I stare at the gloves as the waiter brings me an espresso, appreciating the modern and almost punk rock design. I find myself gravitating to these styles more and more lately. The Dumont label has always been about refinement and elegance—the classic chic look of the typical upper-class Frenchwoman. But I’m not French, and I’m feeling the need to expand my horizons. Try something new. When I put on a Dumont dress, I almost feel like I’m pretending to be my mother. There’s nothing wrong with that at all—I love that it can make me feel that way, because I miss her so damn much.
But maybe it isn’t me anymore. Maybe this job, no matter how hard I work at it, doesn’t give me the joy and purpose it once did. Maybe this is a sign that I belong elsewhere, with a company I want to work for because I believe in the work, not because I’m bound to it out of loyalty and legacy. I’d never even given it a thought before, because I always did what my father wanted me to do, but now . . .
I sigh and sip my drink, bundled against the chilled breeze that sweeps through the darkness. Spring can’t come fast enough. It doesn’t help that I’m about to do something somewhat macabre.
When I’m done with the espresso, I move on to champagne. I’m not the only one out here on the terrace; there is a slew of Parisian smokers puffing away on their cigarettes, braving the cold to get their fix and partake in some conversation and people-watching.
I’m watching too. Seeing a couple of girlfriends laugh and lean on each other, smoking and drinking wine, and it makes me yearn for that. I should call Marie again, unless she thinks I’m too crazy to be her friend anymore. I should contact old friends, go out and have fun. I’m single. I need to get laid, or at least just a night of dancing.
But I can’t. Not right now, not while this loss burns inside of me and the truth is all I can think about. I need to know what happened to my father; I need to know if the man I’m now working for is the very man who killed him.
And so then what? a voice inside me asks.
And so then I do everything I can to take him down.
Even though I know I might lose so much more than I bargained for in the process.
I end up spending a few hours outside, drinking champagne by myself, until my nerves have subsided a bit. I’m still nervous, but I’m a little drunk and that helps. Anything to help me get through seeing Cyril again.
I pay the bill and get up at the same time another patron gets up. I hear the scrape of their chair, see their figure in the background, but don’t pay it too much attention.
Not until I’m crossing the street and heading to the métro to take the train to Cardinal Lemoine. I feel the presence at my back, like I’m being followed.
Once I’m on the other side of the street, I look around, expecting to see someone ominous-looking.
There’s a crowd of pedestrians behind me. Bundled-up old ladies teetering together, businessmen in long coats with baguettes tucked under their arms, women puffing on cigarettes and pushing baby strollers. No one is paying me any attention, no one is following me.
I’ve been paranoid ever since the car chase last year, and I’m even more so since I got back from the castle. I know the odds of anyone having seen me are slim. Yes, it’s possible that my car was spotted by a worker, but anything of concern with that estate would have been funneled up to Renaud, and I haven’t heard from him.
That said, even on the short métro ride to my stop, I’m staring at everyone on the train. Some people stare back, maybe because they recognize me, maybe because I’m acting like a total weirdo. Still, I refuse to keep my eyes down.
The bar where Cyril wanted me to meet him is called the Terrible Cat, and it’s in a part of the Latin Quarter that stops being charming and filled with broke students and now borders on dirty and unsafe. Figures this is the place we would meet.
I step inside the bar, surprised to see how busy it is, though not surprised that it smells like cigarettes, stale beer, and a pinch of urine.
Everyone’s head swivels toward me, taking me in. Some men take me in longer than they should, and I try not to show any fear or shame, because this place is full of men who take pride in that. Using their leers to make women uncomfortable, particularly a woman like me, well dressed and polished and hinting at money.
I spot Cyril waving at me subtly from a booth in the back corner.
Here it goes.
I keep my head high and stride confidently through the bar, though I feel anything but. I hear a bald-headed white dude whisper, “Go back where you came from,” in broken English, assuming that I don’t know French, and it takes everything I have not to stop and pick up his beer and throw it in his face. I’ve done that before, and nothing good comes out of it, and the last thing I need is to draw even more attention to myself.
So I swallow my anger and keep going until I reach Cyril, who is trying to get out of the booth to get up and hug me.
“Stay where you are,” I tell him sternly, gesturing with my palm out. “We don’t need to play nice.”
He pauses, half out of the booth, and then shrugs. “Okay. But you are the one that called me, remember that.”
“And I wish I had another alternative,” I tell him, sitting down across from him.
“Well, you look nice,” he says. “Maybe too skinny. I liked you better when you had some meat on your bones.”
I raise my brow and look him over the same way he looked at me. “And your hairline is waving a white flag. Didn’t think it would recede so fast, but I guess that’s what stress does to you.”
He blinks beneath his black-rimmed glasses, and I know I’ve hit a sore spot. The truth is, Cyril looks more or less the same. He’s tall, slim, has short-cropped blond hair and a long nose. Pale. He banks on his nerd charm, and I know that fooled me into thinking he was handsome in a quirky way. Now all I know is that I can barely stand to look at him, knowing what this gold-digging asshole did and how he took me for a ride. Cyril works for the United Nations and has a lot of connections and a certain amount of status here, as well as in the rest of Europe. Little did I know he’d also made many bad business investments, many of which were questionable, and that our marriage was supposed to be his ticket out of debt.
Didn’t really work that way, though he fought me on it for some time.
“Still sharp tongued,” he remarks bitterly.
I shrug. “You have to be when you deal with idiots all day long.”
“You have an odd way of showing appreciation, you know that?”
I tilt my head and give him an impatient look. “And so, do I have something to thank you for? So far all I see is you, and if you think you’re going to act as my private investigator, then you have another thing coming.”
“He’ll be here in a minute,” he says.
“Who is he? And how do you know him? All you told me on the phone is that you knew someone who might be able to help. Is he a private investigator? Someone who likes money and has no morals? A lapsed police officer?”
“Let’s just say he’s all of those things and more.”
“I’m surprised you know someone like that. Almost as surprised that you wanted to meet in a place like this.”
Cyril is a notorious snob. He probably wiped down his seat with hand sanitizer before he sat down.