Glitter Baby

Baby on the Run
Chapter 15

Fleur tried to sleep on the plane to Paris, but every time she shut her eyes, she heard Jake and Belinda. Fuck my daughter, Koranda, so she can save her career.

“Mademoiselle Savagar?” A liveried chauffeur approached her as she stood by the baggage carousel at Orly. “Your father is waiting for you.”

She followed the chauffeur through the crowded terminal to a limousine parked at the curb. He held the door open for her, and she slipped inside, into Alexi’s arms. “Papa.”

He pulled her close. “So, chérie, you have finally decided to come home to me.”

She buried her face in the expensive fabric of his suit coat and began to cry. “It’s been so awful. I’ve been so stupid.”

“There, there, enfant. Rest now. Everything will be fine.”

He began to stroke her, and it felt so comforting that she closed her eyes.

When they reached the house, Alexi helped her to her room. She asked him to sit by her side until she fell asleep, and he did.

It was late when she awakened the next morning. A maid served her coffee in the dining room along with two croissants, which she pushed away. She couldn’t imagine ever putting food into her mouth again.

Alexi came in, leaned over, and kissed her cheek. He frowned as he noticed the jeans and pullover she’d slipped into after her shower. “Did you bring no other clothes with you, chérie? We will have to get you some today.”

“I have other things. I just didn’t have the energy to put them on.” She could see that he was displeased, and she wished she’d made an effort to look better.

He surveyed her critically. “How could you do such a thing to your hair? You look like a boy.”

“It was a good-bye present for my mother.”

“I see. Then we will have it taken care of today.”

He gestured for the maid to pour him coffee, then pulled a cigarette from the silver case he carried in the breast pocket of his suit coat. “Tell me what happened.”

“Has Belinda called you?”

“Several times. She’s quite frantic. I told her you were on your way to the Greek islands, but you wouldn’t tell me which one. I also told her to leave you alone.”

“Which means she’s on her way to Greece.”

“Naturellement.”

They were silent for a moment and then Alexi asked, “Does all this have anything to do with a certain actor?”

“How did you know?”

“I make it my business to know everything that affects those who belong to me.”

She looked down into her coffee, trying to hide the fact that her eyes were once again filling with tears. She was tired of crying, tired of the wrenching pain inside her. “I fell in love with him,” she said. “We went to bed together.”

“Inevitable.”

She couldn’t contain her bitterness. “My mother had been there first.”

Two narrow ribbons of smoke curled from Alexi’s nostrils. “Also inevitable, I’m afraid. Your mother is a woman of little willpower where movie stars are concerned.”

“They struck a deal.”

“Suppose you tell me.”

Alexi listened as Fleur repeated the conversation she’d overheard between Jake and Belinda. When she was done, he said, “Your mother’s motivations seem clear, but what about your lover’s?”

She flinched at his choice of words. “His motivations were crystal-clear. This movie meant everything to him. The love scene had to work. When I froze, he saw the whole project bombing.”

“Unfortunate, chérie, that you didn’t make a better choice for your first lover.”

“Obviously I’m not the world’s best judge of character.”

He leaned back in his chair and crossed his legs. On another man the gesture would have looked effeminate, but Alexi made it elegantly masculine. “You are planning to stay with me for some time, I hope. I think it would be best for you.”

“For a while anyway. Until I can get my bearings. That is, if you’ll have me.”

“I’ve waited for this longer than you can imagine, chérie. It would be my pleasure.” He stood. “There’s something I want to show you. I’ve been feeling a bit like a child waiting for Christmas.”

“What is it?”

“You’ll see.” She followed him through the house and across the gardens toward the museum. He put the key in the lock and turned it. “Close your eyes.”

She did as he asked. He led her through the doorway into the cool, faintly musty interior of the museum. She remembered the last time she’d been here, the day she’d met her brother. She didn’t know whether her father had ever found Michel. She should have asked, but she hadn’t.

“This has been a fortunate time for me,” Alexi said. “I’m seeing all my dreams fulfilled.” She heard him flick a switch. “Open your eyes.”

The museum was dark except for a pair of spotlights in the center. They shone down on the platform that had been empty the last time she was there. Now it held the most magnificent automobile she’d ever seen. It was gleaming black, exquisitely balanced, with an endlessly long hood that looked like a cartoon of a millionaire’s car. She would have recognized it anywhere, and she let out a soft exclamation. “It’s the Royale. You found it!”

“I had not seen it since 1940.” He repeated the story he’d told her so many times. “There were three of us, chérie. We drove it deep into the sewers of Paris and wrapped it in canvas and straw. All through the war, I didn’t go near it for fear I’d be followed. Then, when I went back after the Liberation, the car was gone. The other two men who knew about it were killed in North Africa. I think now that the Germans found it. It has taken me more than thirty years to locate it.”

“But how? What happened?”

“Decades of inquiries, money applied in proper and improper places.” He flicked a handkerchief from his breast pocket and wiped an invisible fleck of dust from the fender. “All that matters is that I now own the most important collection of pur sang Bugattis in the world, and the Royale is the crown jewel.”

Much later, after he’d shown her every feature on the Bugatti, she went to her room where a hairdresser was waiting. The man asked no questions but cut Fleur’s hair close to her head and told her he could do no more until it grew. She looked horrible, like a prisoner-big eyes smudged with dark circles, oversized head, no hair. Still, her ugly reflection gave her a perverse sense of pleasure. Now her exterior matched the way she felt inside.

Alexi frowned when he saw her and sent her back to her room to put on makeup, but it didn’t help much. They went for a walk around the grounds and talked about what they would do when she felt better. She took a nap in the afternoon. At dinner, she picked at breast of veal then went to Alexi’s study to listen to Sibelius. He held her hand, and as the music washed over her, some of the painful knots inside her began to loosen. She’d been stupid to let Belinda keep her apart from her father these past few years, but she’d always let her mother manipulate her. She’d been afraid to rebel in even the smallest way for fear she’d lose Belinda’s love. A love she knew now that she’d never really had.

She leaned her head against Alexi’s shoulder and shut her eyes. She could no longer work up any real anger against him. In her pain, she’d finally found forgiveness. He was the only person in her life with nothing to gain by loving her.

That night she couldn’t sleep. She found an old bottle of Belinda’s sleeping pills, swallowed two capsules, and slumped down on the edge of her bed. The worst part was losing her self-respect. She’d let Belinda lead her around by the nose. She’d panted like a puppy dog as she followed her mother’s every wish. Love me, Mommy. Don’t leave me, Mommy. And then there was Jake. She’d built stupid fantasies around him and tried to make herself believe he loved her back. She concentrated on her pain, picking at it like a scab.

“Are you ill, chérie?”

Alexi stood knotting the sash of his robe in the doorway. She’d never seen him mussed. His thin steel-gray hair was as neat as if he’d just come from his barber. “No, not ill.”

“You look like a young boy with your awful mangled hair. Pauvre enfant. Get in bed, now.”

He tucked her in as if she were a child. “Je t’aime, Papa,” she said softly, squeezing his hand where it lay on top of the covers.

He brushed his lips over hers. They were dry and unexpectedly rough. “Turn over. I will rub your back and help you fall asleep.”

She did as she was told. It felt good. His hands slid under her shirt, and as he massaged her skin, her tension eased. The sleeping pill did its work, and she drifted into a dream of Jake. Jake making love to her. Jake kissing her neck and touching her through the silky fabric of her underpants.

After the first few days in Paris, Fleur’s life began to settle into a semblance of routine. She got up late, then listened to music or thumbed through a magazine. In the afternoon she napped until one of the maids awakened her in time to shower and dress before Alexi came home. Sometimes they walked the grounds together, but walking made her tired, and they didn’t go far. It was hard for her to sleep at night, so Alexi rubbed her back.

She knew she had to stop moping, and she tried to make plans, but she couldn’t go back to the States right away. Looking the way she did, it was doubtful anyone would recognize her, but if that happened, she’d have to face reporters, which was impossible.

August turned into September. Belinda kept calling, and Alexi kept putting her off. He told her Fleur must have changed her mind about Greece and said the detectives he’d hired thought she might be in the Bahamas. He lectured Belinda on her failure as a mother and made her cry.

Fleur started thinking of Greece. She’d always loved the islands. She could buy a house there, and a horse, too. The islands would heal her heartbreak. She told Alexi she wanted to tap into some of the money he’d been handling for her, but he said it was tied up in long-term investments. She told him to untie it. He said she should understand it wasn’t so simple and that she shouldn’t worry about money. He’d buy her anything she wanted. She told him she wanted a house on the Aegean and a horse. He said they’d talk about it when she felt better.

The conversation made her uneasy. It had been so simple to let Alexi take care of everything. The bills were always paid, and she and Belinda had as much money as they needed.

She tried to force herself to exercise. One day, she made it through the gates and out onto the Rue de la Bienfaisance. A runner with a bright orange headband whipped by. She couldn’t remember what it felt like to have so much energy, and she returned to the house.

That night, she woke up with her nightgown soaked with perspiration. She’d dreamed about Jake again. She was back at the gates of the Couvent de l’Annonciation watching him drive away. She went into her bathroom to get a sleeping pill, but the container was empty. She’d taken the last one two nights ago. She headed for Belinda’s room to see if she could find more. On her way, she saw a dim light at the end of the corridor. It came from the steps leading to the attic. Curious, she climbed to the top and entered the strangest room she’d ever seen.

The ceiling had been painted blue with fluffy white clouds racing across it. A bedraggled parachute, collapsed on one side, hung over the narrow iron bed. Alexi sat in a straight-backed wooden chair, his shoulders slumped, staring into an empty glass. Belinda had told her Michel used to stay in the attic. This had been his room.

“Alexi?”

“Leave me alone. Get out of here.”

She’d been so wrapped up in her own pain that she hadn’t thought about her father’s. She knelt beside his chair. She’d never known him to drink too much, but now he smelled of liquor. “You miss him, don’t you?” she asked softly.

“You know nothing about it.”

“I know about missing people. I know what it’s like to miss someone you love.”

He lifted his head, and his cold, empty eyes frightened her. “Your sentiment is touching, but unnecessary. Michel is a weakling, and I have cut him out of my life.”

Like me, she thought. Like you once cut me out. “Then what are you doing in his room?”

“I’ve had too much to drink, and I’m indulging myself. You of all people should understand that.”

She was hurt. “You think I indulge myself?”

“Of course you do. The way you put Belinda on a pedestal. The way you’ve made me over in your mind into the father you always wanted.”

She felt a chill. She stood and rubbed her arms. “I haven’t had to make you over. These last few years, you’ve been wonderful to me.”

“I’ve been exactly what I knew you wanted me to be.”

She suddenly yearned to be back to her room. “I’m…going to bed now.”

“Wait.” He set the empty glass on the table. “Pay no attention. I am having my own fantasy, so I shouldn’t mock yours. I’ve been daydreaming about what would have happened if Michel had been a son worthy of me instead of a perverted weakling who should never have been born.”

“That’s medieval,” she said. “Millions of men are homosexuals. It’s not that big a deal.”

He came out of the chair so suddenly she thought he was going to hit her. “You know nothing about it! Nothing! Michel is a Savagar.” He stalked across the room, his frenetic movements scaring her. “Such obscenity is unthinkable for a Savagar. It is your mother’s blood. I should never have married her. She was the one mistake of my life, and I have never been able to recover from it. Her neglect perverted Michel. If you had not been born, she would have been a proper mother to him.”

The liquor was talking. This wasn’t her father. She had to get away before she heard anything more. She turned to the door, but he was already beside her.

“You do not know me well at all.” He ran his hand up her arm. “I think we must talk now. I’ve attempted to be patient, but it’s been long enough.”

She tried to step away, but he didn’t let her go. “Tomorrow,” she said. “When you’re sober.”

“I am not drunk. Merely melancholy.” He put his hands on her neck and ran his thumb gently over her ear. “You should have seen your mother when she was even younger than you are now. So full of optimism…So passionate. And as self-centered as a child. I have plans for you, chérie. Plans that I made when you were sixteen, the day I first saw you.”

“What kind of plans?”

“You’re frightened. Lie on Michel’s bed and let me rub your back so we can talk.”

She didn’t want to lie on Michel’s bed. She wanted to go to her room and lock the door and pull the covers over her head.

“Come, chérie. I’ve upset you. Let me make it better.” He smiled so warmly her tension eased. He missed Michel tonight, that was all. And she was jealous, as usual, still trying to forget her brother existed. He steered her toward the bed.

She lay down on the bare mattress and folded her hands under her cheek. The bed sagged as he sat beside her and began rubbing her back through the thin material of her robe. “I’ve waited patiently for you, chérie. I’ve given you two years. I’ve let you fall in love. I’ve let you and your mother smear the Savagar name with your vulgar career.”

She stiffened. “What do you-”

“Shhh. I’m talking now, chérie, and you must listen. The night I saw you lean over the coffin to kiss your grandmother’s lips, I knew a great injustice had been done. You were everything my son should have been, but you were too attached to your mother. Even last month, you would tolerate no criticism of her. I had to give you time to see for yourself who she truly is so your false sentimentality wouldn’t stand between us. It’s been a painful lesson, but a necessary one. Now you know how she really feels about you. And now you’re finally ready to take your place beside me.”

She turned over onto her back and looked up at him. “I don’t know what you mean. Take my place beside you?”

He curled his hands around her shoulders and massaged them. His eyelids were half closed, almost sleepy. She wanted to leave before something terrible happened. She looked up at the parachute. It hung limp and yellowed above her.

“You belong with me, chérie. At my side. You belong with me in a way your mother never did.” He slipped his fingers just inside the open collar of her robe. “I am going to shape you into a magnificent woman. I have such wonderful plans for you.” His hands dipped lower, pushing open the neck of the robe…moved lower again.

“Alexi!” She reached up and caught his wrists.

He smiled so gently she was embarrassed at what she’d thought he was going to do.

“It is right, chérie, for us to be together. Do you not see it every time you look at yourself? Can’t you see your mother’s unfaithfulness whenever you look in the mirror?”

Unfaithfulness? For a moment she couldn’t think what the word meant.

“It’s time for you to know the truth. Give up the fantasy, enfant. Give it up. The truth will be much better.”

“No…”

“You’re not my daughter, chérie. Surely you’ve felt that. Your mother was pregnant when I married her.”

The beast had come back. The great, ugly beast who wanted to chew her into pieces. “I don’t believe you. You’re lying to me.”

“You are the bastard of Errol Flynn, my oldest enemy.”

It was a joke. She even tried to smile to show him she was a good sport. But the smile died, and the painted clouds on the ceiling blurred as she remembered Johnny Guy talking about Belinda and Errol Flynn and the Garden of Allah.

Alexi leaned over and pressed his cheek to hers. “Do not cry, enfant. It’s better this way. Don’t you see?”

The clouds swam before her, and the beast nibbled at her flesh, taking tiny bites that weren’t big enough to do the job right. He touched her lightly through her robe.

“So beautiful. Small and delicate, not plump like your mother’s.”

“No! Damn you!” She shoved his hands away and tried to get up, but the beast had devoured her strength.

“I am sorry, chérie. I’ve been foolish, and I’m quite embarrassed.” He let her go. “I must give you time to adjust, to see things as I do, to see that there is no harm in our being together. We share no blood. You are not pur sang.”

“You’re my father,” she whispered.

“Never!” he said harshly. “I’ve never thought of myself as your father. These past few years have been a courtship. Even your mother understood that.”

She pushed herself up. The mattress buttons dug into her knees.

“Don’t dwell on this now,” he said. “I’ve been unforgivably clumsy. We’ll go on as we have until you’re ready.”

“Ready?” Her voice was thick, as if she were drowning. “Ready for what?”

“We’ll talk of it later.”

“Now! Tell me now!”

“You’re clearly distraught.”

“I want to hear everything.”

“It will seem strange to you. You’ve had no time to adjust.”

“What do you want from me, Alexi?”

He sighed. “I want you to stay with me, to let me spoil you. I want you to grow your hair so you’ll be beautiful again.”

There was more. She knew it. “Tell me.”

“You’ve not had enough time.”

“Tell me!” Her fingers dug into the mattress, and she offered up a silent prayer. Don’t say what I know you’re going to say. Don’t say you want me to be your lover.

He didn’t.

He said he wanted her to have his child.

Alexi explained his plan as Fleur stood at the dirty attic window and looked out on the roof. Something pink lay on the tiles, the featherless body of a baby bird that had fallen from a nest in one of the chimneys. Alexi walked around the attic room, his hands in the pockets of his robe, and neatly laid it out for her. As soon as she got pregnant, he would take her away somewhere for the duration, and then, when it was over, announce that he had adopted a child. The baby would have his blood, her blood, and Flynn’s blood.

She stared out at the little featherless body. It never had a chance at life, never even had a chance to grow its feathers.

He assured her that his motives weren’t those of a lecherous old man-You said it, Daddy, not me-and after it was over, they could go back to their old relationship, and he’d be her loving father, just as she wanted.

“I’m hiring a lawyer,” she said, but her voice was so tight that the words came out as a broken whisper, and she had to repeat herself. “I’m hiring a lawyer. I want my money.”

He laughed. “Hire an army of them, if you wish. You signed the papers yourself. I even explained it to you. It’s all quite legal.”

“I want my money.”

“Don’t worry about the money, chérie. Tomorrow I’ll buy you anything you want. Diamonds for your fingers. Emeralds to match your eyes.”

“No.”

“Your mother was alone once,” he said. “She was penniless, with no prospects for the future. And pregnant, although of course I didn’t know that at the time. You need me now just as much as your mother needed me then.”

She had to ask him. Before she walked out of this room, she had to ask, except she was crying again, and she could barely force out the strangled words. “What do you know about me?”

Her question puzzled him.

She was choking. “What do you know about me that makes you think I would do something so horrible? What weakness do you see? You’re not stupid. You wouldn’t make this obscene proposal if you didn’t think there was a chance I’d accept it. What’s wrong with me?”

He shrugged. It was an elegant gesture, and also a little pitying. “It’s not your fault, chérie. The circumstances forced it on you, but you must understand that, by yourself, you are nothing more than a pretty decoration. You don’t have any real value. You don’t know how to do anything.”

She wiped her nose with the back of her hand. “I’m the most famous model in the world.”

“The Glitter Baby is Belinda’s creation, chérie. You would fail without her. And if you were to succeed…Well, it wouldn’t be your own success, would it? I’m offering you a function and the promise that I will never turn my back on you. We both know that’s what’s most important to you.”

He believed she was going to do it. She could see it in his perfect arrogance. He’d looked inside her, seen what was there, and decided that she was weak enough to do this obscene thing.

With a choked sob, she ran from the attic room and down the stairs to her own room, where she locked the door and pressed her back against it.

Before long, she heard his footsteps in the hallway. He paused outside her door. She squeezed her eyes shut, barely able to breathe. He moved away. She slid down along the door and sat on the floor, where she curled her body over her bent knees. She stayed like that, listening to the pounding of her own heart until the deepest hours of the night.

The key turned soundlessly in the lock as she let herself into the museum. She set down her shoulder bag and flicked on the panel of lights. Her palms were sweating, and she rubbed them on her jeans while she walked toward the small tool room at the back.

Everything was scrupulously neat, just as he was. She remembered the feel of his hands when they’d touched her breasts, and she crossed her arms over her chest. She forced herself to concentrate on the rows of tools. Finally she found what she wanted. She lifted it off the narrow shelf and tested its weight in her hands. Belinda was wrong. The rules were the same for everyone. If people didn’t follow the rules, they lost their humanity.

She closed the door and walked across the museum to the Royale. The ceiling lights shone like tiny stars in the gleaming black finish. The car had been cherished. Alexi had wrapped it in canvas and straw so no harm would come to it.

She lifted the crowbar high above her head and brought it down on the shiny black hood. The jaws of the beast snapped shut.