Geneviève’s antique shopPalais is filled with truly exquisite antique furniture sourced from France and Italy. Gilded, golden creations that have lived on this earth longer than us both, and have a hefty price tag to match. Most of these luxe pieces come from chateaux or castellos. I lament that any person in their right mind would relinquish such beautiful antiques, but I suppose if they didn’t we’d all be out of a job in the antiquities trade.
‘Mimosa?’ Geneviève asks.
‘It’s not even ten.’
‘And?’ Geneviève unwinds her gossamer-thin ruby-red scarf.
‘OK.’ I long for a cup of coffee but that ship has sailed. Geneviève takes a bottle of Taittinger and orange juice from a bar fridge behind the counter and makes two mimosas, heavy on the champagne.
‘Now, I don’t want to alarm you, but it seems that there’s a bit of an investigation going on.’
I sigh and take a sip of my mimosa. ‘Let me guess, Coraline told you?’
She frowns. ‘What? No.’
‘Then who?’
‘The glossies, Lilou. I take it you haven’t seen thepresse indiscrètetoday?’
Not more tabloid press interviews with the man of the hour, surely! ‘Emmanuel Roux is at it again?’ He can’t help himself! Is his star power on the wane? Did his PR team dream this up as a way to get his name in the forefront again?
She grimaces. ‘No, it’s about you! Wait a moment.’ Geneviève sashays from the shop, champagne glass in hand, leaving me to ponder what she’s on about. I’m anonymous when it comes to Paris Cupid, so how can any tabloid refer to me? Before panic sets in, I take a slug of my mimosa. It doesn’t help. Anxiety looms large as I imagine the worst.
A few minutes later, Geneviève returns, waving the magazine. ‘Normally, I don’t pay attention to these trashy tabloids, but this one has me a little worried, I must admit.’ She hugs the glossy tight to her chest as if she really doesn’t want to expose me to whatever lies within.
‘Show me.’
‘OK, but I don’t want you to be alarmed.’
‘That is sweet, Geneviève, but how can I not be when you say something like that! It’s like being told to calm down when you’re in the middle of an argument.’
‘Om…’
‘Are we meditating now? There goes my blood pressure!’
With a sigh, she hands it over. The headline screams from the front cover:
Who’s the mastermind behind Paris Cupid?
Mon Dieu!My stomach flips as I frantically search for the article, speed reading when I find it. They’ve taken information directly from the Paris Cupid website, saying it’s a small affairdedicated to matching the lost, the weary, the broken hearted, or the just plain romantic, using the medium of love letters.
Then it goes on to say it’s becoming increasingly popular as a new way to find the one, and it’s being whispered about in Parisian bistros, and it’s spoken about more widely after the site successfully found a match for actor Emmanuel Roux, who’d previously sworn he’d be a bachelor forever. Online groups have been created where conspiracy theories run wild. The secret everyone wants to know is, who is behind the site? Who is Cupid? Who came up with the old-school idea of a slow-burn romance for modern-day love?
My air leaves my lungs in a whoosh. ‘Why! Why do they want to know who I am? Who are these people in the online groups?’ I throw the magazine on Geneviève’s desk as if it’s tainted.
Geneviève lifts her palms. ‘Nosy people. You know what these online sleuths are like if there’s a mystery to be solved. The issue is, will they find out who you are? And if so, does that matter in the grand scheme of things?’
Does it? ‘The scrutiny would be unbearable. If they dig into my background and discover I was named in Frederic’s divorce, a married man with twenty million children – evenwiththe caveat that I didn’t know, it still won’t look good. There are plenty of market vendors who sawle scandaleunfold and would no doubt love to talk about it to these media types. If they kept digging, they’d find one disaster after another. Let us not forget the cryptomancer who I met in a café and exchanged numbers with (oh, yes, it’s real and just as awful as it sounds) who had me fooled until he tried to seduce me into investing in crypto currency. I mean, why am I a magnet for all the wrong guys? Who would trust a match maker with that kind of relationship history? I wouldn’t!’
Despite my own sketchy love life, Paris Cupid matches have been largely successful. Real love has blossomed for so manyunlikely pairs. Getting to know one another by the written word has laid a strong foundation for them to build on when they finally do meet. And for those who didn’t gel, I’ve rematched them and they’ve reported back that they’re happy to have a new correspondent and another chance at finding love.
This new threat could change all of that. Take the mystery, the anonymity away.
‘Pah! Surely they won’t focus on any of that. If you do get outed, they’ll probably want to quiz you on how you came up with the idea. It’ll be a good plug for Paris Cupid.’
While her voice is upbeat, it’s clear she’s putting a positive spin on it to keep me from descending into panic.
‘That’s the thing, Geneviève. I’m already at capacity with members and what I can handle. By June I’d matched thirty couples. It’s only mid-July now and I’ve matched a whopping twenty more. If I didn’t need sleep, it would be in the hundreds, but I need to take my time when going through their questionnaires in the hopes of finding the compatible partners. Emmanuel Roux won’t stop speaking to the press every chance he gets. It’s been two weeks since his very first interview, and he keeps popping up all over the place. When he does, memberships go wild. But they’re not therightkind of people. They’re influencers, people chasing clout. LoveTokkers, I mean, what even is that? A few I looked into were already in relationships! It’s becoming a circus.’
