“You don’t have to go ahead with this,” Sebastian said. “If you’d like to change—which is certainly your right—I will refund your money. But the rule is, once you say no, that’s it. You don’t get an invite back. And you waited a long, long time to get to this point.”
“Almost two years,” she said, a bit indignant. Her attitude didn’t surprise him. A lot of powerful and famous women believed they should shoot up to the front of the line instead of waiting with the common folk.
“Would you like to leave, Miss Flores? If so, please tell me now so I can make the proper arrangements.”
“And the side effects?”
“This wasn’t explained to you?”
“It was. I just . . . I’d like to hear it again, one more time. If you don’t mind.”
“Not at all. The transfusion will take more or less four hours. During that time, you will most likely experience intense hot flashes, possibly even chills—like a bad flu. Your vitals will be monitored, of course, and someone will be here to assist you the entire time. By the end of the day, you’ll feel tired. Worn-out. You’ll stay here tonight, as my guest, and tomorrow you’ll be examined and, as long as you don’t have any medical issues, released.”
“What about blood moles?”
“Not a single one of my clients has ever developed them, so you can put that out of your mind,” Sebastian said. It was true. Blood moles—tiny red sores that developed all over the body, in hivelike clusters, usually on the face and chest and inside the mouth, sinuses, and anus—had been the telltale sign of a major and deadly autoimmune disorder caused by a chemotherapy drug that was now off the market. Those early blood seekers who had wanted to look beautiful and extend their lives and thwart disease had their blood platelet counts drop so low, they were at risk of hemorrhaging. These people had to undergo, ironically, chemotherapy—massive “shock and awe” rounds to try to escape death.
Most didn’t.
Sebastian took a sip of his coffee. “What you will experience over the next few days is what many clients refer to as a rebirth. Your senses will feel as though they were, say, rebooted. Colors will seem particularly intense, as will tastes. You’ll be very sensitive to sounds and touch. Are you married?”
“God no.”
“Seeing anyone? Involved in a serious relationship? I ask because a good majority of my clients report heightened and sometimes intense sexual arousal during the first month. Nothing to be alarmed about, but we tell clients so they can inform their partner or partners. Clients who are single—we urge them not to put themselves in situations for the first month or so where they may engage in, say, sexual conduct that they may later regret.
“Now,” Sebastian said, “the physical benefits—the tightening of skin and firmer muscle tone, thicker hair and more energy. Those will be noticeable in about fifteen days. Your sleep will improve, too. Of course, a lot of this depends on your lifestyle choices—exercise, diet, what have you. You smoke?”
“No.”
“Great. Booze?”
“A glass of wine every now and then.”
“Nothing wrong with that. We urge our clients to live healthy and active lives in order to gain the maximum benefits of Pandora. If you do that—and judging by how well you take care of yourself, I don’t see that as being a problem—then you can get your next treatment in, say, five or six months. If you start smoking or pounding back bottles of wine, if you develop some disease, then we urge clients to get quarterly transfusions.”
“And if I decide not to get another transfusion?”
“You will go through withdrawal. It will feel like the world’s worst flu. Not life-threatening, mind you, but extremely unpleasant. Do you have any other questions?”
“The blood I’m getting . . .”
“It’s the best on the market,” he said. “That’s why we have such a long waiting list. We harvest the blood on the morning of a transfusion so it’s fresh. No chemicals or preservatives.”
“I want to know about the—you know, the donors.”
“What would you like to know?”
“You treat them well?”
Sebastian had assumed her anxiety had to do with fear of dying or her fear of aging gracefully into a woman who was no longer admired for her radiant youth, beauty, and sexuality. Or, as Maya had suggested, maybe she was simply a narcissist. Sebastian didn’t peg her as the type to have a crisis of conscience.
“The person giving you this blood,” he said, “did so willingly. Hand to God.”
“But you treat them well?”
“No,” he said. “I treat them very well.”
She looked down at the floor, embarrassed.
“I want to keep living my life,” she said.
Sebastian sensed she had more to say. She did.
“I have the most amazing life. I’m going to be taking a tour of Egypt next month—I’m dying to see the pyramids—and then I’m heading to France, where, God willing, I’ll meet a much younger man who will enjoy the company of a much older but hopefully still vibrant woman.”
“He’ll be a lucky man, Ms. Flores.”
“I’m completely shallow. That’s the only benefit of getting older—knowing who and what you really are. I miss being young and pretty because I’m deeply shallow, and I love young and pretty things.” Her gaze drifted back up to him, and she seemed incredibly vulnerable. “Does that make me an awful person?”
“No,” he said. “Makes you human.”
* * *
* * *
Ava was still very much on his mind later that morning, for reasons he didn’t completely understand. He hadn’t seen her in a good ten or twelve years, and here he was showing a beachfront home in Pacific Palisades to a bony, blue-eyed blonde named Celine Marcus and thinking about Ava’s home, a modern architectural marvel of stone and glass that sat on half an acre in Hollywood Hills West, high above Sunset Boulevard. He wondered if she still lived there.
When he had been released from prison, he would often drive through her neighborhood—first at night and then, when he felt braver, during the day. He eventually found places where he could safely spy on her using binoculars, watching her for long periods of time while she was inside her house or out in her backyard, gardening or enjoying the pool. Sometimes he would follow her as she ran errands, often with her daughter in tow. He never approached her, because what was the point? She had gotten married and had a kid while he was in prison. She had moved on without him.