The Quirk Read Online Free Page A

I don’t see how you can help taking it seriously,” Rod said, defending everything he’d become since he had made his big decision. Whose side was she on? She was quicksilver. A mystery. “I’d gladly show you some of my things if you’re interested,” he said, exploring further.
    “I’d like it very much,” she said, sounding impersonal but genuinely interested.
    “You must tell me how to reach you. I’ll call and arrange something.”
    “I’ll give you my card.” She turned from him, apparently having gone as far in committing herself as she would in front of the others.
    Talk became gossipy again. Rod followed it with more attention, anxious to learn all he could about the girl he was determined not to fall for. He picked up clues that indicated that she lived on her own, didn’t work, was relatively poor. There were other clues that suggested there might be a man. So much the better. It would curb his impulse to pursue her, but it was at odds with Lola’s roguishness and the brief candid welcome of Nicole’s eyes. When the talk turned to general topics–the theater, a recently published novel–Rod joined in in careful French. He saw Nicole give him an approving if slightly astonished glance. The French never believed a foreigner was capable of putting together coherently three words of their language.
    Eventually, there was a lull in the conversation, and Nicole stirred and looked at her watch. “I must go,” she said. “I have to go home and change.”
    Rod took a final sip of his drink and stood up. “Me too,” he said.
    “I suppose I really ought to be going along,” Germaine said.
    “Not a bit of it,” the old countess snapped. “I know what you’re doing tonight. You don’t have to go for an hour. I want to talk to you.”
    Rod guessed that this was part of her game as a matchmaker and smiled to himself as he went to her and managed to brush his lips over her hand more expertly than before.
    “I can’t thank you enough,” he said.
    “I told you, I have a weakness for handsome young men.” She brayed happily. “Come see me.”
    While Nicole was making her farewells, he turned to Germaine. “It’s been very pleasant seeing you again,” he said.
    She gave him a final appraising look. “I imagine we’ll be seeing each other,” she said in a way that managed to be both insinuating and insulting. He hovered near the door while Nicole exchanged a few last words with the other two and then followed her out. The butler appeared from somewhere and escorted them down the hall and helped them into their coats. Hers was cloth, he noted.
    “Are they great friends of yours?” he asked as they started down the stairs. They could really meet now, liberated from Lola’s cage.
    “More like family really. Cousins. Like you. My parents are dead, you see. Without parents, cousins become more important.” She spoke more directly and sweetly than she had before.
    He looked down at her and considered offering to see her home. “What about that card?” he asked.
    She stopped and leaned against the banister and lifted her bag to her breast and slipped a hand into it. He noticed that she wore pale polish on her nails. She didn’t make a fuss rummaging through the bag but simply withdrew a card and offered it to him. He automatically passed a finger over it to find that it was engraved; he saw that she lived in a stylish neighborhood nearby. Warnings flashed in his mind. He was used to having girls and used to paying for the pleasure with dinners and shows and nightclubs. In Paris he hadn’t yet discovered where you could take a girl like this without spending a fortune. Let her go. Dammit, I don’t want to let her go, his old self balked.
    “Would you really like to see my work?” he asked tentatively. He thought of the messy little attic room. She would probable expect a real studio.
    “Very much.” She leaned lightly against the banister and looked up at him with charming