Shopping in Paris
Flicka von Hannover
We all have our specialized skill sets.
And indeed, Flicka could shop anywhere.
Dieter did some due diligence surveillance from the windows before they left the apartment, and he staged some items in the room, placing things just so and pointing at the corners of the room or the windows, before they went shopping. He pasted one of Flicka’s blond hairs across the door and its frame with spit.
Flicka skipped along the sidewalk with him, craning her neck at the display windows as they passed bohemian boutiques and interesting little shops.
In a tiny shop off a side street, she found some very nice slacks and blouses in good fabrics that she would have worn any day of the week. In another, they found some nice button-down shirts and trousers for Dieter, whom she bullied into first trying them on and then showing her.
When he walked past her, imitating the long-legged strut of runway models, she laughed at him, and he looked around quickly to make sure no one had seen.
It was nice when Dieter allowed himself to be silly. He wasn’t able to very often, what with keeping her brother from getting shot and all.
The trousers looked good on him, though, especially the way the fine fabric clung to his strong behind and legs. During their relationship in London, they’d never gone shopping together, not like this. Even when she’d had that bespoke tuxedo tailored for him, he had gone to the fittings without her, lest someone talk about them.
Here, Flicka tucked their purchases from several stores into one shopping bag, which she carried, not Dieter. Bodyguards never carry shopping bags. It interferes with shooting the bad guys.
For supper, they found a little cafe and sat far inside and near the back, and they ate together. Flicka ate a mild whitefish. Dieter had a tenderloin of beef. The potatoes were creamy and well-sauced, and Flicka ate four carbolicious bites of them.
Nothing bad happened.
Afterward, in the dimming summer sun, they walked back to the safe house by a different route, and Dieter kept her behind him while he inspected first the door, where her hair still clung to the white paint, and then the room. He flicked on a light and continued the inspection.
When he was done examining everything, he locked the door behind them, and Flicka heard him blow out his breath as if relieved. “And we’re home.”
Home.
Dieter had used to call their flat in Kensington Palacehome.It felt nice to hear it, even if he meant it about a tiny apartment in Paris that they would leave in the morning.
“Yeah,” she said. “It’s good to be home.”
He walked over to the telephone that was plugged into the wall and picked up the receiver. “What was Magnus Jensen’s phone number?”
Flicka told him, starting with the Swiss country code.
He didn’t glance at her while he pushed the buttons.
Dieter said into the phone, “Got them?” He wrote something on the pad of paper and hung up. “Our first flight is at ten-fifty tomorrow morning on British Airways. The flights go all the way to Las Vegas.”
“And after that? How about after we reach Nevada?” she asked.
Dieter looked out the window. “My daughter has been with a babysitter since I left over a week ago.”
“I hired Suze Meier,” she reminded him.
“I have to go get her. I can’t stay away any longer. Alina’s mother abandoned us, and I have full custody. Alina doesn’t have anyone else in the world.” He looked back to Flicka, and anguish shaded his voice. “She’s mydaughter.”
“No, no. I understand.” Flicka understood very well how a young child would miss her mother and cling to a father figure as the only stability in her life.
Dieter chuckled, but it was a sad sound. “I put down Wulfram and Rae as her next legal guardians, if something should happen to me. Her mother doesn’t want her at all.”
“Wulfie would be a good father to Alina, if it came to that. He did everything for me.”
“Gretchen played me, I think. I never managed to have a real conversation with her after she left.”
