Million Dollar Road (33 page)

But there, up ahead—l'Arc de Triomphe! Her face pressed to the window, Lireinne's sleep-deprived eyes widened at the majesty of the high stone arch while the cab rattled around the Arc's immense traffic circle, a fast-moving steel whirlpool of at least two hundred other cars. Horns blared; a police car's siren wailed a repetitive klaxon. A couple on a motorcycle cut in front of the taxi so narrowly that it seemed the young biker had a death wish for himself and the pretty girl riding pillion behind him.

The taxi driver muttered some foreign curse and laid on his horn just as he spun out of the circle, turning left onto another beautiful, tree-lined street. Lireinne almost missed the small blue street sign on the stone building on the corner. They were on the Avenue Montaigne.

In the backseat of the taxi, the names on the shops lining the avenue—Prada, Gucci, Jimmy Choo, and Fendi—appeared and were gone, almost too quickly for Lireinne to recognize. But, she thought, these were the real stores, not just pages in a magazine. In the icy early-morning light, people were rolling up security gates and rolling down awnings, getting ready to start their day selling fabulous things to fabulous people, and she, Lireinne Hooten, high-school dropout and ex-hoser, was
here
.

In the next block, an elegant granite building with red awnings was coming up on their left. The taxi slowed, rolling to a stop with a screech of worn brakes in front of an ornate glass-canopied entrance. Peering through the fogged window of the cab, Lireinne stared openmouthed at the flower boxes overflowing with masses of scarlet geraniums, the lacy black wrought-iron balconies, and fluttering flags. Could
this
be their hotel? It looked like something out of one of Miss Penny's fairy tales, a palace.

“Voilà la Plaza Athénée,”
the cab driver announced, turning off the meter.
“Cent dix euros.”

Euros? She remembered enough French to understand how much money the driver wanted, but Lireinne had no idea what a euro was or where to get any. Since Mr. Con was still sleeping, she nudged him until his eyes opened.

“Mr. Con, the driver wants a hundred and ten euros.”

With a snort, Mr. Con sat up straighter on the backseat, blinking. “Whazzis? A hunnerd and ten?” He patted his jacket's breast pocket and swore. “Dammit, forgot to change money at th' airport.”

The taxi driver stared through the windshield as though he were deaf. He didn't turn around, ignoring Mr. Con, who was unsuccessfully trying to use a credit card.

“Cent dix euros,”
the man repeated loudly. It didn't seem that a credit card was going to be an option and, in the middle of this going-nowhere exchange, Lireinne's door opened. A hot-looking guy in a smart gray uniform bowed in welcome. With a finger to the brim of his gold-braided black hat, he held the door open for her.

“Bonjour.”
Oh, wow—she was speaking French to a Parisian person! Lireinne's smile was luminous as she climbed out of the taxi.

When he rose from his bow and subtly studied her, the uniformed young man raised one eyebrow. Giving her a respectful glance, he nodded his head once in obvious approval. Lireinne was pleased to discover that she'd been right to wear her nicest work clothes—the gray skirt, white blouse, black stockings, and a new pair of heels—for the trip, no matter that Mr. Con had told her she could wear jeans.

“Is it that the young lady is visiting Paris? You are American, yes?”

Beginning to feel uncomfortable under his scrutiny, Lireinne tried not to blush because the hot guy's appraisal seemed to calculate down to the dime how much she'd paid for the black wool coat with the princess seams from Banana Republic (on sale, of course) and her new black suede pumps. Now she wished she'd bought a new purse, too, because she'd owned this battered old shoulder bag since high school. Still, the uniformed man was smiling so she must have just passed some kind of French test.

And then Mr. Con half fell out of the backseat and staggered onto the sidewalk. The hot guy's expression changed almost imperceptibly, his solicitous smile turning into a suggestion of a leer.

“
Bienvenue, m'sieur
. You and . . . the young
lady
are guests of the Plaza Athénée, no?”

Sounding distracted, Mr. Con muttered,
“Oui.”
He turned to Lireinne and shook his head. “Gotta change money inside, 'kay? Wait here with th' valet. Be right back.” He lurched up the stairs and through the shining glass-and-brass doors of the hotel, leaving her alone outside with the now openly smirking valet while the taxi driver unloaded their bags from the trunk.

The driver dropped the luggage at her feet before he and the uniformed man exchanged complicit smiles. The two of them rattled off a stream of French that Lireinne found impossible to follow. They both glanced at her with oily grins, as if they knew something she didn't.

“What?” Lireinne demanded, feeling more uncomfortable than ever.

“The young lady, she is an
escort,
is she not?” This time the valet's eyes were like fingers, roaming her body through her coat. In spite of being determined to maintain her tenuous poise, Lireinne colored, creeped out by both his change of attitude and his incomprehensible question.

“Non,”
she replied haughtily. An escort? What the hell did he mean by that? But before she could think of the words to explain in her halting French that she was in Paris on important business, that she was here with her
boss,
Mr. Con pushed through the doors and hurried down the stairs.

“Voilà,”
he said to the cab driver as he handed him a bunch of bills. To the young man in the gray uniform, he said,
“Merci,”
and as if it were the most natural thing in the world, he took Lireinne by the elbow. “C'mon, sweetheart.” She allowed him to lead her up the steps into the hotel, but in the doorway she looked back over her shoulder, down at the young man on the sidewalk.

Now there could be no mistaking the superior, knowing glint in his eyes: the valet, like the women at the alligator farm, had assumed she was Mr. Con's whore. Lireinne raised her chin and coldly narrowed her eyes at him, but she broke into a light sweat walking into the reception area of the Plaza Athénée on Con Costello's arm. The immense flower arrangements—thousands of breathtaking blossoms in old-looking silver urns—the echoing marble floors, deep-pile carpets, and cascading chandeliers of brilliant prisms greeted her, but Lireinne, her heart a stone inside her chest, stood in the middle of this incredible luxury without seeing it.

Why did everyone always seem to think that about her? Why?

Mr. Con was at the reception desk, checking them in. Lireinne waited for him, wondering if she'd made a terrible mistake in coming here. Home was across a whole ocean, and suddenly, even though they hadn't parted on the best of terms, she desperately wanted the comfort of Bud's voice telling her that she was doing fine, honey. But Bud wasn't here: he didn't know how it felt.

So get over it, she told herself with an inward shake of her shoulders. She was in
Paris
. It doesn't matter what the asshole car-park guy thought about her any more than what those bitches at the farm thought.

But somehow . . . it did matter.

It always had.

 

A cold bottle of champagne was waiting for them in the flower-filled suite, as well as a silver tray laden with a small urn of steaming coffee, a pot of hot milk, and a plate of pastries. Lireinne didn't want any of it. She was still thinking about the scene with the valet, her stomach hollow with the memory of her humiliation, but Mr. Con slugged back two cups of coffee while waiting on the bellman to deliver their luggage.

During the time he was on the phone with somebody named Julien, Lireinne wandered the suite for a few minutes, then unpacked and put her clothes away in the smaller of the two lavishly appointed bedrooms. The delicate gilded armchair and even the walls were upholstered in a soft peach silk, the sage-green curtains at the window drawn open to the morning. Lireinne found herself smiling as she explored the separate bathroom in giddy wonder, touching the supersoft white towels piled on the edge of the deep soaking tub. Her old toothbrush and few Dollar General cosmetics looked out of place and forlorn on the marble sink's edge, but Lireinne didn't mind. For the next four days, this crazy-rich space was for her, just her, and she could lock her door, just as she'd planned. Cheered, she went back out into the sitting room.

To her relief, Lireinne found that the coffee seemed to have woken Mr. Con up some. His eyes were sharper, he wasn't slurring his words anymore, and if he'd been displeased at not being in his regular suite, if he was unhappy about the second bedroom, he didn't mention it. Maybe he'd misspoken, maybe he'd always meant for her to have her own bed. Lireinne hoped that was true.

If not, well, there was that lock on the door.

“Champagne?” Mr. Con said. “You'll need to open it, honey.” He waved his left hand. “Some things are still beyond me, I'm afraid.”

Champagne sounded like a good idea, Lireinne thought, remembering how it had calmed her nerves on the plane. “Sure, Mr. Con. I'll get it.” Stripping off the bottle's foil was easy. How to get it open was something of a mystery at first, but soon she figured out how to twist the cork free with a muted pop and a spill of effervescent champagne, just the way they did it on TV.

“I'll pour.” Mr. Con took the bottle from her and filled both their glasses. “Coffee and champagne. Best cure for jet lag in the free world.” He handed Lireinne the crystal flute and said, “Welcome to Paris, darling.”

Darling. Honey. Sweetheart.

Lireinne drained her glass, barely tasting it.

“Here. Have another.” Mr. Con took her glass and refilled it.

After a moment's hesitation—was he trying to get her drunk?—she took it from him. The bubbles tickled the inside of her nose as she took a small swallow, and maybe it was just the effects of the champagne, but Lireinne's apprehension retreated for the moment as she savored the smooth taste of the Taittinger on her tongue.

It was just after ten in the morning and she was drinking champagne in a suite that astounded her with its comfort and luxury wherever she turned. Whatever happened next, Lireinne told herself, she'd find a way to make this trip work somehow. Like, what was the worst Mr. Con could do if she had to refuse to sleep with him? Send her home? Lireinne took another sip of champagne, wondering if he'd do that. To be in Paris at last, and then to lose all this would be so much worse than never having come at all. She didn't know if she'd ever get over the disappointment. With that thought, suddenly, Lireinne was dying to go out into the city and explore, to snatch as much of Paris as she could before it might be lost to her.

“Hey, sugar,” Mr. Con said. “Come on out. You're going to love this.” He opened the long glass doors onto the small balcony overlooking the bustling Avenue Montaigne below.

Oh,
yes
. Putting her concerns aside, Lireinne joined him. If she leaned over the slender ironwork railing, she could just make out the black silhouette of the Eiffel Tower in the distance. Between the sight of that faraway, evocative structure and the lack of sleep, the whirlwind of change she'd experienced within the last twenty hours and the champagne, it seemed as though Lireinne was in the middle of some fantastic, please-don't-wake-me-up kind of dream. But she was really here, this was no dream, this was no picture in a magazine. It was like hearing the joyous, first notes of a symphony, thrumming deep in her bones, calling to her with love.

And it was then that Lireinne fell forever in love with Paris, her heart opening wide to the city with a wondering adoration. Months later she would learn this life-changing instant was what the French called a
coup de foudre
—a thunderclap—but this morning she was stricken silent.

“Gorgeous view, isn't it?” Mr. Con slipped his arm around her waist, his right hand resting lightly on her hip. Lireinne froze. Please don't ruin it, she begged silently. Trying not to be obvious, she slipped away, moving as far from him as she could on the tiny balcony without backing herself into a corner.

“You all right?” Mr. Con asked. He gave her a concerned look.

Lireinne wished she were older and more experienced, that she knew how to deflect this alarming attention. “I guess I can't believe I'm really here yet,” she said, thinking quickly.

Mr. Con's handsome face relaxed, softening into an easy smile. “Oh, that's just the jet lag. Look, I've got a meeting over on the Rue Saint-Honoré in about forty-five minutes. Why don't you try to take a nap while I'm gone? Later on, after you wake up, you might want to go out and do some shopping, but I'll be back for you around six this evening. We'll go to dinner at eight. Hope you like oysters. There's a great place not far from here where the
fines declaires
are the best in the whole damned city.” Mr. Con reached into the breast pocket of his jacket and got out his wallet. “Here.”

To Lireinne's surprise, he pressed a handful of brightly colored notes into her hand. It was funny-looking money with colorful pictures on it, oddly insubstantial to the touch. It felt nothing like the almost greasy heft of dollar bills.

“That's seven hundred euros, about five hundred bucks or so,” Mr. Con said. “Why don't you head down to the Avenue after your nap, go shopping.” He finished his glass of champagne with a grin and a flourish. “And now I'm off to shave and change.” He took a confident step toward Lireinne, and before she'd realized what he was doing, he pressed a quick kiss to the scar on her forehead.