After a few minutes, Matilde and Blahetter rejoined the party. She stuck to Juana’s side. It was obvious that she wasn’t enjoying herself. Blahetter was following her like a shadow. The presence of René Sampler was also tormenting him. A scandalous scene was going to break out any minute. Al-Saud saw it coming when Roy’s hand shot out to grab Sampler’s forearm.
“Don’t touch my wife,” he ordered in English. “There’s no need to go grabbing her waist.”
Sampler didn’t need any further provocation. He threw himself at Blahetter, and the fight began. The guests, most of them drunk, some of them high, egged them on. Ezequiel and Jean-Paul tried to separate them. It would have taken Eliah two minutes to put an end to their exertions, but he didn’t budge from his corner. He enjoyed watching them attack each other. He looked for Matilde in the crowd. He couldn’t find her. She had disappeared.
Matilde ran farther into the house to get away from her embarrassment. She was going to flee from that house. Nothing would convince her otherwise. Something evil infused these walls and this group of people. Alcohol ran like water, and she had seen a few of them inhaling white powder.
Céline jumped out at the end of the hall, scaring her to death. She pinned her against the wall, pressing on her larynx with her forearm.
“Why the hell did you come to Paris, Matilde? To ruin everything I’ve built here?”
“You’re drunk, like Daddy. You’re the same as he was.” Seeing in the brighter light of the room that her pupils were dilated too, she added, “And you’re high.”
“I hate you. You took everything away from me in Córdoba, the love of our grandmother and our father. And now you want to take away what I have here. Aunt Sofía won’t stop talking about you. Jean-Paul is my agent, my friend,” she stressed, pushing harder into Matilde’s throat, “and he never threw a party for me. Why was Eliah talking to you? Why did he look at you as though he wanted to eat you? Where did you meet him?”
“At Aunt Sofía’s house.” She swallowed with difficulty. “You’re choking me. Let go of me, Celia.”
“Céline! My name is Céline! Goddamn little whore! My name is Céline!”
Matilde slid her right arm between herself and her sister and pushed. Céline fell backward and Matilde shot off down the hall. She was scared of Celia. There was something sinister in her face; her beauty wasn’t enough to disguise the hatred that burned in her heart.
“Matilde!”
The voice stopped her in her tracks. She turned around. Al-Saud was looking at her, with an overcoat and her marble-colored coat in his hands. Juana appeared and found them staring at each other across the hall.
“Isn’t this a lovely, lovely party,” she said sarcastically, with a sour face. “Get her out of here, stud, please. Don’t worry,” she said before Matilde could get a word in, “I’ll ask Ezequiel to take me home. Go on, don’t worry.”
* * *
* * *
CHAPTER 11
* * *
* * *
Al-Saud helped her into her coat before putting on his own. He moved in silence, his face devoid of emotion. They left the building on Avenue Charles Floquet and walked toward the Aston Martin without saying a word. Al-Saud stayed away from her; his indifference shamed and intimidated her. Juana had forced him to take her out of there. No, no, she reassured herself. He was carrying my coat. He wanted us to leave together. Matilde realized that his coldness and silence were an attempt to cover up his fury and jealousy. She had hurt him the night before and again at Jean-Paul’s house. I’m jealous, Matilde, he had warned her. His anger radiated out from him like hot, vibrant energy.
Al-Saud opened the passenger door and, without looking at her, made sure she was inside before shutting the door with a heavy clunk. Matilde put on her seat belt—as her hands were shaking, it took her some time to get the buckle fastened. The Aston Martin’s tires screeched on the pavement, and the sports car violently pulled away. The roar of the engine filled the whole car as though it was a manifestation of the driver’s rage. Matilde held on to the handle above her head.
Even though they were only a few blocks from Avenue Elisée Reclus, Al-Saud wasn’t ready to take her home. He pressed down on the accelerator in the loneliness of the night, rabid, furious, insane with jealousy, blind and unable to control his emotions. Why did she cause this disaster in him? What kind of power did she have that she was able to transform him on a whim? Where did she get this ability to affect his spirit? He swerved sharply and slammed on the brakes. Matilde was being tossed around in her seat. Al-Saud stretched his arms out over the steering wheel and let his head hang down.
“Eliah.” This was exactly what he meant about her power. Just by saying his name, she had turned his insides to jelly. “Eliah,” he heard her repeat.
When she ran her hand up his right arm, it made him shake; no woman had ever made him tremble with a simple gesture. He sat up in his seat and stared at the steering wheel.
“Eliah, please, look at me.”
He complied, and in the half light of the Aston Martin, the sadness and insecurity that were coursing through Matilde shone in her eyes. But he was still wounded and furious.
“I could have torn you apart with my bare hands when you walked in looking so stunning. Why did you dress like that? For your son of a bitch husband?”
“I didn’t know Roy would be at the party! I didn’t even know he was in Paris.”
“Where did you get that dress and everything else you have on?”
“Ezequiel bought it for me.”
“How many times have I asked you to let me buy you everything? Why do you reject me and not him?”
“Ezequiel is like a brother to me, Eliah.”
“And what am I to you, Matilde? What the hell am I?”
Matilde unbuckled her seat belt and moved closer to him. She stroked his hair and ear and neck. She stretched up to speak into his ear.
“You’re the one who makes me feel things I’ve never felt before. You’re the one who’s always on my mind, like no man has ever been. You’re the one who has awakened a desire in me that I never knew before.”
Al-Saud turned his head and, with his hands still on the steering wheel and his eyes closed, dragged his half-open lips over hers.
“Back there, at the party,” he said resentfully, “I wanted to claim you in front of everyone and shout out that you’re mine but I couldn’t, and I was consumed with hatred and frustration.”
“I wish you had done that instead of coming with Celia and letting her touch you and flirt with you. Perhaps you’re not mine after all?”
Of course I’m yours, like a slave is to his master! But I would die before admitting that.
“I can’t claim you because you’re not really mine. Because you have never wanted to give yourself to me.”
“Now I want to be yours, Eliah. I want to give myself to you. Is it too late? Do you hate me too much because of what I said to you last night? Have I already lost you?”
Matilde heard the click of Al-Saud’s seat belt and suddenly found herself pinned down by his torso as it stretched across the space between the two seats. His mouth took hold of hers with a passion that spoke of his fury. Matilde cradled his head and devoured him as well. When she thrust her tongue into him, she heard a hoarse moan burst from his throat and felt the vibrations of the masculine noise rippling over her like waves, making her hair stand on end.
“My God, Matilde,” he lamented in his agitation. “Why does it have to be like this with you? Why do I lose control? Why do I become irrational?”
Matilde didn’t understand what he was saying; he had been speaking too quickly in French. She stayed still, her head back, allowing him to bite and lick her neck and pull down the zipper of her coat. She let out a long, painful moan and grabbed Eliah’s head when his mouth closed around a nipple pressing against the satin dress. Then he moved on to the other.
“Please,” she begged, almost breathless. “Please, Eliah.
”
Al-Saud drew back suddenly, put on his seat belt and put the Aston Martin in gear. Intimidated, Matilde settled back into her seat and tidied her hair and jacket. Her damp nipples were throbbing. Al-Saud’s right hand squeezed her thin knee, wandered up her leg and pushed her dress up until a gear change ended the maneuver. Matilde, her head pressed sideways against the window, clenched her fists and bit her lip. The worried-over and feared moment was approaching. The English sports car was eating up the blocks, and her fear was growing.
The forged-iron-and-glass gate closed behind the Aston Martin, and Al-Saud got out without saying a word. He opened her door and reached out a hand to help her out. Matilde had no way of knowing what it meant for him to allow her to set foot on these sacred premises. He led her to the entrance hall. He turned on the lights and Matilde spun around, amazed, feeling as though she had stepped into a dream, because there was a dreamlike quality about the stained-glass dome above her, the dark parquet floor with plant patterns on the hardwood, the impressive staircase and the banister decorated with forged-iron ivy and flowers, the giant windows with lancet arches and the thin columns whose capitals were sculpted in the shape of ferns and palm trees. Everything was immaculate and detailed and warm in spite of the high ceilings and the enormity of the space.
“This house is stupendous. I’ve never seen anything so magnificent and original.”
“Do you really like it?”
“Do I like it? I feel as though I’m in a dream.”
That was exactly what Al-Saud had thought the day he saw it for the first time, when he’d decided to preserve the architectural style.
“It’s from the end of the nineteenth century, it’s Art Nouveau,” he explained, guiding her toward the stairs. “Some attribute it to the father of the movement, the architect Victor Horta. I had the whole thing renovated, but I didn’t change the style at all.”
“I should have known that your house would surprise me, just as you surprise me, Eliah.”
On the landing, he showed her to a large, exotic, colorful window and took off her jacket, which he hung from a branch of the ivy on the column. He rested his forehead on Matilde’s, caressed her shoulders and, as he moved down her arms, pulled off the gloves, which fell to the floor.
“What surprises you about me?”
“I’m surprised by the power you have over me.” He laughed. How ironic! he said to himself. “I’m surprised to be here. I want to be here, there’s nothing I want more, but at the same time I’m terrified.”
Eliah lifted her in his arms and carried her up the rest of the stairs. Matilde looked up and saw that the staircase continued for two more floors and that the house was finished off with another colored dome. She had never experienced this sensation of contentment and happiness combined with panic. With Eliah everything will be different, she said to summon her courage, pressing her face against his cheek and inhaling his cologne as she covered the corner of his jaw with kisses. Eliah went down a long hall, which was just as eccentric as the rest, with a curved ceiling made of iron and emerald glass, making it look like a large greenhouse. At the end of the hall, he pushed open a door with his foot and twisted the dimmer until he created a low level of light. He put her down on a double bed that was raised up on a plinth. Matilde sat up. Al-Saud quickly took off his black jacket, shoes, socks and his blue waistcoat with white stripes and Matilde started to shrink back. The sight of his naked torso, dark, hairy and firm, quieted the screams of terror in her soul for an instant. She could identify every muscle—the deltoids, the major pectorals, the trapezoids, the abdominals, the serratus anterior, the biceps and the brachioradialis—there was discipline in this body from hours of physical exercise without reaching the excess of muscular hypertrophy that disgusted her so much. It was the torso of a healthy, vigorous man, and she yearned to feel its weight upon her. He continued to take off his clothes but never took his eyes off her. Finally, he was left in just his boxer shorts, which revealed his erection.
Eliah saw the panic in her eyes. He almost laughed at the devastated look on Matilde’s face after seeing his bulge. Just as he was about to take off his boxer shorts, he decided to wait. He went over to the bed. On her knees, she threw out her arms and drew him to her.
“Hold me!” she begged. “Because I’m scared to death.”
Eliah picked her up and carried her to a divan, where he set her down gently, as though she were a little baby. He kissed her freckles and her lips, which were still tinted red, and looked at her intensely. She closed her eyes, and he admired the twin fans of her eyelashes painted black against her milky skin.
“I want to tell you something about me,” she whispered, without opening her eyes. “It’s something painful and humiliating, and I want to tell you. I need to share it with you. I don’t know why.”
“My love, Matilde, I’ve told you many times that I want to know everything about your life.”
“When I got married in December 1996, I was a virgin. I was twenty-five years old and I had never been with a man. A man had never touched me or kissed me or anything. The idea terrified me. My engagement to Roy wasn’t long, barely eight months, and during that time his kisses made me uncomfortable and I never let him touch me. I knew that something was functioning badly inside me, but I refused to accept it.”
“Why did you marry him if you didn’t want him?”
“Because my father wanted me to, my aunt Enriqueta too. I already told you, plus…well…because I thought that no one else would have me.” After this assertion, Eliah raised his eyebrows and frowned. “He was so in love. I had never loved anyone. I didn’t really know how it felt. It was all a big mess!” she exclaimed, in a strangled, almost desperate voice.
“Calm down,” he whispered above her forehead, blowing on her eyelids and giving her little kisses.
“We got married and went on our honeymoon.” She shook her head, her eyes still closed. “I don’t want to think about those days. They were terrible. I cried every day and Roy was in an awful mood. I couldn’t accept him, I couldn’t bear the idea of him…”
“Penetrating you,” Al-Saud completed. “If you want to get over the fear, my love, it would be better if you start talking about sex as a natural act, because it is. Is there anything more natural than the way humans procreate?”
“My psychiatrist says the same thing, but the fear is irrational, Eliah, there’s no explanation. And it’s powerful, as powerful as what I feel for you. I think that’s why…I’m so scared!”
“What happened with your ex-husband?”
“We tried for months. I don’t want to remember it, please.”
“No, no, no details, just the facts.”
“I begged him to go to couples therapy to work through the problem, but he refused. He’s a very reserved, suspicious man. And he doesn’t think much of psychiatry. So our pathetic married life continued without intimacy. And I would retreat further and further and he would become more and more aggressive. I started therapy with a psychiatrist, who explained to me why I’m like this, the origins of my trauma. My education, the dysfunctional family I come from and my experiences conspired to make me a damaged woman.”
“Never say that again!” Eliah was upset by what she was saying, and Matilde started to sob. “You’re not a damaged woman. Matilde, my love, there’s nothing bad in you, believe me. Every time I have you in my arms, I feel your womanhood. Your body vibrates with desire for me and that makes me happy. Matilde, Matilde,” he whispered, overwhelmed by her pain, crushed by his impotence.
“I hurt Roy a lot and he hurt me. One night…” From the inflection in her voice, Eliah knew she was talking about something he didn’t want to hear. “One night he came home drunk and insane with rage. He had been with his cousin Guillermo, who had filled his head with stupid ideas. We fought. He called me frigid, saying that I wasn’t really a woman, then told me that he was sleeping with someone else. He was like a madman and…” Though he knew what she was going
to say, Eliah wanted to implore her not to. “And he raped me.”
Matilde heard Eliah’s rough, deep breath and suddenly felt herself abandoned on the divan. She opened her eyes. He had moved away and was punching the wall and cursing in his language. She understood some of the words. Merde. Merde. Maudit. Fils de pute. Fils de pute. Fils de pute. Al-Saud lifted his arms over his head and rested his fists on the wall. His head hung down, his chin on his chest. The muscles in his back contracted and relaxed as he breathed deeply to calm himself down. Matilde didn’t know how to proceed. She just needed him to hold her, and he seemed incapable of touching her. Rage and disgust kept them apart. She felt the urge to flee. “What a shitty night!” she lamented, depressed and devastated.
Eliah heard Matilde’s movements and turned to see her leaving the room. He strode over to her and stopped her in the hall. They looked into each other’s eyes before he enveloped her in an embrace. Matilde buried her face in his chest, and he felt her tears on his skin. It melted his heart to feel how desperately she clutched his back, like the survivor of a shipwreck clinging onto a plank in the middle of the ocean.
“Don’t reject me, Eliah, please.”
Eliah clenched his teeth so as not to bellow like a madman. She had misinterpreted him. He wasn’t rejecting her. He cradled her face in his hands and kissed her wet eyes, her red nose and her trembling lips.
“Matilde.” He loved saying her name. “My sweet Matilde.”
“I’m terrified, Eliah. But I want to be normal. I want to be a woman.”
“I’m going to help you, my love. I’ll make you mine and I’ll make you feel like a woman.”
“I want to be yours!”
For the third time that night, Eliah took her in his arms and led her to the bedroom. He lay her down on the bed, and she curled up like a fetus. Eliah took off her shoes before curving his body around hers. He spoke softly into her ear and showed her how to breathe to ease her anxiety and stop crying. Little by little, the spasms stopped and the pressure in her diaphragm diminished.