Chapter Fifteen
Text from Emma Lee Maxwell:
Would you please order me a pair of tall Hunter Wellington boots in black gloss as soon as you possibly can? (Like, now.) If you order them from Amazon they will be here in two days. I promise I will pay you back.
Text from Emma Lee Maxwell:
Oh yeah! Don’t forget to order the shine kit.
Text from Tara Maxwell:
Did Emma Lee ask you to buy her rain boots? She tried to get me to buy them for her by saying “everyone wears Wellies in the Cotswolds.” Are you sure we should be encouraging her matchmaking scheme?
I wonder what I would have been doing right now if Olivia hadn’t been nominated for a Palme d’Or. I wouldn’t be driving in a beautiful sports car with a beautiful man in the South of France. I would be spending this evening the same way I spend every Friday evening: soaking in a rose-scented bubble bath while listening to Nat King Cole or Bing Crosby croon one of their dreamy love songs. Later, Olivia would text me to say she wished I had gone out with her to the club of the month. She would tell me how great the DJ was and how she saw Leo or Gigi or Liam. And I would fall asleep watching The Ghost and Mrs. Muir starring Gene Tierney and (sigh) Rex Harrison.
With Xavier, I am able to step over the cultural line that has divided me from the beautiful, glamorous people, a line I never thought I wanted to cross. At least, I never wanted to cross before coming to Cannes. I have never thought myself a part of Hollywood culture—pool parties where the guests are too busy making deals to swim, VIP parties with red ropes separating the “important” from the “insignificant,” hazy nightclubs where celebs do coke or smoke weed in the bathrooms. The drug scene is pervasive in Hollywood, because actors and actresses are often deeply flawed people riddled with anxieties. Johnny Depp doesn’t talk about it a lot, but it is well-known in Hollywood that he suffers from panic attacks. Emma Stone has agoraphobia. Scarlett Johansson confessed in a magazine interview she suffers serious anxiety before each film. And Nicole Kidman said she has crippling stage fright. Some actors snort lines, smoke weed, or pop pills to fight the deep doubt and depression associated with all types of artists. The first party Olivia and I went to was in the Hills. The host was a famous studio exec who told me he often holds gutter-glitter parties for his teenagers and their friends, so they can “learn how to do cocaine responsibly.”
I never stepped over the cultural line separating me from the beautiful, glamorous people because I never felt it was a line I wanted to cross. Xavier makes me think differently, but then he is a different sort of beautiful, glamorous person. Isn’t he?
“You’re awfully quiet tonight, ma bichette.”
“Am I?”
“Is anything the matter?”
“Not at all.”
I look at him. His dark profile against the window lit by street lamps reminds me of one of those Jane Austen–era silhouette portraits, the kind Marianne Dashwood sketched of John Willoughby in Sense and Sensibility. I feel the same way Marianne felt when she looked at Willoughby, the consuming belief that she had found her someone special, her soul mate.
Xavier takes his gaze off the road for a moment, just long enough to steal my breath.
“What you are you thinking?”
“I am thinking about Marianne Dashwood.”
“Is she a friend?”
I smile. “She is a character in a Jane Austen novel. In the film version, she sketches her lover’s profile with a charcoal pencil. When I saw your profile just now, it reminded me of Marianne sketching her Willoughby.”
“You were sketching my profile in your mind?”
I look down at my hands, embarrassed.
“Does that mean I am your Willoughby?”
“I hope not.”
“You don’t want me to be your lover?”
My heart skips a beat. “Willoughby duped Marianne. He was not the hero she believed him to be.”
“That sounds ominous.”
“Despite his charm, Willoughby had a scandalous past.”
“Don’t we all.”
Now what does that mean? How am I to interpret that statement, as a glib response or a confession?
“What happened to Marianne and Willoughby?”
“He abandoned her in favor of Miss Grey, a dazzling beauty with a better social pedigree and larger dowry. Poor Marianne.”
“Poor Marianne? She was better off without Willoughby.”
“That is true,” I say, arranging the layers of my dress. “She was better off without Willoughby because his departure made room for Colonel Brandon, an older, kinder, truer gentleman. Willoughby was without standing or fortune. Colonel Brandon could take care of Marianne.”
“So, Marianne was a social climber?”
Out of the corner of my eye, I notice he is clutching the gearshift so hard the blood appears to have drained from his knuckles. They are as white as his tuxedo shirt.
“What? No!”
“Standing and fortune. Are these what matter most to women?”
“Is that a rhetorical question?”
“Answer me, please. Are they what matter to you?”
The air leaves my lungs in a sudden rush. “I thought we were talking about Marianne and Willoughby.”
“We were, but now I want to know what matters to you, Manderley. Do you value standing and fortune over everything else?”
“Of course not.” Tears prick the corners of my eyes. How did a pleasant conversation about two Jane Austen characters suddenly turn into something strangely personal? “When I commit my life to someone—if I ever commit my life to someone—I want to know we share the same values. Trust, honesty, loyalty, family. These are the things that matter to me. Fortune and standing might matter greatly at the beginning of some love affairs, but their value often diminishes over time.”
He relaxes his hold on the gear shift. “I am glad to hear it.”
He says nothing more. He offers no explanation for his pointed, personal question, merely stares out the window, his brow knitted as he concentrates on a series of sharp turns. I look away, because I do not want to see that scowl on his face when I can still hear his accusatory tone in my head. I want to study the sheer fabric of my skirt and pretend we are back in my hotel room and Xavier is telling me how beautiful he thinks I look in my new dress.
My instincts tell me Xavier is not a dangerous or unbalanced man. There is something deeper at work here, some invisible emotional thorn lodged in the paw of this great beast. I just need to find out what is causing his sudden, unexpected mood changes.
He downshifts and pulls off the road onto a narrow gravel overlook. I glance out the window at the smooth black sea and the moon reflecting golden on the surface.
“Manderley. Please, look at me.”
I turn to him.
“I am sorry, ma bichette. I did not mean to be so brusque with you. You see”—he sighs and runs a hand through his immaculately combed hair—“I have spent most of my life surrounded by men. Boarding schools. The naval academy. At sea. Boardrooms. I have become accustomed to speaking to men, bluntly and plainly.”
“That isn’t all of it, though, is it?”
He inhales sharply. “What do you mean?”
“You weren’t just brusque. You were . . . suspicious.”
“Suspicious of what?”
I notice he didn’t deny feeling suspicion.
“ Me.”
“I have reasons to be suspicious of people and their motives for wanting to grow close to me. Millions of reasons.”
“I am sorry to hear it.”
“No, I am the one who is sorry.” He puts his hand on my face, stroking my cheekbone with his thumb. “It was unfair of me to bring the ghosts of my past with us tonight. Will you forgive me? Can you forgive me or have I ruined the evening for you?”
I nuzzle against the warmth of his hand. “We all travel with the ghosts of our past, Xavier. From time to time, they try to spoil things, but only if we let them. I forgive you.”
I want to share with him about my father’s debt and the humiliation of discovering the IRS planned on seizing all of his property, the disappointment I felt in realizing my father hid things from me, from all of us. I know what it means to have ghosts that make it difficult to trust.
“Merci,” he says, stroking my cheek again.
He shifts the car into gear and we take off again, racing along a narrow road hugging the coastline. He pushes a button on his steering wheel and soft classical music fills the compartment.
“Are you hungry?”
“Yes.”
“Bon.”
“Where are you taking me for dinner?”
“It’s a surprise.” He winks at me. “Our reservation isn’t until nine, though. I thought we might stop for drinks and dancing before dinner.”
We arrive at a small coastal village and Xavier pulls to a stop in front of a one-story white stucco building. A valet appears from the shadows. Xavier leaves the engine running, but opens the door and climbs out.
“We will only be an hour,” Xavier says, handing the valet his key fob.
He walks around the car and opens my door. I take his hand and step out of the cool car into the balmy night air. The sound of bluesy music and tinkling laughter spills out of the building.
“Where are we?”
“This is La Grotte du Pastis, but most people just call it La Grotte,” Xavier says, placing his hand on the small of my back and leading me down a long, dimly lit stone corridor. “It has a remarkable collection of wines and cocktails, but it is famous for its aperitifs.”
As it turns out, La Grotte is French for the cave. The bar is located in an actual cave, with three stone walls, a vaulted limestone ceiling, and one side open to the sea. Tables set into alcoves offer private places to sip wine, but the big draw appears to be the glass dance floor jutting out of the mouth of the cave and offering a view of the surf crashing on the rocks below.
Xavier leads me to a table close to the dance floor. He pulls my chair out and I perch on the edge, watching the dancers sway in the lantern light to the bluesy music.
“This is breathtaking.”
“I am glad you like it, ma bichette. I thought you might.”
A waiter arrives to take our order.
“Would you like some champagne?” Xavier asks.
“I have never liked champagne. The bubbles give me a terrible headache. What would you recommend?”
“La dame prendra un cocktail de citronnade avec de la vodka, un zeste de citron, et des glaçons,” he says to the waiter. “Je voudrais signle-cask de whisky écossais avec une goutte d’eau, merci.”
The waiter nods and hurries back to the bar.
“I think you are the first woman I have met who doesn’t like champagne.”
“You must think me childish and gauche.”
“Not at all,” he says, smiling. “I think you are unpretentious. You are unlike anyone I have ever known and I like you, very much.”
“Thank you, Xavier. I like you, too.”
Our gazes meet in the darkness and the world fades away again. Xavier and I are alone, two lovers swaying to a tune as old as time. Is it lust or love? I am not sure, but I don’t want the tune to ever end.
The waiter returns with our drinks. I look away, afraid I might be caught with my emotions on naked display. He puts my glass on a napkin on the table in front of me.
“Take a sip and tell me if you like what I ordered you,” Xavier says when the waiter disappears into the shadows again.
I lift the glass to my lips and inhale before taking a sip. It has almost no scent except for the hint of lemon from the twist floating between the ice cubes and tastes like a grown-up citronnade.
“What is it?”
“Citronnade cocktail. Lemon juice, honey, and vodka served over ice. Do you like it?”
“It’s delicious. I think I will make it my signature cocktail. Each time I drink it, I will remember sitting in this magical cave with you.”
“That is sweet of you to say.”
“Is it? I am only being honest.”
“Which makes it all the more sweet.”
We are dancing again. Dancing without touching, that’s what I like to call our flirting. I hear the notes of a distant song, something primal and urgent, deep inside of me, something that makes me want to move closer to him, to close the distance between us.
He hears it, too, I think. He stands and holds out his hand.
“Will you dance with me, ma bichette?”
I answer him simply by standing and taking his hand. He leads me to the throng of dancers already swaying together and we dance to a slow, mournful blues tune. The wispy layers of my skirt flirt with our legs with each movement, brushing against my bare thighs, wrapping seductively around Xavier’s tuxedo pants.
It’s hypnotic, the sound of the sea crashing against the rocks, the breeze blowing softly through my hair, the keening of the saxophone, and Xavier humming near my ear. The song ends, but Xavier keeps his arm around me until another one begins.
I look up into his handsome face and my heart aches with happiness, with longing, with the poignancy one feels when they are experiencing a joy they know can’t last forever.
He kisses my forehead.
“What is wrong, ma bichette? You are frowning so much you have worry lines stretching across your forehead.”
“I was just thinking about something my aunt said to me once. She said, Every happy moment is a breath away from dying and becoming but a memory. It makes me sad to think this happy moment will soon die. I want it to go on forever.”
He slides his hand up to the middle of my back and holds me tighter. “So do I, ma bichette. So do I.”
The world around us fades away again and we are alone, dancing over the sea beneath a velvety black canopy adorned with a trillion stars. He lowers his head and presses his lips to mine. We kiss as if we truly are the only people left in the cave.
“Do you remember how you said you would think of this evening every time you taste a citronnade cocktail?” he murmurs, brushing his lips over mine.
I nod.
“Well, I will think of you every time I taste honey. I will think of your warmth, your sweetness, your purity, and how much your lips taste like drops of honey.” He kisses me again, softly. “I have never been a sentimental man. I never would have thought to wish for a way to bottle up memories like perfume.”
I shift my gaze to my feet. He tips my chin up, forcing me to look at him. “Not all memories are worth saving, but this one, ma bichette, is definitely bottle worthy.”
“Excuse me.” We look over our shoulders and discover a man with a camera standing beside us. “Would you mind if I snapped your picture?”
Xavier nods, but he does not release his tight hold on me. I smile. There is a bright flash. The photographer thanks us and hurries away.
“I think his flash blinded me.” I laugh, blinking. “Either that, or I have fallen and am staring up at the starry sky.”
Xavier laughs. “Come on,” he says, relaxing his hold on me. “Let’s finish our drink before we have to leave for dinner.”
We return to our table and are sipping our drinks when a boisterous, fashionably dressed crowd enters the bar. The women are tall and leggy, their beautiful bodies poured into tight Versace gowns. The men are handsome, tanned and athletic, with breeding oozing from their immaculate pores. They do not wait for the hostess to show them to a table, but instead claim several small tables and pull them together to create one large surface. They order several bottles of Veuve Clicquot.
I am so engrossed in studying the beautiful ones, it takes me several seconds before I realize Xavier has not said a word. I find him tipping his glass of scotch back and forth, staring moodily at the amber liquid sloshing around inside. The mood feels heavier somehow, as if someone has dumped a pile of bricks into our cozy hot-air balloon basket.
“I wish I had the confidence to wear a backless Versace gown and sparkly heels and guzzle expensive champagne like it was water.”
I had been aiming for self-depreciating humor, but my comment lands far from the mark.
“You wouldn’t be here with me if you were in a Versace gown guzzling champagne,” Xavier says, standing. “Shall we go?”
We are walking by the boisterous newcomers when a beautiful one, a brunette with model-sharp cheekbones and sleek black hair, looks at Xavier and gasps.
“Xavier!”
Xavier keeps his hand on the small of my back, urging me to keep walking.
“Xavier de Maloret!” The brunette stands, blocking our path with her size two Versace-clad body. “Je pensais que c’était toi, chéri!”
She flicks her cool gaze in my direction and her upper lip curls as if I am a bug she wishes to squash beneath her Christian Louboutin stiletto heel. I suddenly recognize her as the woman in the sparkly dress, the one who confronted Xavier in the hotel parking lot. She continues to stare at me as she speaks to Xavier in clipped French. Xavier responds in equally clipped French. I listen to the exchange without understanding a word.
“Où est Marine?” she shouts. “Où est Marine?”
Xavier removes his hand from the small of my back and grabs her arm, hissing in her ear. They stare at each other, locked in a silent battle of wills, until she finally pulls her arm free of his grasp and walks back to her seat, sinking into her chair like a scolded child.
Xavier puts his hand on the small of my back and we leave the bar. The valet brings the car around and we climb in, but Xavier does not pull away. We sit in the dark, listening to the purr of the car’s expensive engine. I keep hearing the woman’s final question in my head, a question I was able to translate: Where is Marine?
“Manderley?”
“Yes?”
“I know how that must have looked to you.”
“It’s okay. You don’t need to explain.”
He turns to look at me.
“I want to explain.”
I want to press my hands to my ears hard enough to block out the words he is about to speak. La, la, la. I can’t hear you. I can’t hear you telling me you are a playboy with lovers scattered from one end of the French Riviera to the other.
“I already know what you are going to say.”
“You do?”
“Yes,” I say, swallowing a lump of emotion. “That woman is your girlfriend, isn’t she?”
“What?” He laughs harshly. “No. That woman is not my girlfriend. I told you she has never been my lover. I did not lie.”
“Who is she?”
“Her name is Jacqueline. I was involved with her best friend, Marine. I have not seen Marine in over a year, but Jacqueline has misconceptions about how things ended between us. She believes by publicly challenging me she will get me to”—he sighs and runs his hand through his hair again—“I am only sorry her misguided, juvenile behavior has embarrassed you and spoiled our evening.”
People do not use the word undone much anymore, but it is the word I would use to describe Xavier’s current demeanor. He appears positively undone by this latest encounter with Jacqueline, alternately running his hand through his hair or gripping the leather steering wheel until the blood drains from his knuckles. I am Southern born and bred. Jacqueline’s scathing looks and loud scene should have humiliated me. Yet, my only concern is for Xavier.
“Our evening will only be spoiled if we allow Jacqueline to spoil it,” I say, putting my hand on his elbow. “I won’t give her the power to ruin our happy memory, will you?”
He relaxes his punishing grasp on the steering wheel and the color slowly returns to his fingers.
“You are right,” he says, turning to look at me. “This is our evening and I don’t intend to let anyone spoil it. Thank you, Manderley. You are unlike anyone I have ever known.”
He shifts the car out of neutral and we are off again, speeding around serpentine curves.
I meant what I said. I don’t want to allow Jacqueline to ruin this special evening, but I can’t deny her outburst has left me feeling a little undone. The ghost of Xavier’s girlfriend past now has a name to go with her amorphous shape . . . Marine.