by Anne Mather
The pain she’d once tried to spare him was all there on his face. ‘You were attacked?’
‘Yes.’ Clear, unblinking eyes stared back at him. ‘Obviously, it never went to court; my parents were worried about how it would look.’ Only then did her face flicker. ‘I was drunk—because my drinks had been spiked. I know that, because I was seventeen and, unlike my parents, I obeyed the rules and had been drinking orange juice. I started to feel sick and I remember being led upstairs to my room. He’d always seemed such a nice man—well, what I’d seen of him on the television. I honestly thought that he was helping me, and then …’ Karin sucked in a long breath. ‘Well, I’ll spare you the details. But as drunk as I was I did try to stop him. I smashed him in the face with a glass I grabbed from the bedside.’
He watched as her fingers automatically stroked the scar on her wrist.
‘I cut myself in the process. So, you see, it wasn’t a suicide attempt.’ So coolly she read his mind. ‘At the time, I actually thought I was saving my life.’
‘Karin, you don’t have to say anything more …’ He was appalled, sick to his stomach at what she’d been through, and at her treatment at his hands too. He wanted her to stop, wanted to take her in his arms and tell her he was sorry, so sorry. But Karin didn’t want to hear it.
‘I’m tired of covering up for my poor excuse of a family. I’m tired of staying locked in the closet with their skeletons. You wanted the truth? Well, now you’ll sit and hear it. After it happened, I drove my car to get away from him, from them—from this hell hole. I was trying to get to the hospital to get some help, except I smashed the car on the way.’
Xante reached for her arm, trying to comfort her.
‘Don’t!’ Spitting with anger, she stood, all the pain, grief, shame, and rot that she had stuffed down all the years propelling her from her seat. Her usually pale face was red with fury. ‘You had to push. You just had to keep working away till you got your precious answers! Well, here they are—I did drink and drive, and our family is in debt. But your precious source got one thing wrong—I didn’t go to rehab. That was my mother. She felt so guilty that she managed to sober up for a full three months!’
‘Karin—’
‘Terrible, isn’t it?’ Karin snapped. ‘Terrible to have to sit and listen to all this. But it’s worse being the one to remember it. It damaged me, Xante, and it took me years to even start to trust someone else, years to have a relationship. David was a nice guy, nice enough that after a while I was able to tell him part of what had happened. He was a nice enough man to take it slowly, and to say that the scars on my chest wouldn’t turn him off if I showed him …’ A scream was boiling inside her, gushing up, and she didn’t know how to stop it. This rip of pain was shooting from her lips, and hardest of all for Xante was that he’d lost the right to comfort her. He knew that if he so much as touched her she’d hit him. His punishment now was to sit and listen to her pain and be unable to do anything to alleviate it. ‘Except they did turn him off. They turned him off me!’
‘Karin, I didn’t know.’
‘Well, now you do!’
‘Let me help you.’
‘Help me?’ She let out an angry wail that was almost a laugh. ‘I was going to tell you; I was starting to trust you.’ She jabbed a finger in his direction. ‘You walk around like a Greek god with your perfect morals, your exacting standards—but only as far as they suit you …’ She was ranting like a deranged woman, but she didn’t care. Boy, it felt so good not to care and to speak her mind. ‘You collect trophies and claim them as your own. My grandfather bled for that rose. He lived, breathed and slept rugby—he gave everything to represent his country. He worked two jobs and still turned up for training every day. You … You wave your money around and just buy everything, the same way you bought me. And now suddenly I’m not good enough? Well, guess what? I don’t want to be your token blonde, Xante. I don’t want to be on display for others to admire, a little trinket to add to your collection.’
‘You’re not.’
‘I was.’
‘No.’ Of that he was certain. ‘Karin, at every turn I wanted to believe in you. You’re angry with me because I’m not supposed to care about your past. Except I do care—I care about you.’
Karin just stood there, drained from revelation and too bloodied to fight any more, to even think. ‘Just go.’
She’d dreaded his pity, but if anything Xante was actually angry at her. ‘Don’t sit there on your high horse, telling me I dragged the truth from you. I had every right to know that truth when I slept with you.’
‘It was easier for me that you didn’t.’ There was a first twitch of guilt as Xante got straight to the brutal point.
‘Well, it wasn’t easier for me,’ Xante answered. ‘I should have known that, Karin. What?’ He demanded to her shuttered face. ‘I’m not allowed to be worried about you, not allowed to be confused by your actions? I’m not allowed to care?’
‘Just go kamaki boy.’ She watched him wince, but she just wanted him gone. Wanted to be back on her moral high-ground, because it felt so much better there. ‘Go back to your hotel. I’m sure there’ll be another nice girl to add to your collection. One who’s not quite as hard work as me!’
He did turn to go, but he changed his mind.
‘For your information, I didn’t make a very good kamaki boy. I adored every one of those women; every one of those women, I hoped I might learn to love …’ His black eyes found hers. ‘Eventually I did.’
‘Just get out.’
She was actually glad when he did.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
EVEN before the black row with Xante, Karin had made up her mind.
‘Grandfather wanted the house to stay in the family …’ Matthew was immutable when she told him her plans the next day—and insisted they were carried out too.
‘He wanted a lot of things,’ Karin retorted. ‘This house will be sold, whether it’s by us or the banks. Matthew, we can’t afford it any longer.’
‘We can sell some stuff off.’ Matthew shrugged. ‘The library’s full of first editions; those gloomy paintings—’
‘If we sell the house,’ Karin interrupted, ‘We can afford to keep some of those things. We can both start again.’
‘It will be bought by developers.’ Matthew tried to hit her where he knew it would hurt, only he didn’t realise that she was beyond pain now. ‘It will be turned into a hotel, with weddings held here every week. You said yourself it would be a tragic waste if that happened.’
‘There’s been plenty of tragic waste in this family,’ Karin said. ‘Let’s just finish the job.’
Matthew was the first to leave the sinking ship, moving in with friends to carry on with his partying ways, leaving the hard work for Karin.
She’d expected nothing less. In fact, Karin was glad of the solitude. Cleaning up the house, dealing with estate agents, ringing up creditors and explaining the situation felt cathartic. And with every call, with every passing day, she knew she was doing the right thing.
The heady Wallis days were over. They had, in fact, been over long ago; her family had just refused to let the party end.
Sitting on the veranda with his mother watching the New Year fireworks light up Mykonos in the distance, the chiminea and ouzo keeping them warm, Xante knew he had been right to come and spend Christmas and New Year with his mother and to try and make peace. He just wished that Karin were here too, as did Despina.
His mother had been disappointed at the news of his break-up with Karin, and disappointed with him too. Xante had given her a rather heavily edited version as to what had occurred, and his mother had reminded him that she had warned him Athena was trouble.
That always he rushed in, demanding action and answers.
Always he was sure he knew best!
Xante had conceded all points, and now they sat in slightly strained silence as Xante worked up to make an apology that, in his mind, was long overdue.
‘What times?’
‘My kamaki days.’
‘Oh, Xante.’ To his bemusement, she laughed. ‘That was years ago.’
‘I caused you shame when you didn’t need it.’
‘Xante, you were a teenager. You are my son; I forgave you even as I beat you.’ She laughed at the memory of chasing a gangly teenager around the lounge with a belt.
‘You were so upset …’
‘Of course; I didn’t want to be a Grandmother. How times change! Xante, I was upset about a lot of things at that time. I was in mourning.’
‘You still are.’
‘No.’ She shook her head.
‘You will always wear black.’
‘I wore black then to show I was grieving. I wear it now so that I remember—there is a difference. Every morning I dress for your father, I am happy. Xante, you can stop worrying about me.’
Xante looked into his mother’s black, merry eyes and realised that Karin had been right. For the first time he realised how necessary it had been to come here—not to make family peace, but to make his own peace. ‘You are the one in mourning,’ Despina said.
‘Yes.’ Xante nodded, because there was no better word to describe it. Grief, regret, guilt were all there for him to sample again, except this time his guilt was merited.
‘I’ve tried to call her, to email her—flowers …’
‘This is too big for flowers.’
Xante nodded.
‘Have you tried writing to her?’
‘I told you, I’ve emailed.’
Despina shook her head. ‘I have every one of the letters your father sent me. He lived four streets away, but each Friday when we were courting I ran to the mail box. Letters are different.’ She headed off into the house and came back with a pad and envelope, even air-mail stickers and stamps.
‘Write,’ she said. Wishing him a happy New Year and kissing him goodnight, she went inside.
And Xante discovered letters were different. In emails it had been easy to say that he was sorry, just hitting delete when it didn’t come out right. It had been so much easier to plead his case and to tell her that they were worth a second chance. But staring at a blank page was different.
It was as well it was a full pad, because it took endless attempts.
The veranda was littered with little white balls of paper, and down to the last page Xante admitted the truth and told her exactly what was on his mind. Then he signed it, addressed the envelope and at three a.m. on New Year’s Day walked into the village and posted his letter. He instantly regretted it, hating every word he had written, positive he’d blown what little chance he had.
He hadn’t even told her he loved her.
If she’d done one thing right in her life, this was it.
Confident and gorgeous and brimming with hope, Emily at seventeen was everything Karin hadn’t been.
Breezing back at Christmas, she was like a breath of fresh air.
The house minus Matthew was a touch bare, but clean, and there was a maturity to Emily that made Karin proud, that told her the little girl she had spent her life protecting had grown up—and grown up well.
‘Of course you have to sell it.’
They were walking around the frozen lake, the trees white from frost; two sisters walking and talking and sorting out their future together.
‘There will be talk,’ Karin said. ‘Once the papers get hold of it and realise just how much in debt we are. Look, I’m just scared of what might come out.’
‘Scared they might find out we’re not perfect?’ Emily smiled, but then her little face was suddenly serious. ‘I remember how bad it was, Karin. Not everything, but I do remember the rows. And, even though I didn’t know exactly what had happened to you, I knew it was bad.’ Karin stood, and Emily walked a couple of steps ahead before she realised her sister wasn’t keeping up. Turning, she walked back and wrapped her arms around her big sister, and for Karin it was as if Emily was suddenly the elder one.
‘You know about that?’
‘Of course I know.’
‘I didn’t ever want you to find out.’
‘Karin, when I went to boarding school all I felt was relief. I hated that you were still at home. You’ve looked after me so much; you should be the one taking the money instead of paying for my studies. I know that’s why you failed your exams. Keep the rose,’ Emily said. ‘Or sell it so that you can go back to school—it’s time to look after you. I’m all grown up now. And—’ she gave a cheeky smile ‘—relatively unscathed.’ She was smiling and crying, not just a sister, but a friend too. ‘Thanks to you. You’ve looked after me, but who’s looked after you?’
‘I’m fine.’
‘What about Xante?’ Emily asked.
‘That was nothing,’ Karin attempted, but her blush gave her away.
‘Karin, you’d never go to Greece with a man if he meant nothing.’
‘I know,’ Karin admitted. ‘It just didn’t work out in the end.’
“Did you tell him what had happened?’
‘No.’ Karin shook her head. ‘Xante took it upon himself to find out my past.’ And she was expecting at least a loyal utterance of ‘bastard!’ from Emily—only it never came.
‘Maybe he thought it was the only way he could find out,’ Emily said gently. ‘Karin, you’ve never even spoken about it to me.’
‘I was trying to protect you,’ Karin snapped.
‘Fair enough. But please don’t tell me you were trying to protect Xante Rossi by not telling him.’
‘No,’ Karin said slowly. ‘I was trying to protect myself.’
‘From what?’
‘From this,’ Karin said without elaborating, walking across the frozen grass back towards the house. From this endless pain. From loving him only to lose him, and from letting him in, knowing he would one day leave. Oh, he might have accelerated things, but the ending had always been inevitable.
It was a long, cold winter. But because she was a survivor, whether she wanted to be or not, Karin got through it, sorting out her life from the bottom up.
She’d never considered herself a victim, but she didn’t want to be a survivor, either; didn’t want to label herself in that way. All she wanted now was to get on with the complicated, wonderful task of living. She’d never wanted Xante sweeping up her falling leaves, and there had been too many even for Karin. The house had gone on the market and had sold to a delightful young couple with an army of children.
Change rang in along with the new year.
Karin watched the daffodil shoots peer through the grass around the lake, sampling spring at Omberley Manor for the very last time. And, though it hurt to sign the papers, it didn’t hurt as much as she had thought it would. There wasn’t much time to be pensive. Karin was way too busy clearing the house of its more dreary contents, choosing what her and Matthew would keep and what could be sold.
She wasn’t exactly happy, but there was a marked absence of fear that felt nice. Even Matthew had lifted his game, and although she didn’t see him much he did have a job now, and had even sent her a cheque to pay a few of the bills.
There were some good memories, Karin thought as the door knocked and she opened the door to the valuer. And as she walked him through her home and took him through her things, she relived it all. Yes, there were lots of good memories, Karin realised. But there were plenty of bad ones too.
Now she got to choose the ones she kept.
‘I’m not selling the rugby memorabilia,’ Karin explained to Elliot, the valuer. She attempted businesslike, attempted distance, but she had to pull on every last shred of reserve as she watched him pick up and examine her things, making notes in his pad as he went. She had seen his eyes light up when they had come to the library—all the picture and trophies of her grandfather’s glory days were all there on display.
<
br /> ‘Pity. There’s a huge market for it.’ His eyes widened when he saw her grandfather’s rose, safely back where it belonged. ‘One of these was sold at auction not that long ago; it went for a fortune.’
‘Well, this one’s not for sale—’ Karin said primly, actually managing a small smile to herself, wondering what Elliot would say if he knew it was actually that rose that had been sold, and what it had taken to get it back!
‘It will be back on the market soon. I’ll keep an eye out and let you know what it goes for. It’s a great time to sell; the Six Nations is going amazingly. I’ll let you know what it goes for, just in case you change your mind.’
‘I won’t change my mind,’ Karin answered, but she was intrigued. It had to be her rose they were talking about; surely there weren’t that many out there. ‘How do you know it will be back on the market?’
‘It’s what he always does.’ Elliot was holding a leather ball in his hand, besotted with the collection and more than happy to chat if it meant he could linger a little while longer. ‘Some rich chap with more money than he knows what to do with. He often buys sports memorabilia, displays them for a while then sells them on.’
‘Once he’s bored with them.’ Karin struggled to keep the edge from her voice. He’d called her so many times since that bitter day, had sent flowers, had even been to the door, but she’d refused to answer. She was still angry with him, but more terrified she might relent and believe in him again, just as so many had. Xante liked to win, liked the chase, the conquest. And, once acquired, when the thrill had gone, he moved on.
Her heart couldn’t take it again.
It had been a relief when finally he’d accepted her terse request that he please just leave her alone.
‘He likes to change the displays, keep them fresh. He gets a lot of regular guests. It’s a bit of a draw card for his hotels. Mind you, he makes sure his things go to a good home …’ So they were talking about Xante. She was assailed with a sudden vision of all Xante’s exes wrapped in shawls, being put out to pasture like unwanted donkeys. ‘He gives them to charities. They generally auction them off—nice guy.’
