Danielle Steel - Leap of Faith

“How's everything going over there?” he asked, sounding happy. “Is he still Prince Charming?” he inquired, and she insisted that he was, but she was distracted over the disturbing file of bills she was holding. What upset her most was that he had lied about it, and written right on the top of the file was the address of the storage facility he said they didn't have. It was the first time she had ever caught him in a lie. And she said nothing to Billy about it. She didn't want to be disloyal to Bernard.

Billy said he had heard that her Aunt Carole had been sick, and more important, he told Marie-Ange he was getting married. His fiancee was the same girl he had been going out with when Marie-Ange left, and she was happy for him. They were planning to be married the following summer.

“Well, since you wouldn't marry me, Marie-Ange,” he teased her, “I had no choice but to go out and fend for myself.” His fiancee was finishing college herself that year, and they were hoping to get married after she graduated. He told Marie-Ange he hoped she'd come, and she said she'd try to. But she'd been so nervous about the pile of bills she'd found that for once she didn't enjoy talking to Billy. She was still thinking about Billy when she hung up, and of how wonderful it would be to see him again. But as much as she loved him, she had her own life now, a husband and family. She had her hands full, and she was worried about their mountain of unpaid bills. She wasn't sure how to broach the subject to Bernard, and needed some time to think about it. She was sure that there was some explanation of why he had been less than honest with her about the things he had in storage. Maybe he wanted to surprise her. She wanted to believe that his motive had been a good one, and she didn't want a confrontation with him.

She still hadn't broached the subject to him when they went back to Marmouton the following week, when she made a discovery there that truly shocked her. A bill had come to him for an expensive ruby ring that had been delivered to someone at a Paris address. And the woman who bought it was using Bernard's last name. It was the second time in a matter of a week that Marie-Ange began doubting him, and she was obsessed by her own terrors. She was so frightened of what it meant, thinking that he'd been unfaithful to her, that she decided to drive to Paris with her babies. Bernard was in London visiting friends and taking care of some of his investments, and she stayed at the apartment in Paris, while she pondered the problem.

Marie-Ange felt terribly guilty, but she called her bank and asked them to refer her to a private investigator. She felt like a traitor when she called, but she needed to know what Bernard was doing, and if he was cheating on her. He certainly had ample opportunity to do it, when he was in Paris, or elsewhere, but she had always been so convinced that he loved her. She wondered if this woman was a girlfriend of his, and had been brazen enough to use his name and pretend to be married to him. Or far more happily, maybe it was only a coincidence of last names, she was a distant relative, and her purchase had found its way onto Bernard's bill entirely by mistake. She wasn't sure what to believe or how it had happened, and she didn't want to expose herself by asking the store for information. It broke her heart now to doubt him, but given the amount of money he was spending, and the ruby ring she couldn't account for, she knew she needed some answers.

Marie-Ange still wanted to believe there was an acceptable explanation for it, perhaps the woman who had bought the ring was psychotic. But whatever the explanation for the ring, she was still worried about why he had lied to her about the items in storage. And none of it solved the problem of the unpaid bills that were accruing. They could be dealt with at least, but what she wanted to know most was that she could trust him. She didn't want to discuss any of it with him until she knew more. If the matter of the ring was all an innocent mistake, and the things in the storage vault were a surprise for her, gifts he intended to pay for himself, then she didn't want to accuse him. But if something different surfaced in her investigations, then she would have to face Bernard with it, and hear his side of the story.

In the meantime, she wanted to believe the best of him, but there was a gnawing fear in her heart. She had always trusted him, and thrown herself wholeheartedly into her life with him. They had had two babies in less than two years. But the fact was that she had ended up paying entirely for the renovations at the chateau, and now at the house on the rue de Varenne. All told, they had spent three million dollars of her money to do it, they owed another two on the house in Paris, and there were more than a million dollars currently in unpaid bills. It was a staggering amount of money to have spent in less than two years. And Bernard had not yet put the brakes on his spending.

As Marie-Ange walked into the investigator's office, she felt her heart sink. It was small and seamy and dirty, and the investigator the bank had referred her to looked disheveled, and was unfriendly, as he jotted down some notes and asked her some very personal questions. And as she listened to herself reel off facts and houses and dollar amounts, it was easy to see why she was worried. But spending too much money did not make Bernard a liar. It was the bill for the ruby ring that most upset her, and that she wanted to question. Why was the woman who had received it using Bernard's last name? Marie-Ange had been told by Bernard that none of his relatives were living. But as concerned as she was about it, she still believed that there was possibly a simple and innocent explanation. It was not impossible that there was another person in France, unrelated to him, who had the same last name.

“Do you want me to check for any other unpaid bills?” the investigator asked, assuming that she would, and she nodded. She had already expressed her concerns about the woman and the ring. But she just couldn't imagine that Bernard would cheat on her, and buy an expensive gift for his mistress, and then expect Marie-Ange to pay the bill. No one could be that bold or that tasteless. Certainly not Bernard. He was sensitive and elegant and honest, Marie-Ange believed.

“I don't really think there is a problem,” Marie-Ange apologized for her suspicions, “I just got worried when I found the file of unpaid bills, and the storage room he hadn't told me about… and now the ring… I don't know who the woman could be, or why the bill came to my husband. It's probably a mistake.”

“I understand,” the investigator said, without judgment, and then he looked up and smiled at her.

“In your shoes, I'd be worried too. That's an awful lot of money to pour out in under two years.” It was staggering, and he was amazed she'd let him do it. But she was young, and naive, and he correctly guessed that her husband was a master at it.

“Well, of course, it's all been an investment,” Marie-Ange explained. “Our houses are wonderful, and they're both historical.” She said the same things to him that her husband had said to her, to justify the expenses and the cost of the restorations. But she was afraid now that there might be more she didn't know. He had never told her about the house in Paris, until after he bought it and had begun work on it, and she couldn't help wondering now what else he had concealed from her.

But she was in no way prepared for what the investigator told her after he called her in Mar-mouton. He asked her if she wanted to meet with him in Paris, or if she would prefer that he come to the chateau. Bernard was in Paris, and Robert was only six weeks old, but had a bad cold, and she suggested that the investigator come to see her.