Matilde was stunned. Seeing the way the three men and the other employees were looking at her didn’t help to diminish the blush on her cheeks.
“Stud,” she heard Juana say, in mock offense, “you went and abandoned us in Paris.”
“That’s not what I heard,” Al-Saud objected. “Apparently you had a great time without me. You even went shopping at Galeries Lafayette.”
“It’s true. Ezequiel wanted to buy Mat clothes.”
“Ezequiel?” he repeated, looking at Mat.
“I told you about him,” she answered quickly. “My childhood friend.”
“What was he doing buying you clothes?”
“Stud,” Juana said, taking his hands, “don’t get crazy. Ezequiel is the closest thing to a brother that Mat has in this world. He wanted to buy clothes for her because Mat didn’t have anything to wear.”
“Juana,” Matilde said, getting flustered, “I did have things to wear. But you and Ezequiel insisted…”
Juana, ignoring Matilde’s protests, whispered into Al-Saud’s ear, “Don’t worry, stud. Ezequiel is gay and lives with his partner.”
Eliah wondered when the riddle of René Sampler and Ezequiel would resolve itself. It occurred to him that perhaps the BMW belonged to Sampler, Ezequiel’s partner. This idea reassured him. He remembered that his partners were watching them through the door of the conference room and he introduced them.
“It’s so chic having your office in a five-star hotel!” Juana enthused.
“The truth is that the hotel belongs to Eliah’s brother,” Michael Thorton explained, as his dark-gray eyes surveyed the brunette’s svelte figure. “The rent he charges is pretty reasonable.”
“This hotel belongs to Snickers?”
“To who?” Al-Saud was confused.
Matilde explained it to him, and Eliah laughed loudly. His secretaries and partners were getting more and more confused.
“No, Alamán isn’t the owner. My eldest brother, Shariar, is. And he’s married,” he added, seeing Juana’s interested expression. “Are you joining us for lunch?” he invited her.
“No, but thank you for inviting me. Actually, I came to meet Shiloah. He promised to take me out to eat and tell me what this convention about a two-nation state is all about.”
Al-Saud was surprised; his friend must really be interested in Juana to invite her to lunch less than a week before the beginning of the convention, with so many details and issues still to be finalized.
“Is the convention the reason that we had to go through metal detectors when we came into the hotel?” Juana asked.
“That’s right,” Tony Hill explained. “Some of the guests are already staying at the hotel. Some of the most important political figures in Israel and Palestine.”
Al-Saud sneaked back to his office for a minute and came back adjusting the lapels of his jacket. He impatiently waited for Matilde to say good-bye before taking her by the waist and leading her outside. As soon as the elevator doors were closed, he pressed her against the wall and kissed her as though he was planning to undress and make love to her then and there. He could feel her fragile, slight body through the padded jacket. His breathless mouth couldn’t get enough of her lips; there was never a moment when he wanted to pull away.
The elevator was silent, the only noises their irregular breathing and the sound of wet mouths tied together in a mind-blowing kiss. Matilde didn’t even care that someone could get on the elevator. The sounds excited her as much as his tongue in her mouth, on her throat, running over her gums and teeth, touching her tongue. On her tiptoes, clinging to his neck, she was no longer Matilde Martínez; she was someone else, someone she had always dreamed of, a free, uninhibited, brave woman. Al-Saud brushed his lips on her cheek and kissed her behind the ear, where she had sprayed some of her Upa la-lá perfume for babies.
“Did you miss me?” she heard him ask.
“Yes,” she said, and her voice came out hoarse and excited.
Matilde could have told him that she hadn’t slept a wink the previous night because she had been thinking about him. Unable to sleep, she had finished reading The Perfumed Garden. She would have liked to share a paragraph from the book with him: The zenith of enjoyment, which is produced by the abundant and exuberant ejaculation of the sperm, depends upon one circumstance: the vulva must provide suction. She would have liked to confess to him, “Eliah, my vagina does not provide suction. I’m not a complete woman. Actually, I’m not a woman at all. I’m damaged. I’m frigid and incapable of love. I can’t bring you to the zenith of enjoyment, so don’t seek me out, don’t kiss me, don’t look at me. Walk away from me, because I don’t have the strength to do it myself. I don’t want to suffer, and I don’t want you to be disappointed in me.” She didn’t dare to say any of that, or that when it was almost five in the morning, she had turned off the light, closed her eyes and imagined that she was one of the women in the erotic illustrations and that she was wrapped around him. The Position of the Sheep, the Position of the Blacksmith, the Frog, the Raised Legs, the Billy Goat, the Spear. Eliah, if there’s anyone in the world I’d like to try these positions with, it’s you. But I’m afraid. So afraid. Help me. She embraced him suddenly and buried her face in his chest to hold back her tears. He squeezed her tighter and kissed her on the top of her head; her hair smelled of babies too.
“And you, did you miss me?” she dared to ask him.
“Very much.” Al-Saud rocked her face gently in his hands and looked at her, not right in the eyes, but as though to survey all of her features. “You’re so beautiful. You have no idea how good that coat looks on you. Are you warm enough?”
“Very warm,” she assured him. She kissed him on his stubbly cheek and dragged her nose down his jaw and Adam’s apple until it reached the knot on his tie. “I love your cologne.”
The elevator doors opened on the bottom floor and they separated. Al-Saud took her hand as they crossed the lobby. The new bellboy, who had replaced the one who committed the indiscretion, greeted him with a nod and asked if he needed them to bring the car, to which Al-Saud responded no. They walked down Avenue George V to the Champs-Élysées and sat down to have lunch in one of the many cafés. He enjoyed how comfortably he and Matilde spoke to each other. Suddenly topics were flowing freely; they had so much to say to each other that they never seemed to have enough time. After the waiter cleared the table, Matilde took a jar of dulce de leche out of her shika and put it on the table in front of Eliah.
“Here’s your present.”
Al-Saud picked it up to look at it. It was a normal jam jar, but Matilde had made a little cap for it that was embroidered in a cross-stitch that read Eliah from Matilde. The cover was tied on with a red ribbon bow.
“You think it’s silly, don’t you? Juana told me you would think it was silly.”
“Juana doesn’t know me.” His deep, dark voice made her shiver and goose bumps pricked up on her legs and forearms. “Nobody has ever given me anything so beautiful. Something you’ve made with your own hands. Thinking of me.”
“It’s a good thing I asked Sofía how to spell your name, because I didn’t know about the final h.” She didn’t mention that she had lied to get this information without raising suspicions.
Al-Saud put the jar on the table and reached for her hands across the tablecloth. Matilde gave them to him, and the subsequent squeeze expressed the passion they awakened in each other. They stared into each other’s eyes, neither of them able to look away, as if spellbound. Eliah was thinking about the tiny hands had made that gift for him, about her thinking of him. The image of Matilde cooking, sewing, decorating the jar, stirred up emotions he didn’t know he was capable of. “Qui es-tu vraiment, Matilde?” (Who are you really, Matilde?) “What land of nymphs and fairies did you escape from? Because you’re not of this world.”
She had inspired Michael Thorton, a hard man, one of SIS’s top agents during the Cold War and presently a mercenary, confirmed bachelor and incur
able womanizer, to poetry. “She looks like a fairy,” he had said.
“Aren’t you going to try it?”
“It’s so pretty I don’t want to ruin it.”
“The cap is held on by an elastic band. You take it off like this, there you go. Then, if you want, you can put it back on.”
Matilde opened the jar, filled a spoon with the dulce de leche and fed it to him. Al-Saud closed his eyes slowly as the sweet paste melted in his mouth. It was genuinely exquisite, different from the jars his mother bought in the delicatessen. It wasn’t so sweet and had a smoother texture and taste, with a lighter color; a delight.
“This dulce de leche is…superbe, much better than Nutella.”
Matilde’s triumphant smile was contagious, and he smiled back at her, exultantly stunned by what he was feeling, full of the desire to get her out of there and take her to his house, to the refuge he had never shared with anyone. He moved across to the seat next to her, took her by the nape of the neck and the waist and kissed her.
“What a yummy, sweet kiss.”
“The recipe is from my grandfather Esteban’s wife; your grandmother Antonina’s friend. Rosalía was very generous, she taught me everything she knew.”
“Embroidery too?” he asked, pointing to the cover.
“Yes, sewing and knitting. She was very good with her hands.”
“You’re good with your hands, Matilde. They can make a gift like this, but they can also save lives.” He bowed his head and kissed her palms, passing his nose over the veins in her wrists. “I feel proud of you.”
“There are things you don’t know about me, things that would make you change your mind.”
“I want to know everything, Matilde, I already told you. I want you to share everything with me.”
Matilde pulled back her hands, looked down and stayed silent. Finally, she looked at him with a determined expression on her face.
“I’m married, Eliah.”
After a silence, Al-Saud replied, “You’re married, but it’s obvious to me that you don’t love your husband.”
“In fact, we’re separated and we’re going to get divorced. And yes, you’re right, I’m not in love with him. I never was.”
“Why did you marry him?”
“I’m embarrassed to confess it to you. You’re going to think I’m shallow, with no willpower, that I can’t make my own decisions. You’ll think I’m stupid, and I don’t want you to think that about me.”
“Are you stupid, shallow and naive?”
“I hope not. I don’t want to be like that.”
“Trust me. I’m not stupid either. Also, I might just be able to understand.”
“I got married because that was what was expected of me, because that’s what society expects. My father, who has a lot of influence over me, wanted to see me ‘settled down,’ as he put it. He loved Roy, my husband, like a son, as did my aunt Enriqueta, who is a very good friend of Roy’s father. They put pressure on me and Roy put pressure on me.”
“He’s still in love with you.” He stated it in a harsh voice, frowning. He looked at the table, holding his forehead in his right hand while he made a little mountain of bread crumbs with his left.
“And I don’t understand why. I was the worst wife.” Al-Saud looked at her reproachfully. “It’s true, Eliah, I was a bad wife.”
“You didn’t love him, that’s why you weren’t a good wife. In other circumstances, you would be the best of wives.”
Really? Do you really think I would be a good wife if you were my husband? I don’t think so. I’m not normal. I never was. Tears welled up in her eyes and her lips trembled. Al-Saud pulled her out of her chair and onto his lap. Matilde had never before experienced the sensation of safety and pleasure that she felt in the arms of this man, a man who was little more than a stranger to her. His cologne, his strength, his energy, the roughness of his neck, the strength of his hands at her back, all made her feel as though she were in some magnificent refuge, one she never wanted to leave.
“Did he hurt you?”
“I hurt him. A lot.”
“Did he hurt you?” he insisted. “Physically, I mean.”
“Yes,” she whispered, on the verge of tears. He screwed up a napkin in his fist and grimaced until his gums hurt.
“He’ll never do it to you again, I swear on my life. From now on, I’ll protect you.”
She stroked his cheeks and brushed away the straight, thick lock of hair that fell across his forehead. Then she rubbed the back of his head, where the hair was cut short, and kissed his nose and lips, something she never would have done with Roy or with anyone else, especially not in public, and yet with him she acted spontaneously and was filled with peace, happiness and desire.
“Eliah,” she murmured as she kissed him, “I’m so scared.”
“Why?”
“Because none of this was part of my plan. Because life has taken me by surprise. Because everything is happening so fast. Because you’re a hurricane sweeping away all my defenses.” She stopped talking; she didn’t know how to express what was really terrifying her. “I’m also scared of letting you down. I couldn’t stand it.” She hid her face in his shoulder. “You don’t know anything about me.”
“Tell me everything, please, Matilde. I want to help you.”
Really? Would he help me? Or would I scare him off?
“You don’t know how much you’re helping me just by holding me like this. You make me feel strong when you hold me. You make me feel as though I could take on the world.”
“My love, nobody has ever said anything so beautiful to me. If you need my strength, I’ll give you all that I have.”
Matilde’s laugh, a little strangled by emotion, remained in Al-Saud’s ears and bubbled back up throughout the afternoon. Every time the memory returned, his partners saw him stretch in his seat, put his hands behind his head and smile at thin air.
Before he went to pick up Matilde at the language institute, Al-Saud visited one of Mercure Inc.’s most valuable assets, the prostitute Zoya Pavlenko. He called her before arriving at her apartment at number 190 Rue Faubourg Saint-Honoré.
“Are you with a client?”
“I’m alone,” the woman assured him. “Come over.”
They hugged in the vestibule of the luxurious apartment. Zoya stepped back and brushed away the hair to look into his eyes. She looked at him seriously.
“What’s up with you, Horse of Fire? You seem different. There’s a glimmer in your eye that I’ve never seen before. I sense an intense, powerful energy. You’re content. I’d even go so far as to say that you’re happy. This is absolutely unprecedented. I’m astonished.”
Al-Saud nodded his head and smiled approvingly. Takumi sensei had told him that Zoya’s wisdom was part of her nature as a Serpent of Wood, which, in addition to her attractiveness and clairvoyant skills, she used to create an erotic allure that few men could resist.
It was ironic that it had been Samara who brought Zoya into his life. She had spotted her in an alley as they were coming out of a restaurant in Rouen. A man was beating her up, and she seemed to be happy to suffer in silence. “Help her, Eliah, please!” The man had ended up unconscious on a pile of trash. In fairly fluent but poorly pronounced French, Zoya begged them not to take her to a hospital because she would be deported to Ukraine; her visa had expired. They took her to the ranch, where Takumi tended to her wounds, binding her torso to help her broken ribs knit.
Using his position at L’Agence, Al-Saud made sure that Zoya’s attacker—her pimp—was deported and that the beautiful prostitute was recruited. She was given a new, refined image and lessons of every kind, from how to speak upper-class French to silver-service etiquette, to transform her into a twenty-five-thousand-franc-a-night escort. Plied with too many drinks and in the arms of a skilled woman, men could always be relied upon to give up their secrets. A little while later, Mercure Inc. was born, and Zoya joined Al-Saud’s team, although she continued to l
end her services to L’Agence. Her first job for Mercure had consisted of approaching and seducing the hacker Claude Masséna, then wheedling out the information that Al-Saud and his partners used to extort him.
“So,” Zoya insisted, “aren’t you going to tell me the cause of this sparkle in your eyes?”
“What could it be?” He pretended to be surprised.
“I daren’t say it. It’s impossible.” Al-Saud lifted an eyebrow in mock confusion. “Can it be that my Horse of Fire is in love?” Al-Saud nodded again and smiled. “Mon Dieu, it’s true. So tell me about her.”
“Not yet.” He looked at his watch; he had to hurry, Matilde got out at six thirty.
“She must be very special.”
“She is,” he promised. “Zoya, tonight you’ll go to the George V. In room seven oh six, Mr. Shaul Zeevi will be waiting for you. He’s Israeli but his parents are Ukrainian. Speak to him in your language. He’ll like that.”
“Do you want me to get something specific out of him?”
“No. I just want a compromising video in case in the future our business doesn’t go as well as it is now.” Zoya agreed. “What news about Masséna?”
“A sweet little kitten. More in love than ever. Although over the last few days I’ve noticed something restless about him. He’s started to talk about leaving Mercure Inc., about getting rich so he can give me all the finer things in life. Be careful, Eliah.”
“I will. Have you heard anything from Natasha?”
Al-Saud and Natasha Azarov had had an affair the year before. Natasha, who was also Ukrainian and a childhood friend of Zoya’s, had gotten her start in the world of commercial modeling thanks to Zoya’s connections and her career had been growing increasingly successful. One night, in a tearful voice, she had called Zoya to tell her that she had to leave and disappeared. It had been four months since anyone had heard anything from her.
“I don’t understand it, Eliah,” Zoya said. “She was so in love with you. And things were starting to go well for her at work. I don’t understand it,” she insisted.
“Have you called her family in the Ukraine?”