Christmas at Claridge's Page 35

  A muffled bang outside made them both turn and Clem’s eyes widened with horror; the sound was unmistakeable. Rafa, paralysed for a moment, sprinted through the kitchen and out into the garden. By the time Clem caught up with him on the pavement, he had sunk to sitting on his heels, his hands in his hair.

  A hundred yards down the hill, black smoke was puffing in plumes into the blue sky from the crumpled bonnet of the green comedy truck, the stoic tree it was resting against marginally less upright than it had been for the last fifty years. Paint was streaked all over the back from upturned pots so that it looked more like a Pollock than a Piaggio.

  ‘Oh shit,’ she whispered. ‘Handbrake.’

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  ‘Gorgeous!’ Clem smiled as soon as Stella picked up. ‘Got your looks for sure.’

  ‘You got it then,’ Stella chuckled. ‘She looks like a jelly-bean, doesn’t she? I don’t know how those people can tell jack-shit from looking on those scans. Oscar thought her leg was a willy.’

  ‘Her? Does that mean you found out the sex?’

  ‘Nah. Oscar’s convinced it’s a boy but I’m betting it’s a pink one.’

  ‘Well, as long as it’s one or the other, I won’t mind either way. How are you feeling?’

  Stella yawned. ‘Knackered. Not getting much sleep. She’s really beginning to kick now.’

  ‘Still taking your folic acid I hope?’

  ‘Yes, Mum,’ Stella replied. ‘Anyway what are you doing? You sound like you’re shovelling bricks.’

  ‘Thanks! I’m actually just walking over to Chiara’s for supper. Gabriel’s away tonight.’

  There was a short pause and then the sound of humming down the line. ‘Happy Birthday’?

  ‘You know full well it’s not my birthday till November,’ Clem pouted.

  ‘Not that, you daft nana! It’s your three-month birthday. You and Hot Lips.’

  What?

  ‘Stop that! I can hear you panicking from here. It’s fine. It’s good. You can do this,’ Stella instructed bossily, rustling open some crisps. ‘If I can have a baby, you can go past your twelve-week rule. I’m not going to be a grown-up on my own. You’re doing it with me.’

  Clem gave a small, indistinct sound that Stella decided to take as concurrence.

  ‘Next week, you and me are going on some sort of adulthood course. I need to get my shit together before this baby comes.’

  ‘About that . . .’

  Stella stopped munching.

  ‘I’m afraid it’s going to be another few weeks before I can come home after all.’

  ‘Oh Cl–e–m!’ Stella whined. ‘I knew this would happen! Why’d you get my hopes up like that? I’m an emotional wreck as it is! My hormones are all over the place.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I thought that with Tom being here I could get away.’

  ‘So why can’t you then?’

  Clem remembered Chiara’s face in the gelateria. ‘There’s just stuff that I need to finish before I go.’

  Stella tutted. ‘Well, just so long as you’re bloody well back before Christmas. You do know you’re my birth partner, right?’

  ‘What? But what about Oscar?’

  ‘Ozzie?’ Stella laughed. ‘Listen, I love him to pieces, I really do, but the boy has a phobia about jelly, for Christ’s sake. He’ll be as much comfort to me in there as . . . as your mother!’

  Both women shuddered. ‘Talking of which, have you seen my folks recently? They’re never at home when I try calling.’

  ‘Hmm, come to think of it, I haven’t. And I did pass the house last night on my way to preggers yoga. The place looked empty – all the lights were off and it was after nine by then.’

  ‘Probably playing bridge,’ Clem replied, knowing her parents’ social diary by heart, just as something knocked against the back of her knees suddenly, causing them to give. She yelped before turning in alarm. Luca was grinning back at her from the steps above, his football rolling by her feet.

  ‘You monkey!’ she shrieked, picking it up. ‘Stell, I’ve gotta go. I’m under attack.’

  ‘Huh?’ It was the best sound she could manage with a mouth full of crisps.

  ‘Nothing to worry about. I’ll call tomorrow.’

  She pressed disconnect and held the ball out as Luca jumped down the steps three at a time towards her. ‘You’ve been up at the lighthouse again.’ She grinned, taking in his wind-tangled hair. The same thing happened to hers up there, too. ‘Why do you like it up there so much? It’s a pretty long walk.’

  Luca gave a little shrug. ‘Bianca gives me ice cream that must be finished by the end of the day.’

  ‘Oh, does she?’ Clem grinned. ‘Maybe I’ll start going up there myself then.’

  ‘No!’ Luca looked worried. ‘She say it for the local children only.’

  ‘Oh fine then.’ Clem winked at him. ‘Well, I was actually just on my way to your house; maybe there’s some ice cream over there,’ she said, putting her arm over his shoulder and squeezing it. ‘You can be my bodyguard.’

  They started down the steps together, walking into the shade of the park and following the dusty winding tracks that would lead down to the fishing boats. But where they would usually be joking around, Luca seemed quiet and distracted. She frowned, glancing down at him frequently as they shuffled along in silence.

  ‘Is everything OK, Luca?’ she asked, resting a hand on his shoulder.

  He shrugged.

  ‘You just seem a bit quiet today, that’s all.’

  He shrugged again, and she bit her lip, nervous about pushing him on it. Was it that bully at school again?

  ‘All right, but just remember I got in trouble with the police for you! I’m always on your side, OK? You can tell me anything.’

  He looked up at her, a more interested smile on his face, and she grinned back, ruffling his hair as they walked across the crowded piazzetta.

  On the footpath on the far side of the port, she finally managed to engage him in a fierce competition of racing back to the hotel without stepping on the cracks, and they hopped and skittered along like crazy people, barging each other with their elbows until he finally dazzled her with his elfin smile again. Clem thought she might burst with pride that she had turned his mood around. She had!

  Luca got to the finish line first, entering the passcode on the guest entrance as Clem caught up, disputing his win.

  ‘I saw you cheat.’ She grinned. ‘You definitely ran over the last four.’

  ‘No! Was only two!’ Luca contradicted as he skipped down the stairs, before realizing he’d just dropped himself in it. They both laughed, throwing the ball between them, like basketball players, down the corridor. Clem dummied a bounce pass before doing an overhead shot that sailed over him into the kitchen.

  Luca ran after it.

  Clem followed him a moment later and almost tripped straight over him. Luca was standing stock-still, only inches into the room, the ball still bouncing lightly by the fridge on the far wall.

  ‘H–hi!’ Tom managed, straightening up from the kitchen table.

  Clem blinked in shock as she watched Chiara slide off the table beneath him, smoothing her hair and rumpled dress, her lips the colour of crushed raspberries.

  ‘Ciao, Luca,’ she murmured.

  The boy didn’t reply. Clem automatically placed a hand to his shoulder. His small body felt rigid and tight.

  Tom cleared his throat. ‘Good day at school, buddy?’ he asked, summoning up one of his gap-toothed grins. Usually Tom could charm the devil, but there was a heavy silence as Luca stayed quiet. Clem couldn’t see his face, but she could feel, beneath her hand, that he was holding his breath, that every muscle in his body had set as hard as concrete. Then he turned and fled the room in a movement so fluid and quick that he was gone before she could even react.

  ‘Luca!’ Clem cried, spinning around.

  ‘Leave him,’ Chiara said calmly.

  ‘Shit!’ Tom said under his breath, rak
ing a hand through his hair and looking back at Chiara worriedly.

  Clem glared at him and he shrugged, helplessly. ‘It wasn’t on purpose, sis. We just lost . . . track of time.’

  Clem rolled her eyes, but she knew it could have been worse. A lot worse.

  She looked across at Chiara, who had her back to them and was smoothing her hair with her hands. Clem saw the way Tom watched her, worried about her reaction, worried she might call it all a mistake.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ he murmured, walking up behind her and sliding his hands up her arms. ‘It was all my fault.’

  Chiara sank back into his chest. ‘No.’ She wrapped her arms around herself till her hands found his. ‘He had to find out at some point.’

  ‘Yes, but of all the ways to introduce me as your new boyfriend to your son, that wasn’t ideal.’

  Chiara turned and stared up at him. ‘But Luca is not my son, Tom.’

  Tom took a half step back in surprise, his hands dropping hers. ‘What?’

  Clem almost keeled over with shock.

  ‘Luca is not my son,’ Chiara said in a quiet voice.

  Only the almost-empty bottle of wine in the middle of the table stopped the scene from looking like a council of war – fingers threading, knuckles blanched, expressions tense and anxious all at once, as Chiara and Tom looked at one another reassuringly while they waited for Rafa to arrive.

  Clem emptied her glass and hurriedly poured herself another. Her drinking had tailed off hugely in the past few months since she’d been with Gabriel, and she was down to a respectable glass per night. The upside had been bright eyes and more energy, but the downside was her alcohol tolerance had dropped sharply, and she could already feel the third glass beginning to dull her senses.

  Her stomach was in knots. Chiara had followed after Luca and spoken to him in his room at length, while Tom had stirred the risotto and Clem started on the wine.

  They heard the guests’ back door slam shut and they both looked up, listening to the footsteps coming down the hall. A moment later, Rafa filled the doorway, his surly expression suggesting he’d had more exciting plans than this for tonight.

  ‘Raf,’ Tom said, simultaneously tasting the risotto off the wooden spoon and holding up a hand in far-off greeting. ‘Thanks for coming, mate.’

  ‘Prego,’ Rafa murmured, managing, if not quite a smile, certainly to enliven the light in his eyes. He scarcely looked at Clem, his anger at her still palpable for crumpling his truck – and more besides.

  ‘Here, have some wine,’ Tom said, walking over and pouring him a glass. There was a momentary hesitation, as both men took in their roles – Tom, the host; Rafa, the guest – in this, the very hotel where Rafa had been man of the house for the best part of a decade and still part-owned.

  Tom cleared his throat awkwardly and they nodded a toast. ‘Chin chin,’ Tom mumbled.

  Chiara, hearing their voices, came back into the kitchen. Tom met her eyes, the question in them not needing to be articulated. ‘He’ll be OK,’ she said quietly. ‘Ciao, Raf.’

  Rafa looked between them, alert. ‘Is Luca? What is wrong?’

  ‘It’s nothing,’ Chiara said calmly. ‘Just a confusion. Please, sit,’ Chiara said to Rafa, gesturing for him to join Clem.

  Tom came over, too, and the three of them noisily scraped their chairs into position around the table.

  ‘Thank you both for coming,’ Chiara said quietly, clearly leading the discussion. ‘There is something very important I wanted to talk to you about.’

  Clem lunged for her glass and gulped down the remnants. She was scarcely over the shock of Chiara’s last bombshell. What the hell was coming now?

  Clem felt Tom’s eyes on her, and the weight of that look, the one he reserved for her alone and which had been curiously absent out here since she’d been proving herself as an independent, fully-functioning adult. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, her gaze skippy and restless, like a horse about to buck.

  ‘Clem, you . . . you obviously know about me and Tom—’

  ‘Well, if I didn’t before, I sure do now,’ Clem drawled.

  ‘What?’ Rafa frowned, trying to catch up, looking between them all as if they were keeping a secret from him – which they were.

  Chiara looked across at him directly. ‘Tom and me . . .’

  Clem winced. She wanted to correct her to say ‘I’, but didn’t. Damn, she was more like her mother than she cared to admit.

  ‘. . . we are together.’

  Everyone fell still, as the words settled like pieces of a jigsaw on the table between them. From the rapid flicker of Rafa’s eyes, Clem watched him trying to piece the picture together. She watched the small pulsing bulge at his jaw, saw how he had inhaled deeply but not yet let it go again.

  Rafa looked up at Chiara, pointedly not looking at Tom, as though it wasn’t safe and he didn’t quite trust himself. ‘You only just met,’ he said in Italian, a voice so quiet that Clem and Tom could scarcely hear it.

  ‘I know,’ Chiara nodded. Then she shrugged. ‘It was instant.’

  Clem’s eyes swivelled between them. She wasn’t sure why she had to be here. She had guessed at what was happening long before today; she’d picked up on the chemistry that first night, during dinner at the Splendido. This was a love triangle, not a square.

  She reached for the bottle again and emptied the contents into her glass.

  ‘Don’t you think you’ve had enough?’ Tom asked, a rebuke in his voice.

  Clem hesitated, thinking back to the events of the past thirty-six hours. ‘No,’ she said, defiantly taking a large swig and then immediately ruining her hard-drinking image with a loud hiccup.

  ‘We are in love,’ Chiara said quietly, her eyes tender and apologetic on Rafa’s. This time, Clem felt her brother’s stare swing like a compass needle towards Chiara, the woman he loved, the woman Clem sensed he loved more in three weeks than he had loved Clover in five years.

  Tom cleared his throat again. ‘Raf, I . . . I don’t want this to undermine our friendship, mate. My understanding was that you broke up long before I arrived.’

  Rafa couldn’t meet his eyes; hostility shimmered around him like a heat haze.

  ‘Neither of us was even looking for this. We’re as surprised as anybody,’ Tom continued.

  Not quite, Clem thought to herself. Not as surprised as the little boy in the next room. Her eyes glanced at the wall that separated them.

  Rafa said nothing, his jaw grinding slightly from side to side, as though he was massaging his fist under the table, getting ready for the killer punch. Clem saw the muscle spasm in Tom’s cheek, his childhood stress tic, and felt a familiar protective rush course through her.

  ‘Oh, don’t get too worked up about it, Tom,’ Clem said too quickly, too rashly. ‘Rafa moved on long ago. He’s already got a girlfriend. Gorgeous, she is. Not to mention . . . young.’

  Rafa’s glare was upon her like fames over petrol, furious and fast, beating her back.

  ‘What would you know about any of it?’ he growled. ‘You? You just look for the rich man.’

  Clem couldn’t reply – the hatred he directed at her almost seemed to be a living, breathing thing that he nurtured inside himself.

  ‘Stop!’ Chiara interrupted, smoothing her hands between them both. ‘This will not help anybody. We did not ask you to come for this. We are here for Luca.’

  ‘Luca?’ Rafa and Clem echoed in unison, both looking back at her. What did he have to do with it?

  Tom’s head had snapped up at the boy’s name, too.

  Chiara met his gaze, both of them visibly softening as their eyes rested on each other. ‘Tom must return to London soon’ – she took a deep breath – ‘and I want to go with him.’

  Silence fell on them, flattening them all. In an instant, Rafa had gone completely white, even his dark lips appeared pale.

  Somewhere – not on a conscious level – Clem could see this was news to Tom, too; a whimsical
suggestion made more in hope than expectation that had suddenly come to pass, a dream that was coming true. But that didn’t make it OK. Even her beloved brother’s happiness couldn’t come before Luca’s.

  ‘We’ve already discussed this,’ Clem hissed to them both, instantly on the attack. ‘You can’t take that boy away from here – the middle of fucking paradise – and just drop him in the middle of a city.’

  ‘You discussed this? Without me?’ Rafa butted in, his voice ominously quiet, his eyes burning at Chiara. The wine was forgotten and the council of war reconvened.

  ‘No. No.’ Chiara shook her head, staying calm. ‘Because Luca is not coming. He will stay here.’

  This time it was Clem who paled. ‘What? You’re just going to leave him here?’

  ‘Please. I am not just going to do anything. I have spent much time thinking about what is best, and it is best he stays here – for the moment. Here he is surrounded by people who know and love him. He is at school, he has friends here and he will be with Rafa.’

  ‘That is it? This is how you tell me you are going? This is how you tell me you are leaving me with the child?’ Rafa asked, his colour returning after the initial shock.

  Chiara looked at him. ‘You love him, Rafa.’

  ‘Yes!’ he agreed vehemently. ‘But that does not mean my life is . . . is fit for this. I live in a small house, I work crazy hours . . .’ He looked desperate, as panic-stricken as Clem felt.

  Chiara looked across at her calmly. ‘Clem, you have spent very much time with him this summer. Maybe you would consider to stay, too?’

  ‘You know that I can’t do that,’ Clem whispered, transmitting urgent, desperate messages with her eyes.

  But Chiara wouldn’t play ball. They had an audience and she was using it, both of them knowing Clem was gagged. ‘Why? When you stop to think, there is not really a reason to leave. You have a beautiful home here, a man who loves you, and Luca talks about you with very much affection. It would only be for a few weeks to begin with, but if I decide to stay in London, then that is when we can decide if he joins me there.’