Episode 13
Episode 13
Age Is Only a Number
RHODES
I knocked on the door to the penthouse apartment of the luxury resort Alana and Christophe used when they were in Las Vegas. As I understood it, they’d leased the home from the resort owner indefinitely. I’d never seen them live anywhere else in Nevada, other than the same hotel where she kept her office space. It was an odd setup. Most of the year they lived in their home in France. I also knew they owned a home in Hawaii because I’d designed it, and they were thinking of purchasing land in Montana of all places. That idea fit Christophe perfectly, as he adored American culture, but not Alana. She was far too poised and pristine for me to imagine her tromping through the countryside or up on top of a horse. I simply couldn’t picture it.
Emily gave a long sigh as she stared at her phone, her head always down, face glued to the device.
The door opened and Alana stood there looking as beautiful as ever in a pair of gray slacks and a white silk blouse. Her makeup and hair were meticulous, the red of her lips a pretty contrast against her skin tone, while her hair framed her face on both sides and fell like shiny black ribbons down over her chest.
“Rhodes, Emily!” Her arms extended and Emily dashed into her embrace.
“Auntie!” Emily gushed, clinging to the petite woman.
“ Ma douce .” My sweet she spoke the French nickname she’d been calling my daughter her entire life. “Let me get a good look at you.” She put her hands to Emily’s shoulders and held her at arm’s length. “Just as I suspected, more stunning than the last time we were together.”
Emily blushed as a beaming smile spread across her face. Something she rarely did with me anymore. I gave my daughter compliments all the time, but somehow, they always fell flat.
“Is that my niece I hear?” Christophe called from deeper inside.
“Uncle C!” Emily hollered, let Alana go and bolted into their apartment on the hunt for Christophe. He’d likely be in the kitchen.
Alana tilted her head to the side and my shoulders drooped. “Hey Alana,” I said, the weight of my life loosening the tension at the sight of someone I cared for.
She put her hands to my biceps, leaned forward and air kissed one side of my cheek and then the other before pulling back and assessing me. Her gaze was shrewd and all-knowing.
“Teenagers are complicated, no?” She smirked.
I let out the sigh that I’d been holding in since I got off the plane.
I’d been pickpocketed by that gorgeous young woman, who ultimately stole all my cash, but returned everything else. But my hip throbbed from the fall, and I couldn’t get the woman’s warm brown eyes out of my head. Then the second we’d gotten in the car and started our journey to the resort, Emily had started in with her complaints.
“Las Vegas is ugly.”
“The weather is too hot.”
“The desert is sooooo boring.”
“When are we going home?”
It was getting more difficult to deal with a contrary, unhappy teen day in and day out. She needed a female figure to look up to. And her mother wasn’t exactly the best example of the kind of woman I hoped to see Emily grow up to be.
I looked into Alana’s sympathetic eyes and nodded. “Yeah,” I muttered in answer to her question.
She chuckled lightly and I swore it sounded like music. “Come. Christo has prepared a feast.”
I rubbed my stomach. “I have thought of nothing else.” Lie. Technically I’d thought a lot about the woman who ran into me and stole my cash.
I shook off the thoughts as I entered the kitchen where Christophe was holding a wooden spoon up in front of Emily. My daughter sipped from the ladle and made a groaning, appreciative sound.
“Good, non ?”
“So yummy, Uncle C. You cook the best food,” Emily offered, reminding me that there was a sweet girl hiding behind that combative teen angst.
“ Merci, chéri . Why don’t you set the table as I finish up here,” he instructed.
She jumped to help, already knowing where everything was as we visited Alana and Christophe a few times a year. Whenever Alana had her quarterly auctions, Emily and I would pop in from Los Angeles. The flight was short, and they were great company. Really the only extended family we had, besides her mother, and my parents, who were living their best retired life down in Florida.
I greeted Christophe and then eased into a bar stool where I finally started to relax.
Alana poured three glasses of red wine and a sparkling cider for Emily in her own wine glass, something I knew Emily would appreciate since she wanted to be twenty-five like yesterday, instead of the thirteen-year-old she currently was.
I accepted one of the glasses and watched as Alana set one down on the counter next to where Christophe was pan frying pork chops. She placed her hand against his back in an encouraging manner while she peeked over his shoulder at the sauteed peppers and onions he was also cooking. He smiled and then quickly bent down and kissed the crown of her head.
I watched them move around the other, a well-practiced melody they’d perfected over the thirty years they had been together. I had hoped to have that with Portia, Em’s mother, but it wasn’t in the cards. I also didn’t see a romantic relationship happening any time in my near future, as I rarely made it out on dates anymore, preferring the solace of my work over the uncertainty of dating.
“Last we spoke, you mentioned something about looking into land in Montana and having me build you a home there. What could possibly have stoked your interest in Montana?” I asked.
“We have made new friendships there. People we connected to and look forward to spending more time with.” Christophe answered.
“Oh? Tell me more.”
Over dinner they told me a wild story that could be made into an action-packed blockbuster movie for how incredibly unbelievable it all sounded. And all of it surrounded a pair of down-on-their-luck sisters who’d been in her last auction.
“So, you’re now close to Dakota and Savannah who were candidates, the bidders, and their extended families?” I asked while shoveling in a delicious bite of porkchop with a dollop of homemade applesauce on top. “You haven’t befriended clientele in that manner in a long time,” I added.
Alana nodded. “True. I have felt a change come over me as of late. A need to connect to others outside of my Christo,” she said while looking at her husband with pure adoration.
He reached out a hand to hers and squeezed. “My wife is broadening her horizons. She is learning that she doesn’t have to let all of these people leave her life for good once she’s befriended them during the auction process. And one of them is pregnant with twin girls, and you know how my Alana loves to dote on the little ones as we were never blessed with any of our own.”
“Well, I love you like a second mother, Auntie Alana,” Emily announced. “You’ve always been one of my favorite people on the planet. You’re so cool, and beautiful, and you dress awesome,” my daughter breathed with awe.
Alana reached out and cupped my daughter’s cheek. “And I love you, ma douce ,” Alana cooed.
Emily preened under Alana’s praise. Goodness, how I wanted her to have that every day.
“We’re just getting to the point in our lives where we want to spend more time with friends, who are the family we choose, rather than working nonstop.” Christophe answered.
“Are you talking retirement? Do artists do that?” I frowned, not sure how that worked.
Christophe chuckled and shook his head. “ Non . An artist rarely retires, but we do stop taking commissions and planning regular gallery exhibitions. Alana, however, has hired a protégé.”
“You mean you’re going to retire from the auction business?” I gasped and focused on Alana.
Her lips twitched but she didn’t respond right away. “Perhaps one day. We shall see. Depends on what the future will bring.”
“Well, if Uncle C decided to stop creating new artwork for Auntie to sell in her auction, then it would make sense that she wouldn’t be working much, right?” Emily surmised incorrectly. We’d never told Emily what type of auction Alana ran. She assumed based on Christophe being an artist that she sold art. We simply never corrected her, and I didn’t plan to.
I tossed my cloth napkin on the table after I wiped my mouth. “Well, I’ll be damned. I never thought I’d see the day when Alana Toussaint wasn’t burning the midnight oil, trying to connect bidders and clientele to one another,” I said cryptically.
Alana laughed. “One must always keep their options open, darling. Especially when it comes to living the life you want.”
* * * *
Later that evening, Emily was crashed out in the living room watching a movie when Christophe waved me over to the balcony. I held up a finger, gesturing that I’d be out in a minute, then went to my sport coat to grab the two cigars I’d brought for this evening.
I opened the balcony door and found Christophe and Alana seated in a small lounge chair for two. I took up residence in the lone armchair next to them and handed my friend a cigar. He instantly brought the stogie to his nose and inhaled.
“ Magnifique !” he said and then held it aloft so Alana could sniff it.
She dutifully and daintily complied. “It’s lovely,” she agreed, and sidled up close to her husband’s side.
Christophe had already prepared the table before us with the straight cutter to clip the tip and an ashtray and butane lighter. Traditionally, when I would visit, we’d have dinner and then smoke cigars together, usually with an after-dinner drink. Since the wine was delicious, the three of us had stuck to drinking the vino.
“I believe it’s your birth year, 1964. The Padron Anniversary series. Claims to be one of the best out of Nicaragua.”
“Oh, a treat! Merci, mon ami .” Thank you, my friend. Christophe rubbed his hands together.
We both clipped the tips and set the rolled bits of heaven ablaze. Instantly my mouth was hit with floral and fruity notes that were quite pleasant. “Do you taste the fruit and flowers?” I asked.
Christophe nodded jovially, taking long, slow puffs, holding the rich smoke within his mouth and then releasing it.
For a bit we said nothing, just spent time smoking our cigars, enjoying the quiet comfort of good friends, and a stellar view of Las Vegas and the dark desert beyond.
“Rhodes, I would like for you to attend the auction tomorrow.” Alana announced seemingly out of nowhere.
I groaned and stretched out my legs, crossing my feet at the ankles. “Alana, we’ve talked about this many times in the past. I don’t think choosing a wife by sight alone is the right path for me.”
She sat up and placed her hands on her knees. “Then what is the right path? You’ve been divorced and alone for eight years. Emily’s mother is nowhere to be found, constantly jumping in and out of bed with one man or another and leaving her daughter behind. Emily craves continuity and stability, mon cher . She is floundering.”
“I agree, I am the one constant in her life and it’s not enough. Unfortunately, I can’t seem to get Portia to care about her daughter’s needs in the slightest,” I grumbled.
Alana nodded. “Exactly my point. Choose a wife tomorrow, and that woman would be committed to you and your daughter. Also, you’d have help through these emotionally difficult times. Another person to fill that lonely void within your own life. And maybe having a woman around would do some good for Emily,” Alana suggested.
I rubbed at my face with my free hand, the cigar burning away in my left. “Maybe, hell, I don’t know, Alana. Marriage was hard. Dating alone is a nightmare. I’ve tried a couple times over the years, and it never works out. Don’t even get me started about how some women responded when they found out I have a child,” I huffed. “They bolted so fast their stiletto heels left black streak marks on the concrete in their wake.”
Alana made a tsking sound. “My candidates are all fully committed.”
“For three years. That gives me until when Emily is sixteen, almost seventeen. Then what? Another woman leaves her life?” I shook my head. “Nah. I couldn’t do it to her.”
“You wouldn’t be doing anything to her . You’d be bringing in a woman who adds value to your lives for a period of no less than three years. Just because the contracted term is three years, it doesn’t mean the person you chose couldn’t be convinced to stay.”
“And staying with Portia five years worked oh so well,” I scowled.
Alana’s lips snapped together, and she glared. “There are very few people I wish ill will toward, and that woman is one of them,” she bit out frostily.
I burst into laughter, sat back, and puffed on my delicious stogie. “I know you mean well, Alana, but I just don’t see it happening for me. At least not until Emily is an adult and headed off to college.”
“You’d be forty-three by that time. Do you truly want to put your life and needs on hold for five more years? You’ve already done that for the last eight, and the five before with Portia weren’t any better. When do you get to find your happily ever after, hmm?” Her tone was soft and nurturing, much like a sister might respond if I’d had one.
I shrugged and shook my head then stared up at the twinkling stars in the sky above. “I don’t know. Sometimes I believe I’m not meant to find true love. Take today, for example. I had a run in with a young woman at the airport. It was the first time in forever that I’d had a physical attraction to a woman. She ran straight into me. Knocked me on my ass in more ways than one.”
“Oh?” Alana perked up.
I laughed. “Yeah, and it turns out the woman was a pickpocket.”
Alana tilted her head to the side. “A pickpocket at the airport? Explain this person to me,” she commanded abruptly.
“Dark hair, super light brown skin or maybe she was tanned. Large brown eyes. Cute, petite, curvy and too young.”
Alana waved her hand in the air. “You think everyone is too young because you act old. Did she seem to be over eighteen, twenty perhaps?”
“Of course. I wouldn’t be attracted to a child, you know that.” I scrunched up my face and made a gagging expression. “She was definitely in her twenties.”
“Then the problem is?” She continued.
“First of all, the woman stole from me. Second of all, she had to be at least fifteen years younger than me.”
Alana shrugged. “Age is only a number. Love, chemistry, nor attraction, give two figs what someone’s age is.”
Christophe snorted through his own chuckle. “I am more than eight years older than my wife as you know, and we have been happy for thirty years. A few more years wouldn’t change that.”
“Tell me more,” Alana interrupted.
So, I told her everything that happened.
“Sounds like Maia,” Alana whispered under her breath and smacked Christophe’s leg with exuberance. “You must come to the auction! I beg of you.”
I groaned again, showing Alana my frustration at her constant request that I attend one of her auctions. “If I attend this one time, will you promise to never, ever, ask me to come to one again?”
Alana smiled slowly without showing her teeth. A devilish cat-that-ate-the-canary type of smile if I’d ever seen one. She knew something and wasn’t sharing.
“Of course, mon cher . I promise to never ask again.” She sipped on her wine nonchalantly.
“Why do I feel like I’ve just signed my death warrant?” I asked Christophe.
He grinned. “Have a little faith, Rhodes. Who knows, you might find exactly who you’ve been looking for at the auction tomorrow.”
“I doubt it.” I puffed on my cigar and stared out at the view.
The only person I wanted to see again was a sexy, sticky-fingered brunette, who was long gone by now.