.
‘So?’

Anaïs wasn’t as quiet. “Kathleen,
it was already clear at Bethany Halvorsen’s show how attached the two of you
were, so please don’t expect us to believe that. There’s more. What?”

They didn’t know about Mikkel, and
I hadn’t planned on telling them today. It felt like “too much.”
Besides, it
doesn’t have anything to do with the job and Sébastien.
“Oh yes it does,”
my conscience whispered.
Sighing, I answered,
“I know you hate the whole Americans-spilling-their-guts-thing, but in order to
explain why I did what I did, I need to tell you something.”

Anaïs gave me an uncharacteristic
sympathetic look. “We are your friends first, Kathleen. Besides, you aren’t
really American…” She looked at my shoes, and nudged her chin. “…you aren’t
wearing sport shoes.”

I found myself telling them about
Mikkel, the girls’ theory that I needed to go to Aarhus to let go of the past,
and my own theory that I hadn’t told Sébastien because I was finally happy.
Really happy.

They shed no tears, they just
looked at me compassionately for about two seconds and then got to the heart of
the matter. “If you want him, you have to be honest. He’ll tell you what the
agreement allows, and you have to tell him what’s confusing you.”

Yup. They were right. As was the
little voice inside my head.
Shit.

***

Back at home, I lay on the couch,
staring at the ceiling, thinking about what I was going to say to
Sébastien.
So far I had kept quite a bit from
him
. In addition to everything else, I needed to
tell him what I had withheld, my miscarriage. I had yet to tell anyone about
that. Just the mere thought of losing my final tether to Mikkel had torn at my
heart, and to this day I could still feel sad at times. I hadn’t told the girls
when they were in Paris because I hadn’t wanted Charlotte to feel anything but
utter joy at her pregnancy, not worrying that somehow it made me sad. It
hadn’t.

I focused for quite some time on my tendency to keep
secrets. It wasn’t healthy. Or right. No matter how I approached it, I had no
idea where the impulse came from. But I had to stop doing it.

My feelings for Sébastien were far
too strong, and growing very quickly. Time, opportunity, and the social
intensity of Fashion Week had given us a lot of time together, so our
relationship knitted quickly.
But how unhappy was he going to be when he
found out the truth? Then, how unhappy was I going to be?
Because I didn’t know him very well and had no way
of predicting his reaction?