He refuses to look at me. ‘Get your stuff and get out, Miss Wright. The car will take you to the jet.’ His head angles oddly. For a second I wonder if he might relent, ‘To be absolutely clear,’ his knuckles tighten around the handle, ‘I never want to see you again. We’re done.’
A vicious slam punctuates the remark. I gawk, wondering if the door will come off its hinges. I hurl myself down onto the smooth leather sofa, place my hands palms down to anchor myself. ‘Shit. Shit. No,’ I moan. A louder voice is galloping through my head. Yes. I bury my face in a cushion, tears leaking out, hoping that if I ignore the world, it will ignore me for a while.
I shower again, needing to feel clean. Unfortunately no combination of water and soap is strong enough. The phone rings as I stand dripping and dazed in the bedroom. ‘Alex?’ I snatch it up.
‘It is Maria from reception,’ her warm accented voice murmurs. ‘Your car will be outside for you in twenty minutes, madam.’
‘Thanks.’ I fumble the phone back into its cradle with a hollow clunk.
Then I shake myself. I don’t have long. Flinging my stuff into the suitcase, I yank on underwear, tights and a figure-hugging blue woollen dress with vertiginous black high heels, twist my hair up and dab make-up on, hoping it’s enough to conceal the state of my face.
I stagger through the suite to knock on Alex’s bedroom door, my movements uncoordinated and jerky. No reply. Shame, anger and defiance thread through me.
I can’t leave like this. I’ve got to try again.
Bending over the dressing table in my room, I scrawl a series of jumbled notes, screwing them up and tossing them in the bin. The minutes are ticking by and my breathless panic increases as the moments pass. Calm down. Biting my lip, I take a moment to study the wide Mediterranean outside the window, the bright January sunlight glinting off white caps, sky blue and brilliant. I wonder if the sea would swallow me whole if I asked it to. It’s calming, though, the view reminding me I’m a tiny part of a much bigger world, giving me perspective.
With a new sense of resolve, I go to the desk and bend over the pad.
Alex,
I’m sorry. But only for lying, not for the things you want me to be guilty of because trusting someone would be too hard. I get why, but you can’t go through life never trusting anyone, even if, like me, they give you good reason to doubt them.
The money for the assignment would have helped me survive a little longer, but that was the only sum I was interested in receiving after getting to know you. This weekend started out about justice and vindication and yes, compensation for what Tony did to me, but I can see I went about it the wrong way.
I was wrong.
I didn’t sleep with you to gain your trust or for a pay-off. You and I just happened. It wasn’t planned. In fact it was the very last thing I was looking for. Maybe at some point you’ll talk to Tony and look in his eyes for the truth and you won’t find it there, because all he’s ever done is lied. I know I have too, but only about what happened to me before we met and the reasons I came here, not about who I truly am – someone who likes you for the person you are behind the CEO persona.
Alex, I hope you do what you want with your life, whatever makes you happy.
Charley x
A sob lodges in my throat. Grabbing my case, handbag and coat, I leave my bedroom and shove the note under Alex’s door before rushing to the lift. I smile blindly during check-out, focusing on the exit. Then there’s a blank spot and I’m staring at the clouds outside the small round window of the plane. During the flight the staff do their best to look after me but I stare vacantly out of the window. I don’t even get nervous on landing, I’m too numb, and by the time the wheels touch down on tarmac my eyeballs are dry and scratchy with the effort of not crying in front of his crew.
Stumbling from the plane into the back of the car, there is one thing I know for sure.
I’m not the same person I was four days ago. The weekend, and knowing Alex, has shifted something inside me. I’ll need to figure out how to deal with it. But not now.
An hour passes and I’m delivered straight to my flat, knocking the front door shut with my hip and throwing my keys into the purple ceramic bowl on the hallway table, a sweet but gaudy gift from one of Jess’s pupils. I throw my coat at the square functional rack constructed by Jess and I over the course of a long, fraught Saturday afternoon when we ended up cursing everything about self-assembly furniture, modern and Scandinavian.
I tuck my case against the wall. The flat looks strange, both new and familiar.
‘Jess?’ I texted her in the car but haven’t received a reply. She’s probably in class.
Kicking off my heels, I flex my cramped toes back and forth against the floor whilst sifting through the post. Mostly bills. I expected more envelopes but then realise the postman’s only delivered once since I left on Friday afternoon. I traipse into the lounge. Painted in crisp whites and creams with wide bay windows, it looks out over a colourful bustling London street and is my favourite room. It offers little peace now. I deflate onto one of the large black sofas heaped with colourful Middle Eastern-style cushions.
Gazing at the cracked ceiling, I can’t believe I was in one of the most amazing and cosmopolitan cities in Europe a few hours ago and am now back in London in the bitter cold. Now I’m home safe I can blub and shout and throw things if I want to. I wait for it to hit, but nothing happens.
So I force myself to act, stomping into the hallway and dragging my case into my room, upending everything onto my bed. Racing around unpacking, I stop only when my phone beeps. I rifle through my bag, hope soaring for a short moment. Alex?
Hi. What happened? Staff meeting, home about fiveish. See you then. J x
I should spend the next few hours looking for a job but I’ve got to face facts. After this weekend, my career is over. Once Alex tells the agency what I did I’ll be even more unemployable. I can’t summon any upset at the thought. What’s wrong with me? Have I turned into an emotionless robot?
Stripping off my clothes, I stuff them in the laundry basket and change into my favourite loose boyfriend jeans and a baggy white top. I scrub my make-up off, until my skin is blotchy, and brush my hair into a ponytail. Wandering back to the lounge, I sprawl out on the sofa beneath the window and throw an arm over my face, fatigue overpowering me. I close my eyes, hoping to erase the entire weekend. Instead, all I can see is Alex’s face grinning down at me, all I can hear is his deep husky rock-star voice when he’s turned on, all I can feel is the imprint of his warm hands on my body.
He’s just a guy. Forget him. I squeeze my arm tighter over my face and after a few long minutes I fall into darkness.
A gentle hand on my shoulder drags me from an ignorant bliss I’m reluctant to leave behind. ‘Charley, wakey wakey.’
‘Hmm?’
‘I’m home hon, wake up.’ The hand rocks me again.
‘Okay, okay.’ Forcing heavy eyelids open, I squint at Jess. ‘Urgh. What time is it?’
‘Just after half five. I ran a little late, sorry.’
There’s concern in her sharp features, anxiety reflected in her grey eyes. I cast off the last dregs of sleep, sit up and yawn widely. And freeze, remembering where I am and why. Home, cast out. My face burns. ‘Oh, Jess,’ I groan, rubbing my forehead.
‘What happened?’ Shrugging out of her cropped leather jacket, she tosses it on the other sofa, her white-blonde bob darker than usual. When I glance past her, I see the night and heavy rain pressing in against the window.
Sitting and stretching, I meet her eyes. She is here now, and cares. Just like that, it rushes at me. My bottom lip quivers and though I bite down hard I can’t stop the emotional devastation, the scorching humiliated tears. ‘You’re going to say I told you so.’
Jess sucks in a breath through her teeth and spins on her heel. ‘I’ll get the wine.’
When she returns with two giant glasses and a bottle of Pinot, I tell her everything, and finally c
ry.
Chapter Twenty Four
Back to Life, Back to Reality
– February –
As I wrap newspaper around my favourite silver-framed mirror, the black print smudges and rubs off on my hands. ‘Bloody hell! Perfect.’
Kneeling on my bedroom floor, I rub my fists in my eyes and try not to let the tears escape. I hate this. Absolutely hate it. No. Focus. Leaning forward, I grab a fragile jewellery box Jess gave me for my fifteenth birthday and start to roll it up in more cheap newspaper.
To my utter shock, I got paid for the weekend in Barcelona, though the letter accompanying the payslip made it clear the agency would be taking my name off their books immediately. I longed to call them and say I was transferring the money straight back – there’s a part of me that really didn’t want to take Alex’s money, however indirectly it might come to me – but I couldn’t afford to be proud. So I gave most of it to Jess to make up for some of the back pay on the mortgage, and reminded myself firmly it was for the work I did, not sleeping with the CEO, whatever he might believe.
But now the money’s all gone and so has the month I gave myself to find a job after I got back. It’s no good. Once I found the letter from the mortgage company Jess hid in her room, stating the last two payments were overdue and threatening repossession of the flat if payments don’t become more regular, I knew what I had to do. I can’t ruin the wholeness of Jess’s life by trying to hang onto the tatters of mine.
It’s just a shame I didn’t ask my parents to lend me money when I went home for Christmas, because it turns out they’ve invested it all in the IT security firm Tom is setting up. Now that he’s back from Afghanistan and has bought himself out of the army he’s trying out civvy street. I’m really pleased for him, but it just doesn’t help me. Which is why I’m taking up Dad’s offer to move back home and into the summer house for a while. Only until I get my life back on track. Until something good happens. I’ve always believed hard work and passion are the things that get you where you want to be in life, but the events of the last few months have made me think luck plays a part too. And at the moment I’m on a streak of the bad stuff.
Rising, I massage my aching back and stretch out my shoulders. I’ve been packing for three hours. Time for a break. Going into the kitchen, I grab a mug, throw in a teabag and sugar and flick on the kettle. How many more times will I get to stand in this room and do this?
God. This is my home, where I belong. I don’t want to leave.
Waiting for the water to boil, I wonder if Alex makes his own tea. I wonder what his homes are like or if he’s ever had to leave somewhere he loves. I growl in self-disgust. He keeps creeping into my head, though I do my best to drive him out. I’m sure Alex is getting on with his life and has forgotten all about me, so I need to stop giving him headspace.
I start scrubbing the oven top where Jess made us carbonara last night. The girl can really cook, but she leaves behind a mess reminiscent of a world war. Does Alex prepare his own meals or have a private chef? The second is entirely possible, even though he intimated he only put up with the trappings because it came as part of the deal.
‘No, Charley,’ I mutter, ‘you have to stop this. No more thinking about him, wondering about him. You will never,’ I scrape at a stubborn piece of dried cream on the hob with a butter knife, knowing Jess would murder me if she knew, ‘see him again.’ Giving the hob another wipe and throwing the cloth down, I wash my hands and pour the kettle. ‘And now I’m talking to myself,’ I puff out a breath, ruffling my fringe, ‘great.’ I stir the teabag around the mug, a suitable reflection of my spinning thoughts.
This is stupid. Surely in a few more weeks any feelings for and about Alex will be gone. Like a teenage infatuation, the emotions will fade with distance and time. I stir the teaspoon faster. I’ll forget the way he looked at me, smiled, the common ground we discovered even with the difference in our circumstances, the way I could be opinionated with him and he liked it and didn’t feel threatened, that he respected my career. I won’t think of the laughter and banter and that when he relaxed, this warm, sweet guy came out. I will turn away from the memory of how it felt to be within reach of his gorgeous face and sexy, built body. I’ll try my best to block out the warmth and excitement of the brilliant sexual chemistry between us. I won’t remember my surprise that he’s so much more than the spoilt rich CEO playboy I was expecting, how vulnerable he is about the family duty he takes so seriously.
Yes. I will forget. Definitely.
And I’ve dropped the ET claim, even though it sickens me to think of Tony sitting in my office at the casino. I’m getting on with my life. I have to.
The spoon, guided by my agitated hand, whirls round in ever increasing circles, clank, clank, clanking against the side of the mug until it flies free, flicking me with scalding tea.
‘Ow! Bugger it!’ I jump back, brushing hot drops from my arms and running my smarting skin under cold water. At least the pain stops me moping. Fishing the teabag from the mug, I add milk, jerking as the doorbell rings.
I’m not expecting anyone.
Tugging at my casual green sweatshirt, I shrug at my faded, well-worn Levi’s. It’s Sunday afternoon and I’m dressed for comfort, not company. Jess is out and I thought I’d be alone. The bell rings again as I walk down the hallway. Okay, okay. When I unhook the chain and swing the door open, I draw in a sharp breath.
‘Alex!’ I step back, astonished, sharp lust pinging my silky knickers. Despite humongous bags under his eyes and stubble darkening his jaw, he’s still ridiculously hot. ‘W–what are you doing here?’ Mouth as dry as the Egyptian desert, I lick my lips. Alex on my doorstep is completely surreal. He belongs in Barcelona, at the hotel, not here. What the hell does he want?
Anxiety, hurt, confusion, anger. The conflicting emotions race through me like the colours and numbers on a spinning roulette wheel. I wait for it to slow and stop, for the ball to settle into a slot, for one emotion to win out. I grimace. Perplexity, with a massive dash of hope, seems to be the winner.
‘Can I come in?’ His face is unreadable, I’ve no idea what he’s thinking.
I run my eyes over his tight black jeans and clingy grey v-neck jumper under a winter coat. They look like things from our shopping trip on that last day.
‘They suit you,’ I blurt. What am I doing? Balls. Looks like I’ve no control of my emotions. I need to woman-up. But he’s so big and dark and gorgeous. I’m startled my memory has faded enough in the last month that I’ve forgotten how olive his skin is, how black his hair, the depth of his clear-blue eyes, which are now deadly serious as my gaze meets his.
‘Thank you,’ he replies, something flickering across his face, ‘any chance you can answer my question now, though?’
‘Question?’ I’m so blown away by him being here I can’t think properly.
‘May I come in?’
There’s a brief ache in my chest at his deep familiar voice and my breath snags somewhere in my throat. For a second, recalling the shouting and horrid things he said in the hotel suite, I consider slamming the door in his face. Then I remind myself I’d lied to him and hurt him, and burning curiosity to know why he’s here overrules any anger. But I need to take control.
‘It depends what you want.’ I lean against the edge of the door. ‘Are you here to yell and make accusations again?’
‘I hope not.’
‘You hope not? I was kind of hoping for a no to that one.’
‘I’m here to talk.’ A sliver of ice coats his voice, ‘I’m hoping it won’t end in any drama.’
‘Well, let’s do our best then,’ I say irritably, waving him to go along the hall. Slamming the door, I follow. A flash of heat prickles along my skin as I catch the smell of his fresh male aftershave, so I scoop in a deep breath as I walk into the lounge.
He turns from where he’s standing by the window and shoves his hands into his pockets. It underlines his height and taut strength of his body and an im
age of him standing by the hotel bedroom window in his jockey shorts flashes through my mind.
‘Shall I take your coat?’
He sort of prowls towards me, like in vampire books, and I keep still, craning my head further and further back so I can stand my ground as well as maintain direct eye contact. My eyes widen as he stops a foot away and the air between us thrums with unspoken tension. At least it does for me. And I suddenly want to tell him I wish things were different, that we’d met in other circumstances.
Shrugging his coat off, he hands it to me. ‘Thanks. I came here to ask you to tell me what happened with Tony Ferrier.’
‘Right.’ My fingers curl into the expensive wool of his coat and I can feel his body heat on it. Putting it down hastily, I point at the nearest sofa and sit on the other. ‘So why now?’ I ask as he perches opposite me. ‘How come you want to talk like adults a month after you sent me home with such indecent haste? And why, after the unforgivable things you said, should I even have this conversation with you?’ I can’t help it, the anger and humiliation rolls back over me. I’m in the suite that awful Monday, on the end of his guilt-making comments and edgy pain, feeling ashamed and defiant in equal measures. Shaking my head, ‘Don’t you think it’s a bit late, Alex?’
His jaw clenches but he consciously relaxes it, breathing in deeply through his nose, a muscle flexing in one tanned, whiskery cheek.
He smiles grimly. ‘I hope not. And you’re right, I made some totally unacceptable comments. I regret some of them,’ his voice is deep and ragged, ‘very much. In my defence, I was furious.’
I expected him to fight hard, say he had every right to say what he did. His response takes the wind out of sails that were billowing with turmoil and misery. ‘Yes, I get that.’ I edge forward on my seat. ‘And I understood why, after what you told me about Louise and how important it is for you to have honesty and trust.’ I pause, ‘I’m really sorry I made you feel so– so—’ I’m not sure how to describe it. He said in clear terms that day how little he was upset by what I’d done … because he didn’t care. That I was no better than Louise. That he never wanted to see me again. ‘Well,’ I shrug, staring at the small, chipped, wooden coffee table.
The Little Shop of Afternoon Delights Page 46
