When he reached the kitchen threshold, he paused.
“Fabrice?” Cady tried again. “Johnny’s been doing really well lately, but if he—”
“Johnny’s not the problem.”
“Then...?”
Fabrice turned toward her, very slowly and deliberately.
“Cady, are you taking your photographs of Château Clement—and ofme—to make a book?”
“No, no, of course not. I mean, I suggested to my publisher that your carousel might make a nice addition to the book, and I...”
A curtain came down over his features.
“But, Fabrice, I would never—”
“I thought you were different, Cady. Get your things and get out of here. I’m serious this time.”
“Fabrice, please listen to me. I wouldn’t have done anything, and certainly would not havepublishedanything, without your permission. Of course not. I just—”
“I’m so sick of people, I could just spit,” Fabrice said, studying the old stones as if seeking clarity in their unyielding hardness. “You would think I’d learn. This is what comes of having people around. Lucy and I were just fine, and then you come along, and you act a little like herand...” He looked at her with the saddest eyes in the world. “And then you betray me, just as she did.”
“Who, Paulette?”
“I’d like you to leave, Cady. Please be gone by morning.”
“But... we haven’t gone to Fontaine-de-Vaucluse. And the carousel—”
“Please, Cady, leave this old man in peace.” He shuffled into the kitchen and closed the door behind him.
• • •
Cady packed her things and walked the couple of miles into town, trailing her small suitcase behind her, her photography bag weighing heavily on her shoulder. She made her way to Jean-Paul’s apartment.
“Cady! What a lovely surprise,” he said, but then his eyes flickered down to the bags she was holding. “Everything okay?”
“Fabrice kicked me out,” she said, her voice shaking.
“Oh, Cady, I’m so sorry. Come in and let me make you something. Coffee? Apéritif?” He picked up her bags and ushered her inside.
Her arms ached from lugging the bags all the way into town—stepping behind the stout plane trees for protection when cars came speeding past along the highway—but the weariness she felt was not due to that as much as to her emotions. How could everything have gone so wrong so fast? She felt as if she was back in foster care, when she would start to feel relaxed in a new situation, letting her “real” self shine, starting to care for the people she was with, and then she was abruptly yanked out, left completely unmoored.
She took a seat at his little kitchen table, and he moved aside a thick roll of blueprints and a pad of graph paper.
“You’ll join my mother and grandfather and me for dinner, and spend the night, and we’ll figure out what happens next. We can go talk to Fabrice together, if you like.”
“It was just a stupid misunderstanding, but he wouldn’t even let me explain.”
He blew out a long breath. “Listen, Cady, he’s been remarkably open to you so far. But I think you must know that Fabrice hasn’t allowed people into his life for a very, very long time.”
“I know. I just felt like we had a... connection.”
“I think you did. Or youdo.” He set a small glass of Campari in front of her and added a splash of mineral water. “Give him a day or two to cool down, and see what he says then. Do you want to tell me what set him off?”
“Well, Johnny—”
He rolled his eyes. “What’s Johnny done now?”
