CHAPTER 31

CAMILLEHe didn't stop talking.That was the thing about Aurelio, he knew exactly what his voice did to me and he used it the way other men used their hands, deliberately, precisely, with the full knowledge of where it would land."You'll wear something simple," he said, his thumb still moving against my thigh, unhurried, as though we had all the time in the world and he hadn't just dismantled every wall I had carefully rebuilt over the last twenty minutes. "Something that makes the other men at the table forget what they were saying mid-sentence." A pause. "And you'll look at me like you don't know me.""I don't know you," I said, and my voice came out softer than I wanted it to."You know me better than anyone in that room will," he said simply. "That's the point."The heat that had settled low in my body was not leaving, if anything it had found a more permanent address, spreading outward from where his hand rested, moving up through my stomach, into my chest, making it difficul

CHAPTER 32

CAMILLE"I was watching a movie," I said, and my voice came out perfectly even. "I didn't pause it. Sorry, Dad."A beat of silence on the other end."A movie," my father repeated, with the particular tone of a man who was not entirely convinced but had decided not to pursue it."Yes.""At this hour.""It's not that late."Another pause, behind me, Aurelio had gone completely still, and I could feel the quiet amusement radiating off him like heat, which I was going to address thoroughly the moment this call ended."Well," my father said finally, "get yourself ready. The dinner is at eight.""I'll be there," I said. "I'll see you outside."I ended the call.I turned.Aurelio was looking at me with something in his eyes that was not quite a smile but lived in the same neighborhood as one, warm and private and entirely too pleased with itself."You're evil," I told him.He laughed.It was a real one, which was rare enough that it stopped me for a moment, the sound of it low and genuine a

CHAPTER 33

CAMILLEI didn't cry until I got home.I held it together the whole drive back, hands on the wheel, eyes on the road, breathing through my nose steadily so as not to choke on tears, trying to convince myself that I was fine. I gave myself that much, because I deserved it and needed to get home first.I sat on the edge of my bed and took off my shoe, and it finally came, I broke down into tears.Not loudly. I never cry loudly, I pressed my hands over my face and I cried the way I always do, quietly, like even the crying was something I had to keep to myself, and I let all the things I had been holding back at that dinner table finally come out.I cried because I had stood in front of that mirror feeling so good about myself, so sure, and then I had sat at that table for almost an hour and he had looked right through me like I wasn't there, like I had dressed up and driven over and walked into his house for nothing.I cried because of the way he admitted the obvious truth which should

CHAPTER 34

AURELIO"I'm sorry, Aurelio."She said it quietly, and then she moved to leave.I caught her wrist before I had fully decided to.She stopped.I stood up from the edge of the bed slowly, and she turned to look at me with those eyes that were trying very hard to be neutral and not quite managing it. I could see it, the quiet sadness sitting in them, the thing she had been carrying all evening and had not once complained about.I brought my hand to her face.She went still.I traced her jaw with my thumb, slowly, just that, just my hand on her face in the quiet of the room, and I watched something in her expression shift the way it always did when I touched her gently, like she hadn't expected it and didn't know what to do with it.I kissed her.Soft and with no urgency behind it, no pull toward anything else, just my mouth on hers, asking nothing, just there.I pulled back."Stay," I said.She looked at me."Aurelio…."I kissed her again before she could finish it, slower this time, m

CHAPTER 35

AURELIOI woke up before she did.I was a light sleeper by habit, had been since my early thirties when the weight of running a company had trained me to wake at the smallest sound, but somewhere between the soup and her hand in my hair I had gone under completely and slept the kind of sleep that doesn't care what time it is.I lay still for a moment, orienting myself.The room was grey with early morning light, quiet except for the sound of her breathing, and Camille was pressed against my side with her face turned into my shoulder and one hand flat against my chest, completely and entirely asleep.I looked at her.I thought about yesterday, about how it had started, the dinner and the argument in this room and her face when she had said *I'm your mistress* with that particular steadiness that was worse than if she had shouted it. I thought about the road at two in the morning, her headlights behind my car, the fact that she had come without making me ask twice.Yesterday had starte

CHAPTER 36

CAMILLECharles de Gaulle was everything I remembered and nothing like I expected.I had been to Paris once as a child, young enough that most of it lived in my memory as impressions more than details, the smell of something sweet near a market, the colour of a bridge, my mother's hand in mine on a crowded street. I had wanted to come back for years and had never found the reason or the right moment.The right moment had apparently been a Tuesday morning over breakfast in Aurelio's dining room.I pressed my face closer to the window as we descended and watched the city arrange itself below us, grey and gold in the afternoon light, the Seine cutting through it like something deliberate, and I felt that familiar feeling of excitement of waiting for something for a long time and finally having it.Aurelio was watching me from across the cabin."Put this on before we land," he said, and held out a face mask.I took it. "Why?""Reporters," he said simply. "Charles de Gaulle attracts them