I smelt him before I saw him. A noxious curl of cologne. Dior Sauvage, probably.
He emerged from the courtyard with the smoothness of a man who has never queued for anything in his life, dressed in pale cream linen, sunglasses the size of church doors, and modelling that signifier of tasteless wealth: a silver H-buckle Hermès belt.
His honey-coloured hair was coiffured into a gravity-defying nest. His foundation, caked on with the elegance of a funeral parlour beautician, cracked at the corners of his eyes when he smiled — which, to be fair, was only once.
“You must be Jack,” he said, shooting out a pale, manicured hand.
I had invited this man — the fixer — to lunch. He agreed to breakfast, on the condition it be quick. “I’m needed on a yacht in 20 minutes,” he reminded me, before folding himself into the chair opposite. “The usual,” he clicked to a nearby waiter. “And he’ll have the same.”
The fixer, who was introduced to me by a friend of a friend, insisted on anonymity for reasons legal and reputational. He works in the soft underbelly of Monaco, in “high-net-worth lifestyle solutions”. In practice, that means he helps Monaco’s billionaires remain billionaires, while ensuring their every whim and desire is met. He finds apartments for fugitives, discreet dental work for mistresses, and favourable legal interpretations for questionable residency claims. He once, he tells me with a glimmer of pride, retrieved a Persian cat from a quarantined yacht without alerting customs.
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“You want to understand Monaco?” the fixer asked, ashing his menthol Vogue into a silver tray. “You’ll never understand Monaco. It’s not for people like you.”
I asked him, earnestly, what it’s like to live here. “Oh,” he said, picking a speck of lint off his cuff, “you get used to it.”
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