For a few minutes, we rode in silence. For reasons I couldn’t identify, I didn’t want to talk about the cross-country flight—at least, not yet. I’d had few opportunities alone with Luc, and I had a more pressing question in mind.
“How did you become a pilot?”
“That is a long story,” he said.
“We have all day.”
He glanced at me, a teasing gleam in his gaze. “I forget you are a journalist, always asking questions.”
“And you are a private man, always trying to hide.”
He smiled. “You are not interviewing me for an article, are you?”
I shook my head. “No. You would know if I was interviewing you.”
“You’d have your little pad of paper and a pencil in hand, no?”
It was my turn to smile. He had seen me interviewing many people over the past few months. “Yes.”
“I enjoy your writing.”
“As you’ve said—but now you’re avoiding my question.”
His eyes were laughing as he turned down 42nd Street, lighting up in a way that made my breath catch.
Who was this man beside me? A man who was so fearless, he would risk flying over Niagara Falls, point the nose of hisplane toward the earth at three thousand feet, and continue to fly even after he watched countless friends lose their lives.
Was he fearless or reckless?
“I grew up in Paris,” he finally said.
I playfully rolled my eyes. “I know that much.”
He smiled at me—and then grew serious. “My father worked in a bicycle factory when I was a small child, and I learned how to ride very early. I loved everything about cycling—until my father died in a factory accident when I was twelve.”
His words were heavy upon my heart. It hadn’t occurred to me that perhaps he didn’t share his past because it was too painful. “I’m so sorry.”
He nodded, though his thoughts looked far off. “I was the oldest child, and I had four younger sisters and a mother who depended upon me. I had to leave school and was sent to work at the factory where he died, reminded of his accident every day.”
I was quiet as I waited for him to continue. People seemed to talk more when they had the space.
“My youngest sister, Michelle, was often sick. She was so frail and delicate and needed medicine we could not afford. So when I saw that there was a bicycle race with prize money that would take me weeks to earn at the factory, I entered the contest.” He smiled, but it was a sad smile. “I won the race and was so proud to give mymamanthe money. I decided I would enter every race I could find, and I was very successful. When I was a bit older, I earned enough money to buy an automobile, and I began to race those, too. Eventually I quit working at the factory. But my maman was very angry with me. She said that the factory was good, honest, dependable income, that I was being ungrateful, and that I didn’t care about our family.”
His accent grew thicker with emotion, and I could see he still carried the pain from his mother’s disapproval.
“I hated to disappoint her, but I had worked in my father’s shadow at the factory for six years, and it had almost killed my spirit. I decided that if I was going to leave the factory and race for my family, I would have to be the very best in the world to make my maman proud.”
“Is that why you take so many risks?” I asked him gently. For the first time since I’d met Lucas Voland, I felt like I was seeing the real man behind the celebrity. The vulnerability behind the façade of indifference.
“I have to be the best,” he said, “even if that means risking my life.”
“What would your family do if you died? They would have nothing.”
“I have made enough money for Maman to be comfortable for the rest of her life.”
“Then why do you continue?”
He pressed the brake at an intersection, bringing the automobile to a pause. “Because she still does not believe in me.”
