Chapter 16 #2
Precisely his intention. If people started gossiping about Celine and Bastien, then Jacques’s relationship with her would be hanging on by a thread.
Then Grandfather would give one of his disappointed speeches, Jacques’s status as the perfect grandson would be stripped away, and Bastien’s life would go back to normal.
Bada bing, bada boom. Easy.
And his plan was already working. Getting Celine used to him had been phase one. Kind of like Pavlov’s dog—in Celine’s case, a nagging poodle. Now Jacques would see them dressed as Antony and Cleopatra, two infamous lovers who were known for their notorious affair, setting off phase two.
“Sure we can,” he said, tapping his mask. “It’s a masked party, darling. No one knows who we are.”
“I know! And Jacques will. What the hell happened between this afternoon and the moment you decided to send me this?” she pressed. “I thought you wanted to be friends—”
“You weren’t seriously coming to this party as Helen,” Bastien interrupted.
“So you changed my costume because you didn’t think I could pull off the blonde wig?”
“I thought dressing like Cleopatra would suit you better. You’re not that different from her.” He moved closer. Bringing his fingers underneath her chin, Bastien caressed it lightly. “A femme fatale. Bold. Beautiful.” A pause. His gaze fell to her lips. “Irresistible.”
Celine glanced at the motion, then slapped his hand away. “Stop flirting with me, Bastien. It’s not helping your case in the slightest.”
“The fact that you think it’s flirting says a lot more,” he drawled and, looping their arms together, guided her out into the corridor again and down the stairs. “Say, has your boyfriend left you in my care tonight, or has he ended up in a ditch?”
Celine tried to squirm away from him without much success. The hall was now at full capacity, there was nowhere else to go but cling to his side. Guests swayed along to the rhythmic notes floating from the sax, some already tipsy and others seeking inebriation served in glistening flutes.
“Fortunately, no,” she said, giving up and allowing him to steer her towards a quieter nook. “But the night is long. Who knows, maybe one Ménard man might find himself in that hapless situation.”
Bastien’s smile dropped; the reminder that he wasn’t a Ménard anymore crashed against him at rattling speed.
He had been trying not to think about his accounts these past few weeks, finding a few hours of distraction with Celine inside the glamorous Maison Baudelaire or with Juliana inside disreputable cabarets.
But to add disownment on top of that? It was just occurring to him that the issue was bigger this time and not that easy to forget. Or side-step.
The room had become stifling. Bastien slipped off his mask.
“So why hasn’t he found you yet?” he scoffed, trying his best to suppress his gloom and drop his shoulders to a relaxed slump.
It wasn’t working. His whole body was tense, partly because of the conversation he had with his grandfather, partly because Jacques hadn’t made an appearance yet.
How long did it take to put on a costume and walk down the stairs?
“Do you have nothing better to do?” Celine sighed, pushing the leaves of a potted fern out of her face. “You had your fun with the costumes. Go find some other girl to make miserable.”
“And leave you all alone?”
“Good to know you’re so worried about her well-being,” Jacques’s wry voice rang from behind them.
Bastien and Celine turned to face him as one.
Dressed in golden armour, he looked every inch the golden boy Celine, and everyone else, believed him to be.
Except for the blue splotches that framed the right corner of his mouth.
It should have looked worse. Bastien imagined his brother had spent hours before the soirée pressing a frozen slab of meat against his face to soothe it.
To Bastien’s surprise, Celine edged past him and was upon Jacques with her ministrations in seconds. “My God, Jacques! What happened?”
“Yes, what happened?” Bastien chimed. Chances were Jacques had already cooked up some other excuse to explain the bruises. Bastien was only that more curious to know. “I thought Prince Charming could never do wrong.”
“It’s nothing to worry, ma jolie,” he told Celine, cupping her cheek lovingly. She looked up at him with the same adoring smile.
Unexpected irritation crawled underneath Bastien’s skin. When had she started looking at Jacques like that?
“I’m sorry for not finding you earlier,” his brother went on, his thumb now brushing gently across Celine’s cheek. Bastien frowned. “I didn’t know you had changed your mind about coming as Helen.”
“I didn’t,” Celine replied, cutting Bastien a cold glare. “Francine said a Monsieur Ménard had sent me this costume, she must have thought the delivery boy had meant you. You know, Ménard for Ménard.”
“Really?” Jacques snickered. The laurel circlet that blended into his hair glinted when he cocked his head to the side. “That’s funny. Because as far as I am aware—”
“Do you want another bruise, brother?” Bastien cut in.
“Is that your way of admitting you gave me the first one?”
“You did this?” Celine asked, her kohl-lined eyes narrowing in disbelief.
He couldn’t blame her; their arguments had never gotten physical before. “So what?” Bastien blurted.
“Careful, Bas. It sounds like an admission to me,” said Jacques.
A muscle feathered along Bastien’s jaw. His right hand slowly curled into a fist.
It prickled him that Jacques wasn’t reacting, that his brother was just standing there, abnormally calm.
The foreboding smirk he had flashed Bastien after their quarrel reappeared, however, now it seemed to taunt: Go on.
Make a scene in front of Grandfather’s rich friends.
Then wait for Benjamin to tell you you’re never walking through the mansion doors again.
Bastien waited a few more seconds. Then dropped his hand to his side, biting down on his molars so hard he was about to dislocate one. “Truce,” he forced out. “For tonight.”
He regarded Celine next, but she held up a hand.
“You should go,” she said flatly. She wasn’t even acknowledging him, her attention fixed on the bangles around her wrist. “You’ve done enough for one night.”
This hadn’t been the plan at all.
He was supposed to drive them apart, not towards each other and conspiring against him.
Bastien clicked his tongue. He needed to reevaluate here. He also needed another drink. And a distraction.
His gaze wandered off, over the guests, searching, until he found exactly what he needed.
Jeanne Hugot, one of his old paramours, was looking like a lost little lamb by the bar set up in the foyer.
For all that their relationship had been, it had ended just as it had started two years prior: with neither of them acknowledging it as fact.
So if Bastien stirred things up again, she would be game.
“Don’t worry, I was on my way,” he said distractedly, already elbowing through the throng of guests.
He heard Jacques’s voice behind him, rising and falling with his mood. Then he felt Celine’s incinerating gaze on his back as he took up Jeanne’s hand, slid the black glove off her fingers, and kissed the back of it.