Lost in Paris by Elizabeth Thompson (ebook smartphone .txt) 📕

Why would she lie to me? Why not just tell me she was going to London to meet up with Gaynor? That’s probably why she insisted on taking the manuscript to Dr. Campbell rather than mailing it, too. She was probably with Martin that night in London before we left for Bristol.

She’s free to see who she wants, even relive her groupie days for all I care, but why did she have to lie about it? Why is she so adamant that she’s changed her ways?

“Are you okay, love?” Cressida asks.

No, I’m not. I feel like an idiot for trusting her. I should’ve seen this coming. “I’m fine. I need to go because I need to take care of something before I leave the office.”

“Why are you in the office on a Saturday?” Cressida chides. “You’re a workaholic.”

I shrug. “You know my job has never been the traditional nine to five. It’s especially busy in these days before the tour launches.”

Tallulah leans in so that her face is in the frame. “No worries, lovie. I’ll be there tomorrow to help you.”

“I can’t wait, T. Text me your arrival info and I’ll meet you at the station.”

There’s a chorus of goodbyes before the call disconnects.

All sorts of thoughts swirl around my brain as I contemplate what to do and how to handle Marla—everything from firing her for lying to me about why she needed the time off to insisting that she buy me out of the Paris apartment, which would amount to selling the place.

Right now I need some breathing room, so I grab my coat and my keys and head out for a long walk to nowhere.

ON THE MORNING OF the twenty-seventh, Marla texts to tell me her train will arrive at 3:34 p.m.

You little sneak, I think. I wonder if she’ll come in with a bogus story about meeting with Étienne Armand.

I contemplate letting her go through the entire spiel before I pull the “gotcha” routine, but the thought of listening to her lie to me twice makes me sick.

Make no mistake—there will be fireworks. I don’t know how our fledgling relationship can survive this whopper.

When she gets to the apartment, she’s startled to see me sitting there.

“Oh! Hannah. I thought you’d be at the office.” She glances at her phone. “It’s only four o’clock. Is everything okay?”

“How was your trip?” My voice is flat.

She rolls her bag past me toward the bedroom.

“It was good. I have so much to tell you.”

“Do you?”

She gives me a double take. “Yes, I do. Are you okay?”

“How was Antibes?”

“It’s gorgeous down there,” she says as she toes out of her boots. “I mean, it’s the textbook definition of paradise. The weather was beautiful. Sunny with highs in the low sixties. I wish I’d had more time to look around. We’ll need to make another trip because Mr. Armand couldn’t see me. It was basically a waste of time.”

“Really. A no-show, huh? So your lovely holiday and the money you spent going down to Antibes were all for fun? Not a single business-related thing to show for it?”

She frowns as she studies me. “Well, in that regard, yes. I mean, it’s my fault. I’ll own it, but it was only three days and they stretched over a weekend. So, really it was only one day—Hannah, what’s wrong with you?”

“Look, Marla, let’s cut to the chase. I know you didn’t go to Antibes.”

“Yes, I did. I have my train ticket—”

“Stop lying. I know you were in London.”

She flinches.

“What do you mean?”

“I saw a picture of you and Martin Gaynor getting cozy at The Clove Club Friday night.”

Her cheeks flush and she presses her lips into a thin line. She knows she’s busted.

I wait for her to speak first. It takes her a minute to find her voice. She walks around to sit on the sofa across from my chair, and I brace myself for another pile of lies.

“I did go to London, but I went to Antibes first.”

She digs in her purse and hands me a piece of paper. “It’s my itinerary.”

I take it from her and verify that it says Paris to Antibes, Antibes to London, London to Paris. The dates match up.

“Okay, fine. So you thought you’d cloak a little trip to groupie town in family business? You said you’d go down and back in one day or at the most a day and a half, which you knew wasn’t going to happen. You even guilted me into the time off by telling me my priorities were messed up.”

“It’s not what you think, Hannah.”

“Then you’d better start explaining. What happened with Armand? Did you get your times mixed up?”

“Not exactly. I didn’t have an appointment with him.”

“Marla! You went all the way down there without an appointment?”

“He wouldn’t return my call. I thought I’d drop in and see him in person. But when I got there, he wasn’t there.”

I throw my hands into the air, and get up and walk into the bedroom to get my purse. I have to meet Tallulah at the train station in an hour. The sooner I can get out of here, the better.

She follows me into the bedroom. “Hannah, don’t be mad.”

“I’m not mad. I just don’t get it. You’re a grown woman, and if this is how you want to live your life, that’s on you. But you need to take responsibility for the job I hired you to do. In that regard, you did lie to me. You contrived a wild goose chase to hook up with Martin Gaynor.”

I grab my handbag and coat and walk to the foyer. Again, she follows me.

“I wasn’t hooking up with Martin Gaynor in London. I know that’s what you’re thinking, but I went because I needed some information.”

I shrug into my coat and wait for the rest of her bogus explanation.

“I wanted the circumstances to be different than this when I told you, but…”

I wait some more.

“Hannah, I went to London looking for information