“Calm,” he echoes, and I’m not sure he truly comprehends. But he’s docile enough. And I only need twenty-four hours.
Lifting my heavy skirts—made even weightier with over two hundred tiny pots of Glitter—I kneel on the bed behind him, and once I’m completely out of his sight, I reach into my panniers and remove a pot of colorless gloss. I start by rubbing his back and am pleased to discover that that does part of my job for me. My father groans as I find masses of knotted muscles in his neck and shoulders, and once my hands are tired and my self-disgust tamped down, I reach for his shirt with one hand and the gloss with the other.
Once the shirt is tossed over his head, I dip a gloved fingertip into the pot, hoping it won’t bleed through to my own skin. It’ll ruin the glove, but my budget for gloves is exceptionally generous. I absolutely can’t risk touching the Glitter. Down that road lie madness and financial devastation.
Saber said my father has been on a particularly high dose. The better to get him addicted quickly and reel in the fish Reginald was actually after: me. I consider whether I could slowly wean him off the Glitter…but that would mean coming here every day instead of giving him the patches. And risking him figuring out about the makeup. Not to mention that I don’t know what exact dose he’s on now and Reginald certainly isn’t going to share that information, so I might just mess everything up. High is all Saber said, so I’m liberal with the gloss I spread at the back of his neck, where there’s no way he can see it.
The glimmer would give it away. He’d know, and then I’d get no peace. Not a moment. Tamping down a sense of horror at what I’ve just done, I button his shirt so it covers the sticky spot, then gather his long hair into a queue, tied with a black satin ribbon.
“There,” I say, slipping off my soiled glove. “You look much better now, and I’ve no doubt you’ll soon feel better as well. Lie down,” I add before he can argue. I need him to hold as still as possible so the Glitter can get into his system before he unknowingly wipes it away.
My father looks unconvinced but obeys. I fuss with his blanket and pillows and start a film on the wallscreen that looks like a painting of a tide-bound Mont Saint-Michel until I fiddle with the controls concealed in its frame. Once he’s distracted, I grab a clean set of very plain clothing for my new assistant. I don’t expect Reginald to be astute enough to consider such details—or perhaps what I expect is for him to be malicious and “accidentally” forget them.
Only when a glassy expression steals into my father’s eyes do I feel safe sneaking away, the lump of iron in my heart heavier by far than the product in my skirts.
“MON DIEU!” GIOVANNI exclaims when I reveal this week’s stack of euros to be stored in his safe. “Chouchou, I must—”
“Please don’t ask,” I beg. Truly, he’s been a paragon of patience. This is only the second time he’s tried to query me in the nine weeks since I arrived in his studio after almost a two-year absence. I smile and lay a hand on his shoulder. “I’ve already lied to one person today—please don’t make me do it again.”
Molli caught me on the way to the car this morning. I almost told the truth when I said I was going to see Giovanni. She knows about the lessons I used to have with him.
“Can I come?” she asked. “My day is free, and I’m so curious about what you do there.”
“It’s embarrassing,” I said after a long pause.
“But it’s just me,” she said quietly. And there was an answer to far more than the day’s schedule in those words.
I’ve been keeping her at arm’s length the last two months, and she knows it. How could she not know it? My heart wept as I fobbed her off and drove away. She watched my car all the way out the golden gates.
“I’m a liar!” I shouted at the Nav computer when it asked where I wanted to go. “I’m a lying liar who lies.”
“I’m sorry,” the computer replied. “I didn’t get that. Please repeat your destination.”
And here’s Giovanni, asking me to lie again. I can’t. But there’s a reason I chose him as my secret-keeper of sorts. He’s utterly trustworthy and loyal. In the end, after a long, heavy silence, he gathers me into his arms and whispers in my ear, “You know you can always ask for my help, yes?”
I pull back, smiling, though inside I want to cry. “I do. But at the moment, this is the assistance I need.”
“Then it’s the assistance you’ll receive.”
“Thank you,” I say, though words feel grossly inadequate. When he agreed to let me make use of his business safe, I thought the large, heavy rectangle would be more than enough space. I had no idea the footage a million in euros actually takes up, and as soon as next week I’ll have to flow over onto the floor. Odd, that thought: euros stacked on a closet floor because there’s no room in the safe.