Now Steven and Lolly walked up the stairs of the private plane with Anna trailing behind them. Beatrice blocked Vronsky’s view of the door while Claudine taught him how the Parisians made their martinis. As soon as Anna entered, smiling with anticipation of seeing Vronsky, Beatrice moved out of the way just in time for her to witness him eating the cherry that Claudine was dangling above his mouth. Bea loved her front-row seat to the lightning storm of jealousy that flashed in Anna’s eyes, believing for a second that Anna would turn and run. Instead Anna called out to Claudine, “Think you can make me one of those, too?”

At the sound of Anna’s voice, Vronsky promptly choked on his cherry. Anna watched as Claudine lifted Vronsky out of his seat, clutching him from behind and performing the Heimlich maneuver until the cherry shot out of Vronsky’s mouth and landed at Anna’s feet. Claudine rubbed Vronsky’s back and said, “There you go, strapping boy. The big bad cherry will not hurt you any longer,” to which Anna stifled a laugh, her moment of jealousy eclipsed by gratitude that this voluptuous French girl had saved her love from a most embarrassing fate.

“You’re here,” Vronsky managed to gasp in a raspy voice.

“So, who’s your new friend?” Anna replied.

“I’m Claudine. You must be Anna,” Claudine said, shaking her hand. “This poor boy cannot stop talking about you.”

“Pleased to meet you, Claudine.”

Right behind them, Murf showed up carrying a very large bong that he used as a microphone in his own rendition of Katy Perry’s “California Guirls,” which he sang as “California Kush” to the delight of the whole plane.

Vronsky pulled Anna outside and told her how happy he was to see her.

Anna stared at him until he finished. “Is she with you?”

“Anna, she’s no one. She’s the daughter of one of my mother’s friends from Paris. My mom insisted I bring her.”

“So your mother hates me now?” Anna asked in all seriousness. She could barely control the disappointment in how their reunion was going so far. “Such a shame because I felt like she, of all people, wouldn’t hold my mistakes against me.”

Vronsky wasn’t pleased that Anna referenced his mother’s past, as it seemed beneath her to do such a thing, but he told himself she had every right to be upset at his mother’s intent to sabotage them. He remembered what Anna had said the last time they had seen each other, the day Kimmie had shown up and thrown gasoline on the fire of Anna’s greatest insecurity. Anna had said she wanted to believe him when he told her that she was different than all the other girls from his past, and he had sworn on his knees that she was his one and only.