He arrived on the platform at the same time as the guard, and the man gave him a friendly wave. ‘More guests coming in?’ he asked with a smile. ‘You lot are keeping me in business now the holiday season is coming to an end.’
‘My brother.’
The guard nodded. ‘Ah, yes. He’s one of my regulars now. Nice lad.’
Aaron grinned. ‘He has his moments.’ They shared a laugh before the guard moved away to complete his final checks.
The train easing into the station was an older style one with drop-down windows built into the doors. Luke’s head stuck out of one towards the back, and he could make out the wide grin on his face from where he stood. Aaron rolled his eyes; he looked like a bloody Labrador hanging half out of a car window with the breeze blowing in his face. He grabbed his brother’s bag and dropped it on the ground before sweeping him into a tight hug. ‘All right, Spud? It’s good to see you.’
Luke squeezed his ribs and planted a kiss on his cheek. ‘Good to see you, too. How’s things?’ A concerned look creased his brow.
‘Bloody awful.’
‘Thought they might be. We’ll have a beer tonight, eh?’ Luke picked up his bag and slung his free arm around Aaron’s shoulders, offering comfort without censure. Aaron raised his hand to pat his brother’s where it rested on his shoulder and they strolled down the platform towards the car park.
The guard had his back to them, talking to someone. He turned as they drew level. ‘These lads might be able to help you. This young lady’s trying to get to Butterfly Cove.’
Aaron stopped immediately, speaking before he’d even got a good look at the woman. ‘We’re headed that way, we’ll be happy to give you a lift.’
She glanced up through a choppy, peroxide-blonde fringe and he would have recognised those chocolate-brown eyes anywhere. The infamous third sister. Kiki had mentioned Nee knew about the wedding but they weren’t sure if she’d be able to make it back from the States to attend. Apparently, she had.
Stepping forward to offer his hand, Aaron froze at the look of abject horror on her face. Her attention was fixed at a point past his left shoulder. Raising a shaky hand to her mouth, she choked out a single word. ‘Luke?’
‘Shit.’
Confused, Aaron spun towards his brother. The unhappy expression Luke wore matched Nee’s to perfection. ‘You know each other?’
Luke pursed his lips. ‘You could say that.’
He stepped forward, a mocking smile on his face. ‘Aaron, allow me to introduce you to my wife. Nee, this is my brother, Aaron. He’s in love with your sister, but she’s about to leave him. Must run in the family.’ Luke turned on his heel to walk off without a backward glance.
‘Well, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve things to do.’ The guard’s flustered words of departure barely registered with Aaron as he watched the colour drain from the already pale woman’s face.
Grabbing her arm, he held her steady until she stopped swaying. ‘Take a breath, I’ve got you.’
She blinked up through a shimmer of tears. ‘How is he here?’ Her eyes drifted past him again.
‘Luke, you mean? Your sister Mia is marrying my best friend, Daniel. We’ve been coming here since the winter to help with the renovations on the guest house and the studios. I live here now. With Kiki. Not with her, you understand. Just under the same roof. Well, until Sunday, and then she’s moving back to your dad’s. Neil’s giving her a hard time. You know about her leaving him?’ The flood of explanation sounded ludicrous to his own ears, but was nothing compared to the questions screaming in his head. How? How could Luke be married to Nee and he not know about it? How could his little brother be married to anybody without him knowing about it?
Nee glanced over her shoulder at the stationary train. ‘I… I should go. This was a mistake.’ She tugged against his hold, tears brimming over her lids to spill down her cheeks, but Aaron didn’t release her. The train wouldn’t be going anywhere for a couple of hours and he couldn’t leave her on her own in this state.
‘Shh. Don’t cry. Let me take you to see your sisters, okay? You’ve come all this way, it would be such a shame to turn around now.’ He pulled a folded handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to her.
‘All this way?’
She was obviously in shock, poor thing. Hours on a plane followed by a surprise confrontation with Luke. Her husband! the inner voice in his head screamed. Aaron shoved it away and tried to focus on the immediate situation. ‘Come on, my car’s just around the corner. Let’s get you back to Mia’s and the rest will come out in the wash.’
This time, when he tugged on her arm, she didn’t resist. He grabbed the handle on her rolling suitcase with his free hand and led her off the platform. There was no sign of Luke in the car park, although his bag sat on the gravel beside the car. He stowed it beside Nee’s suitcase then helped her into the passenger seat. She didn’t mention his brother, and he thought it best not to. Orcombe was little more than a one-horse town so there weren’t many places he could be. As soon as he delivered Nee, he would double back and look for Luke. His eyes rose to the large white building on the other side of the road. The pub would be as good a place to start as any.
The ten-minute drive from the station to Butterfly Cove seemed endless, and Aaron couldn’t help but heave a sigh of relief when he pulled up close to the kitchen door of the house. Daniel stood in the shade, holding a cold can of lemonade to his forehead. ‘About time you slackers got here,’ he greeted Aaron as he climbed out of the car. ‘Hey, who’s your friend? Where’s Luke?’
Aaron shook his head. ‘Is Mia about? Can you fetch her?’
‘What? Hey, sure. She’s just throwing some sandwiches together.’ He leaned back towards the open door and called out. ‘Mia, love? You’ve got a visitor.’
Mia appeared from inside the house, wiping her hands on a tea towel as Aaron opened the car door and held out his hand to help Nee out. ‘What’s all the racket? Luke isn’t exactly a visit... Nee? Oh my God, Nee! Kiki! Kiki, come see who’s here!’
Nee flew past him like a tiny whirlwind and threw herself at her sister. The two women clung to each other, joined almost instantly by a third as Kiki gave a cry of delight at the sight of her little sister. Laughing and crying, the three women stumbled towards the house in a tangle of arms and legs.
Daniel popped the tab on his drink and downed several huge swallows. Wiping the back of his hand over his mouth he glanced at Aaron. ‘So that’s Nee, is it?’
He nodded his head. ‘Yup.’
‘And where’s Luke?’
Aaron scrubbed a hand over his eyes. ‘The pub, I think. I dunno. I need to go and find him.’ He glanced towards the open door. ‘What a bloody mess.’
Daniel followed his gaze. The chattering voices inside had dropped away, leaving it ominously quiet. His best friend swung back to frown at him. ‘What’s going on?’
Aaron shrugged. ‘I don’t even know where to start. Let me go and find Luke first.’ He rounded the car and slid into the driver’s seat. The forecast hadn’t been kidding when it predicted storms on the horizon. In the light of developments, perhaps his own plans for Saturday should be put on hold. Or maybe he was desperate for an excuse. Whatever. His own problems needed to wait their turn, Luke needed him and nothing else could come before that.
It was with no small sense of relief when Aaron pulled up outside the pub and found Luke waiting for him on the pavement. He leaned over and popped the handle to let his brother in. ‘All right?’
Luke laughed. ‘Anything but. I know it’ll be a bit of a squeeze tonight, but can you find room for me at your place?’ The original plan had been for Luke to stay in one of the studio apartments tonight before he and Daniel stayed over on Friday night. They might be already living together, but Mia wanted to respect the tradition of the bride and groom not seeing each other on the morning of the wedding. Kiki and Charlie were staying over at Butterfly House, and Honeysuckle C
ottage would become a bachelor pad for one night only.
Aaron rested his head on the steering wheel, wishing the errant thought away. After Sunday, the cottage would revert permanently to a bachelor pad. Meals for one, no slalom course of toys and games to negotiate on the living-room floor. Tears burned the backs of his eyes and he bumped his head against the wheel. The horn blared, scaring the crap out of him, and he jerked upright. Laughter filled the car and he punched Luke in the arm. ‘It’s not funny.’
‘No, Bumble, it’s really not.’ Luke stared at him, straight-faced for a moment before they both burst out laughing.
It hurt, Christ it hurt, but the cathartic nature of their shared pain helped Aaron purge the cancer of doubt that had been eating away inside of him. Kiki might be leaving, just as he’d predicted, but in his self-indulgent wallowing he’d forgotten one important fact—she wasn’t leaving him.
Breathing easily for the first time in days, he turned in his seat to regard Luke. ‘She’s the girl you told me about, right? The love-at-first-sight girl from The George?’
His brother nodded.
‘Why didn’t you tell us; tell me at least?’
Luke shrugged. ‘At first, I didn’t want to talk about it. It didn’t seem real, you know? Like I’d been living in this dream world and I woke up.’ He coughed, a raw painful sound, and Aaron reached out to clasp his shoulder. The space in the car made it awkward, but now Luke had started talking, he didn’t want to interrupt him by suggesting they relocate to the pub, or back to the cottage. He notched the air conditioning up with his other hand to ease the stifling atmosphere.
‘When I opened my eyes, the first thing I saw was an empty champagne bottle with one of the roses from her bouquet sticking out of the top of it. Bouquet sounds grander than it was—we grabbed a bunch of them from a street seller on the way to the registry office. She had this lilac dress on, and she’d painted her nails to match it…’ Luke shook his head as though trying to dislodge the image from his mind. ‘The bottle, the rose, I thought my heart would jump right out of my chest as I raised my left hand and saw the band on my finger. I was married, and happier than I’d ever been in my life.’
He looked away and Aaron schooled himself to wait. Forced himself to ignore the tide of anger rising inside him. The anger wasn’t directed at Luke, not even at Nee, though she’d surely broken his brother’s big heart. He’d let Luke down. Been too busy playing hero to a girl who didn’t really need him, and for what? His need to apologise rode him hard, but he swallowed it down.
‘I thought she was in the bathroom, or maybe in the kitchen getting a cup of coffee, so I waited. I’d persuaded someone to take a few photos of us after the ceremony. I reached for my phone and knocked something onto the floor. It… it made this noise when it hit the floorboards, and I heard it roll under the bed.’ Luke glanced over at him and the raw anguish on his face ripped his guts to shreds. ‘I knew. That thud and roll. I just knew what it was.’
Jesus Christ. ‘Her wedding ring?’
Luke nodded. ‘That’s all she left. No note, no trace she’d ever been in my flat other than that fucking ring I’d slid on her finger twelve hours earlier. I didn’t even know she’d left the country until Mia mentioned something about New York.’
He’d opened the door, so Aaron felt able to ask the question that had been weighing on him. ‘When did you realise Mia and Nee were sisters?’
‘Not for ages. I thought Mia looked familiar, but I was so obsessed with Nee I saw her everywhere, in the face of every woman who looked even remotely like her. I chased one poor girl down the street, thinking it was Nee, and the fear on her face when I grabbed her arm broke something inside me. So I did my best to forget. To pretend she never existed.’ And it worked for a while.’ He sighed. ‘It was the weekend we were trying to finish the harem room. Mia had ordered some fabric for the curtains, but it hadn’t arrived. The order was on that big corkboard of hers, the one in the kitchen…’
Aaron nodded. The board was Mia’s lifeline—an overspill of her endless notebooks and crammed with recipes, bills and other things she didn’t want to lose.
‘I lifted a piece of paper, and there was this photo underneath it. Three girls, long hair flowing as they laughed together, and the pieces clicked into place.’
‘You went home early that weekend, said you had a bad head.’ It had been a busy weekend for them all and Luke had been pale enough for Aaron not to think twice about it. He’d been doing that a lot, accepting excuses and taking everything his brother said at face value. Guilt jabbed him below the ribs. ‘I wish I’d been there for you. That you would have talked to me. Why didn’t you say anything?’
‘At first I was too shocked and then it just felt too awkward. What could I say to Mia? By the way, I’m married to your sister. I found myself listening for any hint of Nee, and that made it worse, like I was stalking her or something. My contact details haven’t changed in the last year so she could have reached me if she wanted to. The message was loud and clear.’
His heart ached for Luke, but he must have known things would come to a head eventually. As usual, fate had picked the worst timing possible. ‘What will you do now?’
His brother shrugged. ‘It’s not up to me. Nothing’s changed.’ He grabbed Aaron’s arm, his face creased with intensity. ‘If I’d thought for a moment she’d be here, I would have said something, I swear. The last thing I want to do is screw things up for Mia and Daniel. I should go home…’ He looked past Aaron in the direction of the train station.
‘No. No way. I’m not letting you out of my sight, Spud. Not when you’re so upset. I’ll talk to Daniel and we’ll work something out. You can stay at the cottage and if you don’t want to see her, you won’t have to.’
‘That’s not fair on you. Not fair on them either, I came here to help, to celebrate my friends finding a happiness they both desperately deserve. I’ve accepted the fact she doesn’t want me in her life.’ Luke took a deep breath. ‘I’m not looking for a big confrontation. I don’t even care any more why she left me.’ Aaron wondered if his brother could hear the lie in his words, but he kept quiet.
Luke glanced up. ‘I can handle it, if she can. If she can’t, then I’ll go back to London. I don’t want to spoil things.’
Aaron didn’t think he’d have the same strength if their situations were reversed, but his job right now was to let his brother handle things however he needed to. ‘Do you want me to find out what’s going on?’ At Luke’s nod, he climbed out of the car and placed a call to Kiki.
‘Aaron? Hold on a minute.’ He heard the faint sound of a door closing, and her voice blurted in his ear. ‘Oh my God, did he tell you?’
He paced along the pavement to make sure he was out of earshot should Luke open his window. ‘Yes. I don’t know what to make of it, to be honest. What did Nee say?’
A soft sigh echoed down the phone. ‘Not much. She was pretty hysterical at first. Just kept saying she’d made a terrible mistake.’
He wondered if Nee was talking about getting married to Luke or leaving him, but he kept quiet. It was a discussion for the two of them, and no one else. ‘Luke told me he didn’t think she would make it to the wedding or he would have said something. I think he was in denial over the whole thing. He’d like to stay, but he doesn’t want to cause any more upset, so if Nee can’t handle seeing him, he says he’ll go home.’ Aaron scuffed a stone on the pavement with his foot. ‘He’s my baby brother, Kiki. I can’t let him leave, certainly not tonight.’
Her response was instantaneous and went a long way to easing the tightness in his chest. ‘Of course he can’t! He can stay with us tonight. The kids can double up, or come in with me even. Take him home and I’ll try and find out what’s going on.’
Relief flooded him. ‘Thank you. I… tell Mia and Daniel that I’m sorry.’
‘For what? None of this is your fault, Aaron.’
He could see the logic in her sta
tement, but it didn’t do anything to ease his guilt. He should have seen, he should have known Luke was upset about something. He said as much, and Kiki cut him off with a rude noise. ‘Bollocks to that, Aaron Spenser! If it’s your fault, then it’s surely my fault—Mia’s, too, for that matter. We let our little sister slip away from us; we were too caught up with our own struggles to pay proper attention to her.’ Her voice softened. ‘It happens. That’s life. We can’t control everything.’
A smile stretched his lips. ‘When did you get so smart?’
She laughed. ‘Too damn late for it to do any good, it seems. I’ve got to go.’
‘Okay. I’ll get Luke settled in and make a start on dinner. Ring me when you’re ready and I’ll come and pick you and the kids up.’
‘Okay. Don’t worry, we’ll sort things out.’
He ended the call, hoping like hell she was right.
Chapter Twenty
Friday dawned bright and fair. Birds sang in the hedgerows, and a tractor turned a lazy circle in a nearby field. If she hadn’t spent the night with Charlie and Matty, cuddled close as thunder roared and lightning flashed outside the window, Kiki would never have believed there’d been a storm overnight. Tension rolled off Luke from his position in the passenger seat in front of her. She lifted her eyes to meet Aaron’s via the rear-view mirror and offered him a weak smile. Both Luke and Nee had sworn they could deal with the other’s presence; that their only concern was making sure Mia and Daniel had the best day possible. They were both terrible liars.
Wedding Bells at Butterfly Cove Page 19
