Legacy of the Highlands (4 page)

She settled herself and desperately tried to
blend into the blackness of the limo’s back seat. If she were
invisible maybe it wouldn’t hurt so much. The constant battle she
was waging between acceptance and denial, and the overwhelming urge
to somehow exit her body and run away, strained her overburdened
resources. Avoidance was an increasingly attractive option. Escape
might be the only way to save herself from a complete and permanent
breakdown.

As the long black car slowly headed toward
the cemetery’s gates, Alex’s panic increased. Impulsively she
leaned toward the driver. “If I asked you to take me to Logan
Airport instead of to Beacon Hill, would you do it?”

The driver shrugged and turned to look at
her.

“Diego! What the…” she sputtered. “Where’s
the man who drove me here from the church?”

“He decided to take the rest of the day off.
Someone had to steer this giant boat out of the cemetery. Why not
me?” When he tossed his sunglasses onto the seat next to him, Alex
saw that his eyes were bloodshot and swollen. The forced smile he
aimed at her never reached them.

“You’ve been crying,” she said softly.

“And that surprises you?”

“A little. Yes. No. I know that you loved
Will. I guess he would have wanted you to be here,” she admitted
with a sigh.

“And do you? If not, I’ll leave.”

He had her off balance and she wasn’t sure
how to behave toward him. “I really don’t care what you do and I
don’t have the strength to argue, so you may as well hang around,
at least for the Camerons’ little do. Then you can go,” she said
and shifted her gaze away from him, but not before she saw him
flinch at her curt dismissal. Diego didn’t say anything and turned
his attention back to the procession of limousines headed for
Beacon Hill.

Diego Alessandro de León Navarro was Will’s oldest
friend, the son of a self-made, immensely wealthy Argentine and a
sensuous Italian beauty. Both men, as only children of privileged
families, became as close as brothers when they’d met at the kind
of prep school that exists for the sons of the very rich.

Like many moneyed South Americans, the
Navarros used real estate as a safe haven for their assets and
maintained homes in Buenos Aires, New York City, Miami and
Bariloche, high in Argentina’s Andes.

The Cameron family’s fortune also reached
into the stratosphere, but their New England reserve dictated a
lifestyle of less flamboyant, quiet wealth than the Navarros. The
brick townhouse on Boston’s Beacon Hill where Will had grown up was
among the city’s most exclusive properties, but it whispered wealth
instead of shouting it.

Will had been amused when Diego quickly
exchanged the threadbare jeans he’d preferred in college for
custom-made shirts and bespoke suits that skimmed his body. The
last time Alex had seen him, a platinum watch that tracked three
time zones had circled his wrist. His favorite transportation
alternated between the family’s Gulfstream and his Maserati Spyder,
depending on his destination and how quickly he wanted to reach it.
Although most of his life had been spent in the U.S., his parents
had gifted Diego with an aesthetic in clothing, manners and morals
that were sophisticated and European. With the ease of someone who
never had to be concerned about money, he’d told his friends that
it was no big deal to spend a few hundred every couple of weeks to
have his thick, black hair trimmed. Not an extravagance, he’d
explained. He simply didn’t like the look of a fresh haircut. None
of this was affectation or a need to impress; it was simply Diego.
He was kind and generous and as Will’s best friend, he’d been part
of their extended family until the friendship had abruptly ended a
year ago. Alex still suspected that Will’s explanation for the
sudden rift was pure fiction. She had no idea why he’d never wanted
to tell her the truth.

Alex was out of the limo as soon as Diego steered it
to the curb outside the Camerons’ tall, red brick house. She ran up
the steps as if there were no place she’d rather be. In reality,
she dreaded the next few hours, but she wanted to be with Diego
even less.

She noticed the music the minute she entered
the house. Bloody hell, they’ve got jazz on the sound system. Their
son’s dead and they’re throwing a freakin’ party. She told herself
she’d have to tolerate an hour of chitchat with people she barely
knew, offers of food and drink and comments like, “How perfectly
awful. Call me dear…we’ll do lunch.” But the urge to flee became
too hard to fight and she began to search for Diego, although she
wasn’t sure what she wanted from him. She assumed that he’d
followed her into the Camerons’ house,, so it was odd not to spot
him circulating through the jovial crowd, charming the pants off
some easily-impressed female. She wouldn’t be surprised if the
notorious womanizer had already hooked up with someone and
left.

She found Anne and John who gave her what
passed for a hug as she quickly made her excuses — a migraine that
would only respond to serious medication and sleep. Her
father-in-law insisted on escorting her to the door and would have
seen her into one of the waiting limos, but he was cornered by a
group of friends so Alex made her way out alone. She forced air
into her lungs as she stood outside the house shivering in chilly,
late afternoon air that carried the scent of wood smoke from nearby
chimneys. As she approached one of the waiting limos she heard the
Camerons’ front door shut and suddenly Diego was there. The suit
jacket he wrapped her in still held his body’s warmth. She mumbled
her thanks.

“
Preciosa
,” his deep voice rumbled his
pet name for her near her ear. “Are we never to speak again?” Alex
heard the endearment and wasn’t sure how to react. Will had once
told her that Diego had warned him that she was a precious gem that
many men — himself included — would be tempted to steal. The
nickname stuck.

“I have to get out of here. I have to get
away.” Her voice was tinged with hysteria as she turned toward him.
Repressing her emotions all day had finally gotten to her, and as
her knees turned to jelly and her heart began to race, she knew
that she was on the verge of a major anxiety attack.

“Tell me where you want to go. I’ll take
you.” Strong arms embraced her and she reluctantly leaned her head
against the reassuring warmth of his solid chest. For the moment
she’d allow herself to pretend that Will hadn’t hated this man. She
needed his strength.

The driver of one of the waiting limos
understood the unspoken command in Diego’s expression and dashed to
open the car’s door for them. Once settled, Diego gathered her to
him. She was still trembling and he had to fight the urge to pull
her onto his lap and wrap her in his arms.

“Where to, sir?” the driver wanted to
know.

“Alex? The man wants to know where you want
to go,” Diego whispered as if speaking to a child.

“I don’t know,” she murmured. “You decide.”
The eyes that met his were bloodshot and filled with tears.

“Take us to Logan,” he instructed as he
gently dabbed the wetness from her face with a handkerchief. It was
warm inside the car, but she was still shivering and her
indecisiveness alarmed him as much as her appearance. The intense
need to protect this woman overwhelmed him. Will had been part of
him for most of his life. Diego was sure that the man he still
thought of as his best friend would want him to take care of his
widow and he would do it. He was also sure that as soon as Alex was
stronger she’d zero in on what he’d done to end a lifelong
friendship. Once he’d explained, perhaps she’d deign to thank him
politely for his help and then walk — no, run — out of his life,
but he wasn’t going to worry about that now.

Alex didn’t contradict Diego’s instructions to the
driver. Maybe it was paranoid and totally illogical, but she had to
get out of Boston. If Will — her beautiful, kind-hearted Will —
could have his life snuffed out in the city of his birth, then she
wanted no part of it. And it hurt too much to spend even one more
night in the bed they’d shared, surrounded by a zillion reminders
of their life together. She didn’t give a damn whether she was
doing the right thing anymore. Escape meant survival. And despite
an initial longing to join Will in death, Alex knew that somehow
she’d survive. What amazed her was who was helping her to do
that.

Diego loosened his hold on her to tug his
phone from his pants pocket. The momentary separation made her miss
his body’s warmth and she was relieved when his arm came around her
shoulders again. He pressed one of the phone’s numbers. “I’m on my
way to the airport. How soon can you be ready to take off? Good.
No, not Buenos Aires. File a flight plan to Miami. We’ll be there
soon.”

“Florida?” Alex raised an eyebrow.

“Yeah, Florida. My family has a house there
and from the way you’re trembling, I thought some sun might
help.”

She nodded.

“I’m worried about you Alex. It’s not like
you to let someone else, especially me, seize control.”

“I know, but I’m not the same woman I was a
week ago.” She didn’t want to justify her behavior to him or anyone
so she changed the subject. “Can I also assume that we’re not
flying commercial?”

“That would be correct. There’s a bed onboard
so you can get some sleep. You look like you haven’t done much of
that,” he said and resisted the desire to stroke the dark circles
under light green eyes that always reminded him of celadon. He was
grateful that Alex seemed to be oblivious to the internal battle
being waged inches away from her.

“Where did you fly in from?”

“I was halfway around the world holding
meetings about a project in Abu Dhabi when I heard about Will. My
plan was to go on to Buenos Aires from here and then return to the
Middle East after the funeral, so the plane’s been standing by, but
we’ll head to Miami instead.”

“Okay.” She wondered why he’d circled half
the globe for the funeral of someone he no longer cared about.
“This Middle East project, is it the same one that Will was looking
over for you? He thought something was wrong, but didn’t know what.
He was working on it the same day…” She wept softly as she
remembered the way Will had shoved the plans aside minutes before
he began to make love to her.

As they approached the airport she asked
Diego to call Francie. “Can you let her know that I’m okay? I don’t
want her to think I jumped into the Charles.”

“Of course. Anything else?”

“No. I think that’s it,” she sighed and
realized that for the first time in a week she felt safe.

The Gulfstream jolted as it touched down in Miami,
startling Alex into wakefulness. She rubbed her eyes and wondered
how smart it had been to make her escape with Diego. Then again,
he’d served as a means to an end. She’d wanted out of Boston and
she’d accomplished that. It wasn’t like her to use people, but she
wasn’t the same woman she’d been a week ago.

As they made their way through the airport,
the bright colors of vacationers made her feel like a crow among
parrots in her funereal black clothing. The designer suit’s narrow
pencil skirt and fitted jacket that had looked so chic in chilly
Boston that morning was now a wrinkled mess. She shrugged out of
her jacket and dragged it by one finger. The terminal was warm, as
if the air conditioning was on low. Sweat began to trickle down her
back and between her breasts, gluing the black silk of her blouse
to her body. Her pantyhose clung to her legs like plastic wrap. It
annoyed her that Diego still looked cool, perfectly tailored, and
as confident as ever as he strode beside her, navigating them
through the airport’s organized chaos.

Once past the security barriers, Alex watched
with envy as friends and family greeted arriving passengers with
hugs and smiles. She had no family to meet her, here or anywhere.
Family — what a loaded word! It implied so much — warmth, love,
acceptance, security; all that she’d craved since her parents died
in an alcohol-fueled car crash as they’d sped toward Manhattan on a
snowy night, late for a Broadway show. She and Will would have
built their own family when the time was right. But the fates, or
God, or whatever was in charge of human destiny, obviously had
something else in mind. Alex’s natural optimism had shifted into
pessimism so deep that the only future she could envision contained
no promise of joy.

She prayed that her inner core, the steel
that only her husband had recognized in her, would somehow get her
through the next days and weeks. She’d stopped thinking in terms of
months or years. A future without Will was terrifying. One day at a
time would have to do for now.

Diego led her out of the terminal to a black
Mercedes with dark tinted windows. When Alex caught sight of her
reflection in the car’s mirror-like finish, she grimaced. Florida’s
humidity was already frizzing her hair and she irritably tucked it
behind her ears. What was left of her makeup was melting. Her
appearance was one of the few things still within her control and
now that had been taken from her also. “The hell with it,” she
mumbled.

“Welcome home,
Señor
Navarro,” the
cheerful driver said as he opened the car’s door for them. Diego
shook the man’s hand and introduced Alex.

“Miguel, this is Mrs. Cameron.” The man
nodded to her.

“Welcome,
Señora
. I hope your stay in
Miami will be pleasant.”

“Thank you.” She hoped the expression on her
face was a smile and not a grimace. Despite a brief nap on the
plane, she was as cranky as an overtired two-year-old. All she
wanted to do was strip off her clothes, shower and crawl into bed.
She was grateful that Diego didn’t try to make conversation.