Page 27

Chapter Twenty-Seven

“It’s too bad your sister and parents came down with something,” Marcus says to me on Wednesday when we meet at Le Pompeux. “That’s what you get for eating at a truck stop. But they’ll have to get used to microwaved burritos, won’t they?”

I smile as he continues. “But I’m glad they didn’t spoil the night for us. We’ll all see each other later this week anyway. I think the universe planned it this way. Please.”

He motions for me to sit. I take a seat on one side of the banquette.

“You’re so far away,” he pouts, sliding around to the center. “Le Pompeux celebrates the passion of food and intimacy of ingredients. We will be sharing a lot tonight.” Creepy . “Food that is.” He pats the banquette seat beside him. “Closer.”

I slide a bit farther and as I do, he slides, too. Our shoulders meet.

My stomach turns, and I want to run away, but I force my body to stay put.

“Now we can finally get to know each other better,” he continues. “I feel like you’ve become a big part of my life. I start every morning with Emma Page.” Marcus looks at me, waiting until I meet his gaze. “And now, finally, I’m ending a day with you.”

That night on the beach at my dad’s book party seems like a lifetime ago. I’m still the same age, but I feel much, much older.

Our waiter appears, and I want to leap into his arms to thank him for the interruption.

“A bottle of Veuve,” Marcus says, smiling at me. “No plastic flutes tonight.”

“Would you care to start with anything, sir?” the waiter asks.

“We’ll share Le Tartare de Thon and Le Crab & Avocado, please,” Marcus says.

“Very good, sir. I’ll be back in a moment with your champagne.”

I focus my gaze on the harbor outside the open patio doors.

It is a twinkly summer night.

Star light, boat lights and car lights dance atop the water like an ethereal Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers from GiGi’s favorite late-night movies.

Through the front windows, a snaking line outside Le Pompeux glimmers as well: people, young and old, decked out in sequins, diamonds, sunglasses (yes, worn at night), cell phones shining.

“You’re an insider that’s always felt like an outsider,” Marcus says out of the blue.

He’s been watching me. “I was always an outsider looking in.” Marcus points at the line of people.

“You always seem so confident,” I say. “I’m shocked.”

“We all wear a suit of armor,” he says. “Just look at your parents.” Marcus smiles and looks outside. “I feel as if we were destined to meet at that allegorical velvet rope. Both of our families were instrumental in making us the people we are, both of our families propelled us to this moment, right here, right now.”

You have no idea , I think.

The champagne arrives, and the waiter pops the cork. He pours us two glasses and then nestles the bottle in a bucket of ice on a stand by our banquette.

“To family!” Marcus toasts. “To honoring it and destroying it. Cheers!”

He raises his glass. I raise mine. Marcus recoils as if I’m going to toss it in his face and then laughs.

I actually want to smash the bottle over your head.

“Cheers!” I say.

We clink glasses and chitchat until our food arrives.

“You must taste the tuna,” Marcus insists.

I pick up my fork.

“Oh, no, no, let me feed you.”

He cuts the tartare and captures some tuna and wonton, swirling it in the sesame dressing.

“Open wide,” he says.

I feel both sick and like a fool. I open my mouth.

“Isn’t it delicious?” he asks.

“Mmm-hmm,” I say, chewing.

“The perfect combination,” he says. “Like us.”

I start to choke. I grab my champagne and take a big sip, remembering I need to keep my wits about me.

“Are you okay?” he asks.

I wipe my mouth with my napkin. “I’m sorry. It’s just so good.”

“Your mouth has very good taste.”

I am now screaming inside so loudly that I’m sure whales in the nearby ocean can hear me.

Marcus takes a bite of the tuna and then a sip of his champagne.

“I also have very good taste,” he continues. “In books, in business and in people. So let’s discuss your future.”

“I would love nothing more.”

“Good,” he says. “It seems we have your father convinced our terrible manuscript is a masterpiece. You are still completely confident in that assumption after spending the weekend with them, correct?”

“I do,” I nod. “We were just talking about it. They are ready to leap.”

“Good, good. I plan to leak the first chapter to the press, which will force your parents to get behind it and expend some capital before they ever see the final manuscript. They trust us both so much now.”

“They do,” I say.

“Then we ruin them,” he says. “They’ll have no option but to sell to me at a bargain basement price, and I take over and publish the books I know will make money—mine.”

“Yours?” I ask, nearly choking again. “I didn’t know that. How exciting.”

“And maybe yours,” he says.

Marcus moves so close I can feel the heat from his body.

“For a price.”

“A price?”

The waiter appears and tops off our champagne. “Are you ready to order your entrées, sir?”

“Not quite yet,” Marcus says. “We’re enjoying the appetizers and each other’s company. Both are quite delicious.”

I smile.

“So,” Marcus continues after the waiter departs as quietly as he came, “you want your book published, you want to work with me, and you want a career as an author, am I right?”

“Yes. More than anything.”

“There is a price to pay for everything that matters in this world, it just all depends how much you want it,” Marcus says. He again nods to the line outside the windows. “You’re either waiting in line your entire life for that dream, or you’re granted entrance and never have to wait again. I prefer not waiting for what I want.”

“What is the price, Mr. Flare?”

He places his arm on the table so that it’s touching mine.

“Say my name again,” he purrs. “I can’t tell you how much I love hearing it come out of your mouth.”

“Mr. Flare.”

He trembles.

“Let’s recap what you have in your shopping cart, shall we?” He clears his throat. “For all that you dream, I have two simple requests. First, you sign the NDA my attorney has drafted that I have waiting in my house on Lily Pond Lane.”

“Haven’t I proven myself to you already?” I ask.

“You have,” he says, “but that’s not enough, because I do not trust anyone in this life, even you. Sadly, the human race is inflicted with guilt and remorse, emotions I thankfully do not have but know are still racing around in those Page veins of yours. To truly have someone’s trust you must own them in some way. They must fear you. They must stay awake at night thinking of how they can be hurt if they do not perform as asked. I learned that from the earliest of ages.”

Marcus looks at me and smiles.

“People are simple creatures,” he continues. “We are taught that we require only a few things for happiness—family, love, a home, a little money, safety, a feeling of warmth. So when those things are threatened, simple creatures will follow basic rules.”

“What is your second request?” I ask as calmly as I can muster, hands now under the table so Marcus will not see them shake.

“That, after you sign the NDA, you sleep with me.”

I can feel my heart pulse in my temples. My jaw clenches. I grip my hands as hard as I can to keep myself together.

“I’ve recorded our conversations, and you will become a pariah if I publicly release what you’ve done to your parents behind their backs.”

“But you… ” I start.

“No, I wouldn’t, Emma. Everyone in the publishing world knows I’m saving your parents’ asses, and they’re thrilled I am trying to keep an indie publisher alive in a world of mega publishers and shrinking options for authors. Your parents haven’t had a hit in ages. They may present a perfect image, but their business model is flawed. Furthermore, no one in publishing would touch one of your books, save, of course, for me. Your parents despise the type of book you’ve written, too. And, as I’ve told you before, I hold a secret that will destroy your parents’ entire reputation.”

“And what is that, exactly?” I ask. “I think we’ve played cat and mouse long enough, don’t you?”

“Oh, no,” Marcus says. “Not until we seal our deal.”

“But why would I do that without knowing the actual dirt you have on my family? Why would I just agree to your conditions without some sort of proof?”

I force myself to be quiet for a moment and challenge him with a lingering stare. Marcus does not do well with silence.

He shifts in the booth. I know I can go further.

“I mean, you could be bluffing,” I add, knowing, of course, he’s not.

“Oh, no. You’re smart, but not smarter than me,” he says. “Quid pro quo, Emma. You know what that means?”

Oh, I know my Latin, mister. Believe me.

“Something for something,” I say.

“Very good!” Marcus says. “Yes, there must be a reciprocal exchange of services—or, in this case, favors—and that starts with your signature and your accompanying me home tonight. Once you—pardon the pun—sign on my dotted line, I will tell you every last juicy piece of dirt I have on your parents while we’re enjoy another glass of champagne. Words are words, actions are concrete, just like NDAs.”

Marcus holds up his champagne glass.

“I’m actually saving you,” he continues, “from every construct society has placed upon your shoulders…love, family, playing by the rules.”

“You’re married ,” I say, barely able to hide my disgust.

“And?” he says with a sudden, howling laugh. He lowers his glass. “Another construct, Emma! My God, that’s what I’m trying to teach you.”

“Does your wife know?”

“Of course she knows! And I know, too. I mean, after three years of tennis lessons with a pro who looks like Rafael Nadal, you think she could actually have learned to return a serve.”

“Why do you stay with her?”

“Because she’s beautiful, and it’s the story people want, Emma,” Marcus says. “And Rebecca gets anything and everything she’s ever dreamed of.”

“But not love.”

“Goddammit, Emma, there is no such thing as love! When will you learn that?” His voice echoes. People turn. Marcus waves at a couple. He turns back to me, his voice low. “That’s what I’m trying to make you understand through all of this. We’ve all been taught to believe in love, but it’s a ghost, Emma. It’s not real. Family is not real. Happy endings are not real.”

Marcus takes a sip of champagne and glances around Le Pompeux.

“Why do you think the world searches for love, reads books about love, watches movies about love, dreams of happy endings? Because no one has it, and no one ever will. We spend our lives searching for something that does not exist and the search for that makes us miserable. I write about it solely because I know it’s profitable.”

“How do you know love isn’t real?” I ask.

“Because all we do in this world is hurt one another,” he says, “and then we seek this magic elixir to make all that pain go away, but it’s a self-perpetuating cycle. Love shouldn’t hurt. Family shouldn’t cause you pain. Once you stop believing in love and learn that it’s a business like any other, the world is yours.”

Marcus skews his eyes at me. I look into them, deeply.

I am no longer afraid.

I no longer see an evil man, just the decayed soul of a lost boy who was never told that he was loved. I suddenly realize why his writing has never resonated with me, why it’s so different from GiGi’s. It’s because he doesn’t know a damn thing about love. It’s a mystery to him, and he writes about it like a setting he’s never actually visited.

Marcus is wrong: love is real.

And love can hurt.

They are not mutually exclusive.

I am living proof of that dichotomy.

Love can only hurt when you love back.

That’s why it hurts.

But we must love or what else is there?

An eternal void.

A hole as big and dark as the one in Marcus’s heart.

But love can only start when you are shown love, when you love yourself, and if you’re incapable of that, you are incapable of loving anyone at any time.

And that is the difference between me and Marcus.

Despite my family’s eccentricities, I was taught to love myself, believe in myself, honor myself, and that takes root in a family and grows through generations like the rings in a tree.

I glance around Le Pompeux and then look outside. I no longer see people behind a rope. I see young and old, those who are privileged and those scraping together enough cash for a special night out. They are here to celebrate birthdays, anniversaries and one another.

I realize Marcus is staring at me.

“As a young, smart, progressive woman you should fight against all of the societal constructs you’ve been taught to live by in America,” he declares. “Let me help set you free.”

I again see a boy whose father is in prison, a boy who will never be free.

“May we get the check?” Marcus asks as the waiter returns. “We’ll get some dessert to go to enjoy together later.” He looks at me. After , he mouths.

“Of course, sir,” the waiter says.

I begin to scratch my arm, harder and harder.

I cough.

“Excuse me?” I call to the waiter as he begins to leave.

“Yes, ma’am?”

“Was there papaya in the Crab & Avocado appetizer?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

I know this, of course.

“Oh, my God,” I say. “I’m allergic to papaya.”

“Do you require an EpiPen?” the waiter asks. “A doctor?”

“No, I carry one in my purse in case of an emergency like this,” I say. “Please excuse me.”

I stand and hurry to the bathroom.

I take a seat in a stall and wait.

My cell trills after a few moments.

He left…of course.

When I return to the banquette, Jess is sitting where Marcus just was. She is pouring Veuve into a new champagne glass.

The waiter returns.

“Mr. Flare paid for dinner and left you a note,” he says, handing me a piece of paper. “I hope you’re feeling better, ma’am.”

“Much, thank you.”

The waiter leaves.

“Marcus is a true gentleman,” Jess says. “Paid for dinner but left without saying goodbye when he thought you were sick and knew he couldn’t sleep with you.”

I open the note.

I’ll be back in the Hamptons on Friday. See you at seven. One Lily Pad Lane.

“He’s like a dog with a bone,” Jess says. “And I mean that literally.”

“Did you get everything?” I ask. “I will kill you if you didn’t. I can’t go through this again.”

Jess places her cell against the bottle of champagne on the table and hits Play.

The entire nightmare of an evening is replayed before my eyes.

“This footage is so close,” I say. “How did you get it all so clearly?”

Jess grabs her cell and begins to text. A moment later, Babe and Gretchen appear.

“You can thank our two friends from college,” Jess says. “Gretchen got Babe a table right in front of you. Her face was hidden by that massive vase.”

“The Swans will always protect their flock,” Babe says.

“Thank you,” I say. “What do we do now?”

“Finish this champagne,” she says, “and then tell Mom and Dad everything.”