Chapter 20
Max
‘Tell me how you two met,’ I prompt, because Molly doesn’t seem in a rush to talk about her twat of an ex.
She sighs. ‘I was working at the Savoy, as one of the pastry sous chefs. Felix’s gallery was hosting some kind of party to celebrate him, and the events manager at the hotel organised for us to sit down with him and his gallery.
They wanted tonnes of cakes and pastries and macarons—all very Marie Antoinette, and all in the same palette he’d used for his latest collection.
‘Anyway, he turned up with a laptop full of photos of the most beautiful paintings I’d ever seen a contemporary artist do. And he was very charming and suave, and at the end of the meeting he asked me to come along to the party as his date. And that was that.’
I shovel a generous mound of omelette onto a piece of sourdough and bite into it heavily as I turn over what she’s telling me.
I knew from my brother that she’d married a painter, and, at the time, I imagined her finding a kindred spirit.
Someone bohemian and dreamy. Just like her.
They’d be penniless but happy and live in an airy garret.
But that’s not the impression I’m getting about this guy. At all.
I swallow my food. ‘So, it sounds like he was quite successful by the time you two met?’
‘Yeah. He had a big Mayfair gallery backing him. He was in high demand; he couldn’t paint fast enough.
But after the kids were born, he started taking on commissions.
Sheikhs. Hong Kong financiers. Guys in Colombia who wanted to fly him out to paint their beautiful wives as Ophelia or Proserpine or whoever else they fancied.
That was tough, because I was either on maternity leave or I was dependent on nannies and au pairs, and he was travelling more and more. ’
‘That does sound tough,’ I agree mildly, but inside I’m seething. I mean, who the fuck gets lucky enough to win Molly and then neglects her? ‘So it wasn’t a massive culture shock when he left for good?’
She cocks her head. ‘I suppose not. Though the actual divorce and fighting over assets and worrying about money was really hard.’
I bet it fucking was. ‘I can’t believe you’re not living in the lap of luxury,’ I growl. ‘Sounds like he was raking it in.’
She doesn’t say anything, just nods in agreement and takes a bite of her omelette. I sit there for a moment and watch her eat. I watch the workings of her delicate facial muscles, and the appreciation on her face, and the tiny darts of her pink tongue as she licks her lips.
God help me.
‘How was it, between you two?’ I ask. Even as I utter the words, I wonder what the fuck I’m doing.
Why I’m torturing myself. ‘Did you really love him? Were you happy, for the most part? Because I tell you, it’s so bloody weird thinking about you being married to another guy.
Having kids with him. Playing happy families. ’
Molly pauses, fork poised somewhere between plate and lips, as if she’s giving my question serious thought.
‘I was happy, yeah. Really happy. But it was nothing like it was with you.’ She glances up at me through her eyelashes.
‘I was infatuated with him. He was a few years older and very glamorous and fun.
It was infectious, I suppose, his energy.
And his talent blew me away. I found that so attractive, and I loved how creative he was.
‘So, yes, I loved him. And to be honest, I was thinking with my ovaries, too. I was honest with him from the start. He knew why you and I had broken up. He was adamant he wanted a family with me. And when I was pregnant, he went crazy with inspiration. He couldn’t stop painting me.
’ She gestures at the painting on the chimney breast. ‘He painted that when I was pregnant with Tobes. I wasn’t even showing yet. ’
She pauses. ‘Sorry. Is this all too much information?’
‘No,’ I tell her, my jaw working. Yes. ‘Keep going.’
‘So it was good. Great, even. We were in this kind of… creative vortex together. It was very symbiotic, that side of our relationship. He fed that side of me, as I did for him.’ She puts down her fork suddenly, grimacing as if she’s lost her appetite.
And then she looks up at me again. Her astonishing blue eyes are trained on mine.
‘But I didn’t love him like I loved you. Not in the same way, and not as deeply. I didn’t expect to, really. What we had, back then—I think you get that once in a lifetime, if you’re lucky.’
Fucking hell. The tightness in my chest is so vice-like I wonder if I’m having a heart attack. I lean forward and bow my head over my plate, trying to make sense of what Molly’s told me.
That she’s never loved anyone else more than me.
But that what we had is firmly in the past.
I can tell she’s not coming onto me. There’s no note of flirtation in her voice.
Just sadness.
For what we had.
For what we lost.
There’s nothing to say, really.
‘I know, baby,’ I say in any case, because there’s no way I’m leaving her hanging after an admission like that. ‘It was spectacular, what we had.’
She looks up at me, eyes shining. ‘It really was.’
I clear my throat. I need to move on before my emotions get out of hand.
‘So your dipshit husband—what’s he up to now?’
‘He’s in Dubai at the moment.’ She moves a piece of omelette around her plate with her fork. ‘And then onto Oman, I believe.’
‘Will he be back for Christmas?’
I steel myself for her answer.
‘No. He’s coming back the second week in January to see the kids.’
‘Un-fucking-believable. How the hell can he not miss them with every fibre of his being? What a massive twat.’
She gives me a weak smile. ‘I honestly don’t know.
I mean, he talks a good story. And he’s sweet with them on the phone.
But it’s not the same, and it breaks my heart for them to know that Daddy prefers raking it in thousands of miles away to being close by.
To being able to see them.’ Her sigh is huge.
Shuddery. ‘But anyway. Tell me about you. Broken anyone’s heart lately? ’
I laugh nervously, because the truth is that I broke Kate’s heart a couple of months ago. She was gorgeous, but I feel less guilty about it than I should.
‘I called it a day with someone a while back,’ I tell her. ‘Kate. She was lovely. She worked—works—at WaterAid, too.’
‘And…’ she prompts.
I shift, uncomfortable. ‘And we dated for a couple of years. But as you said—it wasn’t like it was with you. It was relaxed. Fun. It was nice to have someone to be close to out there. But then she started wanting to make plans about the future, about having a family, and—’
‘I think I can guess the rest,’ she says tightly.
‘I was straight with her the whole time.’ I can hear the defensiveness in my tone. ‘It wasn’t a great love, at the end of the day. Not at my end, anyway. She’s better off without me.’
Molly sucks in a breath through her teeth. ‘Poor girl. I can’t imagine how heartbroken she must be.’ She holds my gaze. ‘You, Max Rutherford, have never been an easy man to walk away from.’
‘You say that. But you managed it.’ I aim for amused, lighthearted. But I suspect what comes out sounds more like bitterness.
She considers. ‘I did. Technically. I got myself away from you. Put physical distance between us.’ She pauses, her forehead creasing between her eyes. ‘But you’ll never know how close I came to failing at that particular challenge.’
I still. ‘What do you mean, Mol?’
Her hand drifts up as if she’s beseeching me, before it crashes to the sofa in defeat.
‘Come on. You know how difficult I found it to walk away.
God, I nearly called you so many bloody times.
I wrote you so many texts I never sent. Because I missed you so fucking much, and nothing about cutting you out of my life felt right.
‘In the end, I deleted you from my phone contacts, even though I knew your number off my heart. Obviously. But it made it slightly less easy to drunk dial you, or sober dial you, even. So what might have seemed like a clean break at my end was anything but.’
I rub a hand over my face. ‘Jesus Christ, Mol.’
‘I know,’ she says. ‘I’m sorry. Maybe I shouldn’t have told you.’
‘No. You should have. Look, I was the same. I nearly packed a bag so many times. Nearly went to find you. But unless I was willing to give you what you wanted, I knew it would be unfair to you if I showed up. Not just unfair, plain disrespectful. So I applied to some NGOs in Africa instead. I knew I couldn’t stay at the cottage without you. ’
She scoffs bitterly. ‘Does it make me a horrible person that I’m glad you suffered too?’
I laugh, equally bitterly. ‘No. It makes you human. But just because we didn’t make it, doesn’t mean our relationship wasn’t a success while it lasted.’
‘It’s like that poem,’ she says, her forehead screwing up in concentration. ‘The Jack Gilbert one.’
‘I’m not familiar.’
‘Something about Icarus, about how, just because he fell, it didn’t mean he didn’t fly. Didn’t mean he didn’t triumph, even briefly.’
I pause, digesting her words and making a mental note to look the poem up as soon as I get back to my room. ‘I like that,’ I tell her. ‘We did ourselves proud. And it all worked out. For you, at least.’
She scrunches up her nose and takes a sip of champagne. ‘Kind of.’
‘Kind of. Sounds like your taste in men went downhill after me, but at least he could come up with the goods.’
She laughs so hard she practically snorts out her champagne.
‘Yeah. At least he was good for something.’
I’m going to be good for everything you need, sweetheart, I tell her silently.
All of it.