Gabriella shook her head. “Surely it is a time for wine, darling.”
Carrie’s laugh was frail. “Yes. For Diego, I can do that.”
The house was deserted; the mourners were gathered in the courtyard. Carrie slipped her glasses and coat off and discarded them carelessly on the hallstand. “Let’s go to the study upstairs. It’s more private.”
Gabriella winced. “I’ll admit, I’d prefer not to have to speak to anyone today.”
“I know how you feel. Wait here.”
Carrie returned a moment later with an ancient bottle of Shiraz, a corkscrew and two fine glasses. “Desperate times,” she said, lifting the assortment in front of her.
The study had been her father’s retreat. When he’d died, it had been sealed. Alexandra’s third husband had made a brief incursion, but Carrie had wiped away all traces of him since then. The vulgar monster truck memorabilia he’d displayed had long ago been relegated to the trash.
She settled herself into the green leather wingback armchair, curling her knees beneath her like she had done as a girl. Gabriella took the opposite chair and set to unscrewing the cork and pouring wines.
“Here, dear.” She handed a very full glass over.
“Thank you.” Carrie took it, but settled back into the chair. She was still recovering from champagne she’d imbibed days earlier with Juanita.
“Diego was a bastard to me,” Gabriella said after a long silence.
Carrie nodded. She knew as much from Gael. “And yet you loved him.”
“Yes, I loved him.”
Carrie sipped the wine. It was excellent. Rich and robust, like syrup in her mouth. “Why?”
Gabriella spluttered on her wine, and sat up straight. “Why?” Her eyes, so like Gael’s pierced Carrie’s. “Why is the sky blue? The grass green? The water cold? Why is the Earth round and the sun hot? I loved him because I did. It is because it is.”
Carrie’s heart squeezed in her chest. She ignored it. She did not love Gael. She desired him, hugely, but love was something else. Something soft and pleasant. Comfortable, like old moccasins or hot chocolate by the fire. It was not this burning angst that captured her chest.
“How did you live without him?”
Gabriella’s smile was stretched. “I couldn’t live with him. Nor he with me. Our love didn’t work. Love is often not enough, no matter how much you wish it were.” She shrugged, as though it no longer mattered. “I was happy to know he ended his days in a better place.”
Carrie sipped the wine far faster than she intended. But it was so delicious and she was so exhausted. It sent a heavenly calm through her body, and she sank into it.
“My son is suffering.”
Carrie’s brows lifted, and her heart began to race. “I … suppose it is better if we don’t speak of Gael,” she said, finally, hiding a grimace.
“Ah. Easier said than done, I think,” Gabriella observed with a gentle smile.
Carrie sipped her wine, and stared out the window. The sun had set, and the sky was darkening.
They finished the bottle, conversation sparse, understanding great.
“Are you staying…?”
“No,” Gabriella demurred gently. “Gael’s driver will take me to London. I fly to the island tomorrow.” She kissed Carrie on both cheeks, and walked down the corridor. “Come and see me again, Carrie. You are far happier in the sun than here.”
Carrie watched her go, and then leaned against the doors of the study.
Half a bottle of strong wine and barely any sleep had taken their toll on her. She felt light-headed as she moved through the ancient home.
Weariness was a force wrapped around her, but her feet carried her away from the upstairs bedrooms. She walked, instead, back outside.
It was cool now, as English Summer evenings tended to be. Carrie stuffed her hands into her pockets and moved further into the garden.
The roses were as beautiful as ever.
That was his doing.
Diego’s.
He’d made sure they were well-tended. He told her it was because he had a view of them from his Convalescent’s Chair, as he’d called it. Carrie knew better. He did it because she had loved them once. She’d told him, the day before the wedding, the importance of the garden to her.
She climbed down the wall and began to skirt the blooms, her blue eyes shimmering in the moonlight as she sought out her favourite variety and paused at its base.
“Hello, old friend,” she murmured quietly. “You’ve gone and got enormous.” She ran a finger along its thick, smooth trunk, up to the base of the knotted branches that spread out in a neat circle. A perfect bud on a long stem reached down to her and Carrie itched to pick it.
But she didn’t do that anymore.
She stuffed her hands deep into her pockets and stepped away.
From high above Gael watched her, the same expression on his face that had been there all week.
Confusion.
Desperation.
But overriding everything, loss.
He tried to summon her face to his mind, as she’d looked at him in Spain. Her face when she’d woken from their nap, sweet and trusting, happy and relaxed. But it was elusive, like a ghost of the past that he now doubted ever existed.
His fingers ran across the soft leather of Diego’s armchair. “You loved her, didn’t you?” He sighed. “You loved her in a way you never loved me.”
He sank into the chair and dropped his head forward, between his hands. The irony was not lost on him. Gael was envious of his father, for the love he had been able to experience for Carrie. In the same way Diego had envied Gael for the love he’d received from Gabriella.
And in the middle of all of it stood the Innocents. Gael as a child, who simply existed. And Carrie. Carrie, a contradiction in terms. Carrie who’d worked hard to cultivate an image of hard pragmatism, who took time out each week to read the Classics to an ailing man. Carrie who was intelligent and successful and beautiful, who insisted she wanted no part of a relationship with a man. No part other than sex.
His eyes lifted again to the garden. With a sliver of moonlight slicing through her, she reached up and picked a single rose from amongst the leaves. She did it quickly, as though worried she might be seen, then turned and stalked back towards the house.
12
She couldn’t wait to leave. Duty to her mother constrained her to linger at Forest View for at least a day after the funeral, but mentally Carrie was erecting every barrier she possessed. She wanted to put distance between herself and her mother, and the childhood she now saw as having been miserable in many ways.
She pulled the fridge open and stared at its contents. Platters from yesterday’s wake were lined up, covered in cling film. She surveyed their contents with a shake of her head, then shut the doors.
“Good morning.”
Gael.
She flicked her eyes to him. Her heart was pounding and her pulse was racing, but she kept her appearance outwardly calm. “Good morning,” she responded with a curt nod.
“Have you eaten?”
Carrie shook her head. Leftover chicken sandwiches and crab cakes didn’t seem appetising for breakfast.
Gael’s eyes narrowed. “I came in to make an omelette. Keep me company and I’ll make some for you.”
Carrie’s stomach let out a betraying growl, but she shook her head. “No, thank you.” She couldn’t keep him company. Being in the same house as him was agony. She reached behind him, to the always-overflowing fruit bowl and plucked out an apple. “I’ll see you later.”
“Carrie,” his voice was a groan of desperation as his fingers curled around her wrist. “This is madness. We must talk.”
Her eyes caught his, but she looked away again quickly. “No, we mustn’t.”
His thumb padded across her forearm. “Why? Why are you running away?”
She squared her shoulders. Because only idiotas forgive, and he’d hurt her more times than she could co
unt. Because he’d always have the power to obliterate her soul, and she couldn’t stand living with that fear. “I told you in Barcelona, Gael. I like fun! Sex is fun. What we have is not. It’s too intense.”
He ran his free hand over his jaw. It was intense. It always had been.
“And so you’ve replaced me?” He had to know. Though he was afraid of her answer, he needed to hear it from her lips.
“Replaced you?” She said with a confused frown, before she could think it through.
“Your guard dog friend informed me delightedly that I have already been usurped.”
Carrie felt a smile tickle her lips, though it wasn’t funny. She saw the pain in Gael’s face, and for a brief moment, she was tempted to perpetuate the lie. Because it felt good to hurt him back just a little bit. But she couldn’t do it. “She made it up.”
Relief crashed through him; it was a sweet, heaven-sent balm. “She did?”
“I guess she just wanted you to go away.”
“I see.” He nodded, and then lifted her hand, apple still held in it, to his lips. He kissed each of her fingers, and then lowered it. “I think it’s only fair to give you fair warning then.”
“Fair warning?”
“Si.”
“Of what?”
“I don’t intend to go anywhere, Carrie.”
Her stomach rolled but she didn’t react. He was staring at her again, his eyes searching her face.
“Darling? Has Carrie offered you breakfast?” Alexandra’s voice, up-beat considering she’d just laid her husband to rest the day before, broke through the atmosphere of charged tension.
Carrie’s lips flicked with the disdain Gael felt. “I’m about to make an omelette,” Gael said, without taking his eyes off Carrie’s face.
“Sounds delicious.” While Carrie watched, Alexandra put an arm around Gael’s waist and pressed a kiss to his cheek. It effectively blocked Carrie out, but she lingered. It was like watching a train wreck. She felt powerless to stop it, but she couldn’t look away.
A kind of morbid fascination prompted her to move to the coffee machine and slowly pull a pod from its box.
They looked good together, she realised with a start. Alexandra was older, but she had a stunning, age-defying beauty to her. And Gael looked as he always did – strong, sexy, magnificent. She slipped the pod into the machine and hooked a mug beneath.
“How are you today?” Alexandra placed her free hand solicitously on his chest and Gael didn’t step backwards. At least, not immediately.
“I’m fine. And you, stepmother?” He asked with a quiet drawl.
Alexandra’s laugh was pained. “Don’t call me that, darling.”
Now, he stepped away, his dark eyes briefly lifting to Carrie. She looked impossibly frail, and that same protective instinct that had lodged inside of him six years earlier flared to life.
He’d created this situation.
He should have shaken free of Alexandra’s obvious interest long before this. He’d presumed, naively, that she’d given up on him as a prospect.
He should have known better. Women like Alexandra were nothing if not dogged. Carrie was waiting for her coffee to finish running, and he could tell that she was almost at breaking point.
Gael had to fix it. He had to fix everything. He was good at that – at fixing things. It was one of his gifts. But there was a big difference between buying a broken chain of hotels and turning it into a profitable enterprise, and soothing a lifetime of hurt and subtle cruelty.
“I’m going to take Carrie back to London after breakfast,” he said decidedly. That was a start. Getting her away from this cursed place, and the mother who seemed to hate her.
Alexandra looked from one to the other, her confusion evident in her pretty features. “She’ll be fine, Gael. Carrie’s a big girl. I’d really rather you stayed to help me go through your father’s paperwork.”
“That’s fine by me,” Carrie said firmly. She pulled her coffee cup out of the machine, and lifted her apple. Her blue eyes were pale in the morning light. “Excuse me, I’m going to go pack.”
“Carrie,” his tone was firm, and for the first time in their relationship, she stopped when he called her.
She turned, her expression one of bleak weariness.
Gael almost forgot Alexandra was there. He walked to Carrie, but didn’t touch her. It was his eyes that did it. His beautiful eyes, so loaded with care and compassion. “Why can’t you let me in?”
Her eyes flew to her mother; Alexandra looked as though she could be blown over by a light breeze. She was clearly shocked. “Am I missing something?”
Gael ignored her. “You are pushing me away because you’re scared.”
Carrie bit down on her lower lip. “I’m not doing this here. Not now.”
“You keep running away from me. So if not now, when? Will I return to London to find that you’ve moved? Changed your number and disappeared?”
She squeezed her eyes shut. “I’m running away because I don’t want you. I don’t want this.”
“Liar,” he whispered gently.
“What the hell is going on? You’re old enough to be her father, Gael!”
Gael exhaled slowly. He hadn’t wanted to hurt Alexandra, though he’d come to loathe her over the years. “Hardly,” he retorted with a small laugh. “Don’t you think you’re a little hypocritical to talk about age differences, in any event?”
Alexandra’s expression soured, as though she’d bitten down on the flesh of a lemon. “It’s never bothered you before.”
Carrie’s harsh intake of breath drew his attention squarely back to the woman he now realised he was completely in love with.
“It’s true, isn’t it?” She whispered, her eyes haunted. “You and she …” She squeezed her eyes shut to fight the nausea.
“No, Carrie.” He knew what she was thinking, and he had to relieve her of that burden. “You’re wrong. Nothing has ever happened between us.”
“But I saw you,” she whispered, her tone strange – high and breathy.
He frowned. “You can’t have ‘seen’ us, because there’s never been anything to see.”
“The morning after we … after the rose garden …” She was whispering now. “I saw you.”
He frowned. The event had passed into the insignificant recesses of his mind, but he recalled it now. Alexandra had been waiting for him. She’d claimed to have felt miserable because Diego’s condition was so poor, but then she’d said, “Why couldn’t I have met you first? A man like you, young and strong. You’d never get sick like this.”
Gael had shaken his head. “Age is no guarantee of good-health.”
“But you’re so fit. Your father is so weak. I’m scared, Gael.”
He’d nodded, and she’d pressed her body to his, seeking comfort. Then, she’d kissed him. He remembered now that, after feeling shock and confusion, he’d felt disgust. And he’d felt guilt, too, as though he was betraying Carrie. That had come to his mind first, before he’d even thought of guilt or concern for his father.
Over the years, her attention had persisted, but Gael had learned how to handle it. She was not stupid enough to push her hand. Not while Diego was alive. But now, evidently Alexandra considered it open slather.
Gael focussed his attention on Carrie, and the present moment. “You know me, Carrie. Do you really think I would pursue you, having been with your mother? Do you think I would sleep with my father’s wife?”
Her eyes were wide, her breathing laboured. “No,” she said finally. And the relief that came from admitting that was immense.
“How long has this been going on?” Alexandra demanded, her voice shrill as it whipped around the kitchen.
“Six years,” Gael said seriously, lifting a hand and cupping Carrie’s cheek. “I fell in love with you that night, Carrie. I just didn’t realise it until I saw you again.”
Carrie made a strangled sound of surprise. “No,” she shook her head. “I don’t believ
e it.”
“I know.” He ran his thumb over her cheek. “So let me show you.”
“You were disgusted by that kiss,” she said seriously.
“No, I was disgusted in myself,” he said, his tone urgent. “I was twenty nine, you were an innocent child, and believe me, Carrie, I had very not-innocent thoughts about you. What did that make me?” He shook his head in pained memory. He could see Carrie’s doubt. He understood it. “We need to discuss this elsewhere.”
“Yes.” She nodded awkwardly, her eyes flying to her mother. She’d forgotten Alexandra was there. “Maybe.” She frowned. “I don’t know.”
“You’re crazy if you think you’ll be able to keep his interest, Carrie,” Alexandra’s tone was laced with warning. “He’ll bore of you and then you’ll wish you’d listened to me.”
Carrie sighed. Her head was aching. She hadn’t slept enough and her mind was fried. “Perhaps.” She shrugged. “I have to get out of here now.”
She walked towards the door of the kitchen, holding an apple, a coffee, and a mountain of confusion.
“We’ll leave soon, Carrie.”
She spun around to look at him.
“We have to talk,” he continued firmly, his eyes boring into hers.
“Yes, I know.” She nodded. “But it will wait.”
“No,” he denied hotly.
And Carrie’s beautiful face, usually so carefully blanked of emotion flared with uncontained rage.
“Am I the only one here who cares that we just yesterday said goodbye to a great man?” Tears sparked her eyes. “You should be ashamed of yourselves, carrying on like this. Where is your respect? I loved Diego, and I don’t want to think about any of this right now. None of it matters. Not today.”
She turned before she could see the hatred on Alexandra’s expression, and the shock on Gael’s. She walked away slowly, her head held high.
Carrie’s eyes scanned the contracts again. All was in order. She had no need to have re-read them for the tenth time that morning. But there it was – Gael’s signature in firm black writing, notarized by a member of his in-house legal counsel. They were binding and official.