Chapter 21
Zina
The impact with the automobile never came.
Instead, I felt hands on me. Not hard and grasping as Alec’s had been, but gentle and hesitant. And I heard scraps of a conversation, the words unmistakably French.
Slowly, easy, careful
Back seat
—overindulged
We don’t know
You, stop by the chateau. Question everybody
You, come with me.
My thoughts were a reel of jagged images. I imagined my grandmother catching sight of me. She was already too frail; this would kill her. “Don’t tell her,” I thought I said. “No tearoom. No hospitals.” Then: “Katya.”
Though all this could have been part of the fever dream that gripped me.
Please. No Baba Valya. No hospitals. Katya, Katya, Katya.
A sweet breath wafted against my cheek, reminding me of the taste of chocolate mousse on my tongue.
The air became warm and dry, closed, tinged with leather and gasoline.
The engine roared up beneath me, head- and earsplitting. A rocking sensation started. Alternating rhythm, pain, rhythm, pain. Then numbness. Then, finally, nothing but the vast, black deep.