Christmas at Claridge's Read online

  ‘What appointment?’ Clem frowned, rubbing her face vigorously in her hands. Damn, she was tired.

  ‘Your driving lesson.’

  ‘What?’ Her hands dropped away. ‘Since when did I agree to have a driving lesson?’

  ‘Since dinner at the Splendido.’

  ‘That was weeks ago! And I think I made it very plain that I wasn’t interested in learning to drive out here.’

  Chad gave a non-committal shrug. ‘Well, obviously not.’

  ‘Who organized this?’ Clem demanded just as she remembered the way Chiara had insisted Rafa help her out. She groaned. One good deed for another. ‘Well, he made it very plain that he would rather drink paint than teach me to drive,’ she added.

  ‘Who’s he?’ Chad asked innocently.

  ‘You know perfectly well who, Chad! Rafa. Stop being so obtuse. It’s too early for this shit.’

  ‘Wow! You’re grouchy in the morning. Such bad language!’ A small bemused smile played upon Chad’s lips. ‘Besides, I don’t understand. Why would Rafa rather drink paint than teach you to drive? Don’t you think you’re overreacting?’

  ‘He hates me, Chad,’ she hissed, remembering how he’d blanked her the night before, the anger it had ignited in Gabriel. ‘I am not spending time alone with him shouting orders at me.’

  ‘He does not hate you.’

  ‘Oh come on! You’ve seen what he’s like around me. He can scarcely look at me,’ she raged, glaring at him.

  ‘Nor you him, I’ve noticed.’

  ‘What?’

  He watched as his words blindsided her, leaving her flapping at him helplessly. ‘There’s some weird aura between you two,’ he said calmly.

  ‘No there isn’t. I don’t have an aura. I don’t even wear perfume.’

  ‘Yeah. There is. I thought it that first day I introduced you.’

  ‘Bully for you,’ she muttered, turning away from him and walking over to the desk, checking her diary.

  Chad sighed, watching her. ‘It’s all clear till eleven. I already checked. You’ve got an hour. Well, forty-five minutes by the time you get dressed and out of here.’

  Clem turned and glared at him. ‘I’m not going.’

  ‘Fine,’ Chad shrugged. ‘You tell him then.’

  ‘You tell him! You bloody well set it up.’

  ‘No, I didn’t.’

  ‘Ugh, Chad! It has to have been you and Chiara. You are the only other person who knows my diary. God, you’re doing my head in and I’ve only just woken up.’

  ‘Which is why you need to get a shift on. He’ll be here any minute,’ he said, checking his watch. ‘Go on, hurry up. Unless you want him to see you looking like that.’

  Clem looked down at herself and knew there was no way she could let Rafa see her like this. She looked so post-coital she may as well still have a neck blush. ‘Fuck’s sake,’ she muttered, throwing him furious looks as she ran from the office.

  She was running down the long room – she was going to have to use the back door and sprint along the footpaths rather than the garden if she didn’t want the rest of the workforce to see her either – when she came to an abrupt stop.

  Slowly, she turned and looked back.

  Rafa was leaning against the wall, his arms crossed and his colour up. From his body language alone she could tell he’d heard every word.

  Oh God, where was that paint? she wondered as she looked into his blacker-than-black eyes. She’d drink it herself.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Clem sat with her hands between her knees, trying not to jig. She had hurriedly thrown on a pair of white denim cut-offs with a slouchy grey T-shirt and had piled on so many long pendant necklaces she actually jingled as she walked. Rafa had gone on ahead whilst she’d been getting changed, telling Chad she should meet him by the car park behind the port, and now they were sitting in the little green comedy truck as Rafa pointed out the accelerator and brake pedals, the indicators, the horn, the windscreen wipers and so many other gadgets she felt she may as well be in a Bond car.

  ‘You understand?’ he asked, without a hint of a smile. He could have been mugging her, such was the hostility in his face – she was just relieved Gabriel couldn’t see them now; he’d fire Rafa on the spot. Still, he might get off on a technicality. They weren’t working now and she wasn’t his boss in here, so he could behave as he liked.

  She nodded. ‘I turn it on, put my foot on the clutch, release the brake and—’

  ‘In gear first. Put the truck in gear and then release the brake.’

  ‘OK. Foot on the clutch, move the gear stick, release brake, off I go.’

  ‘Check mirrors, off you go,’ he corrected.

  Clem bit down the impulse to argue that he never used his mirrors. But they’d been here ten minutes already and hadn’t even turned on the ignition yet. Rafa seemed to care about his truck the way most men cared about Maseratis.

  ‘So, shall I . . .?’ she asked, reaching for the ignition questioningly.

  Rafa hesitated, clearly nervous, before nodding. ‘Just go slow.’

  She turned the key in the ignition and the old engine jump-started on; Clem couldn’t quite stifle a giggle as the cab vibrated on its wobbly suspension and she saw her thighs begin to jiggle. The random thought of Stella in here, jiggling, wandered into her head and made her laugh out loud. She felt Rafa glaring at her and tried to stop, but that only made the laughter increase in intensity – it was just like being back at school and getting the giggles in assembly – and it was all over when the image of Stella and Mercy jiggling in just their bras drifted into her mind. She put her face in her hands as the tears began to fall.

  Rafa reached across her furiously and switched off the ignition. ‘What is so funny?’ he demanded, which only served to make her laugh even harder.

  ‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,’ she managed finally, wiping her eyes and throwing her head back on the headrest. ‘I’m sorry. It must . . . it must be nerves. Sorry.’ She sighed and looked across at him, trying to look serious. ‘I’m sorry.’

  He looked at her and then away. ‘Go again,’ he muttered.

  She turned on the ignition and quickly disguised her laugh as a cough, as the engine made them both vibrate again. What was it he’d said? Clutch, gear, gas?

  She pressed her foot down on the clutch and moved the gearstick.

  ‘Wrong gear. Further over,’ Rafa said, watching as she tried to move the car from third into first gear. But she had taken her foot off the clutch and the engine protested loudly, screeching as metal jammed against metal.

  Clem, in panic, took her hands and feet away from the moving parts of the car, and the truck shuddered and stalled. Oh dear.

  She looked across at Rafa nervously. He had closed his eyes and tipped his head back against the headrest, obviously praying for strength.

  ‘This clearly isn’t a very good idea,’ she murmured. ‘We should probably stop before I do some damage.’

  He opened his eyes and turned to face her. ‘Just go again.’

  She turned to open the cab door.

  ‘What are you doing?’ he demanded.

  ‘I’m going.’

  ‘I meant go again. Do the . . . truck again. Turn it on.’ He looked frustrated that he wasn’t making himself clear, and he rubbed his face in his hands. Clem noticed how very tired he looked. Girlfriend keeping him up? He was wearing the same T-shirt she’d seen him in last night.

  She turned on the ignition again and, this time, didn’t laugh. She depressed the clutch, found first and slowly – as though she were atop the Matterhorn on a silver tray – released the brake.

  ‘You didn’t check your mirrors,’ he murmured, even though they were parked against a wall and facing into a tiny, deserted square. ‘But just keep going!’ he added quickly as he saw her go to move back a step and risk stalling the engine again. Slowly, they eased forward. ‘Gas.’

  Clem tapped a foot to the accelerator and the little truck b
egan to move over the cobbles.

  ‘Follow the road,’ he said, pointing to the only road in and out of the village. ‘And keep right . . . Mind the scooters!’

  She clipped a scooter with the wing mirror as they passed.

  ‘What . . . what did I do? Shall I stop?’ she asked, panicking, her knuckles white from gripping the steering wheel so hard.

  Rafa, who was watching the scooters fall one on top of the other like dominoes in the rear-view mirror, shook his head. ‘Just keep going,’ he murmured.

  She wanted to look across at him – she was sure she’d heard a smile in his voice – but she didn’t dare take her eyes off the road.

  ‘More gas,’ he said as the road began to incline, and Clem hesitantly moved up to 15 kph.

  ‘Is it OK? Am I doing it right?’ she asked, her words threaded together by nerves, her chin practically resting on the steering wheel.

  There was a short pause. ‘You’re doing fine.’ She thought he was looking at her but she couldn’t be sure. The sea was on her right now and she was quite convinced she might accidentally drive into it. ‘Try to move up to twenty.’

  ‘Gear?’

  ‘Kilometros an hour.’ Now she knew he was looking and laughing at her.

  She breathed out through a little nervous ‘o’ as they sped up – just. The road was winding on the way back to Santa Margherita, and she took the corners as if the truck were in heels.

  ‘What was that?’ she breathed anxiously, her eyes flitting to the wing mirrors. ‘I thought I saw something.’

  Rafa twisted round and saw an orange Lamborghini sitting restlessly on their tail, bobbing left intermittently, as though it intended to overtake on one of the chicanes at any moment. It had no doubt joined them as they’d passed the Splendido half a mile back, and it looked like it was going to stall. It had probably never moved so slowly before. ‘Is OK. Is nothing,’ Rafa said calmly, facing the front again, his right arm laid along the open window. ‘There is left turn coming up. Use the indicator.’

  Clem switched on the windscreen wipers. ‘Oh! Shit!’ she hissed.

  Rafa chuckled – a surprisingly soft sound that couldn’t have surprised her more if he’d started tap-dancing on the bonnet. ‘Other side.’

  Clem indicated left, braking for the full quarter-mile it took to get to the turning and almost inducing a stress-fuelled heart attack in the Lamborghini driver behind. Rafa had turned his face to the window, away from her, and begun laughing into his hand.

  The road climbed a steep but fairly wide hill, and Clem used most of it, like a novice skier traversing the slopes, as she pressed harder on the gas, trying to get the little old truck up it. She was almost holding her breath, leaning forward in her seat to help bring the weight forward as they crested the hill, and when she finally thought it was safe enough to glance across at Rafa, she saw his shoulders shaking hard.

  ‘Stop laughing at me!’ she cried, half laughing, too. She’d have liked to slap him on the arm, but she didn’t dare take a hand off the wheel. ‘Where am I going?’

  He pointed, unable to speak, to a large parking area in front of a community park on their right. A rusty barbecue was set up with four or five trestle tables clustered around it, a basketball court behind and some outdoor ping-pong tables. Cruising into the parking spot in first gear, she brought the truck to an abrupt halt – no mean feat given that it had scarcely been moving beforehand.

  She cut the engine and almost fell upon the steering wheel with relief. ‘I did it,’ she whispered, resting her cheek on the top of it and looking across at Rafa, who had brought himself under control now that she could see him again.

  ‘You did,’ he nodded, a glimmer of laughter still in his eyes.

  She turned away, wanting to see where they were. The slope was gentle here and the views out to sea magnificent. She could just make out the tip of the lighthouse on the headland; the dense, clipped topiaries of the exclusive estates over there were in sharp contrast to the short stubby olive groves here, bent over like old men, their branches tangled together and throwing down dappled shade as chickens pecked at the ground. In contrast to the smart, shabby-chic striped properties in the port, the buildings in the hills were ramshackle and, in some cases, practically bolted together. In one, a tree was growing through the middle of a roof of an outbuilding, and everywhere were sweetly scented jasmine hedges, rangy and unclipped, their delicate blossoms shimmying in the sea breeze.

  ‘It’s so wild up here,’ she mused. ‘I love it.’

  There was a short silence and she felt them both remember themselves and their roles again.

  ‘Wait here,’ Rafa said shortly. ‘I come straight back.’

  He jumped out of the cab and jogged across the road, into a wild, untended garden. The house it belonged to was low-built, made from a dark grey stone, with a raised deck area at the front and brown, broken shutters at the window.

  She watched as he disappeared inside. Was this where he lived now? She had assumed he lived, if not in the port itself, then in Santa Margherita still, his home town. It was bigger, younger, vibier over there. She leaned across the passenger seat, trying to see past the lemon trees growing out front, but their branches were heavy with fruit and hanging low. Curiosity getting the better of her, she followed suit.

  She walked up the path, unaware that she had started to tiptoe, the grasses in the garden brushing against her bare knees; she saw a football lying inert by the jasmine hedge, but she didn’t stop. Her eyes were on the small house. A wind chime hung at one of the windows, revolving slowly, and she could hear the sound of running water coming from within. A shower? So he hadn’t come home last night; he’d gone on to his girlfriend’s after working at the villa. The realization flattened her, even though she was guilty of the same crime herself.

  She pushed open the outer door, which was covered with a mesh mosquito frame, and stepped into the cool, dark few square metres that passed as a kitchen. It was clean and functional, with mainly grey melamine and rough wood surfaces, clearly patched together on an ‘as needed’ basis. A glass was sitting in the sink and there was a box of Coronas on top of the old white, humming fridge.

  She walked through into the sitting room. It was much the same as the kitchen – spare, bald, impersonal – only a pair of jeans strewn across the sofa gave any indication that someone actually lived here.

  No, that wasn’t quite true. On the windowsill, she saw a single wooden-framed photograph. She walked over to it. Luca was sitting on Rafa’s shoulders, Chiara leaning against him, her arms around his waist, with one hand on Luca’s leg as she gazed contentedly at the camera.

  Clem stared, frozen, at the photo that was testament to the happy family they’d been. From the looks of Luca, the photo could only have been taken in the past year or two, yet she could see a vivid change in them all now, even Luca. In the photo, they all looked peaceful and unaware of the sadness that was coming their way. Seeing the boy on his father’s shoulders, their faces stacked together, the resemblance between them was startling: they shared the same liquid chocolate eyes, proud mouths and scruffy hair.

  A sound behind her made her turn and she saw Rafa coming out of the bedroom, pulling a clean, faded navy T-shirt over his head. He stopped dead at the sight of her in the house, holding the photograph. She saw the way his muscles tensed. It was easy to – his skin was damp from the hasty shower and his T-shirt was gripping onto his stomach, in no hurry to fall. She tried really hard not to look. Really, really hard.

  ‘I–I didn’t mean to snoop,’ she said in a small voice, putting the photo back down again with nervous hands. ‘It’s a lovely picture.’

  She looked up again to find Rafa still immobile, silence the faithful companion that sat between them at all times, like an obedient dog.

  ‘Rafa, please,’ she whispered. ‘Don’t . . . don’t look at me like that.’

  ‘You think I hate you,’ he said, echoing her earlier rant at Chad.

  ‘Yes.
’ She shrugged haplessly, before shaking her head lightly. ‘I don’t know . . . I just know you don’t want me here.’

  ‘I don’t want you here? You were the one who ran when you saw me.’

  She remembered her violent reaction to seeing him and Luca that evening on the path.

  ‘That was shock. I didn’t expect to see you.’

  ‘How? This is a small village. You knew I lived here.’

  ‘I knew you once lived here. You could have moved away for all I knew.’

  ‘You knew through Chiara’s letters that I still lived here,’ he argued with almost leisurely certainty, his voice low and calm.

  ‘Yes, but then you broke up . . .’ she mumbled weakly. He watched her looking around the room, her gaze anxious and flitting, unable to settle on anything, least of all him. ‘Did you . . . did you know I knew her?’ She tried to hold his gaze.

  He went perfectly still, and for a second she thought he wasn’t going to answer again. ‘Not until two years ago.’

  Two years ago? That was when his relationship with Chiara had begun to unravel ‘And did you tell her you . . . knew me?’

  He inhaled sharply, his head tipping back with the movement. ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’

  He shrugged. ‘It was the past. Dead.’ He lobbed the word at her like a grenade, letting it explode between them.

  She froze in the blast, her body trembling from the direct hit, and turned to leave.

  ‘Why did you come back?’

  She looked back at him. ‘I had no choice. I was trying to help Tom. I came here for him, not to . . . not to complicate your life.’

  He gave a short, bitter snort, planting his hands on his hips and finally, inadvertently, dislodging the T-shirt to hide the rest of his stomach. ‘Now you worry about complicating my life . . .’ he muttered, his handsome face juggling pain and pride all at once. ‘Well, thank you for the concern, but my life is very uncomplicated, very simple: I am a single man and enjoying it.’ The memory of the blonde against the wall shimmered between them like a hologram and Clem looked away. She couldn’t say what she wanted to, so what was the point in saying anything?