Opposites Attack: A Novel with Recipes Provencal (8 page)

Her mind quickly went to how romantic it would be here with Nelson.

Isabella took a sip of the espresso Jean-Luc had made for her.

“Her boyfriend in New York, Nelson, is arriving soon. Mmmm, this is good.”

“Two Americans here? Impossible. They can move into a hotel.”

“I’m glad to hear that.”

“It’s all in the bean, my dear. And the grind, the machine, the water, the tamp pressure, the temperature, the brew pressure, and timing. Easy as can be.”

Their eyes twinkled in the same way at the same time. How long could they keep up this charade that they did not speak English?

Alyce had a naïveté about her that he had seen in many Americans traveling to France for the first time. He felt a modicum of pity for her.

Isabella leaned on the counter and bent over slightly so Jean-Luc could see she was not wearing a bra. She was wearing the same sexy dress she had on the night she convinced him to be her escape route from Robbie. He still regretted his compliance, though not entirely.

Jean-Luc eyed his cottage through the kitchen window and wondered how much longer he would stay here. He could feel it was time to move on. Or was that another excuse to avoid writing?

Isabella cautiously asked, “What are you thinking about, Jean-Luc?”

Using a small gold spoon, he stirred up the grounds in the white demitasse cup and searched for a response that would playfully tick her off. “I wonder which Devreaux will be sneaking in to see her. Or will she take another lover before her swain arrives.”

Her cup came down with a clank. “It better not be you.”

He turned to her. “You insult me. She is hardly my type.”

“I thought every woman was your type.”

He nonchalantly looked back at the cottage. “Now you insult yourself.”

“Maybe
I
will seduce her.”

She charged up the stairs to the guest room where she kept her suitcase. What come-hither outfit would she pull out next?

He took a suede shoulder bag off its hook by the kitchen door that opened to the back of his villa, checked that his clippers and pistol were in it, and headed to the woods to snip herbs and wild flowers.

Alyce darted out of the cottage. In French she tried to say, he deduced, “Do you have a housekeeper? This place is dirty.” It came out as: “Have you a house that is gone? I need a bath.”

He held in a laugh and played dumb. She mimed sweeping the floor and scrubbing counters. He mimed the same back, pointed at her, then the house.

“You want me to clean the cottage
and
your house? Yeesh.”

As he walked off he heard her mutter, “Only 78 more days.”

Out of her sight, he took a small notebook and pen from his back pocket and wrote down:
Yeesh.
He threw the pad in the suede bag so Isabella wouldn’t find it, and went about his task.

He returned to find Alyce outside at the wrought-iron table, trying to do her homework. He came from behind and heard her making a common mistake—not connecting a word that ends with a “t” with a word that begins with a vowel so it sounded as though the second one began with the “t.” And her accent wasn’t just off, it was nonexistent. But it was one of the most oft-heard expressions:
comment allez-vous.
How are you?

It could be worse. She could be pronouncing the “z” and “s.”

“Co-
mahn
-tal-
eh
-
voo
,” he said.

She jumped. “You scared me!”

“
Excusez-moi,
mademoiselle.” He handed her part of the bouquet of wild flowers he had gathered for the dining table. “
Pour vous.
”

She smiled and he observed that her teeth were typically American, too straight and white. He would have to add that to his notebook.

“
Merci boucoup
, Jean-Luc. Uh…
très beau?
”

“
Comme c’est beau.
” She nodded as if she understood. “
Répétez, s’il vous plaît.
”

Haltingly she said, “Co-may-say-
bo.
”

Over two months he would have to put up with this?

Nevertheless, he invited her, in French, to join them for dinner at 9:00. She couldn’t answer in French, so she resorted to English while wildly bobbing her head back and forth.

“That’s too late. But thank you, really!”

The eventual scent of pan-seared scallops and braised fennel changed her mind. She said almost nothing throughout the meal, but he could see her listening intently.

Like Colette used to do.

As his sister predicted, this student intrigued him. Not in a sexual way, though that was always a possibility. Was it paternal? Oh, please, not that! Well, maybe a bit. Or was it the assurance that Alyce was material for a story? There was more to this girl than he first imagined.

More than even she knew.

8

The T-word

Alyce thought Jean-Luc’s big dog with matted white-brown hair hanging in cords looked like a Rastafarian. She studied the female Didon who, after two weeks, no longer barked at the sight of her. She remembered something her mother once told her.

“The way a man treats his dog is the way he’ll treat his kids. It’s one of the reasons I married your father. He was so good with his little Pomeranian, Zuzu.”

What about how he treated his girlfriend? Jean-Luc paid more attention to Didon than to Isabella. Either he was always a jerk or something was not right between them.

They had invited Alyce to dine with them the first night—much later than she was accustomed. They went through two bottles of wine. She sensed it was Jean-Luc’s idea to have her there, not Isabella’s, which made her feel even more of an intruder, especially when Isabella acted as though Jean-Luc were the only man alive and Alyce wasn’t even there. Plus, they rattled on in French and quickly tired of teaching her anything. But the meal was so delicious she let their indecipherable conversation wash over her and hoped it would soak into her brain like sun into a plant.

The way Jean-Luc studied her also made her feel uncomfortable.

She was soon taking home leftover lunch at school to cover as her dinner in the cottage. Jean-Luc tried several times to get her to join them. She tried to say in French that she had to study; needed to eat earlier; wanted to be up at 6:00 to jog.

If she heard him say, “
Je ne comprends pas
” one more time she was going to scream. Was she that bad a French student? Really. Even taxi drivers here understood
some
English.

But oh, the wonderful aromas that wafted from his big kitchen painted a warm yellow. The wooden counters made it feel even cozier. It also had a professional eight-burner gas stove,
two
stainless-steel over-under subzero refrigerators, a wine cooler with a glass front, and every kind of pot and pan imaginable hanging above or on a wall. She often helped clean the dishes just so she could be in there and fantasize about her someday home with Nelson.

Alyce wondered about Jean-Luc’s finances. That was an expensive kitchen to put together and he did have a Lexus, yet the house and grounds could look so much nicer.
So
much.

She was at her bistro table outside, finishing a ham and Brie baguette, when she heard Isabella screaming inside the house. She sure was a loud one when they made love.

Wait. Those were real screams.

“
Ayúdeme! Ayúdeme!
” Isabella appeared and motioned. “Come! Now! Help!”

Alyce ran inside. A red-faced, choking Jean-Luc was standing behind his dining chair, clutching the back of it with one hand while frantically pointing to his mouth with the other.

She grabbed him around the waist and did the Heimlich maneuver while Isabella prayed in Spanish. Didon joined the madness with her barking.

She couldn’t help but notice he was in pretty good shape, but after two jerks terror set in.

Isabella ranted on.

Alyce yelled, “TELEPHONO AMBULANCE-O, YOU TWAT!” and gave one more mighty tug.

Jean-Luc staggered out of Alyce’s arms gulping for air, reeled back into the table and laughed between gasps. In a high squeak, he managed, “
Twat!
I cannot believe you said that.”

“You speak English?”

Isabella was furious, too. “You were not choking? It was a joke?”

“Yes, Al-
ees
,” Jean-Luc confessed. “We speak it well. I was just having some fun.” He stood up straight and threw back his shoulders. “I was getting bored!”

That did not go over well with Isabella.

“I mean I was getting bored with our
silly ruse.
I want you to join us for dinner from now on, Al-
ees.
We will make every effort to eat earlier. I need the discipline so I can write.”

Isabella glared at him. Alyce marched out of the room.

She went back to her cottage and locked the door.

What a couple of nuts.

A calmer Isabella stepped under the showerhead to rinse the shampoo out of her long hair. She saw the humor in his prank when he remarked, “You don’t like predictable men. Remember Robbie?”

He was in his shower, seated on the stone seat built out of a chunk of Italian granite. He was at the perfect level at which to bury his face in her own
grotto d’amour.
He did not. One thing was certain. Alyce’s arrival had brought out a different Isabella. She was doing everything in her power to keep him in her thrall.

She knelt before him. He pushed her away. “Not now.”

“You better not be thinking about that girl.”

He stroked her wet hair. “I suggest you stop mentioning her or the defiant boy in me will have to chase her.”

“If you start a notebook on her, I will chase her.
Away.
”

“That is too bad. I was going to write a five-volume set about her.”

Soon they were back in bed. She draped her arm over his chest. He slowly began to stroke it. An owl in the woods screeched and his mind roamed to the day one of his noisy peacocks strutted by a delighted Colette, tossed his head and dropped a brilliant feather, as if presenting her with it. She became upset when she thought she lost it.

The peacocks were long gone. Not only was it pretentious to own them, he couldn’t bear the sight of them anymore. He thought of swimming naked in his pool with Colette, feeling the arch of her back in his hands as she floated peacefully before him, eyes closed. Now the jars of lavender honey they made together came drifting to the surface; her long, curly brown hair pulled back into a ponytail so it wouldn’t fall into it while she concentrated. She would often stop and take a deep breath.

Moments that seemed so small at the time were the ones that lasted the longest in his mind. If only there had been more. He never imagined there wouldn’t be.

He gave Isabella a kiss and focused on her smoky, tarragon taste. Like a Ben Shan oolong tea, it made him crave a thin, light, orange-flavored cookie. She reached to undo the towel he was using as an absorbent sarong. His mind raced, yes/no/yes/no, until his body decided for him.

Her moans intensified until she was begging to have all of him. He reached for a condom from the supply he kept in an antique box on the nightstand.

“Where are they?”

Isabella slowly pulled out the ivory chopsticks holding up her silky mane, causing it to cascade over her bare shoulders like a river of ebony temptation. “We’ve been very busy, no?”

He had to be strong. “There were two left.”

She looked like she wanted to poke one of the sticks in his eye. “I am too old to get pregnant. And I never cheated on Robbie—until you, that is. I have no diseases.”

She was a bad liar. “If you are too old,
then why are you taking Clomid?
”

She matched him in volume. “It’s for making my periods regular, and I would appreciate it if you didn’t look through my things!”

“I was looking for my razor that you borrowed!”

“Then why didn’t you use it?”

“I was too angry after finding your
fertility drug.
It has nothing to do with your cycles. It is to produce more eggs!” In the past he would have physically thrown a woman right out of his home if he’d discovered such a deception. Hard times had taken the starch out of him.

He fell back on the bed, exhausted. “Isabella, if I can’t take care of myself, how can I take care of a child?”

From now on, no more women. He’d had enough to last him five lifetimes.

In the most melancholy of tones, she said, “I understand now, Jean-Luc. I didn’t know the extent of your troubles. But if you are losing interest in me, please be honest.”

He reached for her long dark hair and gently stroked it. “Isabella, I simply cannot be what you want me to be. I cannot be what
I
want to be.”

9