“I couldn’t possibly.”
Richie was momentarily distracted by a text message on his phone. “Wow, guess who just arrived? Mehmet Saban?i! That guy’s family basically owns all of Greece.”
“Turkey, actually,” Nick said almost reflexively.
“Oh, you’ve heard of him?”
“He’s one of my best friends.”
Richie looked momentarily shocked. “He is? How in the world do you know him?”
“We were at Stowe together.”
“You guys met at a ski resort?”
“Not Stowe, Vermont. Stowe—it’s a school in England.”
“Oh. I went to Harvard Business School.”
“Yes, you’ve mentioned that a number of times.”
Just then, Mehmet stepped out of the elevator and onto the terrace. Looking down at the late arrival, Richie said excitedly, “Whew—who is that spectacular babe he brought with him?”
Nick glanced down. “My God…I don’t believe it!”
? ? ?
On the main terrace, Carlton leaned against a railing alongside his Cambridge chum Harry Wentworth-Davies, surveying the scene. “You need to try these foie gras cronuts,” Harry yelled into his ear. “Better than crack cocaine. And I couldn’t believe that bloke on the telly who goes around the world terrorizing other people’s restaurants served it to me.”
“This is how Richie draws his crowd. Heaps of pretentious food and pricey booze,” Carlton said with barely veiled contempt.
“Quite right—this Romanée-Conti isn’t shabby at all,” Harry said, swirling his goblet.
“It’s a bit too obvious for me, but I will help to deplete as much of these reserves as I possibly can,” Carlton said.
“Not sure you want to get too sloshed tonight, mate,” Harry cautioned. “Shouldn’t you be in tip-top condition for the main event later?”
“Quite right. The smart thing to do would be to stop drinking now, wouldn’t it?” Carlton deliberated, before downing another glassful in several quick gulps. He scanned the crowd, recognizing most of Richie’s cronies who had gathered here. It was a wonder Colette didn’t suspect anything. He shouldn’t have come tonight. Being here—seeing everyone trying way too hard to have fun—only made him angrier, and he could feel the blood pounding in his temples. Four hours ago he was in Antwerp, and he wished he’d stayed there, or continued on to Brussels and caught the next flight back to Shanghai. Actually, what he really wanted to do was go to England, but Mr. Tin had advised him not to enter the UK for a few years. How did he ever fuck things up to this extent? To be banned from the one place where he felt like he could truly breathe?
“Colette’s looking rather spectacular,” Harry said to Carlton, eyeing her as she posed for a picture with Rachel by the pyramid of champagne glasses.
“She always does.”
“That girl she’s posing with looks rather like you.”
“That’s my sister,” Carlton replied. Rachel was the reason he had come back today. Part of him resented her for it, but he found himself strangely protective of her at the same time. He just couldn’t ditch her in Paris like that. It had been like this from the moment they met. He was all ready to hate her, this girl who had come out of nowhere and set off an atomic bomb in the midst of his family, but she had turned out to be nothing like what he had expected. She was different from all the other women in his life, and Nick was one of the few guys he could actually stand being around. What was it? he wondered. Was it that Nick had also gone to Stowe? Or was it the way Nick didn’t feel the need to vie for position with Richie like all the other party parasites here tonight?
“You never told me you had a sister,” Harry interrupted his thoughts again.
“I do. She’s quite a bit older, though.”
“You look like you could be twins. That’s the trouble with you chinks—you never bloody age.”
“We don’t for a while, but then there’s a tipping point where we go from looking twenty one night to two hundred the next morning.”
“Well, if they all look like your sister or Colette at first, sign me up. Now tell me, what’s the deal with you and Colette these days? One minute you’re on, one minute you’re off, I just can’t keep track anymore.”
“I can’t either,” Carlton said. He was so sick of the games Colette was playing. All week long, she had been dropping hints every time they passed by a jeweler. He knew that when he refused to go into Mauboussin with her on Tuesday, she had put Plan Richie into action and sent for him to come to Paris. She could be so fucking childish sometimes. As if having Richie here throwing her a party with his daddy’s dirty money was going to make him jealous.
Carlton felt Harry jabbing his ribs. “Hey, do you know that girl over there? White dress, nine o’clock.”
“Harry, someday you’re going to realize that not all Asians know each other.”
“You can’t blame me for getting excited—that’s quite possibly the fittest bird I’ve ever seen! I’m going in.”
“Race you there,” Carlton said. If Colette wanted to play games, he could play too. He gave his jacket lapel a tug, grabbed two glasses of wine from a passing server, and strode confidently across the terrace toward the girl in white. Just as he got to her, Nick suddenly cut in front of him and, to his astonishment, wrapped her in a warm embrace.
“Astrid! What the hell are you doing here?” Nick said excitedly.
“Nicky!” Astrid squealed. “But I thought you and Rachel were in China.”
“We were, but we flew to Paris on the spur of the moment with Rachel’s brother and some new friends. Oh, speak of the devil, here’s Carlton. Carlton, this is my cousin Astrid from Singapore.”
“Pleasure to meet you.” Astrid extended her hand to Carlton, who was completely stunned by the sudden turn of events. This extraordinary creature he was about to hit on was Nick’s cousin?
“And this is my great friend, Mehmet,” Nick said, introducing Carlton. “You rascal—what are you doing hanging out with my cousin in Paris?”
Mehmet patted Nick on the back heartily. “It’s a complete coincidence! I’m here on business, and we ran into each other at Le Voltaire. I was sitting down at a lunch meeting and who should come through the door but Charlotte Gainsbourg…with Astrid! Of course I had to say hello—I couldn’t resist making all my associates sick with envy. Then Astrid invited me to dinner, and I talked her into making this pit stop.”
By this point, Rachel and Colette had joined the group. “Astrid! Mehmet? This can’t be happening!” Rachel shrieked, hugging both of them in utter delight.
Colette was introduced all around, and she couldn’t help but scrutinize every inch of Astrid. So this was the couture-wearing cousin that Rachel had told her about. Astrid’s sexy gold sandals she recognized as being handmade in Capri by Da Costanzo. Her white patent-leather clutch was vintage Courrèges. Her gold Etruscan-style cuff bracelet with the facing lion heads were Lalaounis. But that little white pleated dress she just couldn’t place. My God, it was perfection, the way the linen skimmed her body, just tight enough to drive all the men wild but not so tight it looked vulgar. And those sundial pleats at the neckline to accentuate the sensuality of the collarbone—pure genius. She just HAD to know who designed it.
“I am a fashion blogger—would you mind if I took a picture of you?” she asked.
“Colette’s being modest. She is THE most popular fashion blogger in China,” Nick bragged.
“Um, of course,” Astrid replied in surprise.
“Roxanne!” Colette yelled. Her trusty assistant came running over and snapped a few pictures of Colette and Astrid posing together. Then Roxanne began to take notes as Colette quizzed Astrid on everything she was wearing.
“Now, I just need some caption info. I recognize your shoes and your handbag, of course, and the bracelets are Lalaounis—”
“Actually, they’re not,” Astrid interrupted.
“Oh. Who did them?”
“They’re Etruscan.”
“I know, but who designed them?”