They face each other. Jess feels her pulse quickening, her lips moistening. She breathes slow, desperate to dissolve the no-good temptation to meet his gaze.
“Thanks for coming,” she says. Stick to business.
“No problem. You had me at treasure hunting. So what’s the deal?”
“Do you have it?”
“Have what?”
“The necklace,” she says, exasperated by his casualness. “I need the necklace. This wasn’t just a ruse to get you to hang out with me again—”
But her plea glides over him.
“No?” he says. “You’ve made an effort with the Cleopatra affair though. Definitely a notice-me piece.”
Jess reaches her hand to her chest, to the shield of turquoise beetles.
“Scarabs were a symbol for good luck in ancient Egypt,” she shrugs. “Soldiers wore them into battle.”
“Ah, so you’ve come to do battle?”
“I’ve come for the necklace.”
Guy laughs, flicks his hair.
“I’m serious,” Jess urges, huge sails of emotion sweeping through her. “My grandmother… Her health is bad. We had a call from her care home, and it’s not great news. I just want her to see the necklace before…before she…”
She tenses, shuts her eyes, squeezes back the sorrow, but tears brim anyway. They trickle down her cheeks. Then her composure crumples entirely and the tears turn into sobs.
“Oh,” says Guy, mouth open, sparkle shadowing.
Tentatively he wraps an arm around her, pulls her toward him.
“I get it,” he whispers softly. “You want the necklace for her. For family. Family is everything, right?”
But Jess, obliterated by her sorrow, barely hears his words. She sobs into his shoulder, simply grateful that it’s a shoulder, never mind the fact that it belongs to Guy van der Meer. Her tears and snot dampen the fabric of his navy shirt, while thoughts of Nancy tangle themselves up with thoughts of her long-deceased mother, Carmen, and all of it is overwhelming.
After a minute, however, the purging magic of a good cry sets in. Deep calm replaces the pain. Jess sits up, wipes her cheeks, blinks and winces and apologizes for her outburst.
“It’s fine,” says Guy. “Happens all the time.”
“Does it?”
“Well, no, but—”
He smiles and she can’t help but smile back. And it occurs to her that, beneath the bravado, he at least has the compassion to give a stranger a hug when they need one. Guy meanwhile stares into the depths of the glass display case in front of them.
“Mad, isn’t it, to think that humans have worn jewelry through the ages, that the instinct to decorate ourselves came way before our civility. Obviously we’re no longer adorning our bodies with animal teeth and bones in the hope that they’ll make the sun rise and terrify our enemies, but how much have we really changed? The basic tenet is the same: put on a big, badass bunch of rings, look like a boss. So…you’re a treasure hunter too?”
Jess sniggers.
“Why is that funny?”
“Because I saw it on your profile. It’s the most ridiculous and overblown job title I’ve ever heard.”
“It was good enough for Long John Silver.”
“Who was a fictional character—”
“A fun one though.”
“Well, yes, but—”
“I wouldn’t take it too seriously, Jess. Job titles aren’t my thing. But in a roundabout way, I’d say treasure hunting describes what I do. I deal in antique jewelry. My clients come to me looking for something a little bit special.”
Jess’s insides somersault. He deals in antique jewelry. Of course he does! Why does it feel like the universe is making him more and more attractive to her, when all she needs is the necklace? His arm is still resting on her shoulders, and it’s a thrill. She jiggles her toes, leans out of his embrace, and with the post-cry breeziness still blowing through her, she allows herself to explore her intrigue. Just a little.
“So who are these clients?” she quizzes.
“London’s wealthy, money to burn, the sort who don’t want what everyone else has got.”
“They want everyone to want what they’ve got.”
“Exactly.”
“Any famous names?”
“Oh, I’m exceedingly discreet”—his eyes shimmer—“but yes, I get some interesting jobs. Last month I had to find a gothic ring with a big, pink ruby for an international rock star. Before that, I sourced a nineteenth-century pearl-and-diamond tiara for a well-known socialite’s wedding day. And yesterday I reunited a war veteran with his beloved art-deco fob watch. That’s what I really like doing, helping people find items they’ve lost.”
“So you like a quest?”
“I do. I’ve had clients fly me to far-flung corners of the world in the hopes I’ll unearth their engagement ring from the depths of whatever souk/sea bed/nightclub floor they dropped it in. You’d be amazed the lengths people will go to in order to be reunited with something they treasure—”
“Not at all amazed,” she says pointedly.
“I tell you one thing; it beats pushing paper clips around an office desktop.”
“Agreed. I’ve always avoided the paper-clip/office thing too.”
He smiles.
“So you understand me?”
“Maybe,” she says, folding her arms and fighting to contain the push-pull of her feelings.
He leans forward, inspects a shiny, gold dress clip on a black mount.
“Are those fire opals?” he mutters, more to himself than to Jess, who cannot quite fathom that she has met someone more knowledgeable and committed to the world of jewelry than she is.
“And how do you find these clients of yours?” she presses. “I guess it helps that you’re from a well-established diamond family?”
“I guess it does.”
“They trust you.”
“Yes.”
“So you’re trustworthy?”
He looks at her.
“Of course.”
His phone buzzes, a pester in the quiet space. He shuts it off.
“I’d love to tell you more about it,” he says, “and hear more about your treasure hunting—”
“Oh, my business is small time. I don’t have wealthy clients who fly me to exotic locales in search of engagement rings. I work from my sister’s kitchen.”
“But you love what you do?”
“Totally.”
“Then we should talk about this much more. How about that dinner, later?”
Jess lowers her eyelids, thinks of Tim, their big night.
“Not today,” she says.
“Well, that’s an improvement on outright no. A cup of tea then? You could surely do with a cup of tea. The café’s just down the corridor.”
One cup of tea. One small cup of tea. Would a cup of tea do any harm? She checks her watch, nerves churning.
“Okay,” she says, dropping her shoulders. “But please, I’m on borrowed time. A quick cup of tea, just so we can sort out the necklace, then I have to go.”
“But, but, but,” says Guy, gently mocking her as he rises.
***
In the resplendent café, among the bottle-green Victorian tiles, the stained-glass windows, and the twinkly contemporary space-ball light fixtures, Guy nudges Jess to a table next to the grand piano, then goes to order. It is raining outside—another summer downpour—and the sound gives the space a cosseting, snug feel. Jess takes a seat and prays Aggie isn’t watching over her with some undisclosed crystal ball. Even though nothing has “happened” between her and Guy, his presence feels like a deceit. In his company—she can’t help it—she just seems to glow. What if other people can see this? What if they can tell she’s having tea with someone who isn’t her b
oyfriend? She swallows her guilt. She shouldn’t—mustn’t—go down that path. Just get the necklace and go.
Guy returns with a tray of tea and mounds of cake, including pecan pie, lemon drizzle, and scones with clotted cream. So much for a quick cuppa. The sight of this indulgence shocks Jess.
“Wow, you have a sweet tooth!” she exclaims, remembering how he’d chased down the doughnuts that day in the cab.
“One of many weaknesses,” he confesses, “but life’s too short for alfalfa.”
He hands Jess a spoon, then dives into the fruity, creamy, cakey jumble. Jess eyes him, the way he eats with gusto. At over six feet, with coat-hanger shoulders, he’s somehow managed to stay slim, although she notices, at his waist, a certain bulge around his belt—a cake paunch. It’s infuriatingly endearing, a hint that he is perhaps not as vain as she took him for.
“So you’re just a down-to-earth dude who happens to be mixed up with the top 1 percent?” she asks, scooping a piece of pie into her mouth.
“I’d say ‘mixed up’ is a little strong. I merely hang on to their Gucci coattails.”
“Hah! So you’re a wannabe?”
He laughs, unfazed by her repeated attempts to topple his crown.
“I’m just canny, Jess.”
“Why do I get the feeling there’s something slightly scoundrel-like about you?”
He shrugs, eyes twinkling. A glimpse of his leopard-head ring reminds her of her initial instinct about his character. That magnetic charm spell he seems to cast… No doubt it gets cast quite regularly. She lays down her spoon and sits back, arms folded. He copies, all the while holding her gaze.
“Are you always this suspicious?” he asks.
“One can never be too careful about the company one keeps,” she replies.
“True. One must never hang out with boring people.”
Jess suppresses a giggle. “That’s not what one meant.”
“So tell me more about your jewelry business,” says Guy, holding her focus, leaning forward as though keen to know every detail.
“It’s called Miss Taylor’s Vintage and Retro Jewelry. I find great pieces, then give them a second home. My mission,” she says, smiling smartly, “is to smash the throwaway culture that has us reaching for two-for-one mass-produced supermarket charm bracelets sooner than we’d buy something preloved.”
“Quality, design, fine craftsmanship, and the magic of past adventures captured within,” adds Guy.
Jess’s eyes widen with glee. How he gets her! She hands him her business card.
“I’d like to grow it,” she says, “reach more people.”
“Of course,” he says, giving the card a little flex. “You know, if you need any contacts—”
“Thanks, but to be honest, I’m thinking of going back to teaching this September. Design and technology for rogue fifteen-year-olds. There’s a post available. Apparently their last teacher quit suddenly after an incident with a jigsaw blade—”
“Yikes! Are you sure about this?”
“It’s a grown-up job,” she says with a shrug. “And I’m trying to be grown-up.”
“A grown-up?”
“Uh, I owe it to a few people to make more sensible choices in life. Besides, the soon-to-be deputy head is my, um, boyfriend.”
“Oh yes, the boyfriend who speaks for you. How’s that working out?”
“Great, actually.”
“And now you’re thinking of working together. How commendable.”
“It’s a good opportunity. It’ll give me some stability. We’ve got plans together and—”
Their eyes meet, fervently absorbing each other’s meta-signals.
“What jewelry does he wear?”
“A smart watch and a copper band for warding off arthritis.”
“That’s not jewelry. That’s…artless timekeeping and quack medicine.”
Jess bristles, her gaze catching on Guy’s emerald-eyed leopard ring.
“We can’t all be diamond magnates,” she says. “So tell me about your jewelry business and your family, the van der Meers? Are you close? Did they inspire you?”
“Something like that,” he says evasively.
The way he brushes his hand through his curls, jiggles his knee, and looks everywhere but at Jess, she senses he’d prefer to avoid the topic. But still she presses on, determined that if her life choices can be interrogated, so can his.
“Are you a fine or costume person?” she asks.
“All of it, but if I had to choose, I’d say costume. Less snobbery. More playfulness. You?”
“Costume always.” She lowers her eyelids, thinks back to her mother’s dressing table. “My mum had this jewelry box, and when I was little, I used to go through it and play with everything. I had this idea that she was extraordinarily rich because she owned so many rubies and sapphires. I didn’t realize they were cheap colored crystals and plated brass.”
Guy laughs. The rain drums hard on the window above them. They both take mouthfuls of unctuous lemon drizzle.
“So, with all this cake in your life, do you ever go to the gym?” Jess asks.
“God no! Boring! I probably don’t do as much exercise as I should, but I like walking in the city. And dancing—that’s exercise, right? And I’ve also been known to do a bit of waterskiing in my day. And I once tried horse riding, but that was a big mistake. You?”
“I used to do all sorts,” say Jess ruefully.
Guy casts his gaze to her walking cane.
“So what happened?” he says.
She shuts her eyes at the question she dreads. At least he’s blunt about it, and there hasn’t been a single pity smile. So she takes a breath, readies herself to dive into the past.
“A year ago…I fell out of an airplane.”
“What?”
“It wasn’t intentional. I did a skydive in Mexico. My parachute failed to open.”
His eyes widen.
“Whoa!”
“Well, it sort of opened, but not enough. I hit a tree branch, then a bush, then a field full of alpacas. The flora damaged me, but at the same time it broke my fall and saved my life. If I’d hit the ground directly, I’d have been jam.”
Guy blinks, openmouthed.
“That…that wasn’t what I was expecting to hear. Do you…do you remember it?”
Jess lowers her eyelids and smiles. That he would ask such a probing, personal question intrigues her, tells her something of his nature.
“You mean you want to know what it’s like,” she says, leaning close, “at six thousand feet in the air, to have your mortality rush to meet you?”
“I so do,” he says, leaning closer.
“The din of white sky, the loom of the green, green, green fields, and the eerie serenity that engulfs you when you realize…death is real and it’s coming. And all you can think is: Have I done it right? Have I lived my life the way I was meant to?”
Guy blinks.
“Jesus. It’s not often I get stunned into silence.”
He leans closer still, the tip of his nose just inches from Jess’s. She can sense the warmth of his face, the musky smell of his aftershave.
“If it’s not impertinent of me to ask,” he says, holding her gaze with fierce intensity, “have you? Have you lived the way you were meant to?”
Jess dips her gaze, tunes into the ache in her back.
“I thought I had,” she says. “I used to be very carefree, not one for settling, but…my outlook is changing. I’m growing. Like, I can see myself as a mother, sort of. Or, at least, as someone who gets married and goes on one holiday a year rather than ten. Just, you know, normal stuff.”
“Rrrright. Good luck with that.”
“Do I detect sarcasm?”
Guy shrugs.
“Leopards,” he
says, flashing his ring. “Some say the spots never change.”
“Are you saying you don’t believe I want to be normal?”
“I’m saying it sounds like motivational self-talk.”
Jess shakes her head.
“Nah. Trust me. I’ve had my fingers burned and learned the lesson. No more high jinks. From now on I want a calm, simple, sorted life.”
“So what were your injuries?”
“I fractured my spine and smashed my pelvis. I was airlifted to Mexico City in a helicopter, but by then I’d lost consciousness. I woke up in hospital a week later. Four operations and seven titanium plates to piece me back together. After that, I spent two months in a rehab center, where I healed and found a new way to walk. And then I flew home to the UK”—she takes a breath—“and now I’m trying to find a new way to live.”
“But you do live. And you can walk.”
“And it’s getting better every day,” says Jess, brightening, drawing hard on those inner reserves, positive all the way.
“What were you doing in Mexico?”
“Looking for silver.”
“There we go, treasure hunting!”
“It was to help start my jewelry business,” she explains. “Before I went to Mexico, I was a struggling trainee teacher. I mean, I liked the idea of it, but my head of faculty kept telling me I needed to write this report and that report and set targets, which then had to be SMART targets, and that I had to follow a specific curriculum and use certain kinds of vocabulary and, in the end, I don’t think I taught anything interesting. Anyway, I was fed up and wanted a change and someone told me the silver in Taxco was good and then I saw a cheap flight and…went for it.”
“So where did it go wrong?”
“I made the mistake of falling in love.”
“That old chestnut?”
“He was blond, actually. Matteus from South Africa. We had a great time. For six months we lived out of each other’s pockets. I kept posting my Taxco silver back to London, storing it up for the future, and we carried on living the backpacker dream. We hiked through rain forests, lazed in hammocks, ran along deserted white-sand beaches, explored secret Mayan temples and azure waterfalls. Lots of quesadillas and lots of tequila.”
The Lost and Found Necklace Page 9
