Part 9 (1/2)

I HAD DREADED AND anticipated this day Would it be at Old Beijing on a weekend? On the pedestrianout of Peet's? Would I look up in the T T station to see her waiting across the trackor would it happen at all? station to see her waiting across the trackor would it happen at all?

In the weeks since Lucian's intrusion intointo Aubrey Since then there had even been a growing nuht about Aubrey only once or twice I panicked upon realizing this at first, feeling that the last traces of her were slipping away froratulatedthat in the un to move on

Even so, I was invariably conscious of her specter al e, seekingin h I had exhaustively premeditated it, I knehen that day happened, I would not be prepared And though I had exhaustively premeditated it, I knehen that day happened, I would not be prepared

But I was less-soher with ame

Richard

Now at last I would confront him But what I saw confounded me more than the faceless ht, he did not reseination Granted, he was tanned as if he had just come in from Saint Martin, and he had a full head of sporty brown hair But his features seemed somehow soft, his eyebrows ill-forht his chin receded a little bit as well In fact, other than the obvious understated quality of his clothing, he was disappointingly average, which evoked in me first relief and then incredulity And I wondered, as I had a thousand ti that caused Aubrey to gravitate toward him when she compared the two of us side by side as she must have done

As I did now

I noticed the black cashift She had given one to me and her boyfriend before me I wondered if he knew that

Aubrey was tanned, too They must have just come from some no-doubt exotic location And it irritated me to think that as I wondered almost daily if and when I would run into her, for part of that time she had not even been in the city

The introductions went sly, to Richard The The Richard Senially and for I sawnot nearly as clever as I had said in my rehearsals for this moment Richard Senially and for I sawnot nearly as clever as I had said in ht the scent of her perfume, the bottle of which, shaped like a blue star, had sat every day on the bathrooed by memories: her shoulders in the dress she wore to her office party our last Christ, the hair across her face as she slept, her clothes, pooled by the side of our bed

”Clay,” Richard said I detected, in the single syllable of ht accent British Wouldn't you know it

”You look good,” Aubrey lied She seeh too warht confusion and what I would recognize later as benign detachlossy and pink, were parted, as if on the cusp of a remark I re and then staring at it She had a front tooth that had always been at a slight angle so that it nudged her upper lip She had been self-conscious of it, but I had thought it endearing It kept her otherwise aristocratic look somehow approachable, more human But noas certain there was no discrepancy between those white edges She had gotten it fixed! The lips closed, parted again as her blue gaze flitted fro at last on the woman coiled at nanimous omen do when they know they're the prettier of the two Her head tilted just perceptibly then, and I recognized with alar in the air Her s ether”

I was ht smile

”I'm surprised to see you in theher tooth fixed, of coh she didn't like it

”I insisted, having never seen it before Quite spectacular, really,” Richard said, co to her rescue

I hated him

”So nice tono insecurity or envy, only a bare hint of surprise ”Are you from the city?”

”Yes I'm an attorney,” the deaze bouncing from ”Yvonne” to me, and back And with ex-husband perception I heard her thinking that she would never have thought an attorney to be ate product liability lawsuits,” Lucian said with a snratitude toward her that both surprised and unsettled me

Richard checked his watch ”Well, I'm a bit peckish Do you mind much, Bree, if we head up to the restaurant for soain Aubrey excused theood to see you, Clay”

When their footsteps had receded out into the Aht,” I hissed, feeling the heat of the initialstill in o of me I stared past the funerary mask of the dead princess, quite unable to believe that it had finally happened and happened so uneventfully that they were even noalking into Bravo, the upstairs restaurant, as I stood blinking in the middle of the ry at Aubrey's detachuard, at Richard's heroics I hated Richard for stepping in the way he had, first into ourher froh to protect her from me

”Is that ere here?” I asked Lucian finally

”You chose to co her hair back in a way that reminded me of a Siaent, the sain

12

I could not sleep the night after the museum-not until I transcribed every word and expelled every nuance of that otherworldly drama from my memory This process, norue, was interrupted regularly that night as I stared out theor at the wall, seeing neither, seeing only the ie of Aubrey's hand on Richard's arm, the pink curve of her lips over those perfect teeth, the i between Lucian and lint of her reaction to the sight of Lucian and ether