Chapter Twenty
Paulette remained amused only the two seconds it took me to point at the table and shout, “ A l’attaque, go! ”
The dogs sprang up from the ground, let rip with a volley of barks that shook the room, and leapt toward their master. Her laugh see-sawed into a scream, shrill like the sounds she made before, only much louder.
Whiny Voice cursed vehemently, and something got slammed onto the table. I would have stampeded after the hounds had Raoul not pushed me to the ground and, in a whisper as chill as vodka on the rocks, told me to stay put.
Throughout the pandemonium, Yvon never said a single word.
“Call off your mangy curs,” she yodeled.
I shrugged off Raoul’s ghostly hand and squatted at the corner of the bar to get a better view.
My gaze zoomed in on Paulette perched on the table she and Yvon had been sitting at, the flower arrangement trampled, one shoe on the table, one underneath. She was surrounded by three extremely pissed-off canines jumping at their victim, snapping for her stockinged feet.
He was leaning against the nearest wall, his smile reminiscent of a satyr, his arms crossed in front of his chest. Wordlessly, the tree man opened the door and slipped from the restaurant. Unlikely he would be a problem anymore.
His companion stared at the gun lying on a table, shaking his head. “But I checked. It was loaded. It must have been,” he kept saying.
Something chinked onto the floor next to me.
A cartridge.
“Thanks, Raoul,” I said.
No need to whisper anymore, not with Paulette caterwauling at the top of her voice, the doggy chorus baying away, and the pudgy chap arguing with himself whether or not he loaded the weapon.
An invisible hand patted my shoulder.
Yvon pushed himself off the wall. “No, you can’t have her. Madame would upset your stomachs. Zut . Sit.”
The dogs gave him the stink-eye, but they sat and swapped their barks for growls. He tossed her a quizzical look. “You’ve messed with my table arrangements.”
“How dare you give me such a fright?” Contorted in a rictus of fear, her face glistened with perspiration.
“My canine friends don’t approve of people who threaten me.”
“But, but... They weren’t supposed to be here. You gave me your word.”
“We never discussed animals.”
For an instant, his gaze slipped across to the bar counter and found mine. Then it returned to the woman on the table.
“Do you need a hand?” he asked.
“What with?”
“To get back to the ground. My hounds won’t hurt you,” he said when his antagonist hesitated. “For now.”
“I’ll help Madame Gingembre.” Whiny Voice bustled across and held out a meaty paw.
Paulette took it, grimaced, then clambered from her perch, never once letting the dogs out of sight. Once returned to terra firma, she reached for a napkin and wiped her fingers.
She balled it up, dropped it onto the table and shot Yvon a bold look. “Voilà, what do you say to the deal?”
Her voice still sounded squeaky.
“It’s not a deal, Madame, since we’re talking extortion, and you know it well enough. Given the circumstances, I don’t trust you to deliver your part of the bargain. If you therefore want me to agree to anything, you’ll need to think of a rock-solid guarantee. To do so, you have forty-eight hours, Madame.” He swept into one of his great bows.
I didn’t like the glint in her eyes. Oddly enough, she nodded.
“Fair enough. Consider yourself forgiven for the dogs, but in future, you must keep these brutes under control. To be honest, I never expected you to accept my demand without protest. I would be worried if you did, and I tell you, it’s never a good idea to upset me.” She slipped her killer heels back on and straightened her skirt.
“Really? In that case, you had better consider yourself worried, Madame. You have thrown me a gauntlet. After all these years, I’m not without influence myself.”
Yvon’s face was expressionless, the lips relaxed, the hands dangling at his sides. Yet, somehow, he exuded enough menace to fill a space much larger than his restaurant. Even Paulette must have noticed. Hastily, she created some distance between herself and Yvon.
“If we agree,” he continued, “I’ll honor it. So should you, if you value your life. I want proof, though. Now you can consider my offer. We will talk again in two days. Same time. Oh, and if you can, be punctual, will you?”
He opened the door.
“We shall see.” She swept past him, Whiny Voice in tow, clutching a bottle to his chest.
Yvon curled his fingers. “My Armagnac, if you please.”
“You heard what she said. It’s not yours anymore.”
“Only if we agree. We haven’t yet. The bottle, if you don’t mind.”
Whiny Voice didn’t like that; I could see it on his face. But he thrust the bottle at Yvon and followed his mistress, whose heels clicked on the pavement like staccato bursts of gunfire.
~ * ~
L ater the same evening , when the night had finally conquered the light, the cicadas were in concert, and Raoul returned to his resting place sheltered by gazillions of stars, Yvon, Louis, the dogs, and I sat in his living room with the French windows open wide.
Louis was perched on my lap, purring gently, unruffled by the three large canines crowding Yvon, who also appeared remarkably laid back.
He slurped his wine and smacked his lips. “Ah, bravo. This has everything. Crisp acidity, bright citrus aromas, and flinty minerality. It’s Pouilly Fuissé from Cosne-sur-Loire.”
The pool lights reflected in the straw-colored liquid.
Sometimes, I wondered whether I would ever understand the man sitting next to me, twirling the stem of his glass in his gentle fingers as if his lifestyle and livelihood weren’t under attack. “An excellent vintage. From an unknown gem of a vineyard.”
I swigged a healthy mouthful of the crisp, cool liquid. Admittedly, it was perfect. “I expect no less from you. What are we going to do?”
“Drink more wine.”
I faced the nearest window, pushing a fist to my lips. A pale face stared back, bisected by the latticework in the panes.
He placed a hand on my leg, the bit not covered by Louis, and squeezed gently. “Try not to be upset, my love. It’ll be fine. This isn’t the first time someone tried to make my life difficult.”
I would have risen, had the cat not owned my lap. “Difficult? It’s more than that. Even Raoul isn’t exactly happy about the developments. Do me a favor, cut your water off a duck’s back routine. Paulette will ensure you lose everything before she shops you to her lab rats. She’ll never stick to her word. It’s a shame Raoul had to leave, otherwise, we could have worked on a strategy.”
Yvon removed his hand. “You trust him more than you trust me?”
Oh, blast it. That alpha thing again.
“Not at all. I get the impression you’re not taking Paulette seriously enough. She’s pure, undiluted poison.”
“Mel, I know what I’m dealing with. Enough to put my support network on orange alert. I hate drawing on them. I was hoping enough time would have passed and I could finally live my life the way I wanted to. Looks like I was wrong. Again.” He downed his wine in one go and placed the empty glass on the nearest table.
“Then what? You don’t have a leg to stand on. Under normal circumstances, you would have died centuries ago. You admitted your papers are false. Officially, you don’t even exist. You’re a non-entity lost in the no-man’s land of time.”
“How poetic.”
Louis flattened his ears, no doubt responding to the edge in our voices. I scratched his chin and forced myself to control my tone. “The temptation to go after you will be too strong to resist. The fountain of eternal youth, a cure against death, is one of the oldest dreams of humankind. Certain people would do anything, pay any sum to be spared the ultimate fate. Death.”
“Their experiments wouldn’t kill me if that’s what you fear. It’s impossible.”
“Oh, the scientists would keep you alive, but you’ll be a prisoner for the rest of your miserable existence. An existence, as you pointed out, that will last forever. You can’t want that.”
“I don’t. What is it you’re trying to tell me?”
“We need to run. While we still can.”
“Aye, there’s the rub,” he said.
“Don’t you quote Shakespeare at me. We might be speaking English, but you’re French. And this is serious.”
“ Desolé . Yes, it is. I’ve been on the run ever since the revolutionaries shot me, and I fled Castelmore. I’ve explored the world. Many times. I returned to Gascony because it is my home, the place where my dreams were born. Finally, I’m the person I always wanted to be.”
“Paulette won’t care two hoots.”
“There’ll always be the Paulettes of this world. At some point, I must stop running and make a stand. Teach them a lesson.” He reached for my hands and kissed my fingertips, slowly and deliberately.
All my inner butterflies launched at once. “Yvon...”
“Yes, Mel?” He rose and pulled me from my seat, forgetting poor Louis.
He tumbled from my lap, fortunately onto a settee and not on a dog. With a grumpy expression on his fur face, the cat stalked away and plonked his furry body on the throw pillows.
Even later that night, or early the next morning, somehow I lost track of time, we were in Yvon’s bed when he moaned my name over and over again, his breath hot on my neck, coming faster and faster.
Spent, he soon fell asleep, but I couldn’t. Encircled in his arms, I should have been safe, but I wasn’t. Too many somber thoughts added their weight to my chest.
I wriggled from his embrace. Sleep was miles away, lost at sea, a dark mass with glittery highlights courtesy of the moon. The night air was cold and, even wrapped in my duvet, I shivered.
I might talk him into running, but he would be miserable afterward. To worsen matters, he would waste precious time and energy trying to protect me, like he had on the beach. I would become a burden. Eventually, he would make a mistake, and they would be waiting. The trap would snap shut.
And she would laugh, and laugh, and laugh...
When the dawn chorus tweeted, I left his bedroom and sneaked through the back gate into the place I called home, Louis draped over my shoulder. There, I slumped on my saggy mattress, staring at the wall, stroking my furry friend.
But the softness of his pelt did nothing for me. Outside, the light of a new day returned the color to the world beyond my window.