Patras Jewelry Co. was only a ten-minute walk from Jardin des Tuileries in Paris. The flat that Laurent had temporarily rented in the Latin Quarter wasn't far either, though it was under-furnished and had two roommates too many.
He could imagine a life like this-a nice job in a cool city in a part of town where his beauty didn't particularly stand out. Get a boyfriend, get a little dog, bring home macarons from that overpriced, touristy place on Rue di Rivoli, read novels on his days off in front of some cafe or another, fade into the dreamy limestone and forget about the strange and extraordinary and painful life he'd had before.
That's who he channeled at Patras. The owner, one Mr. Torveld, was a baron or a viscount or was brothers with one, and a cursory Google had shown-via tabloids at least a decade old-that he liked naive blonde twinks. And Laurent could be naive for the paycheck.
In the afternoon, after some British reality star had come through the shop and bought a tacky pair of earrings that screamed new money, Mr. Torveld switched on an entertainment news channel-"It's our job to know who might be in Paris shopping for an engagement ring," he had said when he sensed Laurent's disinterest. It was clearly an excuse.
The presenter-Laurent would not deign to call her a journalist-was pretty and smartly dressed, out of breath in front of the famous Ios palace.
"Today, Crown Prince Damianos of Akielos announced his engagement to Lady Jokaste," she said. The feed cut to a stock image of the prince in a billowy white linen shirt on the beach, holding hands with a decidedly beautiful blonde, then to another of him alone on a red carpet. "This on the heels of King Theomedes's advisors announcing that he recently suffered a mild heart attack."
Laurent thought perhaps Mr. Torveld could hear him roll his eyes because his boss turned to look at him. He did his best to look starry-eyed rather than bored and said, "That's very romantic. Isn't the prince handsome?"
In truth, he was preparing for the nonstop updates on every inane detail of the proposal followed by hours of speculation. It had been a slow news year for the wealthy part of Europe.
"He came through here once and got a very tasteful little tennis bracelet for his consort. He was terribly polite. Not my type, though," Mr. Torveld answered. But Laurent knew that. Mr. Torveld liked them sweet and soft, with pale hair and paler skin. Maybe Laurent would be exactly Mr. Torveld's type in another life.
The television program was now showing a studio where a woman said, "We are getting an update that the prince proposed with his late mother's ring, the extremely famous 14-carat, emerald-cut diamond set in white gold."
This piqued Laurent's interest. Lowball, that's worth €500,000. Considerably more for the right collector. There was probably some American weirdo who'd pay four times as much for it just so he could show it off to his weirdo friends at his dinner parties. Or it could be collateral in other deals-that's what they used the Van Gogh they'd stolen last year for. It'd be a trick to get it off this Jokaste's finger, though.
"I don't think I'd like to be proposed to this close to Christmas," Laurent said pensively. His tone implied that such an issue meant a great deal to him. "It seems like there'd be a lot else going on. Hello? I just got engaged, and you want me to worry about baby Jesus?"
Mr. Torveld was indulgent with a good sense of humor. "I know you're Veretian and they weren't so pious over there, but this is a Catholic country, and you can get in serious trouble for that sort of blasphemy."
The subject of Vere was a tender one for Laurent. Anyone else might not notice the small furrow in his brow, but Mr. Torveld, damn him, noticed small shifts in Laurent's posture, little inflections in his voice, and minute twitches in his otherwise schooled face.
"Oh, my. I'm sorry, Laurent, it was only a joke-"
"It's quite alright, Mr. Torveld," Laurent said as sunnily as he could manage.
"When I think of what you must have seen-" he tried again. This was a common mistake people made, trying to empathize when they could not. Mr. Torveld had never himself seen war, or anything close to it, but he was smart; woke as they say. He read topical nonfiction-anti-capitalist stuff like Murray Bookchin to understand the situation in Rojava (the irony that he sold diamonds for €250,000 a pop was apparently lost on him) and stuff like Ta-Nehisi Coates to understand the racial politics of the United States. He'd seen a few films about what happened in Vere, read a little of this or that. Followed some conflict journalists on Twitter who'd been there when things were really bad.
Laurent detested the pitying quality of Mr. Torveld's voice. He detested the unspoken sadness in strangers' eyes when he said, "I'm Veretian," and then corrected, "I grew up in Arles, which is in Belloy."
There is no graceful way to end a conversation about it. iWhen I think of what you must have seen/i! And yet, what had he seen? Everything had happened incrementally. It was normal, normal, normal, until it was not normal. When had it crossed over into not normal? The analytical part of his brain said things were divided into two times: before Auguste's death and after. But things aren't fucking dichotomous, no matter how much he'd like them to be. Things did not fit neatly into one box or another. Vere had dissolved before Auguste died, after all.
Laurent did his best to sound like someone who did not let adversity harden him when he said, "I have only seen beauty since I came to Paris."
This was, of course, a load of horseshit. There were homeless people camped out alongside the IKEA mere blocks away. On his way home from work the previous day, he'd seen two rats fight to the death at Pont Neuf-a scene which he found strangely compelling and stayed to watch until the end. And he'd had the unfortunate task of waiting as Orlant and Jord, on his uncle's orders, questioned (and subsequently killed) a guy living near Sacré-Cœur who'd been skimming on jobs, despite the fact that Laurent had made it explicit that his teams did heists and heists only.
It was nearly freezing that night. Mr. Torveld had feigned having a dinner cancelation quite theatrically and had asked Laurent to accompany him to a famous restaurant known for both its souffle and its friendliness to foreigners.
"I have a date, Mr. Torveld," Laurent said, waiting for his boss's face to fall before he added, "a date with iThe Idiot/i. I promised myself I'd read it this year and I've only got two weeks left to make good on that promise."
"Which translation?" Mr. Torveld asked, his driver parked outside, as he helped Laurent with his coat. "You're quite the polyglot if I'm not mistaken."
"I can read Russian-not well, though. I have the English translation, too, as a sort of lingua franca."
"How ambitious! When I was your age, I was doing coke in Ibiza. I didn't even get my bachelor's until I was twenty-six."
It was statements like that, which so flippantly showed Mr. Torveld's considerable wealth and privilege, that would cause Laurent to snap back to reality. There would be no boyfriend, no little dog, no expensive macarons, no novels to read at his leisure as he sipped espresso. There would be no quiet, good life. And Mr. Torveld with his kind smile, with everything he could possibly want, no adversity or care in the world, was about to be robbed blind and he fucking deserved it.
"Cocaine in Ibiza!" Laurent said, incensed, as he walked home in the frigid air. He hated rich people, dripping with tacky jewels, announcing their engagements on the news, putting off their education for a couple of years so they could shovel drugs up their noses and fuck blond boys in Spain. They were hedonists.
Orlant was in the apartment, cooking something that didn't look particularly appetizing and scrolling through his phone. He ignored Laurent pointedly and, when Laurent saw the newspaper on the table, he found out why.
"That job we did in Nice made the papers?"
It had been pretty small-scale, and they'd only taken a few thousand euros worth of jewelry. It had been a crime of opportunity, really, as Jord had pointed out that the security cameras in that area had quite a few blind spots.
"Because of the fucking wig you had me wear."
Laurent laughed. The fucking wig! He'd insisted that Orlant wear it, saying that he was the most recognizable of the three of them (this was patently false, but Laurent had said it with such conviction that no one argued), and that he must wear a hairpiece. The wig was a woman's, styled with a bouffant that made Orlant look completely absurd, which Laurent enjoyed quietly. It had apparently not occurred to Orlant until today that the wig had been a lark.
"It was a very funny wig," Laurent answered.
"I'm getting roasted alive in the group chat."
"There's a group chat?"
"You know that American movie where John Travolta plays a fat woman? That's who everyone is saying I am." Orlant turned the phone to show an image of John Travolta in a mumu and prosthetics. Laurent considered the image carefully.
Pensively, he asked, "What is this film?"
"Laurent!"
"The bright side here is that the wig has taken center-stage. Is there a description of us? No. Does the article even say what we stole? All anyone can focus on is the wig."
Orlant couldn't argue with that. Laurent turned the newspaper to the front page, where "PRINCE DAMIANOS TO WED SOMETIME NEXT YEAR," read in bold letters.
"What do you know about Akielos?" Laurent asked casually.
Orlant made an incredulous noise. Akielos had very famously attempted to interfere with the Veretian civil war which had made the situation about a thousand times worse. Prince Damianos had certainly gotten a few nice photo ops with grimy, orphaned Veretian children, standing in the rubble of destroyed Arles in tactical gear that looked like it was made to appeal to his vanity rather than serve any practical purpose.
Laurent pulled up Lady Jokaste's Wikipedia page on his phone. "Looks like the woman he's going to marry majored in art history. How much you wanna bet she's got the palace decked out in priceless paintings? Engagement parties can be chaotic affairs, you know. I wouldn't be surprised if three or four of those paintings went missing!"
"You and your fucking paintings. Did you see the rock he gave her?"
"We'd have to cut her finger off to get it," Laurent said. "But who knows what we could find in that palace. Fabergé eggs, maybe? You know, Vannes was telling me the other day that she was working a job that went south. She heard the cops coming, they hadn't gotten a single jewel out of the cases. She says, 'Fuck it,' and gets her guys to just take the table in the sitting room. It was a genuine Queen Anne. Worth €10,000 easy."
"Okay, say you get support from the Council. What's your plan for getting into the building?"
Laurent cracked open his book. He hadn't been lying about wanting to finish The Idiot. "I'm working on that."
"Can't I persuade you to come with me to this party? Famous people, good music, good food…" Mr. Torveld appealed for the third time that day.
"Mr. Torveld, I'm surprised at you. What would your customers think if we closed two hours early?"
"That we were behaving very Parsian. No one is going to come in here and buy a diamond ring on New Year's Eve, darling."
Laurent bristled a little, not a fan of endearments, and certainly not a fan of endearments coming from someone who was supposed to be his boss.
"Why don't you go along, and I'll meet up with you after I close up?"
"Really?"
"Of course," Laurent lied. "Just text me the address. Would I give your name at the door for the guestlist?"
"Yes! I'm so pleased. You'll have a wonderful time. Are you sure you don't want to close up right now and go get ready?"
Laurent did his level best to look hurt. "Am I not presentable as I am?"
Mr. Torveld, backtracking, sputtered out, "No, you're perfect. You're lovely. I'll see you soon."
He's gone, Laurent texted Jord.
Jord could not help but be sort of excited for this plan. It involved groping Laurent, after all, and although Laurent had to look upset for the security cameras at Patras Jewelry Co., who was to say that Laurent wouldn't think, in the back of his mind, Huh, maybe Jord knows what he's doing with his hands.
He wouldn't say no, hypothetically, if Laurent became interested in him because of the encounter and, after they absconded to Belloy, wanted to fuck on top of a pile of money.
So, bedraggled and behaving drunkenly, he stumbled into the jewelry store ten minutes before Laurent was set to close up.
The security tapes had no audio, and so, though Laurent ilooked/i alarmed for the sake of the camera, he said, "Cutting it a little close, are we?"
Jord, really getting into character, made a lunge mouth-first at Laurent, which Laurent cowered away from. He swung his hand out to grab Laurent's crotch and was pushed away. Laurent's face was red. iGood acting,/i thought Jord as he stumbled back a bit and flipped him off belligerently.
"I think that's good enough," Laurent said, his voice breaking slightly. He'd managed to start crying, the sight of which was so bizarre that it almost gave Jord pause.
"Alright, see you tonight," Jord said, still walking clumsily out the door and down the street until he was out of view of even the CCTV cameras in the neighborhood.
Laurent trembled as he locked the door behind Jord and collapsed against the wall. His face in his hands, he sobbed. For the sake of verisimilitude, he really had been working himself up, picking at old, scabbed-over wounds: the day he became an orphan, the last day he spent with Auguste before he was killed, the day his uncle, his next-of-kin, came to collect him-"Poor Laurent. I'm the only family you have left," his uncle had cooed, tongue on his ear, and Laurent had imagined himself high above Arles, a particle of ash swirling around the troposphere, an impartial result of the destruction rather than a victim of it.
Laurent collected himself, though not particularly well-this was key-and completed locking up the store.
At the stroke of midnight, the boom and crackle of fireworks could be heard across Paris. The New Year was always celebrated this way, and no layperson could distinguish that noise from, say, the explosion of a stick of dynamite planted in the vestibule of a famous (and improperly locked-up) jewelry store.
Mr. Torveld's mouth was dry and his head ached. It was too early to be up, certainly too early on a holiday where he'd been drinking more ardently than Dionysus mere hours ago, and certainly too early to be speaking to fucking INTERPOL outside of his destroyed storefront.
God, it was fucking bright. Was it always this bright? "Sir, we've determined that your vestibule's front entrance was left unlocked. That's how the criminals got past your first set of alarms. We have reason to believe that this is connected to a criminal organization we've been after for some time now. Did you lock up last night?" said a dark-skinned agent in front of him.
"No, no. I left early. My employee locked up. I've already called him to come in," Mr. Torveld said, massaging his temples, making plans to file his insurance claim already.
"My God," he heard Laurent gasp next to him. He had not sensed him approach. Immediately, Mr. Torveld regretted calling him in. In his own panic, he had not considered what unpleasant memories seeing a bombed building might bring back to him. Mr. Torveld wondered about his childhood-Laurent had mentioned in passing that he had no immediate family as a result of the turmoil that had been Vere's dissolution-and had fantasized about the task of saving him. Poor, sweet Laurent, now speaking to that same dark-skinned agent, was shaking like a leaf.
The agent nodded, gingerly stepping over rubble and into the store where another agent was reviewing security footage.
"It's all my fault, Mr. Torveld," Laurent said, clearly racked with guilt, his hands clasped together in contrition. With his long, golden hair and his angelic features, he reminded Mr. Torveld a bit of a classical painting of a repentant saint. "This man came in last night and I was so flustered I-"
"What man?" Mr. Torveld asked, immediately feeling silly for the pang of jealousy he felt.
"A drunk man! He came in here and tried to grab me. I was so upset that I didn't correctly lock up the vestibule. I'm so sorry." Towards the end of his statement, he had begun to choke up.
"Oh, my dear boy," Mr. Torveld said, embracing him. Usually, Laurent shied away from even casual touches. Friendly pats on the back had been shrugged away from; quick touches of his arm as Mr. Torveld passed him in the store were met with apprehension. This time, though, Laurent allowed Mr. Torveld to hold him as he cried. "It's all insured, Laurent. What matters is that you're safe."
Too soon, Laurent pulled away. His lovely face was blotchy and, with his index finger (slender and elegant, like a pianist's, Mr. Torveld thought), he caught a final tear rolling out of his eye.
"Mr. Torveld, I don't think I can work here any longer. This is all too scary," he said, his voice still quaking a little. It was obvious to Mr. Torveld that Laurent was trying very hard to be brave.
"Oh, Laurent, I would be so sad to see you go. Will you do me a favor? Go home, take the week off, and think it over? Let me call my car for you."
Laurent shook his head, his lip quivering. "No, sir. I need to walk. I need the fresh air."
"Be safe!" Mr. Torveld called after him, just as that radiant head of hair turned the corner.
Laurent checked his watch-a vintage Piaget with a navy blue leather strap, not particularly flashy but valued somewhere around €50,000, which he owned as a practicality, not a luxury. In a pinch, an expensive watch is as good as cash, and in Laurent's profession, you needed contingencies for your contingencies-and was pleased with how quickly and smoothly the whole job had gone. Jord and Orlant would be back in Vere now, the jewels over the border and in someone else's hands. Impossible to trace back to them.
Presently, Laurent was boarding a train to Antwerp for a job with slightly less-desirable partners-Lazar, who wasn't terrible but was undisciplined, and Aimeric, who, in Laurent's opinion, was too green to be on a big job and likely to get them caught-but he didn't decide who he worked with, the Council did.
The trip from Paris to Antwerp was rather long, but Laurent did not much mind this. He liked being alone. Digging his headphones and notebook out of his messenger bag, he settled in for the two-hour journey. Yo-Yo Ma, playing Bach's Unaccompanied Cello Suites, drowned out the unnervingly liminal sounds of the train as Laurent began to scribble out his proposal to the Council.