Free The Secret Agent by Francine Mathews Page A

second trip, in the dark.”
    “I will,” she replied. “I want to see those skis you promised me.”
    They left their gear outside in the clear dusky cold. The hall was empty but for a painted Swiss armoire and a long pine bench; a faint scent of vanilla lingered in the air. The pavers beneath Stefani’s toes felt warm, like the stones of a hearth.
    “Glycerin,” he told her. “Piped through the subflooring. Thicker than water and heat retentive. It warms the surface, then the whole house.”
    “I thought this place was an antique.”
    “It dates from the forties. I renovated a few years ago.”
    In 1996.
The year after he’d settled in Courchevel and bought the farmhouse. She remembered the date from his dossier—those one hundred forty-three pages consumed before Scottish bedtime. She had most of the man’s life memorized by now; none of it had prepared her for Max.
    The videos had captured the cutthroat competitor, the inexhaustible energy. But there was a quality of refusal about Max in person—of disengagement from the world—that Stefani found intriguing and unnerving. He weighed every word before he spoke, as though the consequences of speech—of contact—of human emotion-might be irreversible. She suspected that yawning fear lay behind that reflexive control; but fear of what? Was he capable, as his air suggested, of living without a shred of love? Was his solitude the result of arrogance? A defense against pain? Or a calculated decision to take the best life could offer, and give nothing back?
    “How did you manage to build up here?” she asked.
    “It wasn’t easy. In summer, the roads are accessible byfour-wheel, but most of the lumber had to be lifted. Around June, the resort people pull the quad chairs off the cable and attach steel containers capable of carrying anything up the mountain. Whirlpool baths, caviar, goats seeking summer pasture … The usual mix of necessity and luxury.”
    “Max, why did you leave the States?”
    The tousled gold head turned in the act of shedding its helmet. “That’s the first personal thing you’ve asked me.”
    “I couldn’t find the answer in my files.”
    “And do you like your data complete?” He studied her intently with those clear, light eyes. “Or are you trying to understand my soul?”
    “I’m interested in French real estate.”
    It was not, Stefani thought, the truth. But she had kept Max at arm’s length ever since she’d arrived. It was the one way she felt safe.
    “I detest the American skier’s practice of retiring to a resort as the local mascot,” he said deliberately. “I have no interest in skiing once a day with a crowd of delighted fans or plastering my face across billboards. I don’t want to make commercials endorsing watches or credit cards. I chose this place because I could
live
here, and do work that interests me. The French don’t care what I eat or what I wear or who I sleep with. Courchevel is so public I can disappear.”
    Until,
she thought,
a corpse shows up in your bed.
“Don’t the paparazzi ski?”
    His mouth twisted. “Not on my terrain. The last time they followed me, three guys and a woman had to be airlifted off the headwall. Like a drink?”
    He had tampered with the old Savoyard structure in the main room; the far wall was glass instead of stone,with a view of the tramline. The lights strung from base to peak were sparks in the growing dark. She stood in the middle of the space—he was spare with furniture— and felt the loneliness. He probably slept with all his windows wide open. She shuddered suddenly.
    “What happened to Suzanne Muldoon?”
    “Your second personal question.” His hands stilled over a bottle of Bordeaux. “Once she got my check, she cut me out of her life. Is red wine okay?”
    “Red’s fine. Why did she sue you?”
    “She could hardly sue Innsbruck. Or the World Cup.” He concentrated on pouring her a glass. “When you race, Stefani, you face death every day.