Black Notice - Cornwell Patricia. Страница 57

"Oh yeah?" Marino's voice was muted and soporific like bourbon on the rocks. "Some tear-ass I bet.::' "Naw. He's okay..:"

I slept and drifted, city lights touching my eyelids as I began to feel that empty ache again.

"… got so shit-faced one night I woke up the next morning and didn't know where my car or crass were. That was my wake-up call…"

The only other time I had flown supersonic had been with Benton. I remembered his body against me, the intense heat of my breasts touching him as we sat in those small gray leather seats and drank French wine, staring at jars of caviar we had no intention of eating.

I remembered exchanging hurtful words that turned into desperate lovemaking in London, in a flat near the American Embassy. Maybe Dorothy was right. Maybe sometimes I was too much in my mind and not as open as I wanted to be. But she was wrong about Benton. He had never been weak, and we had never been tepid in bed.

"Dr. Scarpetta?"

A voice grabbed my attention.

"We're here," our driver said, eyeing me in the rearview mirror.

I rubbed my face with my hands and stifled a yawn. Winds were stronger here, the temperature lower. At the Air France ticket counter I checked us in because I didn't trust Marino with tickets or passports or even finding the right gate without being an ass. Flight 2 left in about an hour and a half, and the instant I sat down in the Concorde lounge, I felt exhausted again, my eyes burning. Marino was in awe.

"Look at that, will you?" he whispered too loudly. "They got a full bar. That guy over there's drinking a beer and it's seven o'clock in the morning."

Marino took that as his wake-up call.

"Want anything?" he asked. "How 'bout a newspaper?"

"Right now I don't give a damn what's going on in the world." I wished he would leave me alone.

When he returned, he was carrying two plates piled high with Danish, cheese and crackers. He had a can of Heineken under an arm.

"Guess what," he said, setting his breakfast snack on the coffee table next to him. "It's almost three o'clock in the afternoon, French time."

He popped open the beer.

"They got people mixing champagne and orange juice, you ever heard of that? And I'm pretty sure there's somebody famous sitting over there. She's got sunglasses on and everybody's staring."

I didn't care.

"The guy she's with looks famous, too, sort of like Mel Brooks;"

"Does the woman in sunglasses look like Anne Bancroft?" I muttered.

"Yeah!„

"Then it's Mel Brooks."

Other passengers, dressed far more expensively than we were, glanced our way. A man rattled Le Monde and sipped espresso.

"Saw her in The Graduate. You remember that?" Marino went on.

I was awake now and wished I could hide somewhere.

"That was my fantasy. Shit. Like that schoolteacher giving you tutoring after hours. The one who made you cross your legs."

"You can see the Concorde through the window over there." I pointed.

"I can't believe I didn't bring a camera."

He swallowed another mouthful of beer.

"Maybe you should go find one," I suggested.

"You think they'd have those little disposable cameras around here?"

"Only French ones."

He hesitated for a moment, then gave me a dirty look.

"I'll be back," he said.

Of course, he left his ticket and passport in the pocket of the coat draped over his chair, and when the announcement came that we were about to board, I got an urgent text message on my pager that no one would let him back inside the lounge. He was waiting at the desk, face flushed with anger, a security guard beside him.

"Sorry," I said, handing one of the attendants Marino's passport and ticket.

"Let's not begin the trip this way," I said to him under my breath as we walked back through the lounge, following other passengers to the plane.

"I told them I'd go get it. Bunch of French sons of bitches. If people would speak English like they're supposed to, this kinds, shit wouldn't happen."

Our seats were together, but fortunately, the plane wasn't full, so I moved across the aisle from him. He seemed to take this personally until I gave him half of my chicken with lime sauce, my sponge roll with vanilla mousse, and my chocolates. I had no idea how many beers he drank, but he was -up and down a lot, making his way along the narrow aisle while we flew twice the speed of sound. We arrived at Charles de Gaulle airport at 6:20 P.m.

A dark blue Mercedes was waiting for us outside the terminal, and Marino tried to strike up a conversation with the driver, who would neither let him sit in the front seat nor pay any attention to him. Marino sullenly smoked out his window, cold air washing in as he watched abject apartments scarred with graffiti and miles of switchyards draw us into a lit-up skyline of a modern city. The great corporate gods of Hertz, Honda, Technics and Toshiba glittered in the night from their Mount -Olympian heights.

"Hell, this may as well be Chicago," Marino complained. "I feel really weird."

"Jet lag."

"I been to the West Coast before and didn't feel like this."

"This is worse jet lag," I said.

"I think it's got something to do with going that fast," he went on. "Think about it. You're looking out this little porthole like you're in a spaceship, right? You can't even see the damn horizon. No clouds that high, air's too thin to breathe, probably a hundred degrees below zero. No birds, no normal planes, no nothing."

A police officer in a blue and white Citroen with red stripes was pulling a speeder near the Banque de France. Along the Boulevard des Capucines shops turned into designer boutiques for the very rich, and I was reminded that I had failed to find out the exchange rate.

"That's why I'm hungry again;" Marino continued his scientific explanation. "Your metabolism's got to pick up when you're going that fast. Think how many calories that is. I didn't feel nothing once I got through Customs, did you? Not drunk or stuffed or nothing."

Not much decorating had been done for Christmas, not even in the heart of the city. Parisians had strung modest lights and swags of evergreen outside their bistros and shops, and so far I had seen not a single Santa except the tall inflatable one in the airport that was flapping his arms as if he were doing calisthenics. The season was celebrated a bit more, with poinsettias and a Christmas tree, in the marble lobby of the Grand H8te1, where our itinerary let us know we were staying.

"Holy shit," Marino said looking around at columns and at a huge chandelier. "What do you think a room in this joint costs?"

The musical trilling of telephones was nonstop, the line at the reception desk depressingly long. Baggage was parked everywhere, and I realized with grooving despondency that a tour group was checking in.

"You know what, Doc?" Marino said. "I won't even be able to afford a beer in this place."

"If you ever make it to the bar," I replied. "It looks like we may be here all night."

Just as I said that, someone touched my arm, and I found a man in a dark suit standing next to me, smiling.

"Madame Scarpetta, Monsieur Marino?" He motioned us out of line. "I'm so sorry, I just now saw you. My name is Ivan. You're already checked in. Please, I will show you to your rooms."

I couldn't place his accent, but it certainly wasn't French. He led us through the lobby to minor-polished brass elevators, where he pushed the button for the third floor.

"Where are you from?" I asked.

"All over, but I have been in Paris many years."

We followed him down a long hallway to rooms that were next to each other, but not connected. I was startled and unnerved to find our baggage was already inside them.

"If you need anything, call for me specifically," Ivan said. "It's probably best you eat in the cafй here. There's a table for you, or of course, there's room service."