Lucien and she had been the perfect match, completely compatible. They liked the same movies, books, music, and art, and got on so well, it was almost uncanny. They shared the same philosophy of life, wanted similar things, and were ambitious for themselves.
Jessica had believed she knew Paris well— until she met Lucien; he had quickly shown her she knew it hardly at all. He took her to wonderful out-of-the-way places, charming bistros, unique little boutiques, art galleries, and shops, and obscure pretty corners filled with peacefulness. He showed her interesting churches, little-known museums, and he had taken her on trips to Brittany, Provence, and the Côte d’Azur.
Their days together had been golden, filled with blue skies and sunshine, tranquil days and passion-filled nights.
He had taught her so much … about so many different things … sex and love … the best wines and food, and how to savor them … with him she had eaten mussels in a delicious tangy broth, omelettes so light and fluffy they were like air, soft aromatic cheeses from the countryside, and tiny fraises du bois, minuscule wood strawberries fragrant with an indefinable perfume, sumptuous to eat with thick clotted cream.
With him, everything was bliss.
He had called her his long-stemmed American beauty, had utterly loved and adored her, as she had him, and their days together had been sublime, so in tune were they, and happy. They made so many plans.…
But one day he was gone.
Lucien disappeared.
Distraught, she tried to find him, teaming up with his best friend, Alain Bonnal. His apartment was undisturbed; nothing had been removed. His agent had no idea where he was and was as baffled and worried as they were. He was an orphan; they knew of no family member to go to, no one to appeal to for information. She and Alain checked hospitals, the morgue, listed him as a missing person. To no avail. He was never found, either living or dead.
That spring of 1994 Lucien Girard had disappeared off the face of the earth. He might never have existed. But she knew very well that he had.…
Suddenly jumping up, Jessica hurried across the office to the large French armoire where she kept fabric samples, opened the drawer at the bottom, and pulled out a red leather photograph album. Carrying it back to the desk, she sat down, opened the album, and began turning the pages. It was a full and complete record of her three years in Paris studying interior design. Almost everyone she had met and cared about was in there.
There we are, Lucien and me, she thought, staring down at the photograph of them on the banks of the Seine, just near the Pont des Arts, the only metal bridge in Paris. She peered at the picture, instantly struck by their likeness to each other; Lucien had been tall and slender also, with fair coloring and bluish-gray eyes. The love of my life, she thought, and swiftly turned the page.
Here were she and Alexa, Kay, Maria, and Anya, in the garden of Anya’s house. And here was a fun picture of Nicky and Larry clowning it up with Alexa, and Maria Franconi looking mournful at the back.
Jessica experienced an unexpected feeling of great sadness … Lucien had disappeared and everything had gone wrong after that. “Les girls,” as Nicky Sedgwick called their quartet, had quarreled and disbanded. And it had all been so … so … silly and juvenile.
Jessica closed the album. If she went to Anya’s birthday party she would undoubtedly run into her former friends. She shrugged mentally … not knowing how she really felt about them. Seven years. It had all happened seven years ago … a long time, a lot of water under the bridge.
And could she actually face being in Paris? She didn’t know. Paris was Lucien.
Lucien no longer existed.
That had to be true, because he had never surfaced, never reappeared. She still heard from Alain Bonnal occasionally, and he was as baffled as she continued to be; they had come up with every scenario they could think of, and were never satisfied with any of them, never sure what could have happened.
Accept the invitation. Go to Paris, just for the hell of it,
she told herself. Then changed her mind instantly. No, decline. You’re only going to open up old wounds.
Jessica closed her eyes, leaning back in the chair … her memories of Paris and Lucien were golden … filled with happiness and a joy she had not experienced since her days with him.
Better to keep the memories intact.
She would send her regrets.
————
GARY SAID FROM the doorway of her office, “So, you finally decided to come home.”
Startled, Jessica swung around in the chair and stared at him. He was leaning against the doorjamb, wearing crumpled clothes and a belligerent expression.
He’s an angry drunk, she thought, but said, “You look as if you’ve been ridden hard and put away wet.”
He frowned, never having liked her southern Texan humor. “Why did you get back so late?” he demanded.
“What difference does it make? You had passed out dead drunk on my sofa.”
He let out a long sigh and slid into the room, came to stand by her chair, suddenly smiling down at her. “I guess we got to celebrating. Harry and Phil were crazy about the first draft of the script, and after making our notes, a few changes, we were pretty sure it was almost good enough to be a shooting script. So … we decided to celebrate—”
“I guess it just got out of hand.”
“No. You just got back very late.”
“Nine o’clock isn’t all that late.”
“Why were you late? Did Mark Sylvester detain you … in some way?” He cocked a dark brow and glared.
“Don’t be ridiculous! And I don’t like the innuendo. He wasn’t even there. And I was late because there was a lot of traffic on the Santa Barbara Freeway. And how was Gina?”
“Gina?” Gary frowned, then sat down on the sofa.
“Don’t tell me Gina wasn’t here tonight, because I smelled her perfume in the den. And she’s always at your script meetings, drinks my best red wine, and leaves her lipstick on the wineglass. Harry hasn’t taken to wearing lipstick, has he?”
“Your sarcasm is wasted on me, Jessica. And I fail to understand why you’re always so hard on her. Gina’s been my assistant for years.”
And partner in bed when you see fit, she thought, then said, “This ain’t my first rodeo … I know what’s what.”
Gary leapt to his feet, color flooding his face. He looked apoplectic as he said, “I can see the frame of mind you’re in, and I’m not staying around to get in the way of your whip, missy. I’m going to my place. I’ll get my stuff tomorrow. See you around, kid.”
Jessica did not respond. She merely stared at him coldly, understanding suddenly how truly tired she was of having him use her. And misuse her house.
He strode out and slammed the office door behind him. A moment later she heard the front door bang and the screech of wheels as he drove out of her front yard at breakneck speed.
And at this precise moment Jessica Pierce realized she actually didn’t care that he had left in a temper … or that she had pushed him at a bad moment, and he had almost snapped.
She opened the red leather album and turned the pages, staring at the photographs of her three years in Paris, and with a flash of unexpected insight she recognized how little Gary Stennis meant in her life. Yes, she had feelings for him, and in the early stages of their relationship she had truly believed they had a chance of making it together on a long-term basis. But now the odds of it working were remote. If she were honest with herself, she knew she shouldn’t string him along anymore. It wasn’t fair to him, or to herself for that matter. She ought to end the affair.
Well, maybe she just had. He had left in a huff and might never come back.
She thought again of Lucien, gazing at a photograph of him standing between her and Alexa outside Anya’s school on the rue de l’Université. How young we all look in the picture, she thought. Young, innocent, with life ahead of us … how unconcerned we were about the future … about our lives. We t
hought we were invulnerable, immortal.
“Lucien,” she murmured out loud, tracing a finger over his face. “What happened to you?”
She had no answer for herself, just as she never had. His disappearance was a mystery. It was one that would never be solved.
CHAPTER EIGHT
TO JESSICA THE PACIFIC HAD NEVER LOOKED MORE BEAUTIFUL.
The deepest of blues, glittering brilliantly in the afternoon sunlight, it was dazzling to the eye as it stretched into infinity.
Her gaze remained focused on the ocean as she turned inward, fell down into her thoughts, asking herself what her life was all about, where she was heading, and where she would end up.
In the last twenty-four hours she had felt extremely depressed about her relationship with Gary, which she now believed was doomed to failure. The end was coming, of that she was sure; she could only hope it would not be too messy.
It was Monday afternoon, and Jessica was sitting in the small antique gazebo she had shipped from a stately home in England. It now stood at the tip of Mark Sylvester’s property in Santa Monica.
On a bluff facing the sea, the gazebo was a peaceful spot, a place for reflection and tranquillity, as she had known it would be. Mark loved it, just as he loved the new house. She had been quite certain he would approve, but it was a relief, nonetheless, to know he was actually thrilled with it. He was moving in next weekend, and today she had walked him through for the first time since the furnishings had been installed.
Everything’s gone right with the house; everything’s gone wrong in my personal life, she thought, her mind settling on Gary. She had called him yesterday, wanting to be conciliatory, to make amends, but he had not picked up. Nor had he returned his messages. At least, not hers.
So be it, she suddenly thought. I must get on with my life, move on. I have to in order to save myself. Instinctively, Jessica felt that Gary Stennis would only drag her down with him. She paused in her thoughts, frowning to herself. There it was again, the frightening idea that Gary was on a downward spiral.
“What a strange conclusion to come to,” she murmured to herself, then stood up and left the gazebo.
Slowly, she walked up toward the house, through the beautiful gardens that had been planned and executed by one of the world’s great landscape designers from England. They were in perfect harmony with the new house, built where the old one, a Spanish hacienda, had once stood.
In its place, shimmering in the sunlight, was a Palladian villa of incomparable symmetry and style. Built of white stone, it had the classic temple façade of arches and columns made famous by Andrea Palladio, the Renaissance architect.
Jessica paused for a moment, stood gazing at the new villa, and realized once again how much it reminded her of one of the great houses on Southern plantations. But, as she well knew, these, too, had been Palladio adaptations, as were so many of those lovely Georgian mansions in Ireland.
Jessica had hired an architect renowned for his expertise in Palladian architecture to design the villa, and she had worked very closely with him to achieve what she knew Mark liked and wanted. Inside, the central hall was the pivotal point, with all the rooms grouped around it for total symmetry, following Palladio’s basic rule.
Once the house was completed, Jessica had decorated the interiors in her inimitable and distinctive style, using lots of pastel colors and cream and white for the most part. Her well-known signature was a room based on a monochromatic color scheme, the finest antique furniture and art money could buy, combined with luxurious fabrics, carpets, and stylish objects of art. Since Mark had given her carte blanche and an unlimited budget, she had been able to create a house of extraordinary beauty and style, and one totally lacking in pretension or overstatement.
Walking along the terrace, Jessica opened the French doors leading into the library, and found herself coming face-to-face with Mark.
“Where did you disappear to?” he asked, looking at her curiously.
“You became so involved with your business call, I thought I’d better leave you in peace. I went for a walk.”
“I didn’t need privacy, you could have stayed,” he replied, and sat down on the sofa.
She took a seat on the opposite sofa and said, “I’m glad I put the gazebo down there on the bluff … I enjoyed a few minutes of perfect quiet, just whiling away the time, watching the ocean.”
“It’s a great spot …” His voice trailed off, and he eyed her for a moment before saying, “You’ve looked awfully troubled all morning, Jessica. Want to talk about it?”
“Not sure,” she murmured.
“He’s been around the block too many times for you, and he’s—” Mark cut himself off, stared at her, suddenly looking chagrined.
She stared back at him, her eyes wide with surprise.
“I’m sorry, Jessica, I shouldn’t have said that. It’s none of my business. I overstepped the boundaries there.”
“No, no, it’s okay,” she said swiftly, offering him a small smile. “I was staring at you only because I’d thought the same thing myself yesterday. I’m afraid Gary and I are at odds at the moment, and I’m not sure the situation will change.”
“Leopards and their spots, and all that,” Mark volunteered, and shook his head. “I guess he’s drinking again.”
“No, no, not at all, it’s not that,” Jessica was quick to say. “We’re at odds because of other things. To tell you the truth, it’s partially my fault. I’ve been so involved with my work in the last six months, I’m afraid I’ve neglected him some. And also, I think we’ve just grown apart.”
“That can happen when there are two careers going strong. Separations, preoccupations.” He rose and walked over to the built-in bar at one end of the library. “Would you like something to drink? A Coke? Water?”
“I’ll have a cranberry juice, please, Mark.” She laughed. “I know there’s a bottle there, I put it in the refrigerator on Saturday morning.”
He nodded, stood for a moment pouring their drinks, wondering why Jessica had become involved with Gary Stennis in the first place. She deserved so much better. He was a nice guy, and still good-looking in a washed-out, faded sort of way. That was partially due to the booze and hard living over the years. In one sense, Gary was bordering on the edge now, almost but not quite a has-been in the business.
It’s one helluva cruel town we live in, he thought, pouring cranberry juice into a highball glass. He knew full well what the industry thought of Stennis, that he had only a couple of scripts left in him, and that was about it. Once he had been the greatest, in Mark’s considered opinion. But the booze and the women had taken their toll, got to him, laid him out flat at times. Life could be pretty tough on the fast track of Hollywood fame and fortune, accolades and alcohol.
He smiled to himself. You had to have the strength, willpower, and ruthlessness of a Genghis Khan to survive here.
As he walked across the room, he couldn’t help thinking what a good-looking woman Jessica was. She looked especially wonderful today. She wore a pale-lavender-colored suit with a shortish skirt and very high-heeled shoes; he had always admired her long, silky legs. She was a bit too thin for his taste, but striking nevertheless, and her coloring was superb.
“Thanks, Mark,” she said as he put the drink in front of her on the glass-topped coffee table.
His thoughts stayed with her as he went back to the bar to get his ginger ale. Jessica Pierce was one of the nicest people he knew. There was a sweetness and kindness in her nature that was most commendable, and which he admired.
He knew that she knew that Gary was drinking heavily, and that she had avoided agreeing with him, of admitting this, in order to protect Gary in his eyes. Honorable, loyal girl. Too nice for Stennis, as it happened.
When he returned and sat down opposite her, Mark raised his glass. “Cheers, Jessica. And thank you for making this place so beautiful. You’re just … miraculous.”
She smiled at him, her eyes suddenly spar
kling with pleasure. “Thanks, Mark, I’m glad you love your new home. Cheers.” There was a moment’s pause. “And thanks for trusting me, giving me carte blanche to do what I wanted.”
“I’m a bit in awe of you, you know. In awe of your knowledge, your taste, your restraint, your flair, your style. You’re just the … the … whole enchilada, Jess.”
She laughed at his turn of phrase, took a sip of her drink, and studied him for a moment. She found herself wondering for the umpteenth time why Kelly O’Keefe had left him, had sued for divorce last year. He was such a nice man, at least he was with her, fair, reasonable, and a pleasure to work with, plus he had a good reputation in Hollywood. But she was aware he was a tough businessman, which is why he was a successful producer. Wimps didn’t make it in the movie business. At least not to the big time.
Jessica knew Mark Sylvester was forty-five, but he didn’t look it. In fact, he seemed much younger, like a man in his mid-thirties; he was lean, tanned, somewhat athletic in appearance, with a pleasant if angular face, and very knowing, alert brown eyes. Kind eyes that could turn as hard as black pebbles if he was displeased. She’d seen that look directed at one of his associates a couple of times, and she was glad it was not she who was on the receiving end.
“You’re staring at me, Jessica.”
Laughing self-consciously, she admitted, “To be honest, Mark, I was thinking about you and Kelly, and your divorce, wondering why on earth she would leave you.”
He gave her a quick, speculative look and replied, “I let that idea penetrate the town. But in actuality, Jessica, I was the one who asked for the divorce.”
“Oh, I didn’t know.”
“Nobody did. Nobody does. They think she wanted it.”
“I see.”
Mark sat back on the sofa and looked off into the distance for a split second, a reflective expression entering his dark eyes. As if coming to a sudden decision, he sat up straighter and said, “I’ve never really explained about the divorce. Not to anyone, Jessica. However, I trust you in a way I can’t quite explain. So, here goes. I had a problem with Kelly. She drank a lot, and that was hard for me to take. In fact, she was well on the way to becoming an alcoholic.”