Chapter 1: New York City, August 2004

"Pierre, c'est toi?" I heard down the phone line, a line that stretched all the way to the elegant 7th arrondissement in Paris, that most exclusive of areas, now home to my only sister Marie Justine (nee Mary Brown) Tremblay.

"Oui, c'est moi Marie. What a pleasant surprise to hear from you. I was just thinking of you," I lied, both nervous and excited at hearing the voice of my forty-three year old sister, a sister who would be calling me only if she wanted something. "How's everything going over there?"

"Good news Peter," she almost sang as she switched back to her native tongue, "Amelie's coming to visit you."

"She is... When?" I stammered, but relieved that this looked like a simple request to perform, a couple of days escorting my pretty niece around New York City.

"Well Cherie, not exactly a visit," she added ominously. "Actually it's wonderful news Peter, your brilliant niece has been accepted to our Alma Mater."

"NYU? But she's only fifteen," I protested, confused by the idea of my only niece wandering the halls of America's best University.

"She's seventeen Peter. Don't you even know the age of my daughter? She graduated from the Lycee in June."

"But does she speak English well enough?" I asked, as my mind whirled through the possibilities and problems Amelie's presence in New York would cause me.

"Of course she speaks English," she almost shouted in response, her natural dislike of the male species coming perilously close to the surface as she spoke. "But she'll need a place to stay when she arrives in three weeks."

"I'm sure she'll love residence living Marie. Remember how you enjoyed your first year?" I enthused and then added, "And of course I'll love entertaining my beautiful niece from time to time."

"We were too late Peter."

"Too late? For what?"

"Amelie was going to go to the Sorbonne of course, but when NYU accepted her last week, both Jacques and I thought she should experience at least one year in America, it'll be good for her."

"And?"

"We were too late to get her in residence Pierre, so we thought...

"Yes?" I finally murmured, all of a sudden realizing what my dear sister was hoping for.

"Well, you do have a huge house. And you are so close to the University, well, so we thought maybe the best thing for your innocent little niece is to live"

"I'm sure she'd be better off with people her own age," I said quickly, interrupting her argument. "In fact, I'm sure with the contacts I have that I could easily arrange a place for her in residence."

"I've already decided Peter! She'll stay with you first year. It'll be much safer for a young girl. Remember Peter, she's innocent, she's not used to the violence and guns and criminals and murder and drugs like all you Americans are."

"Marie, you're an American too," I protested weakly, knowing this was an argument I'd never win.

"We're arriving on the 28th Peter, Air France of course. We expect to be met," she warned, and before hanging up added, "I'll e-mail you the details tomorrow."

A myriad of emotions flashed through my brain as I sat immobile in my easy chair, the phone's busy signal buzzing unnoticed in my ear. It was hard to believe that Claire Amelie Tremblay, my little 'cat', was already seventeen and about to become a University student. I hadn't seen her for over four years and had often wondered if her Mother hadn't intentionally sent her away whenever I had made one of my visits to France in recent years.

Was it on her thirteenth birthday the last time I'd seen her I asked myself. Even then she had been taller than her Mom, I remembered. She was a thin, coltish, auburn haired girl, frisky then and with no hips and just small bumps rising under her tee shirt.

She'd had hard fat nipples though, I thought suddenly, grinning at the remembered image of a topless, soaking Amelie climbing from their pool as we adults sipped wine.

Even then though, she was her Mothers daughter, having already developed a haughtiness, even a snobbishness that can be maddening in a twenty year old, but in her thirteen year old body four years ago it had been simply irritating. She'll be a bitch I knew suddenly, that worst of all possible combinations, a beautiful, rich, private school educated French teenager, brought up by my status conscious sister.

My sister, I mused, as a lifetime of sibling memories crowded my brain...