1 The Unexpected Guest

Mei dropped her pencil on the table, her hand shaking and her stomach sick with regret and fear. "I have to stop thinking about him", she told herself again for the thousandth time in four years as she gazed down at the face looking back at her from her sketchbook. Picking up her pencil again, she quickly flipped the page over to make a clean start but his face lingered in her mind and her strokes involuntarily outlined the same contours. Frustrated, she slammed the pencil down on the table and leaned back on her chair, closing her eyes to concentrate on the classical music she had playing in the background. She would not let him conquer her again, she thought to herself. He was a part of her past, a painful part and it was time she moved on.

Impatiently, she stood up and walked over to the half complete canvas by the window. She had been working on this piece for days, and it was safe. Her subject matter was not human, but a landscape she had seen in a dream and as she worked, she could feel herself calming down again. As usual, she wore no makeup and within minutes of picking up the brush, had accumulated a collection of paint smudges on her delicate face. It didn't matter though, since she rarely saw anyone these days except for Francis, her art dealer, who religiously made a weekly trip down from Paris to her small cottage in the countryside to collect her work.

Moving to France four years ago, alone, art was the only past-time Mei found respite in and it was Francis who had discovered and promoted her talent whilst she studied at ENSBA. With his support Mei had become a success in the art world, producing works under the alias Clara Comtois with pieces selling for thousands. Enough for her to live a comfortable life, hidden away from the remnants of her family and away from that man.

She worked meticulously on the canvas for hours before the fading light outside prompted her to finally stop. Feeling accomplished, she cleaned and put away her paints and brushes in their usual place before walking over to her iPod dock to turn off the music. She hadn't noticed how loud she had been playing it until she looked at her phone on the kitchen counter to find that she had missed five calls from a hidden number. Who could it be? She pondered, confused. There was only a handful of people who knew her number which included Francis and a few friends from ENSBA who she had mostly lost contact with since graduation and none of them would hide their numbers.

A chill travelled down her spine momentarily as the thought that perhaps it was someone in her family crossed her mind. But she immediately pushed that thought aside. The Ren family had made it clear that they never wanted to see her again since she walked away from her marriage, so there was no way it could be any of them. Concluding that whoever it was would eventually call her back if necessary, Mei opened the fridge and retrieved a carton of orange juice to quench her thirst. As she poured it into a glass a loud knock on the front door startled her.

"Mei, are you home?" Francis's voice carried through from the other side in French. "I have an urgent request".

Mei walked towards the front door and opened it. She wasn't expecting to see Francis for another two days, but she could already guess why he was here. It was the same reason she had been trying to draw a face earlier. A client, a very mysterious one who had bought her last three pieces of work at a substantial premium had requested a painting that captured human emotion in her unique style. A gauntlet she was struggling with.

"It's an emergency", Francis said charging in. "Mr. Yang is suddenly in Paris and is after a new piece of work. Preferably yours".

Mr. Yang was the agent working on behalf of this client and from what Francis had told her, he was buying her pieces to decorate a new hotel in Singapore. The first three pieces had impressed the client so much that Mr. Yang had returned to Francis with an exclusive offer, that he would also purchase 'Clara's' next ten pieces of work, if she succeeded in producing the client's request for his private residence. A lucrative offer that would ensure her financial stability for a while.

Mei looked behind her to the canvas she had just finished. The paint was still fresh, but she was happy to let it go once it dried. "I have just what you need", she smiled at Francis, leading him to it.

Francis gawked at the canvas with awe. "Where is this place?" he asked.

"A place in my dreams", Mei replied. "You can have it in the morning. It'll be dry then"

"Magnifique!" Francis smiled with delight.

He agreed to come back in the morning to pick up the painting, informing Mei that he had a room booked at the village inn. After his departure, Mei walked back over to the table with her sketchbook and stared down at the familiar contours she had sketched out earlier. Her heart lurched again for a moment before she reached down and ripped the page out, promptly disposing it in the bin. No matter how many times she had tried to sketch a person in the last few days, the person she always ended up drawing was someone she was trying hard to forget. Turning off the lights in the living room she headed for her bed. Tomorrow she would try again.

The next morning, Mei woke up to the sound of Francis's urgent knocking. The man really was impatient when it came to making money, she thought as she opened the front door, still rubbing the sleep out of her eyes.

"Good morning", Francis greeted her with an enthusiastic smile, holding out a cup of coffee and a bag full of pastries. Bribes for waking her so early.

Mei spent the next half an hour helping Francis pack the canvas carefully into his car for the journey back to Paris and once he was off, she quickly showered and sat down in her living room with her laptop to check her emails. As she flicked through them one by one, a growing sound began to disturb the tranquillity of the countryside surrounding her cottage and she bolted to a window to see where it was coming from.

What she saw made her heart stop for a moment as a sick feeling suddenly crept up her stomach. It was a helicopter, she realised as her heart began to race with both pain and panic. And there was only one person who would bring a helicopter to this isolated village.

Sure enough, a few minutes later, the helicopter landed in a field close to her cottage and she could see the outlines of a group of men dressed in expensive black suits approaching her property. Mei, frozen to her spot, watched in horror as the one man she never wished to see again in her life walked towards her front door.

For a split second she considered not letting him into the cottage. But that wasn't an option. This man had never let anything stand in his way and if he was here to see her, then one way or another he would. No one ever challenged this man. A man who was so brutally cold and impersonal that he made her life a living hell. He was the man who married her, without loving her. A man she walked away from. A man who she still couldn't forget or forgive.

Mei mustered up every inch of courage she had inside of her and waited as her ex-husband first knocked on her front door, before his men knocked it down.

----------------------------------

A kind reminder to please refrain from cutting, copying, pasting or reproducing the contents, themes and ideas of this story without approval.

Next chapter