The Island Villa_The perfect feel good summer read

by Lily Graham

  ‘We have a plan though,’ she assured him, trying to make her voice sound confident to allay his fears. She knew well enough that worry was the foe of any recovery.

  ‘To risk your lives for me – a stranger?’

  She shrugged. ‘Would you prefer that we turn you in? It’s not our way.’

  He looked ready to protest again, but Cesca saw that he was tired, so she shook her head. ‘Sleep. When you wake up you can meet my sister and mother. Hear about our plan.’

  ‘And your father? What does he have to say about it?’

  A shadow passed over Cesca’s eyes. ‘He’s gone.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t be. He would have approved,’ she assured him.

  Her father had always been the big risk-taker in the family. The one who believed in the importance of doing what was right, no matter the cost.

  But Benito didn’t smile at her, or seem to feel relieved. He looked as though a worrying thought had occurred to him. ‘So, it’s just women here? You mentioned a sister, a mother? Is there no one else, no husband, or brother?’

  ‘No, I’m sorry. My father passed away some time ago and my brother Antoni had to return to the ship, so I’m afraid, you’re stuck with us.’

  He blinked. It was clearly worse than he had imagined. ‘I can’t do that – I can’t put a house of women at such risk.’

  Cesca shook her head. ‘Yes you can, and you will.’

  ‘You want me to pretend to be your cousin?’ Benito said the next morning, dumbfounded, when Cesca brought him another bowl of the thin porridge he’d spat up the day before.

  He’d learned his lesson. He sat up and took a small spoonful, despite his roiling belly crying out for more. Everything ached – his head, his ribs, his very skin and heart. He couldn’t believe the trouble they were willing to put themselves through for him – a stranger – he didn’t want to be the cause of it, didn’t feel that he deserved it either. Not after what he’d done, how his actions had caused the death of his older brother. How much more was he willing to risk to save his own life? It hardly seemed just.

  There were two other women in the room now alongside the woman who’d been tending him, the one he’d confused with an angel, with her fine red hair and sea-green eyes, and gentle touch. Cesca. The older woman looked like an ageing version of her. She was tall, probably in her late forties. Her hair a faded rust-like red. The third woman was dark, with skin like honeyed silk and a dark waterfall of hair. She had deep, dark eyes with thick lashes. Beautiful. She was the little sister, called Esperanza, he had learned.

  She was staring at him, a frown on her face. Her arms were crossed, and she didn’t look at all happy about their situation.

  Benito looked away. ‘I don’t mean to cause you trouble but I can see I have. As soon as I am able, I will get passage out of here.’

  Esperanza looked relieved, but Cesca shook her head. ‘You are not causing trouble.’

  Esperanza snorted, and Cesca hissed, ‘’Spranza, stop it.’

  ‘As far we are concerned you are our cousin, Rafael. Your mother sent you here to be cared for by me and Señor Garcia. No one will question that here.’

  ‘I can’t ask you to lie for me.’

  Cesca shook her head. ‘It’s not a lie, well, not really. Our cousin, Rafael, died last week – no one knows this here, word hasn’t spread from Ibiza. Antoni has already spoken to my uncle. You will take his place.’

  ‘In everything?’ asked Esperanza, looking at her sister with wide, shocked eyes.

  For a moment they stared at one another in silence, their eyes saying more than words. ‘Perhaps not in everything,’ said the older woman, with a sniff.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Formentera, present day

  Every day like clockwork, Emmanuel Sloviz arrived at sunrise. He took the coffee I made him outside, in one of the four mugs that were still all I owned, and got to work on painting the rest of the house.

  He was a quiet man, with methodical ways. He often left the sandwiches I made him or the cereal I left out for him when he was absorbed in whatever task he was busy with, which might have explained his waif-like appearance. I could see that he would need reminding to eat. Perhaps he often forgot to eat, so consumed was he in the work that he was doing. There was something to be admired about that.

  He hummed softly when he worked, and I found the sound soothing as I puttered around the house, trying to make a dent on the spare room so that Sage or Allan would be able to come and visit soon. I found that Emmanuel’s presence chased away the shadows, and brought a sense of routine to the day. There was something about knowing that he was around that made the mornings a little less lonely, even if we hardly spoke to one another.

  I had got into the habit of working when he did. Starting with the spare rooms, I had decided upon which furniture would stay and what would need to go. Unfortunately, a lot of it was unsalvageable, flimsy MDF that had seen better days, but there were a few pieces that could be used. Like a bed frame for one of the spare bedrooms, and an old wardrobe that Emmanuel helped me to move into the main bedroom, replacing the flimsy one that had been put there. It was one of those old-fashioned ones with claws for feet, and once it had been cleared of dust and debris – old newspapers and blankets, mainly – it added a sense of charm to the room. Emmanuel offered to help me paint it, but it seemed a shame to go over the old cherry wood with anything but some polish.

  It wasn’t until he’d been working at Marisal for more than a week that Emmanuel began opening up, ever so slowly, to me. I’d found that the only way to guarantee that he would, in fact, eat the food I made him was to stand around and ensure that he did. It was a good way to make sure that he took a break as well. He worked like a man possessed, a man who used work to chase away the devils inside his head. I couldn’t help wondering about what drove him to work that way. At first I’d admired it, his doggedness, his reliability, but after a while I began to see something else in his eyes as he worked, something I recognised from my own – the need to keep going, the fear of what would happen if you stopped.

  Despite my hesitations about crossing any boundaries, the truth was that I found him fascinating.

  This stranger who had come into my home, with his dark good looks and half-starved frame. I was curious to find out more, but I knew that his was a story that would probably take many months to prise out. There was something about his manner that reminded me a little of my gran, the way her eyes would grow dark, and how she too would clam up whenever questions were asked.

  Even the simplest ones I asked Emmanuel were evaded. ‘Where are you from?’ I asked as I handed him a baguette filled with tuna salad, one afternoon when the sun had gone from tangerine to blood orange, and the sound of the ocean was a lazy sigh in the wind.

  ‘Oh, not far from here,’ he responded.

  Healthy protein, a source of good fat. I was a mother whose only child was away, so perhaps it wasn’t that surprising that I couldn’t help the need to nurture those who I perceived to be in my care, unintended or not.

  ‘But where?’ I persisted, holding out the plate to him. He looked at me, his dark eyes showing something like a flash of amusement, then he put down his paintbrush in a nearby bucket of water so that it wouldn’t dry out and washed his hands, coming over to take the sandwich from me, and shaking his head slightly as I gave him a nod of encouragement to keep going, to keep eating.

  He snorted. ‘I didn’t see it before,’ he said, an amused glint in his dark eyes.

  ‘What?’ I asked, puzzled.

  ‘Your Catalan side, you sound a bit like my mother. Eat… eat,’ he joked.

  I grinned.

  I’d told him when we first met that my grandmother was from the island, but I hadn’t gone into any great detail or explained about the house. Or the circumstances of how I’d got it.

  ‘I think that’s only because you don’t eat enough.’

  He sighed. ‘I know – I forget.
It’s hard to remember when I’m busy. But you mustn’t trouble yourself, Charlotte. I’m stronger than I look.’

  There was something about the way he said my name that made me look away. It was so intimate. I couldn’t help but take an involuntary step back.

  I shrugged. ‘I’m sorry, it’s not my place to interfere. But it’s just that I see you working so hard, often on an empty stomach, and I can’t help feeling bad.’ It couldn’t be healthy to do that, I thought but stopped myself saying.

  He stared at me, giving me a rare smile.

  ‘It’s a sign of a good mother. Thank you,’ he said, then took another bite of his sandwich for my benefit.

  After that, we began to speak a little more regularly.

  I was putting on the coffee one morning when he came inside and answered the question I’d asked him a few days before, without ceremony.

  ‘Barcelona,’ he said, rinsing his plate in the sink.

  I turned to him with a puzzled frown. ‘Pardon?’

  ‘That’s where I grew up. You asked the other day, and I’m not sure I answered you.’

  I nodded, slowly.

  ‘Coffee?’ I offered.

  He nodded. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Where in England did you grow up, London?’ he asked.

  I took down the mugs from the dresser and turned to him, trying to mask my surprise at his sudden loquaciousness.

  ‘No. I grew up in the Surrey countryside. It’s where I’ve lived all my life really.’

  He considered this as he took his cup of coffee. His dark eyes contemplative. ‘You never moved before?’

  I shook my head. ‘No, well, not very far. When I met James, we talked about moving to the city – London is about an hour away, not that far, really – but in the end, I didn’t want to be away from my family.’

  He stared at me, and I touched James’s ring, twisting the metal in my fingers, feeling the zigzag pattern, the small gemstone. I was further from them now than I could ever have imagined. He saw the movement but didn’t say anything.

  ‘James is your husband?’ he asked.

  I nodded. ‘He was. He died.’

  To my horror, I found my eyes pooling with tears, which I dashed away.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, his hand briefly touching mine, then letting go. I could see from his eyes that he meant it. I took a deep breath of air and told him a bit about it.

  ‘It happened a few months ago. That’s why I’m here, really.’

  He nodded, his dark eyes boring into mine. ‘I thought maybe it was something like that,’ he said, his gaze falling on to James’s ring. ‘Well…’ he paused, his eyes sad. ‘I thought it was divorce—’ He broke off.

  I gave a small, short laugh. ‘I wish.’

  He nodded, then stared out of the window. His jaw tightened slightly. ‘It’s not the same, of course. I’m sorry. But it is a kind of death… well, that’s how it feels for me.’

  I looked at him in surprise. ‘You’re divorced?’

  Somehow, I hadn’t imagined that he might be married or that he ever had been. There was something so lost about him. Maybe that was why.

  He nodded. ‘It’s been a year now. Some days it feels like it just happened, though.’

  It was my turn to stare, and he looked away, perhaps regretting sharing a part of his story with me. Opening up.

  He set his mug down and gave me a small smile. ‘I must get back to work.’

  As he left I thought of that famous quote about misery loving company. The thing was, more often than not, it didn’t.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Formentera, 1718

  The man now known as Rafael Alvarez slipped outside once he was sure everyone had gone to sleep. His ribs hurt, even when he breathed, and it was hard to see out of his left eye, but it was nothing to the pain in his heart at the thought of his brother, Paulo, buried at sea.

  He had failed him. Risked it all. He’d been careless. It’s not like his family hadn’t warned him. In Majorca, they tolerated ‘new Christians’, as they called people like them. People whose families had been forced to convert their faith. It was easy to turn a blind eye to these new Christians when they were deemed useful, but if someone with that type of background rose too high, suspicions could also rise, faster than you could blink. Paulo had warned him to be careful. Not to take that promotion in Palma. But Benito had thought that things were changing. What he hadn’t realised was that they were changing for the worse. There had been another resurgence, a fresh new wave to get rid of these conversos, the ones they suspected of only pretending to have changed their faith, once and for all. And this time they were more bloodthirsty than ever. You had to be careful and he hadn’t been careful enough.

  They’d come for all of them. His brothers, and his cousins. What’s worse is that the colleague who’d turned him in had come to his home just before to warn him, racked with guilt over what he’d done, an act that was inspired by jealousy but which quickly soured when he realised he couldn’t take it back, couldn’t call off the howling dogs he’d sent for their throats. Benito and his cousins had no choice but to run, to flee their homes. It was the only way. Very few conversos lived to tell the tale, and some said even Catholics would admit to being Jews when tortured, just to make them stop. Now Paulo was dead, his cousins had been separated from him and he was in a house full of strange women, who all seemed ready to risk their lives for him.

  He couldn’t allow it. He wasn’t worth the risk. All he’d caused was misery and he refused to bring that here.

  He waited until they were asleep so that he could step out into the starry night, the sound of the waves crashing, full in his ears. He would slip away, unheard and unseen.

  Every step felt like lead, but he was determined, even if it meant death – at least then they would be safe; no one need ever know he had been here.

  ‘I didn’t take you for a fool,’ said a voice from the dark, the tone casual, yet surprised.

  He turned sharply, wincing as he did, the pain in his ribs making him clutch his side.

  It was the other sister. The one with the dark waterfall of hair, Esperanza. She was sitting on a tree stump and next to her was a small dog, the size of a loaf of bread, whose fur was wiry and pale brown. It had only one eye, which it fixed on him, head cocked to the side, as if it, too, was waiting to hear his answer.

  He sighed, ran a hand through his dark hair and decided to be honest. ‘You don’t want me here, so what’s it to you if I just leave? Wouldn’t that just make things easier?’

  She’d made it clear enough that she didn’t want him here. Not that he blamed her. To be honest, hers was the only reaction he’d understood.

  Her face was bathed in moonlight, and she had been resting her head on her knees while she stared out to sea, deep in thought, till he’d arrived.

  She didn’t deny it. It wouldn’t have occurred to her to try. ‘That doesn’t change anything. You can’t leave.’

  ‘Why?’ he said, taking a seat on the stump next to her. She moved over to give him space. The dog made a soft growl, like a warning.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because you can’t do that to my aunt and uncle – they’re pretending that their son, my cousin Rafael, is still alive, to save you. You can’t make them go through all of that – not being able to mourn him properly – for nothing.’

  His eyes widened. ‘They would do that for me?’

  She raised a shoulder, and then looked at him. ‘Yes.’

  He stared at her. Didn’t know what to say to that.

  She shrugged, turned back to look at the ocean. ‘It’s an excuse, one you need, and they know that it will protect you. People like to do their part, where they can.’

  ‘But they don’t even know me. I could be anyone. Maybe I’m not worth it.’

  She sighed. ‘Maybe not. But I suggest you go back inside, let my sister care for you and stop fighting it. I have. Cesca has made up her mind. You’d have more chance of c
hanging Grunon’s mind than hers,’ she said pointing to the goat pen.

  ‘Grunon?’ he asked, with a snort at the name, which meant grump.

  Her mouth twisted into a grin as she told him about the demon goat and he found himself laughing despite himself. It was the first time he’d laughed about anything in weeks, he realised. It was nice for once to talk about something other than his imminent discovery, illness or the people he’d lost.

  ‘I’d like to meet this Grunon.’

  ‘No, you wouldn’t, she’s the bane of my existence.’

  His lips twitched. She didn’t look like the type of girl who had a bane of existence. She seemed a little spoilt, and headstrong – but if the tall, hard-working woman, Cesca, who’d he’d half convinced himself in his delirious state was an angel, was the one who everyone in the family didn’t dare cross, then looks could be deceiving.

  ‘Maybe I can help with the goat.’

  The girl turned to him. ‘What, you didn’t get enough injuries on your way here, you want a few more?’

  Chapter Twenty

  Formentera, present day

  ‘I’ve been thinking,’ said Emmanuel a few days later after I’d made us both a quick sandwich while he prepped the kitchen for a fresh coat of paint.

  ‘This table…’

  ‘Yes?’

  He was eating his sandwich over the sink, so as not to make a mess. I’d taken a break from writing, or in any case my attempts at writing. Unlike Emmanuel, I was easily distracted from any task at hand.

  I looked at the kitchen table in question and sighed. It was hideously ugly.

  ‘What about it?’ I asked, wondering if he thought a touch of paint would make a difference, though I couldn’t see how, or why one would bother painting Formica.

  ‘I think it would look better somewhere else.’

  ‘Like where?’ I asked, confused.