Read Chapter 22: THE PAINTING HE HID

Lucien did not attend Saint-Aurelie for a week after Orphée dissolved.

Élise told herself she did not care.

Then she went to his studio.

It occupied the top floor of a building near Canal Saint-Martin, paid for, she assumed, by one of the structures he resented and still used. The caretaker recognized her name and let her upstairs.

Lucien opened the door wearing paint-stained trousers and no shoes.

“You vanished,” she said.

“I was working.”

“So was everyone else.”

He stepped aside.

The room smelled of oil paint and cold coffee. Canvases leaned against every wall.

Élise stopped.

None of them resembled the work Saint-Aurelie knew.

No abandoned pools. No immaculate hands. No controlled monochromes.

These paintings were of boardrooms, gala dinners, private cars, museum trustees seen from behind, security guards holding doors, waiters reflected in silver trays. In one, Étienne Valcourt stood at the center of a crowded reception while every face around him had been painted out.

“How long?” Élise asked.

“Two years.”

“Why haven’t you shown them?”

“My father owns stakes in two galleries that would be offered first refusal.”

“You can say no.”

“Yes.”

“But?”

“But I have been a coward.”

The simplicity of the answer silenced her.

Lucien pulled a canvas from behind a stack.

It showed Atelier 7 empty after a meeting. The bronze lyre sat on the table. Around it were twelve chairs, each casting a shadow shaped like a doorway.

“Title?” Élise asked.

“Inheritance.”

“Vautrin would hate the metaphor.”

“He told me it was obvious.”

“You showed him?”

“Yesterday.”

“What did he say after obvious?”

“‘Unfortunately, true.’”

Élise laughed.

Lucien looked at her carefully.

“I withdrew from the Valcourt Fondation graduate program.”

She stared. “Your father knows?”

“Yes.”

“How did that go?”

“He asked what alternative structure I had secured.”

“And?”

“I told him none.”

Élise could imagine Étienne’s horror more vividly than any shouting match.

“What will you do?”

“Apply for residencies like everyone else.”

“Your name will still open doors.”

“I know.”

“You cannot renounce being Valcourt.”

“I know.”

She walked closer to Inheritance.

“Then don’t perform poverty. Just stop pretending privilege is neutral.”

He looked at her. “You make everything sound simple.”

“No. I make it sound possible.”

For a moment neither spoke.

Then Lucien said, “Are we still done using each other?”

“I think so.”

“That creates a problem.”

“What?”

“I still want you here.”

The sentence was so unstrategic that Élise almost did not recognize him.

She took his hand.

“Then ask.”

“Stay for dinner.”

“Can you cook?”

“No.”

“Terrible start.”

“I have money.”

“Worse.”

He smiled.

She stayed anyway.