Invitation to Provence(83)



Jake went and picked up his dog. He walked behind them carrying Criminal. They tried to shut him out of the ambulance but he turned on them so fiercely that, intimidated, they allowed him to accompany them, still holding the dog on his knees.

Half an hour later he was sitting in the hospital waiting room, staring at the clock on the wall as it ticked away the endlessly slow minutes. Minutes that might be the last for Little Blue and Franny. Every now and then some official came to tell him he really couldn’t keep the dog there, but he ignored them and eventually they went away.

An hour passed, then two. His pilot showed up with the staff from his plane. They’d heard from the helicopter company what had happened. They brought him coffee that he didn’t drink, offered words of sympathy he couldn’t respond to, said maybe they should take care of Criminal for him. Jake said nothing, he was still frozen in emotional time—reliving the hell of his first wife’s death and the torture of maybe losing his new love.

Hours later, the surgeon came out to speak to him. “We’re lucky, Monsieur Bronson,” he said, managing a tired smile. “They were not burned. When the explosion happened they were thrown from the balcony. The child is deeply concussed, and we must watch her for signs of neurological damage, though from the scans it’s doubtful. She has a broken leg and many cuts and bruises, but she’ll be fine.”

Jake felt a little lurch of his heart and knew that at least it still beat for Little Blue.

“Mademoiselle Marten took most of the impact of the explosion and she is still unconscious. She has a fracture of the fourth vertebra, which means, sir, that she has a broken neck. Plus she lost a great deal of blood from a severed artery. We’ve done what we can. The next twenty-four hours will tell their own story.”

The surgeon smiled that tired smile again and held out his hand, but Jake didn’t even notice.

“She’s alive?” he said, as though he hadn’t been able to take in what had just been said. “She’s alive,” he repeated with such a note of relief that the others smiled. Then he buried his head in his dead dog’s rough fur and he wept.





66





LYING ON THE BED in his cheap hotel room in Cannes, Alain watched the TV news report. He was not happy. The villa had been destroyed but not the planned Marten victims.

He’d been right, though. There was no way to trace the gas leak to the unlit burners on the stove because everything had been blown to pieces. The villa had not been used for a long time, and it was assumed to be a gas leak, just one of those unfortunate incidents.

He lay for a long time, thinking about what to do next. Finally, he got off the bed, took a long shower to clear his head, then went to get his car. He drove to Le Suquet, the old port area of Cannes, and sat in a bar overlooking the marina with its hundred-foot-long yachts and parade of glossy cruise ships, drinking Ricard and feeling sorry for himself. He’d lost the money he’d won at the casino and was broke. He didn’t even have access to Felix’s money because Little Blue had inherited his entire estate. He wondered why the f*ck Felix had done that. He’d never even acknowledged the kid when he was alive. Of course the real reason was that Felix had never wanted to find out the truth about who was the father because he was afraid it would turn out to be Alain.

Through the years Alain had kept tabs on Felix. He knew where he was at any given moment. Not only that, he’d used his name fraudulently several times, though Felix had never prosecuted. Too proud of the old family name, Alain thought with a grim smile.

He’d gotten even with Felix years ago, though. He’d found the bar where Felix’s woman worked. She’d needed to work because Felix had refused to make a commitment to her and she had no money. But Alain made it his business to get to know everything about Felix’s woman. He’d kept watch on her. He knew even before Felix did that she was pregnant because he’d made friends with one of her girlfriends who had told him. He’d laughed then. He thought it was amusing, the old story repeating itself—the pregnant girl, him and Felix—who was the father?

He’d called Felix and demanded a meeting. He’d never forget the grotesque look on Felix’s face when, bluffing, he told him his woman was pregnant and the child was not his, that he, Alain, was the father. At first not believing, then maybe half believing … then, no it can’t be.

“She’s not pregnant,” Felix said in a quiet, deadened voice. How could it be true? He was always so careful when they had sex.

“Ask her,” Alain said confidently, “ask her yourself if she’s pregnant. Then ask yourself how else would I know, Felix, if I were not the father.”

Felix never saw the woman again. He’d paid Alain off, and when the woman died, he sent a small amount of money each month to salve his conscience, and the child had lived in poverty with her ailing grandmother. And that was that.

That is, until Jake Bronson had come along with Rafaella’s invitation to the great Marten family reunion, just as Alain was forced to ask Felix for financial help again. When he was refused, in a spate of anger, he’d killed Felix.

He’d gotten lucky that night, but luck hadn’t been on his side this time. A big blast like that should have killed anyone in range, yet it had not.

Alain ordered another Ricard, and his thoughts turned to his mother. If only Rafaella had given him what he wanted, just given him the vineyard and the chateau that were rightfully his, he’d have had enough money to live the lifestyle he enjoyed and none of this would have happened. Rafaella was at the heart of all his problems.

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