The Conspiracy of Us (5 page)

A
pounding reverberated in my head and I bolted upright.

Where was I?

Warm afternoon light streamed through the window and lit the crushed-velvet comforter, still indented from my head, and I remembered. After I'd tried to call my mom, I'd taken a shower, and then I'd realized I hadn't slept in twenty-four hours, so I was going to sit down for a minute before I went exploring . . .

The pounding came again. It was someone knocking at my door.

“Just a second,” I called, my voice thick with sleep.

I rubbed at my dried-out contact lenses and pulled the bedroom door open.

“If I'd known it was shower time, I would have brought a towel.” Stellan flicked his eyes over my suddenly too-small white bathrobe.

Heat crept across my skin. I drew the robe tighter and frowned at him to disguise the fact that I was now trying—unsuccessfully—not to think about him in the shower. He was doing this on purpose, I reminded myself. And it still wasn't going to work. “Can I help you?”

His slow smile said he knew exactly what I was thinking. “I suppose I'll take a rain check on the shower. Now I am taking you to get a gown for the ball. A welcome gift.”

I blinked. “For the what?”

“The ball.” He'd untucked his dress shirt and rolled up the sleeves, and when he drummed his long fingers on the doorframe, I could see the muscles in his forearms twitch. “Tomorrow night. It's a celebration for the Dauphins' new babies.”

“Babies.” I remembered the pregnant woman downstairs, who got the Olympics as a baby shower gift.

“Madame Dauphin is giving birth to twins,” Stellan said, like it should be obvious.

“And there's a ball that's a baby shower. And I need a . . . gown.” Obviously my brain hadn't woken up yet.

“Madame Dauphin likes her guests to reflect well on her.” He shot a disdainful glance at my prom dress, now balled up in the corner. I opened my mouth to protest, but honestly, he was right.

“Shouldn't I wait here until Jack shows up? Or the Saxons?”

“Do I really have to tell you this again? Alistair Saxon is supposed to arrive tomorrow. You'll see them soon enough. I have other errands to run, so unless you're wearing that, I suggest you get dressed. You can find something in the closet.” He gestured to a door in the corner that I'd found earlier led to a huge, well-stocked walk-in.

He left, and I called my mom again. Still no answer, on either phone. With that on top of the shock of being here that was finally starting to hit me, nerves fluttered in my stomach. I kind of wanted to curl up under the covers and not leave the room until my family got here.

But it wasn't like there was anything wrong with shopping. It could be fun. It was nice of the Dauphins to take me in, and I might as well enjoy the perks while I could, before my mom found out what I'd done and locked me up until I turned eighteen.

I searched the closet for an acceptable ball gown shopping outfit. Ball gown shopping. I smiled. There was a phrase I never thought would apply to me.

I slipped on a navy sundress with white stripes, grabbed a similarly striped piece of taffy from a candy bowl on the desk—I was starving—and headed toward the hall where I was meeting Stellan. I passed a library with the door open a crack. The pregnant blond lady, who I assumed was Madame Dauphin, sat at a conference table with four men. As I passed, a word jumped at me.

“. . . about the mandate,” one of the men said. I tripped over my sandals.

“Any news?” Madame Dauphin asked.

I flattened myself against the wall next to the doorframe.

“The Mikados claim to have a lead, but it's unlikely,” one of the men replied.

“And nothing has come of the Louvre exhibit?”

“Not yet,” said another voice. “Cecile, time is running out. If more information on the mandate is not found—”

“Then we choose the union ourselves, and assume the rest are intelligent enough to rally behind us, even without confirmation of the One. We can't let this opportunity pass us by. Meanwhile, we keep searching for the tomb. As much as some of the families want to believe it, the mandate isn't
magic,
” Madame Dauphin said scornfully. “This is the modern world. No one's even certain anything will happen.”

There were murmurs of assent, then a few moments of silence, broken by a hesitant voice. “And we must have a united front if we expect to stand against the Order. Aren't you particularly concerned about them right now? The recent attacks . . . They seem to know so much. They even found out about the baby girl.”

“What are you saying?” another man said. “Do you think information is being leaked?”

There was a loaded pause. The taffy stuck in my teeth was sickeningly sweet.

“It doesn't matter how they're finding out. You heard what Alistair Saxon has been saying. He thinks the Order should be eliminated altogether, just in case,” someone else said. “And it sounds like many others are starting to agree.”

Madame Dauphin cleared her throat. “And if we vote to do that, it will be made easier by finding the tomb. Shall we return to the matter at hand?” she said coldly. “Monsieur Dauphin has sent some intelligence out of Egypt. If you will turn to page three . . .”

I took this time when everyone would be looking down to creep past the door. I glanced in as I did, and saw another familiar face.

One of the men who had been speaking was the president of France.

•   •   •

The mandate. The Order, whatever that was. Alistair Saxon—someone from my own family. The president of France.
Attacks.

It didn't sound like they'd been meeting for a fund-raiser. I thought about all the paranoid looks at the party, and it was almost enough to make me forget I was in a limo, driving along the Seine. I tried to shake off worries about politics that weren't my problem and enjoy that I was going dress shopping in Paris with friends of my family. And especially that I was suddenly able to say “friends of my family.”

Stellan sat in the facing seat and looked me over, from my sundress to my white wedge sandals. I followed his eyes down to my chipped eggplant-purple pedicure, which looked out of place with these casual-but-obviously-expensive clothes. I tucked my feet back against the seat.

“So, Avery West,” Stellan said. “I've been wondering about you. You don't know much about your extended family?”

I looked up from my hands in my lap. “I think we've established that.”

“Why were you so willing to come along, then?” Stellan leaned forward. For the first time, I noticed that his eyes were deep blue, with splashes of gold around the irises.

I frowned. “I—”

“What kind of girl abandons everything for people she doesn't know?” he continued, eyes narrowing.

“If you'd stop interrupting, maybe I'd tell you.”

“Please do.” Stellan splayed his long legs casually into my foot space, and I ignored them with Zen-like control. I couldn't help but wonder again what he was trying to do. He could be one of those guys who saw an uninterested girl as a challenge, but I felt like there was more to it.

“I wanted to meet—”

“Yes, yes, you wanted to meet your family. Your father was a long-lost third cousin twice removed. But that's not all of it. Really, you wanted a change.” He folded his hands behind his head. I opened my mouth to chastise him for interrupting again, but then what he'd said sank in.

“A change,” he continued with a slow smile when he saw my face. “A way away from ‘the ache that is your existence.'”

Zee ache.
In Stellan's light accent, it sounded especially weighty, like an ancient prophecy. I leaned forward without really meaning to.

“
Toska.
” He leaned forward, too. “It's a Russian word. It has no translation into any other language, but the closest I've heard is
the ache.
A longing. The sense that something is missing, and even if you're not sure what it is, you ache for it. Down to your bones.”

I sucked in a sharp breath.

Stellan rested his chin in his hand and watched me, like he understood things I wasn't saying.

How did he know that? How did he know exactly the way to describe the gnawing hollow in my chest? I sat back and folded my arms like he could see straight inside me. “I'm not longing for anything,” I said defensively. “I don't even know what you're talking about.”

I scooted as far away from him as I could and leaned against the window. We were stopped at a light, and outside, a group of laughing girls rode bicycles along the cobblestone walk bordering the Seine.

I could tell Stellan was still watching me.
Toska.
The Ache.

Past the walkway, through the flowering trees, I could see people taking photos from the deck of a white barge cruising lazily along the river. The sun warmed my face through the sterile cool of the car's air-conditioning.

“It was Nabokov who coined that translation of
toska,
” Stellan said after a minute. I heard the shift as he leaned back into his seat. “Nabokov is—”

I let out a breath. “I know who Nabokov is,” I said without turning around. “I've read
Lolita.
”

Stellan kicked his feet up on my seat. “Have you?”

I moved even farther away. “Why not?”

“
Lolita
is not a children's book.”

“How old do you think I am?”

“I know exactly how old you are. Sixteen, seventeen next month. June fourteenth.”

Now I did turn around. “How did you—”

“Five foot two inches tall.” He looked me up and down again, and I straightened automatically. “One hundred and three pounds.”

“How do you know—” I tucked my skirt under my legs. “That's creepy. Why do you know that?”

“Could use a little more meat on those bones, if you ask me,” he said, leaning across the seat to wrap one slim hand entirely around my upper arm.

“Do not touch me.” I jerked away. “So part of your job is stalking? What, did you find my driver's license records?” After everything else that had happened, I shouldn't have been surprised.

“Why would an innocent thing like you read
Lolita
? Into older men?” He raised an eyebrow.

“What is
wrong
with you?” I pulled my feet up onto the seat, tucking them under my dress.

“Ah. Daddy issues, then,” he said with a sage nod. “Though I suppose that should have been obvious when you immediately agreed to run off with strange and somewhat threatening men you didn't know.”

I felt myself flush. Okay, yes, obviously I did have daddy issues, but it had nothing to do with my literary preferences. I fished for a witty comeback, but I'd gotten too flustered. “You're an ass,” I said instead. “I'd read through the whole kids' section of the library by the time I was seven, so . . .”

Stellan rolled his window down a few inches and tested the breeze with his fingertips. Outside, a car smaller than a golf cart zipped past. “So then you read
Lolita
?”

“So then I read everything,” I huffed. It was none of his business that imaginary friends were my only friends for a lot of my childhood.

“Everything? Just fiction?”

“Everything.” I turned to the window again. How could I possibly make it more obvious that this conversation was over?

Stellan drummed his fingers on the seat. “You know Aristotle? ‘He who is to be a good ruler must first have been ruled.'”

I ignored him.

“So that's a no? By ‘everything' you really just mean twisted love stories.”

I gritted my teeth. “Yes, I've read some Aristotle. And I can see that
you've
read philosophy to give yourself an excuse for pretentious name-dropping.”

“Works better on girls than you might think,” he said with a wink.

“Ugh.” I rested my forehead on the window.

“And I don't only read philosophy.” He nudged my hip with his boot. “I enjoyed
Lolita
for the lollipops.”

I finally turned and shoved his boots off the seat. We drove by what must have been a government building. High, arched windows were ringed by carved stone garlands, and a row of statues kept watch from the roof. But then again, nearly every place we'd driven by looked like that. It would make a good game. Buildings in Paris: significant national monument or apartment complex?

“What about history?” Stellan said. “How much do you know about Alexander the Great?”

“What does that have to do with anything?” He made me so combative. As hard as I'd tried to ignore him, and even though I knew he was doing it on purpose, he still annoyed me.

I gestured to the outline of the knife hilt on his side. “So, why the concealed weapons? What is there to be afraid of on a weekend of famous people going to balls and meetings?”

He tilted his head to the side. “Even a girl from small-town Minnesota should not be that naive.”

“What's the Order?” I said. Two could play at this game. He'd deflect my questions, and I'd ignore his deflection.

The smile slid off Stellan's face. “They're nothing you need to worry about,
kuklachka.
” He cocked his head to one side. “Unless, of course, you know something I don't.”

The car rolled to a stop, cutting off any more conversation. We were on a wide street, lined by trees in full bloom. Shops paraded down either side, and the Eiffel Tower loomed much closer than I'd realized. The annoyance dropped away and a thrill shivered through me.

Yesterday, I'd never left the United States. Today, I was shopping in Paris. I opened my own door before the driver got there, and followed Stellan out of the car and down the street.

And then we turned up the walk to one of the shops and I stopped, my foot halfway up a step. The tasteful gold lettering on the cream-colored building said
PRADA
.