Midnight in Brussels (32 page)
Read Midnight in Brussels Online
Authors: Rebecca Randolph Buckley
She already knew about the square, though, had read up on it when she’d decided to go there for the midnight festivities. Originally it had been created for the 1910 World’s Fair. A park and monuments were added, as well as an expansive staircase leading from the Royal Square above to the Mont Des Arts below. Cascading fountains flanked the stone stairway, making it even more impressive. Royal museums of all sorts surrounded it, mingled with more cafes and shops. A show of utter magnificence. The Palais Royal was on the Place Royale, where the king presided as Head of State.
Rachel didn’t plan on viewing any of the historical buildings, however. She just wanted to be near and feel the presence and emotion of the masses as they stood at the Mont Des Arts greeting the coming of the new year in Brussels.
As the countdown began and the fireworks spewed high into the sky, her thoughts were of Pete. Tears flowed as she whispered, “I will miss you forever.” Then loving thoughts of others who had gone on to the next life flashed through her mind – Ethan, her mother, her father.
She closed her eyes and smiled at the image of Paul’s face and the memorable kiss on that first New Year’s Eve in London’s Trafalgar Square. She shook her head to shift to thoughts of Belinda’s love for Paul.
A man had bumped her off balance, but caught her before she fell. “Excuse me!”
“That’s okay, really. I’m all right.” Rachel stepped back and sat on one of the stone planter boxes, trying to stabilize.
“Are you sure you’re all right?” he asked.
She didn’t look up at him. “Yes, yes. I’m fine. Thank you,” she murmured, obviously dismissing him.
He moved away a short distance, but his glance was directed to the sad, beautiful woman shedding tears on the planter box.
Rachel was wondering what Amanda was feeling right at that moment, and she envied the beautiful life that lay ahead of the bride and groom, envied the love they shared. Then the inevitable image of her father appeared in her mind.
As fast as she could wipe them away, tears continued to spill down her cheeks. She wondered if her daddy was looking down on her, could see that she was in Brussels on another New Year’s Eve. He would love to be there sitting beside her. She knew he would.
The voices screaming ‘…
THREE
…
TWO
…
ONE!’
shook her from her reverie as they
echoed loudly over the thousands of people congregated in the square. It was midnight.
The man who had bumped her stepped closer to her.
“Madam?”
She stared at the gloved hand held out to her. Then she looked up into the face of a silver-haired gentleman whose dazzling eyes and smile were as grand as the rest of him.
“Yes?” she replied weakly, still sitting, dumbfounded.
“Would you be so kind as to allow me to rescue a damsel in distress, in exchange for a New Year’s kiss? One should not waste precious moments that are so few. Wouldn’t you agree?”
Rachel’s heart skipped a beat. She couldn’t believe the boldness of the man, but then she remembered a New Year’s Eve not so long ago when another man had been just as bold. And so had she.
She smiled, wiped the tears from her eyes with one hand, took his hand with the other, and rose from the planter.
He slipped his arm around her waist gently, pulled her closer, and bent down to touch her moist lips with his.
Rachel was surprised at how good the kiss felt to her. She was surprised that she’d allowed him to do it. She was surprised that the sadness that had overwhelmed her just a few moments before had totally disappeared.
He released her, grinned, stepped back and bowed slightly. “Let me introduce myself, I’m Maxim Balanchine. And you are … ?”
“Rachel O’Neill.”
“Ah, an Irish lass, yes?”
Rachel nodded. “Yes, and you’re Belgian? Is that the accent I hear?”
“I’m Russian, actually, but I have had a home here for twenty-five years. So I would say it’s a combined accent. Are you living here?”
“Just visiting. I came for a wedding.”
“So where is your home?” he asked her.
“In England, but I’m originally from the U.S.”
“That is good. England is very close.” His grin grew. “May I buy you a drink somewhere, so that we may continue to talk?”
“I’m meeting my friends at the Metropole,” she explained. “You may come along, if you wish. I’m sure they wouldn’t mind.”
“I would like that. Thank you.”
Chapter 61
The streets were overflowing with pedestrians: cheerful elderly couples arm-in-arm, energetic students on a mission carrying and setting off stashes of fireworks wherever they could, young lovers billing and cooing, police cars wailing and foot policemen trying to catch the independent pyrotechies. The sidewalk cafes were filled with patrons observing and enjoying the late night jovial events.
Maxim and Rachel made their way along the winding lanes to the Metropole Hotel.
“Do you ever go back to Russia?” she asked him.
“I go home every year for three months at a time, sometimes twice a year. Depends on how much I am needed there.”
Rachel smiled. “I may be going to Moscow next winter for the holiday season, am a writer and my next novel is set in Russia. It’s amazing that we’ve met like this. Quite a coincidence, isn’t it?”
“That depends,” Maxim said. “do you think it is coincidence or fate?”
“That’s a good question, and regardless, I should glean your mind about Russia while I have the chance,” she said as she looked at him with curiosity and an even more brilliant smile than before.
He smiled back. “That I would welcome. My mind sometimes needs a good gleaning.”
They both laughed and continued to walk in silence, dodging oncoming foot traffic while catching their breaths from the excitement they both were feeling.
As they rounded the next corner, the street ahead was blocked off by police cars, lights and sirens screaming.
“Let’s go this way,” Maxim said as he put his arm around Rachel’s shoulders, guiding her in a different direction.
She thrilled at his touch that gave her a terrific sense of safety. Suddenly she felt protected and relieved, something very new to her. For a moment it was as if all her fears and heartbreak had disappeared …
poof!
… into thin air. And at that moment she felt completely happy and content, not a care in the world. Her thoughts were only of the man next to her who had tucked her safely into the warmth of his body.
As they traversed the detour, Rachel told Maxim about her father’s last wishes about her celebrating New Year’s Eve in cities around the world. She told him about her closest friends, her cottage in Cornwall and the house in Paris.
Maxim told her he was a widower and told about his partnership with his nephew in Moscow. They were in the jewelry business, amber and diamonds, mostly.
They turned at the next corner and the canopies of the Metropole loomed just a few steps ahead of them.
“We’re meeting in the lounge,” Rachel said as they passed in front of the Metropole sidewalk café and turned toward the front doors of the hotel. “It’s to the right, down the corridor from the café.”
“Yes, I know. I have been here many times.” Maxim held the door for her.
A combo was playing American standards and jazz. Normally a solo jazz pianist was there. It puzzled Rachel that no matter where she went in Britain and Europe, the music in the cafes was American – either Frank Sinatra ballads or hits by other popular American singers. Tonight was no exception.
“There they are, up in the corner to the right of the piano.” She walked ahead of Maxim, grinning widely and raising her eyebrows at her friends, signaling, as if she had a secret to tell them and couldn’t wait to do so.
“It’s about time! We were beginning to worry about you,” Richard said as he took a few steps toward her and gave her a hug.
Amanda stood and joined them. “Did you get lost, Rachel?”
“No, not at all. I want to introduce you to someone. This is Maxim Balanchine. We met at the square.” Rachel’s eyes had a glow that none of them had seen before. “And Maxim, this is Amanda, she’s the designer
Mandy Malone
… and Richard Miller, a cattle rancher. They are the newlyweds.”
Maxim shook hands with both of them. “Congratulations, Amanda, Richard.”
“Paula is Amanda’s sister visiting from the states, and her husband, Drake …”
Maxim moved toward them, holding out his hand, “Hello, so nice to meet you. Happy New Year!” They responded in the same manner.
“And this is Frenchie, our restaurateur friend from the States. Owns a fabulous steakhouse I hear. And her fiancé Lance.”
“Hello, Frenchie, Lance.”
“It’s so nice to meet a Belgian gentleman,” Frenchie said.
“Oh, he’s actually Russian,” Rachel explained. “But has lived here for years. He was out on the town alone, so I thought I’d invite him to join us. Can’t let a perfectly good New Year’s Eve go to waste without being with friends, now can we?” Rachel took his hand and led him to the empty leather loveseat in the cozily seated group.
Richard had already ordered trays of appetizers that were on the cocktail table before them. “Please help yourselves to the food. I think I over-ordered, so we’re happy to have two more mouths to feed. What would you like to drink, Maxim?”
“I’ll have champagne with the lady, if you don’t mind. You are having champagne, Rachel?”
“Absolutely! Always champagne on New Year’s Eve.” She chuckled. “And any other time.”
They all laughed.
“So tell me, why is a handsome man like you alone on a night like this?” Frenchie asked in a flirty, tipsy manner.
Paula gave her an amused startled look. It wasn’t like Frenchie to flirt in front of Lance.
Richard chuckled as he leaned back and put his arm around Amanda. It wasn’t very often one would see Frenchie inebriated. But it was okay, it was New Year’s Eve.
Maxim smiled. “Thank you, madam, for the compliment. As for being alone tonight, that isn’t the case.” He looked at Rachel. “You see, I am with this lovely woman who shares my sentiment of a magical evening. It seems we both have similar promises to keep – she to her beloved father, I to my deceased wife.”
Renewed excitement rose all around.
The man is single!
Amanda quickly added, “Well, we’re tickled pink as we can be that you’re here with us, Maxim. If you don’t mind me saying so, Rachel, this is meant to be. I ain’t never seen you this happy. Oh dear. There I went and did it again. Rachel’s been helping me talk better English. Sometimes I remember, sometimes I don’t.”
Richard laughed. “Darling, you don’t have to worry about how you talk. I love you no matter what or how you say it.” He gently squeezed her shoulder, pulled her closer to him and planted a sweet kiss on her lips.
“He is right, Amanda,” Maxim said. “You are charming and delightful.”
“You should listen to these two handsome men,” Rachel said as she avoided Maxim’s pale blue eyes that were looking at her almost every second.
He reached for her hand, which forced her to look at him, and he lifted it to his lips while speaking softly, “I am so happy I met you tonight. It was a prayer answered.”
Rachel gazed into his eyes and whispered as softly, “I believe
two
prayers were answered.
”
C O M I N G S O O N
“Midnight in Moscow”
The fourth novel in the continuing saga of Rachel O’Neill as she travels from city to city on New Year’s Eves, becoming entangled in the lives of the people she encounters. In
Midnight in Moscow
she meets Della Doheny, Anastasia and her brother Valentin Andreyev (Maxim Balanchine’s niece and nephew).
Excerpt
Della Doheny reminisced as she watched the villages shoot by in a blur. Here she was, on the train from St. Petersburg to Moscow, having the same break-away, run-away feelings as she usually did on holiday trips. She was fantasizing about hopping off the train to live with the Russians. She was thinking she could learn their language and could happily become another poor peasant in the Russian countryside.
She was tired of the complicated, congested life she’d been leading in New York, and wanted to cut all ties from her projects, friends and family. She felt she desperately needed a break, maybe a permanent one. As usual she’d managed to overload herself with commitments and deadlines and her mind and body ached under the weight of it all. It wasn’t easy being a publisher in the Manhattan rat race.
Her assistant had insisted she take a vacation, knowing how much she loved Russia. Della was obsessed with the Russian culture and history. So here she was, in Russia once again.
It took a few months to make the arrangements through the Russian Consulate and to obtain letters from the hotels that she’d booked in St. Petersburg and Moscow. It wasn’t as easy to go to Russia as it was for foreigners to visit the United States.
And now after spending a two weeks in St. Petersburg she was on her way to Moscow. Since leaving the U.S., she hadn’t thought about book deals and deadlines, marketing strategies, or hectic schedules at all. She was able to switch off that part of her brain easily enough. She was thinking maybe for good. Over the past couple of years her interest in publishing had waned.
It didn’t have the kick she felt in the beginning years.
Now it was more of a burden than anything else.
In fact she was having thoughts of fazing herself out of the business.
She hadn’t thought about Kaman either. He could go to hell for all she cared.
Her immediate attention was drawn to the woman in the red and white polka-dotted dress sitting in front of her.
The woman stopped the waiter. “I would like a glass of champagne, please.”
“I am sorry, madam, champagne is by the bottle, not by the glass.”
The woman looked disappointed. “Thank you, a cup of coffee.”
As she stood up, Della glanced at the other woman across the aisle. Their eyes met and they smiled at each other.
Then Della followed the server to the next car while thinking of the woman in the polka dots, who had been sitting for quite a while in the crowded train station in St. Petersburg before boarding. She stood out because of the large red hat she was wearing and the dress. White, scuffed high heels and a white handbag topped off the attention-getting outfit, so unusual for women of Russia to be wearing.
Della noticed that she seemed to be a bit wilted, as if she’d been traveling for a couple of days. Della could tell she was feeling self-conscious and conspicuous in her attire so different from the rest of the passengers.
She reminded Della of Leslie Caron in the film
Lili,
although an older version of Caron of course, stouter, but with the same pixie haircut and those same endearing features and big brown eyes. She could smell her flowery perfume throughout the car. It had a hint of citrus in its aroma, too. It was a welcoming scent and camouflaged the otherwise musty, mildewy smells of the passenger car.
In the forward car where the waiter was turning in orders, Della caught up with him and asked for a bottle of champagne and two glasses, told him that she wanted to share it with the woman in the red hat.
His eyes sparkled and he seemed happy to accommodate her. He seemed to reflect her thoughts that the woman either couldn’t afford a bottle of champagne, or she didn’t want to drink more than one glass.
“That is very nice of you to do,” he said.
“I will bring it to you.”
He watched the American woman in the black tunic and leotards return to her seat.
The train was slowing down at a village station where the usual matchbox houses dotted the landscape. Many of the houses were side by side along the tracks, others were scattered back across the flat land, with a bit of acreage between them. Then to her delight, a huge lake appeared beyond the dwellings. It stretched for miles it seemed, unexpectedly beautiful. Now tall trees were bordering the railway, blocking the view in spots, but what she could see was wonderful and inviting.
Yes, I could live a simple life here
, she was thinking as she leaned her head back and watched the changing landscape through the window.
Although every house was different from its neighbor, they all seemed to be about the same size with assorted trim and made of different materials. From the train they looked like little decorated boxes when in reality they probably were about thirty by thirty feet square, or may have been larger, it was difficult to tell at the time. She wanted to see the inside of one of them, and she wondered if the woman in the red hat was from one of the villages. Maybe she was on her way home from a visit to St. Petersburg.
One thing she noticed about the working people in St. Pete: they wore monochromatic colors. Nothing bright. Della’s shoulder-length black hair and matching clothing fit right into the general female Russian populace, as well as her stature, for most females were short and stout. For the most part they were fashionable, but they didn’t wear colorful garments. Definitely not red hats and red & white polka dot dresses. So she was curious about this woman on the train.
The waiter brought the champagne and set one glass in front of Della and one in front of the woman across the aisle. He spoke in Russian to the woman and nodded toward Della.
Della smiled at her and lifted her empty glass as their eyes met. She motioned for the woman to come join her at her table.
“Thank you very much,” the Leslie Caron look-alike said with a thick English-Russian accent.
“You’re quite welcome,” Della replied. “Do you live in one of these villages?”
The waiter poured the champagne into their glasses.
“In a village, yes.”
“You speak good English.” Della lifted her glass and the woman did the same.
“Za vashe zdorovye!” the Russian said.
“Cheers!” Della replied, figuring she’d just given a Russian toast.
“You are English?” she asked.
“American.”
“I would love to live in America.”
“I guess we all want what we don’t have.” Della said with a smile.
The woman took a sip of her champagne. “I was in Paris to see my sister.”
Della raised a brow that disappeared up under her straight bangs. “No kidding?”
“You are going to Moscow, no?”
“Yes. But I’d rather spend time in one of these villages instead of Moscow. I’ve seen St. Petersburg and Moscow.”
“We are a poor people. Not as it appears in Petersburg.”
Della nodded. “I figured that. I walked back away from the usual touristy areas – the city façade. It reminded me of Mexico when I was in Puerto Vallarta and went two blocks off the beaten track. Poverty-stricken. Same as in St. Petersburg.”
The woman nodded. “Yes, it is like that in all of Russia.”
“But it’s getting better, right? You’re able to come and go freely and can afford to do that?”
“Well, it took me five years to save enough money to visit my sister in Paris. But yes, some things are better. Yes.” The woman sipped her champagne.
Della could see the sadness in her eyes as she had attempted to convince Della that life was better than it used to be in Russia. But Della knew what the average wages were; she had talked to several people in St. Petersburg about it. It leads the Ukraine and Afghanistan though, with around $220 per person per month. The monthly wage is barely $25 in Afghanistan. So she knew already what the woman probably made a month, at the most, and being from a small village, unless she worked in a factory near or in the city, she probably made even less. Maybe she didn’t work at all, she thought. Maybe her husband brought home the bacon.
And here Della had been thinking that she could finally wear her full-length white mink coat in the winter if she lived here. Now she was thinking that it probably wouldn’t be gracious to wear it in one of these small poor villages. No, no mink coat. Anyway, the activists were crusading to get all the Russian women to shed their fur coats for man-made fur, same as in the States. Years of being the fur capital of the world was now on the brink of change in Russia.
Della wondered what this woman would do with the $20,000 she had spent on her mink. Of course that was a few years ago. Who knows what it would cost now? She loved Julie Christie and the fur coats in
Doctor Zhivago
, but her fascination of Russia went back long before Zhivago. She’d read most of what Dostoyevsky and Tolstoy wrote. Ingrid Bergman in
Anastasia
was superb. Chekov’s stories were fascinating. So she’d been drawn to Russia and everything about Russia for quite some time.
“What is your name?” she asked the woman.
“Anastasia.”
“You’re kidding me, right?”
Anastasia looked at Della curiously, wondering why she questioned her.
“I mean, well, I’m thinking of the Czar Nicholas and Caterina. Their daughter Anastasia—”
“Oh yes. A fable. Yes.”
“You don’t think she escaped?”
She shook her head. “No. She was executed with her family.”
Della sighed. “Oh dear. I prefer to believe she lived.”
Anastasia smiled, probably thinking,
crazy, gullible American
. She took a sip of champagne and then asked, “What is your name?”
“Della. Della Doheny. I’m Irish. Or rather my grandparents were, and my parents. So I guess that makes me Irish, although I was born in the U.S.”
She took another sip of the bubbly. “Where do you live?”
“In a small village south of Rybinsk. You know Rybinsk? A beautiful city. I will take a train from Moscow to go up to Rybinsk. My brother lives in the next village, I’m going to visit him before I go home.”
“So you have a sister in Paris and a brother near Moscow. Nice places to visit, yes?”
“Paris is nice,” she said quietly. She began sipping her drink again, not commenting on Moscow. She looked out of the window, her thoughts seeming to drift elsewhere.
Maybe it was the Russian way, but Anastasia offered no more information than what was asked.
“Does your brother have a big family?” Della asked.
“No, he is not married.”
Della poured more champagne for both of them. “He is younger than you?”
“He is my oldest brother,” Anastasia elaborated. “He never married.”
“How many brothers and sisters do you have?”
“Four sisters, two brothers. My youngest brother lives in Switzerland and my youngest sister is in Paris. The rest are still here in Russia.”
Anastasia seemed to loosen up a little and went on to tell Della about her family, how her mother and father had been killed when terrorists blew up a bus in the Ukraine, how her husband had been killed in the war in Afghanistan, and how she was glad she didn’t have children. She told about her oldest brother and how he took care of the family and had a lucrative business in Moscow.
Della liked Anastasia. She was a sweet person and showed no animosity or anger over life’s obstacles that had been thrown her way. She was a seamstress in her small village, did piecework for a sewing factory in Rybinsk. She had designed the dress she was wearing and had been to Paris to show her designs to the owner of the retail designer shop her sister was managing. She said she felt that the meeting had been successful, and although no deals had been made, she felt sure that something would come of it.
Della hoped so.
Anastasia’s tenacity and positive outlook were amazing. Traveling all that way to Paris by train had to have been utterly exhausting, and here she was as cheerful as one could be. Della had to hand it to her; she didn’t know that she would have been as cheerful after such a long train trip.
“Would you care to join us for a meal before you go on to Moscow?” Anastasia asked Della. “My brother is preparing the food and I am certain there will be enough. Other village people will be there to welcome me.”
Della’s eyes widened. “Do you think that would be alright? I mean, I wouldn’t want to intrude on your private time with your brother.”