Toys - James Patterson [55]
The door slid closed behind me, and then the car’s automatic pilot started us moving through the countryside, accelerating to a rapid but smooth speed.
“Beautiful night for a ride,” I said.
“It is, isn’t it? Champagne?” Chantal Dugare replied, waving toward a silver ice bucket on a stand.
“Not just now, thanks. Do you always bathe in your car?” I asked next, sitting warily on a velvet couch beside the sloshing tub.
“Quite often, yes, I do. It relaxes me, helps me think through difficult problems. And I’m very busy, so it saves time.”
“It doesn’t bother you to have an audience?”
“Where’s the harm in it? It’s an old custom of the French aristocracy actually. Louis the Fourteenth?” Then, with a little laugh, she added, “Besides, I wanted you to know—I’m not hiding anything.”
If Chantal Dugare was, it was very well hidden. The froth of the spa water blurred her body, but I could see its outlines. Very nice, those outlines of hers.
“But something puzzles me,” she said. “I expected your partner to be with you. Lucy?”
“She’s not exactly my partner,” I said, hedging. And she’s not exactly my sister, either.
“But you’ve been with her lately, non? When did you two part company?”
“Actually, she bailed out of the plane just before I got here. I have no idea why. I have no idea where she is now. I do know this: she has a mind of her own.”
Chantal nodded. “How strange.” Then she eased forward in the tub, still submerged to the rounded tops of her breasts. She crossed her forearms on the rim closest to me, resting her chin on her slender wrists.
“Tell me,” she said, her big, brown eyes fixed on mine. “Do you trust Lucy?”
Was this a trap—or just French seduction? If I admitted doubts about Lucy, I was betraying her. If I lied to cover for her, I was betraying the human cause. Either answer and my loyalty could be suspect.
“I’d be crazy to trust anybody at this point,” I said. “Including myself.”
She sighed, shaking her head in exasperation. “You talk like a schoolboy who thinks he’s quite smart. How very American of you.”
“I think of myself as a hybrid—don’t you think that’s right?”
She sighed again. “I think—you are quite handsome, Hays. I wish we had a little more time to be together.”
“I see, and was all this a test?” I asked.
“A test? Well, if it was, you failed, but with flying colors. I wasn’t expecting a gentleman.”
“Then we’re even. I wasn’t expecting a very beautiful woman in a bathtub.”
I felt the limo slowing, and a chime rang softly. The road had narrowed to a winding one-lane path. Ahead in the distance stood a huge, old, stone château with warmly lit windows, surrounded by well-tended vineyards—acres and acres.
“We arrive at our destination,” she said. “I must ask you to look aside while I dress. But first, would you be a gentleman and kindly dry my back?”
She tossed me a big, fluffy towel, then rose up out of the tub, turning away demurely.
I couldn’t really claim to be a gentleman, but I didn’t mind pretending. And I was definitely right about one thing—the éminence grise was very beautiful, from top to bottom.
“You are peeking, non?”
“I am peeking, oui.”
“Then you pass the test, Hays. You are human. Very much so.”
Chapter 74
AS THE VERY clever and alluring Chantal Dugare and I walked into the imposing dining hall of the château, she clapped her hands sharply to quiet the guests—about two hundred of them, from what I could see, representing many nationalities, standing in groups and talking excitedly. Waiters bustled around with trays, serving food and fine wines. It looked like a classy, but otherwise quite ordinary, party.
Except that these were reputedly the most important leaders in the free world—gathered to try to keep humankind from being destroyed by a powerful race that despised them.
“Attention, s’il vous plaît,” Chantal called out in her husky and cultured voice. “I bring you Monsieur Hays Baker. We are honored that you are here.”
Before she could continue, a stern-looking military man strode forward. He saluted me, then leaned in close to Chantal Dugare and