S Stirling - A Taint in the Blood

The waiter’s eyebrows rose. “An excellent combination for you and your friend, madam. And your lamb?”

“Oh, rare, certainement. It’s not food unless it screams in despair when you bite it.”

The waiter chuckled dutifully. “Has madam had time to examine our wine list? We’re proud of it.”

“It’s quite impressive,” Adrienne said graciously. “I think a glass of the Rombauer Carneros with the scallops for me. Mildly chilled. One of the 1975 Ch?teau d’Yquem to accompany the foie gras for my companion. Then a Burgundy with the entrees; a bottle of the 2005 Richebourg, and open that now, please. And we’ll both have a glass of the Cru d’Arche-Pugneau with the desserts. Coffee then, of course, but I’m afraid we’ll have to be absolute barbarians and leave at around seven thirty-previous engagement-so do bring me the check early, if you would?”

“I… don’t feel hungry,” Ellen said.

The man ignored her and left with a little skip in his step; a fifteen-percent tip on that order would be more than his salary for a month.

“My stomach is clenched tight and I’m woozy. I’d throw up if I tried to eat. Please.”

“I know you are a bit stressed, ma petite,” Adrienne said, making a graceful gesture. “It’s been a difficult twenty-four hours for you. I admit, I can be demanding-perhaps even a little needy, at times. Give me your hand. Yes, I think I can-”

Ellen made herself stretch her hand out across the white tablecloth, palm down. Adrienne took it in hers, fingers interlocking with fingers; she smiled into Ellen’s eyes, and lowered her lips to the knuckles. The soft touch seemed to warm her hand, then spread up the arm-up the nerves of the arm, like some heated oil, or like a sauna and spa massage at Ten Thousand Waves up in the mountains. Ellen felt muscles relax she hadn’t known existed, and her back slumped against the high rear of the chair, head rolling helplessly.

Gold and blue crept in around the edges of sight as waves of warmth reached her solar plexus and radiated out to the ends of her limbs and back, building on themselves. Her toes curled and her eyes rolled up as tension peaked and released.

“Oh, God,” she breathed, surprised into a long, soft involuntary moan. “Oh, no, please, God! ”

She didn’t know how much time had passed when she came back fully to herself. La Casa Sena’s staff were elaborately not noticing anything whether they had or not, and it wasn’t the sort of place where customers would stare too openly. But half a dozen were looking in her direction, if only out of the corners of their eyes. One man moved his hands in a discreet double thumbs-up gesture as she caught his eye.

And Giselle Demarcio was staring at her from two tables over, eyes wide with disbelief, mouth open, a forkful of adobe-baked trout poised forgotten halfway from plate to lips.

Giselle. Manager of Hans Demarcio Galleries. My friendly boss. The biggest motormouth gossip in town just watched me cream my pants in public. Santa Fe’s a small town. Three hundred galleries or not, the art scene’s even smaller. Everyone will know inside twenty-four hours.

The deep flush she could already feel turned fiery crimson with embarrassment and spread from breasts to earlobes, and she was achingly conscious of how it would show with her skin, and this off-the-shoulder dress displayed a lot of it.

Oh, God! This is a white douppioni silk sheath! It shows everything!

She squirmed in the seat, and then stopped when she realized that would make it worse.

When I stand up… and everyone will be watching to check! “You’re humiliating me!” she hissed.

She stared at the linen of the tablecloth with one hand still locked in the other’s grasp.

“Ellen, Ellen, you complain when I make you feel pain; now you complain at pleasure. Some people are never satisfied. I fear I may become exhausted trying to live up to your expectations.”

Adrienne turned her hand and kissed the palm. There was a soft wet contact of lips and tongue; then a small quick pain at the base of the thumb, and a steady suction. It seemed to cool away the last of the languorous warmth, but made it impossible to do anything but sit, passive and relaxed. Then she lifted her face away and let go her grip.

Ellen jammed her napkin into the palm of her cut hand and clenched both in her lap, glaring to one side where the wall held no faces. She suppressed the impulse to wipe the light film of sweat off her face or adjust the bosom of her dress against the hypersensitive skin.

“Some say mental torment is bland compared to physical pain and the fear of it. Nonsense. It is subtle. Ecstasy spiced with humiliation and shame… it makes your blood taste like warm banana fritters with thick vanilla whipped cream and just a touch of sharp ginger. And now you are hungry, eh? Really you were hungry to begin with, but I distracted your mind long enough to stop blocking it.”

In fact she was ravenous, more so than she could remember being in all her life, enough that she had to make herself not gobble the entire contents of the bread basket. The appetizers arrived, and she gave another small involuntary sound-much quieter-at the rich complex taste of the seared foie gras, with its toasted pistachios and saffron oil. The forty-year-old d’Yquem was a shock; sweet, but with an underlying acidity and tastes of vanilla, mango, pineapples, honeyed peaches and grilled almonds. The feeling that the inside of her body was quivering with cold died away slowly. In a way that made things worse; the more grounded she felt, the less dreamlike the predicament became and the more real the fear. But…

If I’m going to die horribly or be tortured by a monster, I might as well enjoy dinner and get my blood sugar level back up first. I can’t do anything but collapse into a jelly if I’m in shock. The physical affects the mental as well as the other way ’round.

“A most sensible way of looking at things. I knew Adrian must have good taste. After all, he is my twin.”

The entrees arrived, and the Burgundy. The waiter made a small production of pouring the sample glass. Adrienne swirled it, sniffed, held the glass tilted so that the candle flame shone through it, then tasted in a breathy sip.

“Perfect. Nine years, and perfect. Ah, the check.”

She dropped her debit card on the tray and the waiter left again. Ellen swallowed a mouthful of the boar sausage and sampled the wine with defiant slowness, then stopped and looked down for a second as the ghosts of cherries and lilac and spices flooded her mouth.

“You’re nothing like Adrian,” she said quietly, and bit into a piece of bread.

The smooth shoulders shrugged. “Adrian would agree with you, or at least hope you were right. But I suspect from that interesting array of paraphernalia at your apartment-”

“That’s just a game! It’s the one who’s tied up that’s in charge.”

A chuckle. “Not when it’s my game. Ah, Adrian, though… did he never go… a little far? Did things never become… strange? The poor boy is a mass of inhibitions, but he has the same genes, the same needs, the same abilities, as I do.”

I think I’ll change the subject.

“How do you do… what you do?”

Adrienne reached into her handbag and pulled out a coin. “Flip this. Keep your hand over it each time until I call the toss, then reveal it.”

She did. The other spoke every time the coin came down and was covered by her other palm: “Heads. Tails. Tails. Heads. Tails.”

Ellen stared down at the coin. “Adrian… said he made investments by flipping a coin. I was angry because he wouldn’t talk seriously with me about his work. I thought he was joking, flipping me off, pushing me away.”

“Not in the least. He was avoiding lying by telling you a truth you wouldn’t believe. Now, again.”