Honor Thyself (6 page)

“Have you tried e-mailing her?” Jason asked.

“Her computer is turned off. She really wanted some time to herself,” Stevie answered matter-of-factly.

“Where's she staying?” he asked, sounding worried. And he was getting Stevie upset too. She had thought of it, but told herself it was ridiculous to worry. She was sure that Carole was fine, but Jason's concern was contagious.

“At the Ritz,” Stevie said quickly.

“I'll call her, and leave a message.”

“She might be traveling, so you may not get an answer for a couple of days. I'm not too worried yet.”

“It can't hurt to leave her a message. Besides, I need to know about this house, or I'll lose it. And I don't want to take it unless the kids want to come down. It might be fun for them.”

“I'll let her know if she calls me,” Stevie assured him.

“I'll see if I can catch her at the Ritz. Thanks.” He hung up then, and Stevie sat at the desk in her office, thinking about it. It seemed so unlikely that anything had happened to Carole, that Stevie was determined not to worry. What were the odds that she had been in the terrorist attack? About one in a hundred million. Stevie forced it out of her mind as she went back to work on a project she'd been doing, gathering information for Carole for some of her women's rights work. With Carole away, it was a good time for Stevie to catch up. The research she was doing was for a speech Carole was planning to make at the UN.

As soon as he hung up, Jason called the Ritz in Paris, and asked for Carole's room. They put him on hold, while they called her room to announce the call. She always had her calls screened by any hotel she was in. They came back on the line then, said she wasn't in her room, and referred him to the front desk, which was unusual. He decided to stay on the line and see what they had to say. A desk clerk asked him to wait for a moment, and then an assistant manager with a British accent came on and asked Jason who he was. The call was getting stranger by the minute, and he didn't like it.

“My name is Jason Waterman, I'm Miss Barber's ex-husband. And I'm a long-standing client of the Ritz. Is something wrong?” He was beginning to have a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach, and he wasn't sure why. “Is Miss Barber all right?”

“I'm sure she is, sir. And this is rather unusual, but we've had a note from the head housekeeper about her room. These things happen, and she may be traveling, or actually staying somewhere else. But she hasn't used her room since she checked in. Normally, I wouldn't mention it, but the housekeeper was concerned. Apparently all of her things are there, as well as her handbag, and her passport is on the desk. There's been no sign of activity in the room for nearly two weeks.” He spoke in a hushed voice, as though divulging a secret.

“Shit,” Jason blurted out. “Has anyone seen her?”

“Not that I'm aware of, sir. Is there anyone you'd like us to call?” This was very unusual. Hotels like the Ritz did not tell people who called that the guest they were calling hadn't used their room in two weeks. Jason knew they must have been worried too.

“Yes, there is,” Jason answered his question. “This probably sounds crazy, but could you check with the police, or the hospitals where the victims of the tunnel attack were taken, and just make sure there are no unidentified victims, either dead or alive?” It made him sick to say it, but he was suddenly worried about her. He still loved her, always had, she was the mother of his kids, and they were good friends. He just hoped nothing terrible had happened. And if it wasn't the tunnel attack, he had no idea where the hell she was. Stevie probably knew more than he did, and didn't want to divulge secrets. Maybe she'd been meeting some guy in Paris, or elsewhere in Europe. She was, after all, single again now, since Sean's death. But then why hadn't she used her room, or at least taken her passport and handbag? These things didn't happen, he told himself. But sometimes they did. He hoped she was shacked up somewhere, with a new romance, and not in a hospital, or worse. “Would you mind calling around?” he asked the assistant manager, who immediately promised that he would.

“Would you be kind enough to leave me your number, sir?” Jason gave it to him. It was one o'clock in New York, and just after seven at night in Paris. He didn't expect to hear from him till the next day. He hung up, feeling uneasy, and sat at his desk, staring at the phone for a long time, thinking of her. His secretary told him the Hotel Ritz in Paris was on the line twenty minutes later. It was the same clipped British voice he'd spoken to before.

“Yes? Could you find anything out?” Jason asked, sounding tense.

“I believe so, sir, although it may not be her. There is a victim of the bombing who was taken to La Pitié Salpêtrière hospital. She is blond, approximately forty to forty-five years old. She is unidentified and has not been claimed.” He made her sound like lost luggage, and Jason's voice was a croak when he spoke.

“Is she alive?” He was terrified of the answer.

“She's in the intensive care unit, in critical condition, with a head injury. She's the only unidentified victim of the bombing they have left. She also has a broken arm, and second-degree burns.” Jason felt sick as he listened. “She's in a coma, which is why they've been unable to identify her. There's no reason to believe it's Miss Barber, sir. I would think someone would have recognized her even in France, since she's known worldwide. This woman is probably French.”

“Not necessarily. Maybe her face is burned. Or maybe they just didn't expect to see her there. Or maybe it's not her. I hope to God it's not.” Jason sounded near tears.

“So do I,” the assistant manager said in a gentle voice. “What would you like me to do, sir? Should I send someone over from the hotel to have a look?”

“I'll fly over. I can catch the six o'clock flight. That will get me to Paris around seven A.M., and the hospital about eight-thirty tomorrow morning. Could you book me a room?” His mind was racing. He wished he could get there sooner, but he knew there was no earlier flight. He went to Paris often, and it was the flight he always took.

“I'll take care of it, sir. I truly hope it's not Miss Barber.”

“Thank you. I'll see you tomorrow.” Jason sat at his desk then, feeling stunned. It couldn't be. This couldn't have happened to her. It didn't bear thinking. He didn't know what to do, so he called Stevie back in

L.A. and told her what he'd heard from the assistant manager at the Ritz. “Oh my God. Please God, tell me that's not Carole,” Stevie said in a strangled voice.

“I hope to hell it's not. I'm going over to see for myself. If you hear from her, call me. And don't say anything to the kids if they call. I'll tell Anthony I'm going to Chicago, or Boston or something. I don't want to say anything to them until we know,” Jason told her firmly.

“I'll fly over,” Stevie said, sounding frantic. The last place she wanted to be now was in L.A. On the other hand, if Carole was fine, Carole was going to think they were all nuts, when she and Jason walked in, as she arrived back at the Ritz from Budapest, or Vienna, or wherever she'd been. She was probably fine, and floating around in Europe somewhere, having a good time, with no idea that anyone was worried about her.

“Why don't you wait till I see what I find out there. The guy at the hotel is right, it may not be her. They probably would have recognized her if it is.”

“I don't know. She looks pretty simple without makeup and fancy hair. And they probably don't expect an American movie star to show up in a trauma unit in Paris. It may not have occurred to them.” Stevie also wondered if her face had been burned, which would explain their not recognizing her.

“They can't be that stupid, for chrissake. She's one of the best-known female stars on the planet, even in France,” Jason snapped.

“I guess you're right,” Stevie said, sounding unconvinced. But then again, he wasn't convinced either, or he wouldn't be going there. They were just trying to reassure each other, without much success.

“I won't get there till ten tonight your time,” Jason told Stevie, “and I probably won't know anything for another couple of hours after that. I'll go straight to the hospital from the airport and see her as soon as I can. But it'll be midnight for you by then.”

“Call me anyway. I'll stay up, and if I fall asleep, I'll keep my cell phone in my hand.” She gave him the number, and he took it, and promised to call her when he got to the hospital in Paris. After that, he told his secretary to cancel his appointments for that afternoon and the next day. He told her what he was doing, but warned her not to mention it to either of his children. The official version was that he had to go to an emergency meeting in Chicago. And five minutes later he left his office and hailed a cab. He was at his apartment on the Upper East Side twenty minutes later, and threw his clothes into a suitcase. It was two o'clock, and he had to leave the city at three for a six o'clock plane.

The next hour was agony as he waited to leave. And it was worse once he got to the airport. There was a surreal quality to all of it, he was going to see a woman in a coma in a Paris hospital, and praying it wouldn't be his ex-wife. They had been divorced for eighteen years, and he had known for the last fourteen that leaving her had been the biggest mistake of his life. He had left her for a twenty-one-year-old Russian model, who had turned out to be the biggest gold-digger on the planet. He had been madly in love with her at the time. Carole had been at the height of her career, doing two and three movies a year. She was always on location somewhere, or promoting a film. He was the whiz kid of Wall Street then, but his success was small potatoes compared to hers. She had won two Oscars in the two years before he left her, and it got to him. She'd been a good wife, but he realized later on that his ego had been too fragile to survive that kind of competition. He needed to feel like a big deal himself, and in the face of Carole's stardom, he never did. So he fell in love with Natalya, who appeared to worship him, and then took him to the cleaners, and left him for someone else.

The Russian model was the worst thing that had ever happened to them, and to him surely. She was staggeringly beautiful, and she'd gotten pregnant weeks after they started their affair. He'd left Carole for her, and married Natalya before the ink was dry on the divorce. She'd had another baby the following year, and then left him for a man with a lot more money than Jason had at the time. She'd had two husbands since, and was now living in Hong Kong, married to one of the most important financiers in the world. Jason hardly knew his two daughters. They were as beautiful as their mother, and virtually strangers to him, despite his visits to them twice a year. Natalya wouldn't let them come to the States to visit, and the New York courts had no jurisdiction over her whatsoever. She was a bitch on wheels, and screwed him over royally in the divorce, a year after Carole and the kids came back from Paris, and moved to L.A. Although Carole had lived in New York with him, while they were married, she had decided to go to Los Angeles. Her work was there, and it seemed like a fresh start after Paris. And after Natalya left, he had tried to go back to Carole. But it was too late. She wanted nothing to do with him by then. He'd been forty-one when he fell in love with Natalya, and having some kind of insane midlife crisis. And at forty-five, when he realized what a mistake he'd made, and what a mess he'd made of his life and Carole's, it was way too late. She told him it was over for her.

It had taken her several years to forgive him, and they didn't actually make friends again until after she married Sean. She was happy finally. And Jason had never married again. At fifty-nine, he was successful, and alone, and considered Carole one of his best friends. And never in his life would he forget the look on her face when he told her he was leaving her, eighteen years before. She looked as though he had shot her. He had relived that moment a thousand times since, and knew he'd never forgive himself. All he wanted now was to know that she was alive and well, and not lying in a hospital in Paris. As he boarded the plane that night, he knew he loved her more than ever. He actually prayed on the flight over, something he hadn't done since he was a boy. He was willing to make any deal he could with God, just so the woman in the Paris hospital wasn't Carole. And if it was, that she would survive.

Jason sat wide awake for the entire flight, thinking about her. Remembering when Anthony had been born, and then Chloe … the day he'd met her … how beautiful she had been at twenty-two, and was even now, twenty-eight years later. They had had ten wonderful years together, until he screwed it up with Natalya. He couldn't even imagine what that must have felt like to Carole. She'd been working on a major movie in Paris when he flew over and told her. It had been a flight like tonight, he'd had a mission then, to end their marriage so he could marry Natalya. And now he was praying for her life. He looked haggard and anxious as the plane landed in a driving rain at Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris just before seven A.M. Paris time, the flight had come in a few minutes early. Jason had his passport in his hand as they landed. He couldn't stand the suspense any longer. All he wanted was to get to the hospital as fast as possible and see the unidentified bombing victim for himself.

Chapter 4

J
ason had brought nothing more to Paris than his briefcase and a small overnight bag. He had hoped to distract himself with work to do on the plane, but he had never touched his briefcase, and couldn't have concentrated on his papers. All he thought about that night was his ex-wife.

The plane touched down at 6:51 A.M. in Paris, local time, and parked far out on a distant runway. Passengers came down the stairs in the pouring rain to a waiting bus, and then lumbered and lurched toward the terminal, while Jason stood impatiently, desperate to get into town. With no luggage checked, he was in a cab at seven-thirty, and asked the driver in halting French to take him to the Pitié Salpêtrière hospital, where the unidentified woman was. He knew it was on the Boulevard de l'Hôpital, in the thirteenth arrondissement, and he had written it down so there would be no mistake. He handed the slip of paper to the driver, who nodded and said, “Good. Understand,” in a heavy French accent, which was no better or worse than Jason's French.