“Richard added one more journalist, someone who called today. He only does this when I already buy ingredients. American guy, I don’t know.”
Fiona said, “Crap,” because she suspected she did know.
* * *
—
It was another two hours before the doorbell rang—what Serge had been cooking was a Moroccan stew that apparently took years—and yes, oh boy, it was indeed Jake, handing Fiona a bottle with a shit-eating grin, as if he’d hunted the wine down himself in the woods. She wanted to say that she wasn’t the host, this wasn’t her idea, this wasn’t what she’d meant when she gave him Serge’s number, but soon enough she was hosting, because Serge had to stir and Richard was still getting dressed and the other woman was running late.
She set her phone under her thigh on the chair, so she’d feel if it buzzed. Arnaud hadn’t promised to call tonight, had in fact implied that he’d be in touch tomorrow morning, but surely he’d call if he saw something good or something bad, wouldn’t he?
Jake—“Jake Austen, like the writer, but, you know, with a K. My mom was an English teacher”—had accepted a clear cocktail from Serge, and Fiona sat as far from him as possible on the couch, pointedly sipping water. She wasn’t going to flirt with Jake Austen, if only on principle. She didn’t want him to think he could waltz in here and expect her to be thrilled to see him, to go all girly over the way he complimented her necklace. “Are those birds?” he said. “On the sides?”
“Oh, it’s deeply symbolic. Speaking of English class. Well, no. It’s for luck.”
He said, “You don’t wear any other jewelry.”
So he’d been looking at her ears, her hands. He might be referring to the absence of a wedding ring.
If she’d been in Paris for any other reason, if she’d had the time and boredom, she might have entertained the possibility of a fling. What did it matter if he was a drunk, a con artist, if she was only going to use him? And the way he kept staring at her legs, he didn’t seem to mind the difference between their ages.
After the divorce, Fiona had dated so much that her friends had joked about getting her a reality show. But that was a long time ago. She’d gotten busy with the shop, with other things. And after Claire disappeared, she and Damian spent a good deal of time on the phone. It wasn’t romantic, but it filled some need. A shoulder, albeit two thousand miles away, to cry on. She still dated on occasion, but the dates were rote now, and so was the sex.
It was pleasant enough, she’d grant, that Jake was sitting here talking to her about how he needed new hiking boots. It was nice that he believed she was here on vacation. And as Serge came out and almost forcibly removed the water glass from her hand, replaced it with the glass of wine she’d left on the kitchen counter, as she looked out the window to the darkening walls of a Parisian street, she could almost believe it was true.
It was seven p.m. A decent chance Arnaud would be staked out by now. Fiona took off her watch and stuck it in her pocket so she wouldn’t stare at it all night.
Jake said, “Tell me the story of your life.”
“My life,” she said, and laughed. She’d never been good at that. Her life had been tumultuous, but the basic rundown always sounded boring.
She told him her degree was in psychology, that she’d started college when she was twenty-four, that she’d married her professor and then divorced him. That she ran a resale shop. She left out that it benefited AIDS housing; this was not part of the romantic, carefree version of the story, and she really didn’t care to hear his follow-up questions.
He said, “Does the psych degree help you run a shop?”
She thought she felt the phone, but when she looked her screen was blank. A phantom buzzing, the vibrations of her own nerves.
She said, “My daughter was born when I was still a student. So I finished school, but things got away from me.”
“Got it,” he said. “Got it.” Although he couldn’t have.
When the buzzer sounded again, Richard rushed out to answer.
The journalist—Corinne—had brought a bouquet of dahlias and an apple tart. She had silver hair, a bracelet of smooth green beads. The kind of woman