Chapter 17
Frederic was already waiting for Bente at an outside table at the wine bar. As soon as he saw her, he stood up and kissed her on the cheek.
“I wanted you to see this place,” he said, waving to a man inside who was arranging wine bottles behind the bar. “I work with them a lot. They have an amazing wine list, and have bought our new lines, the ones I told you about.”
Bente knew that Frederic worked hard to modernize the family vineyard. He wanted to maintain the traditions, but he also liked to experiment with styles and blends.
He waved again to the man behind the bar, who came over to introduce himself as the owner and say hello. He then hurried away and came back with a bottle. Bente recognized the label from Frederic’s family business.
“Our latest blend. You have to try it.”
He spoke intensely about the wine, a classic Bordeaux blend but in a modern style—Cabernet Franc, Merlot, and Cabernet Sauvignon.
He looked expectantly at her. She had always appreciated the fact that he valued her opinions on wines, especially the ones he produced.
Because she was gifted in the field of wine, as he put it.
They clinked their large glasses together, then she inhaled the aroma of juicy, mature, dark cherries. Next came black currants, plums, and a delicate touch of herbs.
She took a sip. The taste reflected the aromas, but unlike a classic Bordeaux, the wine wasn’t harsh, and it had a wonderful, spicy aftertaste.
“Fantastic—it will definitely appeal to the public.” She smiled at him.
He returned her smile. “You think so?”
“It’s complex, but incredibly easy to drink.” She took a larger sip. “This would be perfect for cozy Friday evenings in Sweden. Depending on the price tag, of course.”
Frederic looked pleased. “Good to hear.” Getting a wine into the state-owned Swedish liquor stores would be an achievement, and give Frederic’s business a considerable advantage.
The government-run chain placed large orders and was the best buyer imaginable.
Frederic liked to discuss the Swedish market and national preferences with Bente.
“So let’s hear it,” she said, putting down her glass.
He looked at her inquiringly.
“The wine bottle,” she clarified.
Frederic sipped his wine, then gazed into her eyes and smiled mischievously, the way he always did when he wanted to do more than just talk. Which irritated her enormously.
“What did you find out about the bottle?”
He took a deep breath and leaned back on his chair. “I might have a good contact you can speak to, but I’m not sure yet.”
“You might have a contact?” She laughed. “So why did you ask me to come here?”
“I wanted to see you.” He tried a winning smile.
His phone rang, and she saw the name on the screen. Emma.
She sympathized with his poor assistant; she knew exactly how it felt to be the one who was kept waiting.
After those whirlwind summer months when she was newly in love and had his full attention, when it felt as if she were floating on the pink fluffy clouds drifting over the Seine on summer evenings, Frederic had become increasingly distant.
He needed to go back to Bordeaux, while she carried on working at the restaurant.
She hung out with Camille and her other colleagues at the wine bar, but couldn’t help waiting and waiting .
. . and waiting, for Frederic. Weeks would go by without him returning to Paris, for one reason or another.
Then he would show up again for a week or so, behaving as if nothing had happened.
He even surprised her with the occasional weekend trip to Bordeaux, only to disappear again. This went on for months.
When he was in Paris, he gave her his full attention at first, but after a while he became very busy with meetings. Meetings that went on all night. And once again she waited.
In the meantime she tried to enjoy this wonderful city, but Frederic was always there in the back of her mind.
She wanted to be with him, yet she wasn’t in a position to make demands since they had never promised each other anything.
Eventually she realized that he was seeing other women, but thought she had no right to be angry—once again because she felt she had no right to make demands.
After all, they weren’t a couple, were they?
Their unpredictable relationship had gone on for almost a year when she decided to give up hope.
And yet they continued to see each other, albeit more sporadically.
Because they had never been exclusive, she’d found it hard to let him go.
And maybe she hadn’t been prepared to admit to herself that she had real feelings for him.
After a while, she’d gotten a job as a sommelier with a prestigious restaurant in the historic district of Marais, but continued to work the odd shift at Marion’s wine bar because she loved the place.
One evening as she was serving a Swedish woman, Bente was talking, as usual, in some detail about the wines on offer.
The customer was asking lots of questions, and it turned out that she was an editor on TV24’s morning show.
She loved Bente’s descriptions, the way Bente took down the wine from the crystal chandeliers, as she put it, and before long Bente was offered a slot on TV.
She didn’t tell Frederic she was leaving Paris until a week or so before she was due to go.
He was in town for meetings, and as was their habit, they had gone to some club before going back to his apartment.
Toward dawn, as the city was waking up, she had told him.
She had imagined the scene beforehand, the way he would suddenly realize what he was losing, but that simply didn’t happen.
It was obvious that Frederic had never felt the same way about her as she had about him.
She left Paris with a broken heart. Back in Stockholm, once TV filming began, she created a new life and a new world for herself as a celebrity sommelier.
It wasn’t something she had dreamed of, but when she became famous, it was as if a desire had been awakened within her.
A desire for the recognition, the attention. The validation.
The fame had satisfied a need she didn’t know she’d had. But it struck her now that the feeling it once gave her—that of being drunk on life—reminded her of the way she’d felt with Frederic for a while.
She looked at him sitting across from her.
He wasn’t all that exciting, if she was honest about it.
In fact, she found it hard to understand what she’d seen in him.
Okay, so he was a typically charming Frenchman, and he was knowledgeable and passionate about wine.
But at the end of the day, he was probably even more lost in life than she was.
The flirting that had once been so appealing now seemed unattractive.
And then there was his hair—why had he had those beautiful curls cut off?
He leaned across the table and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.
Suddenly she knew exactly how he had expected the day to play out.
He had arranged this meeting in order to have some time alone with her, after she had behaved so dismissively.
Back in the day, she might have been flattered that he had made the effort, but right now she had a show to make. She didn’t have time for this.
Frederic gazed at her searchingly, a small smile playing on his lips. “Why are you hesitating? What am I missing?”
She leaned back in her chair. “I . . .” What could she say? He was used to the game between them. Which always ended in the same way. In bed. “I’m thinking that maybe we’re . . . done with each other? We have history, but it doesn’t really appeal to me anymore.”
He laughed. “Done with each other?” He reached over, placed a hand on her cheek. “You and I will never be done with each other.”
If she hadn’t been so disappointed that he had no information about the bottle, by the fact that she could literally see the show disappearing before her eyes, she might have stayed and finished the delicious wine, maybe tried another exciting bottle that the bar had to offer, indulged Frederic with some friendly flirting.
But as it was, she just wanted to get out of there.
“Thanks for the wine, but I . . . To be honest, I don’t have time for this. I’m only here for a few days, and I’ve got so much to do on the TV show.”
“Please stay, Bente.” Frederic got to his feet, realizing that she was serious. “I apologize, I . . . I just wanted to spend some time with you.”
Bente looked at him. “And I wanted to see you, but I know now that I’m done with this. Give me a call. If you find out something about the bottle, that is.” She stood up and left the wine bar.
A cold wind was blowing up the street. Bente pulled her leather jacket closely around her body and headed for the hotel, feeling like an idiot.
She had wasted two meetings with Frederic in the hope of learning something useful, and the worst part was that she had arranged the first meeting partly because she had wanted to see him.
For so long she had nurtured the idea that Frederic and the way he lived were what she wanted, that they were right for her.
How much had she allowed that perception to steer her actions?
Would she have seen Henrik and her relationship with him in a different light if Frederic hadn’t been on her mind?
She would probably never know the answer.
She thought about visiting a museum, but she really needed to prepare for the day’s meetings.
When she reached the hotel, she went straight to the bar to order a large café au lait to take up to her room. Didrik was sitting at the bar, shoulders slumped, with an untouched glass of whiskey in front of him. He was staring at it as if he was wondering what to do with it.
“Are you going to drink that?” she asked as she slid onto the stool next to him.
He glanced at her, shrugged. “That’s what they always do in movies—knock back a large whiskey.”
The bartender came over to take Bente’s order.
“I’ll have the same as him.”
They both sat in silence, watching as the bartender poured whiskey into a crystal glass and placed it in front of her. The glow of the lamps was reflected in the amber liquid, causing tiny flickers of light to spin around the glass on the brass counter.
Didrik picked up his own glass, then changed his mind and put it down again.
“I thought you liked whiskey?”
Another shrug. “The odd sip is okay.”
“I thought you were the type who drank quite a bit.”
He gave her a questioning look.
“When I came to your office that day, I got the impression you’d put away half a bottle.”
“Right. Yes. I tried the same thing then as now. Isn’t that what brooding, distinguished men do when they’re trying to numb their feelings?”
“It’s very Don Draper.” Bente picked up her glass and knocked it back in two gulps. “I think I needed that. So how are you? Why do you need to numb your feelings?”
“My wife—sorry, ex-wife—is pregnant by her new boyfriend.”
“Fuck.”
He nodded. Sipped his drink and pulled a face. He didn’t seem to like the taste. “So what did Fredrik have to say?”
She gave a half smile. “Frederic didn’t really have any more information. The meeting was probably just . . .”
“An excuse to see you?”
She nodded.
“I thought so.”
She raised an eyebrow.
“I know his type.”
“So how did your meeting with the military historian go?”
“It was helpful. She pointed me in the direction of some useful reference material, and made me realize that we might be taking the wrong approach in our search for Sven.”
“How so?”
“If he sent the bottle, and he was in Bordeaux during the occupation, he was probably using a different identity, and possibly a different nationality.”
“Why?”
“My best guess is he was working for the resistance.”
Bente sighed. “That makes it even more hopeless—we don’t even know who we’re looking for.”
Didrik stared blankly into space. “Exactly.”
Bente buried her head in her hands. “I just don’t see how we’re going to make any progress.”
Didrik said nothing. She had hoped for words of encouragement, but he seemed incapable of stepping up, and she could understand why.
He was now watching as the bartender inserted a corkscrew into a bottle and opened it with a loud plop.
Didrik’s hair was tousled, his glasses lay on the bar, and his shirt was partly unbuttoned.
He had a very attractive three-day stubble that made the manly contours of his face appear even more pronounced.
He took a sip of whiskey and grimaced again, but looked like maybe it didn’t taste quite so bad this time.
Being off his game really suited him. This was something very different from the neat tweed jackets and the perfect bow ties, a look that was reinforced by his round glasses.
He dragged his attention away from the bartender. “Listen, that business yesterday evening. I’m sorry I took liberties with the show. I should have checked with you first.”
Bente nodded. “It’s fine.” She knew she had overreacted, but she didn’t want him to see that his involvement in the show bothered her; she didn’t want to come across as anxious.
“So far the show has existed only in my head, so it’s kind of hard to relinquish control.
But I guess I have to, sooner or later.”
“You do. And you’ve come up with a fantastic idea. I’ll do my very best to make the show as good as possible.” He was smiling now.
“I don’t doubt that for a second.”
He adjusted his wristwatch with a slightly clumsy movement, then ran his fingers through his already messy hair.
The gesture gave him the look of a cute high school guy with a guitar.
Bente had loved guys with guitars when she was in high school.
She felt warm inside. What was it she actually found attractive?
The way everyone’s darling Didrik was off-kilter—was she seeing something more genuine there?
“Okay,” he said after a while, putting on his glasses. “Shall we tackle the rest of the day? We have a few more meetings.”
“Why not? I think Elnaz is checking out possible filming locations—she said she’d meet us at the sommelier school later. How about we start at that antiquarian bookstore by the Jardin du Luxembourg?”
“Visiting a dusty antiquarian bookstore with historical literature by the Jardin du Luxembourg after knocking back a glass of smoky whiskey. I can’t think of a better way to spend the afternoon.”
Bente couldn’t help noticing the movement of Didrik’s shoulder muscles as he stood up and put on his tweed jacket.
Or the fact that he was sexy even when he was talking about a dusty old bookstore.