Delphine had eventually let him loose again. With a warning.

  “Her hands would have been all over you if I’d given her five more minutes.”

  Aric hadn’t thought so, saying that he’d thought she was just being nice to a visitor, but Delphine had swept his skepticism briskly to one side.

  “There’s nice, and there’s nice. Just be careful.”

  He promised he would be, even though he had no idea what that meant. Besides, the room was full of men taller and more attractive than he was. He’d been using them as camoufge—standing with them or behind them while taking in the spectacle of the evening. He was mostly silent—speaking when spoken to, never initiating conversation. An occasional joke would get a spontaneous ugh from him which would draw attention. He drank almost nothing, and there was almost nothing to eat as far as he could see.

  Models and calories, he thought. It seemed that liquid refreshment was the preferred form.

  His eye caught a glimpse of a red coat. He turned his head and leaned to one side to get a better view. She was young. Aric wasn’t sure what the legal drinking age in Min was, but he was sure she hadn’t reached it yet. And there was something vaguely familiar about her, though he couldn’t figure out what. Maybe she’d been on the same train they’d been on? He’d seen her in the dining car? She saw him looking at her and she stopped in mid stride.

  Geneviève had been walking deliberately, ensuring each precarious step was centered on the tiny stiletto heel before rolling her foot forward on to her toe. She kept her hips loose, and didn’t lock her knees. She gnced down at her feet for a brief moment. When she looked up again there was a man watching her.

  But no ordinary man. Even in this room filled with beauty he was stunning.

  And he was looking at her. At her. As if—in this sea of gmor and perfection—she was worth looking at. Blood rushed to her face.

  Aric couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d seen her somewhere, and decided to investigate.

  Christ, he’s coming this way. He’s coming right toward me, she thought. She guessed he was older than her—how could he not be? But in that instant she felt like she was eight years old, caught wearing her sister’s clothes.

  She said a quick silent prayer.

  God, please don’t let me sound stupid.

  He stopped a few feet away from her. He was even more breathtaking up close. She couldn’t tell what cologne he wore but she knew it was expensive. As his clothes were. He looked at her like he recognized her, but she was sure that the only pce she might have seen him before was in her dreams.

  He seemed like he was about to speak when a voice—familiar to both of them—shouted her name.

  “Geneviève!”

  They both turned towards the voice, and the face that was beaming joy—and a fair amount of confusion.

  Aric could see the girl—young woman— smile back.

  “How do you know Delphine?” He asked.

  “She’s my sister.”

  It was all Delphine could do not to sweep her petite s?ur into a bear hug that would have wrinkled both their ensembles. They were forced to stand at arm’s length, admiring each other and marveling that they were both in that room—so far from home. Hugs, kisses, tears of joy—all would have to wait until ter.

  “I can’t believe it’s you!” Delphine said, beaming.

  Geneviève executed quarter turns to the left and right—hand on hip, chin held high. She’d practiced the catwalk—as she pyfully called it—for hours. Mostly how to walk in stilettos, but also the pose she now struck: the excmation point at the end of the runway, just before the turn and a quick change of wardrobe.

  In the excitement of seeing her sister again Geneviève had forgotten about the presence of the beautiful man, and that he knew her sister.

  Standing together, their profiles almost a reflection of each other’s, Aric realized why the younger woman looked so familiar. He’d been thrown off course by the different hairstyles and clothes. But the bone structure, eye color, porcein skin—it was clear they were cut from the same exquisite cloth.

  He stood silently as the Moreau sisters babbled happily. A waiter approached with three fluted gsses filled with Prosecco. Aric had been holding the same one for long enough that it had reached body temperature. He exchanged it for a fresh gss, and then demonstrated his ignorance—and reminded the women of his presence.

  “Is she old enough to drink in Italy?”

  He was saved from enduring a waitstaff eye roll by the fact that he spoke French. Nothing stood between him and Delphine’s pyful derision.

  “Everyone is old enough to drink in Italy. They don’t have a minimum age for consuming alcohol.”

  Geneviève was shocked to hear the accent of Provence-Alpes-C?te d’Azur flow from the man’s beautiful mouth.

  It was a small rural vilge of vineyards and fields filled with vender. It had seen fewer atrocities during the war, but it had not escaped unscathed. Several scars—made from decaying concrete or rusting metal—still existed. Her own grandfather—her father’s father—had joined the maquis. Provence as a whole had been a transit area for Jews, political exiles, and members of the French Resistance. It was by all accounts a dangerous time. Acts of resistance—hiding Jewish families, passing notes, or delivering supplies—could get you and your family killed. Those that survived—the occupation and the subsequent retaliation against colborators—became even more tight knit of a community. Someone who looked like this man would never have gone unnoticed.

  “Why do I think that has bad idea written all over it?” He asked. That was when Geneviève saw how they looked at each other.

  They’re in love.

  A second thought fshed through her mind.

  This is him. This is the man she wrote to me about.

  She knew his name already, so when Delphine said it she wasn’t surprised.

  “Gene, this is Aric. Aric, this is Geneviève, my youngest sister.”

  He reached out a well manicured hand.

  “Je suis ravie de vous rencontrer enfin. J’aurais d? vous reconna?tre immédiatement. Seule une des s?urs d’Elphie pouvait être aussi belle.” It’s so nice to finally meet you. I should have recognized you immediately. Only one of Elphie’s sisters could be so beautiful.

  She stuttered out some sort of response, but she barely noticed.

  Why does she have all the luck? she wondered.

  “Franco wanted it to be a surprise,” Geneviève said, almost shyly. “He told me to thank you—for everything. He said, She’s my unch pad. Any heights I achieve after this will be because of this week. And her.”

  Aric thought it was the perfect metaphor.

  “Someone’s going to name a celestial body after your sister one day. No one deserves it more. She’s a gift to the entire universe.”

  “No, no, no, no. Non piangere!” said a voice from behind him. A moment ter, a woman who Aric was certain had once been a model herself appeared and gently dabbed a tissue beneath each of Delphine’s eyes. No, no, no, no. No crying!

  Delphine took control of the napkin as the woman turned on Aric like a charging bull.

  “Bastardo! Che cosa le hai detto?” Bastard! What did you say to her?

  Aric held up his hands in surrender.

  “Ho appena detto che un giorno qualcuno avrebbe dato il suo nome a una costelzione!” I just said that someone would name a consteltion after her someday!

  Their conversation—if it could be called that—continued in Italian. Gene couldn’t follow most of it, but it was clear Aric was on the defensive, and that they were starting to draw attention.

  “Do you know how long that makeup took? And you want to ruin it with your vapid compliments?”

  Aric’s hands lowered, his back straightening. To Gene, it was like watching a knight readying for trial by combat.

  “In my defense, there was nothing vapid about it. And as it happens, I do know how long it took. I was sitting next to her the entire time.”

  That was when the woman made the connection.

  She turned to Delphine. “This is what’s-his-name?”

  Delphine ughed as she wiped the st of her tears. “Yes, this is what’s-his-name, Anna. This is my Rico.”

  Anna turned back to Aric and appraised him from top to bottom. To top.

  “Sorry. I thought you were just another one of those idiotic models.”

  Aric offered a slight bow. “Entirely my fault. I didn’t think before I opened my mouth.”

  “Most men don’t. God knows Giovanni doesn’t,” Anna muttered, still trying to pce the accent—what part of Rome produced men this beautiful with speech patterns this odd?

  “Ar-Rico,” Delphine said with a smile, “this is Anna. Giovanni—the man who sponsored our trip—is her husband.”

  Anna continued to take him in, this time more slowly. The longer she looked, the more she liked what she saw.

  “If I’d known who you were bringing,” she said to Delphine, “I’d have sponsored you myself, dear.”

  “You’re not staying in that fleabag hotel,” Delphine insisted to her sister as they walked into our hotel. “Do you want to be covered in bug bites for your first show?”

  It was te when they returned. Delphine would hear nothing of her sister returning to the budget business lodge she’d booked. She deyed in the lobby just long enough to make a request—a demand—of the night manager.

  “Send a porter to my room immediately.”

  Geneviève’s reaction to Delphine’s room was simir to Aric’s. She took several steps in and then turned slowly.

  “It’s bigger than our house!”

  Aric ughed. “I said almost exactly the same thing.” He began to remove his jacket before noticing the clothes he'd been wearing when they’d arrived at Luca’s ying on Delphine’s bed, covered in clear pstic.

  “Did he dry clean my clothes?”

  Delphine was beside him in a moment. She stood and watched as he lifted the denim jeans and fnnel shirt by their hangers before she spoke.

  “The way he looked at them I was afraid he’d have burned them.”

  Her own clothes had been carefully hung in the closet. Also dry cleaned.

  He was about to comment on the disparity of treatment when there was a knock on the door. Geneviève was closest to it, and did the honors. Delphine promptly took command.

  “Run to the Pensione Aurora and collect my sister’s things. Return them to this room. Tell the night manager she has checked out. They can send her bill here.”

  She looked at her sister with a face that would brook no argument. “Give him your key.”

  The boy disappeared with a quick, yes, miss and a head bob. Geneviève stuck her head out of the door and watched him run down the hall. She was impressed how silent he was.

  Try that in stilettos, she thought.

  Aric was removing his few possessions from the dresser and pcing them in his single bag. He picked it up and walked to the door between the two rooms. He realized as he rotated the lever style handle downward and opened the door that he had no idea what the room looked like. But it was the same as the room he was vacating, only mirrored. He could hear Delphine talking to her sister through the open door.

  “The day porter can return your wardrobe to Franco and get your things tomorrow when he’s bringing everything back to Luca.”

  “He was so happy, he was bursting at the seams. You should have seen him. Well, maybe not—you’d have cried for sure.”

  Delphine smiled as she shed her shoes and earrings. “I like him. He’s sweet. And he has a fir that I admire. I hope I can pull it off as well as you do.”

  “He was throwing clothes left and right before he found something he liked,” she replied as she began to shed some of her own borrowed attire. She removed her shoes and sat down on the bed and had just begun to rub her feet when Aric returned—cd in American jeans and a red/bck faded fnnel shirt. The contrast from barely five minutes earlier was striking. Before he’d been an elite model. Now he was a backwoods lumberjack. Geneviève couldn’t decide which of the two she found more attractive.

  “How are your feet?” he asked Delphine. His voice was soft—intimate. It was a simple question, but Geneviève felt like she was intruding. “Would you like me to rub them?”

  “Later,” she replied warmly. He gnced at the younger Moreau sister but any thoughts he had of offering anything to her were blocked by the elder sister.

  “Not her. She’s not ready.”

  Aric smirked. And sent a thought to her.

  I wasn’t offering that.

  “Not ready for what?” Geneviève asked suspiciously.

  “I’ll tell you ter,” Delphine replied with a ugh as Aric wished them both goodnight. He closed the door behind him but didn’t lock it. On the other side of the door Delphine and Geneviève set aside their expensive clothes and finally embraced as sisters should.

  Delphine tried to be as quiet as possible when she finally slipped out of the oversized bed she shared with her sister. Her bare feet made no noise as she walked to the door and opened it slowly. She moved like mist on a silent breeze before shedding her nightgown and sliding under the covers next to Aric. He rolled onto his side immediately afterward and took her in his arms. He hadn’t been sleeping.

  Neither had Geneviève.

  She'd known what Delphine was doing before her sister’s foot had touched the floor. She'd been expecting it—would have been surprised if it hadn’t happened.

  Alone in her bed—in Delphine’s bed—she tried not to actively listen to what was happening one thin wall away. She heard murmuring but not words. She used her imagination and pictured the two of them professing how much they loved each other, how they couldn’t imagine life without the other. Things she fantasized that she would say in that situation. She lost track of time—until the sounds coming from next door left nothing to the imagination.

  “God,” she whispered as she grabbed her sister’s pillow and pced it over her head.