The Cinderella Moment Read online

The Comtesse glanced at her watch.

  “What time is your fitting, Lily?”

  Angel pushed all thoughts of Nick, his parents and the ballet from her mind. She had to focus on her plan. “Ten-thirty, Grandmama.”

  “That is earlier than last time, is it not?”

  “Yes, but they’re very busy—what with Bertrand away sick and all.”

  The Comtesse raised her eyebrows. “You seem very well-informed.”

  Angel colored. “Not really, the fitters were talking and I happened to be there because … well, they were fitting my gown and … ” her voice trailed away.

  “ … and naturally you listened.” The Comtesse eyed her appraisingly. “Do you know, Lily, sometimes I think there is rather more to you than meets the eye.”

  Angel shifted uncomfortably, but said nothing.

  “Run up and get your things, then. Henri will bring the car around.” The Comtesse thought for a moment. “Perhaps I will come with you. I have an appointment in Montmartre at eleven, but I should like to see you in your ball gown.”

  “No!” cried Angel. She’d never be able swap her designs if the Comtesse came with her. “Please don’t, I’d much rather you didn’t … ” Angel faltered at the hurt look on the Comtesse’s face. “I … I want my dress to be a surprise! I know you’ve already seen it, but you haven’t seen it on me! And when you do, I want it to be perfect—not stuck with pins or sewn all over with tacking thread.”

  The Comtesse’s face cleared. “I see.”

  “It’s my first Versailles Ball,” added Angel. “I don’t want anyone to see me in my gown till then.”

  The Comtesse nodded. “So you have your heart set on a grand entrance. Your very own Cinderella moment. All right, I shall wait until the Versailles Ball to see you in your gown.”

  ***

  Vidal’s was busier than Angel had ever seen it and the receptionist seemed unusually flustered. The telephone rang endlessly and a steady stream of people ran in and out giving instructions or demanding information. Angel waited until she heard someone call the receptionist by name, before she approached the desk.

  “Bonjour Hélène,” Angel said brightly. “It is busy this morning, n’est-ce pas?”

  “Oh, yes, mademoiselle,” the receptionist replied with a sigh.

  “Well, I won’t bother you,” said Angel. “I have a fitting at eleven, but I can find my own way.”

  “Oh no, Monsieur Vidal would not like it if I did not escort you.”

  “Nonsense,” said Angel, hoping she sounded a little like the Comtesse. “I’m sure Monsieur Vidal won’t mind, not when you’re so busy.” She looked pointedly at the ringing telephone.

  “I’m not sure … ”

  “It’ll be fine,” Angel reassured. “I know my way.”

  “Perhaps it’s all right … ” The receptionist eyed the delivery man coming through the door, laden with boxes. “It is true we are very busy. Monsieur Vidal has made several last-minute changes to the collection.”

  “I understand,” Angel interrupted. “It’s a lot of extra work.”

  “Oui, but fortunately, Bertrand—our head designer—returns today.”

  “I heard he’s been ill.”

  Hélène nodded. “It is a great relief he returns, for many things await his attention.”

  Without thinking, Angel said, “So he’ll begin the cull today?”

  “I do not know,” Hélène answered, suspicion on her face. “You are interested in the Teen Couture?”

  “Not especially,” replied Angel, kicking herself mentally. “Only, my grandmère—the Comtesse de Tourney—was talking about it, and she said the winner would be announced at the Versailles Ball. That’s next Saturday and I was thinking maybe the Teen Couture wouldn’t be judged in time.”

  The receptionist’s face cleared. “Ah, but naturellement, The Comtesse would be concerned. But you may tell her there will be no delay, for Bertrand and Celeste will begin the cull at noon today.”

  “I’m sure she’ll be relieved to hear it,” Angel said as she turned away.

  It took all of her self-control not to break into a run. She had to swap the designs now because once the cull began it’d be too late. She hurried down the hall towards the empty studio. As she approached the door, Angel held her breath. Would it be empty as before?

  She passed the Teen Couture room and opened the studio door.

  It was empty.

  Quick as lightning, Angel was across the room to where the rolls of fabric still stood exactly as she’d left them. Flinging off her dress, she dragged jeans and a T-shirt from her bag and pulled them on.

  Grabbing her flashlight and penknife, she pulled her bag onto her shoulder, dropped to her knees and crawled into the space beneath the bolts. Reaching the door, Angel wedged her foot against the roll of blue denim and tried the handle. She gave the door a gentle push and, with one hand bracing the fabric roll, slid through and pulled the door behind her.

  Finally, she was in.

  In the center of the room stood a dozen large clothing racks, each hung with ten or twelve garment bags.

  Angel felt the panic rise. She had less than fifteen minutes to find the right bag, swap the entries and get back in time for her fitting.

  What color label had been on Clarissa’s?

  She hurried over to the nearest rack and examined the tags. They were all pastel colors: pale pink, lemon, lilac and ice green. Nothing rang any bells. The labels on the next rack were all different shades of blue and beside it the labels ranged from orange to a deep blood-red.

  Angel tried to think. Closing her eyes, she let her mind go back to when she’d seen her day dress spilling from the suit bag. She could see the woman checking the label and …

  Purple. Clarissa’s entry was tagged with a purple label.

  Angel scanned the racks. There it was—three racks over between a violet and a brown tag.

  Pushing her way between the racks she stopped in front of the bulging garment bag. The name CLARISSA KANE was written on the label in large black letters.

  Angel’s heart skipped a beat.

  Clarissa Kane. In the past few days she and Margot seemed to have faded into the background. Angel had been so busy being Lily that she’d almost forgotten them. But seeing Clarissa’s name was a powerful reminder of why she’d come to Paris.

  She remembered how Margot had looked that night in the back of the Rolls—like a hideous, gloating snake. And how triumphantly Clarissa had told Lily that her Teen Couture entry had gone to Paris.

  Her Teen Couture entry! Not for long. Not now that Angel was here, just inches away from swapping Clarissa’s forgeries for her own designs.

  She reached up and pulled down the zip. Free of its confines, the green-and-white silk day dress fluttered from the opening. Pushing past it, Angel groped for the purple folder she’d seen that first afternoon at Vidal’s.

  With trembling fingers she pulled it out and flipped it open. There was the entry form and the sheaf of designs that showed in all their detail her five Teen Couture garments.

  As she’d expected, every single forgery had been signed with Clarissa’s name. Resisting the urge to tear them into pieces, Angel laid the drawings on the floor and took her design folder from her bag. Easing the pages from their sleeves, she laid them beside Clarissa’s copies and stared at the picture on top of each pile.

  They were each a sketch of her red cocktail sheath but, other than the signatures, it was almost impossible to tell them apart. If she looked closely, Angel could see variations in the pencil strokes and she thought her coloring was slightly richer, but to anyone else either drawing could have been judged original.

  She quickly leafed through the pile of designs, but they were all the same: Clarissa’s copies were perfect. Only when she came to the sketch of her midnight-blue velvet ball gown did Angel see any difference.

  “Because Clarissa never saw my final drawing,” whispered Angel.

  She shoved Claris
sa’s entry form into her bag, and picked up the pile of forgeries. She was about to push them into her bag when her fingers brushed something on the back of the bottom sketch. It felt stiff and unfamiliar. Angel turned the drawing over with a sense of foreboding.

  She stared down at the back of the sketch and her heart sank. In the bottom right-hand corner was a heavy white sticker with a House of Vidal logo stamped on it and underneath, handwritten in flowing script, was a name.

  Just two words, but they struck Angel through the heart like a knife.

  CLARISSA KANE.

  She feverishly turned over the next drawing and the next, but they were all the same. Every one of the forgeries was labelled with Clarissa’s name.

  Angel gazed at her sketches and knew she was beaten: she could never duplicate the logo or the handwriting that identified Clarissa Kane as the designer. But even worse was the realization that the labels indicated a system—that even before the judging had begun, somewhere on a database or in a file Clarissa had been recorded as the creator of Angel’s designs.

  It was in that moment that Angel realized what she should have known all along. Her plan had been flawed from the beginning because the House of Vidal wasn’t some two-bit store; it was a sophisticated business that would ensure all Teen Couture competitors could be matched to their designs.

  Angel felt the tears gather. She reached out and caressed the silken day dress. Coming to Paris had been a terrible mistake. She should have found some other way to beat Clarissa.

  And now it was too late, because everyone thought she was Lily and if she explained who she really was, they’d all hate her—especially Nick and the Comtesse.

  As she sat there, staring down at her sketches in her right hand and at Clarissa’s copies in her left, it seemed to Angel that she’d never known such despair. All her efforts had been for nothing. Clarissa had won.

  A tear ran down her cheek, just missing Clarissa’s sketches. For a moment Angel was tempted to rip them to shreds and throw the pieces into the garment bag.

  But what was the point? Her Teen Couture dream was over and she might as well accept it. For Lily’s sake she’d get through the next week as best she could, then go home to New York and try to get on with her life.

  She pushed her designs into their folder and was about to put Clarissa’s forgeries back into the suit bag when something made her stop. Angel hesitated for a split second then shoved the whole lot of them into her bag. She flung the empty folder into the garment bag, pulled up the zip and fled.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Angel never knew how she got through her fitting. She stood on the platform in a daze while Jeanne and Claudine talked endlessly in French about Bertrand and the cull until Angel thought she might scream.

  She didn’t want to think about the Teen Couture or the countless hours spent creating her designs or the fact that Clarissa had stolen them without a qualm. Every time she thought of Clarissa, Angel felt ill and shaky—and when she thought of Clarissa’s forgeries stuffed into her bag the nausea threatened to overwhelm her.

  Why had she taken them?

  The question pounded in her brain.

  It wasn’t as if she’d thought about it. It had been a split-second decision because she’d stupidly imagined that by taking the designs she might somehow still be able to show Clarissa Kane up for the ruthless cheat she was. Instead, all she’d done was alert Bertrand, Celeste and, ultimately, Vidal, to the fact that an entrant’s designs were missing.

  And when they looked up their database, the designer’s name wouldn’t read Angel Moncoeur, but Clarissa Kane, who’d never spent a single second designing the Teen Couture entry which bore her name.

  Angel felt sick at the thought.

  She continued to feel ill right through the charity lunch at Les Invalides. She tried to think of other things, to chat and laugh and listen to the speeches, but it was no use. She hardly ate, instead drinking glass after glass of water to try and cool her heated skin and ease the throbbing in her head, but nothing helped.

  She watched the other girls eating and talking and laughing together and wondered what they’d say if they knew that a few hours earlier she’d broken into a workroom at the House of Vidal and taken the designs from one of the Teen Couture entries.

  They’d say she was a thief. And she couldn’t say she wasn’t without revealing that she was an imposter. A thief or an imposter: that’s how they’d see her.

  And what about the Comtesse? Angel practically flinched every time Lily’s grandmother smiled at her and when she came over to speak to her after the speeches, Angel wanted to burst into tears.

  “Are you all right, Lily?” asked the Comtesse, touching Angel’s cheek. “You look a little flushed.”

  The kind words were like a knife to Angel’s heart and the caress like a red-hot brand, but she managed to smile and say, “I’m fine, Grandmama, only not very hungry.”

  “Too much excitement, I expect,” replied the Comtesse. “Was the gown as you’d hoped?”

  “Yes, it’s beautiful.”

  “I cannot wait to see you in it.” She smiled at Angel and then at Kitty sitting beside her. “And I look forward to seeing your gown, too, Kitty. Is it as you had imagined?”

  “Oh, no, Madame, it’s better,” exclaimed Kitty. “It’s so beautiful you can hardly believe it’s real.” She touched Angel’s hand. “And it’s all thanks to Lily. I wasn’t looking forward to the Versailles Ball until she helped me to choose my ball gown and now I can’t wait.”

  The Comtesse nodded. “I’m glad. I want this year’s ball to be very special.” She patted Angel’s shoulder. “For it is at this year’s Versailles Ball that my granddaughter will make her Paris debut.”

  ***

  As the afternoon wore away, Angel felt worse and worse. When they got to St. Thérèse’s she threw herself into the work, but no amount of weeding or painting walls could take her mind off those moments in the Teen Couture room when she’d taken Clarissa’s forgeries.

  She tried to tell herself not to get so worked up about it. After all, she’d come to Paris for the express purpose of swapping Clarissa’s drawings. So why, when she’d done it, did she feel so terrible? She hadn’t felt sick pretending to be Lily and surely deceiving the Comtesse and Monsieur Vidal and Nick and Kitty and the others was far, far worse than trying to stop a cheat like Clarissa Kane?

  But Angel couldn’t seem to stop the tide of nausea that rose up inside her or the hot and cold sensations that made her feel sick and giddy. She couldn’t understand her response—it was illogical and stupid, but no amount of reasoning made her feel any better.

  By four o’clock, she was aching all over. Her stomach hurt, her head was pounding and she was shaky and weak. Bending down to pick up her paintbrush, she almost fell over.

  Kitty looked down from her ladder. “You okay?” she asked, climbing down and dropping her paintbrush into the pot.

  “Just a headache.” Angel leaned against the wall and closed her eyes.

  “Too much sun,” pronounced Kitty. “You should’ve been wearing a hat outside. Do you have anything you could take?”

  Angel nodded. “There should be some Aspirin in my bag,” she whispered gratefully.

  “Sit down while I get it.” Kitty crossed to the table where the gang had piled their bags.

  “It’s this one, isn’t it?” Kitty held up Angel’s bag.

  Angel opened her eyes just in time to see her pulling on the zip.

  “No!” she cried. Whatever happened, Kitty mustn’t see the designs. Ignoring her trembling legs, she forced herself upright, ran shakily across the room and grabbed the bag from Kitty.

  “Sorry, but I remembered I left the tablets in my room.” She groaned. “I feel so awful, I guess I’m not thinking straight.”

  “That’s because you’re not well,” said Kitty, with an odd look. “Let me call the Comtesse.”

  “No!” Angel caught her arm. “No, don’t do that,” sh
e said, trying to speak calmly. “She’s in a meeting and I don’t want to disturb her. Henri can take me home when the working bee’s over.”

  “I think you should go now.”

  “But we haven’t finished.” Angel held up her paintbrush.

  “You have,” said Kitty, taking the brush and putting her hand under Angel’s arm. “Don’t argue. Anyone can see that you’re ill. Come on, I’ll help you to the car.”

  By the time Henri pulled up at the villa, Angel almost felt too ill to move and when Marcel opened the front door he immediately called Marie. Within minutes, Angel was upstairs being helped into bed, her protests ignored.

  “You must rest, Mademoiselle Lily,” said the maid. “That is the best thing. Madame will soon be here; don’t worry.”

  But that was the whole problem, wasn’t it? Angel thought grimly, putting her hand to her mouth as another wave of nausea threatened to overwhelm her. She’d done nothing but worry from the moment she’d realized that Clarissa had won.

  Suddenly she remembered her bag. What if Marie or the Comtesse opened it? Ignoring the red-hot hammers pounding in her head, Angel sat up. “My bag,” she said, looking wildly about the room. “I need it.”

  “It is here, Mademoiselle Lily.” Marie put the bag beside her and Angel sank back onto her pillows. “Try to sleep,” said the maid, tucking in the sheet. “I am sure Madame would say it was the best thing.”

  “Indeed I would,” said a voice from the doorway.

  Angel’s eyes flew open. The Comtesse was coming towards her with a look of such concern on her face that Angel closed her eyes again. A moment later she felt a cool hand on her forehead and a voice said, “I have telephoned the doctor. He is on his way.”

  Angel opened her eyes and said feebly, “I don’t need a doctor. I’m not sick, just tired.”

  The Comtesse put Angel’s bag on the floor, sat down on the bed and gently smoothed the hair from Angel’s face. It was soothing, and Angel couldn’t help feeling glad she was there. If only she could tell her the truth, perhaps she could stop worrying and the surging nausea would go away.