The Beautiful Ones - Silvia Moreno-Garcia Page 0,132
it. I will not rescind it.”
“Even—”
“You are correct on one point, Valérie. And that is that I care for Antonina very much. I would like to see my cousin be happy, and she loves that man with all her heart, as was obvious today.
“And he loves her,” Gaétan added.
She would have slapped him this time, but he moved across the room and opened the armoire, pulling dresses and tossing them on the bed as though they were old rags rather than precious silks and velvets.
“You will pack your bags tonight. You are leaving for Eli, near the northern border. There you will remain,” Gaétan said.
“You will attempt to send me away from Loisail?” Valérie asked. “As if I’d go.”
Loisail was as important as the air that she breathed. It was her city. She was in the society pages every other week, a constant fixture at the most lavish parties. The boulevards might as well have been named after her.
“You have no choice.”
“Attempt to put me on a train, and tomorrow The Courier will have the most scandalous story printed on the front page, and it will concern Antonina Beaulieu. All a woman has is her reputation,” she warned him.
He moved back toward her, clasping her arm with a force she did not know he possessed, his fingers tight.
“Attempt to say a word against my family, Valérie, and not only will I divorce you, I will see that you are left begging in the streets.”
She shoved him away but stumbled and almost tripped as her foot tangled in a dress that lay on the floor.
She heard the fabric rip as she straightened herself up.
“You wouldn’t divorce me,” Valérie said. “They’d blather all around the city about it.”
“Yes, they would. Which is why I’m sending you to Eli. A separation of this sort is not unheard of and better for both of us. I’ll give you an annuity. But my kindness has a price, and that price is that you stay far away from me and my kin, that you never speak of us.”
“I am no fool, Gaétan. Kindness can run dry rather quickly.”
“So can my patience. I want you out of this house by nightfall.”
Nearly breathless and in shock, she tried to think of a solution, of a way to escape this maze she had trapped herself in.
“I’ll speak to The Courier today,” she said, and though she wanted to deny it, she was afraid. Gaétan’s eyes had an edge she did not know.
“As you’ve said, all a woman has is her reputation. Take Antonina’s, I’ll take yours, and as I’ve explained to you, my kindness will cease. Trash on the streets, you said? Pray someone lifts you up then. Pray very hard,” Gaétan told her.
He left her to sit at the edge of her bed, all her finery spread upon the floor. Valérie rubbed her hands desperately. For five minutes, she labored over a letter for the papers, then ended up tossing ink and paper upon the fine carpet when the futility of the situation hit her.
She rushed to her vanity and opened her jewelry box, thinking that she might sell the precious items in there and … and what? Return to her father’s home? To do what?
She pulled out necklaces and bracelets, until she found that lonely, thin circle of gold Hector had given her.
She clutched it tight, and as she grasped it, everything bled away from her heart. The anger, the desperation, until she was left hollow and cold. She felt herself disappearing. If she looked in the mirror, she thought she would not be able to make out her own face.
A maid came to help her pack. Valérie did not resist. Having assessed the situation, she determined that staging a scene would not benefit her. This was a small mishap. She’d pick herself up. Gaétan was a small man, anyway, and she despised him. It was good to be rid of him. Yes, she told herself. Everything was fine.
She went into the carriage, then boarded the train. As it was leaving the station, her fury returned for a moment as she watched the city speed by. She took the ring, which she had been cradling for a long time now, and tossed it out the window.
Valérie regretted the gesture at once, pressing both hands against the glass.
“It is gone,” she told a startled passenger who sat in front of her and surely thought her mad.
She looked down at her perfect hands, and she recalled how her grandmother