Christmas at Claridge's (30 page)

‘Just wait, hear me out. The money wasn’t ever supposed to be for me. I can’t spend it. I made it for my brother but he doesn’t want it. In fact, he refuses to touch it.
And . . .’ She took a deep breath, her mind racing. ‘And he’s not going to need it now anyway, as what I’m doing out here is far bigger than we’d realized.’ She
smiled at Chiara. ‘You can have it. I want you to have it.’

Chiara shook her head, but Clem was used to drinking far more than her hostess, and her thoughts were clearer, her wits sharper. ‘Yes. Look, I can help advise you, and you already know
Chad. I’m sure he’d help.’

‘He is one of the most famous interior designers in Italy. I could never afford him.’

Clem tipped her head to the side. ‘He’s a good guy. And frankly with what he’s being paid to assist at Villa ai Cedri, he doesn’t need the money. I reckon he’d be
good for it.’

‘You are so kind, Clem, but I cannot accept.’

Clem slid off her chair and crouched down beside Chiara, looking up at her. ‘After what you did for me all those years ago? I’m not asking you, Chiara. I insist. You have no choice.
We both know I am in your debt.’

‘What?’ Stella screeched down her ear, making Clem lose her balance. ‘So you’re telling me that now you’re doing a villa, a boat
and
a
hotel? Jesus Christ, Clem, for the girl who never did anything but drink vodka under the desk and hide out in the Hummingbird, you’ve sure grown yourself a work ethic out there.’

Clem hopped on to her other foot. She was standing in the middle of the long room, waiting for Chad to arrive with the specialist painters who were going to be starting work on the frescoes on
the exteriors of the villa. ‘I’m not physically painting the walls or making the curtains, Stell. I’m consulting. Outsourcing.’

‘Oooh, get you. A consultant.’ Clem rolled her eyes as Stella rolled off some ‘la di dahs’. ‘Well, just so long as it doesn’t mean you’re out there even
longer.’

‘No reason why it should. It’s all going fairly tickety-boo so far. The hardest part is actually deciding on all the different schemes and getting down to the nuts and bolts of what
we need and where. We need to get the orders in for the products and materials as soon as possible, as most of them are on six- to eight-week delivery schedules, some a bit more. But I reckon
I’ll be done and out of here by the end of August, give or take a week.’

‘Oh do you?’ Stella’s tone showed she wasn’t so convinced. ‘And what about luvaboy?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well, I take it you realize that the end of August is over
three months
away?’

‘So?’

‘Well, either you’re going to have to dump your boss before he’s paid you – awkward! – or you’re going to have to break your own rule.’

Clem was silent for a moment. Could she manage without Gabriel out here? He was her buffer, her safety, her escape. ‘Things are different out here. I’m trying not to project.
I’m just taking each day as it comes.’

‘Project? Have you swallowed some sort of self-help manual?’ Stella demanded suspiciously.

‘Nope.’

‘You were intercepted by the Scientologists at the airport?’

‘I was not.’ Clem laughed. ‘I’m just concentrating on living in the moment.’

‘Oh my God! You’re Shirley MacLaine’s love child!’ Stella hollered.

‘Well, that would be preferable to being my mother’s.’ Clem giggled, jumping from one wood strip to another.

‘Talking of the wicked witch, any word?’

‘I’ve sent the bag back, but there’s been no response. Tom’s spoken to me only once since I’ve been here, and I’ve tried ringing home, but no one picked up.
They’re obviously all still sulking with me.’

‘Mmm, well, I haven’t seen your folks about, now that you mention it. Although, of course, your mother always crosses the street when she sees me.’

The sound of a door opening and voices in the hallway made Clem look up. ‘Oh, Chad’s here, I’ve got to go.’

‘All right. Keep me posted. But no more new jobs, OK? Please remember I live vicariously through you, and I’m flipping exhausted right now.’

Clem grinned. ‘Deal. Laters.’

She clicked off as Chad appeared round the corner, a vision in narrow white linen shorts that clung to his muscular legs, and a blue striped seersucker jacket.

She grinned at the sight of him. ‘Hey We’re twins.’ She too was in white shorts, albeit teeny ones, camel ankle boots and a striped matelot T-shirt, her hair pulled back in a
floppy ponytail.

‘In your dreams, sweetheart.’ He laughed, kissing her on both cheeks. ‘Sorry we’re late. I got stuck on a call with Tissus d’Hélène. There’s a
delay on the Thibaut wallpaper you liked for the third guest suite and I don’t think we can afford to wait. We might have to go back to the drawing board on that one.’

Clem wrinkled her nose. ‘Oh, bummer. That was the glade print wasn’t it? I really liked the idea of making that room like a garden bower. It’s got that lovely magnolia tree
that taps at the window.’

‘We’ll think of something else,’ Chad said, leading her outside, where a man was standing with his back to them, examining a section of the wall. ‘In the meantime, I want
you to meet Rafaello Vicenzo. He’s the only remaining painter in the entire district who specializes in trompe l’oeils. It’s a dying art, sadly.’

Clem stopped dead in her tracks as the man turned round, his own movements stiffening as he saw her.

He walked towards her, his face as set as if it were a stone mask. She remembered the heaviness of his brow bone and the thick, straight eyebrows that lay across it, his chocolate-brown eyes
with lashes as long and thick as hers, the pale matte fullness of his lips, how pretty he looked when he scowled. Brooding had suited him, too, she remembered.

She swallowed. ‘Hello, Rafa.’

Chad looked at her in surprise, before realization struck. ‘Oh, of course. Chiara’s your friend.’

Clem nodded. It wasn’t how they’d met, but it didn’t matter.

‘It was you the other day.’ His accent was thick and rolling, like a dark, ominous thundercloud.

‘Yes.’ She could feel herself beginning to tremble.

He gestured vaguely at the cliff-top estate around them. ‘You are working here.’

‘That’s right.’ Only Chad knew about her and Gabriel. She had kept his name a secret even from Chiara – she didn’t want it to be openly known in the port but she
didn’t want
him
to know most of all.

They fell quiet, Clem inhibited and withdrawn, Chad shifting uncomfortably as he took in the atmosphere.

‘OK, well, then that’s all . . . good,’ he said, rubbing his hands together uncertainly as he looked between the two of them. ‘Like I said, Raf’s going to start on
the exterior. We’ve gone over the colour scheme you chose and where you want the fanlights to be reinstated above the windows. The scaffolding’s coming today, right?’

Rafa nodded, but his eyes were trained on Clem.

‘Great. Super. Well then, we won’t hold you up. I’ll come and check on you in a bit, make sure you’re happy with everything.’

Chad put a hand on Clem’s elbow, moving to steer her away, but the sound of glass shattering made them all start. They ran round to the side of the house, where a young boy was standing,
pale and immobile, looking back at them all. He looked like Bambi, all chocolate-brown eyes and skinny legs, hazelnut-coloured hair flopping over his forehead like a forelock. A football, punctured
now, was lying on a bed of glass just inside one of the French doors of Clem’s office.

‘
Lo siento
,’ he stammered as Rafa advanced towards him, his jaw thrust forward in fury as he admonished him in rapid Italian.

‘Don’t! It’s OK,’ Clem cried, arms outstretched as she rushed over beside them. ‘Really It’s fine.’

Rafa took a reluctant step back. She was, after all, the boss.

Clem looked down at the boy staring up at her, the boy she’d passed just days ago on the path. He looked like he might cry and she knew he was scared of her; knew he thought she was the
rich lady going to demand the window be replaced. She crouched down to his level and saw he had the same eyes as his father. ‘You must be Luca.’

He blinked at her uncomprehendingly. She looked up at Rafa, wanting him to translate for her. ‘He speaks English,’ he scowled. ‘He is just in panic.’

Clem looked back at the child. ‘I’ve heard
so
much about you, Luca. I’m . . . I’m Clem.’

Slowly, the boy put out his hand, on his best behaviour, trying to make amends for the broken window. She looked at it – such a grown-up gesture from such a small child – and took it
in her own. ‘A pleasure to meet you.’

‘A pleasure to meet you,’ he echoed in a voice that was as wobbly as his legs.

She stood up again and Rafa came to stand behind Luca, his hand on the boy’s shoulder.

‘I will pay for the repairs,’ he said, his voice even surlier than before.

‘You don’t need to do that,’ she said. ‘Breakages are part and parcel of a job this size.’

He blinked once, his eyes dark and hooded. ‘I insist.’ And then he turned and walked Luca away.

Clem and Chad watched them go, waiting for them to disappear from sight.

‘Anything you want to tell me?’ Chad asked quietly, turning to face her.

‘Nope,’ Clem replied, trying to look surprised by his question.

‘You seemed a bit . . . tense with him.’

‘Yeah, ‘cause he’s a guy who’s really in touch with his feminine side.’ Clem forced a laugh, but she wasn’t fooling anyone.

‘You’d tell me if you had a problem working with him.’

‘Chad, you said he’s the only guy in the area who does what he does, right?’

‘Yeah.’

‘So then there’s no problem. It’s fine.’

‘Cle—’ he frowned.

‘Chad, we just need to get this job done and get it done right. Because the sooner it’s done, the sooner I can get back to my own life, all right?’ Her voice was all over the
octave, skipping notes, flat and sharp all at once.

He nodded, jamming his hands into his shorts pockets. ‘Sure.’

‘OK then. Now I’m going to find a dustpan and brush and clear this glass up before someone walks through it.’ And she walked back into the house, arms swinging, chin in the
air. Her heart somewhere in her boots.

Clem dropped her head in her hands, her fingers tonging her hair in tight twists. She had been staring at the plans for hours now, but the day had been a write-off. She’d
achieved nothing. She couldn’t think straight. The thick plastic sheeting she’d secured at the broken window would keep the wind and rain out, but it rustled noisily in the breeze and
she was distinctly aware of Rafa just the other side, his body darkly silhouetted as he moved back and forth and around it, working on the far wall.

She could hear Luca was still with him, intermittently passing brushes or refreshing the water, but mainly kicking the ball whenever he could, the slow-puncture making it bounce lower and lower.
They chattered non-stop together, Rafa’s voice low – not animated exactly, but certainly more tonal as the boy laughed and teased and told jokes in his high singsong voice, running
around him all the while. They had a keepy-uppy competition at one point, not knowing she was sitting there just feet away, their bodies cast in dark relief against the white plastic as they kicked
the ball with honed skill and a shared boyish delight.

‘Hey.’

She looked up with surprise. Gabriel was leaning in the doorway, his briefcase by his feet, his tie hanging loose around his neck.

‘What are you doing here so early?’ she cried at the sight of him. He was never home before ten.

‘I cancelled the rest of my meetings. The only thing I can think about is you.’

She jumped up and ran over to him, throwing her arms tightly around his neck, burrowing her face in the silky pima cotton of his shirt. She was safe again.

‘Are you OK?’

She nodded, not lifting her head. ‘I am now.’

He clasped her face with his hands and drew her back to look at her, his eyes scanning her like a computer, wanting to decode her. He bent his head and kissed her, his hands sliding down her
back as she moulded herself into him.

‘Let’s go upstairs,’ he murmured.

She nodded. It was the best remedy she knew for escaping herself.

Outside the wind caused the sheeting to crackle again. Gabriel looked up and saw the makeshift window.

‘What happened?’ He frowned.

‘Oh, it was just an accident earlier. We were going to replace them anyway,’ she lied, her eyes and ears suddenly straining for a clue as to Rafa’s and Luca’s whereabouts
as she remembered them again. Where were they? Everything was silent outside now, but they had been there just moments earlier. They would have heard every word.

She didn’t have time to think about it, though. In the next instant, Gabriel lifted her suddenly, hoisting her over his shoulder, and she laughed out loud in surprise, smacking him on the
back. ‘Put me down!’ she shrieked. ‘Stop it! You can’t do that!’

‘I think you’ll find I can,’ he demurred, even taking the time to slowly bend down and pick up his briefcase.

Clem laughed and kicked her ankles, trying to get free. When she looked up she saw Rafa standing by the far set of windows, watching them. She went limp at his expression and felt a tremor of
fear ripple through her as Gabriel ferried her away, seduction the only thing on his mind, survival the only thing on hers.

Summer took hold. Within a month the skies were tented blue every day, the sea soaking up the sun’s warmth for her, as she and Gabriel swam in the cove at night,
revelling in the pleasure and pain they found there, the place where they had begun.

The days finally had a rhythm to them, and a soundtrack, too, as an army of workmen banged, tapped, chipped and whistled around the house, Chad furiously debating thread counts with her, the
drone of V8s in the bay every evening telling her that her man was back.

She and Chiara had started running together, too. She had never let anyone keep up with her before – not even Stella – but Chiara had the answers to her questions. For Chiara, she
was prepared to slow down.