Chapter 21
magnus: following clementine
MAGNUS NORWAY
Magnus Norway followed Clementine and Alina Volkov out of the ballroom, down the terrace steps, and around the blue-glowing swimming pool.
Alina kept calling after Clementine, “Wait up, Clem-Clem. I just want to talk!”
Clem-Clem? Alina was lucky Clementine hadn’t turned around and socked her in the mouth. She only tolerated the nickname Clemmy because her favorite cousin had started it when she was young.
Clementine kept walking like she didn’t hear Alina trotting behind her and pulled what looked like a valet check ticket out of her purse.
Dear God, had Clementine driven here? Magnus hadn’t heard sirens.
Clementine’s legs were longer than Alina’s, and she had a head start as she marched around the pool deck. If Clementine didn’t want to be caught, it was unlikely Alina was going to succeed in whatever her game was, unless she sprinted.
Nevertheless, Magnus stayed quiet. Clementine could take care of herself, and Magnus wasn’t so dumb as to suggest she could not.
Magnus wasn’t so dumb as to suggest Clemmy could not take care of herself again.
Ahead of him, Clementine’s lightly tapping footsteps on the cement pool deck stopped dead, and Alina pranced the last few yards to where Clemmy stood.
Magnus stepped sideways behind a giant potted palm before one of them turned to look in his direction.
Was eavesdropping intrusive when you were concerned about a friend’s well-being?
Yes, probably, but he was going to do it anyway.
Alina announced, “Clementine, I feel so bad about what I did and how I treated you in junior high. I was a jerk. I was so mean. I shouldn’t have said any of the things that I did about you or to you.”
Clementine was standing with one hip jutting out and her chin lifted so hard that she was staring down her nose at Alina. “I appreciate that. It is good to know that you regret your actions. I accept your apology.”
And she turned and walked away from Alina Volkov.
“Hey!” Alina called and ran to catch up with her again. “I apologized.”
Clementine kept walking. “I know.”
Magnus moved away from the potted palm and followed them on a parallel track behind the tall foliage privacy screen around the pool. The thick grass and soil were soft but not squishy under his shoes.
“Aren’t we going to make up or something? Aren’t we going to vow to be friends from now on?”
“I have plenty of friends. I certainly don’t need one like you.”
“Yeah, but I apologized,” Alina said. “I really am sorry for the way I treated you in junior high, but that was a long time ago. Shouldn’t we be friends now? Or at least come to some sort of mutual agreement to be fond acquaintances?”
Clementine rounded on her, and I poised to prevent Clemmy from committing a murder that Alina might have coming.
“If you were truly regretful about what you did to me in junior high, the horrible rumors, the snide things you said to my face, the terrible things you had your friends say behind my back, then your apology would be freely given. There would be no quid pro quo in your apology. You would not want anything from me. You would only want to express regret. I have accepted your apology. Let’s leave it at that. ”
“Yeah, but I’d hoped we could be friends.”
“As I said, I have more than enough friends. After you left Le Rosey for whatever international school you went to, I picked up your former friends, and they are my friends now. I heard you didn’t make many friends at that English boarding school.
It’s very hard to weasel one’s way into English upper-class society.
I’m sorry you had a less-than-optimal experience, but I have no desire to associate myself with you. ”
With that, Clementine lifted her head, spun on her heel, and strolled away into the darkness.
Alina stood by the pool, gaping as rippled light passed over her face and her palest pink dress, until she finally turned and walked back to the ballroom. Her chin was held high by the time she heavily climbed the terrace steps and strode back inside.
Shit, poor Clemmy.
Magnus walked faster, his long legs covering the ground even though he had a longer path around the outside of the pool area.
By the time Clementine emerged from the aqua-glowing pool tarmac into the dark sidewalk leading to the car drop-off roundabout, Magnus was waiting for her. “Clemmy, are you okay?”
“Of course I’m okay. I have no reason not to be okay.” Her firm tone brooked no questions.
The amplified music from the small orchestra reached even this far from the ballroom. They started playing a slow waltz, one they both remembered from high school compulsory physical education.
“You didn’t even dance one waltz,” Magnus noted.
“I didn’t feel like it.”
“You always dance at these cotillions.”
“I didn’t see anyone worth dancing with.”
“Ouch. You wound me.”
“No, I didn’t. You hate dancing at these balls.”
“Dance with me before you leave. I wouldn’t want you to think you came all the way here for nothing.”
“Oh, Magnus. We don’t need to start us again.”
“I thought we were friends. That’s what we both insisted.”
“Not that kind of friends. Not with benefits.”
Oh, he could argue that, from many occasions. “This isn’t about benefits. It’s just a waltz. It’s just one waltz because we never get to dance. No one holds proper balls or even country dances anymore.”
“I don’t feel like dancing.”
“Don’t let Alina Volkov make you not feel like dancing.” Magnus grabbed Clementine’s hand and spun her around and pulled so that her thin body crashed into his front.
It might’ve been borderline too aggressive, but her hand in his did not pull away, and her other hand landed on his shoulder.
As his arm slid around her waist, she melted against him, even resting her forehead on his shoulder.
Poor Clemmy. She was distraught.
He held her a minute, stroking her back, and then murmured into her hair, “See? You want to dance.”
Her feet shuffled closer to his, and his tux jacket and white vest underneath muffled her voice. “No, I don’t.”
“Yes, you do,” he whispered fondly, and moved one confident step forward, pressing against her hand at the same time.
Clementine liked someone who used a little physical authority. Magnus had figured that out quickly enough during the few times they’ve been dating in high school, in college, and afterward.
On again and off again, and on again and off again.
Each time they ended up together, Magnus got a little smarter, a little quicker, but not quite smart enough for Clementine Kaas.
Clementine responded as he led, and he steered her through a very slow, shuffling waltz to the strains of the faraway orchestra. The water lapping at the edges of the pool was louder, a calming white noise that seemed to gentle his sweet friend Clementine in his arms.
“You were right, you know,” he told her. “You have many, many friends, and you shouldn’t let her in. She’s a snake.”
“Even if she has changed,” Clementine sniffled. “Even if that was a genuine apology and not a propaganda tactic, I don’t want to always be waiting for the knife in my back.”
“That’s my Clemmy.”
“And I swear to God, Magnus, if Alina Volkov and her rotten father are trying to trap or use Nicolai somehow, I swear to God I will pull every string I have to make sure no one ever speaks to her again.”
“You are a formidable opponent. I would be terrified if you said that about me.”
“As well you should be,” Clementine muttered.
He lengthened his strides a little, dancing her farther away from the pool lest she fall in because Clementine would never forgive him for dumping her in the water at a ball like this. He side-stepped her into one of the darker lanes leading away and around the balcony, and she followed his lead.
“I heard Nico is winging his new bride away to Verona for a few days,” Magnus said.
“Ungrateful bellend, and after I came to his rescue with Lexi’s wardrobe for the week.”
“Supposedly, they’ll be back for Friday night.”
“I should hope so, with the dress I got her. Do you know what it takes to get a custom Oscar de la Renta these days? He’d better not fuck it up for her. She’ll be magnificent.”
“You’re always magnificent, Clementine. I would have expected nothing less.”
They waltzed well together, and Magnus stepped them through a quick spin to make her smile.
It worked, a little.
But the spin veered them off the path, and Clementine’s high heels sank into the grass and soft loam the Skyview casino maintained despite the arid desert surrounding the resort.
Clementine flailed, and her hand that had been on his shoulder windmilled.
Magnus dipped and caught Clementine’s legs over his other arm and picked her up like he was easily carrying her through a doorway for whatever reason.
“Magnus! Put me down. I don’t need you to pick me up.”
“Of course not, Clemmy. I’ll just walk a few more steps this way so you can steady yourself against that wall when I put you down.”
“Don’t make me scream for help,” she said, but her soft lips trickled up the side of his neck as she said it.
A thrill ran up his spine and through his whole body.
Magnus smiled. “Scream all you like.”
As long as she didn’t scream one of their safe words from their intermittent affairs.
Cabbage Patch. Orangutan. Aristotle.
At the hot slump-block wall, Magnus dropped her legs, and he held Clementine against his chest with one arm as he slowly slid her down his body like he was a dirty male dancer on stage.
He had never been a professional dancer, of course, or a professional anything for that matter, but he’d had all sorts of friends his whole life.
Magnus liked to learn useful things.
As her feet alighted on the grass at the base of the wall, Clementine hooked one hand around the back of Magnus’s head and pulled him down to kiss her.
Aw, she’d been sweet to pretend she might scream. He knew that she liked authority, but she knew he liked games.
Nevertheless, he kissed a trail over to her ear and whispered, “This okay?”